Business As Usual
Chapter 23: The New Legacy
By Miyamashi
Miya's Note: Oh, finally! A new chapter, at last! I've been wanting to get this one up as much as you all probably wanted me to. Believe it or not, I really do hate to keep you all waiting.
Remember the format change, with Reno's little intro at the beginning. Just a little reminder, so it doesn't throw you off. This chapter introduces quite a bit of the material for the plot of the next few chapters, as well as revealing who Leanora Richmond, who I teased you guys with a few chapters back, is. The other mystery character, Lucas Feltz, will come in #24.
When you get to the Nora part of this chapter, don't be afraid. She's not a Mary Sue, hell-bent on destroying Reno and Rufus. There's a lot more to her than I let on at first, and a big part of the early chunk of this section of the fic revolves around her.
You don't just forget Rufus Shinra. You don't just forget the feel of him, the taste of him, the smell, sight, sound of him. You don't forget him in a day, in a week, in six years or eight years.
That's why, when, six years after he left for Junon to "run Shinra world affairs", and I was still thinking about him, it scared me. And it scared me even more that Rude kept on and kept on telling me that he--meaning Rufus--sure as hell wasn't thinking about me, and that, when he got back, he wouldn't give a rat's ass.
Even scarier was that I started believing Rude, but it didn't change the fact that I kept pining over Rufus. So, six years alone, and I was stuck on someone who I was damn sure didn't spare a single thought about me, and even the best casual sex with the hottest whores in Midgar couldn't make up for the fact that I'd had Rufus once, but didn't anymore.
So I waited. I waited another two years after I had lost all hope of ever continuing what ended the day he left, until I was lying in a hospital bed, half my ribs snapped from meeting up with that AVALANCHE group on a mission to drop one of the plates straight down on top of my very own ex-home, Sector 7.
I was laying in that hospital bed, hurt from a lot more than my injuries, since I had just killed every person on and under that plate for my loyalty to the life-giving phallic symbol in the sky.
I didn't blame AVALANCHE. Sector 7 had been home to me once, but it wasn't anymore. Shinra tower was. But, I recognized one of them as that Tifa chick from Seventh Heaven that Rude had that little crush on once, and I was pretty sure that she probably still thought of that slum as home, sweet home.
When I'd fought her, I'd actually noticed how young she was. She looked in her early twenties, at the most, which would have made her fifteen or sixteen at the oldest when we'd first "met". What an age to be running a bar and have ten-year-older guys hitting on you.
Leave it to the slums.
I suddenly wondered what had happened to the chick who ran the bar before her, back when I'd actually lived there.
Oh well. Didn't matter anyway. No more Sector 7, no more Seventh Heaven bar. All of it a pile of rubble and dead bodies, and I was the heartless bastard who'd set off the charge that made it that way.
That's business as usual for ya'.
So, I laid in my bed, still waiting, trying not to feel guilty for something I couldn't take back.
And then, the waiting stopped.
Rufus Shinra picked up the phone on his Junon office desk, answering with an unenthusiastic "Yes?"
"Sir, I have some urgent news for you," rang the voice of Janice Jeanne Johanneson, all the way from the Vice President's ex-office in Midgar.
"It's been a long time, Janice. What is it?"
"General Sephiroth has returned, and he stole something from Hojo's laboratory and ran away, killing many vital members of the corporation in the process."
"Alright," answered Rufus unenthusiastically. "What does this have to do with me? Why can't the old man handle it? That sort of thing is no longer my business."
"Sir, the President was one of those killed."
Rufus held the phone, motionless, for a moment. He blinked a few times, allowing the news to set in.
Janice flinched on the other line as she heard laughter coming from the phone. She sat, shocked.
"Janice?" asked Rufus, his voice growing darker.
"Yes, Sir?" asked the secretary, a slight shaking in her voice that Rufus could hear clearly, despite how hard she had tried to conceal it.
"Prepare the office for a new President."
"Yes, Sir."
The helicopter was louder than usual, it seemed, and, by the time it reached Midgar, had become nearly deafening. Rufus stepped off of it onto the balcony outside of his late father's office, his ears ringing. Dark Nation followed its master, scanning the area for any sign of alarm. The blonde held down a hand to calm his pet as they both spotted what lay inside the dead President's office.
This was a dream. This had to be a dream.
Midgar. Rufus hadn't seen Midgar in eight years.
Howard Palmer, leader of the Shinra space program, bounded out of the office toward the blonde man, his large face dripping with sweat. "Sir, Sephiroth was here!" screeched Palmer in almost a wheeze. "I saw him with my very own eyes. He killed your father! I saw it!"
"And why didn't he kill you?" hissed Rufus coldly, making no effort to hide his contempt with one of his least favorite employees. "I'm sure the General could have found a better messenger, but I guess you will have to do. Very well, Palmer. Now, leave, before I decide to finish the job."
A strange group filed out of the office, a spiky-headed blond boy in the forefront. Rufus turned to them, his eyes clearly showing his annoyance with the greeting party. "So…so Sephiroth was actually here…"
Palmer ran off with a squeak.
"By the way, who are you guys?" asked Rufus dully.
The leader was first to introduce himself. "I'm Cloud, former SOLDIER First Class!"
The next was a large, imposing man with a gun for an arm. "I'm from AVALANCHE!"
A girl with rather large breasts confirmed that she was from that same group.
The woman behind her, an oddly exotic brunette wearing pink, continued, "…a flower girl from the slums."
And the last, a red, cat-like creature who Dark Nation was growling at ended, to Rufus' slight surprise, "A research specimen."
The blonde, still very obviously uninterested, simply shrugged and pushed a shock of hair out of his eyes. "What a crew. Well, I'm Rufus, President of Shinra Incorporated." The strawberry blonde punched the last few words, unfamiliar with their sound.
"You only President, 'cause your old man died!" rebutted the man with the gun-arm.
"That's right." Rufus shrugged again, his face showing a bit of a smirk. "I'll let you hear my new appointment speech." The new President began to pace, looking over each of the members of the rag-tag group before him. "Old man tried to control the world with money. It seems to have been working. The population thought that Shinra would protect them. Work at Shinra, get your pay. If a terrorist attacks…"
Rufus smiled, his eyes glinting slightly.
"…the Shinra army will help you. It all looks perfect on the outside." His voice became suddenly cold, and a few of the group cringed slightly. "But, I do things differently. I'll control the world with fear. It takes too much to do it like my 'old man'."
The group watched, mouths slightly agape, as the man in white before them turned his back to them, stepping to the railing of his fortress and looking over the edge. "A little fear will control the minds of the common people. There's no reason to waste money on them."
"He likes to make speeches, just like his father," cut a feminine voice from behind Rufus.
The blonde clenched his hand on the rail.
Rufus heard some commotion behind him. He didn't bother to pay attention to what the new AVALANCHE was saying. He heard a large portion of the group leave, and didn't care. He only turned when he heard the sound of a large sword being drawn. He faced the group's leader, who was standing before him, ready to fight.
"Why do you want to fight me?"
"You seek the Promised Land, and Sephiroth."
"Hm, exactly." Rufus walked dangerously close to Cloud and his sword, and he ran one finger over the blunt side of the blade. "Mm? Did you know that Sephiroth is an Ancient?"
"A lot has happened." Cloud moved his sword slightly, away from the other man's thin fingers. "Either way, I can't let either you or Sephiroth have the Promised Land!"
Rufus simply shrugged, his white teeth showing through a crack in his lips. "I see." The President drew a large, double-barreled shotgun from his coat and aimed it one-handedly at the other blonde's head. "I guess this means we won't become friends." Dark Nation curled around its master's legs, the now large creature's yellow eyes glaring at the enemy. Its almost wolfish snout curled back in a half growl, half hiss that set the AVALANCHE leader's skin crawling. The black of Dark Nation's fur contrasted strongly with the white of Rufus' coat.
Cloud made the first move, responding to a gesture from Rufus for him to begin the fight. The ex-SOLDIER slashed his sword down on Dark Nation's back, and blood marred the creature's black fur. Rufus snarled in a manner very similar to his pet's and fired as the coeurl cast a protection spell on its master.
Cloud slashed at the creature again, and this time, its skull cracked with a sickening crunch. Dark Nation fell, casting a last bolt spell with what power it had left.
Rufus fired as many shots as he could into Cloud while the other man countered with his sword and spells. The ex-SOLDIER slashed one last time, his enormous blade breaking through the protection spell around Rufus and cutting deeply into the man's left shoulder. A helicopter came into view around the Shinra building and hovered over the two men, causing wind to ruffle their hair and the dead coeurl's fur.
"That's all for today," said Rufus calmly.
Cloud slashed the air as Rufus sidestepped to avoid him, jumping first to the balcony's railing and then into the air, where he grabbed onto the helicopter's runner with his injured arm. And the helicopter flew off, with Rufus putting his gun back into his jacket and waving at the enemy with a sarcastically cordial smile and a laugh.
His name was Cloud Strife. Rufus ran a finger over his keyboard, tapping down on a few keys absently as he stared at the file. Cloud Strife, ex-SOLDIER, now a member of AVALANCHE.
That would serve him well.
At least the boy could fight. This was a good fact, because then he and his ragtag group of friends could be of some help to him. Let them go after Sephiroth, that psychopath. Then, if they got too out of hand, Rufus would take care of them. Until then, he was quite content to let them go, running on a wild goose chase after a crazy, problematic General.
The blonde scratched at some blood that hadn't been quite cleaned off of his new desk.
The blood of his own father.
Thank you very much, General Sephiroth, for killing the old man. Now you get to die, too.
Any man who thought Rufus Shinra above using his enemies for his own gains had underestimated the new President.
He would have to torture this Cloud Strife, though. Just a little. Bastard killed his pet.
QQQQQQQQ
Rufus ran a finger over the clipboard that hung outside of the restricted Shinra infirmary. He read the short list of patients assigned to the room, and smiled slightly when his finger stopped on the name Reno Kiribani.
A nurse stepped out of the room, looking over the man's cuts and wounds with wide eyes. Rufus handed her his identification.
She bowed her head slightly, never taking her eyes from his form. "Sir, I will get you a doctor right away."
"No need, I assure you. Just tell the lead doctor to give Mr. Kiribani a message that I wish to speak to him, and not to disturb our meeting, for any reason."
"Yes, sir."
It was a disturbing thing for Reno Kiribani to wake up in his hospital bed a mere two nights after he had snapped a rib and cracked two on his mission to bring down a massive metal plate on top of Sector 7 to find the new doctor--a burly and imposing giant of a man--standing over him and telling him "The President wishes to see you."
Reno's eyes opened wide. "Say that again?"
"The President wishes to see you," repeated the doctor like a recording.
The redhead didn't exactly know what to say to that, except for "Tell him I'm…in…a coma or something."
"Whatever," grumbled the doctor gruffly.
Reno, soon after, heard footsteps coming in his direction. He had to concentrate very hard to keep his body from visibly tensing up. The steps echoed through the infirmary in light, rhythmic "tap-tap, tap-taps" of a man walking from toe-to-heel instead of the normal heel-to-toe pattern that most people used.
This was not the booming sound of President Shinra's footsteps that he had expected to hear.
But then…?
The taps stopped by his bed. Reno kept his breathing as slow and steady as he could; kept his eyes closed as if asleep.
Fingers rested on his left cheek, and the breath caught in his throat.
"I know you better than that. You're not really in a coma, are you, Reno? Thought I was him, did you?" came the call of a ringing tenor voice that seemed to the redhead slightly more gravelly than he remembered.
"You're…you're back." The Turk opened his eyes to greet the back of a tall strawberry blonde man in white who was closing the curtain around the bed.
"Fancy meeting you here, of all places. You could even say it's just like old times." Rufus smirked at the redhead. Reno noticed that the lines in the blonde's face had grown deeper over time. His hair was shorter and mostly slicked back, except for a couple of locks that fell in front of his eyes. It was a bit of a shock to see Rufus like that, where age had actually begun to take its toll.
Like any normal person.
"I hear that you had a run-in with AVALANCHE, too," continued the blonde, leaning slightly over the bed. "Although, you look in considerably worse shape than I. The doctor said it was broken ribs. How did that happen?"
"I had to collapse the plate, and I got in a spat with that spikey-headed Cloud guy and his friends."
"I fought this 'Cloud', as well. He was quite strong, and an Ex-SOLDIER."
"That explains the eyes."
"Yes."
"Rufus?"
"Yes, Reno?"
"Did you have anything to do with that order?"
"The one to collapse the plate?" Rufus tilted his head as Reno nodded slightly. "No, I didn't. The first I heard of it was the damages and casualties report that came to me afterwards. Father didn't exactly keep me informed of Midgar current events while I was away."
"At least that's good to know." Reno turned his head to the side and stared at the sheets. "Do you know how long it's been, Rufus?"
"Eight years. Yes, I know. Over eight years."
"You just left."
"I know," said Rufus solemnly.
"And then you just didn't come back. For eight years."
"But he's dead now."
"Your father?"
"Yes. Sephiroth killed him, according to Palmer. I found him, slumped over his desk, a massive, gaping hole in his chest. It looked like his coat was melting with the blood, you know."
"Morbid as ever, I see."
"I heard his new wife was just as happy as I was. He'd forced her to marry him, just like the fucker always does, and in the last few month, too. I sent her a percentage of what money he had actually owned and set her on her way. Never met the bitch, but I heard she was sleeping around with another one of the employees. I bet he's a happy man, now."
"Yeah, whatever. Don't change the subject, Rufus."
"I've been waiting for this day, Reno."
"You?" Reno caught himself before he could yell louder, hushing down into a fierce hiss. "You're the one who left Midgar, remember? You have the money to take a plane or a helicopter across the world every once in a while to come visit or something, and you couldn't get fired if you did. What about me, Rufus? One day, you're there. The next, you're gone, and I don't hear anything from you except a note in a book and those same speeches you gave to every drug dealer and whore in the slums! And, every day, for eight years, Rufus--Do you know how long that is?-- I hoped Tseng'd give me a mission report that said I was going to Junon."
"You know it wasn't easy for me to leave like that, and that it would have been impossible for me to return before this day."
"No, I don't, Rufus. Oh, and guess what. I did go on a mission to Junon once, but it was on the wrong side of the city, and Rude was there with me to keep me from running to the other side and…well, I don't know if I would've fucked you or strangled you if he had let me go."
"Reno, listen to me," Rufus whispered in a dangerously dark tone as he pushed down slightly on the redhead's chest.
Reno gasped in pain, Rufus' light, deliberate touch like a fresh stab wound on the broken ribs under it.
"You feel how I hurt you, and how little it affects me to do so. You know how dangerous I am."
"I…don't care," Reno groaned slowly, grabbing the blonde's hand and pulling it slowly against his chest.
Rufus simply let him, and didn't recoil, or even flinch, as he felt one of the Turk's cracked ribs break further.
Reno screamed in agony.
"You're killing yourself, Reno."
"So stop me."
Rufus pulled his hand free from Reno's grasp. "Give me permission, Reno."
"What?"
"Give me permission to feel." Rufus took of the fingerless gloves he wore and laid his head on the hospital bed next to Reno's right hand. "I haven't felt in eight years, since the day I left my soul in Midgar."
"Why did you leave? I still don't understand. Why?"
"I couldn't stand it…I couldn't stand to feel. I couldn't stand the pain of losing her; that renewed fear of losing you, so I left, and every day I spent in Junon, I learned to die again."
"Why do you want me to give you permission? How does a word from me let you feel again?"
"Because, at this moment, I fell nothing for you. You can change that. You're the only one who can make me feel."
"Don't you hate emotions? Why do you want that back?"
"Because you do."
Reno tried to move to look at the blonde, but had to stop for the pain. He had sounded so somber, so sincere. Rufus' emotions didn't seem to have died out, but to have strengthened over time.
Or, perhaps Reno was just hearing things out of sheer hope that a Rufus he tricked himself into remembering was the same as the man whose hair was brushing over his fingers.
The Turk was startled by movement, followed by the feeling of Rufus' right hand on his own. He had never really paid attention to the blonde's hands before. They always looked deceptively fragile, but the fingers that laced in between the Turk's at that point were thin but terribly strong.
The skin that covered Rufus' palms was surprisingly rough, albeit still considerably softer than Reno's. The way their fingers interlocked reminded Reno of the way their bodies had begun to fit perfectly together before Rufus had left.
He wondered, briefly, if they would have enough memory of their tough left for that to still be true.
"So?" asked Rufus.
"Yeah?"
"Do I have your permission?"
"Yeah, Rufus." Reno let his fingers curl around Rufus' knuckles, and he scraped his nails slightly on the back of the other man's hand. Rufus followed the redhead's lead, pushing his nails--which Reno noted were the same as always, slightly longer than should have been normal for a man, and quite a bit sharper--into the Turk's skin.
The pain this caused was only slight, but it was enough to cause Reno to react, doing the same gesture to his partner. Rufus' grip went lax, and his fingers arched back between the redhead's.
To Reno's surprise, one of his nails broke skin, and he stopped.
"It is quite alright," said Rufus, noting the suddenly apologetic expression on the Turk's face. "I have done far worse to myself, or did you not feel the scars?"
Reno pulled the blonde's hand into his line of vision, running his left index finger over a few of the deepest scars there. Some looked like cuts, some of them fresher than others, and one looked like a shot wound. Some of these he knew the origin of. Rufus had explained to him once how he had cut himself repeatedly to raise pain tolerance in his hands, in preparation for wounds such as the shot he knew had come from the blonde's late father.
Others, he realized, were still pink, as if they weren't quite finished healing.
"You did this to yourself?"
"Yes. Is that so surprising?"
"A little, but I guess I should've kind of expected it. Was it just your hands?"
"No."
"No, of course not."
Rufus leaned over the bed so that Reno could see him. "Do not fret, Reno. It stopped hurting a long time ago."
"You sound bitter."
"Perhaps."
"Where are the others?"
"Everywhere, but the freshest ones are on my throat."
"That explains the new shirt," Reno said dully, noticing the turtleneck that had replaced the various different styles of dress shirt the blonde had used to wear.
"Yes."
Reno reached up slightly, but not far enough to touch the blonde. Rufus stopped him, cupping his mutilated hands around the Turk's. Looking at them, Reno found them almost grotesquely beautiful, deformed as they were through years of masochism and outside injury.
"I want to see them, your others scars."
"No, you don't. You won't like what you see."
"Just let me."
Rufus let go of the Turk's hands and leaned over farther. Rough fingertips scraped over Rufus' skin as the redhead pushed the black turtleneck down to expose a number of surprisingly long, slender slash wounds that, had they been much deeper, could have easily been fatal.
"Those are still fairly fresh, Rufus. This one here still has some scabbing." He ran a finger over it to show. "How old is this? A week, maybe?"
"About four days, I think."
"If it doesn't hurt, then why do you still do it? The blood? The scars?"
"Yes." Rufus leaned down farther and hovered over the Turk. "Because if nobody has ever seen me bleed or cry, at least I must."
"I've seen you."
"You weren't there."
"That's your fault."
"Yes, it is."
"I really do wanna understand you, but I don't know if I ever will."
"What do you mean?"
"I don't get how anybody could sit down and decide one day, 'I'm going to take this knife and slit my own throat repeatedly,' and then do it, just to see himself bleed."
"You understand me better than you think." The blonde propped himself up, placing his elbows around Reno's head. He leaned even farther down, brushing his lips over the scars on the Turk's cheeks. "You did this for me, remember? And for no reason other than the blood. For your 'tears', remember?"
"But you did that for yourself."
"No, Reno. Not just for me. Sometimes, I would think to myself that the Lifestream can feel you bleed."
"Repentance?"
"Sometimes. Others, a plea for freedom, and still others a cry for help. I wonder, did you ever hear me?"
Reno searched Rufus' eyes. For what, he didn't know, but he searched, perhaps for a spark of familiarity or for a clue to help him solve the blonde's greatest mysteries. "I don't know," he said after a few moments of fruitless searching. "I was too busy wallowing in my own shitty life to pay much attention to any cries in the Lifestream."
Rufus began to open his mouth to speak, but Reno cut him off.
"I want you to show me. I wanna see you bleed for me."
"When you've healed," the blonde replied calmly.
"Fine." Forgetting for a moment about his broken ribs, Reno tried to sit up. He fell back, frustrated and in agony. "I want to kiss you."
Rufus leaned to just over Reno's reach. "I thought that you were angry at me."
"That's why I want to kiss you.'
Rufus smiled slightly at that. "Of course." The blonde climbed up onto the bed, straddling Reno's waist, and their lips met.
Reno took in the still-familiar taste of Rufus' mouth. The blonde seemed to always carry the metallic under taste of blood, which lay hidden under the bitterness of vodka, and that under a semi-sweetness that Reno didn't know the origin of, save for it being held on Rufus' tongue.
It kind of reminded him of chocolate and toothpaste, but not quite, and a thousand times more satisfying.
Reno realized suddenly that he had gained quite a taste for the bittersweet.
He dug his fingers into the back of the blonde's neck, through the neck of the shirt he had donned to hide his personal retribution. The Turk pulled the other man close to him, ignoring the overwhelming pain it caused him.
Eight years. They would make up for those eight years in this single meeting, even if it killed them, and that was a large possibility, Reno realized as he pulled Rufus even closer, and couldn't stop himself from screaming into the blonde's mouth.
Rufus wrapped one hand behind his lover's neck and the other behind his head and slowly picked him up from the bed.
Reno's body went into shock. His breath caught in his throat and his arms went limp. One of those arms came down upon something on the bedside table, causing it to topple with a crash and a shatter.
Rufus stopped in his passionate assault and looked at the table. The broken pieces of a delicate vase littered the bedside. A small card floated with already dying flowers in the water that had spilled from it.
"What is this?" Rufus sneered smoothly to the shaking figure of his lover. He smiled sinisterly toward Reno's wide eyes, pulling a small vial from his jacket, pouring its contents into the redhead's mouth.
"What…?" was all that Reno could choke out before Rufus began to stroke at his throat to help the liquid down.
"Elixir, dear. What did you think? Poison, perhaps?" Rufus turned, still straddling Reno's now slightly shaking form, holding the vial under the table's edge and catching drops of water in it as they fell. He reached for the card before it could follow the pool off of the surface.
"No…" Reno gasped, and the blonde closed one terribly mutilated hand over his throat.
"Oh, so Reno has a secret, I see?" the new President hissed, his words morphing into a deadly laugh. "Let's have a look, shall we?"
Reno tried to protest, but the grip tightened around his neck, and his lips, still tinged deep red from the pull of the kiss only moments before could only open and close futilely, and small streams of saliva ran down his cheeks from the corners of his mouth.
"Reno," read Rufus from the slightly water-smudged ink, adding nails to the still-tightening grasp. "Get well soon, Baby. I miss you. Love, Nora."
That red began to drain from the Turk's lips, to be replaced with a pale blue. He tried to gasp for air, but couldn't.
Rufus let go with a laugh.
"Love, Nora," the blonde repeated darkly. "Is there something I should know, Reno?"
The redhead let out a small squeak, still trying to regain his breath and dabbing at the spit on his face and the blood on his neck from the small cuts from the other man's nails.
"Who is she, Reno?"
Reno shook his head, his eyes wide and pleading, the Mako treatments the doctor had given him showing through clearly.
Rufus gave up on gaining a response from the Turk, and stood, opening the curtain around the bed. "Doctor," Rufus called, and the man walked toward him. "Who sent these flowers?"
"Leanora Richmond, Sir: Mister Kiribani's girlfriend. She checks up on him every day."
Rufus smiled, looking down at Reno. "Well, tell Ms. Richmond that I am terribly sorry about the flowers."
There was a glint in his eyes that Reno didn't like in the least.
As Rufus walked from the infirmary, he pulled a Mako needle from a table, injected the contents calmly straight into the injury in his arm, and said, "Get well soon, Reno."
"How is he, Doctor?" asked a young woman as she strode quickly into the infirmary, her heels clicking lightly on the tiles.
"Ms. Richmond?"
"Yes, Sir. Is Reno alright? Will he be out soon?"
"I'm sorry, Miss, but I'm afraid there have been some slight complications, and his recovery has been delayed further."
"Nora?" asked a quiet voice from behind one of the room's curtains.
The sound of Leanora Richmond's heels started back up, followed by the whooshing of a curtain being moved. "What happened?" she asked, kneeling down next to Reno's bed.
"It's nothing. I'm okay."
"Are you sure? The doctor said that you were going to be here even longer. Something must've happened."
"It's nothing, really. I just tried to get out of bed early again, and ended up hurting myself even more."
Nora sighed, shaking her head. She laughed slightly, smiling warmly at the redhead. Her bright blue eyes glinted with mischief. "You're so silly, always trying to speed things up, and all it ever does is get you into trouble."
"Yeah, that's all." Reno noticed that the woman at his bedside was looking at the empty table beside her. "Your flowers died," said Reno in response. "I didn't want to get rid of them, but Doc insisted. He said they could be a health hazard."
The doctor was about to speak, but Reno silenced him with a glare.
The woman simply shrugged. "I'll just have to get you some new ones, then. Maybe silk this time, so they don't die on you?" Her face became suddenly somber. "Did you hear what happened upstairs? I was so worried. I had just hoped that he hadn't gotten down here to you."
"Yeah, I heard from the best source around."
"Oh, yeah, and who is that, hm?" Nora smirked slightly, giving a look that seemed to jokingly challenge the redhead to say any name but hers.
"Hey, don't look at me like that! I just thought you'd be impressed that I know somebody as important as Rufus Shinra himself!" Reno suddenly regretted that he had mentioned that name.
Nora's eyes opened wide. "Oh, really? Well, I just hope he's nothing like his father was."
Reno grimaced. "No, nothing like his father. Believe me. I didn't like Shinra much, and he didn't like me. What, you knew him?"
Nora paused for a moment. "No, I just met him a couple of times, doing work for the company." Her face grew especially pale. "He was…vile."
Reno laughed. "You can say that again."
"He was vile."
"You're cheesy."
Nora grinned, standing and placing her hands on her hips "I know. But who's the one talking here? You're the King of Cheese, so it's appropriate that you'd have a queen that could stand up to your level of finely aged dairy product."
"What?" Reno and Nora laughed at the odd expressions that formed on both of their faces at that comment. "You are a bizarre woman, you know that?"
"I can't believe I actually just said that," giggled the woman, clasping her hands over her mouth to let only those sky-like eyes and the bangs of her strawberry blonde hair show.
"I can. You artists always come up with the weirdest shit."
"I'm not an artist yet, Reno."
"Sure you are. One of your pieces made it into the last exhibition, remember?"
"That was only because my boss was trying to keep me happy so that I could get more funding from the Shinra."
"And? The critics liked it, didn't they?"
"I guess."
"Oh, don't be so hard on yourself. C'mon. In the last two months alone, you went from some measly janitor or something to Vice Curator. You're a businesswoman, and you have talent."
"You flatter me."
"Gotta keep a lady happy, right?"
Nora's eyes brightened further, and she bit her bottom lip for a moment. "I just got an idea."
"What?"
"I can do a painting."
"Of what?"
"Your flowers, so that you can get better faster."
"How will a floral painting help me heal? You know, I'm not much a flower person."
"But you're in the hospital. I have to keep sending you flowers and get well cards, or you'll never get better. That's just the way the world works."
"Maybe your world."
"Fine. I'll make them dying flowers, like the ones the doctor got rid of, only these won't be a health hazard because they'll only be a picture."
"You don't have to do that. Plus, I'll probably be out of here before you're anywhere close to finishing them."
"Scary, man-eating flowers then? You'd like that better?"
"Nora, are you even listening to me?"
"Nope." She grinned and turned her back to the redhead, the back of her hair swishing as she did. She traced out a rectangle on the wall. "And they can go here, and stare at you while you sleep and give you nightmares until you're too scared to stay in bed any longer."
Reno sighed. "Nora, why don't you go paint it, then?"
She turned back toward him, a little puzzled by his sudden change in tone. "Reno, what's wrong?"
"I just don't think it's safe for you to be coming to see me so much anymore."
"What? Why not?"
"There's been a lot of shit happening around here, and it's getting dangerous. I don't want to see you get involved in that."
"I'm strong enough to take care of myself, believe me."
"You sound like someone I know."
"Well, I am strong enough. And I'm not leaving, because right now you're not capable of protecting yourself, so I'll be right here so that I can get you out of trouble if it comes along."
"Thanks, Nora, but I really don't want you getting involved in all this."
The strawberry blonde looked at Reno with uncertainty, her eyes turning into slits. "All this? Is there something you're not telling me?"
"Nora, please. I don't want to go through this. I just need you to leave. It's dangerous here. Plus, I need some time to myself."
She shrugged, her face showing disappointment. "Fine. I'll be back tomorrow to check up on you, whether you like it or not. I do have some work here, after all."
"Bye, babe."
"Goodbye, Reno." Leanora Richmond kissed her significant other's forehead and left, the sound of her heels fading away.
Reno stared at the ceiling. He was sore from his injuries, and he couldn't sleep. He couldn't move. He couldn't do anything, really, except stare at the ceiling.
So, that's exactly what he did. And the ceiling, like one of Nora's canvases, lay as the base for the pictures that played through his mind. Memories, from the past eight years.
"She looks like Rufus," said Rude dully, taking off his sunglasses so that he could properly glare at his best friend.
"Hey, at least she's a she. You told me to get myself a babe to try and get over Rufus, so I did. She's a nice girl, and she's got all the necessary parts, so stop bitchin' at me. No dick. Boobs and a cooch. That's all you said."
"Don't get so testy, Reno. I'm just trying to help. You could use a nice, normal relationship with a girl to get you back to the old you. Remember him? The one that used to go to bars and get drunk with me and look at the chicks. The womanizer, who always used to be able to charm a lady's pants off with a look and smirk. I knew him for about a month, and then he became the Vice President's bitch and turned into a angsty teenage girl."
"Wow, Rude. That's the most you've said in…how long?"
"Oh, I dunno, ever since everyone around me stopped listening to a damn word I was saying. Why talk, if people just ignore you?"
"And you're calling me bitchy. Mr. 'Nobody wants to talk to me! I'm so sad!' You're just pissed off 'cause I'm still hotter than you and can still get all the good babes."
"That look like Rufus."
"Feck off."
"No thanks, Reno. That's what your she-Rufus is for."
"Her name is Leanora, by the way."
"Whatever. She'll probably just turn out to be another one-night stand like the rest of them."
Reno laughed at that memory. Yeah, if Nora was a one-night stand, that had been a helluva long night. More like two years.
She just happened to be the unlucky one who was still around when he came back.
In what was now his office, the new President of Shinra Electric Power Company smiled as the vice curator of the Midgar Museum of Fine Arts stood before him to negotiate new funding proposals.
Miya's Note: All that I'm gonna say is "FINALLY!" And I hope you all enjoyed the little bit of actual FF7 material in this one. That section was fun to write, except for poor Dark Nation. I really did like the coeurl, although it was cuter as a kitten-puppy.