NarcissisticRiceball - I love Physics, but I just got an F on a test o . I decided that Newton should definitely go to hell. He's a sinner. He made a lot of people's lives miserable. Did you know that he dumped his girlfriend, who then wisely married someone else? Smart girl.

RaspberryPolarBear - Uh, Arien did NOT enjoy the kiss, let me just tell you that. Forced kisses might sound romantic, but it's cool ONLY IF the GUY IS SOMEONE YOU LIKE! Hey, I definitely don't mind my boyfriend forcing a kiss on me (oh wait, I'd like it, so it's not forced)... but Arien is grossed out. Ew. Ivy has officially become the second mother for Vince, btw.

GacktLover14 - Your rival (Andora) is definitely in for a tumultous fate. Your character is going to live, so no worries there. I hope the character is just as you imagined; it's hard, because your mental image of Arien is probably different from mine. Oh well. I tried! she's going to make another entrance soon.

Moonshine's Guide - I hate Jack (the real one). He's REALLY annoying now. I don't know why I used to like him, because now I hate him. he has this really annoying habit of saying "Oh jeez" that makes me want to punch him in the face. And he used to be really cute, but now he's not.

RiNi RaCeR - Jack... hmm, I never actually thought of him as obese, mainly because the real one is skinny as a stick. But I still hate both of them. I don't mind people disliking me, because people do have that right, but ranking people just isn't the way to go. Go Arien! Wrath, thy name is woman.

Crazy Bubbling Blonde - I LOVE blonde hair, I think they're really pretty color (I have dark hair) but those kinds who have artificially tanned skin and cakes their faces in make-up just bugs me. Isn't blonde pretty enough? Dunno. I just have things against artificial anything (tan, hair, e.t.c.). Andora is going to die.

Echo - Michele is going to appear in the next chapter. She (along with Miaka) are going to play big parts in this story, along with Ivy, as usual. Miaka's going to be on Arien's side, but I'm not sure about Michele. I'm running out of awesome villains, since I can't use Sephiroth anymore. He's dead, and he is going to stay dead.

Kyae Sohma - welcome to the series, and thanks for reading BOTH of them! they're long, so I'm really thankful. I'm not that good of a writer, I hate reading the stuff I wrote three months later... and I did get a huge writer's block, because this fic is still half-baked. I don't want too much action or romance scenes, so it took time to balance it out.

Insanity - Hey, as far as you're here occasionally, I don't care. Thanks for the cheer! The block is gone now, thanks to completely off-genre stuff I've been reading. I HAVE to finish this fic - I'm sure everyone (and myself included) wants to see where this couple is going to end up (hopefully not in a ditch).

Everynone else who kept me in their thoughts or sent me cheers, thanks so much! You guys are actually keeping me up with this... I would have abandoned this thing long ago if not for you.

Chapter 4: Girls and Boys

"She did WHAT?"

"I swear to God, Reno! I saw her kissing a guy!"

Renaldo Miller was ready to shoot Elena, blast her to the moon, blow her into smithereens. Just then, Arien walked in the door, looking disgusted.

"Oh, so you waltz in innocently, huh?"

Arien stared at him. "I'm really not in the mood to discuss anything unless you're offering a kiss of unbridled passion, Reno. So scoot."

Reno slapped her. Really hard.

"What the fuck did you just say?"

Arien threw her arms in the air. "Look, I just got kissed and got my face sucked by a guy who turned me down years ago, okay! I need to go wash my mouth out." She made a face. "So unless you're trying to get rid of this traumatic experience by kissing me like there's no tomorrow, just scoot off. I'm in a very mad mood." With that, she marched off to the bathroom, holding a large bottle of Listerine that she had purchased on the way back to her office.

Rude began to chuckle as Reno watched her storm off with a very blank expression on his face. Reno whirled, and glared at his buddy.

"Rude, don't even start. YOU need to get laid, virgin."

The chuckle stopped as the faucet began to run.

Arien was washing her mouth out for the seventeenth time when she felt a warm pair of arms around her shoulders. She looked into the mirror, and saw the red hair beside her neck, the pale blue eyes.

"May I help you?" She asked coldly.

"Turn around," he said. She placed the cup on the sink and slowly turned.

"I'm sorry I slapped you like that, Arie. You didn't deserve it."

"Actually… I did." She stared into his blue eyes. "I could have thrown him across the street. I didn't. I was selfish. I was focused on my own revenge first, not you, and that…" she touched his nose. "Is not the way it's supposed to be."

"Nah, you were doing your job."

"Still…" Her word faded away as Arien ran out of things to say.

Reno looked into her eyes, saw honesty and candidness in them. And a little guilt. He slowly felt his mouth touch hers, a tentative touch, a small, meek one, as if his lips were a small bird. She returned the kiss with equal fragility and delicacy, her look still bewildered and almost like a small child.

"Feeling better?" Reno finally asked when they broke the contact. She leaned onto him and nodded. He gently touched her hair, feeling the silky strands.

"Should we tell Vince about this?" Arien asked into his shirt.

Reno thought about it for a second. "No," he said finally. "Not yet."

Regardless of Reno's attempt to placate the woman throughout the day, Arien was still cranky when she clocked out at two o'clock to pick Vincent up.

"Get changed before I come back," Reno told her as she got in her car.

"Why?" She asked, looking through her pockets to find her keys.

"I'm taking you out tonight. We're not going to bed with you cranky."

Arien stopped her hands, raised her eyebrows. "I am not going to leave Vincent alone in the house."

"Don't you remember? He's getting a check-up from five. He won't be back till tomorrow morning, and don't explode at me, yo!" Reno hastily scooted back as Arien's eyes showed a brief flash of sadness that turned into anger. The fact that Vincent was an anomaly with his green eyes and possible effects of having mutated parents still hurt the young mother, and it tended to be a touchy subject.

"Fine," she snapped. Then she slammed the door – hard – and drove off with such recklessness for her that Reno wondered if she was going through PMS. Such was the woman that he had fallen for, and he sometimes wondered what he had done to deserve such fate.

When the young commander came back, Reno found Arien lying on the bed, staring at the ceiling. He took the jacket off, and she swung her legs and hopped off the bed. Automatically her hands went to the discarded jacket, the shirt, and the slacks. Those hands moved, hanging the clothes so it will not wrinkle.

Shirtless and now in jeans, he kissed her as she moved over to hang the clothes in the closet. "Miss Vince?"

Arien nodded.

"Well, it's just a regular check-up. He's used to it."

Arien said nothing.

"We can't stay there, Arie. We got kicked out the first time, remember?"

She shrugged, but pulled out a black shirt, and tossed it on the bed. He noticed traces of tears on her face. All of a sudden he wanted to kiss her traces off her face. He wanted her to be smiling and laughing. In all the truth, he wanted her to quit being a Turk as well. He wanted her to stay at home, take care of the child. She shod off all signs of femininity during the work hours. He hated it.

"Come on," he said, yanking her hand. "Sitting around and crying won't do any good, and I wanna see you with a smile."

Her lips curved, but it was not a smile. She looked tired, he thought. He fought the urge to tell her to quit her job, become a mother for the child and a wife for him.

Or was she falling for that bastard? He had a small seed of doubt. Women never changed… ever. They were inert creatures, creatures of habit, generally resenting change. And Arien had once loved that undeserving twit. If her heart never left that unappreciative bastard, then he would let her go. But if something was forced on her – not just a kiss, but something more drastic – Reno was really going to kill him. She was his, damn it. No one else's.

"Arie."

She looked up.

"If you don't wanna go, just say so. But I do want to take you out. We've been mommy and daddy for a while, not a guy and a girl. Come on. Parenting doesn't mean relationships die."

"So is this a date?"

"Maybe." He winked at her mischievously. "We can have more fun when we come back, babe."

Reno loved to watch Arien put make-up on. As rare as it was, he liked to watch the woman turn herself into someone else. Depending on the color and the techniques, she turned herself into an innocent young woman, a sharp businesswoman, a mysterious woman with heavy-lidded eyes. He liked the bare, naked Arien the best, but there was a different sense when she was putting make-up on. He watched as she gently applied the eye make-up, lipstick, and blush.

"Remember our first date?" he asked as she sucked in her cheeks to apply the soft pink on her pale cheeks.

"Yes. You kissed my lipstick off, and I dropped the lipstick somewhere in the car seat when you were on top of me."

"Your mouth is sexy as hell."

Arien burst out laughing. "A very late apology for the loss of the lipstick?"

"Just stating a fact, yo. I love your mouth so much I wanna kiss it all the time." He wrapped his arms around her shoulders and kissed her right beside the mouth. "My girl is a pretty girl, the prettiest in the world."

"Not so," she said. "There are more beautiful women than me."

"I haven't slept with them, so they don't count."

"Then there are very few women in the world, half of them were men… yaah!" Arien yelped as Reno pulled her hair. "Oww," she said, rubbing her scalp.

"Revenge." He stood up. "Hey Arie?"

"Hmm?" She smacked her lips in front of the mirror.

"Do you love me?"

"That's a silly question. I don't love you, Re, even though I gave you my virginity and I had your kid, who turns out to be exactly what I dreaded."

"No, really."

"Ask me right before I die and I might be able to answer." Arien stood up. Her collarbone was visible with the open-neck green sweater. Tonight, she was not a mother, nor a Turk, nor his coworker. She was just Arien, just a woman he lived with. He smiled at her, still wondering faintly if she was completely his.

Arien woke up with a loud knock on the door. Rubbing her sleepy eyes and carefully removing Reno's arm draped over her waist, she threw on a random shirt that was draped on the chair and boxer shorts. She stood still for a second, mourning the fact that their peaceful morning was disrupted by whoever was at the door. She had a distinct feeling that the shirt did not belong to her, but to a very naked man still in bed. The sleeves were too long for her, for instance. Regardless, she was leaving the bedroom when Reno woke up with a groan.

"Oh man, my hip…" he warbled. "I'm getting old."

"You certainly were energetic last night, Reno. Too vigorous for a man in his twenties."

"Shut up." Reno sat up in the bed. He grabbed a sweater, then wore a strange expression. "This sweater ain't mine."

"I think I'm wearing your shirt," Arien replied off-handedly. She sniffed the cloth. "Yep, I am. It smells of cologne and cigarettes."

"Sexy," came back the sleepy reply. "Who the hell is knocking on the door?"

"Like I'd know."

Reno pulled on jeans and Arien's green boat-neck sweater which showed off her shoulders but looked ridiculous on him. The sleeve, which was supposed to be to her forearm, only came to his elbow.

"You look like a Chrismas tree," Arien noted.

"Hohoho! Merry Christmas," Reno replied sarcastically, then slid between Arien and the door and ran down the stairs. Arien followed, still in Reno's shirt. Her eyes widened when she saw the very familiar yellow head, and Reno's exclamation.

"What. The. FUCK are you doing here?" He shouted. Arien could imagine what Andora was seeing; her object of obsession in an obviously female green sweater and tight jeans, hair in a worse mess than usual, with her boss in a male shirt and dangerously short boxers behind him, buttons done up wrong. Boxers that obviously did not belong to her. Oh well.

"Sir…!" Andora's eyes widened. "You… your…"

"She's my girlfriend." Reno understood everything right away. "And yeah, what you're thinkin' is hitting the bull's eye."

"I told you," Arien said softly behind her curtain of raven hair.

"Sir…"

"Go home, Ferrer," Reno said tiredly. "I'm dead tired and I'm not gonna argue."

"Sir!" Andora's eyes filled with tears. Arien secretly noted that she should really use waterproof make-up, if the noodlehead was so intent on caking her face with it. She looked like she was crying black tears, and it had a very freaky effect. She was still thinking when Reno took a step forward, grabbed the young woman, and kissed her brutally.

"There. Merry Christmas." Reno spat out blood. "Now go home, and don't bother me again. I have better shit to do." He slammed the door in her face.

He turned and saw Arien gaping.

"What?"

"I'm so glad you didn't do that to me," Arien said truthfully.

"I wanted to get into your pants. I don't wanna get into hers."

Arien's laughter rocked the house. "She wants to get into yours."

"My reputation still holds." He shrugged. "When are ya gonna get out of my shirt?"

"I don't know. When are you going to get out of my sweater?"

"I don't think I will," Reno said, touching the knitted material. "This thing is warm."

"Reno, you're going to stretch it out!"

The redhead was not listening. "Hey, when's breakfast?" he asked. The response was a swift kick, which he dodged.

The raid was coming up faster than Arien could recognize. Days passed in preparation, and suddenly the Turks found themselves briefing the selected units on the upcoming mission. The rookies looked unsure, a little afraid. Good, Arien thought. A little fear would make then cautious. We don't really see Reno's too often. Despite her long-term relationship with him, the woman had still not yet understood the redhead completely.

She stood in front of the two junior Turks – Vered, the team captain, and Andora, whom she secretly hoped would see the reality of her career and straighten up, or die. It sounded cruel, but Arien really hoped that she would find the ramen noodlehead dead by the next morning. And possibly mutilated and hacked into pieces, if her preference went through. She really hated the blonde.

"Andora, are you listening to me? I said, no make-up," Arien repeated herself tiredly. "Alright. I'm sure you would know, but the mako-treatment stimulated your cells enough so that it went through nuclear mutation. That is, we are no longer carbon-based creatures." She was tired of repeating this information by now. "All mako-treated specimens went through a cellular level mutation, with the cells absorbing the high energy from the mako exposure and going through atomic level mutations. This means that we are now silicate-based beings. Thus, we heal faster, we move faster, and we have enhanced abilities, such as the nightvision, extreme senses of hearing, smelling, and so on. On the downside, we are mostly sterile." She slapped the desktop angrily. "Andora! Are you listening?"

"Yes," came back the snide reply. Arien fought the urge to yank her yellow hair as hard as she could.

"Alright. What also killed us the most is that we rely too much on our silicate-based advantages. We're still human. Don't get too cocky. Any questions?" Not waiting for an answer, she said, "Alright. It'll be Elena and me today, so Reno and Rude will be staying behind."

Vered followed her nervously, which was good. He had enough experience to estimate the level he was going to have to go at. Andora, on the other hand, kept touching her hair. Arien whirled.

"If you keep touching your hair, Andora, I will shave it off," she said vehemently. "I mean it."

Andora's hand moved away from the banana yellow strands.

"Okay," she said, sounding careless. "Get ready. Meet me back here in an hour."

When she walked into the conference room, Elena was slumped in the chair again. She sat up when she saw her colleague. "They're going to die," she said lamely.

"I should hope so." The raven-haired woman replied blithely.

"You hope so?"

"Yes. If they carried on like this, they might get us killed." She sat down in a chair. "Nobody asked them to join us. They came by themselves. And if they're incapable, well, I don't want to die yet."

"I see that you dearly love your recruits," Elena noted.

"Inability to learn should be a sin," Arien said absently. "How's Tseng?"

"Busy," Elena replied mournfully. "Too busy for me to…"

"Ladies, stop the girl talk," came Reno's snide voice from the doorway. "It's time."