That night, well after he had fallen asleep, Yuffie curled her hand around Tseng's again. The day's meditations, the encounter with Leviathan and Chekhov and the revelation that she would need Tseng to unlock her family's power—all of it had culminated into a pressing need for human touch. He didn't make a move, and his breathing didn't change, and she hoped he was really asleep.
No sooner had she drifted off than she found herself in the midst of an intricate dream.
Leviathan was in her—no, she was Leviathan, sliding through water so deep and so vast she felt as though she were flying. She snapped up smaller fish up and swallowed them like jelly beans, letting them ride the roller coaster of her serpentine tongue and into her gullet. She absorbed not only their precious nutrients and sustenance, but also their life forces, energy assimilating into her own, greater power.
Destruction and creation twined as she ruled the ocean. She birthed creatures from a swift dart of her eye, destroyed them with a sigh.
When she became bored with her millennia-old games, she took to the air, and with a rear of her head, made an island full of people to worship her. She watched the generations form and clash, and she watched the other gods create their lands and fall from favor with their peoples, all the while remaining strong in the heart of her land.
She watched the birth and rebirth of royal families which ruled and fell from grace and ruled again. Her interest in some waned while some she favored. She watched for many years, until the scenes and the towns and the people began to look familiar.
She saw Kisaragi Godo, and she saw Wutai shredded by war with the Shinra. She roared in her grief, at the destruction, at her newest scion's inability to fully harness her power. In truth, no scion had been able to harness the power for three hundred years.
When the child of Kisaragi Godo wriggled in his arms for the first time, shiny and wrinkled and squalling, a beacon flashed and called. She felt the welcome light of new hope and settled in to wait. The growth to adulthood would be a bat of an eyelash in the centuries for her.
Yuffie's eyelids snapped open as consciousness surged through her. She registered several sensations at once.
First, Tseng's hand gripped hers in an almost painful embrace. Second, he stared at her with narrowed eyes, which seemed illuminated in some strange light. Third, the strange light seemed to be coming not from behind her or above her or from the window, but from Yuffie herself.
As alarm spiked through her, she felt—rather than really saw—the light dim. As the glow faded from Tseng's eyes completely, leaving them black and no less unsettling than before, she tried to free her hand from his grip. Reluctantly, he released her, and she remained in place. If she got up now, would it seem suspicious?
"Good morning," she said. The time on the bedside clock read 06:30 am. The sun was just beginning to lighten the horizon outside her window, hence the gray light filtering through the curtains.
"Tell me what just happened," he replied, forgoing pleasantries. Though he was lying on his side facing her as he had been in sleep, he seemed intimidating somehow.
"I don't know what you mean," she said. "Are you feeling okay?"
He ignored her deflecting question, his brows furrowed. "That light just now…" He hesitated. "Why could I… feel it?"
In truth, she had a funny feeling she knew why she had been glowing and why he could "feel" it, but a lifetime of training had its hooks in her brain, and a lifetime of distrusting Shinra settled onto her skin like a suffocating blanket.
"Tseng, I honestly don't know what you're talking about." She made to rise from the bed, and he reached out and grabbed her wrist. Yuffie stopped as he sat up.
"Tell me what you're hiding from me," he said. He might have sounded threatening, except for the strangely sincere way he stared at her, dark eyes searching.
"Let me go, Tseng," she breathed.
He dropped her wrist abruptly, and she stood. It took her three steps to get to the door, and she halted when he said, "I can't protect you if you don't tell me everything."
She opened the door and fled, barely registering she was still in her pajamas as an odd feeling of guilt chased her.
That night as she suited up for a discreet mission, Tseng caught her. Yuffie had stayed out of his way for most of the day, but he opened the door just as she slipped her tight black shirt over her head.
He stopped, his gaze intent on her. She knew from the pinched look of him he was more than a little frustrated with her at the moment. Part of Yuffie cringed at chipping away the small kernel of trust she'd nourished between herself and Tseng, and the rest of her latched on to her secrets and kept them close.
Considering how mysterious Tseng still felt to her, Yuffie didn't think this was entirely unreasonable.
"Where are you going?" he asked in clipped tones, his black eyes cataloguing her movements and dress in one sweep. So observant. She wondered if she would ever completely stop fearing it.
"How do you know I'm going somewhere?" she said, all sweet and wide-eyed innocence.
"You're suiting up and you dismissed the door-guards so no one will know you're going," he said, without any sort of surprise.
She scowled. He read her entirely too well. "Gorki gave me some information, and I don't feel like waiting to hear back from a reconnaissance team on this one. They'll probably fuck it up anyway, they always do on this delicate stuff." The mattress dipped beneath her as she sat to pull on her boots and lace them. She noted with pleasure how supple the knee-high leather babies were. They'd be nice and quiet.
"Information?" Despite the cool tones of his voice and the arched brow, she knew she had oiqued his curiosity.
"Yep," she said cheerfully.
When it became clear that she didn't intend to elaborate, he turned on his heel and made to leave. "I won't disturb you further."
Her soft heart twisted a little. "Tseng, wait."
He stopped at the door, his back turned to her. She stared into the deep green of his haori, the the stark black cranes studded across his shoulders. He always looked born and bred for Wutai, while she felt like this week's Bargain Hunter Special on Empresses.
"Gorki told me today he thinks he's located a small hub for Dust-dealing in Wutai."
"What makes you think you'll find anything a recon team won't?" he asked, finally turning toward her.
She finished lacing her left boot and sat up, spreading her hands with a cheeky grin. "I'm the Great Ninja Yuffie Kisaragi. Duh."
Was she imagining the shadow of a smile on his face? "I know you'll be up all night worrying about me and stuff, but don't worry. I'm just going to stake the place out, see what it looks like."
"Does Gorki know you're doing this?" His hand dropped from the doorknob. Now she had him interested.
Yuffie averted her eyes and told the truth. "I told him I had to talk it over with you first."
"I see."
"So here I am. You know, talking to you first." She tied her favorite blue bandanna into her hair, feeling for the first time in a while as if she were in her element. Tonight, there would be no posturing, no manners and airs. She would just be herself, in her natural habitat, one of the best ninjas Wutai had ever spawned. "Look, I know it's tempting, but no partying while I'm gone, and especially no hot babes. It'll be all over the tabloids by tomorrow morning: Ex Dog of the Shinra Gets Laid, and Not By His Wife."
Tseng stared at her, apparently nonplussed by her high spirits and chattering mood. She hadn't been this energetic in a while. She put the brakes on a bit, deciding to save her energy for the actual run. "Sorry," she said. "I can't help myself when I get all jazzed up to go on a run."
"How long before you leave?"
Thinking this an odd question, she shrugged. "I'm ready to go, but if you need me for a bit, I can wait."
"Give me ten minutes to prepare." Tseng went to the wardrobe as he said this, rummaging through it and opening a small compartment. From it, he pulled a few articles of black clothing before disappearing behind the changing screen. Stunned by this turn of events, Yuffie could only watch with gaping mouth as he emerged from behind the screen wearing a sleek ensemble comprised of a fitted, long-sleeved black shirt, slimming black pants, and black socks. His inky black hair had been tied at the nape of his neck, accentuating his high cheekbones.
"You... want to go with me?" she murmured, still shocked.
"If it will keep you safe, I'm going," he said firmly.
"Right," she said, feeling almost disappointed. Of course he wouldn't just want to come with her for fun or anything. Yuffie, you're the only weirdo who would ever think spying on an underground drug ring is fun, she thought. Well... maybe Reno would agree with me.
True to his word, it only took Tseng about ten minutes of traveling the room and picking up various devices and equipment and attaching them to himself. She observed him holstering two handguns on his person, one at his hip and one at the shoulder. He clipped on a belt with extra rounds, and slipped on some lethal-looking black leather gloves. His boots were not quite as high-cut and girly as hers were, but they still had a sexy effect that had her swallowing and trying to think of something else. Like dead kittens. Or Barret naked.
Though Yuffie felt high and tight with excitement, she knew in the back of her brain that her good cheer had not necessarily mended the new rift between them. She hoped that with time he would forgive her her secrets. An image of the safe in his office floated through her mind's eye. It's only fair he forgives me my secrets, considering the entire collection he has.
"Now, I dunno if you know how to get out of here without being seen, but I've got some primo—"
"If you mean the roof exit, you'll recall I already know. It's a wonder half the palace doesn't know already," he said with a wry tilt of his lips.
"What do you mean, 'it's a wonder'? That's a closely-guarded Princess Secret, my friend. The only reason you know about it's because you're a nosy-ass Turk who follows me around everywhere and—" Seeing the look on his face, she swallowed her next words and changed tack— "totally saves my ass all the time. Yep."
"Indeed," he drawled, eyes narrow. She could've sworn she saw amusement in his face, but it vanished the next moment quicker than water in Corel.
"Well, if you know everything so well, lead the way," she said, waving her arm in a courtly manner.
Before they reached the door, though, Yuffie stopped, involuntarily putting a hand on his arm as a thought occurred to her. "Tseng," she said.
"What is it?"
"What about your shoulder?" she said. "Are you sure you're well enough to do this?"
Then, he did something that surprised her. In one quick motion, he stepped back from her and pulled his shirt over his head, leaving his upper body bare. Before she had time to appreciate the sight, he did a one-eighty so she could see the bullet's exit wound.
"Holy shit," she whispered. "How?"
The wound was gone, stitches and all. If Yuffie hadn't seen him almost bleed to death with her own eyes, and if not for the faint pink shadow where the wound had been, she might have thought he'd never been hurt in the first place.
In response to her question, he shrugged and said, "You tell me." Then, he put his shirt back on and led her out the door before she could truly process what had just happened.
A shred of her dream from the past night filtered back to her, and Yuffie thought about the blue glow she'd been emanating this morning. Had she somehow used Leviathan's powers to heal him? If so, could she figure out how to do it and use it again when they needed it? She filed this information away for later when she could speak to Chekhov.
They made it to her secret roof exit without encountering very many people. Twice they had to hide from routine guard patrols, checking the halls for intruders and general tomfoolery. She was glad for the increased security what with all the activity as of late, but she didn't particularly enjoy clinging to the ceiling spread-eagled.
"I don't like how easy it is to sneak past them," Yuffie mumbled as Tseng emerged from a nearby closet. She wasn't quite sure how he had stuffed himself in there with all the cleaning supplies, but she supposed better him than her. "I'll have to talk to Gorki about palace security. Again."
Tseng shrugged. "I can't fault them for missing us."
"Why?"
He slanted her a glance and said, "I believe you call yourself the 'Great Ninja' Yuffie, yes?"
She shot him a quick victory pose and then jogged to catch up with him, disgruntled at his total lack of reaction. "That's me."
"And of course, I'm the head of the Turks."
Weighing his words for a minute, she finally said, "Eh, I guess you're right. We're pretty awesome." The genuine warmth in his smile surprised her.
When they had reached the roof exit and successfully scaled the garden wall without being seen, Yuffie felt herself relax just a bit. Truth be told, the guards had been improving in their work lately. Twice recently she'd attempted to sneak into the back gardens for an anonymous evening stroll and been caught by her own protectors. Luckily for her, having Tseng along probably lessened her risk of being discovered.
The copse of trees around the palace gave way to the city limits. They found a building with a convenient fire escape to scale and scrambled up. Well, Yuffie scrambled. Tseng was more like a panther in the dark, all sleek lines and smooth, unbroken movement. She briefly contemplated pushing him off the fire escape as punishment for him looking way better than her all the time but decided that would be against the best interests of her health and continued existence.
"Stop being so awesome," she muttered as she gave him a hand onto the roof. He didn't need it, but he took it anyway.
The corners of his mouth lifted in a small tense smile, and he said, "It's part of my job description."
She did a double take. Tseng had made a joke. Maybe he wasn't mad at her anymore? No, best not push her luck in that department. She would just keep buttering him up until she was absolutely certain he didn't want to bug the shower or something.
"Lead the way," he said, gesturing, and she realized suddenly that she had been just standing there. Right. Leading the way. For Tseng. She could do this.
And now she was nervous. She had started preparations for this jaunt with no qualms, not a single seed of anxiety in her body, but now she was nervous, dammit.
Some of that feeling waned as she and Tseng leaped from building to crowded building like monkeys, and here again she amended herself, for Tseng could never resemble a monkey. She might have, but not Tseng. The eaves and dips and strange mixture of East-West architecture in Wutai suited him, and she could imagine it as his natural habitat. He was a man of both worlds, and she came close to his perfect balance but never quite achieved it. She was always more of one or the other, depending on the day.
On a larger gap, she charged up a running start and would have ended the whole shebang in a roll if the roof of the next building didn't have stylized pagoda eaves. Instead, her feet hit the eave with a solid thump, and she used her continued momentum to slide off the edge and grab with her hands before she fell to her death three stories below. Tseng followed shortly after, landing to her right, and she grinned cheekily over at him.
"Come here often?"
He rolled his eyes and edged his way around the right corner of the building with a strong, sure grip. She knew his gloves had a pebbled section on the fingers and palms, and she wondered where she could get her hands on something like that. The grip would be nice, but even better would be the protection from dried bird crap.
When he had disappeared around the corner, she followed, supporting her entire body with just her arms and fingers. An acrobatic feat like this would never be easy, but she hadn't been lax with her physical training, either. Tseng was waiting for her around the corner, where a streetlamp illuminated the sloped eaves of another edifice. Without pausing to speak to him, she swung her lower body up between her arms, braced her feet against the edge of the eave, and kicked off like a swimmer in a pool.
In the five foot gap between buildings, she twisted in midair, grabbed the edge, and hauled herself onto the gentler angles of this building's rooftop. She let out a small, inaudible sigh of relief that her insane acrobatics had succeeded once again. No amount of political wankery can rob me of my beauty and talents, she thought happily.
Tseng, for his part, followed suit, and she admired the twist and turn of his muscular body in the glow of the streetlamps. She leaned to haul him up, though she suspected he didn't require her assistance.
"Nicely done," she murmured to him, mindful of the dark windows and the few passersby on sidewalks below. "I see the Turks are actually teaching you something."
"I didn't know the acquiring the skills of a trapeze artist would be included in the curriculum of Royal Training School," he said with a pointed look in her direction as he adjusted his gloves and rose from his crouch.
Amused that he would remember that conversation, she shoved him in the shoulder hard enough to shake most people. He didn't move, merely stared her down. "Aw, you killjoy."
"Your limited sensibilities should not and do not define me as a killjoy."
Instead of responding, she took off, a running dash for the next rooftop, and listened for his footsteps as he followed, pleased with their rapport. Progress, progress, always progress with Tseng. She wondered if it would ever come to a satisfactory conclusion, then decided that as long as they were moving forward, she would continue to enjoy it.
They traveled in good humor, and after about thirty minutes of work, when they were beginning to need a break, she halted him with a hand. She ducked low on their current rooftop, a flat, gravelly affair. He did not hesitate in imitating her, for which she was pleased.
"We're here," Yuffie murmured.
"Which one?" He shimmied up beside her on his elbows.
She pointed, sure to keep her hand low. The shadows ought to hide them with no problem, but she didn't want to take any chances. "Two to the left of the hot dog joint across the road."
The old, abandoned textile factory ought to be condemned already, but Yuffie acknowledged to herself that building and zoning laws in Wutai hadn't exactly been up to standard in recent years. It was only due to her and Staniv's efforts toward fixing this oversight that new workers had even stumbled on this place and begun to suspect something. Gorki was lucky they had put in a report to Wutai's law enforcement.
"This location would be ideal for peddling Dust." Tseng scanned it with his quick, intelligent gaze. "The area is not a particularly affluent one, the shelter seems abandoned except for squatters, and it would be easy to hook local residents on an upper."
Yuffie smiled grimly. "Too bad they underestimated me and my Turk."
At the phrase "my Turk," Tseng turned his eyes on her, an intense stare which Yuffie could not decipher. She returned his look, cornered by his gaze until he smiled as well, a slow, dangerous curl of his mouth. "Too bad for them, indeed."
She resolved to avoid the flare his smile lit in her gut—stop it, Yuffie, stop being attracted to people who can snap your neck in your sleep—and fumbled for her binoculars in her hip pouch. Her mind screamed that something important had just passed between them, but she tucked it away for later. "They're probably going to do most of their dealing in the wee hours of the morning," she said. "And we've got front row tickets."
"Now we wait," he concluded, shifting to get more comfortable on his elbows.
Two hours passed. Two painstaking hours of trying to hide her yawns (this whole having a bed-time and a real schedule thing was ruining her groove). Just when Yuffie thought she wouldn't be able to keep her eyes open any longer, they spotted movement.
Three dark figures rounded the corner at the end of the street and made their way toward the factory. Yuffie didn't pay them any more attention than anyone else. She had stopped squinting at every late-night partyer or worker walking home after the first half hour. However, when they ducked through the crumbling doorframe, she stiffened.
"Did you see—"
"Yes."
"When they come back this way, we'll pick one and follow," she ordered, surprised at herself. Bossing Tseng shouldn't be so easy. He nodded, apparently unperturbed by her commands.
After about a minute, a faint glow shone from one of the second story windows.
"They won't leave from the same place they entered," Tseng said quietly. He began to crawl toward the back edge of their rooftop, from where they had come in the first place. "We need to get to ground level."
She followed him as he scaled the building with the aid of window ledges, glad for her custom leather boots and the silence they offered. If any lonely souls had stayed behind for late night office work, they would not have an inkling of Tseng and Yuffie's presence.
The followed the alley back around to a different vantage point. Sure enough, just as he concealed the two of them behind a large, stinking dumpster, they saw three figures exit the building. One left from the front door, one from a side exit, and one leapt from the fire escape with a speed and lightness of foot that suggested maybe these Dust dealers were testing the product.
"Which one?" she breathed in his ear. He turned his head toward her, so that she had to move to keep their faces from accidentally brushing.
"You choose."
Thinking quickly, she said, "Let's take the one from the side exit."
She dashed away from him, into the back of the alley. Their target was still across the street, heading in the direction from which he had come before entering the factory. Tseng followed her as she navigated through the labyrinth and out into the street just as their target rounded the corner.
Yuffie felt as though her feet were air and the ground clouds as she scampered in the shadows behind him. On a whim, she leapt onto a stair-railing and propelled herself from there onto a one-story rooftop, swift along the shingles.
Their target looked to be about five feet, five inches tall, right in the range of height that spelled "nondescript." Most working-class Wuteng wore a curious mix of Eastern clothing stylized by classical Western trends. This man's manner of dress fit that bill perfectly, a flourishing dragon embroidered painstakingly—most likely hand-made by a wide or relative—onto his denim jacket. She could see he wore a knit cap to protect his ears from the chill night air, and his pants, though also cut in a style reminiscent of Edge citizens, seemed to flow a bit at the legs. Despite their hatred of Shinra,
Tseng followed closely behind her. He was so quiet, she would never know he was there if not for the occasional glance backward.
When she deemed them a safe distance from any prying eyes, Yuffie sent one meaningful glance in Tseng's direction. He nodded his approval and acknowledgement of her next action, so she pounced.
She shifted from a light prowl to a sprint. By the time their target's head whipped around toward the sudden sound of footsteps, Yuffie's feet had made firm contact with his back. The man went down onto the pavement.
She heard the soft thwack of his cheekbone hitting concrete, the world righting itself as she landed on her feet. Tseng approached, resembling a panther. He put his boot on the weakly-struggling man's neck.
"If you make a sound," he said, voice low and cold, "I'll break you."
Yuffie and Tseng remained carefully out of the man's sight. It would not do for him to recognize his rulers in their mission garb.
"T-take my money, man," he stammered, "you can take m-my money, just let me go. I won't tell no one, please!"
"Quiet," Tseng commanded again, and Yuffie watched with interest as he ground his toe a little harder into the man's neck. She raised her eyebrows at Tseng, who slanted a dead-eyed look at her.
She tried not to shiver. Sometimes, Tseng reminded her all too suddenly that he was a Turk. She cleared her throat and lowered her voice. "We know you're dealing Dust. Name your supplier."
"D-dust? I don't touch that stuff, man, it's too much. I don't know who told you I deal Dust, but I don't mess around with—"
"You're high right now. Answer our questions or I'll split your head on the pavement," Tseng said, and quicker than she could register, he whipped out a handgun and pointed it at the man's head.
Yuffie shushed his sudden whimper, mindful of the dark street and the possibility that even on a week night some innocent citizen might pass them by. "I can't tell you anything!"
When Tseng pushed a little harder with his boot, the man hissed and said, "His face is always covered, and he barely talks."
Yuffie's eyes widened. Now this was interesting.
The man rambled on, tears leaking from his visible eye. "I swear I can't tell you anything because I don't know. Please, I got two little girls at home—they'll kill me if I tell you, man—"
Tseng met her eyes, and she realized he was waiting for her word on what to do next. She shook her head. No, she wasn't heartless. And she knew the look of a flunky. This man didn't know shit—he was at the bottom of the ladder, kept completely in the dark.
She gestured for Tseng to speak. "We're going to let you go," he said. Yuffie thought his voice would be less recognizable than hers, so she let him continue. "If you tell anyone about this encounter, we will find you, we will kill you, and then we'll kill your children. Do you understand?"
"Yes, I understand," he blubbered, his face shining in the dim night lights. "Th-thank you so much."
Yuffie wanted, desperately, to say, Don't thank us. Go home to your daughters and kiss them and tell them you love them and you'll never leave them. Tell them you'll never get sick and die. Tell them you'll stop dealing Dust and clean up your act.
But she knew the only way a single father working a pitiful job in the Wuteng slums could pay for his daughters to live a halfway decent life would be extracurricular activities like Dust dealing, like gambling, like black market sales and exchanges. This, this here, was why she had to fix her country. For people like this man, so children could grow up with full bellies and warm beds.
She swallowed all the words that bubbled behind her lips and said, "Keep your mouth shut, and you won't have to thank us."
Tseng said, "When we leave, remain on the ground, in this position. Count slowly to two hundred. Once you have reached two hundred, you may rise. Not a second before then. Do you understand?"
"Y-yes. I understand. Thank you."
Yuffie counted down from three with her fingers, and Tseng stepped off their captive's neck. The man sucked air down in panicked gasps, and Tseng kept his gun pointed as he and Yuffie backed away. When they rounded the corner, they broke into a run and made it to the nearest roof without having to communicate. It would be better concealed and safer for them the higher up they were.
"Mind if we save it until we get back?" she whispered to him. "I'm beat."
Tseng nodded, and they made their way back to the palace in thoughtful silence.
They fell asleep that night discussing what they'd discovered, what they had not discovered, and what they were going to do next. For the first in ages, Yuffie was out as soon as her head hit the pillow.
.
Yuffie woke the next morning slowly, the warmth from the room's space heater casting a sleepy, comfortable pall over her. She dimly registered a smell of warmth and soap, the feeling of someone's arms around her.
It was a few moments before she understood the implications of this, and she almost flew out of the bed when it hit her. Not someone's arms. Tseng's arms. He was wrapped around her shoulders with one hand in her hair; her head rested neatly on his chest. She could hear his heartbeat beneath her ear and the steady sound of his breath.
She thought quickly. Maybe, if she were very careful, she could disentangle herself from him before he woke up. Usually he was up and gone before her, but apparently last night had tired him as much as her. Before she could make any move, though, Tseng tensed beneath her cheekbone.
She froze. All real sense or logical thought fled her in that moment. Usually, her propensity for babbling under pressure would take the steering wheel and command events in a hilarious or humiliating direction, but even that character facet seemed to be malfunctioning.
The world narrowed to pure sensation: Tseng's fine silk pajamas beneath her cheekbone; the warmth radiating from his body; the dim light of morning invading the room. He smelled warm, like a man in the morning should. She could not see his face, and she dared not turn her head, but she desperately wanted to.
He spoke first. "Good morning," and his voice was languid and rough with sleep.
"Good morning," she tried, voice unsteady with nerves. "Ah, sorry about this."
"Did you sleep well?" he asked, and she was acutely aware of his hand still threaded through her hair, the slight movement of his fingers as he toyed with the strands there. How surreal, that this should be happening to her, with Tseng.
"Yeah," she finally said.
He sighed, and stretched. "Then don't apologize."
She didn't want to get up, but she didn't know how to stay there. The decision was almost made for her when the alarm clock blared, but Tseng surprised her by reaching out and clicking it off with finality. His eyes drifted closed, and he said, "My arm is asleep."
"Oh, well, we can just—" Her awkward sentence terminated when he pulled his arm out from beneath her, only to turn on his side and curl his body around hers.
"Any meetings to attend?" he asked, voice still drowsy.
"No," she whispered. For the first time in her life, Yuffie felt if she spoke, the moment would shatter into a thousand pieces and be lost forever. "None."
"Then stay." He yawned softly, his mouth moving against her hair.
"Okay," she said, half-thrilled, half-terrified. She tucked her head beneath his chin and drifted slowly back to sleep.