A/N: So glad to see a bunch of new faces join this little nook of FFN! Welcome, I hope you enjoy the ride!
mun3litKnight, XXTakaraXX: Yeah, I don't think Tess stopped to consider the fact that that's what she'll actually have to keep saying from now on. X)
Reeve had made our deal sound like a mutually beneficial agreement, but I wasn't gullible enough to believe that my protective suit would be the full extent of it. He was, after all, an executive for the company that was holding me prisoner. I was certain he had just as many questions as everyone else.
Sure enough, the man pumped me for information while we worked together, but he did so in his own, civil manner. Often he encouraged me to talk in subtle ways, rather than ask outright. When Reeve did inquire directly, most of his questions were related to Earth itself, the reasons for its looming demise and our technology. I saw no harm in humoring the man. He was polite enough to offer equivalent knowledge about his own world in return.
However, I was surprised when he decided to delve into personal matters.
"Do you miss your world?" Reeve inquired one afternoon while he was bent over the suit's chest piece on his worktable, prodding at the exposed innards with some tool I couldn't name.
It was just the two of us and an idle moment for me, watching while he wired up an adjustment to Sparky's shielding. Leaning back in my chair, I took a few moments to think before answering. My fingertips tapped my thigh to the rhythm of what sounded like instrumental swing with an experimental bent. Reeve's music, this time.
"Well, yes. Of course I do." A wry bitterness made one corner of my mouth twitch upward as I considered the question some more. "Not that there's much left for me on Earth anymore."
James, Victor, the Gateway – these were the people and the project my life had revolved around in the past few years. My fiancé had turned out to be a backstabbing bastard, Victor was likely dead and the Gateway either beyond repair or in the hands of Orca. To think that so many years' worth of work and relationships could be wiped out in less than an hour.
"Don't you have family?"
My fingers went still.
"Not anymore. My parents died in the London earthquake of '72."
My tone was flat. It was either no emotion, or too much. I preferred the former. If only I could have used the same control to dispel the uncomfortable tightness in my chest.
The man paused and looked up, his brow creased in tactful concern.
"Oh. My condolences."
"Don't worry about it," I said with a fragile smile. "It was years ago."
His gaze lingered on me for a while, before he nodded and returned to his work.
"London is... a city?" he asked.
"Yes, it was the capital of the country I was born in. I lived there for several years in my teens. The earthquakes eventually destroyed it."
My parents had feared that my move to the States would put me in the danger zone for that particular kind of natural disaster. I wasn't able to appreciate the irony.
"I see," Reeve said, focused on wrangling an uncooperative piece of wire into submission. "So, you were an only child?"
This time the pain of remembrance cut deeper, as more memories I would rather not have dwelled on flickered back to life. When had they become so many?
"No. I had a sister. She's gone too."
The executive straightened in his seat and set his tools down, the frown on his face deepening as he studied me.
"I'm sorry, Tess. I didn't mean to dredge up painful memories."
Until now, the man had been all suave talk and courteous smiles; showing the face of a charming executive. This was different, not to mention unexpected.
"It's fine," My second attempt at a smile was fainter than the first. "I'm afraid no one on Earth has a happy story to share anymore."
"How did it happen? If you don't mind me asking."
Did I? Yes and no. I didn't mind the question, but the words to answer it were not so easy to find. Still, something about his searching gaze and the concerned line of his mouth made me decide to try.
"She went missing in an accident at one of the starship construction sites. It was a terrible disaster, over a hundred casualties. Dozens of workers were set adrift from the station and just vanished, never to be found. Camille... She was one of them."
It might have been easier if she had been killed on the construction site. There would have been a body to bury; some closure. Instead, all I had was the thought of her endlessly floating into the abyss of space, lost forever, still alive for who knows how long before...
I swallowed hard and lowered my gaze to my hands in my lap. I hadn't realized I was wringing them hard enough to whiten my knuckles.
"Look, why don't we take a break?" Reeve suggested. "I'll get the coffee brewing."
I nodded with a half-hearted glance his way and the man got up, heading for the small coffeemaker he kept in one corner of his workshop. On the way, he gave my shoulder a gentle squeeze; another surprising gesture. I let my eyes fall shut while I waited, focusing on the flow of the music. By the time the aroma of fresh coffee drifted my way, my fingers were once again performing a small dance to the rhythm.
The executive returned with two steaming cups, offering one of them to me before taking a seat in his chair.
"Do you want to talk about it?" he asked after a tentative sip of his coffee.
I was the first to admit I wasn't the best judge of character and intent, but Reeve's offer seemed sincere. With a twinge of regret, I declined.
"Maybe another time."
I offered him an apologetic smile to let him know I appreciated the offer. I had encountered few friendly faces on this planet so far and I certainly hadn't imagined I would find one among Shinra's top echelons.
Reeve nodded.
"You mentioned starships. As in space travel?"
I noticed an enthusiastic gleam in his eyes. While not his department, I wasn't surprised to find an engineer drawn to the idea of a spaceship project. James hadn't been immune, either.
"Yes. A desperate attempt to escape a dying planet. None of them have been completed yet. If any of them will be, and in time to make a difference, well..." I shook my head. "That remains to be seen."
"Sounds like you don't think that will happen."
"A spaceship carrying a few dozen, maybe hundreds? Sure, that could work. But the millions they propose, travelling far enough to find a habitable planet? No, I don't see that happening."
It was a popular undertaking, though. There was something romantic and liberating about the notion, I supposed, about leaving the past behind to seek a brighter future in the vast unknown. A freedom that appealed to dreamers and thrill-seekers alike. The advertising certainly did its best to depict the idea as a bold adventure for all of humanity.
"It would make more sense if the companies building the starships were only pretending to offer salvation to millions," I added with a dark smile, "to raise the funds to build one for themselves and take off before anyone realized what they were up to."
Reeve raised his eyebrows.
"That's awfully cynical of you."
"Yes, well, my faith in humanity has suffered lately," I muttered, bringing the cup to my lips.
"I didn't say you were wrong."
I noted the shadow that passed over his features, but Reeve asked me another question before I could contemplate its meaning.
"These starships, did I understand correctly that they are built in space? Meaning you have already launched people into space successfully?"
After that, the discussion continued on more neutral ground with a comparison of space programs. I would have thought that a civilization capable of producing robots for military use would have been farther along in space exploration, but manned space flight still eluded the people of Gaia. Reeve theorized that if Scarlet had been into space travel instead of mechanized weapons, the situation might have been reversed. He seemed to hold little regard for Palmer, the man in charge of Shinra's space exploration department.
Reno joined us late in the afternoon, dragging his scruffy self through the door without his usual swagger, only to throw himself into the nearest chair. To make his mood clear beyond a doubt, the Turk let out a drawn-out groan.
"Good evening, Reno," I greeted him, keeping my voice breezy.
"How was the vacation?" Reeve asked in a similar tone, without looking up from his work.
"Vacation? Hah!"
"Sounds like you had a good time," the executive commented.
Standing next to Reeve, I could see the smirk on his face. We had just enough time to share an amused glance before Reno launched into full rant mode.
"I hate Wutai," he whined. "I hate mountains. I hate sleazy slumlord pricks. I hate rookies who don't get that bein' off the clock means bein' off the fuckin' clock and run off to get themselves stuck neck-deep in shit and make the rest of us have to work, with goddamn eco terrorists I might add, to get 'em out of it!"
After the last monster of a sentence, he fell into a fuming silence while Reeve and I traded another look and poorly hidden grins. It was clear from his demeanor that the redhead was just taking the chance to blow off steam. Whatever had happened, he wasn't too broken up about it.
"The food was all right, tho'," Reno added as an afterthought.
"Go on," I nudged. "Tell us all about it."
I doubted the man needed encouragement, but judging by the way his face lit up, the prompt wasn't unwelcome. Reno likely left out work-related details, but he managed to weave a gripping, if somewhat rambling tale of adventure and intrigue in the west while Reeve and I finished up for the day.
His description of Wutai's villages and nature ignited a burning curiosity in me about the outside world. All I had seen of it was what had been shown in news reports on TV. In all my months on this strange new world, I hadn't so much as caught a glimpse from a window.
As the Turk led me out of the workshop after the day's work, I gathered my courage.
"Reno, I'd like to see Midgar."
He glanced at me out of the corner of his eye and shook his head.
"Sorry Fitz, can't take ya out of HQ."
"It doesn't have to be outside. A window would be fine. I just want to see what the city looks like."
We came to a halt by the elevator. Reno hit the call button and checked his watch while we waited.
"Yeah, all right," he said right before the doors pinged open. "The library floor has a pretty good view, yo."
I couldn't stop the large smile that spread across my face. I was barely able keep still while the elevator brought us toward our destination. Reno seemed amused, but kept any comments to himself.
A few minutes later, I was approaching not just a window, but a whole wall made of glass. It was dark outside, and I felt my heart speed up with a naive sense of excitement at the prospect of a nighttime view.
I walked up to the window, holding my breath, and touched its smooth surface with light fingertips. My mouth hung open and I was distantly aware of Reno watching me with a smirk on his face. I must have looked like a star-struck schoolgirl, but I didn't care. This was Midgar. Gaia. This was my first proper look at a foreign, alien world.
Never had I seen anything like the city spreading out below us. A pizza, the Turk had called it once, and an apt description it was. The nearly full semicircle I could see from this vantage point was divided into neat, symmetrical sectors by massive walls. It was so strictly geometric, so flagrantly artificial, as if its creators had sought to defy the laws of nature with every aspect of its construction.
We were up high; so high that I wondered if the top of the Shinra tower touched the slate gray blanket of clouds draped low over the city. None of the aspiring skyscrapers could reach us. Far below them, matchbox houses lined thin ribbon streets, laid out in ordered patterns that followed the lines and curves of the sectors.
At even intervals in the distance, massive pillars of smoke, lit from underneath by a fluorescent green glow, billowed out of immense smokestacks until they melted into the thick layer of clouds. Mako reactors, I surmised. Their eerie light blocked out everything beyond the city limits, giving the surreal impression of being suspended midair with nothing but a misty haze in the darkness beyond.
"It's incredible," I breathed.
"If ya say so," Reno said with a cynical smile, sauntering up to join me by the window.
I looked over to respond, but my eyes caught something else before they found the man's face. Beyond his shoulder, I saw a different scene. An empty void where street lights and neon signs should have been, lined by twisted metal and broken cables. I had seen it before, on the TV screen.
"Sector Seven," I whispered.
There was something deeply unsettling about the sight, a still but menacing reminder of the frailty underlying the grand first impression.
"What's left of it."
His tone of voice made me glance up at him. Reno hadn't turned around to look at the sector, nor was he looking at me. The smile was still there, but it had changed. As I looked back over the triangle-shaped darkness, a thought occurred to me.
"Did you live there?"
He shifted his weight, pushing his hands deeper into his pockets. His restless eyes wandered over the scenery in the opposite direction.
"Nah."
"Did you know people who did?"
"Not really."
The smile was gone now. In the time I had known him, Reno rarely seemed to care much about anything. I frowned and studied his face, trying to figure out why this would have affected him so much.
"Did you know someone who died when–"
"Enough with the questions!" he snapped. "Just shut up and enjoy the fuckin' view, will ya?"
I flinched and drew back, then turned my face toward the window and crossed my arms over my waist. In my peripheral vision, I could see Reno rake a hand through his hair with a sharp exhale.
"Ah shit," he muttered. "I didn't mean to yell like that, babe."
"I'm not your babe," I mumbled automatically, still staring at the emptiness that upset him so.
That's me, babe. That's Shinra. All fucked up.
My eyes widened as the pieces clicked into place. His injuries, right after the incident. His attitude. The dark look Reeve had given him when speaking about the "dreary realities" of working for Shinra, and the unsavory parts of his job I had experienced personally.
Staring at the ruins of Sector Seven, I mouthed a small "oh".
"Figured it out, did ya?"
His voice was emotionless, as were the eyes that were watching me when I glanced up. His jaw tightened upon seeing my shocked expression, but otherwise the man remained still. Several seconds ticked by in smothering silence, until he scoffed and looked out over the cityscape.
"Don't look at me like that," Reno growled, no longer bothering to hide his anger. "I may be the worst kind of asshole, but I ain't a fuckin' monster."
I kept myself so very still. Even my breaths were quick and shallow. The only part of me that failed to stay stationary was my heart; it battered my ribs as if it wanted to punch its way to freedom through my chest.
"Out of sight, out of mind," the Turk continued after a while, his voice now lifeless but startling in the tense silence. "Worked pretty well for me in the past, y'know? But now that damn hole in the ground is there to stay. Had to change the route I take to work just so I wouldn't have to see it every goddamn morning."
"Why did you do it?"
Reno laughed. It was a jarring, bitter sound compared to my timid voice.
"You think I had any fuckin' choice? Thought you were smarter than that, FitzEvan."
"You just do what they tell you? Anything they say?"
I regretted my questioning straight away, as the man spun his head back around to level his face with mine. I shrunk back, but his eyes already had mine ensnared.
"I'm a Turk," he snarled. "I hurt, I lie, I kill, just 'cause the big bosses say so. I do their dirty work, 'cause that's what it fuckin' takes to keep on livin'. I do what I gotta do to survive. Ain't that how it works for any goddamn animal, Doctor?"
The smoldering rage in his eyes burned into me, choking the air from my lungs. Even after I was able to tear my face away from his and squeeze my eyes shut, I could sense it radiating off of the man. The almost-forgotten fear returned, as strong as ever and so close to strapping me back into the interrogation chair. I felt myself begin to tremble and hugged myself tighter in an instinctive attempt to hide my weakness, even though I knew it was pointless. He was too damned observant.
Something else dawned on me. Sector 7 was a huge cover-up. I had seen the news reports. Immense expense and effort must have gone into fabricating news stories, creating evidence to incriminate the terrorist group, producing fake witnesses for interviews.
Silencing the real witnesses.
Blood drained from my face as I realized the implications of the situation. I knew the truth now. Reno, one of Shinra's black-ops agents, knew that I knew.
"Hey."
A hand touched my shoulder and I gasped, twisting out of reach. Lacking the courage to face the Turk, I glanced sideways at him. It was absurd, but even in my terrified state I couldn't help but feel guilty when I saw a look of hurt pass over his features. He let his arm fall to the side in a slow and deliberate move, then nodded toward the door.
"I'll take ya back to your room."
The anger had faded from his voice, or maybe he was just hiding it again. He hadn't fully mustered the usual nonchalance, though. His lips were pressed together in a firm line and when our eyes met briefly as he held the door open for me, there was something akin to dejection in his.
The return to the ward was laden with awkward silence.