Final Fantasy 7-Reno X Rude
Fandom: Compilation of FF7
Pairing: RenoXRude
Theme Set: Delta
Title: confounding Variables
Rating: PG-R
Warning: Some cursing. Some violence and sexual content but nothing graphic, unbeta'd, abuse of the definition of "sentence".
1. Air
Rude doesn't think he'll get used to waking up to the smell of breakfast cooking, especially on workdays, but eventually, without noting or wanting to, he does.
2. Apples
Reno doesn't drink anything caffeinated, and doesn't like sweets unless they're peppermint or apple, Rude likes the solstice season because for once he knows what to bring his partner from the cafe.
3. Beginning
That first mission left Rude absolutely livid, and he told Veld he wouldn't work with the mouthy, reckless, child again; Veld had calmly informed him that said young man outranked Rude, had been a Turk longer, and that he would work with whomever Veld decided he would work with.
4. Bugs
Reno laughingly tells him once that he likes cockroaches just fine, because they may get a bum rap for being what they are but you can't keep the little fuckers down; sometimes Rude looks at Reno and agrees.
5. Coffee
Coffee doesn't have any effect on Rude at this point, but he likes the taste of it anyway, and it has a way of appearing on his desk, black but with sugar, waiting when he get's back from his first break in the mornings.
6. Dark
Reno can only see himself reflected in Rude's dark glasses, but thinks that's alright, they'll blow up something unnecessarily today, then hit the gym, then Reno will buy drinks, and if Rude has something to say then, he will.
7. Despair
Despair is a luxury, and one they can't afford when they have an entire planet to right.
8. Doors
Rude has always like doors as symbols, and he hasn't told Reno this since it's never seemed relevant and Reno hasn't read the right books, but through the pall of oncoming oblivion it amuses him anyway when Reno kicks that door at him, trying to gift one last thrill.
9. Drink
Rude tell himself for the dozenth time when he opens his door to find Reno swaying in the threshold that he can't allow this, that if Reno was sober he wouldn't be here, he tells himself this even as he's pulling the smaller body against his and the door is swinging closed again.
10. Duty
Rude doesn't know it, but over the course of their first three missions, Reno takes two shallow stab wounds and a bullet in Rude's stead; he may be older but Rude is a rookie and Reno is his senior and it's his goddamned job to make sure he lives long enough to be the Turk the boss thinks he can be.
11. Earth
It drives Reno crazy that he doesn't have the words for what Rude smells like, until the job sends them camping in fall and smells grass and sweet damp soil.
12. End
“My condolences and congratulations Rude, you've been promoted.”
13. Fall
“Hey Rude, what's wrong with the trees?” Rude doesn't answer, just turns makes Reno do up his jacket as the wind picks up again, carrying brightly colored leaves.
14. Fire
Rude doesn't have any clear memories of the days spent combing the rubble of Sector 7 while the fires still raged, just the impression of smoke, heat, and something repetitive and wordless that might have been a prayer.
15. Flexible
No matter how many times he see's him do it, Rude is still surprised when Reno folds all six feet of himself into the impossibly small spaces in air ducts and between filing cabinets, and into foot wells; sometimes Rude catches himself imagining other applications of that flexibility.
16. Flying
Heights make Rude dizzy if he isn't actively doing something to distract himself, and he is absolutely sure that Reno likes flying more than he likes Rude with the tricks he pulls at every opportunity.
17. Food
Whenever they're out together, Reno 'sneaks' bits of food off of Rude's plate; he isn't actually being very sneaky at all, but Rude never thinks of telling to stop.
18. Foot
At home on the couch Reno's feet always find their way into Rude's lap, sometimes Rude thinks Reno is just double checking that they're both still real and alive, but Reno looks so lazily happy when he does it that Rude files that away as over-thinking.
19. Grave
When he's first conscious again Reno watches news coverage of the plate drop on repeat for days; When Rude is sure that the images of smoke and twisted metal have seared themselves permanently into the screen he unplugs it, and hides the remote, and both of their firearms.
20. Green
The only real colors bellow the plate are gray and livid mako green and they pollute all other colors that try to exist there; Rude isn't part of that world and Reno hates the way the lights eat at his skin and suit as if they could take him like toll.
21. Head
“Wait you mean you've actually never gotten...but you're...so...” Reno flails and practically throws the shot glass at Rude's shocked face trying to cover his sudden self-consciousness, and vows never to play this particular drinking game again.
22. Hollow
Reno never quite grows out of that half-starved look, and Rude is fascinated by the way he can run his fingers along the spaces bellow his shoulder blades.
23. Honor
“It's been fun man, a real godsdamn pleasure” Reno says as they run for cover in the shuddering remains of Shinra tower, Meteor bearing down on them; if he's going to go out, there's no one else he'd rather be standing beside.
24. Hope
Hope is a loose term, he decides, atonement is tighter, more concise, more accurate, but hope sits better on his tongue while they work side by side repainting the sign for Healin.
25. Light
In the semi-dark the gun flash is brilliant, illuminating too-bright eyes so that for an instant, they don't look human.
26. Lost
“Remind me to get you one of those beeping things for when you lose your keys, you know it's around here, you'll find it as soon as you get a new one made.”
27. Metal
The last time he kissed him, Reno's mouth had been bloody, and he'd tasted darkly like copper and cum, and Rude can't decide whether to cling to that memory or drown it.
28. New
Rude blinks behind his shades for a couple of seconds at this odd new request, but Reno's face is sincere and open when he hands the book over, so Rude flips to the first page and begins to read aloud.
29. Old
“Shit man, age don't mean nothing, when you was eighteen I was twelve and you hadn't killed nobody yet.”
30. Peace
In quiet moments, between missions and shift changes and nights spent pouring over new gathered information until the sun starts to rise, they curl up on the break room couch, Reno's head resting on Rude's thigh, while Rude runs his fingers through unruly hair.
31. Poison
Sometimes the sky over Midgar get's fed up with the pollution it's constantly fed, and it showers the upper plates in acid, and it's a rush to get under cover and peel off outer layers before anything starts to burn.
32. Pretty
Rude thinks that at night the bright lights of the upper plate are pretty; Reno thinks they're just boring lights, but he doesn't mind the way they reflect in the rare moments when Rude's eyes aren't covered by shades.
33. Rain
It's cold enough that Reno has actually slept in the bed for a change, and Rude doesn't plan to let him out again until the rain stops pounding against the window.
34. Regret
At first, Reno wants nothing more than for Chelsea to come back, because he doesn't think he can make Rude laugh the same way.
35. Roses
He had brought Chelsea roses once, because the smell reminded him of her, and the romantic in him thinks of her still, and that he'll probably never give flowers to anyone else.
36. Secret
It was true that Reno had been head over heels for his partner pretty much from day one, but he would have been perfectly happy to say nothing and stand beside Rude as a partner and friend until one or the other of them died; luckily for him though, the rest of the office had other ideas.
37. Snakes
The stories about the Zolom are different in Kalm than they are in Midgar, but the both still grow up with a healthy wariness of snakes.
38. Snow
It had been snowing the first time Reno kissed him, propelled more by an unrelated, uncontainable happiness than desire, and his lips had been ice cold, but still soft.
39. Solid
Reno loves the low calm gravel of Rude's voice and when he does decide to talk it's like a physical substance that fills up all the empty corners of a room, or a body.
40. Spring
On the bad days when Rude's muscles are wound tight enough to snap, Reno knows exactly which buttons to press to edge him over, and Rude always feels better afterwords.
41. Stable
Reno's anxious around the animals the first time Rude brings him to his hometown to visit, until when one morning they're cleaning the stable, and Rude takes Reno's hand and places it on the old cows neck to show how they like to be petted.
42. Strange
Reno lies casually, sometimes, about little insignificant things, and only things he knows Rude knows the real answers to, and Rude doesn't know what to do with that, but he thinks it's some kind of test.
43. Summer
Reno laughs and fusses and makes fun, but ultimately he settles down and lets Rude map out patterns in the explosion of freckles the summer sun has spread across his shoulders.
44. Taboo
There is nothing Rude can do or say that will convince Reno to hold hands in public, adrenaline and blood-lust fueled sex in an alley is fine, but simple affection is too personal.
45. Ugly
The skin beneath Reno's tattoos, the first time Rude runs a thumb along one, is raised slightly and unnaturally smooth, and he pulls his hand sharply away.
46. War
They are fighting a war; it becomes a mantra, something they tell themselves and each other over and over as as their bullets find bodies they don't agree with, and the collateral grows steadily beyond the bounds of control, they are fighting a war.
47. Water
On the way to Junon the sun shines bright white off the water and Rude suddenly wants to tell his partner about the camping trips he took here as a kid, but he's pretty sure the seasick bastard doesn't want to hear it as he clings miserably to the railing, salt caking in his hair.
48. Welcome
The second time they visit for solstice together, they don't even have time to get presents out of the trunk before they're mobbed by Rude's half a dozen nieces and nephews, mittened hands pulling them excitedly towards the brightly lit house, and Rude's sibling laughing in the doorway.
49. Winter
As the temperature drops, Shinra sets up collections for toys and food and warm clothing around the tower; Reno glares at the empty box in their department for a week before Rude finally realizes he is in fact glaring at the emptiness, not the box.
50. Wood
“If you fall and kill yourself, I'm not going to do anything about it” Rude tells hims smirking, but Reno isn't worried as he scrambles towards the sky; trees are much easier to climb than buildings.