Elena's Apartment, Edge, Later Wednesday Night (NFB)
Elena
Elena might have been sniffling, as she reached her tiny apartment, but she was not about to throw herself onto the bed and cry like some sort of ninny. She was -- had been -- a Turk. She hadn't been very good at it, but she could pretend she knew how to be one, one last time.
Instead, she tugged her tie loose, and worked on the buttons to her shirt. She was going to take the suit off, and have herself a nice, hot shower, and then change into something that normal people wore. And if she did cry in her shower, the soap would hardly tell anyone on her.
That accomplished, Elena left her hair pulled up in a towel while she went through the apartment. Time to sort her possessions into piles. Some things she would have to return -- her ID, perhaps her gun. Some things were hers. Some had come with the apartment.
She folded the suit, noticing the familiar bulge of her cell phone in the pocket. On an impulse, she flipped it open and sent one text message: you were wrong. That said it all, didn't it?
She tossed the phone back into the Turks pile, before moving on to her (sadly meager) book collection. Packing was easy when you hardly owned anything.
Reno
Yep! Tifa had one hell of a set of--
Oh. Hey. A text.
Reno tore his attention from that hell of a set in order to fish his phone from his pocket, flip it open, and read.
...
"Well, shit."
He was out of there so quickly, Tifa didn't have time to snag him to remind him to pay. Sigh. Onto the tab. Again.
And on the way, he was going to send a text to Rude. I ducked up.
Stupid automatic word selector thingie. Reno was going to buttonmash now, just to show it who was boss as he ran.
find rookie damn it move ur slow ass
Reno would probably beat him there, of course. Even while inebriated, there was a reason he was considered the fastest of the Turks.
Rude
Who was Reno calling slow?
ON IT
And he was -- off and running. Elena's apartment was just down the street from his, so he'd check there first. He pounded on the door, and hesitated just a fraction of the second while he decided whether to kick it in.
Elena
Elena froze at the knock. Tseng didn't pound like that; Reno, possibly. She didn't want to talk to him.
In which case, she shouldn't have sent the text message. Right? Another smart move, Elena.
She pulled the towel off her head and tossed it onto one of the piles, shaking out the damp strands of hair and running her hand through. At least she could make herself presentable.
"Come in."
Rude
That... wasn't the sort of thing he was expecting to hear. A struggle maybe, or someone injured. Still...
Rude turned the knob gently -- hey, it was unlocked -- and THEN kicked it in. If Elena didn't have a doorstop, she'd probably need to patch the drywall later.
He burst into the room and looked around quickly, surveying and assessing.
Elena
Elena jumped, dropping the pants she'd been folding. "Rude," she gasped, hand automatically going to where her holster was usually strapped on. Which was over there, in the pile with her suit. Dammit. "What's going on?"
Rude
"That's... my line," he told her, still looking around for danger.
"Reno said you were... in trouble?"
Reno
"No, dumbass," Reno said, stepping up behind Rude and surveying the damage, "I said I fucked up," Ducked up. Whatever. "An' to find her. To check on her, yo."
He then leaned sideways a little to peer around the wall of Rude.
"Yo. Rookie. Uh."
Well. This was awkward.
Rude
At this point, a normal person would have asked "Would someone please tell me what the fuck is going on here?"
Rude, being rude, just raised and eyebrow, looked at them, and waited. To anyone who knew him, it was the same thing.
Elena
So much for her door. The hell with it. She was leaving. They could take it out of her security deposit.
"Reno. Rude." Her voice was toneless. "I'm fine. Get out."
She had clothes to fold. And she couldn't let them come in, because her eyes were still sort of red. Crying in front of these two would complete today's parade of mortification.
And there, a pang of guilt. Reno had been trying to help (maybe) and Rude hadn't even been involved.
Reno
Reno was going to stand there for a moment, kind of just gritting his teeth a little. Get his head around this. Get his heart out of his guts.
Something.
"Elena, look, I didn't think it'd get all..."
All...
"However it got." A beat. There were piles. Oh, shit, there were piles. "You... uh... Got anyplace to go?"
Elena
"I'll think of something," she said, rubbing her eyes with a sigh. "Mideel's nice this time of year. Look, it's ... not your fault. I should have known better."
Had known better, really.
"I didn't expect him to be so mad," she said, returning to the nearest pile. "I guess I see his point. Pretty unprofessional of me."
She wasn't being paid to moon around, sighing like a middle schooler, after all.
Rude
Rude turned and GLARED at Reno. Well, turned his head in Reno's direction. But there was a glare behind those shades, there really was.
"You got her... FIRED?!?"
Reno
Reno actually winced at that.
Damn. Got the rookie fired and being yelled at by the partner. He was one hell of a Turk, wasn't he?
"Told her to talk to Tseng. I mean, about... You know. Figured it'd go okay."
Elena
"He didn't get me fired," Elena sighed, straightening up one of the piles and wondering where she could find boxes. "Reno said I should go talk to Tseng about that stupid crush I had on him. Tseng pointed out that he wasn't paying me to burst into his office and bother him with that sort of thing. And oh, what did I expect was going to happen, anyway, and how could we possibly work together if I was being such an idiot, and so on."
She was paraphrasing, more or less.
"So I said, oh, right. About that: I quit."
Rude
"He didn't say that," Rude pointed out. He knew Tseng, and what Tseng meant and what Elena heard were probably two entirely different things.
"Also, Tseng's an idiot."
Elena
"Oh, he didn't?" Elena arched an eyebrow at Rude. "Thank goodness you were there, so you can correct me. I thought I might have known what he said, since I was listening to it, but you're a much better Turk than I am, so why should I know anything."
There was absolutely no call for being this mean. Especially not to Rude. So Elena was going to see if there were any boxes in the bathroom. You never knew. There might be. Also, it was over there.
Reno
Reno winced again. Dammit. Way to drag Rude into this gong show, Red.
He was following after Elena now, because like hell he was going to let it go so easily.
"You know, Mideel ain't so nice as people say it is this time of year. It's all rainy an' shit, really. Crappy winters. Funny colored apples an' junk. You can do better than that, yo."
Elena
"I don't care about better," Elena said, pretending to look through her medicine cabinet for ... boxes. For her piles of clothes. Okay, so she'd open the drawers and pretend she was looking for something else, then. "I just want to be somewhere that isn't here. Gray and dead, filled with miserable, starving people, and a bunch of kids dressed up and playing at being soldiers. And the sky is so hazy and smoky that it hardly counts as one."
Sky was a big deal when you grew up on the underside of a plate. Reno should understand that much.
She finally stopped fussing around with the cabinets and actually looked at him.
"You said you'd help me. You said if it went bad, and I wanted to leave, I could leave. Didn't you?"
Reno
Elena was really, really damn good at delivering punches to the gut, tonight.
Reno couldn't blame her, either.
"I did, zoto. An' you wanna get away. What are you hopin' to get outta the deal, then?"
Elena
"Myself," she said, softly. "I want to run to something and not just away from here. I want to take some time to be me, before I forget what that even means."
She flipped down the toilet-seat lid and sat. "I'm not sorry that I told him. I was thinking, you know, no matter what, something's going to change. And it'll be my choice, to make everything change, instead of just letting things happen to me. I don't know where I want to go. I don't know what I should do, when I get there. I don't know that it won't go horribly wrong. But I have to try. Not because Tseng yelled at me, but because ... I think I need to."
Reno
Reno was quiet for a long, long moment. Thinking it over. Chewing on it, agonizing over it, even. This was his fault, this whole damn mess, and now the rookie was unemployed and heartbroken, and all she really wanted was herself and her sky.
...
Huh.
...
"You ever give any thought to finishin' school?"
Elena
She hadn't expected that question, from him. She laughed, easily.
"I don't suppose you've heard," she said, "but the ShinRa Military Academy is somewhat out of commission."
There had been fairly low enrollment lately, what with the school itself being destroyed and most of the staff dead.
Rude
"There are better schools out there," Rude commented, walking in the front door. Yes, he'd been even quieter than normal. Now, he had a quart of double chocolate ice cream and a quart of rum.
He waved the bribes at Elena. "Dumbass doesn't get any."
Elena
"Double chocolate and rum," Elena smiled. Aw, now she felt loved. "This means we have to make rum floats."
She would even share. But first, she was going to sample the rum. Twice.
There were mugs in the kitchen, and spoons. They should all head there directly and start making rum floats. Rude was the best Rude ever.
"I think most schools wouldn't want a ShinRa transfer," Elena added over her shoulder. "Especially not one who's missed a couple of years doing their dirty work."
Reno
Reno was going to follow after, kind of staring.
"You know, I can think of one right offa the top of my head that'd take you without askin' any questions," he noted. Caaasually. Really. "Got a nice sky. Good beaches. Decent dorms. Fucked-up radio show that I ain't readin' for no more..."
Rude
"...Hot cheerleaders..." Rude chipped in. He was helpful that way. "Of course, right here is good, too."
Elena
"I'm not saying I'd be gone forever," Elena reassured Rude. Her glasses didn't match, but rum floats didn't require fancy stemware.
She turned her attention to Reno, trying not to sound intrigued by the idea. "Wouldn't that be weird for you?" she asked. "Me going to your school?"
There had to be some good, solid reason she couldn't go to that island. Didn't there?
Reno
Reno shrugged.
"It ain't my school no more. It's my Alma Mater, or whatever." He grinned faintly. It was kind of forced, but it was still a grin. "An' besides, if I can find me there, it'll probably do wonders for you, Rookie."
A beat. An almost wild smirk.
"Go Gremlins, zoto."
Elena
She wasn't considering this. It was ridiculous. It was ludicrous. It was insanity itself. An hour ago, she'd been a Turk, and now, she was going to pack everything she owned and go back to high school?
Why was that any more ridiculous than going to Mideel? Aside from the fact that one of the two places was here, on this planet, and the other was a dimensional nexus.
"Is there a fight song I'd need to learn?" she asked. Teasing. In the morning, she'd go to Tseng and grovel to have her job back. In the morning ...
Reno
"All you gotta really keep in mind are two things, yo. First, don't forget to avoid the real gremlins, yo. They're more hardcore then the wimpy shitheads here that just make you get all mopey, yo. An' second? Keep tellin' yourself, 'yeah, it's real, no, I ain't nuts.'"
Reno was awesome at selling the place, wasn't he?
Rude
"And third, videotape EVERYTHING and email it to us," Rude added. "...Especially if it involves sex."
Elena
"You want footage of my sex life?" Elena asked. "It's going to be a depressing video."
It was harder to go to the bar and find someone to take home when you lived in a place like Edge. Which was a point in this island's favor.
She handed a glass to each of them before lifting her own in a hesitant toast. "I can't tell if you guys are serious about this," she admitted. "I'm going to pack, and then you'll both laugh at me and say you went to Tseng and got me my job back."
Elena was surprised to realize how disappointed she would be, to unpack and go back to work like nothing had happened. She'd rather ... go to boarding school? In that weird, crazy place of Reno's?
Reno
Reno smirked, took his glass, and lifted it.
"Sounds to me like you could use the vacation, Rookie. Don't worry about the job. I got it covered, yo."
Double-shifts! More monsters to kill! How could that possibly go badly?
Elena
Vacation? She couldn't remember the last time she'd even had one.
"What are you going to tell Tseng?"
She wasn't going to go talk to him. That would be ... messy.
Rude
"That you're fucking hot young guys who aren't him," Rude answered.
Then he lifted his glass and drank like there was nothing unusual about what he'd just said.
Elena
He was the best Rude ever ever. And she was ... free. To be Elena. Maybe for the first time.
"Go, Gremlins," she said, lifting her own glass and draining it.
(NFI, NFB. Preplayed with raspberryturk and sarcasm_guy, who rock the hizzy. Part 2 of 2, which means I'm done spamming now. OOC is love.)