Final Fantasy - All Series Fan Fiction ❯ Fired?! ❯ Chapter 1

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Fired?!
Part 1
An Advent Children Parody.



Reno settled his goggles on his forehead. Time to get to work he thought as he snatched up his weapon.  It had a rather odd look to it, a long metal rod that was a cross between a bokken and a taser.  It was standard issue for Turks but he thought it was cool.  He fastened a leather bracelet to his wrist; a thong ran from a ring on the bracelet to the butt of the weapon.  Perfect as usual, He exited his room, for some reason all the Turks had rooms here, almost as if Rufus was afraid to be without his bodyguards, even though most times he sent them off on various missions.  It seemed that most of the missions ended in some degree of failure more than success.  He could count the successfully completed missions on one hand.   He was vaguely amazed that President Rufus kept them around; the only thing they seemed to be good at was keeping him alive.  He stopped in front of Rude's door and rapped at it with one knuckle.

   "Yo, Rude.  Time to go."  He wasn't particularly surprised when he got no verbal reply, but the door didn't open either.  He stood outside Rude's door for a moment, needlessly smoothing out his suit.  When Rude still didn't open his door a nagging sense of something wrong began to seep into his consciousness.  Reno knocked again, and tried the knob, it was locked.  He frowned to himself and headed down the hall to Rufus' suite, maybe Rude had left early.  True, it'd never happened before but it was possible, he supposed.
  He stopped outside the front of Rufus' door and looked around, the feeling of impending doom was still growing.  He gripped the handle of his weapon tightly and raised his empty hand to knock on the door.  He had barely knocked once when he heard the familiar command "Enter."
Reno obeyed and the door slid shut with a final sounding click, his eyes scanned the room for a moment before settling on his boss.  All the Turks were in the room slightly behind and to either side of Rufus.  Nothing was out of the ordinary except the tension in the air and the fact that none of his fellow Turks would meet his eyes.
   "Sir?"  Reno bowed slightly and waited for someone to say something.

"I've been reviewing the Turks Performance lately and a few things have come to my attention, Reno.  It seems that every mission you are sent on does not go well."  Rufus said in a voice that held no emotion and brooked no argument.  "If I didn't know better, I would question your loyalty, but it appears that your continued failure is due to incompetence rather than traitorous intent."
  Reno's jaw dropped and he stared blankly at Rufus, unable to think of any response.  "Sir, I. . . "
Rufus raised a hand to silence his protest.  "You are on leave Reno until told otherwise.  You are dismissed."
  Reno continued to stare in stunned silence for a moment before he pulled himself together enough to bow again.  "Yes, sir."  He stiffly took himself out of the room and the Shinra owned building, not really noticing where his feet took him.

Reno is sitting in the corner behind the pinball machine, a half drunk bottle of sake held loosely in one hand and very drunk. Tifa is busy behind the counter, busing herself with cleaning and tidying up while keeping a careful watch on Reno. She hoped Cloud would come back soon or the Turks would come drag him off somewhere else. He looked like he had gotten into a fight or two before he arrived, his suit was rumpled but there didn't seem to be a scratch on him.

"I don't need em, yo." He mumbled to himself and took another mouthful of sake. His eyes were clouded over and he slumped to the floor. Whether he was truly passed out or not, Tifa wasn't sure. She waited a few minutes and when he didn't move she wiped her hands on a dishtowel and walked over to him. She prodded him with one toe and he slurred out something incomprehensible. With a sigh of disgust, she pulled the bottle of sake from his hand and set it on the table then rolled Reno onto his side.
"Why is Cloud never here when he'd be useful" Tifa asked herself and walked back behind the bar.
Reno woke with a throbbing head some time later. Somehow he'd gotten a bed or was put into one. He had no idea where he was and his brain refused to work. He closed his eyes and rubbed his temples with a hand. When he sat up he found that however he'd gotten into the bed it was fully clothed except for his jacket, boots, and weapon. He set his feet on the floor and began to groggily search for his boots. There was the sound of footsteps in the hall, each step echoed in his aching skull, but fortunately they stopped in the doorway. Reno half turned, overbalanced and half fell onto the bed, still holding a boot in one hand. He flinched as the light was turned on.
He was vaguely surprised to see Cloud standing in the doorway. "This isn't an inn."
"Yo, Cloud." Reno plastered an oafish grin on his face as he managed to tug on a boot. Some dim corner of his mind realizing the fact that he was hung over and still drunk.
"Why are you here?" Cloud asked as Reno managed to pull on his other shoe. Reno stood and reached for his jacket, misjudged the distance again and knocked his chin on the edge of the seat as he fell forward. He pulled himself up and smoothed out his clothing as best he could.
"Rufus didn't send me if that's what you want to know. Yo." He reached for his weapon and fastened its thong to the ring on the leather bracelet he wore. When he turned, he found himself staring down the length of Cloud's sword.
"I don't believe you." Cloud stated. Reno batted the sword away with his weapon; annoyance was starting to filter through his drunkenness and headache.
"Then beat the answer you want out of me. I know longer work for the Turks, yo" He glared at Cloud a moment then lunged forward, forcing Cloud back into the hallway.
The hallway was too narrow for Cloud to do more than block Reno's attacks and he hesitated to either kill Reno or face Tifa's wrath if anything were broken.
Reno backed him down the hallway to the stair landing and aimed a blow to Cloud's head when Reno's cell phone began to ring. Reno looked down in half drunken amazement at his pocket, as Cloud leaped forward and shoved Reno off balance and down the staircase.
Reno crashed down the staircase and landed in a heap at the bottom of the stairs. The force of his impact knocked a picture off the wall and it crashed to the ground. Tifa seemed to appear from nowhere as Reno was trying to sort himself out and grabbed one of his ears in a hand. She used her grip to pull him to his feet and frog march him out the door to her bar.
"Owwwww let go. That hurts Yo." Reno protested and rubbed at his ear when she let his ear go outside. She turned on her heel and stormed back inside.
Reno was still rubbing his ear and glaring at the closed door when Cloud came outside. Cloud watched him a moment before speaking.
"Why did Rufus send you?"
"He didn't send me, yo? I was fired." He wavered a little on his feet, adrenaline was burning away the alcohol in his body but he still wasn't sober. "I'm as much a Turk as you are SOLDIER, yo."
Reno charged Cloud again and Cloud simply stepped out of the way then kicked him to the ground. Reno started to climb to his feet but stopped when he felt the sharp edge of Cloud's sword at the back of his neck. He glared at the ground; everything in his life was fine until Cloud and his friends showed up. He couldn't even beat Cloud; maybe he was incompetent after all.
Reno's hand tightened on his weapon reflexively before he dropped it. He drove his fist into the ground and a faint tremor ran through him and he punched the ground again. The pressure of the sword against his neck vanished, but his anger at being beaten built as the thought of being incompetent rattled around in his inebriated skull.
"I'm not incompetent, you?" Reno muttered to himself. Behind him, cloud shifted uneasily.
"What?"
Reno's shoulder's Trembled with repressed anger. "I'm Not Incompetent, Yo?!" His right hand gripped the rubber handle of his weapon and he sung around to face Cloud.
Cloud backed away a few steps, a look of faint surprise crossing his face. Reno swung his weapon at Cloud and there was a metallic clash as Cloud parried. He slid his weapon down towards the hilt of the sword and close to Clouds face before pulling back and kicking upward. Cloud caught his ankle and twisted, flipping Reno over. Reno kicked at Clouds feet to make him back away before leaping to his. He jumped backward to avoid Clouds attack then darted inside Clouds reach before he even thought about it and jabbed the blunt tip of his weapon into Cloud's side and pushed the button, sending a jolt of electricity through Cloud. Cloud gasped in shock and brought the hilt of his sword forcefully back into Reno's face. Reno staggered backward, one hand clutching the left side of his face. Cloud twirled his sword over his head and brought it back around in his Cross Slash attack. Reno's eyes widened and he made a desperate attempt to block. Cloud pulled some of the force of his attack but it still sent Reno measuring his length on the street, out cold.
Cloud turned toward 7th heaven and saw Tifa standing in the doorway; she was looking past Cloud to where Reno lay.
"Elena called. Reno was telling the truth. Rude got fired this morning and is looking for him.”
Cloud sighed and walked over to Reno. He knelt and lifted Reno over his shoulder and went inside. Tifa followed Cloud inside and helped him prop Reno in a corner. That done Cloud walked out the door, leaving Tifa to fix him up.
Reno woke up again as Tifa was doctoring his bleeding nose.
"Lean your head back and hold this." He numbly obeyed her instructions. "Elena said Rude got fired today. I suppose Cloud went to go get him."
Reno closed his eyes and wished he could will himself deaf too; he wasn't really in the mood for talking.

He was nursing a cup of tea when Cloud returned, his nose had stopped bleeding and so had the split on his lip he'd gotten from the hilt of Cloud's sword. Tifa had refused to give him anything alcoholic and suggested to Marlene that a tea party would cheer him up. So here he was sipping a cup of tea and staring at finger foods with Marlene, a teddy bear, rabbit and a stuffed moogle. Sometime during the party he'd been given a newspaper hat to wear. Somehow he just couldn't find the resolve to say no to Marlene with Tifa looming in the background. If Tifa could make Cloud do what she wanted him to, then he had no desire to incur her wrath. Reno listened to Marlene talk about Aeris' flowers and a rather amusing story about Cloud.
Reno looked up when Rude followed Cloud in. "Yo, buddy. . . " And broke off at the smiles on rude and Cloud's faces.
"Nice Hat." Rude said and sat down at a table next to Reno. Cloud watched them a moment then turned away with a sound that sounded suspiciously like a chuckle.
"At least it's not a dress. yo?" Reno said and set the newspaper hat at an even more absurd angle. Cloud stiffened and shot Reno a black look before going to talk to Tifa.
Reno met Rude's questioning glance with a smirk and raised his cup of tea.  "I'll tell you later, yo?
Rude nodded once and drank from the cup that Marlene poured for him.  Marlene was talking in detail about something that had happened earlier and Reno pretended to listen, wishing again that it was alcohol in his cup instead of tea.  He drained the cup and set it down on the table, wondering how long tea parties lasted.  When he looked up again, Tifa stood behind Marlene.

"Marlene why don't you go make sure Denzel is behaving?  We need to talk to these two."  Tifa suggested.  

Marlene nodded, "Reno has to come play again tomorrow, ok?"  

Reno looked askance at Tifa but Tifa just smiled at him.  He coughed and glanced at Rude, then sighed and nodded a reluctant agreement.  Marlene smiled happily and gathered up her stuffed animals and ran to put them away.  A few moments later, Marlene was outside.
Tifa took the seat that Marlene had vacated and poured herself a cup of tea.  Cloud leaned back against the bar, his arms crossed as he stared at a picture on the wall.  Reno plucked the newspaper hat of his head and set it on the table.  
"It was nice of you to humor Marlene, Reno.  No one seems to have time to play these days."  Reno focused on a chip in the tabletop and muttered something noncommittal.  "But no one expects you to entertain a little girl everyday.  What will you do?"
"I don't know."  Reno replied after a moment.  "It's not like there's much we can do, yo?"
"No Food Service." Rude commented and straightened the cuffs of his suit.
"Bouncers." Cloud suggested after a moment, but didn't turn his attention away from the picture. "Cid mentioned that the Honey Bee was hiring."
Tifa's face took on a look of resigned disgust. "Better than nothing I suppose." Tifa sighed. "Cloud can show you where it is later."
Rude cleared his throat and Reno felt his ears burn. "We know where it is, yo?"
"Men." Tifa muttered, if she was going to say anything else she was interrupted by the door flying open.
Marlene came running in the door holding something close to her chest with both hands. Denzel followed behind her, a mischievous grin lighting his face. Marlene ran up to the table and stopped beside Reno. "Mr. Reno, We brought you something to cheer you up."
She held both her hands out to him and he reached out his to accept whatever it was, curiously. She deposited a fuzzy bundle of blue feathers in his hands. Reno looked at it as whatever it was raised it's beaked head to look at him.
"Kweh?" The blue chocobo chick cocked its head to one side and looked at him quizzically with a bright brown eye, before pecking at the shiny metal on his leather bracelet.
"Her name is Sprinkles. We can't have a pet so you can have her."
"Uh, thanks, yo? I'll take good care of it. . uh, Sprinkles." Reno managed to smile at Marlene and petted the chick. Marlene beamed at him then Ran back outside. He wondered absently what he was going to do with a chocobo and didn't hear Tifa's question. He was brought back to the present when Rude kicked him under the table and Tifa rapped her knuckles on his forehead.
"What was that for, yo?" He protested.
"I was asking where you planned on living." Tifa repeated.
"Well, we had rooms at Shinra. . ." Reno started.
"You can stay downstairs until you find someplace. I guess Sprinkles can stay as well, but." Tifa pointed a finger at him. "You clean up after it. I'll ask Elena to send over your things."