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Taking Care of Business	By : Turkaholic Category: Final Fantasy VII > Yaoi - Male/Male Views: 1121 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own Final Fantasy VII, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 10
- 11
- 12
Chapter 11

The guy looked down at me, grinning, the switchblade reflecting the dim green neon striplight behind my head, while I sat there fucking weaponless.

Why the hell hadn't I realised my gun was missing before?

My eyes darted over his shoulder. I could see the back of Rude's head - shiny, pink, and completely fucking useless. The bastard hadn't noticed anything, and now? Now it was too late.

"You gonna say something?" Mocked the guy with the knife. He was speaking lowly, making sure the only person that heard was the weaponless idiot right here in the chair. "I thought you were meant to be tough. Looks like Shinra's all talk after all."

I growled under my breath, sitting forwards. Sure, I never expected to live to a ripe old age - go grey, buy a rocking chair, end up with false teeth, an incontinence problem and a walking frame, but then I sure as hell didn't want to die here - stabbed to death by a booze addled greasemonkey in a crappy, vomit-soaked bar.

I could only imagine what Tseng'd say at my funeral.

"You put that knife down, you'll find out who's all talk." I said - a little louder than the guy in front of me. I was hoping Rude would hear my voice and run to my rescue, but Rude's a hell of a lot like me when it comes to picking up chicks. Everything else just goes over your head.

The guy just chuckled. "Oh yeah, I bet you'd love that." The blade came nearer. I tried my damndest not to draw back. Even if I was drunk and Lola-less, I still had my damn pride. "You'd love to add another victim to your collection, wouldn't ya? But not tonight."

The guy leaned further forwards and placed the knife against one of the scars on my cheek. I hate to admit it, but I flinched - only a little. Anywhere else, I would have kept my cool, but there? I'd had enough knives in my fucking face to last me more than a lifetime. It was enough to make the guy feel smug, though. "Get up, Turk. We're going for a walk."

My mind was practically doing fucking cartwheels, the amount of thinking I was trying to do. You ever been in a life-or-death situation? Trust me, it does wonders for your IQ. Shame it ain't permanent, or I'd've been a goddamn genius by now. The adrenaline was sobering me up fast - my double vision was gone. A plan was slowly forming... I just needed a little more time.

"Now!" Hissed the knife guy. Now that he was in focus, I realised something.

Something that made my stomach feel like it was inside a car crusher.

This guy... this apparently drunken, stupid guy had been faking it.

He was stone cold sober. This wasn't some stupid drunken attack. It was planned.

Well, if he could fake it, so could I.

I stood up, swaying slightly and holding onto the wall for support. He snorted in laughter and his ugly little hand waved the knife in my direction. "Look at this. The high-and-mighty Turk, completely out of his face. Don't worry, you're probably so drunk it won't hurt much when I rip your guts out."

"Try it... pussy." I slurred, stumbling past him, my eyes out of focus. I felt the knife pressing into my back now. My heart felt like it was about to rip through my chest like an alien. Could I pull this off? Come on, Reno, you've had enough practice acting drunk before...

Last chance to make my move. Once we were outside I was a dead man.

Ah fuck, this was really going to hurt.

I pretended to stumble over one of the crappy plastic chairs, and threw myself down, as far away from that knife as possible. Splaying out as I fell, three or four empty chairs overturned, filling the entire damn bar with a ruckus so loud I thought my eardrums were going to explode. I collided with the floor at full force. My head smacked against the black, sticky tiles so hard I was sure it must have cracked open like an egg. I had no idea what was happening - I felt like I was staring at a goddamn disco ball as lights flashed in front of my eyes - but I listened.

Either I was about to get turned into Turk shish-kebab, or my plan was going to work.

There was the smallest god damn silence, but to me it felt like a million years, lying there, expecting any minute to feel steel sever my spine. Then came a roar that sounded like an angry bull, and three gunshots. Screams, the sound of breaking glass, running footsteps, a door slamming. And then silence.

Well, I wasn't dead, that at least was a good sign. I tried to sit up, but my head hurt so damn much that my muscles decided to follow suit. Suddenly I was aching like hell, and I could feel something warm and sticky running down my forehead.

"Reno."

That was Rude's concerned voice, unless the fall had completely fucked me up. I tried to open an eye, but whatever was running down my head seeped into my eyes.

"...Ow." Came my amazingly articulate reply.

I felt myself being lifted up - about as easily as a rag doll.

"Oh, thank god, he's alive." That was a woman's voice - the barmaid, I think. "Rude, put him down here. Let me take a look." Somebody put something cold against my head and I was sat in a chair. After a moment, I managed to open my eyes.

Everything was blurry as hell - worse than if I'd knocked back the entire Midgar spirit supply. My head was thumping like someone was mining for gold in there. I raised a hand to my pounding head - only to have my wrist pulled back down to my side by an out-of-focus brunette woman.

Apparently, the rest of the regulars had bolted home as soon as they sensed trouble. Best not to get involved with Shinra's battles.

"Did... did'ja get the bastard?" I croaked. Rude growled.

"Got away." He sounded unbelieveably pissed. Good. It was his damn fault I had to throw myself on the floor in the first place.

"'S cause you're a crap shot."

The barmaid tutted. "You would have died if it wasn't for Rude!" Apparently she didn't get my humour. "He was so brave. He worked out what had happened straight away." She did, however, seem pretty determined to defend the guy. Even in my fucked up state, I couldn't help smirking weakly. It was about time he got laid. Maybe he'd loosen up a little.

The barmaid stood up and went to get some bandages, and I slowly realised that the stuff pouring down my face was blood. My vision started to focus a little more and I looked down - my shirt was nearly red. Apparently I really had cracked my head open on the way down.

"Sounds like she's sweet on you, big guy."

"She gave me her number."

"Think she'd hook up with me?"

"The way you look now? No."

Ah thanks Rude, glad to know you'll be there if I need an ego boost. "What happened?"

The weak smirk fell off my face like it was greased, remembering the reason I got into the shit mess in the first place. Truth was, I had no idea where the hell Lola was. Had I left her back at my apartment? Tseng's apartment? Oh shit, had I lost it down in the pawn shop?!

I explained groggily- trying not to hurl all over the guy through pain - what had happened - the drunk, the knife, the threat, my gun... and finally deciding to fall flat on my fucking face just to pull his attention away from getting laid. His brow furrowed. "You should tell the boss."

I tried to imagine how Tseng would take the news. I could only imagine it would end with me being thrown from a 69th floor window. "Nah, he's got enough crap to deal with."

Rude saw straight through it. He just snorted at me. "Chicken."

You know, I always thought Rude had missed his calling. He would have made an awesome sports commentator. He was always so damn articulate.

The barmaid came back into the room, a concerned look on her face. She handed me a glass of water and started cleaning up my face gently. I could taste blood, my head, nose, chest, knees - screw it. Everything fucking hurt. As I sat there, covered in blood, sipping down ice water, being called chicken, and suddenly feeling the loss of Lola like a body part, I was beginning to wonder whether letting the guy rip my guts out with a knife might have been a funner end to the night.

"I've cleaned you up as best I can." The brunette said a few minutes later. Well, I felt a little better anyway. I tried to give her one of my seductive looks, just to make me feel a little better, y'know? She just smiled at me weirdly. Apparently my sex appeal wasn't at it's best when I'd just thrown myself onto a concrete floor. "You should still go into a hospital overnight. Just in case you have concussion."

I froze.

"No. No, no way in hell!" I stood up, dizzy as fuck but determined to stay upright. Rude and the barmaid stood up with me. They both looked beyond nonplussed. "I mean... I feel fine." I added weakly.

Yeah Reno, because smashing your damn head open and nearly being gutted? Better than sex, booze and cigarettes all rolled into one.

You know, I used to love getting sent to the hospital floor. I used to try faking every goddamn disease known to humanity just so I could spend half a day down there. For one reason, I'd get to sit around doing jack shit and get paid for it, which in turn made Tseng so frustrated he nearly had a fit, which in turn made me practically fucking giddy with amusement. Secondly, if I was really lucky, I'd spend a few days surrounded by smoking hot nurses in tight uniforms who thought that I was a Sex God. It was like being in my own private porn film. And thirdly, there was the absolute insane high of Mako Fluid. Man, that stuff made you feel like you were floating on air, surrounded by butterflies and unicorns and pixies and shit. even if - like me - you'd been shot in three different places, or hell even electrocuted half to death with your own EMR, a few minutes with that stuff and you'd think you were halfway to the moon.

The trouble was that none of it appealed anymore. At all. In fact, anybody even mentioned heading down to the hospital floor and I broke out into a cold sweat. Hospitals, Mako fluid... that stuff was now nightmare material, kept locked as far down into my twisted little subconscious as it possibly could be. But then, how the hell were Rude and this chick to know that I'd rather bleed to death than spend half a day up there?

I started walking towards the door, unsteady as hell.

"Don't be a dumbass. Sit."

"Make me." I spat.

Bad choice of words.

The next thing I knew I was back on Rude's shoulder, like a sack of potatoes or something. Sometimes it sucks being this slim and attractive.

"Fuck you, Rude. I'm goin' home. Try an' stop me an' I'll use your balls as a hat."

Yeah it was an empty threat, and a fucking bad one at that, but it was the best I could do. Satan would be ice skating to work before I put another foot in that god damn hospital, even if I had to bite Rude's arms off and beat him to death with them to let me go.

"Shut up Reno." Rude growled, apparently not phased by my pathetic struggles to get free. Didn't stop me trying though. In fact, I was so damn busy flailing like a dying fish, that it took me five minutes to realise we weren't in the bar anymore. I stopped struggling. Like I could get out of Rude's grip of death, anyway.

"Can ya at least put me the hell down?" I sighed. My head was throbbing, and Rude ain't exactly got the most elegant walk in the world. Besides, I was starting to get bored of looking at his ass.

"You gonna run?"

"....Do I look like I could fucking run?"

He seemed to consider it a second. I'd been known to try some stupid shit when I was injured, but the way I felt right now, I'd be lucky to make it ten feet without falling flat on my face. Again.

Rude seemed to come to the same conclusion. He placed me on the pavement with about as much effort as putting down a paper bag, then he looked at me, irritatedly. I just rubbed my head and looked around.

We were standing in the urine-soaked alley outside my apartment.

I glared at him. "I thought you and your wife were takin' me to the hospital."

"You want me to make you go?" He asked, wiping my blood off his shoulder. I opened my mouth, ready to insult the living crap out of the guy for being such a bastard, but then I closed it again. I hadn't even said thank you, and I'd probably stopped the poor guy getting laid tonight.

I mean, there was about as much chance of me saying thank you to the son of a bitch as seeing Palmer take up ballet, but still, I wasn't gonna tear him a new one just for bringing me home.

"...Guess you ain't as much of a bastard as I thought." I gave him a half-assed smirk and pulled my goggles off to ease my aching head, letting my bangs fall down over my face. "Hell of a night."

"Tell me about it."

With the little energy I had left I smacked the guy on the shoulder, kind of non-verbal affection. "See ya in work tomorrow."

Rude snorted and smacked me back, adding a bruised shoulder to all the other aches and pains I had.

"Huh. If you're not dead yet."

He turned on his heel and stomped away towards the end of the alley, with all the grace of a wounded elephant, then He turned the corner and disappeared from sight.

Once he'd disappeared, I stumbled up the steps and tried to open the door as quietly as possible. My head was getting worse, my entire body ached like hell, and I was more than a little upset about losing Lola; not to mention the amount of thoughts buzzing round my head... The ambush in the slums; the trap at the bar... were they all part of the same thing? Did the guy at the bar somehow know I had no gun?

Ugh, this was making my brain hurt. I'd ask Tseng... when I built up the courage to tell him, that is.

I took my blood soaked shirt off as soon as the door closed, and dumped it on the already cluttered floor. All I wanted to do was climb into bed and sleep this shit off like a bad dream. Hey who knows, when I woke up, I might have dreamed the whole fucking mess.

Yeah, I've tried that method before. It ain't worked so far, but who knows, right?

I was about to head through to the bedroom when something stopped me. I couldn't tell ya what it was - a feeling, a sound, a smell... just something that put the hairs up on the back of my neck.

I was tired, headsore and bruised, but Tseng trained me pretty damn well, and I know when to follow my instincts. Right now my instincts were telling me that something was wrong. Really wrong.

I looked around in the dark in a panic. Surely the same crap couldn't happen to me three times in 24 hours?

But I could feel it: There was somebody in the apartment.
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Taking Care of Business