Final Fantasy - All Series Fan Fiction ❯ The Purloined Hair Materia ❯ Chapter 1- Hey Spiky! ( Chapter 1 )

Chapter one- "Hey Spiky"!

"It was an enigmatic and tempestuous night. The incessant rhythm of rain only escalated the resounding melancholy amidst the night's oppressive atmosphere; a hazardous fate could be lurking within any and every fold of the cities circuitous byways. I knew straight away that"-

"Will you shut up?!" Elena exclaimed, sharply cutting off Reno's baleful narration.

"Aww~ I'm just trying to add a little drama to the story!"

"You probably do enough of that when you brood while you're drunk. Now come down off of that gargoyle and pick up the pace, will you please?"

"Fine." whined Reno.

"The Shinra building is only a few more blocks down; are you certain it's a good idea to search trough the client files for suspects? Rufus is tetchy enough as it is right now, and I wouldn't want to think about what he'd do to you-to us if he caught you sneaking around in there."

"Hey, whoever stole that hair materia must be someone who recently visited the Shinra building, right?" Reno smugly intoned while checking to make sure that his pistol was immaculately clean.

"I suppose." admitted Elena. However, she couldn't help but think- Although, something tells me you aren't checking your gun for no reason at all. It wouldn't do you much good if you got the President's ire up.

"Well, why not go under the guise of a client?" Stated Reno, simultaneously holstering his revolver, and taking out a hip flask.

"Wow, for the first time this trip you're actually showing some skills in your profession," came Elena's exclamation of feigned amazement.

"Thanks! I think…"

Rounding a bend, the pair looked up to the most monstrous building one could ever imagine. Well, looked up as far as they could before their necks wouldn't bend anymore…

"Well…" said Elena, indicating the immense structure with a noncommittal air, "this is it."

While gaping at the building, Reno let out a low whistle (well, as much of a whistle as you can let out when your jaws are about five feet apart and your neck is stretched way back) and said "I've lived in this city most of my life, and the Shinra Building has always been a part of my landscape-a rather prominent part-but I never imagined it could… I mean, I never thought it would… it's enormous!"

"Yes, well, I never really pay attention to it any more" Elena said, quite indifferently, as she fished out her electric key card to open the door.

Once they were through the threshold, Elena pointed once again, and said, "That's the door leading to the cellar; we should be able to find the necessary files down there."

"The cellar?! How big is it??" Reno babbled in disbelief and with not a little bit of fear.

"I don't know," Elena answered, "I've never seen the whole thing."

Without another word (well, at least not any coherent words, Reno was whining and crying the whole time while Elena dragged him down the stairs), the pair proceeded to the door, and down the flight of stairs within.

A few hours later…

Okay, many hours later…

"Reno, have you found any leads yet?" Elena moaned as she read the company bulletin for the fortieth time.

In the corner of the room, Reno stood by a wall that was covered with filing cabinets. About his feet were many discarded sheets of paper (Actually, more like over his feet and up to his neck). Fishing out a file (literally, since he had to dive for it) Reno exclaimed, "Whoa!"

"What, you find a lead?" asked an incredulous Elena as she seemed to deflate onto the floor. "Hal-le-lu-jah!!"

"No, even better." Reno slowly rotated the file till it faced Elena, all dramatic and such, and said, "Would you look at the profile on that woman! Think she'd go for me?"

In an instant, Elena whipped out a flamethrower and torched the file. For a long time. A very long time.

Gazing at the cindered remains of the document, Reno slowly looked up at Elena, gauged her at about an 11 on the Richter scale, backed off about 3 inches (as much as he could manage in that pile) and pleaded-"Alright, alright, I get the idea!" he then rigorously returned to his work. More like hid in it. After a few more moments of digging, he said in an oh look at me, look at me, aren't I so skilled~ tone of voice, "Alright, I've narrowed it down to these three men." He swam up to her, fanning out the three sheets of paper, and pointed "Here," he pointed to one with a picture of a spiky headed freak, "is a man named Cloud Strife. I consider him suspect, well, for quite obvious reasons I should say."

"So he's the man we go to see first, Reno?"

"Yes, we'll stop by there tonight."

"Tonight, Reno, is almost morning. What possible excuse could we make for stopping by this early in the day without drawing unwanted attention?"

"Think about it, Elena. What's the one salesman that can come across as stupid, lost, and desperate for just some place to dump his wares?"

Elena raised an eyebrow in half skepticism, and half apprehension.

Seeing Elena's uncertainty, Reno impishly supplied, "Why, as a teenage pizza delivery guy, of course."

Elena responded by dropping her face in her hands and emitting a low, pathetic groan of despair.

At the outskirts of town

"Reno, this will never work." Elena whined, face still in hands.

"Sure it will", consoled Reno, whilst adjusting his ridiculous looking paper hat and the box of half-eaten cold pizza he'd fished from his office on his way over. "I just have to act dumb, and convince whoever's home that I'm innocent enough to be let inside the house and give my supposed pizza shop a call."

"Well, I guess that the first part should be no trouble." Elena mumbled as she drug her hands off of her face with an effort.

"Hush." Reno responded, an air of extreme confidence about him. "This is the place, now you just stand back, while I do my thing."

"Believe me," Elena sarcastically replied, "I've seen you do your `thing', and I'll have no problem with staying back. Way back."

Reno pretended to ignore her as he skipped up the porch of a rather quaint little house, smiling with his upper lip extended about three inches from his face. The house was beautiful, compassed about with various exotic blossoms, and constructed from simple brick. Once before the door, Reno rang the bell and donned an expression of what could only be described as your basic "would you like fries with that" face. However, after the door had been answered, all pretense of stupidity became unnecessary, as the beauty of the woman left Reno dumbfounded. Her hair was a frame of glorious, sheen chestnut hair, done up in a rather complex plait that dangled behind her back. Her eyes were emerald facets that gleamed like a thousand mirrors. Her face was pale and frail, as though the mask of an angel. Trying with all his might to keep his mind on the job, but still failing miserably, Reno blurted, "Hi, I'm Reno! Would you like my number? "

Raising a single brow in skepticism, the woman responded, "Is there something that you want?"

Shaking away from his gawking, and only half succeeding, Reno fumbled, "Um, pizza!"

Absolutely baffled, the jade-eyed female replied, "I'm sorry, we don't have any."

"What? No, I mean that I want you to have pizza. No, wait, I mean that I want you to buy pizza. Um, here" Reno jutted forth the box to punctuate his point.

Completely bemused, the auburn maned woman said, "But, sir, we didn't order any."

Donning a pretense of annoyance, Reno snapped his finger as he stated, "Blast. Can I use your phone? I'll need to inform the shop that I couldn't make the delivery."

Slightly suspicious, but allowing her benevolence to win over, the woman stood aside, and said, "Yes, please come in?"

Reno traipsed through the now open threshold and came to stand in the center of a cozy little family room. After the woman had shut the door, Reno spun round, withdrew his badge, and dutifully stated, "Alright sister, this is a search warrant, now tell me where your husband is, I have a few questions for him."

Completely taken off guard, the woman was able to do nothing but meekly mutter, "H-he's not home at the moment..."

Replacing his badge, a perverse sneer spread across Reno's face, as he lewdly replied, "He's not home, eh? Well then, I suppose I simply have to begin the search with you." He slowly advanced towards the helpless lady (although, had he gotten much closer, he would've found she wasn't that `helpless'). However, before Reno even took his seventh pace, he felt a light tap upon his shoulder. Turning about in surprise, Reno beheld a navy-clad, flaxen banged man, whose deep azure eyes were trilling with rage. Reno's sneer deepened, almost into a cringe, as he greeted the figure (who stood about a foot taller than he did). "Hey spiky."

With no sense of the civility in his voice, the man demanded, "What exactly are you doing here??"

Reno swallowed a lump from his throat, and answered, "I… I… am here on legal business! Yeah, and, uh, you will cooperate or face …serious …charges!" Reno smiled ingratiatingly after the last and started backing towards the door.

With an audible crack to his knuckles, and a sidelong glance while he cracked his neck, the man smiled with morbid delight, took Reno by the throat, and began a series of actions that are far too gory to describe in this G-rated story.

Elena stood leaning against a street lamp, gazing at the clouds to pass the time. Wondering at Reno's progress, she stared towards the house within which he'd entered, and after she'd done so, there arose from that house mentioned house a mind-searing shriek of colossal proportions (Colossal in that mouse-like squeaking sense). Withdrawing her hands from her ears, Elena looked again to the house, and there saw a red tipped blur flail from the house's second story, and land upon the street in a painful-looking and -sounding fashion.

After the blur had landed, a man's head poked out from the second story window, and said, "Get so `friendly' with my wife again, and I'll use your entrails to paint a mural of warning on the side of my house to others like you!" With that, the man's head withdrew from the window, and the said window was slammed shut.

Casually traipsing over to the twitching lump, Elena sighed as she asked, "What'd you find?

Shakily coming to his feet. Reno painfully responded, "I ~ search ~ mm-hmm. Not ~ did ~ get ~ perform ~ do ~ see?"

Setting her palm to her chin in thought, Elena followed up with, "Well then, I suppose that we're just going to have to keep looking."

Shaking his head with a gaga-like manner in the negative, Reno amended, still staring at the pretty little birdies above his head- "No, ya see, Is gots ta smell his ha-ir as he was throt-lin, uh, pumlin, uh, whupping my tinie finie heinie. And, it weren't no gel, naw, it were quick dry cement. How does I know it were quick dry cement, hrmm, well honeyy~, believe me, nobody, and Is means nobody knows the smell of cement close up likes Is do!" That said Reno fainted forward to be caught by Elena.

Supporting the unconscious Reno in her arms, Elena looked to the sky as if seeking divine guidance, and exasperatedly intoned, "It's going to be a long weekend."

*Author's Note-Yeah, yeah, I know, It's been years since I've done anything with this story, in fact it's probably been so long that the few of you who might have read this story's first chapter don't even care by now, but nevertheless, I might as well stick with the saying and make it late rather than never. On a final note, for those of you who reviewed my first installment of this story, thanks.