New Junon, FFVII (Tseng/Reno) Title:New Junon Author/Artist: greenjudy Rating:R Warnings: language, "adult situations" Word count: 844 Prompt: Final Fantasy VII, Tseng/Reno: Trust – Seize the day, put no trust in tomorrow. Summary: Of all the gin joints in all the world, you had to walk into this one. A/N: This probably isn't quite what the prompt was looking for. True ukemi, though, requires a lot of trust. On both sides.
I recognize the shoulder line, first: his back is turned to me, there’s a band of bright daylight from the window on the floor in front of the table where he’s drinking with a couple of other guys. I’m on my way over to order a drink from the bar and this is what I see out of the corner of my eye.
Weirdness.
I steal a glance as I cross Tseng’s line of sight, and we lock eyes: big mistake.
The first thing I feel is shock, a kind of shock on his behalf, and I wish I could take myself right out of there, rewind and back up and get all the way out of town; do it over, come back from my gig in Corel and get back out of the helicopter and walk into chirpy little Morning Snack instead of this place, the derelict and sour-smelling Argot Flower.
Based on my own experience, you get that waxy complexion around day three of the bender. His eyes are charcoal smudges, his expression too complex to parse, but way down deep under the hunger and the fatigue and the exultant darkness, I catch it, a signal, the real reason I should never have looked.
You’re about to break his cover, Reno, you stupid fuck.
It’s too late to fake my way past this moment. It’s too clear that we know each other. Tseng’s drinking buddies perk up a little. Throughout most of Old Midgar, neither of us could have pulled this off; we cut too high a profile, Shinra flacks, big boys in the playground.
But this isn’t Old Midgar; this is New Junon.
“Prakesh,” one of Tseng’s buddies says. Tseng shakes his head slightly. Greasy strands of hair slip across his face.
“Prakesh, you got a problem?” the other one asks.
The other one is the problem.
See, we don’t need it anymore, the drug that was marketed as a way to slow the effects of Geostigma. We don’t need it, but—hey, this is weird—we kind of do need it, now more than ever. And the poppy fields of ruined Mideel, and the sketchy shipping regulations covering maritime freight out of Costa Del Sol—we need those, too. You see how this works? A shiny new Golden Triangle. With New Junon as the hypoteneuse: Shit Central.
And this guy, unless I’m deeply mistaken, is Parvel Har, the one guy in this town you just don’t want to meet, New Junon’s custodial consigliere.
It all comes together in one shiny-bright instant of Reno clarity.
Fuck me, what have I done?
Tseng blinks, once.
Either I have my gut instinct on how to fix this, or I’ve got nothing. Either my next move will set him up as the Lizard King or it will get him eviscerated.
“Long time no see,” I say, “baby.”
He’s on his feet all of a sudden. I keep his friends in my peripheral vision as clear as I can; they are watching speculatively as he pushes the little round table back with his foot, crosses in front of the big guy to confront me. I recognize the remains of his subdued pinstripe suit, the shirtsleeves rolled, the pants rumpled and stained.
I let him grab me one-handed, by the lapel of my suit jacket. His free hand reaches toward my face. He runs a thumb across the scar under my left eye, the touch hard and sure.
There is no way to communicate past the roles we play. All we’ve got is the now, and my desperate hope that I haven’t just burned my boss to the ground.
Tseng draws me in – his hands ice cold – jams his tongue into my mouth, and grinds his hips into mine.
Don’t, I think, don’t lose it – ride –
I ride it, the ferocity of his kiss, his tongue cold and wet in my mouth, I feel the involuntary shudder, starting in him, traveling to me, note in passing with a shocked corner of my brain that he is erect; I gasp into his mouth, feel his weight shift, feel his hands twitch, and now I know what’s coming, I got it through skin contact, through breath and pressure and the touch of his tongue and his cock. He grips me, hard; yet I feel him relax, just a little, for he knows, we both know, we can’t fake anything about this moment, see–
The blow takes me just under the ribs, lifts me off my feet, tosses me on my can.
Tseng, his face blank, kicks me back into the corner.
I hear snorts of laughter coming from his table.
“Fuck me silly, Prakesh, no idea you was a queer, man,” says Parvel Har.
The other one chortles.
“Aw, man! Have to call Animal Sam, have him swap the bitches we got you for a couple of assboys. Holy shit, Prakesh, you ain’t just a assfucker, you a crazy assfucker.”