What's funny now is how long Tseng has known Reno without ever really knowing him at all.
It is always a surprise. It was a surprise the first time, when Reno slapped those confidential reports into his hands and told him that he'd brought them all this way because he thought that Tseng would enjoy them. It was a surprise when Tseng held that gun to Veld's head and looked over his shoulder to see Reno, looking not at his director or the gun but at him, nodding and waiting. It'd been a surprise almost every day, every morning that Tseng woke up and thought this is it, it has to be, only to discover his visions of mutiny and betrayal had been trumped by the reality of Reno appearing in the office, every single day, maybe tired, maybe hungover, but forever prepared to be one of his Turks. Every time, it is a shocking, sobering surprise.
This time, even more so. Reno's presence is so familiar to him now, but he does not allow himself to believe it until he sees it with his own eyes. Jumping, rolling, gracefully scaling dangerous peaks and crumbling ledges. It isn't the acrobatics it takes to reach him that he is so confounded by, but the simple matter that he is trying to reach him at all, that he is here, that again he knew just where to find him.
His smile fades, but not completely. Reno takes his place by Tseng's side as if neither of them ever left their fated positions. Tseng isn't sure what happened after his death, but he gets the feeling now that it must have felt very wrong because nothing in this world feels so right as this. Such a dangerous thought, a perfect hook for a monster of a man like himself to sow suffering. But they have suffered, haven't they?
And here they are now, grinning at each other at the ends of the earth.
"You weren't there," Tseng says, plucking the cigarette from Reno's lips. He cannot help but to savor that first drag, his eyelids drawn low, his nostrils flaring as he breathes out twin plumes of smoke that drift and curl and threaten to cloud up all of Midgar.
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It is always a surprise. It was a surprise the first time, when Reno slapped those confidential reports into his hands and told him that he'd brought them all this way because he thought that Tseng would enjoy them. It was a surprise when Tseng held that gun to Veld's head and looked over his shoulder to see Reno, looking not at his director or the gun but at him, nodding and waiting. It'd been a surprise almost every day, every morning that Tseng woke up and thought this is it, it has to be, only to discover his visions of mutiny and betrayal had been trumped by the reality of Reno appearing in the office, every single day, maybe tired, maybe hungover, but forever prepared to be one of his Turks. Every time, it is a shocking, sobering surprise.
This time, even more so. Reno's presence is so familiar to him now, but he does not allow himself to believe it until he sees it with his own eyes. Jumping, rolling, gracefully scaling dangerous peaks and crumbling ledges. It isn't the acrobatics it takes to reach him that he is so confounded by, but the simple matter that he is trying to reach him at all, that he is here, that again he knew just where to find him.
His smile fades, but not completely. Reno takes his place by Tseng's side as if neither of them ever left their fated positions. Tseng isn't sure what happened after his death, but he gets the feeling now that it must have felt very wrong because nothing in this world feels so right as this. Such a dangerous thought, a perfect hook for a monster of a man like himself to sow suffering. But they have suffered, haven't they?
And here they are now, grinning at each other at the ends of the earth.
"You weren't there," Tseng says, plucking the cigarette from Reno's lips. He cannot help but to savor that first drag, his eyelids drawn low, his nostrils flaring as he breathes out twin plumes of smoke that drift and curl and threaten to cloud up all of Midgar.