Chronic Subterfuge

The streets were busy at this time, and she got even more irritated when her own brother had left without her. Both of them worked at the same place, with the same schedule, but her brother didn't once drive home with her nor did the both of them go to work together. She dodged people and dogs and even cars as she hurriedly ran to the oversized building in which she worked in.

She sighs, panting when she arrives at the entrance. For a while she catches her breath, and the next she is firmly pressing the elevator button. She watches patiently as the elevator descends from the highest floor, down, down, down to where she was standing. The doors slide open, causing her to abruptly stop as the familiar shade of light brown hair greets her eyes.

"Sir President!"

She says with surprise, seeing Tseng on the other side of Rufus Shinra. The said man looks at her, his usual unpredictable face directed only to her.

"Nero, your brother had come early, I thought you wouldn't be coming to work today."

Nero flips her scarlet hair with a sigh, slightly irritated. Had she been a minute later she might have missed the president. Tseng notes that he isn't needed anymore, as Nero was already there. He gives the president a questioning look, and surely, the president nods.

Tseng walks over to Nero, all the while taking off all the hidden weapons he had and transferred it to the girl. Soon after dispatching of his deadly hidden weapons, he walks away, back to the Turks lobby.

Nero looks down at her arms full of ammo and guns, wondering how Tseng fit it all in him. Sure, she had some places for weapons to hide too, but not THIS many. She chooses over the ammo and guns, finding and taking only the weapons she was familiar with, and throwing those she thought wasn't needed into a nearby trash bin.

As she puts the last gun inside her coat, she felt eyes lingering on her, there were a lot of people on the first floor, but she knew well that and the only close person to her now was the president. When she looks up, their eyes meet. She instinctively looks away and clears her throat.

"Sir, we should get going."

Nero suggests. She doesn't hear an answer from her superior for a while, and finally, Rufus proceeds to walk out the Shinra building, Nero close behind him.

_____________________________________________________________

As soon as they entered the meeting room, all eyes were on them. Nero stood stiff beside her boss as a couple of people stood and shook hands with him.

Like any other meetings with different companies, Rufus was seated in the center, where everyone would give him looks of approval, but today, it seems that most of the people were sour.

Nero's job was to be Rufus Shinra's personal bodyguard, and she has been doing so for quite a while now. As far as she could remember this was about the 20th or more meeting she's been to, and by far, this was the most cold and uncomfortable one yet.

At most, she would listen to them talk business for hours, but it hadn't been 30 minutes when a man threw a fury and walked out of the room. She sensed danger approaching, all the others followed suit with the man, except her boss.

She positioned her earpiece properly, ready for any emergency at hand. She felt her sides for the weapons she had positioned earlier and got ready to use them.

"Sir, shall we go?"

Rufus smirked, knowing the danger ahead. But somehow as he stood and faced Nero, he felt a slight tug on his heart. It was the first time he would see Nero in action, and he wasn't quite sure he wanted to see that. He was very confident in Nero's ability; she had gone through a lot of missions before becoming his personal bodyguard.

His personal bodyguard, something didn't sound right when he thought that.

He was snapped back to reality when Nero swung the meeting door open, and let out a series of shots from her gun. Not one shot came back for them; Nero had taken out five guards outside the door.

"Stay behind, sir. I'm sorry to say this but please watch your back."

Nero sent Rufus a grin. Apparently, when on the battlefield, she took the behavior of her brother. Rufus nods, he knew how to fight after all, it wasn't much of a problem.

They both reached the elevators without difficulty, not a single shot reached them as Nero was fast at analyzing and acting. The elevator doors opened with a 'ding', and she instantly shot at the camera overhead.

They weren't heading down, of course, that would be plain stupid as a whole army was waiting for them downstairs. She pressed on the 'P' button, and momentarily relaxed when the elevator smoothly sailed upwards.

"Are you alright, sir?"

Nero turns to her boss, real concern showing on her face. Rufus studied her features, her concern didn't look like that of a servant to her boss, it was something he depicted to be deeper, in a sense that he couldn't understand.

"Yes, I am fine. You?"

Nero smiles and Rufus thought he felt a slight flush on his cheeks when she did so.

"I'm alright sir, no need to worry about me."

They both snap their heads back when the elevator came to a stop. Nero glances at the floor indicator and scowls when she sees they were a floor away to the penthouse. Floor 49.

"Please step away sir."

Rufus does as he is told, stepping back and pressing his back on the walls of the elevator, just in time for the doors to slide open and a rain of bullets to come on them, or rather, Nero.

Some of the bullets were impossible to dodge, they were after all, in a cramped up place and outside was an army of shooters. Nero fires a round of shots, first getting rid of the nearer enemies and flinches when a bullet grazes her cheek. She fires another round, finally getting rid of the rest.

She sighs in relief, and presses on her earpiece.

"Tseng, do you hear me? Is the helicopter there?"

She hopefully asks. If the helicopter was there, the guards on the penthouse wouldn't be a problem as Tseng would have dispatched of them.

"Yo sis! This is Reno! Sorry, I’m a little late, but I'm almost there!"

Nero makes an annoyed sound, why couldn't it be Tseng that went instead?

The elevator stops, indicating that they have arrived at the penthouse. Nero shoves a hand down her coat and clutches the grenade in her hand, thanking the Gods that she decided to bring one with her. She didn't take heed of the blood trickling on her cheek from the graze earlier.

The doors had yet to open when she removed the safety pin from the hand grenade, but a second later the doors moved and she instantly threw the grenade outside. She saw some soldiers retract in surprise, before she pressed the 'close' button frantically.

The elevator shook, a sign that the grenade had gone off. She once again glances at the person she was protecting to again find out he was looking at her. She bites her lip, she wasn't nervous facing a thousand men, but why was this certain man making her feel otherwise?

She shook her thoughts out, raising her gun and quickly stepping out of the elevator when it opened. She smirked to herself, only one person was left standing, and by the look of his face, he was about to piss in his own pants. She motioned behind her back that it was safe to go out, after shooting the lone survivor.

Rufus steps out and adjusts his tie, looking at the girl in front of her. The side of her face had blood on it, yet she didn't seem to mind. Rufus involuntarily reaches in his pockets and takes a handkerchief out. He stares down at it, somewhat surprised as to why he did or even thought of it.

He walked next to Nero, catching her by surprise when he lifts her chin up to him. Nero looks at her boss with a slight tinge on her cheeks, feeling the handkerchief passing her cheek and cleaning the blood on her face.

She looks down and muttered a thanks. Rufus looks at her once again and now knew something he didn't a while ago. He now knew why Nero being his personal bodyguard didn't sound right.

As much as he hated to admit it, he had taken a liking to the girl, and this girl risking her life for him, sounded disgusting. The sound of rotors resulted in both Rufus and Nero tilting their head up. The helicopter descends, sending Nero's scarlet hair flying everywhere.

Rufus walks ahead and despite Nero's hair disarray, she sees something move at the corner of her eyes. She abruptly turns, her eyes widening. A sniper was way behind them, pointing his gun at the now unalert Rufus. Nero sees the sniper about to pull the trigger, and she does, the only thing she could do.

"Rufus!"

Everything was slow for a minute, Nero's blood spills all over Rufus' white coat, and Rufus himself, turns in shock. Reno had his mouth agape, and it slowly turns into a scowl.

"Bastard!"

Reno was about to abandon the helicopter, deciding to take his fury out on the bastard who shot his sister, but a hand flew up and blocked him from getting down any further from the helicopter, then, a gunshot. The sniper dropped dead.

Nero clutches the portion above her left breast, and turns to her brother with a pained almost pleading look.

"Reno, just get us out of here!"

Nero's eyesight was beginning to fail; she stumbled to get up the helicopter with one hand, as the other was trying to stop the serious blood flow of her wound.

Rufus grimaces at her sight; nonetheless, he takes hold of her waist and pulls her up the helicopter. She was sweating, but cold to the touch. It made him scared, for a reason he didn't know. Rufus didn't want to let go of her, so he pulled her on his lap, and let her rest on his shoulder.

Her breathing was ragged, labored and hard. He looked down on her, noting her pain stricken face. His heart was beating a rate that was faster than Reno driving the helicopter.

"Ru-Rufus..."

The president presses his face closer, the rotors and her small voice made it so it was hard to hear.

"Are-Are you hurt?"

His heart shattered when he hears this, there she was, probably dieing, and all she could think about was his well being. He presses her closer to him, taking out the same handkerchief and tying it tightly on her wound.

"You fool, I'm alright, and you saved me. All you have to do now is not fall asleep, okay?"

His own voice was soft, to the point that he doubted whether it was really him who had talked. Nero nods with a smile, but her actions say otherwise. Her eyes were drooping, as if it was weighing her down.

Reno slightly turns his head to look at his sister, his eyebrows arch when he sees the position in which the president and his sister was in, and smirk. His sister would be alright, all they had to do was get her to the infirmary in time.

Rufus bends his head closer than before to Nero, causing the girl to slightly widen her eyes. His lips met her forehead, and the both of them felt electricity run down their spine.

"Don't sleep, Nero, we're almost there."

Nero struggles, she wasn't able to keep her eyes to work properly, she wanted to see Rufus' face, but all was in a blur, even when they arrived she didn't notice that she was already being reeled in the infirmary. A hand touches hers as she lays on the bed, and a voice whispers,

"Don't give up on me, Nero."

Not sure who it was, for her hearing was also a bit impaired, she didn't respond, and the last of her strength left her, bringing her into a deep and dreamless sleep.