All for the Love of Chaos

Chapter 5

Kay rubbed the back of her neck, out of habit it seemed, as she stood over her pilot who was trying to examine the damage. There were others as well, a total of thirty or so people milled around the wreckage. The lights from the distant terminal were dim though the falling snow, too dim to be able to see the actual damage. The plane was totaled, that was for sure. It wasn't worth repairing. It had been torn all to hell, the hull having forged a trench nearly a hundred yards long though the asphalt, which was now beginning to fill rapidly with heavy snowflakes.

They were in trouble; that much Charlie was sure of. The snow was coming down fast and heavy. Under normal circumstances they would have left right after the runway had been cleared and that would have been the end of it. But with the Bucket kicked, another plane would have to be rented from the airport or flown in from Midgar. Insurance would probably cover the Bucket, but the rented plane or the pilot from Midgar's pay would have to come from his own pocket. Everything was screwed.

Charlie sighed, shaking his head. It wasn't very often when Charlie lost his cool, but when he did he was about as easy to deal with as a rabid chocobo.

"Where did that damn Turk go?" He growled.

"I asked him to get a Sat. Com. set up," Came Kay's cool, though slightly agitated response.

"Why? So that asshole Krendler can bitch at us?" Charlie rarely cursed, unless he was in a particularly foul mood.

"He needs to know too, it is his plane. Get your head outta yer ass, it wasn't anyone's fault."

His head whipped around to glare at her. Charlie had very particular eyes, she noted. He was from Cosmo Canyon, one of the native tribes that had lived there for centuries. As genetics would have dictated, his eyes should have been black or dark brown. Yet his were deep gold in color and seemed to nearly glow in anger. But they softened when his copilot met him with a warm, almost motherly gaze. His shoulders slumped and he backed down.

"...I guess," He sighed, almost like a little kid that had just gotten scolded lightly.

She nodded. "We didn't loose anyone, be thankful for that."

He made an indiscernible grunt and returned to the examination. His wandering hand found something, a large gap in the aluminum platting. He got down on his hands and knees to peer at it but it was too dark to see. "Hey, hand me your stick, will you?"

A grin passed across Kay's features. "Wow, Charlie, that's really…Suggestive…"

When Charlie looked back up, his face was bight red, and it wasn't from the cold. "You know what I meant..."

She smirked and handed him her nightstick, notched at the lowest setting. When he clicked the button, it emitted a soft lantern-like glow. He looked once more at the hull.

"My God..." he breathed, several people around him gasped and pointed as well. "Kay, have a look at this..."

There were hatch marks in sets of four down the entire side of the plane, each leaving a hole wide enough to put a hand though and anywhere from six inches to a foot long. It was done with near surgical precision, the hull had seemed to be about as easily cut as a scalpel glided though human flesh.

"It...It looks like claw marks..." She stammered. As if to test her theory, Charlie placed his fingers, minus thumb, into the corresponding slash marks and made a sort of downwards sweeping motion.

"Yeah..." He agreed. "But, how could a monster have hit us? Nothing I know of could have possibly flown at our altitude...And look at this! They knew exactly where to cut! The fuel lines are lined up with the slashes!"

Kay shook her head; it was too hard to believe. "So...you think something was sent to sabotage the plane? Why?"

"I don't know..."

At that moment, Reno had arrived at Kay's shoulder. He gazed with a mix of confusion, horror and curiosity upon the damage.

"Shit..." was all he could manage.

"You get the thing set up?" Kay asked, without adverting her gaze from the wreckage.

"Yes." He said quietly. "It's set up at a bay window in the terminal."

Without a word she started to walk swiftly towards the low-lying building in the distance.

"Hey." Called Reno at her back. She paused and looked over her shoulder, not knowing quite what to expect. He flashed that trademark grin of his. "You really should apply, you know."

She looked at him quizzically. "You really think so?"

"Of course. We need some new blood, what's your weapon?"

"Nightsticks, guns, pole arms, you name it."

"You're not a fist fighter?"

"In a pinch maybe," she shrugged, "But I don't favor it."

"Good, good. We like a variety. I wouldn't let you get stuck with a desk job, though it'd still be slow at first and you'd need to get your three weeks of MP training."

"That it? Three weeks of boot camp and I get to work for Mr. President of the World?"

"No, not hardly. There's a mountain of paperwork and red tape, and of course a thorough background check. You don't have a record, right? No unpaid fines or drug offenses?"

She shook her head. "I'm clean."

"Good, I can get all that straightened out easy enough then."

"How much does it pay?"

"More then you can ever hope to make as a courier."

"Good point…"

"So? Yes or no?"

She smiled back at him. Bodyguard. Secret Service. It sounded almost too good to be true. Could she handle it? Sure. She was Kayla. And besides, after something like this it didn’t seem she would be getting anywhere fast. Charlie was safe, no one would dare bust down on one of the top pilots in the fleet. She was an excellent pilot, a natural, practically raised in the cockpit. But she was also a junior on the force in one of the lowest positions. Damn glass ceiling.

"I’ll think about it, sir."

He sighed irritably. "It’s Reno. Reno. No sir, no mister."

"Sorry."

"It’s O.K., just don’t make a habit of it. Anyway, I’ll get your forms filled out and send all that legal shit you need to fill out to your residence. Kapeesh?"

"Right…"

A few minutes later she had reached the low-lying station full of light and heating units. The terminal was a welcome change from the weather outside, she was almost sorry she had left Charlie out to fend off the cold alone. Fortunately, it wasn't jam packed with people as usual; only about a dozen or so people were present. They didn't move, didn't speak. Most were camped out on the floor with nothing better to do then wait for an early-morning flight--only to find that it would be canceled. As loud as the crash was, she thought that perhaps one or two would wake up then start interrogating her about every minuscule detail.

She soon saw Damitri though; in his Soldier fatigues he was about as hard to miss as a semi-automatic machine gun in an umbrella stand. He was leaning against a large screen accompanied by a camcorder on a tripod. Through the tall floor-to-ceiling windows, she could see what remained of the Bucket quite clearly. He waved as he caught her gaze, still smirking. It seemed Reno had gotten him patched up nicely, he wasn't bleeding anymore. It had taken three men to carry him in from the plane.

"It is working, ain't it?" She sounded rather discouraged. The government owned the small fleet she worked on and since most of the time they were shipping supplies, she was officially part of the military. She needed to report to her commander, Daniel Krendler, someone who she...was not particularly fond of.

"Yup."

"Damn...Alright, turn it on," She sighed, taking her position in front of the gleaming camera. She had been desperately hoping that they couldn't get satellite reception though the thick snow. Score another one for technology.

Seemingly at it's own accord, the screen flickered to life to reveal a fat, graying man with mean-looking ratty eyes in his late fifties wearing an undershirt that had long since grayed in the wash. Kay was immensely thankful that she could only see him from the chest up; he probably wasn't wearing any pants.

"Kay?!" He barked in surprise. "Where's Hawking?"

"Busy...And for God's sake put on a shirt, I can see your nipples through that thing..."

Krendler's face turned beet red and the corners of his mouth lifted in a sneer to reveal mossy-looking teeth. His mouth worked up and down furiously as he let out a long stream of obscenities, yet Kay didn't hear a word. She had quite a time managing to keep a straight face.

"I have a censor on, sir, I couldn't hear a single word you said."

"----You!" He screamed at last, being that it wasn't a curse word alone. Seeing that it would do him no good to scream himself hoarse, Krendler gradually calmed down. Well, a little anyways. "Alright, alright! What's going on! What's your situation over there?"

"SNAFU."

"What?!"

"...Never mind, sir. The Bucket's been demolished, nothin' in hell's gonna to get it in the air again."

A pause. She could literally see the gears turning in his head.

"What happened?"

Feeling that perhaps showing him would be easier then explaining, she took the camera and turned it to face the crash site. As he examined what he could from the narrow field of vision the camera offered, she went on to explain what had happened. She didn't tell him everything though; she excluded her personal opinion, knowing he wouldn't care.

"...I see...I'll have to trust you to renting another plane from Nibelheim. It'll come out of your pay, of course." With this, Kay couldn't argue, she knew the rules. "And, you will of course take leave for all the days you miss if you should not make it back on time."

"What? Sir, that's completely unreasonable! If I miss more then three days--"

"--You'll be discharged." He cut her off with a nasty grin. "You took off till the twenty-forth. If you're not back by the twenty-seventh, you can pick up your belongings at the Midgar impound lot. Bye..."

The screen flashed to black. The conversation was over. She stared blankly at the glass surface before scowling and muttering some of the most obscene oaths Damitri had ever heard. A gentle hand brushed her shoulder. Now what?

"You alright?" Damitri asked, that concerned tone resurfacing. She turned around slowly, face hardened.

"Today's just not my day, I suppose...That little prick would do anything to get me fired..."

"Why?"

"I dunno, he could be sexist, just an ass, a bit of both probably."

"Well, we could all be dead." He responded with an ever-present smirk. She smiled back weakly.

"I guess..." She shook her head and looked back out to the fallen plane. Charlie had somehow managed to rig up some floodlights, though it didn't seem to change the outcome. It was still a mess. Everything was a mess, but it wasn't out of the ordinary. Hence SNAFU. "My father's going to have a field day with this..."

Damitri shrugged. "Hey, why don't we get some rooms in town?"

"'We' meaning me, you and Charlie, right?" she asked skeptically, she looked over her shoulder to eye him cynically. He scratched the back of his head.

"Well, yeah, of course..."

"Sounds good ta me, go tell yer boss..."

***

Charlie was tired beyond anything, but couldn't sleep. It's hard to go to bed when your mind is still swirling with thoughts and emotions. He could have died that day. Something was attacking seemingly at random. Rocket Town, Midgar, and the plane...What did they have in common? What was their goal? Random acts of violence? No...No, if they were smart enough to know where crucial components of a plane were located, it wouldn't seem logical that they would attack for the giddy fun of it. Perhaps someone...sent them? Trained them? Breed them? Created them? But, who would be sick enough to do such a thing? God, if only he could get some hard facts...

He shook his head, watching the snow come down in thick, heavy clumps by a street lamp outside. It had been about two hours since they left the airport and found a decent hotel with three rooms available; one for Kay, one for him and one for the Turk and his Soldier.

The Soldier. Damitri...Yes, that's what she said his name was. Charlie didn't trust him, not one bit. For one thing, he liked Kay, which was clear enough to see. But, then again, there were a lot of men attracted to her, hounding her like dogs. She was sure to end up with one of them sooner or later; that's just how nature worked. He was no different in any sense concerning that matter, a first class womanizer. But there was something else, he thought it was the way he looked. He wasn't particularly striking or ugly--quite the opposite, which made him all the more dangerous--but there was just something about him that was vaguely familiar...

He sighed "I think too much..."

The pilot rested his hand against the glass pane, feeling the icy coldness that radiated from it prickle his skin. The streetlights and glow from distant windows did nothing to pierce the inky black. He could remember a time when there was no night as dark as this, when everything remained in a perpetual sunset. A ball of rock and swirling gasses the size of Midgar itself stained the sky a bloody red. He was still pretty young at the time, five or six, but that was enough. The meteor that had been summoned to cleanse the Planet of Humanity fascinated him. It was dangerously beautiful; the swirling red plumes that enveloped it, The way the powers radiated from it like bolts of lightning, the way it seemed to glow before it hit...

"Wow, Charlie, you have the tightest body I've ever seen..." Someone murmured from behind. In a blind panic, he whirled around to see a slender shadow leaning against the open door frame to the room. Kay was standing there, her hair freshly washed and dried, gleaming from the light outside. She was dressed in her usual attire, though she had changed into a much more practical white sweater. Between her breasts a long chain with her military dog tags glinted.

And he stood before her in nothing but a pair of boxers.

She grinned as he desperately tried to cover himself with a shirt off the dresser. Even though it was dark she knew that his tanned face was beginning to glow red. Charlie was possibly the most modest person she had ever met.

"Kay! Damn it, don't sneak up on me like that!" He hissed, yanking his head though his shirt collar. "What do you want?"

"Why, I want what every woman wants at one in the morning..." She murmured, her voice filled with sultry overtones. She smiled mischievously, her teeth as perfect as two strings of pearls. His heart skipped a beat.

"O-Oh? What's that?" He stammered. He damned himself when his voice cracked like that of a boy in puberty.

"Booze." She replied bluntly.

He smiled too, though to be honest he was greatly disappointed. "I hate it when you tease me so..."

"Yeah, yeah..." She sat down on his dresser, arms folded cockily across her chest. "So how 'bout it?"

His stomach did a belly flop. "No way, I can still taste the toilet seat from the last time you got me drunk..."

Going to the bar with Kay was something he simply couldn't manage. Charlie didn't hold his liquor well. After about six or seven bottles of beer he'd be plastered. Kay on the other hand was quite the opposite. She could do about twelve and walk out the bar without even a stagger. One of her favorite pastimes was betting against men for money to see who could drink the other under the table first. She always won; he had never seen her sloshed. Charlie's preference was to wait in a corner for a drunken brawl to start and--maybe--join in. It worked out well for them both. Teamwork, you see.

"Besides," he continued, "This isn’t Midgar. The town folds in the sidewalks at ten. There won’t be much open."

Kay didn't argue, she knew it would be pointless. "Okay then, what?"

Hmm...How about taking a walk before the snow gets too thick?"

"A walk? The hell? But okay, if that's what you want..."

Go on to Chapter 6