The next day, I was trying to get some indication of AVALANCHE's progress, but failed to find any information to that extent. All the media was occupied with yesterday's "beeper madness" episode.
"Well, at least we've managed to give them some cover," I said to Hart.
I looked at my voice mail. I had collected another 240 messages, despite the fact that the media had made it clear not to call my number. Some people probably called it just because they saw it on TV. I deleted them all, unknowingly deleting one from Johnny informing me that AVALANCHE was in Kalm Town and involved in a long-winded flashback sequence.
We had nothing better to do, so Hart and I took our new swivel chairs out in the hallway for a few races. We almost collided with Zangan as he turned the corner into the hall leaded to our office.
"Zangan!" I exclaimed.
"What the hell happened yesterday?" Zangan asked.
"I don't have a clue," I admitted. "I tried to page you, but something got messed up with the pager system. Seriously messed up."
I filled Zangan in on what happened yesterday. Zangan said he'd run into AVALANCHE on accident on their way out of Midgar. He'd commandeered a nearby crane and helped them escape, then they headed east. Johnny was still tracking them. At this point in time I had no idea where AVALANCHE was headed, but I guessed they were going to Fort Condor.
However, AVALANCHE would have to wait at the moment. Rufus was now President of the Shinra Company, and Palmer and I were "invited" (read: "required") to attend the festivities in Junon. I managed to get some guest passes for Hart and Mukki (Zangan and Holzoff had to stay behind and run the shop in Midgar -- Hart had a secret new robot design that he didn't want stolen), and we were off. Tseng was off the hook, as he and the other Turks were out looking for Cloud's party.
Hart, Mukki, Palmer, and I took a flight down to Junon. According to our message from now-President Rufus, we would be staying at the four-star Ramuh Inn. When we got to where the hotel was supposed to be, we found there was a SOLDIER barracks there instead.
"There must be some kind of mistake here somewhere," Palmer said.
A Shinra MP poked his head out the door. "You here for the celebration? You'll be staying on the top floor."
"What..." I started. "But -"
"Look, whoever you are, I'm just a lowly MP -- I don't make the rules; II just work here, okay? I'm having a bad day, all right? My parakeet is breaking out in rashes, I got a ticket for improperly parallel-parking my Chocobo, and I can't get off the first level of PaRappa. Don't make it any worse."
"Wow, you and Barret could start a support group or something," I said.
"What?" the MP snapped.
"Never mind," Hart said hastily, stepping in front of me. He pushed past the MP and headed upstairs with his bags.
The next day, I was rudely awakened at 5:30 in the morning by a pounding on my door. Sleepily, I opened it. It was Heidegger, dressed as always in Fidel Castro's hand-me-downs.
"You," he said. "Mayor Domino." He consulted a clipboard. "You haven't signed up for a committee."
"Commitee?" I asked.
"Yeah," Heidegger said. "You can be on the decoration committee, the welcoming committee, the production committee, the spend-the-whole-time-partying committee or the cleanup-after-the-spend-the-whole-time-partying-committee committee. Wait, sorry, the spend-the-whole-time-partying committee is full; I took the last slot. There's plenty of room in the cleanup committee, though."
"What is this, some middle school talent show or something?" I asked. I was not in a good mood.
"Sorry," Heidegger said. "You've got to pick a committee."
I turned to Hart, who was standing behind me. "Well? How should we decide?" Hart asked me.
"How about Janken?" I suggested.
"Please, no more PaRappa references," Hart said hastily. "They're growing old."
"We'll be on the decoration committee," I said.
"Okay," Heidegger said. "Report in 45 minutes."
It took a few seconds for that to sink in. "45 minutes?" I repeated. "But it's 5:30!"
"That means you'll be reporting at 6:15," Heidegger said. "Gyaa haa haa!" He turned and left the building.
"Heidegger has left the building," a computerized voice said over the barracks' PA system.
"Oh, shut up," I snapped at it, and went back to sleep. I was awakened 35 minutes by an anxious Hart.
"Tortellini, come on!" he said. "We've got to report to Heidegger in 10 minutes!"
"Heidegger..." I muttered under my breath. "All he does is give one-word answers and apologize for everything." Somebody must have overhead me saying that and told it to Rufus, because I swear I made up that quote. I made up "You spoony bard!" too, but that Tellah guy ripped me off.
The four of us -- Hart, Palmer, Mukki, and I -- headed over to Al-Junon, where the "decoration committee" was putting up tacky-looking red banners reading "RUFUS" all over the place. We had the "privilege" of joining them.
Hart and I were putting up a Rufus banner when a Shinra MP passed by and dropped a piece of paper at my feet, then walked nonchalantly away. "Hey you!" I shouted after him. "You're littering! Come back and here and pick that up!"
The Shinra MP started walking more quickly and pretended not to hear me. "Give a hoot, don't pollute!" I shouted.
"Tortellini..." Hart said quietly, picking up the paper. He started to unfold it. "I think it's a note to us."
I looked over Hart's shoulder at the note. It read, "TORTELLINI - Meet me at the bar in the alley on Eggplant Street. -- Tseng."
"Oooh, a secret note," I said excitedly.
"Sssh!"
After we got our lunch break from the decoration committee, Hart and I hurried to the bar Tseng was talking about. The bar was dark and for some reason mostly blue-colored. The only person inside was Tseng. "I put a dead ferret in the ventilation duct," Tseng offered by way of explanation.
"So that's what that smell was," I said. "I should have recognized it."
"So you made it to the festivities after all," Hart said wryly.
"I ran into AVALANCHE on the way here," Tseng said. "They were in the mythril mines. They seem to be chasing after Sephiroth."
"Yeah?"
"It turns out that a Gelnika's bringing in a big shipment of Materia is coming in to Junon from the caves. Now, there's so many extra troops in town for the celebration that nobody's going to think it very odd if some MPs show up at the Gelnika and offer to help unload it."
"Us," I said.
"Right," Tseng agreed.
"So when does the Gelnika land?" Hart asked.
"In about fifteen minutes."
"Wow, thanks for all the advance warning," I said.
"Sorry, I had to wait until I could get rid of Rude and Elena," Tseng apologized. "I suckered them into playing Persona. They're busy looking for a save point."
"All right, we'd better get moving," Hart said.
"Here, I swiped two MP uniforms for you," Tseng said. He reached behind the bar, grabbed two blue suits of armor, and handed them to us. We put on the suits and hurried to the airport at the far end of Junon. There were several Gelnikas on the runways. All were painted in the typical brown camoflague.
"Let's hope it hasn't landed yet," Hart said, looking at the planes. We stepped on the elevator and punched the button to rise. As the elevator was rising, a Gelnika descended from the sky and came to a stop in the airport.
"There we go," I said in satisfaction. We ran across the runway to the Gelnika. We ran up to the SOLDIER who was overseeing the unloading of the plane. "We're here to help with the plane," I said.
The SOLDIER paid little regard to us. "All right, haul some of those boxes of Materia out of the storage room and take them over to Al-Junon," he shrugged.
For once everything was going well. Hart and I entered the plane and proceeded past several other MPs (all also unloading the plane) to the storage room. The room was filled full of boxes of Materia.
"Now we're talking," I said. "Where are we going to take all this?"
"Let's take it back to the barracks," Hart said quietly. He grabbed as many of the boxes of Materia as we could carry, and I did the same. We staggered back towards the airport elevator. Although I wanted to rush back to the barracks, I tried my best not to hurry, because I didn't want to attract any attention. It was best to act as normally as possible.
The boxes so obstructed our vision that we did not notice the TV reporter hurring towards us until it was too late. "Excuse me, sir, what do you think about the new president?"
"Sorry," I said to the reporter. "Can't talk. I've gotta take this Materia over to Al-Junon."
"Hey, wait," Hart said to me as I tried to brush by the reporter. "We can be on TV. I want to be on TV!"
"But..." I tried to protest. The reporter was looking at me strangely. I sighed, set down the crates of Materia, and took the microphone. I noticed the reporter was from SIN (which made sense, since all the competing networks had been crushed or acquired by Shinra years ago), and arrived at an appropriate response. "I think President Rufus is a real swell guy," I said. "He's super-dee-duper!"
"Hi, mom!" Hart said, waving at the TV camera.
I jabbed him in the side with my elbow. "Knock that off," I whispered.
"And what about you?" the reporter asked, handing the microphone to Hart.
Hart put down his Materia boxes and took the microphone. "Yeah, I'd have to say this is a great moment for the Shinra company. It gives me a real warm fuzzy feeling inside. Rufus is a real new age Shinra president." Somebody must have picked up on that phrase and liked it a lot, because within an hour it was on every one of those cheesy "RUFUS" banners.
"C'mon, Hart, let's get going," I urged.
"- and I want to say 'hi' to everyone back home in Midgar," Hart was saying. "Especially -"
I grabbed the microphone from Hart and shoved it back at the reporter. "Well, we've got to be going," I said. I turned around to pick up the Materia, but it was gone! Another Shinra worker must have taken it.
"The Materia's gone!" I exclaimed.
"Let's go get some more!" I urged. We ran back to the Gelnika and looked into the plane's storage room. It was empty.
"Now what are we going to do?" I wondered.
Hart scooped up a few loose Summon Materia from the floor and stuffed them in his pockets. "I guess we'd better head back to the barracks."
We left the Gelnika and took the elevator out of the airport. As we were walking through the gateway to the main city, we found Tseng running down the hall. "There you are!" Tseng asked. "What happened to you?"
"We got... delayed," I said, glaring at Hart. "And we lost the Materia."
"We don't have any time to worry about that now!" Tseng said. "The parade's starting! You'll be the only MPs out in the city if you don't get over there quicky! Hurry!"
"Um... okay," I said. We ran out into the street. A huge mass of Shinra MPs were marching by in perfect formation. I scrambled to join them.
"Not yet!" Tseng shouted from inside. "Wait until there's an opening."
I tried to back away from the parade. "No!" Tseng shouted.
"But..." I protested.
"Now! Go! Hurry!" Tseng shouted.
Hart and I ran towards the parade. "No!" Tseng shouted. "Not now!"
"You just said -"
"What do you think you're doing?" Tseng yelled at me.
"Uh... what the hell is going on?" Hart asked.
"Quick! Go!" Tseng shouted, pointing.
We ran towards the parade. "Don't move!" Tseng said. "It's not -" He broke off when I punched him in the forehead and knocked him out.
"I didn't want to do that, but this stupid parade is really making me mad," I commented. "Let's go find Mukki and Palmer."
We ducked into an alley and hurried back towards the barracks where we were staying. We almost collided with two people running in the opposite direction. We tried to step to the right to avoid them, but they also stepped in the same direction. So we stepped left, and so did they.
"I hate it when this happens," I muttered. Then I recognized who they were -- it was Johnny and Mukki. "Hey, Johnny!" I exclaimed.
Johnny peered at me in the gloom until he recognizedme. "Tortellini! Hart!" Johnny said. "Good to see you! AVALANCHE is hijacking a ship to Costa Del Sol! Come on!"
We followed them to the Junon docks. Rufus and Heidegger were standing in front of a ship, accompanied by a few Shinra MPs. Rufus was giving a speech and obsessively rubbing his hair. "Who is the boss of you? Me! I AM THE BOSS OF YOU!"
The Shinra MPs all saluted with their guns. Rufus and Heidegger turned and marched on board the ship. One of the MPs took off his helmet and scratched his head. It was Cloud.
"Hey... Cloud!" I hissed.
Cloud turned towards us. "Who -- oh, you're Domino, right?"
"We were going to get you some Materia, but it got kind of lost," I apologized.
"We did manage to salvage a bit though," Hart added. He dug into his pocket, produced a Shiva materia (of course, AVALANCHE later covered this bit up by having Priscilla give it to them), and tossed it to Cloud. Cloud nodded in response and boarded the ship. We followed him.
"Where's Palmer?" I asked Johnny and Mukki.
"He got held up," Mukki explained. "Scarlet needed his help programming her VCR."
"So what's our plan?" Johnny asked me.
"We really gotta find out what Sephiroth is up to," I said. "I mean, we all thought he was dead, but now he's back. Something's up here, but I don't know what. And since AVALANCHE's trailing Sephiroth for the time being, we'd best stick with them."
| Next chapter: In Which We Gain Two New Allies |