Heroes have it easy
The "Last Order" that I'm referring to is the Turks' attempt to save Zack Fair and Cloud Strife, as shown in FFVII: Last Order (that animated one shot that came out with Advent Children) and in FF7: Crisis Core.
The title of this piece is taken from the 31 Days theme for March 23, 2008.
Rufus Shinra remembered stumbling across the files for the infamous Last Order of four years ago quite by accident – the shabby state of the corporation's files had annoyed him into setting things straight within his little domain, and part of that included going over the mission logs for the Turks before properly arranging them into some sort of logical sequence. He had not known what the Last Order had been at the time (he had been in Junon during the incident), and as such, the report caught him completely by surprise. Failure was unheard of when it came to the Turks – the organization had learned some valuable lessons with the Verd Incident and in their dealings with the original AVALANCHE rebel army, and Tseng's leadership was pretty much flawless. That an operation had been unsuccessful under his watch was a most unpleasant surprise.
Confrontation was something that Rufus was extremely good at; feeling guilt was not. Nonetheless, Tseng's reaction startled him. He had never seen Tseng shy away from answering in the past, but he was almost positive that that was exactly what his subordinate did when he brought the topic up. Names were mentioned (Zack Fair, Cloud Strife, Cissnei, Reno, Rude) and results were given (the Turks operatives on the case had failed to rendezvous with the targets in time), but no reasons were given. Rufus, being unused to having his questions unanswered, proceeded to interrogate everyone else on the matter, and consulted other sources. Rufus ended up getting the answers he was looking for, but he was left to wonder why it made him feel so unsatisfied to have them. It took a week of cold silence and even colder affections for him to figure it out.
Just when people thought that the relationship between the President and his most trusted aide would deteriorate further, Rufus appeared without warning on the Turks floor of the Shin-Ra Building. He brushed past the questioning looks of the Turks operatives in the lounge, and entered Tseng's office without knocking. He marched over and tossed a clear, plastic case filled with three-year-old letters onto the man's desk, effectively stopping him from continuing his work (read: signing documents). Tseng blinked, looked up, blinked again. Rufus sniffed.
"Your obsession with past failings and that Cetra girl is troublesome. Rid yourself of it before it gets in the way of doing your job."
Tseng showed his appreciation for his President's concern later, in the young man's bed.
