Author's Note: I thought getting these two would be kind of hard, but after I started it was easy to write. Sort of the same thing that happened with Fine-tuning. Anyway, this is the last thing I can submit before I'm gone for two weeks. Sorry, people! Hopefully when i get back I'll have a few more drabbles, and maybe something else.
Turk Pride
Tseng and Vincent
Tseng had always been slightly intimidated by Vincent Valentine, ever since he had first seen the man. Vincent had a feel of icy control to him that was palpable even through the images relayed to Shinra through Cait Sith, and that was even more noticeable when Tseng was observing AVALANCHE in person, watching them unnoticed. The head of the Turks could tell that even the members of the rebel group were somewhat afraid of their silent kept a healthy distance away from the man, and some even muttered things about vampires.
At first he thought his trepidation was simply because of the man's cold personality and unparalleled skill with his weapons. That was what his Turks used to scare their targets, after all, though they had the factor of working for Shinra on their side. Everyone knew to be afraid when you had Shinra's Turks after you. But even if the terrorist's gunman didn't work for Shinra, he had the same aura as if he did- his targets were dead, they just hadn't noticed it yet. As he observed the eco-terrorists, Tseng could not help but compare Valentine to his own Turks.
It was quite a revelation when they discovered- through Reeve and Cait Sith and extensive digging through Shinra's records- that the man had been a Turk, thirty years ago. It explained so many little things about the man that Tseng had noticed, especially his way of fighting when he wasn't taken over by his demons. He had the detached air of a professional killer that took practice to obtain, and not just a deadpan personality. Tseng almost considered trying to ask the man about it. But they were on opposite sides, and he got the feeling the man wasn't going to take well to an invitation for conversation with anyone from Shinra. He might even despise the Turks, for all Tseng knew.
So instead of trying to talk witht his man who had been one of them, Tseng ordered his Turks into their fights with AVALANCHE, and their observation missions, and went on his own. He knew it was irrational, but he couldn't help but feel that when he ordered them to attack the terrorist group, and Vincent, he was doing some kind of backstabbing. Turks took care of each other. That was the philosophy that had gotten Tseng to his position as Turk Commander. It didn't matter if they were sloppy and insubordinate like Reno, or rookies like Elena, or haunted and possesed like Vincent Valentine. The Turks looked out for each other.
Vincent Valentine was startled when AVALANCHE first encountered the Turks. He wasn't sure why, but he was shocked to see those unfamiliar faces in the uniform that had been such a large part of his previous life. He mentally reprimanded himself- what was he expecting, to see his fellow Turks from thirty years ago? That the Turks had stopped being a part of Shinra?- and focused on the battle at hand.
The others thought of the Turks as a joke. They were silly, and easily angered, and were nowhere near powerful enough to defeat the mismatched team that AVALANCHE had become. It was annoying to Vincent, the ease with which the Turks were defeated, again and again. He was disgusted at how far the Turks had fallen in the time since he had died. There were only four of them, and none were spectacular fighters. They were like pests, annoyances that never did any real damage, and only hindered the quest to stop Sephiroth. Vincent couldn't understand why they didn't realize that they were in over their heads and give up.
It was only after they found Tseng at the Temple of the Ancients that Vincent understood. He looked at the man lying there in front of them, with his life slipping away in pools of crimson, and was struck by memories of seeing his blood stain the floor beneath him and the gun still in Hojo's hand and his own numbing realization that had failed, he was dying, that he had failed to help Lucrecia and her child and he was dying. He stared in shocked silence at the injured man, suddenly remembering the time when he had worn that navy blue suit.
The Turks knew that they couldn't possibly win. They knew that they were being made fools of again and again as AVALANCHE defeated them constantly. They knew, yet they simply brushed it off and kept coming. They were not afraid, despite the overwhelming odds against them. They were not afraid, even though President Shinra was throwing their lives away, and sending them on suicide missions. They did it anyway, because they had to. They did it because they were loyal to Shinra, but most of all because they were loyal to each other, and even if they were looked down on as weak, they would not be looked down on as cowards.
A small part of Vincent that still held onto the feeling of being a Turk, of being part of the dysfunctional family that the Turks had always been, screamed in protest as the gunman moved to walk past Tseng. It didn't matter that he wasn't a Turk any more, and that they were enemies. It didn't matter that Vincent had barely even seen this man, even facing them. It still felt wrong to leave him there. It felt like he was abandoning him, a sensation that left Vincent feeling quite a bit of self-loathing.
"I'm sorry," he murmured as he passed by the man, knowing that his apology didn't make up for the fact that he was abandoning a comrade, but needing to say it anyway. "I truly am."