II: Tact, and how to not use it properly

Most of my days start out at ShinRa headquarters in the break room with Reno and Rude. Rude smokes a cigarette while Reno catnaps and I drink coffee, hoping for the most laid-back day yet every single day. While it might seem like we don't do much around here, it's quite the opposite. You might have guessed it from that mission I mentioned earlier, most of our jobs involve risking our lives and shooting the bad guys up. According to Rufus, the big guy at the head, ShinRa owes the planet more than we can actually pay back, so we have to double our workload, which means less time to sit on our asses and play poker and enjoy the beer Reno has sitting in the back of his fridge.

Like I was saying, most days start out in the break room trying to get a moment's peace without having guns shoved into our hands. But this one day in particular was different-the three of us, plus Rufus, made our merry way out to a place called Healin.

Healin is this smudge of a place that can't decide if it's going to spell its name with an "i" or an "e," and the Healin/Healen Lodge is the main attraction. It's actually a rather nice, spacious place, meant for people with Geostigma.

Oh, that's another thing entirely. Geostigma, I mean.

Geostigma is said to be the planet's punishment, but what it really is is the result of contacted with the contamination of the Jenova cells. Rufus had it pretty badly, but he didn't seem to mind as much as most of the people in that lodge. He'd been preoccupied over the mission when we lost Elena and Rude for almost the past two years, anyway.

Back at Healin, the four of us were chilling out in the main room, Rufus in his wheelchair, Reno sprawled out on the couch, Rude standing by Rufus, and me leaning against the window.

"You really think she's gonna answer if he's not there?" Reno asked Rufus, not bothering to pull the mouthpiece of his cell phone away from his mouth. Rufus didn't answer, probably because he didn't know.

"Just leave a message," Rude said patiently. How he remains that calm with Reno in charge of something I still don't understand.

"She's not-oh, wait! Hey! She picked up!" Reno sat up quickly. "He-ey, is this Tifa? Nice introduction, by the way." Grinning with his success, Reno nodded at us, pointing to the phone. Rude and I glanced at each other, then rolled our eyes. "Oh, come on, you mean you don't recognize me? It's me, Reno. …You remember me, right?"

A pause, and then Reno's grin doubled in mischief.

"She remembers me," he said to us before placing the phone back to his mouth. "So listen, Tifa, I have a message for you to pass on. We here at ShinRa have some work for Cloud, if he's interested."

As he listened to Tifa, his grin faltered a bit.

"Whaddya mean he's not there?" Not bothering to listen to her response, Reno turned to Rufus. "She says he's not there. What do I do?"

"Tell her anyway," he said quietly.

"Was that really a necessary question?" Rude asked, turning to me. I just smirked.

"Well, listen anyway, Tifa. Pass this on to Cloud as soon as you can. We have some urgent work for him, it'd be worth everyone's while if he helped out. 'Kay thanks, bye."

"It's a wonder we get anything done around here with that kind of effort," I said, sighing heavily. Reno just gave me a look as he hung up the phone.

"And what have YOU done since we got here, missy? That's right, nothing."

"And I'm BORED. When do we get to shoot stuff? Isn't that what you hired me for?"

I heard a faint sigh come from under the sheet covering Rufus, and Reno and I both grinned. Mission: success. It just wouldn't be a completed day if we didn't make Rufus frustrated at least once.

"Mae."

The way Rufus said my name-it made me think I was in deep shit. But when he spoke again, he had a bit more curious tone to his voice, and I immediately chilled out.

"Go to where Tifa is now. Make sure she passes the message on."

What the actual fuck. Rufus was indirectly telling me to threaten Tifa if she didn't agree to our plans.

Well, ok. Better than sitting around doing nothing.

I left without a word, just a nod and a smirk. Jogging down the stairs, I spied my motorbike, and within sixty seconds I was on the road to Tifa's place.

^^vv^^vv^^

As he zoomed along on his bike through the back roads toward Healin, Cloud frowned. Even as he listened to Barrett's enthusiastic voicemail about finding a new oil field, something still troubled him about having to make this visit.

"Cloud," Tifa's voice said from his phone. "Reno called again. He sounded kind of funny this time. Be careful, okay?"

The voicemail ended right as he pulled into Healin Lodge's entrance. It looked quiet, and maybe even a bit sadder than the last time Cloud had seen it.

Sighing through his nose, the blonde parked his bike and grabbed one of his smaller swords, just in case. Almost at a run, Cloud proceeded up the stairs and threw open the front door. Reacting just in time, his sword met Reno's weapon with a loud clang. Tifa was apparently right.

Reno backed up a bit, and both men lowered their weapons. Then suddenly, letting out a battle cry, Reno lunged at Cloud. The blonde, completely unfazed, simply stepped aside, sending Reno running through the open front door. Stumbling to a stop, Reno turned around and started to run back in, but Cloud quickly shut the door in his face and locked it.

"Okay, so you're good," Reno said from the other side of the door. Before Cloud could respond, the door to his right burst open, and Rude walked through, pulling on gloves, as if to prepare an attack on Cloud. The blonde reacted quickly and swung his sword so that the tip of the blade met Rude's face.

"Yeah, Rude, lookin' sharp!" Reno shouted from the other side of the door. A small smirk crossed Rude's face, then quickly vanished as a figure in a wheelchair rolled into the room.

"Good," he said. "You fight like the SOLDIER you once claimed to be. You haven't lost your touch."

Cloud paused a moment, then murmured, "Rufus Shinra?" The brief silence that followed was the confirmation that Cloud needed. "Do I feel sorry for you."

"The day of the explosion-" Rufus began.

"What do you want from me?" Cloud interrupted quickly.

"I managed to get out-"

"Who were the guys that attacked me?"

"Before it collapsed-"

"I'm leaving."

Rufus waited a moment, as if to see if Cloud really would walk out so soon. He didn't, so the President continued.

"We need your assistance, Cloud," he said calmly.

"Not interested," Cloud replied, turning toward the door.

"I acknowledge that ShinRa…owes the planet a lot. It goes without saying that my company and I are the ones that put the world in the sorry state it's in. Therefore, it's our responsibility to set things right."

"I'm still out here!" Reno shouted through the door suddenly, but Rufus ignored him, as did Cloud.

"As a first step, we have commenced an investigation in Sephiroth's wake."

"Yep! In the Northern Cave!" Reno called out from the other side of the door.

"What do you think we found?" Rufus asked Cloud. The blonde didn't reply, but he was now fully attentive. "Nothing. Nothing at all. You can relax. However, not all went as planned. We were interrupted by the same three who attacked you-Kadaj and his gang."

"Kadaj…" Cloud mumbled, thinking back to the silver-haired man he had seen hours earlier.

"It seems he doesn't want us finishing what we started. Really, what could they be thinking?"

"What does that have to do with me?"

"You're our buddy, aren't ya?" Reno shouted. Cloud kicked the door hard, and he heard a thud outside. Suppressing a smirk, Cloud looked back at Rufus, wanting the real answer.

"Kadaj and his group are young and violent-as dangerous as they come. That's why we decided that it might be in our best interest to hire a little muscle."

"Too bad. I'm only a delivery boy now," Cloud said.

"You're all we have," Rufus countered quickly. "Cloud, look, you're an ex-SOLDIER, aren't you?" Cloud let out a soft chuckle, turning toward the door once more.

"In my head," he replied, opening the door. But before he walked away, he stopped and added, "What's this stuff about…Mother?"

"Why? Did Kadaj say something to you? No surprise. There are plenty of kids who miss their mothers; that's the world we live in." Rufus paused a moment before continuing, obviously choosing his words carefully. "I hear there are orphans living with you. Think about it: don't you want to put smiles back on their faces? All we want in the end is to rebuild our world, Cloud."

Hesitating, Cloud turned around locked on the floor. "But I…"

"Come on, Cloud, think about it," Reno said, hands shoved in his pockets. "Together we could rebuild ShinRa!"

A brief look of shock washed over Cloud's face for a moment, and he quickly turned to the door again, heading out with heavy footsteps.

"Not interested," he said without turning back.

"Reno!" Rufus and Rude said, sighing. The red head turned back to his friends, grinning sheepishly.

^^vv^^vv^^

The place Tifa and Cloud lived looked like every other uniform building in Edge, to be honest with you. But I dunno what I was expecting. While they were certainly considered heroes, they weren't celebrities, and even if they were, the world was in too bad of shape to afford a place that was extravagant, or even luxurious. But the place was big, I'm assuming mostly for the sake of fitting business in with the four of them.

"You keep staring at me," I said to Tifa, who averted her dark eyes quickly, embarrassed.

"Sorry," she said. "You just look-"

"I know, I look like Reno." Sighing, I leaned against the kitchen counter. "Cloud is already on his way over to Healin, then? Guess it was a waste of my time coming over here."

"What would you have done if he wasn't?" Tifa asked, raising an eyebrow.

"My job."

We stared each other down for a moment. If Marlene hadn't showed up, who knows what might've happened.

"Tifa, where is Cloud?"

"He's visiting someone," Tifa replied, breaking her gaze with me to smile at Marlene.

"I wanna see him!" the little girl whined. "Denzel said he felt better, so he went outside, but I wanna see Cloud instead!"

"Marlene, I don't know when Cloud will be back," Tifa said, her voice growing more stern. "But…tell you what, we'll go somewhere else special, okay? Does that sound good?"

Marlene looked up at Tifa for a moment, and I watched as her pout slowly faded. The kid knew she wasn't going to get her way this time. Tifa had told me that Marlene's main caretaker was actually a guy named Barrett, but he was out with work too. And this Denzel kid, he had Geostigma pretty badly. Tifa didn't seem to expect him to pull through, but things were changing in Edge. For good or for worse, we didn't know yet.

"Okay, Tifa, I'll go get ready!" Marlene finally answered, smiling.

As she ran off, Tifa stood upright, sighing.

"Are you ever gonna be upfront with her about all of this?" I asked.

"How can I be? She's too young to really understand," Tifa replied, sighing again as she finished the dishes.

"Age has nothing to do with anything. If her brain is functioning and working as well as most kids her age, she'll be able to figure it all out in no time."

"…I don't even like to talk about it," she admitted, frowning. "Cloud gives up too easily."

"Hm." If what she said was true, what was the real use in getting his help? ShinRa wasn't exactly on Cloud's good side, so what made Rufus so sure he would help us? It sounded pretty damn stupid to me, but oh well. I was at least doing my job, so he couldn't complain about anything but his own dumb decisions.

"What will you do now?" Tifa asked me. I smirked.

"Whatever I have to to get paid."