Rufus and Larette had been so swept up in their dissension that neither had heard the catlike arrival of Reeve - a pathetic misstep for the wretch trying to prove her worth as a Turk - but the choleric looks on their faces couldn't have made it any clearer that they had heard the words coming out of his mouth. For her part, that irksome female creature wore that conflicted expression the blonde was quickly coming to associate with her - as if he wanted to be plagued with any sort of thought about that troublesome individual - debating her available options. Gaging what he knew about her thus far, something in Rufus figured that she would want to stay and have it out, even if that ultimately meant her termination, but on the other hand, it was likely that she wouldn't want to risk directly disobeying Tseng, on the off chance that Reeve was actually telling the truth and the summons were real. With a prolonged gaze at Reeve that betrayed hints of some kind of silently acknowledged familiarity, she nodded gratefully at the older man and left the office, shooting the vice president one last malicious look. Such a joy to have around.

Once 'Backhand of Besetment' was out of the room and on her way to what the business executive would have bet was a mostly empty department (was there ever a second throughout without a Turk on duty?), Reeve launched into a thousand and one endeavors, explanations, and excuses. "Sir, Larette has been working late hours at the community center lately, so she hasn't been getting much sleep. I know that she's been put on suspension from duty, but she works harder than anyone else I've met, and she's a good-"

"Hmm?" Attention still on letting that woman just waltz out of the office after she had treated him that way, Rufus really hadn't been listening to what Reeve said, until the other man had mentioned something about her being placed on temporary respite. Now it made sense why she was such a headache - that woman had been unable to channel her pent-up energy, and so she was directing her ravenous appetite for momentum at the first thing she could: him. Yet while that answered one question, it also served to further rise the level of resentment he felt for the president, since he had allowed Tano to hire on a Turk that was dancing the fine line of permanent retirement, young as she was.

A Turk just on the cusp of disgrace was going to be his bodyguard until this issue resolved itself, one way or another. That troubled the blonde immensely - not because the Turk in question was an emotional time-bomb with questionable at best abilities, but because those he trusted to have his best interests were being so lax about the situation. It was a small matter that should have resolved itself long ago, but even still he wasn't worried about the external threat; how could he be when a move like this was screaming there was a mole? But if there was in fact a leak, that would place someone like Tano at the top of the list of suspects; the timing fit well enough, and being who he was, Rufus didn't need to consider what possible motivation there was - the only question he had was why not kill him before now? If it was Tano, he would have had plenty of opportunity to snuff out the vice president, so what was the endgame?

Becoming so engrossed in his own thoughts, Rufus barely noticed that Reeve had stopped rambling; in fact, had it not been for the intent way he was being watched, the younger of the two males probably would have been too deep in thought to realize that Reeve was waiting for more input on the fate of that lamentable laughingstock. "Sir?" After a span of five more seconds, the engineer pressed on. "What are you going to do about Larette?"

The Turk...? Hmph, might as well just sight back and see what she was capable of - who knows, the woman might even come in handy later on and help draw the assassin out into the open, so the #$%^&* could be dealt with in a prompt and fitting manner. As an added bonus for having to endure days upon days of her griping, Rufus eagerly thought that provided she completed this job, they would never have to see each other again, barring that if - and in the very likely event of when - she failed, he could fire her himself. Yes, that seemed a satisfying enough benefit of overlooking this sole incident, although should it occur again, the consequences were too dire to even bear thinking about. Well, for the time being, but he swore to himself that by the time they were back in Junon, he'd have something figured out for her. "The mission should sort her out."

Reeve looked quite alarmed at that notion, despite not knowing what the mission even entailed; no doubt one of the many pitfalls of caring about others. "Sir, I don't know what there is between the two of you, but Larette's a good girl, and you should have more faith in her abilities as a fighter. I realize that she doesn't look like much, but if you give her a chance, you could be surprised by her results."

Half tuning-out what Reeve was getting at, the part about there being something there between himself and that infuriating Turk caught the Vice President's otherwise attentive ear. "You think that there is something between...?!" That was the most ridiculous thing that he had ever heard! "Haha!" It was so amusing an idea, so absurd a notion, so impossible, the VP started to laugh. "Hehe, Reeve, that's a good one! Hah!" Rufus laughed so hard that it quickly became hard to breath, his lungs contracting too fast to work with the atmosphere any longer. "That Turk...!" Once he sobered up, the young man gazed over at Reeve, realizing that he wasn't laughing. Ah, they must have been close. "What do you know about that woman?"


Silver-'-Doe290s, really can't thank you enough! Every little bit of opinion is helpful to hear from anyone! And no, I expect that the POVs should primarily remain Rufus' and Larette's. Guest - my fellow Disney loving birth-year brethren - I do have to bow respectfully have to bow, because it's not very often that I meet another fan. That's my main point of research as well, but I'm more of the last-minute skimmer. My FF knowledge pretty much just pertains to vii - bad experiences when I branched out - and even then it's such a mixed-up thing! I started with Advent Children, went Dirge (and regretfully sold after a single play through), and I'm not exactly sure what came next, but it might be Crisis Core and then the original... Anyways, Complete was one of my last stops, before part of Before Crisis and Case of Shinra. Really not interested in Dissidia (because I know so much about it), and I never really got the chance to get into Kingdom Hearts (I got so far as the tutorial, which is rare for me). But getting back to Reno, yeah, I have to agree that he's somehow more likable/interesting with smooth 3d modeling. If I had started with the original game, who knows what my feelings on things would be! There is something about his eyes that makes him stand out... In fact, I always wondered if maybe he wasn't exposed to light mako radiation or something... I have blue-grey eyes, unlike a majority of my family. As for color preference... I dunno, I haven't noticed it in color for me - I focus more on shape, I think. Alas, I really don't remember Dirge at all (small pieces though, like Lucrezia, his gun, and Vincent in this one hallway...), but hearing that, I really have to look into that! Did they? I knew that they said something about a possible HD remake, but that sounded next to impossible, so I kinda tuned that out as to not get my hopes up. I always felt that there was more to tell, especially with both lines in the movie about 'as long as you exist, the nightmares will always come', and then Sephiroth's 'I will never be a memory'. I personally expected something for the 20th anniversary, but I didn't hear anything that made it sound possible, not that I exactly looked *guilty face*. I knew the plans of both games, but I had no idea that the one was originally the Versus one. I got a lot of, if not most of my VHS Disney around either Christmas or my birthday, expect for Mulan, which was Valentine's Day. For one, I understand the difficulties with spelling, so no problem, and for another, Pocahontas is really hard to spell. Without spell-check, I just just failed for fact. That's a lot of Disney. I have most of those movies, minus The Rescuers, the first Peter Pan, the Sword and the Stone, any of the shows (House of Mouse was so awesome, and I remember watching all the others as a kid) and Mickey/Donald features (I do have the first Goofy Movie and still want the second), and Dumbo. I do have Dinosaur, the Lion King 2: Simba's Pride, Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas, Belle's Magical World, James and the Giant Peach, Snow White, the Aristocats, and maybe one or two others, I'm not sure... Hey, than's not a bad thing! There could be worse things in the world to be a fan of. Yeah, that would probably scare a person or two off of signing on to finish up a show. And yet, looking at what passes nowadays, would that really have been so wrong? Well, either way I don't really recall much about Sailor Moon... Thanks, I'm working on it!

Hopefully there are no major typos...

Please review.

I do not own FFvii or any of its characters. I do own Larette. And Carriyon. Oops, Tano too!