Destiny Interrupted

Final Fantasy 7. Rufus/Reno. R. 2100 words.

The first time Reno screws up bad enough for Rufus to take notice, he’s shaking in his boot.

Fifth Time’s the Charm

The first time Reno screws up bad enough for Rufus to take notice, he’s shaking in his boots. It’s not like he’s afraid of his boss’s boss, not in the same way most every other poor fuck in the building is, it’s just that he likes his job and life wouldn’t quite be the same without it. Wouldn’t be when it came down to it.

He can’t keep his mouth from running on, though, bad habit, one both he and Rude are pretty sure is gonna kill him faster than the smokes in his pocket. His stomach flips a little thinking about his partner. Even when it’s raining hell, Rude’s always got his back.

“Can we get this over with?” Reno says, fishing out a battered Strike while Rufus looks on thin-lipped and serious. He taps the end of the cig against his lighter, glancing away when he puts it to his lips and flicks a flame to life.

On the other side of that huge fucking desk of his, Rufus hardly moves, hardly even blinks. Embraced by a high-backed chair that’s eased back on its hinges, he seems reptilian, pale eyes cold and calculating. “Are you that eager to be reprimanded?”

“Mark my file, dock my pay, give me a fucking spanking if you want, but I’ve got a partner in the infirmary and we’re just wasting each other’s time here.”

“Don’t you think it’s up to me to decide whose time is being wasted? Whose resources?”

Reno bites down hard on a retort. He’s no stranger to dealing with administrative types, but he doesn’t need to take their shit, ‘cause his department is more than half off the books. And over the years, he’s figured out what the man he answers directly to expects outta him. Rufus’s a lot higher up the chain though, next in line to be the C.E. fucking O. and it’s a whole other song and dance. Right now, Reno isn’t sure if he ought to be laying on the charm and aiming for a dip or tap-dancing his fucking legs off.

“Next time, then,” Rufus says, and to Reno’s poorly hidden surprise, dismisses him.

*

The second time, the way things went down wasn’t Reno’s fault at all. Wasn’t Elena’s either, no matter what those fucks from the grunt squad were saying. Only, Reno knows she’s got a recent blot on her classified personnel record—ain’t his problem Tseng doesn’t lock his files down well enough to keep him out—on account of the citizens that got dumped at the local ER when a routine shake-down got nasty.

“She don’t gotta be here,” he says, and the way Rufus’s eyebrow creeps towards his hairline is almost enough to get Reno saying fuck it and letting the girl take the lumps.

“Leave,” Rufus tells her when she tries to speak up, and both he and Reno do a good job of ignoring her indignation. She’s got that chip on her shoulder, bald-faced frustration of being one of the few skirts on the roster.

“Such loyalty,” Rufus remarks as the door clicks shut. He starts filing his nails; they’re shiny-smooth and manicured, clean as a churchgoer’s compared to Reno’s. A quick rinse under the tap before high-tailing it up here had no chance to wash away all the blood that had gotten on his hands when he quit playing nice and got down to business. There’s enough dried at his fingertips to crunch when he picks them clean with his thumbnail.

Reno shrugs, loose and easy, and smiles like he isn’t feeling like he’s been pegged by a cactuar at being painted a white knight. “Well, you know, those motivational posters get to a guy after a while.”

“I just hope you’re as loyal to this company.”

A flash of heat runs through Reno, sends his shoulders tensing like there’s bad news coming his way looking for a brawl. This is the test, he realises. Rufus is getting ready to make his move, to quit fucking around and take dear old dad out of the equation. Knives are out and Reno isn’t looking to get his throat cut.

“Ain’t the company I’m willing to take orders from,” he says, catching Rufus’s eye.

*

The third time, Reno isn’t even sure what the fuck he’s doing standing in the middle of Rufus’s fancy new top floor office with the best view in the entire city. It’s been repainted and redecorated since the last time he was up here doing the dog and pony show with Tseng for Shinra Sr. There used to be dark, heavy furniture, shades drawn and brandy on the cabinet. Now everything is modern, windows bare to prove Rufus’s got nothing to hide, and there’s too much space to think straight and puzzle out why the big boss thinks him picking up a bullet in the leg is worth chewing him out over. It’s not like he landed on the fucking thing on purpose, or didn’t make the bastard who tagged him regret it.

Reno smiles a little, remembering.

“Something funny?” Rufus asks.

“No, Sir,” Reno replies, and it’s almost a kick in the teeth the way sincerity is rolling off his tongue a whole lot easier these days. Says a lot for the way ShinRa is running smoother since all those suits got blown to bits by some environmental nutjob in that oh-so-regrettable ‘terrorist attack’.

“Let me see the wound.”

“What?”

“The wound,” Rufus says, gesturing at Reno’s leg.

“I’m gonna have to take my fucking pants off if you want a look.”

Rufus just smirks. Reno knows—hell, everybody knows—that he’s more than a little queer, fucks around mostly on the other side of the fence no matter how many pretty birds are hanging on his arm at the red carpet events the tabloids love so much. It’s not like Reno is a stranger to a mouthful of cock, either, more like it just never crossed his mind that he might be the guy’s type.

It takes Reno another second for him to realise Rufus really expects him to do it, but then he doesn’t hesitate shucking his pants down. It’s his turn to feel a little smug when Rufus is as surprised as the girl who patched him up that he isn’t wearing shorts. No less appreciative, either.

It’d been a mostly grazing shot, bullet gone straight through. The flesh of his thigh is angry and red around the dressing. Hurts like a motherfucker to stand there, but painkillers make Reno loopy. Plus, sometimes, he kinda likes the pain. Keeps him sharp.

“Could sue you for that,” he says, pulling his pants back up.

Rufus sits back and sizes him up, and there’s less of a chill in his eyes. Reno finds himself glad he’s got his pants on again. A good bit of violence in the morning always gets his blood going, and watching the twist of Rufus’s lips has him halfway to hard thinking about whether or not ShinRa’s head man would moan like a bitch if he fucked that pouty little mouth raw.

On his way out, already planning to make a stop in the washroom for a couple minutes of alone time, Rufus’s secretary hands him the forms to report an incident of sexual harassment.

Reno shakes his head. He has to hand it to the guy. Rufus turned this whole fucking company inside out after taking charge and so far has always held himself to the same standards that he expects from the drones. Reno swings by his very own veal fattening-pen long enough to dig an envelope out of his desk and fill out the report.

He sends the whole thing directly to Rufus twenty minutes later, signed at the bottom in the most personal way possible.

*

The fourth time Reno earns himself a reprimand, it comes at the tail end of a shitty fucking week, and Reno’s too tired to fence words or figure out whether or not he should be flirting or apologising. Getting his eyes to stay focused is taking pretty much all he’s got. He just wants to go home, have a beer, take a hot shower, blow his load, and go to sleep.

He tells Rufus that pretty much verbatim.

For a second, after the dressing down his poor ears were still ringing from, Reno thinks Rufus’s gonna be a dick and not let him go, then it’s a wave of dismissal and nothing else.

“So that’s it then? I can leave?”

Rufus had already put pen back to paper. He lifts his gaze, spears Reno straight through, and slides his pen through his fingers as he says, “Unless you want to do all of that at my place.”

Reno holds his breath, gauging just how serious Rufus is about that ‘cause for all the times it seemed like the boss was going to make an honest pass at him, he’d been left on his toes waiting for something that never came.

He’s tempted, really fucking tempted, but he gets the feeling that if he says yes, he’s not gonna get much sleep and he’s been running on caffeine and adrenaline for four nights straight.

“How about a rain check on that,” he says, trying to ignore the little voice telling him he’ll regret not jumping on the chance to roll around with the most powerful man in the whole fucking world. It almost works. But, like Tseng is fond of telling him on days like today, almost is far from good enough.

Rufus nods, snapping the cap off his pen again, back to business in a flash. Streaming in through the windows, the bright, mid-afternoon light turns his hair to gold. Reno watches Rufus’s signature flow across a few pages before excusing himself.

*

The fifth time Reno ends up in the middle of a shitstorm, Rufus comes to him instead. The boss looks out of place hanging at the entrance to Reno’s little cubicle, white pinstripe pressed neat as usual and his hair slicked back.

“Trouble follows you,” he says, his eyes flickering to the requisite crap Reno has painstakingly collected and pinned on the walls.

“Seems like it most days.”

“Two weeks unpaid leave.”

“Yeah, Rude already served up the bad news straight from Tseng’s mouth.” A week ago he’d been bitching about not having any vacation time, but the truth is, when he doesn’t have anything on his calendar, Reno just doesn’t know what the fuck to do with himself.

“What are you still doing here then?”

“Shift doesn’t end for another two hours.” Reno crams his hands in his pockets and leans back in his chair. It squeals like a banshee, but Rufus doesn’t even have the courtesy to twitch. Reno jerks his chin towards the little stacks of paper crowding around his computer. “Paperwork to do before I get outta here anyway. Damage reports, promises not to wreck anymore company property, you know the drill.”

“Feel like hitting the coast while you have nothing to do but sit around with your thumb up your ass?”

“Look, I don’t need the charity,” Reno says, his neck turning hot. He doesn’t need a pity vacation from a guy he can’t quite call his boyfriend for all the mornings he’s been waking up in the man’s bed recently.

“I wouldn’t be going with you.”

“Doesn’t change my answer.” Reno shifts forward, chair screaming nice and loud, and flicks open the file folder he’s been procrastinating over for the past half hour.

“Well, look over the travel plans anyway,” Rufus says, and it sounds like an order. Reno bristles, knows he’s about to say something he’ll regret because he can feel it building in his chest. But although he doesn’t remember seeing anything in Rufus’s hands, suddenly there’s an envelope slapping down right on top of the work he was planning on pretending to do.

Left alone again, it takes him twenty minutes to give in to the urge to rip the fucker open.

“I trust you. Don’t fail me,” it says, in the curvy, prissy handwriting he’d recognize anywhere. The note is pinned to what looks an awful lot like the preliminaries for the kind of job that usually comes to him eyes-only in a red envelope.

“Son of a bitch,” Reno breathes, and for the first time since he hauled himself out of bed at the ass-end of morning only to find he was out of coffee, he manages an honest grin.

*

End