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Rude
Rude's fingers clenched around his bowl of popcorn, eyes locked on to the screen as the narrator continued, ""... the baby seal escapes by the dint of being small enough to squeeze past the Bloatfloat, safe for the moment;""
He grinned at that, only to gasp when the documentary continued with, ""the pup escaped but its mother wasn't so lucky. Her frame washes ashore, her pup oblivious to the danger it's now in.""
"No!" Popcorn flew, scattering over the carpet as Rude leaned forward.
""It continues down the beach, the small form forlorn and starving when suddenly—""
The tear slid down his cheek, the warm splash bringing him back to the cold reality of his shitty ShinRa sponsored apartment.
Rude swiped at it angrily, the betrayal of his body enough to reach for the remote to turn it off.
""...suddenly it finds a sleeping mother with no pup."" His head snapped around to watch as the small pup united with a mother who had lost her pup in a previous episode.
This time he doesn't bother to wipe away the tears that spring forth around his smile.
Reno
Reno hates Church Duty.
"A-A-ACHOOO!"
No, seriously, he hates it but not for the reason their Director thinks.
It's not because he's opposed to ShinRa's goal of the Promised Land (like Martial Arts Femme).
It's not because of the anti-ShinRa forces that attack them on a regular basis because they know that Turks are in the vicinity of Sector Five Slums.
It's because he's allergic to those godsdamned flowers and they're ruining his image.
He likes Aerith alright but she trails pollen like a bee and he's constantly trying to avoid dying from inhalation.
"Ah-Ah-ACHOO!"
So when Bossman makes him fight in that godsawful flower factory, he's so grateful to that upstart SOLDIER pretender that even with tears streaming down his face, Reno gives chase over city streets instead of flowery bullshit.
Tseng
Picot, slip stitch, double crochet—
Tseng stopped mid-way through finishing his blanket edge and counted, suddenly suspicious about the amount of the border leaves he was finishing off.
The yarn was a little too wavy, even for a proper vintage yarn like the one he'd inherited from Veld's knitting stash when the Director 'vanished' oh so long ago.
He counted backwards, marking a tally for every base stitch and then, slowly, carefully, put down his project to grab a pillow and muffle the absolute furious scream that escaped him.
Three stitches.
Three.
Three!!
They'd thrown off his stitch count for days and he'd never even bothered to look at the base!
He slowly picked his project back up, pulled the hook out of it and yanked out the stitches he'd just done, muttering to himself the stupid viral meme Reno had sent him merely an hour prior, "When you crochet, you have to ask yourself, do you know how to count and are you ready for that answer to be no?"
The tears that slipped unbidden down his cheek were gently wiped away by Katana's kerchief, the sign of frustration gone as soon as they'd been shed.
«You will do it right next time, beloved.» came the whispered support as Katana picked up his embroidery in their shared office, suited shoulder pressed to suited shoulder.
Tseng—perhaps a little rougher than usual with the vintage yarn—frogged the project back down to its base layer and took a deep breath before starting once more.
Katana's presence was deeply appreciated as he counted again, each tally written in ink gifted by his beloved.
Elena
Elena knew she was the youngest Turk by a long stretch but all that meant to her was that she had to be faster, better than her predecessors.
She could book it from one end of the Turk bullpen to the other in under a minute carrying scalding hot coffee for Tseng.
She could outshoot everyone but Two Guns and the other Turks who specialized in that weaponry.
Her knife-throwing skills were even getting up to par against Knives and Katana!
Elena guarded the President with the best of them and avoided his clutching fingers just so as all the other female Turks did.
She was damn good at her job and she was at the top of her cohort when it came to the nitty-gritty details.
She was not, however, immune to slamming her pinkie toe against the edge of her own desk.
No one was, apparently.
"FUCK!" slipped out of her mouth as tears pricked the corner of her eyes.
Martial Arts Femme hissed in a breath as Elena inhaled sharply and gingerly sat down with as much of her tattered dignity as she was allowed.
"You want some Blizzard on that?"
"I..." Did she admit weakness? Should she?
"Elena," Oh that the gods might bury her now, her boss had just seen her lose control—"there is no shame in taking that offer."
"Sir?" She questioned tightly, barely controlling her voice.
"... Did that last week. Sucks ass. Take the Blizzard." Tseng stated point blank. "Would've saved me the Cura later when I couldn't walk right on a mission."
"Oh. Yes please, Martial Arts,"
Her co-worker chuckled as she targeted Elena's little toe and iced it with a faint snap of her fingers. "Still so polite, little lion cub; we'll see if it stays."
Katana
The after-mission routine was always the same; debrief, shower, shave and then sharpening his beloved blade.
This last mission had been in sub-zero temperatures and the blade had seen a little too much use for Katana's taste.
He pulled out the whetstone, set it into the clamp on his table, gently sprinkled on some water and watched in wide-eyed horror as one of his family's heirloom pieces snapped like a cheap stick.
-crick!-crick!-CRACK!—
The whimper that left him as he fell to his knees beside his sharpening station wasn't even registered as he unclipped the broken stone and held it in his hands.
"Oh gods, it was too cold up there, they're going to murder me for my carelessness..." he bemoaned.
«Good even-Ah. Beloved?»
«I broke the heirloom! They're going to murder me if I don't have it when I go home next time!» Katana held out the pieces, each click and grind of the stone against itself causing him to wince.
Tseng gracefully sank next to him, gently tugging the pieces out of his hands and setting them on the kitchen tile as he turned Katana's hands over in his own. «Did it cut you, beloved? Are you injured?»
«Well, no, but—»
Brown bored into violet, serious as Tseng never was in their personal life, «Katana, we can replace the stone and yes, you can heal from scratches but I don't want you to be hurt if I can help it,» Tseng softly traced his fingertips along Katana's palms and pressed a kiss to each. «Things are replaceable, you are not.»
Katana laced their fingers and leaned into Tseng's offered embrace.
Less than three days afterward, having borrowed Tseng's own whetstone for his usual routine, Tseng was handed a package by the SOLDIER Couriers that traveled to and from Wutai.
This in itself wasn't unusual, as Tseng enjoyed things from his homeland on a semi-regular basis.
What was unusual was the fact that he set Katana to follow him into their shared office with a hand signal. He locked the door, kicked on a security trio of Silence, Shield and Libra at MAX level, implying the utmost secrecy about this particular package.
«Open it,»
Katana pulled apart the furishiki wrap after setting it on his desk, hands blindly reaching for Tseng at the sight of a set of whetstones, each of them with the original straw packaging around them.
His throat worked, bobbing up and down before his fingers clutched at wool suiting and he sobbed, "Thank you,"
«Anything for you, beloved.» Tseng murmured against his hair, lips pressing faintly against his craggy facial scar.
To steal a phrase from Reno, he truly was a lucky Turk, yo.
Cissnei
Everyone knew that it was Zack and Kunsel when it came to the SOLDIER buddy pair.
What they didn't know was that Cissnei and Zack had a friendly competition for getting each other the shittiest ShinRa MRE flavors to take on missions as a joke.
The kicker was that they knew each others actual favorite flavors for when they needed favors.
Cissnei was this close to picking up Zack's—Mystery Meat with Tropical Medley.
Right as she reached for the last one, a burly Second plucked it off the shelf and—Oh no.
Gil flashed and the box disappeared into the SOLDIER's Inventory.
"Ah, excuse me, would you mind trading-"
"Turk."
Right, not everyone appreciated her chosen profession.
"Can I trade you your Mystery Meat?"
"... No."
"Dude, I'm offering you Chili-Mac." She brushed aside his rudeness because everyone loved to trade and especially for the good ones.
"On mission, can't talk,"
Oh no, no, no, no.
"I need that Mystery Meat, I'll trade while you walk,"
"Transport leaves in less than 5, Ms. No."
Well shit. Only one thing to say now, "Come back in one piece,"
"... I'll do my best, Ms. Turk." Surprise slid across the SOLDIER's face but so too did acceptance.
Cissnei was not moping in the Turk's bullpen.
She wasn't.
Absolutely—
"Heard from a big birdy that you tried to trade for my fave from Second Class Oleander," Zack said as he flumped into the couch cushion next to her.
"Oh gods,"
"He doesn't trade," her buddy answered her raised eyebrow. "Never has, never will but he says you made a damn good attempt with the Chili Mac."
"What does he do?"
"Eats them," Zack scoffed, "no sense of commodity with this guy," he patted her knee in consolidation, "but his battle buddy did manage to pick up your favorite."
No, he hadn't—
"Plus he was willing to trade my premium Rocket Town Steak & Beans for it."
"You love Steak & Beans!" She spluttered in protest.
"Love you a little more, 'Nei-nei," Zack countered with a grin. He pulled out a Brisket MRE with a flair, setting it into her lap with the smugness of a cat that got the canary, the cream and fish for dinner too.
"Oh Zack!" She threw her arms around those obnoxiously large shoulders and sniffed a little, swiping her tears away before Zack could see them.
"Don't need to see 'em, 'Nei," Zack teased, "I can smell 'em," he offered her his kerchief, a practice apparently imbued to him by his mentor.
She took it, blew her nose and then cleaned it with a vigorous cross-cast.
"Ass!"
"Would you have me any other way?" Zack asked while wriggling his eyebrows in an obscene manner.
"Za-ha-ha-CK!" she laughed, shaking her head at his antics.
No, the Puppy was truly named in her eyes.
Rufus
The world ended one day.
ShinRa's sins had risen up to greet it with open arms and truly Hellish intent; for all that Sephiroth had been their crowning achievement, once upon a time.
ShinRa scattered.
Many of its Executives had died in the wave of Holy versus Meteor.
Rufus and his Turks, however small the amount that remained, picked up what was left of ShinRa's structure and tactfully retreated.
What a shame that Cloud Strife, former Infantry who now possessed the strength of a true SOLDIER, wanted nothing to do with them.
No matter, his Turks and thier loyalty remained unquestioned.
Geostigma.
A punishment from the gods, they said.
More of ShinRa's mistakes coming to haunt them, they said.
Reeling from the loss of two of his most staunch defenders Rufus put up a strong front against all comers until he was alone with his Turks once more.
Then the tears dripped, the steady patter of them against the white suiting disappearing almost instantly into the fabric.
The tears slowed then stopped before Katana spoke for the first time in two weeks. "Weep not for them, sir,"
"I beg your pardon?"
"They're not dead," Katana stated, revealing a blinking light on the Healin Lodge tracker dash. "Tseng is..." the beeps finally registered as Rufus's ears popped. "injured less severely than Elena but they will meet us in Edge. He said to be ready to cast off your disguise, sir."
"Excellent, I shall dress my best for the reveal against those upstarts," he purred, patting the box by his feet that contained JENOVA's head.