Final Fantasy - All Series Fan Fiction ❯ Missions ❯ Chapter 1

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Shinra is reformed, but the Turks still need to go on missions. It's just that the missions are a little different, such as finding lost pets and helping make the world a better place.

Missions: Report I

Mission 01: Puppy

"Found anything yet?" This had to be one of the most boring missions Reno had ever been on.

"No," and Rude wasn't helping.

"Hey Rude, who do you like?"

Rude looked at his partner and shook his head, offering no verbal response.

"Yeah, I know, I already asked you that."

"Seven."

"Seven times, I know, I know... This stinks..." and it quite literally did. Searching for a lost puppy in the wreckage of old Midgar was not Reno's idea of a cool Turk mission. "I'm going to look over there."

Rude nodded and the Turks went their separate ways.

A few more minutes of fruitless searching passed, until Reno saw a white and black spotted puppy. "Hey!" He ran towards the dog, "here puppy! Come here!"

Unfortunately the puppy did not listen and instead ran away from the strange human.

"Come back here!"

The dog hid in a pile of wreckage that was too small for a grown human to fit in.

Reno reached in to try to grab the puppy by the collar, but the dog bit his hand, causing Reno to quickly retreat. "Damn mutt!" He clutched his hand and gave the pile of junk a frustrated kick.

The debris came crushing down, the puppy's cry was heard, and then there was silence.

Reno cringed, it looked like he would fail this mission, but he should at least heal up. He retrieved a small bottle from his jacket pocket and drank a little of the potion. It tasted like sour medicine, so instead Reno resolved to apply it directly to the tiny cuts on his hands and he was healed. Against his better judgment, Reno rounded the pile of debris and found a small opening to look in. He looked away quickly, yeah, the dog was dead alright.

A stray puppy slowly approached, whimpered a little and wagged his tail. He wasn't too used to seeing humans around that area, but this one didn't look particularly scary to him.

"Looks like my problem is solved, come here little mutt."

The puppy looked at the human curiously; it looked like he was being called so he went over there and allowed the human to pick him up.

"Good puppy," Reno held the dog with one arm and called Rude on his PHS with the other. "I found the dog; let's go back to the chopper." It was all for the sake of positive publicity, and a dog is a dog, so who cares?

But Rude noticed and pointed out the difference, "that is not a Dalmatian." He wasn't sure what breed the dog was, other than being a mutt, maybe a cross between golden retriever and something else.

"Who cares, let's get out of here!" Reno gave the dog to Rude and they both boarded the helicopter, leaving the ruins of old Midgar behind. The new Shinra missions sucked.

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Mission 02: Pancakes

Rufus poked and prodded the food with his fork, but where the utensil should easily sink in, it did not. The president wrinkled his nose in disapproval and pointed an accusing finger at the items on his table. "What is this?" They looked like pancakes, but unlike pancakes, they were not fluffy and soft. Instead they were hard, like a disk one would throw to a dog in hopes that the canine catches it and brings it back to win some silly competition.

"Pancakes," Reno replied as if it was the most obvious thing in the world, and to him, it was.

"These are not pancakes!" Rufus' tone grew more offended with every word. "I don't know what they are, but they are not pancakes." He pouted like a child refusing to eat his vegetables and crossed his arms, sticking his nose up in the air.

Reno grumbled a few inaudible curses and removed the plate from Rufus' table. It was a fine time Elena picked to come down with such a bad case of the flu. Tseng was tending to the fallen Turk and that left Reno and Rude to pamper Rufus.

Reno deposited the rejected pancakes, plate and all, into the kitchen trash can. He was about to complain about his effort not being appreciated, when a particular scent reached his nose. The scent was familiar and pleasant; it was the scent of freshly made pancakes. That is, pancakes that, unlike his, did not turn into an inedible disaster. "Rude, I didn't know you knew how to make pancakes. Why didn't you say so?"

"Try," Rude took the pan away from the stove and carefully moved the pancakes to a new plate.

"Why should I waste my time trying if it's going to turn out to be a mess?" Reno pouted. "You know I'm not good in the kitchen."

"Learn," Rude placed the plate with the pancakes on a tray and added a glass of orange juice on the side.

"No matter how much I try, there are things that some people can't learn. Rude the silent can't learn to be talkative, Elena the chatterbox can't learn to be quiet, Tseng the workaholic can't learn to be a lazy hobo," Reno lowered his voice for the next one, "Rufus the prick can't learn to stop being a prick," then he spoke normally again, "and I can't learn to cook." Those were the impossibilities that kept the world in balance, and if any of them were defied, Sephiroth would surely sprout out of the ground as the result.

"..." Rude quietly left the kitchen and served Rufus his precious breakfast. The president eagerly devoured the pancakes, chewing with his mouth open and everything.

After breakfast was done and Rufus was transported from Healin Lodge to his office at the new Shinra Headquarters and Reno continued to pester Rude the entire day. Those pancakes smelled really good and he wanted some too.

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Mission 03: Frying Pan

As soon as Reno looked at the report detailing their next mission, he thought it would be annoying. Then he saw the name of the person requesting the mission and he knew it would be annoying.

Reno and Rude met their client at the shopping mall, near a store that sold kitchen appliances. "Everyone thinks this entire help the community thing is a joke!" Albeit a well paid joke. If not for keeping his regular Turk pay check, despite the trivial missions, Reno would not be there.

"I wanted to see what you were really doing," Cloud admitted. The entire campaign about making the Turk services available to the public so people could see how nice they are, looked like a desperate effort to cover something. Cloud didn't know what Shinra was hiding, but they had to be hiding something.

"You just wanted to see Rude because he's the new greatest chef..." Reno walked past the two, slightly bumping into Cloud, and went into the kitchen store. He wanted to get this mission done and over with as soon as possible, and hopefully without being reminded once again that he would starve if fast food restaurants ceased to exist, because he couldn't cook anything edible if he life depended on it.

Cloud tried to counter Reno's odd accusation, but couldn't come up with anything and just stood there open mouthed with no voice. Rude quietly waited for the client to wake up, until Cloud finally reacted. "It's not like Rude even knew about the frying pan before the mission," the blond muttered.

Rude gave Cloud an odd look, though it was impossible to tell behind his shades.

"Tifa's frying pan," Cloud explained, then silenced himself. Tifa promised a variety of fried treats to who ever gave her the 'ideal frying pan'. Sure she was only thinking aloud while cooking, but Cloud had heard, and he brought it upon himself to find that ideal frying pan for Tifa.

Reno happened to be on break at the time Tifa spoke those words and he also heard. He was eating at the Seventh Heaven because he didn't feel like setting foot in the Shinra cafeteria if anyone had heard about the latest Turk missions. If they laughed, he would kill, and that would ruin the very image those missions were trying to construct, and possibly get him fired since Rufus couldn't afford his precious reformed image to be tarnished.

Cloud and Rude both entered the store, the blond grumbling about having specifically requested that Elena be sent on the mission. He thought a woman might know how to navigate the kitchen store better than him, and would provide some useful advice in choosing the 'ideal frying pan'. But apparently Elena was already busy with some other mission and Cloud got stuck with Reno and Rude.

The delivery boy and the bald Turk walked around the kitchen store completely lost. Rude knew how to cook but he wasn't an expert in the kitchen. There were many kitchen appliances and tools, some of which they had no idea what they were used for.

"May I help you?" A woman with a big smile approached Rude and Cloud. She was wearing a uniform that matched the color scheme of the store, identifying her as an employee.

"We're looking for a frying pan," Cloud replied. You never find those customer service people unless you're not looking for them. Hence why Cloud assumed he wouldn't find any and decided to hire Elena, while at the same time investigating Turk activities.

"Of course, but let me show you our selection of pots first, we large a large variety!" The woman proudly proclaimed.

Meanwhile, in a different part of the store, Reno was talking to someone on his PHS, "so I turn right past the bowls, left past the spoons, then straight down the aisle? I see them, which one? Is that written on a tag? Okay, I got it." With a victorious grin, Reno picked up a frying pan and headed off to the front desk.

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Due to the severe headache that overtook Cloud having to listen to the annoying employee, the delivery boy fled the scene without buying anything. Having no need or desire to stay at the store any longer, Rude left as well.

They both retreated to the Seventh Heaven just in time to see Reno leave with a bunch of take-out bags. "Don't get me wrong, I was just hungry." The red head promptly left.

Cloud and Rude looked at each other, wondering what that was about. They soon found out when they entered the Seventh Heaven and Tifa served them french-fries. "Try these fries; I made them with the new frying pan Reno gave me. He was at the kitchen store and called me to ask if I needed anything. Well actually he called the Strife Delivery Service number, but since a certain someone is never around, everyone knows I'm the one who always answers. It's a really great frying pan, he even asked me what kind he should get, wasn't that nice of Reno? I think I finally found the ideal frying pan. Oh and he left this envelope for you, Cloud."

By now Cloud was twitching with a murderous mako glow in his eyes. But at least Rude remained cool, calm and collected as always. Cloud opened up the envelope and found his own credit card. The moment when Reno bumped into him at the kitchen store replayed in his mind, he must have used the stolen card to pay for the frying pan. This couldn't get any worse.

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Mission 04: Child

Rufus stared at his reflection in the mirror and fixed his hair for the millionth time. He looked at himself from every possible angle, smiling in satisfaction. "Is everyone ready?" He did not take his eyes off the mirror as he asked this.

"Ready when you are," Reno replied.

"Then let's-" Rufus looked away from the mirror for the first time in the past hour. "Reno!" He scolded.

"What?"

"I thought I told you, you had to look presentable!" Rufus complained.

Reno shrugged, "I do look presentable." He was in his uniform, mostly. He wasn't wearing a tie, but he never did, and his hair was messy, but it was always messy. To Reno, that was presentable enough.

"We're going to be on TV, you need to look more professional!" Rufus felt a headache coming on. The media had been very annoying lately and today's interview should quiet them down for a while.

"I don't know what the big deal is," Reno had been waiting at Rufus' office for the president to finish fixing his hair for a long time and he just wanted to get this over with.

Rude remained quiet as usual and Rufus gave an exasperated sigh. The door flew open and a little girl ran in, followed by Elena, "you're supposed to wait outside with the press people!"

The little girl pouted, "I'm only saying nice things about Shinra because they're finding my puppy for me. I want to see Lucky or I won't say nice things anymore!"

Reno pointed at the mutt who had been quietly eating in a corner of the office, "there's your dog."

The little girl shook her head and pointed at the puppy, "that's not Lucky! Lucky is white with black spots, that dog is light brown with no spots!"

Lucky had not lived up to his name, having died while Reno was trying to save him. He didn't know what to say except that accidents happen, but he couldn't tell that to the little girl. Surely the kid would start crying over her dead pet and that would ruin all the positive things she had told the press so far.

"You brought the wrong dog?!" Rufus threw his arms in the air dramatically.

"A dog is a dog, who cares?" The Dalmatian was dead and the mutt had been found just in time. Reno thought his resolve to bring the mutt instead, was a good enough solution.

"I care!" The little girl yelled.

"Of course you can't just replace a pet that easily," Elena agreed.

"Whose side are you on?" Reno picked up the light brown puppy. "Look kid, just take this dog, it's better than no dog at all, right?"

"I want Lucky!" The child refused.

"C'mon don't be so stubborn, just take the dog!" Reno tried to talk the girl into accepting her new pet, and maybe she wouldn't mess up the nice image she created for Shinra in front of the press.

Tseng entered the office, "the press members are getting impatient."

"Great, they want to see the touching scene of a Turk giving this little br-beautiful young lady her lost pet, but it turns out we don't have the right dog after all." Rufus dramatized.

"President, relax, I'll figure something out," Reno was fed up with everything and having a hard time staying there. He just wanted to hop on his chopper and fly away, far away. The new Shinra missions sucked and so did the new goody-goody image. "Hey kid, take the dog and don't complain, if you don't like it we'll get you another one later, just accept this dog now as a gift, alright?"

The little girl curiously tilted her head. "Then you're giving me this puppy as a gift?" She pointed at Reno, "A gift from you," then pointed at herself, "to me?"

"Yeah, that's right," Reno was relieved that it looked like the child would finally accept her new pet and quiet down.

"Okay, I'll accept it then, what's your name Mr. Turk?" The little girl asked.

"Reno."

The little girl squealed in delight, "then this puppy's name will be Reno Jr. and he'll be our baby!" She held the dog with one arm and clung to Reno's leg with the other, she was five years old but she was very small.

"Why do you have to name it after me?" Reno complained, and tried to pry the child off.

"Because you're his daddy, you gave me a gift so that means you like me. It's okay; I like older men anyway so I'll go out with you!" The little girl continued to cling.

"What? No! You're just a child!" Reno continued trying to get her to let go.

"I'm not a child, I'm a lady!" The girl argued.

Rufus covered his face with his hands, "this is bad."

Elena took a deep breath and walked over to the little girl, "hey little lady, I have an idea, you should keep this a secret."

The girl looked curious, "how come?"

"Because it's so much more exiting to have a secret lover than it is to have a boyfriend," Elena smiled.

The little girl was happy that she was apparently being treated like an adult and quickly accepted Elena's idea. "Okay! I'll keep it a secret!"

Reno was about to protest, but Tseng shook his head and the redhead remained quiet.

"When we talk to the press, tell them that I found your puppy and gave him to you. Tell them that Reno Jr. is Lucky, okay?" Elena continued.

The girl nodded, "okay!"

It looked like Elena had saved the day, "and what about Reno?"

"Reno who?" The girl asked as if she did not know of anyone by that name.

"Very good! Now let's do the interview." Elena left along with the little girl and the puppy.

Rufus checked his hair in front of the mirror once more and left with them to face the press. Tseng left as well, and Rude stood at the office door glancing back at Reno. The redhead shook his head, indicating that he wasn't going and grumbled about how annoying children could be, becoming fan girls at such a young age.

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Mission 05: Cat

Reno's goggles slipped off his head and fell on Rude's head. They bounced off and were caught by the bald Turk. He considered taking revenge on his partner for all those times his sunglasses had to suffer, but Rude knew that Reno didn't do it on purpose, and he had an infinite supply of patience when it came to the redhead.

The aforementioned redhead was currently up in a tree, trying to reach a cat that her owners claimed was stuck. "Here, kitty, kitty." He called as gently as possible. "Here kitty..." but the cat ignored him and sat there regally grooming herself.

"Save her! Please, save her!" An overly dramatic young woman wearing fake cat ears begged.

"Save her, save her, saver her! Save our precious baby!" A chorus of a dozen other women also wearing cat ears echoed.

The cat was the precious mascot of their college sorority, and they have requested Shinra's help in recovering the little darling who got herself stuck in a tree.

"I'm trying!" The branch where the cat sat looked too fragile to support the weight of a human, so Reno was trying to reach her from a near by branch. "Come here kitty cat, be a good girl and come to Reno."

The white cat looked at the red haired man for a moment, green eyes glowing with interest for just a split second, before she returned to grooming herself and ignoring her would be savior.

"I don't think she wants to come down..." Reno concluded.

"She's terrified, petrified in fear!" The leader of the sorority cried.

"Terrified! Petrified! In Fear!" The other women echoed.

"No, she looks pretty calm to me..." Reno tried to reason with them from the tree but they weren't listening.

"Save her! Save her!" The cat obsessed women chanted.

"I'll try..." Reno grumbled. "Come on kitty cat, your owners will feed you if you go back with them, and I'm sure they have cat toys and stuff too, so come over here."

The cat ignored him.

"Here kitty, kitty, meow..." Reno kept trying to get her attention.

The cat's ears perked up with half interest.

"Meow?" Reno tried again.

The cat finally looked at him.

"Look at that Rude, I think she understands!" The only problem was that Reno didn't speak cat, so he had no idea what he was saying. "Meow, meow, meow, meow..."

"Reno," Rude tried to get his partner's attention without causing a commotion.

But Reno kept trying to communicate with the cat. "Meow, meow, meow..."

"Reno!" Rude called in alarm.

"What's is it Ru- hey what's that? How come the sorority girls are setting up that net, and chains... and a big cage... Is all of that just for the cat? Oh oh..."

The cat finally jumped into Reno's arms purring happily.

"If you want to get down from the tree, do it yourself, because I'm staying." Reno put the cat down on the tree branch and she easily jumped off landing on her feet, but her owners ignored her. Down below, the cat obsessed fan girls where trying to chop down the tree. "Rude... a little help?"

Rude shook his head.

Reno should have known not to try to speak cat around cat obsessed women. Now he held on to the tree for dear life. "I'm not a cat! I'm a human! Why must I be so attractive? Rude do something! Hey! Where are you going? Rude! Don't abandon me!"

A few minutes passed and a helicopter piloted by Rude flew by. Reno was able to grab the rope ladder and climb aboard, right before the tree went down. Then they safely flew away with another mission fulfilled.

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Mission 06: Bagel

"Did he fall asleep?" Denzel pointed at Reno who was sitting at the Seventh Heaven's front counter leaning on it, his face hidden in his arms.

Rude shook his head.

"I'm awake," Reno muttered and looked up. "I'm just in shock," and he was completely unmotivated to work. He would much rather take a nap and pretend all of this was a bad dream.

"Why?" Denzel curiously asked.

Reno wondered if he should dignify that question with a response, he looked at Rude searching for support. Rude nodded as telling Reno to go ahead and answer. Reno grumbled before finally offering his reply. "We were hired by a child."

Denzel shrugged, "even if you think that way, the Turks work for me for today. Marlene and I won the sweepstakes after all. She gets to play with Tseng and Elena for today and I get the two of you."

It was rigged, Reno was sure. Rufus wanted to create a good image for Shinra by having the Turks baby-sit children linked to Cloud Strife and his friends. But either way, Denzel had a point; Reno and Rude were stuck working for him for the day.

"I'm hungry," Denzel informed the Turks. "I want a bagel."

"Of course, you can't boss us around on an empty stomach. Rude, get the kid a bagel," Reno returned to his nap.

"No, you get the bagel and get a bagel for Rude and one for yourself too, then maybe after eating you won't be so grumpy. You could at least try to have fun." Denzel started to feel a little cheated, Elena was always cheerful, and Tseng was serious but he was readily helping with anything Marlene requested. Rude was quietly standing around, blending in so well with the equally silent furniture, one could forget he was even there, and Reno clearly did not want to be there.

"Fine..." Reno got up and went to get the bagels, but realized that Denzel was following him. "Anything else?"

"It should be a lightly toasted chocolate chip bagel with butter!" Denzel cheered.

"Alright, I'll see what I can do," Reno attempted to toast the bagel, Tifa was working in the kitchen and stood back to watch the show. It already had chocolate chips, so the bagel just needed to be toasted and covered in butter. But instead it was burn until it turned black, and a piece of a butter bar was placed on top of it. "Here you go; you know this isn't all that different from working for Rufus."

Tifa tried to hide her laughter while Denzel received the inedible bagel and looked at it. "This is what Rufus eats?"

"Actually, Elena does most of the cooking and sometimes Rude cooks," Reno explained.

"Oh, in that case, Rude could you make us some edible bagels?" Denzel asked.

Rude nodded and made the bagels, they tasted very good.

"So the cooking should be left to Rude," Denzel made a mental note. "What about videogames?"

Reno realized that maybe this wasn't so bad after all. "I'm good at videogames, I'm the best!" It was turning out to be much better than babysitting Rufus, even if his current boss was a kid.

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Mission 07: Handcuffs

"What?" Reno laughed. "No, wait, don't give me the details; let me imagine the strange story behind this." He clicked his PHS shut and returned to his previous task of sleeping on his desk and ignoring the paper work, he would have some very amusing dreams.

The silence that had taken over the Turks office at Shinra HQ was once again broken when Elena curiously asked. "What happened?"

Rude had been out on that last mission for a long time, and it wasn't like him to take so long with how simple the missions have been lately. As far as she knew, Rude's mission was to help Cloud deliver some packages. Thanks to Reeve, Strife Delivery Service was doing well, but Cloud could only do so much on his own.

"Who knows?" Reno shrugged and went back to sleep.

Meanwhile at the Seventh Heaven, in Tifa's bedroom to be specific, Cloud sighed and closed his PHS, "I don't think he's coming."

"..." Rude didn't know what to say. The truth of the matter was that they were handcuffed together and the third cuff of the triple handcuffs was attached to Tifa's bed. Unless they broke the bed, broke the handcuffs or carried the bed with them, which would be too noisy, they were trapped. There were no means to pick the lock of the handcuffs anywhere within reach and the key sat tauntingly on the other side of the room.

"How did we get into this mess?" Cloud Strife was not having a good day. The events that led to his current predicament replayed in his mind.

Cloud requested some help delivering packages and during most of the day, Cloud and Rude had gone their separate ways. They met up at the Seventh Heaven after their respective deliveries were completed as planned.

When Rude arrived, Cloud had been upstairs, delivering the last package, one that he had to pick up from Yuffie to give to Tifa. Tifa had asked him to leave the package in her room and Rude went up to find him.

Against his better judgment, Cloud succumbed to his curiosity and opened Tifa's package. It was a triple handcuff, supposedly a ninja collector's item from Wutai.

The delivery boy heard footsteps approaching, and in his haste to hide his snooping, he couldn't tell they belonged to Rude and not Tifa. He tried to wrap the package again, his wrist getting caught by the handcuffs. Cloud looked in horror at the triple handcuffs. "Get it off!" He uselessly tried to shake the handcuffs off.

Rude caught Cloud's hand on time before the delivery boy's flailing hand hit him on the face, but with a click the Turk's fate was sealed along with Cloud's.

"The key!" In his panic, Cloud slipped and knocked the box off the bed, sending the key flying to the other side of the room. He moved too suddenly, pulling Rude along with him, and they fell on Tifa's bed, the third cuff getting caught on the bed post.

Cloud didn't want Tifa to find out he opened her package, which meant that breaking the handcuffs was not an option. They were unable to pick the lock as they were even if with the proper equipment it could be done. Hence why Cloud had called Reno and told him about the situation in hopes of having the redhead rush over and pick up the key they couldn't reach.

To which Reno had replied with a surprised, "what?" followed by an amused laugh.

Cloud tried to explain, "Tifa is down stairs right now and we-"

"No, wait, don't give me the details; let me imagine the strange story behind this." Reno hung up, which brings us back to the present time with Cloud and Rude handcuffed to Tifa's bed together.

"Cloud, Rude?" Tifa went up the stairs, receiving no reply. Cloud and Rude had been up there for a long time.

Cloud desperately tried slip the handcuffs off to no avail, while Rude remained cool, calm and collected, looking completely serious despite the situation.

Then Tifa appeared at the door and crossed her arms over her chest, her face holding an annoyed expression.

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Mission 08: Roses

At times like this it became painfully obvious that being a Turk was no longer what it used to be. Reno was not happy with his latest mission. He had not liked any of his missions recently and they were getting worse.

Reno received the item he had just purchased and paid for it with the money he was given for the errand. He felt as if he was a kid sent off to the store to buy a few things for his mother. Except Reno wasn't a child and Vincent was certainly not his mother.

Feeling completely ridiculous, Reno made his way from the flower shop back to Vincent's apartment, fighting back the urge to go to Healin Lodge instead, and strangle Rufus for his bright idea of making the Turk services available to the public. The redhead, hurried to his destination as quickly as possible, and finding the door unlocked he let himself in.

"It is disrespectful to enter one's home without knocking," Vincent pointed out.

Reno ignored him and held out the flowers. "Here's the delivery."

Vincent shook his head in disapproval. "I cannot offer her black roses!"

"Why not?" Reno asked, "they fit your entire vampire theme."

"I am not-"

"Denial!" Reno shoved the roses into Vincent's arms and started to leave.

The click of a gun ready to be fired was heard and Reno turned around to face an angry Vincent. "You will fulfill your mission!"

"Why don't you just buy the flowers yourself?" Reno argued, despite being at gun point.

"I wish to surprise her. Besides, I hired you for this job, you should not argue." Vincent did not lower the gun.

Reno grumbled, "fine I'll take the black roses back. I don't know what the surprise is, it's not like she'll see you buying them." Unless the flowers were not for the frozen lady in the isolated cave that Vincent was rumored to like. "Who do you like?" Reno couldn't resist.

"Out," Vincent was still aiming Cerberus at Reno.

"You're so anti-social," Reno left, off to exchange the black roses for more suitable flowers.

Upon his arrival at the flower shop, Reno spotted some red roses that Vincent might like. He was tempted to exchange the black ones for the reds, Vincent liked to wear red after all, but he decided against it. Reno was in a bad mood, and even if it made the chore harder upon himself, he wouldn't make it easy for Vincent who dared to hire a Turk for such a trivial task.

Instead of the red roses, Reno exchanged the black ones for some ice blue roses, with bits of white that made them look as if they were really frozen. He didn't care if he was send back to the flower shop at gun point, he was annoyed and he would annoy Vincent for causing him this annoyance.

Once again, Reno intended to enter Vincent's apartment without knocking. He paused at the door and noticed that Reeve was there, with a laptop and several folders in his arms. He was probably going to discuss some WRO work with Vincent. "What?"

Reeve seemed to wake up from his daze, a surprised look evident on his face. "Nothing," and he scurried away deciding that it was best to come back later.

Reno shrugged and let himself in, but this time Vincent was not upset. He received the roses with an approving look, "Icy blue... she'll like these."

Reno blinked, great, he had failed in annoying Vincent. "I hope you get dumped," he let himself out without waiting for Vincent's reply. All in all he didn't even get the information out of Vincent about who the girl he liked was. It appeared that Vincent had finally moved on from his crush on that lady frozen in a cave the rumors spoke of, but the identity of Vincent's new girlfriend remained a mystery, and a nosy guy like Reno simply had to know.

Later that day, the evening news featured a report about an electrical problem that occurred in an apartment building, resulting on several people being injured. No one knew how or why it happened, and the cause was classified as an accident but not investigated in detail.

However, Vincent was not amused and demanded an explanation the next day at Shinra HQ, having suspected that Reno was behind the so called accident.

"I don't know anything." Reno denied his involvement.

"I know you did this," Vincent insisted. He didn't want anyone disturbing the peace of the apartment building where he resided. The neighbors gave him odd looks all the time as it was, he didn't need it to become worse. Maybe hiring a Turk to run errands wasn't such a great idea after all.

"Sure, accuse me just because I'm a Turk," Reno replied sarcastically. "You don't know what it's like."

"Actually I do," Vincent revealed, "I was a Turk too," though things were different back then.

Reno looked curious, he had been severely bored lately and was easily entertained. "Do you remember your old employee ID?"

Vincent paused, wondering if he should really disclose that information. But he didn't even work as a Turk anymore, so it wouldn't really matter. "36105997"

Reno looked up the files on the computer. "You should talk; you had to make it look like an accident too. Hey Vincent..." Reno's tone suddenly turned serious.

Vincent wondered about the change, "what is it?"

Reno made an overly dramatic pause then asked, "who do you like? Who were the flowers for? There's no need to be embarrassed. C'mon tell me! Who do you like?"

Vincent felt his eye twitch, as he was once again tempted to shoot Reno. Fortunately, he was able to resist the temptation and quietly exit the Turks' office, leaving Reno without an answer.

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Mission 09: Miscommunication

"Can you believe the missions we've been getting lately?" Reno glanced at his desk, the chair was on the floor. He was in such a hurry to leave work yesterday before another unworthy mission came, that the chair was thrown back when he bolted to his feet and out the door. "What's next?" He kicked the chair flipping it right side up, "another delivery mission with Strife? A pizza that needs to be delivered in thirty minutes or less? This is a job for the Turks?" Reno sat down, and put his feet on the desk. He picked up the latest issue of the Shinra Magazine, which was delivered to the Turks office monthly even if no one requested it, and placed the open magazine over his face to block the ceiling lights and try to take a nap. He really hated his job lately.

Elena sighed, "I'm not in the mood for sarcasm today." She looked at her watch. "I need to go to my next mission... alphabetizing books in the public library."

"That sucks," Reno commented and continued his previous task of trying to fall asleep.

The sound of the door opening and closing, accompanied by Elena's footsteps leaving, was that last sound that was heard for a while.

Several minutes passed, until eventually, the door to the Turks office was opened again and another rhythm of footsteps entered. The newcomer lifted the magazine off Reno's face, causing him to close his eyes tightly at the sudden light.

Reno looked at the young woman standing there. "I have a mission for you," she voiced.

She appeared to be a Shinra employee, though Reno didn't know who she was. But the fact still stood that she had made her way high up in the Shinra Headquarters, all the way to the Turks' floor where the access was restricted. "I haven't seen you around here before."

"I'm new, started a few months ago. I'm usually down at the tech department working with data and stuff," which meant that she could have access to the codes that operated the electronic locks, and access to the technology to make herself a special card granting her entrance to just about any floor on the building.

Reno chuckled, "I thought all the tech people were nerdy men," goody-goody nerdy men who followed the rules and didn't make themselves special key cards. Nerdy men with oversized glasses held together with tape over the nose, who wore their pants up to their chests, with bow ties around their necks and an assortment of pens in their shirt pocket. He looked at her up and down, what could be said if not that technology had improved.

"I was going to try out for the Turks," the girl admitted, "but I'll wait until they're cool again. Community service sucks."

"Tell me about it," Reno hoped that, as the girl said, the Turks turned cool again very soon, because he was at the end of his rope putting up with the goody-goody act.

"I know there's a waiting list and all, but maybe you can slip this on top," she handed him the form detailing the requested mission. "It's an unusual request... interested?" She grinned mischievously.

Reno looked over the form. The job description was short, simple and to the point, consisting of only two words. He grinned, "sure, I can help you with this," and signed the form.

Later that evening, Reno arrived at the young woman's apartment. She let him in and handed him a list. "Here you go."

Reno looked at the list with a puzzled expression, "what's this?"

"The list of the chores you need to do," the girl replied.

Reno started reading a few of the items on the long list, "clean the house, do the laundry, wash the dishes, take out the trash, feed the fish, feed the cat, make sure the cat doesn't eat the fish, go grocery shopping, wash the car... what am I your slave?"

"Isn't that what you signed up for? Personal slave, with emphasis on slave more so than personal." She gave him a pat on the back, "good luck."

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Mission 10: Ham

It seemed that ham had become Rude's worse enemy, as odd as it may sound. His latest missions had somehow involved ham, and he was fed up with it, no pun intended.

First it was Tifa and her quest to find the most delicious ham to for the big dinner she was planning for a reunion with all her friends. Rude's job was simple, to carry the grocery bags filled with an assortment of different hams and other foods that went well with ham. Cloud was off delivering packages so Tifa didn't even bother to ask him for help with the groceries.

As luck would have it, Cloud's deliveries for the day were not just any packages; they were ham, special gourmet hams that were to be taken to the Shinra grocery store for safe keeping, until Elena went by to pick them up and take them to Healin Lodge later that day.

After Cloud delivered the gourmet hams that Rufus would eventually consume, the grocery store employees made him an offer that was hard to resist. They would give him a little extra gil if he helped unload and set up some regular hams that had just arrived in a truck, and Cloud agreed.

The delivery boy was setting up the hams at the grocery store when he spotted Tifa. She was discussing hams with Rude as if it was the most interesting topic in the world. That's when his jealous side woke up and his insecurities kicked in. Then Cloud proceeded to whine and complain to Tifa about being excluded from ham shopping.

The argument, and Tifa's attempt to console Cloud, made the shopping process move a lot slower, which meant they had to stay in the meat section right next to the hams for far longer than they originally intended. Even after Tifa finally choose all her hams, and the groceries were paid for and carried back to the Seventh Heaven, by both Rude and Cloud, Rude could not get the scent of ham out of his nose.

At first Rude was annoyed, but when the scent of ham finally left him as he got home after a long day's work, he inexplicably felt like eating ham. That should be easy to solve, he had some ham in the refrigerator. It wasn't as fancy as Rufus' gourmet ham, but it would do.

But alas that was not Rude's day. When he tried to search for the ham in the refrigerator, anticipating the delicious ham and cheese sandwich he would make, he found that the ham was missing, as were several other foods.

"..." Rude only had one suspect, his best friend who came and went in and out of his apartment, making a mess, eating whatever he could find, and disappearing without cleaning after himself or mentioning what he ate. "Reno..." Rude settled for some ramen since he was not in the mood to leave his apartment again just to go buy some ham.

The next day, Rude discovered that Elena had not cooked Rufus' ham on the previous day. The president had changed his mind and said he wanted to "leave it for tomorrow." That was the previous day, so the "tomorrow" that Rufus spoke of was today. On the previous day Elena could have cooked the ham, but today was her day off, which left Rufus' secondary cook in charge of feeding the hungry president, and the secondary cook was Rude.

"No," Rude was not in the mood to deal with hams. Hams have been there when he did not want them to, their scent stayed with him when he wanted it to go away, and then, when he actually wanted ham, he didn't have ham.

Rufus stared at Rude in disbelief, "you said no?" The Turks were there to protect him and to tend to his every need, which of course included food.

Rude shook his head and looked at Reno. The redhead pointed at himself, "me? But the president banned me from the kitchen." Not only did Reno burn everything he attempted to cook, but he ate everything that did not needed to be cooked.

"Rude, get me my ham, that's an order!" Rufus insisted.

"No," Rude walked away. It was best that he didn't force himself to attempt to prepare Rufus' meal, because as fed up as he was with ham, the president might end up with a too large to swallow piece of ham forcefully jammed in his throat.

Rufus was in shock from seeing Rude walk out. Reno was also surprised but he was the first to recover the ability to speak, "should I get the ham?"

"No," Rufus decided that the ham would just have to wait. "Order a pizza instead."

End of Report I

Disclaimer, I don't own Final Fantasy VII. Missions 02 and 03 were requested by Hikou. There is also a small reference to Harvest Moon in the first paragraph of Mission 02. The idea for Mission 04 came from a comment sent by Sasami10. Mission 06 was requested by Little Duck. Mission 07 was requested by CrAze. Mission 08 was requested by Snow. Mission 09 was requested by Littleduck. Congratulations if you caught the references to Devil May Cry and Maniac Mansion: Day of the Tentacle in Mission 09. The reference to Devil May Cry is in the first paragraph when Reno sits at his desk Dante style, mentions pizza, which we know Dante loves, then tries to take a nap while he waits for the next mission like Dante does in the anime. The reference to Maniac Mansion is Reno's description of nerdy men, which is actually what Bernard looks like. Mission 10 was requested by Windy. Most of the mission requests consisted of a character and a word, then I wrote a story about that character that involved the chosen item or verb and a few requests were basic concepts of things the Turks should do.