LadyKF Writes

Rufus Shinra back in time fix it fic.

This was originally going to be “what if Rufus and Lazard (in canon timeline) turned to each other instead of Hollander and AVALANCHE” but the more I thought about it the more I thought “young!Rufus was an amoral little shit who would probably not have cared let alone had the tact to approach his very bitter half brother successfully” so then

then

this nonsense came about where I’m like, so ok, what WOULD make Rufus do this? What would make him care enough? (And “care” is still a difficult word, because this IS Rufus Shinra we’re talking about, and even post DoC he’s not all fluff and sunshine.) But post-DoC, he’s levelled out. He’s smarter, and he has the experience to balance out his grand plans. He learned a lot of very brutal lessons. Given the chance, he’d do things differently by then. SO THEN PICTURE -

End of the world, post-DoC, the world is wrecked and there needs to be some fixing that they honestly don’t know if the Planet will even live to see. And Reeve, whimsical genius he is, does have an idea. About time travel. And there’s this argument about who should go - Cloud right? He saved the world, could totally do it again! - only Rufus of all people points out that at the point Cloud would have any idea of what to do, the worst damages are already laid to happen. That change needs to happen far sooner.

There is suggestion, admittedly, of Vincent. Vincent points out that by the point he had the power to do anything, the Jenova Project was already in motion, that the Reactors were already built. It was before the wars (Wutai, Genesis, Jenova…) but even still, it was a time of flux. Things could be steered, but not prevented. None of them are so old, and back then he really didn’t have that much influence.

None of them had that much influence, except, except-

Rufus, the heir to the company, one of the only people who really COULD have changed it around from the inside. Who was Vice President as early as Genesis’ desertion, who was old enough to start nudging things even sooner had he only known…

Yeah. This might have to be a Thing.