Rufus heard the words Reno left unspoken, the implication that lay at the culmination of the Turk's grievances. He felt the shredding cold touch of his oldest ghost in the damning review, eclipsing all else. The blood drained from his face, leaving him white to match his suit, though his skin felt hot. Red suffused his vision, and his breath was a rough thread of air being tugged through the raw pipette of his throat. Bone-white knuckles flexed, creaky, and his nails dug into the flesh of his palms as though fisted in the folds of his self-control and physically holding it in place. Anyone but Rufus ShinRa might have attacked the Turk then; might have lunged across the table and fastened aching hands about that elegant white throat with enough force to bruise it pure black, tiny blood vessels bursting in the Turk's face and fire-green eyes as Rufus' thumbs crushed one wall of his trachea flush against the other and starved him of air until he stopped moving. No words, no blood, just strength and ruthless, tireless patience.
How dare you.
The only movement was the taut quiver of Rufus' shoulders. Otherwise he held utterly still, and drew silk-thin strands of air into his lungs, each filament sliding through his throat with a faint wheeze in the silence. It was a long time before he had enough air to speak.
"I," he breathed, "do not care if you despise me." His throat closed entirely, so abruptly he nearly fell back. Instead he dropped his head and raised his shoulders, playing off the flash of directionless panic that stole through him as suppressed rage. There passed a long stretch as his vision darkened, and he placed his hands flat on the table for balance, still lightheadedly striving to keep his stance enraged. A thread of air teased through his throat. Another. He grasped them, pulling them in hand over hand, and gradually they came faster, easier. He straightened and found the Turk's glare again. "I do not care," he continued finally, voice only slightly rough, "if you follow me because you are 'loyal,' or if you follow me because it is convenient." His hands were trembling on the table, and he leaned more weight on, pressing them still. "I do not care, so long as you follow me. So long as you obey me.
"But if you are not willing to do your job," breathe, "and you do not have the dignity to quit," obey me, end this, he was building walls around the Turk, penning him in, finally feeling he had something solid with which to direct the Turk, because Reno will never leave his job, even if he could do so and live, "then I will fire you.
"Because you are not a person. You are a Turk. And therefore," he snarled, hands curling on the desk, "you are mine."