Meta: Reno and Loyalty
This meta has been a really long time in coming, to be honest, but it's kind of tricky just because of how much I have to actually cover in it, and because I write a very... fluid Reno, I guess? And what I mean by that is that I am very quick to modify my Reno's backstory to fit in with my partner's stuff. Especially when writing with a Rude or a Tseng or a Veld, because all three of those characters have the potential to massively impact his character development.
So. For the details... below the cut. Warning, there's some dark topic mention (I mean, Turks, okay?) and this is very long, because I touch on his history, and I kind of go into his relationships with authority figures, and I go pretty in depth in why he's such a lost soul post-game.
Basic Premise
First of all, think of Reno's loyalty as a switch. It's either on, or it's off.
Hierarchy of Loyalty
Second, his loyalty is a very short list. For the sake of simplicity, I'll go with my "default" Reno here, which is to say, Reno when I am not writing specifically with a Tseng or a Veld.
1. Tseng. (More on this under the "Why Tseng?" section.) a. Rufus Shinra. b. Turks. c. The Shinra Company.
That's literally it. You'll notice that everything is a subcategory. It's because those letters are things that Tseng has told Reno he should be loyal to. Things that Tseng has told him he has to protect or obey.
A side note, my Reno will always confirm orders with Tseng. Even if they're from Rufus or the old President or Heidegger. His eyes flick over to Tseng, wait for that confirmation, and then he does as told.
(Now, for those keeping track who remember me mentioning his sisters, let me just say, they are outside of this ranking system, and they are basically always first in his priorities. There are exceptions to that, however.)
Why Tseng?
Basically, because Tseng is the one who recruits him in my default verse. Now, if I'm writing with a Tseng or with a Veld who thinks someone else recruited Reno, that's going to drastically change Reno's characterization, and it would, in all honesty, change several canon events.
For example, if Veld recruits Reno personally and brings him above the Plate, you're looking at BC happening ... very differently. Reno would not take Tseng shooting Veld very well, to put it mildly. He would either have to be in on it, or he'd probably go rogue and attack Tseng and flee the company with Veld's "corpse."
Unless, of course, he was under prior orders not to. Because here's the thing. Whoever Reno is most loyal to, can literally give him any orders they like, and he will follow them, no matter what he thinks personally of them.
"Go kill this person." Not a problem.
"Torture this woman." Let me get my torture kit.
"Kill this small child." Got a preference how you want it done?
"Drop the Plate and kill thousands of people." Sure thing, Boss.
Reno doesn't trust his own sense of justice anymore. He never has, really. He knows his own moral code is horrific, and he knows that honestly, he simply can't be trusted to make ethical decisions. So he leaves that in the hands of those who have more experience. In the hands of someone that he trusts.
And he does trust Tseng. Tseng saw something valuable in him. Saw that he could be more than another rat in the slums. Tseng brought him Above Plate and taught him and trained him and pretty much didn't treat him like he was stupid.
Reno would do anything for Tseng.
(And if you're a little baffled as to why getting Reno out of the slums is such a big deal... well. I probably write Midgar's slums darker than you think of them. I've noticed that's a common problem I have here on Tumblr. At some point, I'll do a meta about the Midgar slums, but that's probably going to be even longer than this one is, so it'll be a while.)
After Veld's Death
Now, this is basically the beginning of Reno's fall. Up until that point, nothing Tseng has done has ever contradicted the list Tseng laid out to him. Tseng's orders, then Rufus's, then the Turks, and finally, the Company. And then Tseng "kills" Veld.
And he does it for the Company. He kills one of the Turks because the Company has told him to. After everything they did to try to save Veld, to keep him. Tseng throws it all away and Reno can't... He can't see Tseng's play there. He thinks Tseng did it to keep the rest of them safe, but what "rest of them" is there? Tseng, Reno, and Rude? Gun's little sister that they want to recruit who professes to hate them all?
He can't see the value in what Tseng's done, mostly because he doesn't know that Veld is alive at that point, and it starts to crack his blind faith in Tseng. Suddenly, Tseng isn't the grandmaster moving all the pieces, he's just a guy struggling to stay afloat.
Reno has two months to wallow in that while they're suspended.
And then Reactor One blows. And they're given their first real assignment after being reinstated, and it's to blow the Plate. And so help him, but he looks at Rude and he looks at Tseng, and he realizes that neither of them can handle it. Rude's soft in ways that Tseng and Reno aren't, and Tseng...
Well. Reno's just had a very real moment of realizing that Tseng is very mortal. Very human. Just as liable to crack as any of them are.
Cue Reno nearly dying from the fight with Cloud and Tifa and Barret (because remember, canonically, he's badly wounded enough that he's out of commission between Sector Seven and Junon) and Elena is hired on purely because Reno is out.
(Which is a whole other meta honestly: Why is Reno so hard on Elena? Because she's him. Slum kid in over their head and desperately wanting to prove themselves? She's him, and on top of that, she's his replacement.)
And then Tseng nearly dies and Meteorfall happens. They're rushing to evacuate Midgar, to try to salvage something, and the more the world falls down around them, the more desperately Reno holds onto what he has left of the Turks, and then...
They show up. All of them. Not dead, just gone. Because being a Turk doesn't mean shit, and apparently, what was the point of the stupid family thing that Tseng had sold him, when he has living proof that none of the others cared? They walked away. They left Reno and Rude and Tseng to deal with whatever punishment the Company decided to dish out, and they only bothered to come back because the world was ending.
Reno's world is upended. Shattered. He's twenty-five, and he's just had everything he's spent the last... ten years or so defending thrown back in his face.
Post Meteorfall
Reno's loyalty to Shinra and his own sanity are both at their absolute weakest after that. He should be seeing a Company mandated shrink, should be getting pressure from Tseng and Rude and Elena about his nightmares and the fact that he's sleeping even less than normal, but the fact is, they all have too much on their plate.
Reno stays with Shinra because he has nowhere else to go, not because he's a genuine believer anymore. That's broken. It was broken the moment Tseng killed Veld, and seeing that it was all a sham, instead of restoring him, just makes it worse. But he can't leave.
(Who would take in the man who dropped Sector Seven?)
Now, I think, if left to his own devices, depending on what, exactly, Shinra is doing post-Meteorfall, Reno's faith could probably be restored. He wants it to be. But it would take work and concentrated effort that I don't think Tseng or Rufus or anyone else actually has the time or inclination to put in.
So he's just kind of drifting. Trying to find something to fill that emptiness.