Rufus Shinra has been training to become President since birth. Now sixteen-years-old, the boy is Vice President and utterly against his father´s means of running the company. Although allowed to discuss SHINRA´s programs and projects as second in command, he is consistently against every idea his father has. ¨Hmph. This is stupid. Everything you do reeks of superfluity,¨ he states boldly to his father´s face. ¨If I were in charge, the company would be ten times what it is now.¨ The teenager will do anything to kick his father off his throne ... even if that means he must betray the company all together. Pairing up with Fuhito of AVALANCHE, Rufus funds the eco-terrorist group in order to drain the power his father has over Gaia. Eventually, the Turks learn of this deceit and capture him. Rufus orders AVALANCHE to blow them all to bits, but is unsurprisingly stabbed in the back by the organization he had been funding. Fuhito threatens to kill him along with the Turks, and much to Rufus´ dismay, he is forced to beg them for rescue. Wish granted, as always, the young Vice President is taken back to his father and put under house arrest for his antics. He remains in his Head Quarters in Junon until his father passes away. The public is informed that he is on an ´extended mission over-seas´.

The fact of the matter is, Rufus hates AVALANCHE and the Turks equally. He sees them all as toys for his manipulation - surges of power to be exploited in order to obtain his vision of the ´perfect Gaia´. His only real ally is probably his trusty companion Dark Nation, whom he only really gets along with so well because the poor creature isn´t human. Rufus may be an expert on how to control human emotions and milk them for all they´re worth, but he doesn´t seem to have a grip on how to maintain his own.