A/N: (Okay, I promise not all the author's notes in this fic will be this long. I'm sorry for this one, I feel like a dumbass.)

So, I am taking place in a 100 fic challenge over on Livejournal, and these are the resulting fics from the 100 prompts. (Yes, I said 100. THIS IS GOING TO BE A LONG ONE.)

This "story" is actually a series of one-shots, each one a stand-alone snapshot of a small moment in the lives and love of Squall Leonhart and Rinoa Heartilly. Some will be in-game, others post-game. Some might even be AU. It's hard to say, as I've not written them all yet. They are just coming to me randomly. :)

They are in no particular order, and you do not have to read them all to understand anything. Like I said, they are all meant to stand alone. The ratings will range everywhere from K+ through M. I'll make sure to give any warnings at the beginning of each chapter. I hope you enjoy these small moments that are seemingly mundane, but reflect on one of the most beautiful relationships in Final Fantasy's history. (And please let me know if any of the formatting is funky, like words all smushed together or what have you. I hate when that happens, and I don't always catch it.)

Anyway. This first one is rated K, and there's really nothing in it that requires any kind of warning. ONWARD!

Destiny Starts
(Prompt: "First Meeting")

Rinoa was in a good mood as she prepared herself for the SeeD graduation dance that balmy May evening. This was the evening that her whole life would change -- for the better, for the worse, for forever. This night, she would meet her Knight.

But she wasn't thinking about any of that at the moment. Right now, she was thrilled because Cid Kramer, headmaster of Balamb Garden -- and, might she add, her new freaking hero -- had agreed to help her. And as soon as possible, he'd be sending some brand-spanking-new SeeDs to Timber to help her group, the Forest Owls, with their resistance movement. It was the miracle that they had been waiting for.

Of course, she'd be lying if she said that was the only reason she was excited. Balamb Garden was also the home of one Seifer Almasy. It had been a while since Rinoa had last seen him, but she was nearly giddy with anticipation over the prospect of a reunion.

The previous summer, she and Seifer had spent a lot of time together -- they had gotten to be very close. And she couldn't wait to see him again. She couldn't help but wonder if that spark would still be there as she ran a brush through her long black hair.

She gave herself a final glance in the mirror, making sure her appearance was satisfactory. She was quite nervous, though it seemed silly. Rinoa Heartilly was not a girl who was given to nerves. Even boys didn't make her nervous. But tonight … something felt different. There was a strange kind of energy in the air, she could sense it. She assumed it was just butterflies over seeing Seifer again, silly as that sounded to her. But there was no other explanation for it, was there?

Nervously, she touched the neckline of her white slipdress, and then gently fingered the wedding band that she wore on a chain around her neck. It had belonged to her mother, and in times when Rinoa felt uneasy, touching it calmed her immeasurably.

Tonight, however, it didn't seem to work. She couldn't shake the feeling that something was off. Shaking her head, she told herself she was being ridiculous. "It's just Seifer," she muttered irritably. "It's not like there is anything to be worried about."

Taking a deep breath, she opened the door of the spare dorm room Cid had offered her for the night, and into the deserted Garden hallway.

Well, nearly deserted, anyway. As fate would have it, she saw Seifer standing with his "posse" -- Fuujin and Raijin at the end of the corridor. Barely able to contain her grin, she hurried over to them, her butterflies from just moments ago all but forgotten. "Hi, you guys!" she said brightly. Her smile faltered when she saw the glower on Seifer's face.

"Whoa, you look great, ya know?" Raijin crowed.

Rinoa smiled and dropped a curtsy, then looked back at Seifer, who had still not cracked a smile. "Hey. You look kinda down," she said, concerned. She reached out to touch his arm, but he brushed her aside. She frowned. This was not the reunion she'd be expecting. Not even close.

He waved his hand dismissively. "It's nothing. You do look nice, though," he amended quietly.

She sighed. Well, it was better than nothing, she supposed. Even if it didn't really seem like he meant it. "Thanks," she said dryly. "Oh, my Hyne, Seifer, I have to tell you! Cid agreed to help! He's going to send SeeD to Timber! Isn't that fantastic? Thank you so much for setting up the meeting."

"I'm glad to hear it went well," Seifer said, his tone warmer. His eyes still looked distant and cold, though, and she really wished she knew what was bothering him.

Rinoa sighed. He was certainly in a sour mood this evening. "So, why aren't you all decked out in your brand new uniform? Cid invited me to stay for the dance, and I was so excited about it --"

"I'm not going to the stupid dance," Seifer said bluntly, cutting her off mid-sentence. "Have fun though." He motioned for Fuujin and Raijin and headed off down the hall.

"Seifer," she protested, a little shocked at his cold attitude. This was not the boy she had spent so much time with last summer. "Wait just a minute!" She chased after him, feeling utterly ridiculous to be running after him like some kind of lovesick twit. Good thing no one was around to witness it. When she caught him up, she grabbed his arm. "How can you not be going to the dance?"

"Easy. I'm not going. Considering who will be there, I'd rather spend time in the training center." He shook his head. "I'm glad you and Cid hit it off, though. See you 'round, Rin."

"Seifer. Won't you tell me what's wrong?" She put her hand on his shoulder in what she hoped was a comforting, reassuring gesture.

Apparently, it wasn't.

"Nothing's wrong, Rin," he growled. "Just let it go, all right?" He shook her arm off his shoulder and continued walking down the hall, away from her.

She knew when she'd been dismissed. She couldn't help but be confused, hurt, and a little angry. Over the summer, Seifer had been so different. Wonderful, even. Full of hope and promise and dreams. But now? Rinoa wondered what had happened this last year to make him seem so bitter.

She took a few deep breaths to steady herself, and then headed for the ballroom. She was determined to enjoy herself, Seifer or no Seifer. Of course, he was still on her mind, but she was young, and the air was full of electricity and excitement. That strange energy she'd felt earlier, in her room, seemed to have come back once Seifer had walked away.

How odd, that it would dissipate while he was standing beside her, only to fill the air again the second he walked away. She wanted to ponder what it all meant, but she didn't want to squander her time thinking about things that she couldn't change -- at least not tonight. It was apparent that tonight, Seifer did not want to be around her, and she wasn't about to go where she wasn't wanted. That way would only end up making her miserable in the end.

If Seifer wanted to sulk, and if he wanted to refuse to talk to her, fine. One thing Rinoa had learned from her mother was that you shouldn't let your happiness depend on one person. She always got a sad look in her eyes when she told Rinoa that, and Rinoa knew, deep down, that she had done just that. And she'd paid dearly for it.

Rinoa reached the ballroom and gave pause after walking through the double doors. The sight before her was absolutely breathtaking. Sparkling chandeliers, polished brass and marble so smooth it was almost mirror-like, and the newly graduated SeeDs in their sharp blue uniforms. But most stunning and eye-catching of all was the enormous glass-domed ceiling. The stars twinkled brightly, and Rinoa felt as though she could simply reach up and pluck one right from the sky.

She accepted a glass of champagne from a young man in a waiter's uniform and did a quick scan of the enormous room. She knew he wouldn't come, but a tiny part of her -- the ridiculous part, she knew -- kept hoping to see Seifer walk through those doors. Somehow, though, she just knew that everything was different now. The electricity was almost palpable in this room. Something was here. Something … big was definitely here. But she wasn't sure if that was a good or bad thing.

Rinoa sighed to herself as she walked around the ballroom. She had really thought that Seifer might be The One. She had thought that all the signs were there last summer, but now ... Now she just didn't know. Something had gone terribly wrong. Absence did not, apparently, make the heart grow fonder.

"Hi!" a cheery voice said. Rinoa snapped out of her reverie and looked up. She saw a girl, about her own age, with bouncy light brown hair and snapping green eyes. She wore a SeeD uniform and Rinoa thought she looked hopelessly adorable. "You look lost," she said. "I'm new here myself."

"Not lost. More like, lost in thought, I guess," Rinoa said honestly. "I kinda thought tonight was going to be different. Special." She sighed. The girl raised an eyebrow. Rinoa shook her head. "Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sort of -- a client -- I guess. But I also -- I'm a friend of Seifer Almasy's." Or I was …

"Oh, him." The brunette's brow furrowed. "Don't think he'll be here. He had a pretty bad day. I doubt he's in a party-ing mood."

"Bad day, huh?" Rinoa said quietly.

"Yeah, quite the scandal, actually. Something to do with not following orders during the field exam. They're pretty big on that around here. I'm sure he'll tell you the whole story himself." She looked at Rinoa, considering. "You -- close friends?"

"We sort of had a thing last summer is all. I don't even know if he's still interested. I just kinda thought maybe we'd reconnect tonight." Rinoa took a sip of champagne. "I think I was wrong."

"Oh?"

"He kinda blew me off earlier, when I saw him in the hall," Rinoa confessed. The champagne must've been getting to me, she thought.She didn't normally tell total strangers her business. In fact, she didn't normally talk so much with anyone. Of course, it was more from lack of opportunity than anything else. Rinoa had grown up very sheltered, and she didn't even have any close girlfriends.

"He's really bent outta shape right now. I'm sure he'll get over it. He'd be an idiot to blow someone like you off," the other girl continued, grinning.

"Thanks," Rinoa told her, and she meant it. "I'm Rinoa, by the way."

"Selphie," she replied, smiling.

Selphie -- Rinoa thought that the name fit her very well. She found herself thinking that Selphie could be a good friend, under different circumstances.

"Whoa, Selphie, who's your friend?" A cute blond guy with an interesting tribal tattoo on the left side of his face sauntered over. He, too, was wearing a SeeD uniform.

"This is Rinoa. Rinoa, this is Zell. Rinoa is a friend of Seifer's," Selphie said.

Zell made a face. "I see. Well, it was nice meeting you, Rinoa," he said, heading off across the dance floor.

"Wait," Rinoa said. She was completely baffled by this boy's strange behavior. "Something wrong?"

"Zell and Seifer aren't exactly what you'd call 'good friends'," Selphie explained.

"Oh," Rinoa said, unsure of what to do with that knowledge. "I'm sorry."

"It's all right," Zell said glumly. "Figures he'd have a girl like you." He turned to Selphie. "You seen Squall?"

Selphie shook her head. "I wouldn't be surprised if he's not here, either." She looked at Rinoa. "He's kind of anti-social," she confessed.

Rinoa just nodded, though she really had no idea what a "Squall" was and why it should matter to her if he was at the dance or not.

"So are you coming to Garden?" Zell asked, eyeing Rinoa warily.

Rinoa laughed heartily at that. "Me? A SeeD?" She was barely cut out for the Forest Owls, truth be told. "No, no. I came as a client to see the Headmaster, and he invited me here. I thought I'd be able to spend some time with Seifer but ... Well." She waved her hand dismissively. "But you guys are nice!" She smiled warmly and wished for a moment that she could live in a place like this, with people her own age around all the time. Of course, her father never would have allowed it. Rinoa was far too "fragile" and "delicate", according to General Caraway. She hated those words.

She hated even more that they were true. She wanted so much for someone to see her as strong and capable. But she feared that no one ever would. Even Seifer handled her with kid gloves. Like she was some kind of porcelain doll that might shatter if shaken.

The band started playing a lively tune that Rinoa loved, and it pulled her out of her rumination immediately. "Do you dance, Zell?" She cocked her head toward the dance floor.

"Right," Zell snorted. "Seifer's got eyes everywhere. If word got back to him that I was dancing with his girl ..." Zell shook his head. "Sorry, I gotta go. Selphie?"

Selphie smiled apologetically. "Later! It was nice to meet you!"

"Likewise," Rinoa said, and then sighed. She'd been so happy less than an hour ago -- and now everything seemed to be going wrong. Seifer didn't want to talk to her for whatever reason. That was fine. It had been several months since anything had … well, since they'd been "together", and people were bound to move on. Not a big deal. But it hurt her, nonetheless. And it also pained her that people here who seemed perfectly nice didn't want to talk to her because of Seifer. It seemed like maybe she'd been wrong in her assessment of the green-eyed boy from last summer. Maybe he wasn't Prince Charming after all.

Chewing her bottom lip thoughtfully, she glanced up to look at the stars through the dome. They always made her think of her mother. Julia Heartilly had loved the night sky. She told Rinoa that it inspired her. Rinoa had never really understood her when she was younger, but now, standing here, she realized that she finally got it. There was magic in the stars, magic just waiting for her to reach up and grab it. If only she dared.

Suddenly a shooting star streaked across the sky. She quickly reached up to the ring around her neck, and made a wish. She had wished for many things over the years, but tonight … tonight she wished for one thing. The truth. Her truth. She followed the path of the star with her gaze.

And that's when she saw him. And all the electricity and energy that had been building up around her seemed to spark, the moment her eyes fell on him.

He was tall and brooding, dark hair falling in his face. He stood all by himself at the wall, a glass of champagne in his hand. He was also watching the star.

Rinoa made eye contact with him, smiled a little, and pointed up. He tilted his head slightly, almost uninterestedly. His attitude seemed to say, "...Whatever." Rinoa shook her head, giggling slightly to herself. She thought that he was entirely to cute to be standing alone, so she walked over to him. She hated missed opportunities, and if she didn't say something to this boy, she knew it would haunt her for a very long time.

But the closer she got to him, the harder her heart pounded. Something about him felt almost magnetic to her. She didn't understand, couldn't even begin to grasp what was going on, but she knew in her heart, her blood, her very bones, that she had to get to him.

When she reached him, she smiled coyly, and considered her target. He was standing there, looking at her. Not expectantly, oh no. Rather, he looked quite bored. Rinoa bit her lip, her heart pounding wildly in her chest, butterflies wreaking havoc in her gut. Why does this matter to me so much? she wondered briefly. Sighing, she grinned even wider at him, flashing her teeth. "You are the best-looking guy here," she said, and prayed he didn't laugh in her face. "Dance with me?"

He looked up at her and she nearly gasped out loud. He had the most stunningly cool blue eyes she had ever seen. And his face … Mysterious. Dangerous. Insanely hot.

So why were there chills running down her spine?

xXx

Squall considered the girl standing before him. He was shocked that she'd even approached him at all, truth be told. Most times, his off-putting attitude made people keep a wide berth around him. He preferred it that way.

But this girl … well, it didn't matter what he thought about her. He wasn't about to dance with her. Not that she wasn't pretty, because she was. All pale skin and dark hair and quite the smile. The fact remained though, that he didn't even want to be at this stupid party, and he wasn't about to go out on the floor and dance. People would see him, and he hated being looked at.

The girl smiled again, and Squall fought off the urge to just walk away. She was so … eager and earnest. Go away, he grumbled in his head.

"Oh, I see," she teased, a playful glint in her dark eyes. "You'll only dance with someone that you like." She looked him squarely in the eyes this time, and he swore for a second, his heart stopped. "You're going to like me, you're going to like me. Did it work?" she asked hopefully.

"I don't dance," he said bluntly.

She sighed. "Oh, come on. I've been looking for someone -- I can't dance by myself. " She reached out and grabbed his hand. The charge that went through him the moment her hand touched his was enough to nearly floor him. It struck him so suddenly, that before he realized what was happening, she had already dragged him out to the middle of the floor.

He glowered at her once he regained his bearings. She pouted at him. "Oh, come on," she teased him good-naturedly as she positioned his hands for him. "I don't bite. Much." She winked at him and his breath caught in his throat. He was struck by the strange notion that they seemed to fit nicely together.

Oh, yeah, he really needed to get away from this girl.

It was then that she turned her head. He caught the faint whiff of lavender and vanilla coming from her hair, and he suddenly couldn't remember how his feet were supposed to work. There was no way he could've gone anywhere without falling all over himself like a total moron.

As it turned out, though, looking like a moron was apparently in his stars that night. He stepped on her feet (and was sure he heard them crunch a time or two, much to his supreme humiliation). "Sorry." He mumbled that a lot, he realized, feeling more the dolt with every passing second. "Sorry, sorry. Oh, sorry!"

But the high point came when he tripped on his own feet and fell into her, which caused them to collide with another pair of dancers.

"Watch it!" the guy barked while his partner glared at them menacingly.

"Oh, calm down, meanies," Squall's partner shot back, wrinkling up her nose at them. Then she looked at Squall and smiled reassuringly.

Of course, to him, it was patronizing. Squall hated to be patronized, and he was not going to continue to stand out here and be humiliated in front of the entire Garden and the strange, fascinating girl in front of him. "This is stupid," he said, and started to take off.

"Oh, no you don't," she said. She caught him by the arm and dragged him back. "You can't abandon a girl on the dance floor. It's rude. It's okay that you suck. It's kinda cute, really." She giggled.

Suddenly, all the tortuous training that Squall had undergone over the past ten years came back to him. Oh, no, he wasn't going to be embarrassed like this. SeeDs were trained to be able to handle anything. A dance was nothing compared to the horrors he would face daily from now on.

A strange light flashed in his eyes and she gasped as he grabbed her around the waist and began leading her through the intricate steps of the dance. Soon, they were spinning around the floor as though it's what they'd been born to do.

He spun her back into him, and as their bodies were flush, she laughed warmly. He couldn't help but feel a twinge of raw male satisfaction, as she was so obviously impressed by his moves.

The final notes of the song played, and he twirled her out, and then back in again so that their faces were just a breath away from one another for a split second before they spun once more and ended up holding each other loosely, palm to palm, while a gorgeous array of fireworks exploded overhead.

"Wow!" she breathed, beaming at him. "That was -- awesome!" She caught herself and her smile faltered when she noticed how he was looking at her. He couldn't help it, they were both breathing harder than they had been, standing so close that they could feel each other's heartbeats … and she was pretty. He actually found that he was loathe to release her, so he kept his hand about her waist, while the fingers of his other hand began to curl, ever so hesitantly, around her hand.

To her credit, she didn't look away, either. They stood there, watching the other watching them, for what seemed to be an eternity. It was really only a few seconds, but in that few seconds … everything changed.

The Knight had met his Sorceress for the first time, unbeknownst to them both.

xXx

He started to say something to Rinoa then, but just as he opened his mouth to speak, she saw Seifer looking at them from the door. He didn't look thrilled.

"I'm really sorry. I have to go now. But thank you for the dance!" She pulled away and headed for the door.

As she walked away from him, her heart felt heavy, and every step seemed to be a trial. She was going to see Seifer -- she should be happy, ecstatic, even.

So why did she care more about the fact that his eyes were on her as she walked away?