You spoke, and I told you. Popped you in the lip—gave you that smack you'd been puckering up for ever since Timber. Ever since ever.

There's a reason why no one has any fond memories of you, and it's not just down to the GF. You're a fucking kid—a little boy breaking everything he touches, dropping and ruining and cutting up all ties you ever had just because you've got this dumb picture of yourself in your head that you want everyone to see. What's so bad about being normal? Why can't you have that like everyone else? And what if you were a big-shot hero, strutting around with blood on your boots, Ultimecia's hand on your balls? I'm sure you'd have been living it up in time compression about now if everything had gone to plan.

Tch.

I told you, and you kept grinning, blood on your chin. At first I thought you really might have gone insane—then I remembered that you're just an asshole and just about everything you do is because of that.

I can't talk to you. I feel greasy talking to you. I don't want to talk to you—and even when I used to want to talk to you, you'd say, "Shut up, Chicken." But you spoke, so I said it. All of it—everything you needed to know and couldn't care less about. Blasé, aloof, strolling back like it's your old block and you've just been off for vacation.

Some vacation.

We fretted for you, and gave you the benefit of the doubt. You took that generosity and shoved it down our throats, and kept at it. And still—still—you're back here on that: our giving you the benefit of our doubts.

You're like a cat at a ball of yarn; unravelling everyone's patience until there's nothing left. I honestly don't think there's anything left, Seifer. We're losing our doubts altogether.

-

What's the matter, Chicken? Gonna cry?

Good, I'm glad. Take your benefits—your crybaby benefits, and good will. I didn't need your hope—hope is useless. I was just living out my destiny—time compression—loopy-de-loop, like you said—turning bad luck into something useful, something memorable.

I don't need to explain this to you. It's not like you would understand, anyway.

In the end it's just a lot of words. Blah blah, words words. I always wanted to make something of myself, and you all have me pinned as this dropout tearaway. I kept to the rules—hell, I enforced the rules. You have to think of it, though. A struggling artist can have a trough of integrity and still take a million from some sleazy business dealer. Does it make sense? The skill and the ambition does not always match the opportunity.

I don't need to explain this to you. I could try, but each time you would just punch me in the mouth.

I have learned nothing. I remember little. My feelings are crossed and tangled and I don't care to unpick them. I came back here because I have nowhere else to go, and nothing else to do. And it's home, I guess, but that comes after the other two.

I see a golden haze when I think back to her, and what we did together. I get the moths in my stomach, the stifled breath. And somewhere in my throat the heat rises from my heart and the magic claws down my throat, and they meet there in awesome discord.

I could try to explain this to you, but you'd still hate me anyway.

-

You don't need to explain anything to me. I'm not that fucking dumb. You're not that fucking complicated, either.

I remember one time you tripped a kid up and put your foot on his head. I punched you in the mouth then, too. We fought, and later I felt bad because you had to go to the summer ball with a split lip and a shiner. I felt bad, and took an icepack to your room for you to snatch. I still laughed, though, and I think you probably did too, because you know nothing is that serious. Nothing is as grand and sparkly as it looks on the outside.

Right?

I forgive. I forgive the neighbour's cat for scratching at my ankles. I forgave Ma's fisherman friend for giving me food poisoning. I even forgave Quistis for saying the Pupurun series was "painfully derivative". Eventually.

Seeing a girl lying in a hospital bed with a third of her head missing because of a missile strike—that's not easy to forgive. Seeing a roomful of students with the same training and different-coloured uniforms trying to kill each other isn't easy to forgive.

This was you, Seifer. Not all of it, but it was still you. I don't need to explain this to you, because you do understand. You're not that dumb, either.

I promised myself I would cut you out for good. But you spoke, and I hit you, and yet I still turned up at your door with an icepack.

-

So what?

So you've got your picture in the paper, you've got a badge of honour from Cid, an increased salary and permanent membership in the I Was Right squad. So what?

You are that dumb, Dincht, to think I'm accountable for any of the shit that happened, or that I should pay penance for doing what I've been trained for all my life. I came back to Garden with a mark—the bad scar, pariah, stray cur. All those noses I had to look up at—into—to see those stuck-up little brains painting their little picture of me in their heads.

If I had made SeeD I would never have been in this mess. I'd be on The Right Side with you guys, all buddy-buddy ne'er-do-wrongs. Why didn't I make SeeD? What distinguished me from you and Squall that day, Dincht? It certainly wasn't class or skill.

Initiative, free will—Garden's forbidden fruit. This is what cut my chances and failed me the test. You were there, and Leonheart, quivering in your boots, giving it all the shoulds and shouldn'ts. The orders, the person in charge—these are the only things that matter for SeeD. That's all it's about. Someone tells you to kill, you kill, no questions.

That's what I fucking did. I played SeeD's game, and did as I was told, with no questions, no qualms, no conscience and no freedom. I obeyed.

And I'll try to tell you this, but you'll always punch me in the mouth before I can finish.

-

I don't care if you think I'm a momma's boy anymore.

You're useless, impossible. It's not a matter of opinion; you can't twist your logic on this one. You did awful things and loved it—I saw it there, in your eyes, in the auditorium, swinging your blade and giving it the high and mighty.

I've told you, and you don't listen. Or you listen, but don't learn—or even you learn but just ignore that and do it anyway. You've broken everything, and tried to kill everyone who has cared for you. For some reason you need to fight everyone because you can't face up to the fact that someone could care for you and even love you—

You're here now. There's no starting over from this point. You're so stupid, Seifer, with your stupid dreams. You could have had so much better than those stupid dreams if you'd used your stupid head.

I'll hate you, but I'll always be at your door, the icepack melting in my fingers.

-

Bring it, Chicken. I always loved your crackly-voiced whining, retard-moralising. You fuel my fire—with your dumb hair and gay face paint.

I can't help that you're the kind of person that makes me who I am. I can think if it went differently, I'd still be tripping you up on the battlefield and laughing at the look on your face, all wearing the same uniform as you, fighting for the same side.

I'm tired. I feel like I haven't slept in a year. I'm all battled out, wuss. Re-schedule an ass-kicking for sometime next year. Nobody gets away with busting a lip on me.

I kind of don't get why you're always there when I open the door. Like you're apologising or something.

You fucking care too much, Dincht. I always expected less from you.