Black Shoes On Grey Pavement
~More of Kouen's Shit~

Spoon in spoon
Stirring my coffee
I thought of you
And turned to the gate
On my way came up with the answers
I scratched my head
And the answers were gone
--Dave Mattews Band; "Spoon"

The coffee was black.

Sometimes I try to think back to that night and that's one of the few things I remember. I see myself staring down into that dark, dark pit of blackness that some say has flavor. I remember forcing myself to drink it. I wouldn't have even done it if I hadn't been trying to drink myself into normalcy. No one told me I couldn't trust my squad leader. Of all the people in Squad A I could've trusted, I thought my squad leader would be the most decent person to give that oportunity.

I was never so wrong in my life.

Most drugs give you a sort of dizzy, euphoric feeling. I never did exactly figure out what was in the drink my squad leader gave me and the other member of our squad, but it must of been something powerful. Certain little flashes of the evening stick out in my mind like photographs. Some black and white, some colorful...

We were at a carnival. There was music... but all of the notes are slured together in my memory. Our station was by the merry-go-round. There were so many people. I'd been positioned as the look-out. I wandered around slowly. The Drug had a weird effect even early on. I can remember seeing people...a lot of people. Light colored people...dark people. Some of them had intricately detailed faces. Some of them had no faces at all. I don't remember any of them making noise... only the slurred, high-pitched carnival music of the merry-go-round, and the strange buzzing in my ears.

Headmaster Cid Kramer had put his utmost faith in the two squads he sent to the carnival as a SeeD feild examination. We were to be accompanied by six other SeeD special militia members whom were only to enter the picture should we fail our duty of assasination. I can't even remember the name of the VIP. Just that he was on the merry-go-round...

Squad B was assigned to pull the trigger. Their squad leader was trained to shoot without second thought. They waited for our signal on the roof arcade. They waited for a very long time for a signal that would never come. I never found out what happened to any of them.

I guess in a way I was lucky. I got the smallest amount of the Drug. I spotted the VIP and muttered into my ear mic.

'I see... I see... him..."

Everything blurred for a second, and I waited for my squad leader to reply. I never heard him.

It must of been then that he passed out. All in a split second's time the confusion I was growing accustomed to began to set in times three. The other member of the squad must have picked up the head set, but I can't remember for the life of me what he said...or even what his name was...but I do remember the fuzzy, static sound that filled my brain for the next five seconds.

And then... then... I remember... his voice...

"Abandon...(static)...--ost... (static)...--ve out...(static) ...quickly! Did you hear me, Xu? ABANDON YOUR POST! RUN!"

A gunshot, and then silence for five seconds. It was the longest five seconds I've ever experienced.

The blue flames engulf and swim around the clear glass of boiling water, while little bubbles of air swim up from the bottom to release their prize. The whistling is so faint I hardly hear it through the blurred music of my memories. It is stained black as I pour it from the pot into a mug, where the grounded coffee flavoring awaits it. It's strange how fond of coffee I've become in the past years. Two spoonfuls of sugar; three would be too much, one would be too little... No cream, but I must always add the sugar. I will never again drink black coffee.

And there I am again, staring down into its shimmering blackness, inside the little cafe of the city of Dollet. Just an hour before this I'd been running through the streets, the world a blurred daze about me. I could hardly see anything at all. By then the Drug had taken almost all of my senses. Running down the road, I'd been blessed by some second energy, a second wind, I suppose, that carried me faster and further than I'd ever run before. The carnival, I don't remember how I escaped it, just that I found myself running through empty streets with tears rolling down my cheeks as merry-go-round music danced on the air around me.

Finally, the stupid, tinkly, fairy-like music stopped, and I felt safe enough that I could stop running. In an old alleyway I curled up in a ball and wept. I had no clue where I was, or what had happened. I was dizzy beyond control, and it was there, in that dark corner, that I finally let my body go. My vision shut off, I heard nothing, I couldn't even feel the cold, dark night that had completely devoured me.

Gentle sunbeams raptured the ground about me when the little old man found me. He pulled me up by my elbow. His faceless head spoke to me.

"Who are you, girl? Where are you from? Look at me... that's a girl. My God, your eyes! What happened?"

I don't know whether or not I responded, only that he pulled me along behind him on my rubber, senseless feet into the cafe and sat me down towards the front. "Get her coffee, Linus, she's drugged."

Drugged.

The reality of the evening came rushing back to me at the sound of that word. The popcorn on the grey pavement, being crushed under my black boots... the horses, painted colors that dripped together and swirled around as they bobbed up and down... the faceless people... the nameless VIP... the merry-go-round music.

It started in a low drone in the back of my mind, but rapidly became louder and louder until it was the only thing I could hear. I shook my head, trying to block it out, but it only increased. I put my hands over my ears, but it didn't shut it out. Somehow I ended up screaming on the floor, screaming for it to stop.

The man who'd dragged me in was only able to silence me by slapping me across the face. "Just drink the coffee damnit, you're scaring the costumers." He shoved me down into the chair again. There I stared into the black coffee, and, after another nudge from the gruff man, attempted to swallow it down. It didn't help at all.

Somehow Joe, the owner of the cafe, found out from me that I was from Garden. I suppose he called them, because an hour or so later I was picked up by the Headmaster's wife, Edea, herself. She engulfed me with a hug I will never forget.

"Thank Hyne, Xu! You're alive! We thought you were all dead!" She led me outside to the Train station and proceeded to load me into a passenger seat. As the train began to move she squeezed my hand in her own, and whiped a tear away from her eye. "Tell me," she pleaded. "Is there anyone else? Anyone else that might have escaped?"

I stared at her for a long time, and then, for reasons I cannot explain, I began to cry. Edea whiped my tears away with her thumb as the train lurched beneath us. I fell asleep in Edea's embrace, rocked by the rhythmic movement of the train. Half an hour later we reached Balamb.

Headmaster Cid was waiting for both Edea and myself. By now my vision was begining to clear. Edea kept her hand comfortingly on my shoulder as we aproached her husband, and then, he, too, folded me into a warm hug.

"You are very brave," he told me. I didn't understand what I'd done so brave. I had failed my mission and then run from my post. "To have escaped alive from a disasterous situation. Xu, you're the only one we've found. We've never had a feild examination go so wrong! You handled the situation very well for a sixteen year old girl!"

I was designated a SeeD that day; exactly seven years ago. On an estimation, I've had about six cups of coffee leading up to this day. Today's cup will be my seventh. Now the Balamb Garden Secretarial SeeD, I review the order that has been presented to my by Headmaster Cid. I am to deliver the message to a squad of SeeD canidates on a water vessel headed for Dollet. I haven't been to Dollet since that day seven years ago.

I finish mug coffee in three swallows, then straighten. Instructor Quistis Trepe and three of her students, Seifer Almasy, Zell Dincht, and Squall Leonhart, await my arrival at the docs of Balamb. We are to leave soon.

As I am about to board the vessel I hear a crunch underneath my feet. Normally I would pay no mind, but today, a day of blurred, mixed memories, I chance a glance down at the grey concrete underneath my polished black shoes. My memories pull out a colored photo that's been locked away, only taken out once every year over a cup of coffee.

Black shoes on grey pavement.

A light breeze wafts through my hair and I chance a peek at the rising Dollet in the distance. I lift my eyes up in silent prayer for the SeeD canidates, and the SeeDs who will be assisting them, myself included.

And also in memory, for the six members of SeeD and the five canidates who went to nearby Dollet and never came back alive.


Unholy day
If I leave now, I might get away
But this weighs on me
As heavy as stone
And as blue as I go
--Dave Matthews Band; The Stone


[End Prose]

Authoress's Note: This story was written on a whim after a trip to an amusement park where I wandered aimlessly around the Merry-Go-Round for half an hour in the rain, watching the people. That music can seriously screw up your head. I chose to wrote about Xu, because not many people delve her past. I know this story is confusing, but it's meant to be that way, as it's told from Xu's point of view, and only of what she can remember under the influence of the drug. The drug, by the way, although it is not directly stated in the fic, is Rohypnal, or the Date Rape Drug. To clear things up, the drug was disolved in a drink, which in turn was shared by Xu and the other members of her squad. Now I feel like an idiot for explaining my fic. Please tell me what you think of it!!!!! Thanks! ~Kouen