Falling Storm, Rising Lion
Disclaimer: I don't own it.
He looked back only once.
Leon always regretted that once.
It entered his dreams, most nights, what Squall saw looking back, and what it had led to. He had turned to look back, the first time he lost a world, and so much of him was destroyed, buried. That first time he saw his friends; Zell, Quistis, Selphie, Irvine…and Rinoa. He saw them falling, and he could do nothing. Squall saw their hearts being taken, and he was too far away to help them.
They had been with the recruits and he in a meetingin Esthar. He hadn't been able to protect anybody, not his father, whom he still would not acknowledge, not his friends, not the SeeDs, not the people of his world, and not Her. That was what hurt the most. The knight is supposed to protect his sorceress.
He had lost control, destroying the shadows left and right, yet in the end he had succumbed to exhaustion, and had been pulled into darkness. When he had awakened, he had been in a bed, in a room he didn't know. To the brunette who stood at his side, he had introduced himself as Squall Leonhart. That was what the others there had called him as well, in the land known as Hollow Bastion. Aerith, Cloud, Cid, and Yuffie had met Squall.
The second time that he lost a home, he lost another friend: Cloud. This time the world wasn't gone; it could be saved. This time, he didn't look back. That didn't stop something being lost. The four of them had fought hard, trying to survive, and trying to find their lost friend. In the end….they had had to escape on an airship that had somehow managed to survive. Traverse Town became the land to be saved; the redemption. All of the survivors had lost something; something they had been unable to protect. They were not willing to allow this again.
The next time Yuffie spoke to him, calling him by name, his only response was, "My name is Leon."
Squall hasn't seen the light of day since, only the darkness of the cage he had built for himself, key within easy reach, yet so far away.
A key with angel's wings.