Disclaimer: I do not own anything related to FF8; believe a company called square-enix does. Also, has anyone seen my bank card?
.
"Romanticism is precisely situated neither in choice of subject nor exact truth, but in the way of feeling." -- Charles Baudelaire
.
ROMANTIK// i. The Rules
1. The first to say mercy is the Loser.
2. Cheating is not allowed.
3. Loser agrees to the wish of Winner.
"It hurts!"
She had hoped it would come out like a statement; a brief, calm statement that simply informed him that she was in pain, and for the sake of courtesy, he should let go. Instead it was a long, agonized cry that stabbed at his eardrums and prickled along her throat, and it only made him bend more, and twist harder, and she would not, and would never, give.
"You have to say it!" he commanded her. He couldn't let her know that she was dangerously close to reversing the hold, or that her small fingers were pressing points on his hands and wrists that were translating into angry scowls on his otherwise youthful and pink-cheeked face. He felt her nails digging trenches into the back of his hand.
"Say what?" she questioned, a determined spark in her blue eyes.
"Cheater!" he yelled, trying to will himself taller for an advantage. "You can't scratch!"
Her only response was to grit her teeth and try with all her might to look for an opening. All she needed was one second, one momentary flash where he would buckle, and he was hers for the taking.
She curled her toes into the sand and glared harder at the boy nearly nose to nose with her, in hopes he'd succumb to the psyche assault of her expression. "You think whatever you say is right," she growled. "It's not that way. You don't tell me what's right!"
To her suprise and dismay, the corner of his lips tilted upwards into a tiny, unbeknownst to him, smirk. "Zell is too scared! I'm right! Squall is too stupid! I'm right! You want to fight me 'cause you don't want me to fight them. I'm right!"
With that, he twisted even harder, and a growing knot in her forearm suddenly exploded in a spasm of pain that made the water in the distance behind him rise up in psychedelic patterns over her eyelids. She cried out, but he wouldn't let go, and there was no way she'd let him win like this. Her small sandaled foot raised itself from the sand and struck him quickly in the shin. Faintly, she thought she could hear his scandalised cries of 'cheater' somewhere above her right ear. He was still holding onto both her hands, still vigourously twisting and pushing at her wrists.
She had buckled, her forehead now nearly resting on his shoulder as she lost her footing from the desperate kick. Blinded with pain that came in waves up her arms and into her head, she opened her mouth and bit hard into his shoulder. He jerked away in reflex, and she kicked him again, sending them both tumbling into the ground. Sand flew around them, all over their clothes and in their hair; she knew Matron hated when that happened, and they were going to be in trouble, but that wasn't happening yet. All that mattered was who winning right now...
She splayed her weight over him and yanked hard at his hands, still entwined with hers, pushing upwards and praying that he would just admit defeat, and he'd give up, and she'd win and she'd be the one that was right.
"CHEATING, LYING QUISTY!" he half-shouted, half-gasped in that dramatic way he always did. He coughed, sand settling in the back of his mouth.
"Quistis! Seifer! Both of you stop it right now!" Another voice, this one usually calm and gentle, now uncharacteristically angry and panicked. Little blonde Quistis suddenly felt hands grip into her shoulders like talons, trying to pry her off where she perched, rather like a war hero, on top of her fallen enemy. The adult half succeeded, getting the little girl to fall unceremoniously onto her bottom in the sand. The little boy cried out again, and it was then that the adult noticed their hands were twisted together in some sort of painful knot.
"Quistis," she coaxed, trying to sound sweet through her panic. "Why don't you and Seifer let go?"
"No!" the little girl said loudly, anger brimming behind her blue eyes. There was sand on her face and blood on her lip. "He has to say it!"
"No!" echoed the little boy, still staring daggers at the girl across from him. Were those bite marks on his shoulder? "She already lost! She cheated!"
"He doesn't have to say anything," their Matron continued anxiously. "Both of you – don't have to admit defeat. Just let go – okay? How about if you let go at the same time?"
They both continued to pout and glower at eachother, and Matron was disconcerted to see their knuckles stained white where they witheld their deathgrip.
"No one is winning here,"she said softly. "It doesn't matter anymore who wins."
"Yes it does," Seifer said from his spot on the sand. "I don't lose."
Matron placed her hands over theirs, feeling their skin taut from pulling, and lacking of warmth from the displacement of blood. Almost instinctively, their grips slightly loosened.
"I don't ever want to see you two fighting like that again," she said in a low voice, now in the process of untangling each of their chubby fingers from one another, and they complied without complaint, although she swore she could feel the heat of their ominous stares passing through her head. "Both of you; you do not hit one another." She emphasized each word with an alternating pointed glance between them.
"It wasn't hitting," Quistis said in a small voice. Matron looked at her, now clasping each of their hands in one of her own. Seifer had sat up by now, his attention on his battle partner. "We were just ...playing."
Matron looked slightly incredulous. She was used to, and fond of, the sheer ridiculousness of children sometimes, but this was beyond childlike playfighting.
"This isn't playing," she said soothingly, wiping away a tiny tear streak that Quistis hadn't even known was there.
"It was a game!" Quistis barrelled on, not wanting such an injustice of getting into trouble for fighting (when they clearly weren't) to come to pass. "Seifer was trying to get the boys to play; he made fun of them and I told him to stop, and he said he that he wasn't asking me, then I said I'd play, then he said I was stupid and that I couldn't --"
"That's enough, Quistis," Matron interrupted quietly. "Seifer, is that true?" Quistis peered around Matron's shoulder and glared triumphantly at Seifer with a you're-gonna-get-it expression smeared across her face.
"Quisty tattletale," Seifer muttered. "Quithty, liar."
Matron gave him long, piercing look. He didn't meet her eyes, instead pulling his aching hands away and crossing his arms in front of his chest. She sighed, turning her gaze to Quistis.
"Go inside and wash up, Quistis. Don't forget it's your big day today," she ordered, giving Quistis a similar look which let her know she wasn't off the hook just yet. Obediently, Quistis stood and let Matron nonchalantly swipe at the sand coating her bottom and legs, and ran up the steps towards the orphanage, stopping when Matron ceased watching her and sticking her tongue out at Seifer in a decidedly immature fashion.
He was still red-faced and simmering when Matron finally addressed him. Matron, a woman who appeared sophisticated and elegant even with children hanging off of her legs and arms – she had the power to calm and diffuse the most difficult of situations, most of the time.
"What did I tell you about hitting the girls, Seifer Almasy," she began sternly.
"I don't hit no girls!" Seifer protested, balling his fists and becoming redder in shades. "Quisty's no girl."
"I know and you know very well that Quistis is a girl."
"She always hit me back! And she hits me even when I don't hit her, she hit me when I hit Sefie that one time, and that was an accident. I said that I'd play the game with the boys only because I can't hurt girls, and Quisty said she'd play! She said, 'you can't hurt me Thifer'. Quisty is a girl because you say so Matron, I think Squall and Zell and Irvine are the real girls," he continued in his tirade. "You're just tricking me 'cause Quisty's your favourite."
In spite of herself, Matron bit back a small smile, twining strands of her long dark hair around her index finger. "I think you're a little confused, Seifer."
"Why am I in trouble and she's not," Seifer mumbled to the ground. "She hit me too! She kicked me," he said, slamming little fists into the ground and grimacing when he felt the ache in his wrist. "And I followed the rules!"
Matron pretended to consider this, absently clicking her tongue and tapping her chin with her finger. "You're still both in trouble," she said finally, looking at Seifer with a knowing glint in her eyes. "Are you ready to stand up now?"
In response, Seifer crossed his legs in front of him and rested his elbow on one knee, dropping his chin in his palm. Immediately, he felt Matron swiping at his hair, spraying loose sand across his shoulders. Then, almost systematically, he felt similar actions on his shoulders and back.
"And what did I say about making fun of the way she talks?"
Matron felt him tense under her hands, preparing herself for a tantrum, but all that she got was another grumbled protest.
"She can't go if nobody won."
She paused her movements, thinking. "What was that, Seifer?"
"The rules are, you can't leave unless you win," he said, a little louder this time. Matron's brow furrowed, and her tidying swipes became soft circles on his upper back.
"Because stupid Quisty always wants rules," he added sourly, now looking out towards the water. "She don't even follow them. She kicked me first, so that means she lost and you came and told her to leave, and now she's leaving. That's not the rules!"
"Seifer..." Matron trailed off, not knowing where to begin. He was staring at her accusatorily as if realizing she was the reason he was in this whole mess. "I am not telling Quistis to leave."
"Then why is she going?"
"Two people who... very much want to take care of Quistis came to me, asking for just that."
"Why can't you take care of her!? You're our matron! And y-you're giving her away! Give them Squall instead!" he was stammering now, even if he didn't know it, and he was angry, so very angry. "Why do they want her?"
Matron thought about this for a long moment. "They want Quistis to be happy."
"Is she unhappy because of me?" he asked abruptly. "It's not my fault!"
Matron hugged him to her then, and he didn't respond. He was stiff but his limbs slack. She patted his head and smoothed his hair down. "Come on, Seifer," she murmured into his ear. "It's hard to understand now... but just come and say bye to Quisty." To everyone, she wanted to say, but somehow, she didn't think it would matter. In time...
She let go of him and stood up, brushing sand off of her plain, faded dress, and holding out her hand. When he turned his head away, she began walking, holding her hand out behind her absently. It never worked, trying to scare him into following her with threats of being alone, because he would always just run off regardless and end up being collected by her shortly afterward. He wanted that freedom and independence, and ran – but no one followed him, and it made him angry. And when she would calm him down and take him back to the others, it seemed like he dreaded it; it seemed like he wanted to have something to show for his brief moment of treachery, but never did. It was confusing, with Seifer.
"It's almost lunchtime, Seifer," she said in a warning voice. "We all have to eat together you know." She came to the top of the small hill and waited, looking back towards the large stone house where her husband waited with the rest of the children. By this time, she mused, a tiny smile playing on her lips, he would be more than slightly dishevelled by dealing with the rest of their charges by himself, shirt half-untucked, glasses askew -- inwardly, her smile grew wider.
After a long moment, Matron began to suspect that this bout of stubbornness was heading into the long term, and started back down the hill. Sunlight glinted across the water and she shielded her eyes, wind whipping her hair about in the breeze. She had just opened her mouth to call out for the little boy when she saw him running towards her, sand rising in small puffs where his feet fell. He took her outstretched hand immediately, cheeks flushed from the jog.
"How are you feeling?" she asked him as they walked. He was dragging his feet, his steps making long tracks in the sand behind them. He mumbled something unintelligible in response.
"I heard hungry," Matron continued with a smile. He didn't answer. She sighed.
--
Lunch was surprisingly uneventful, to Matron's surprise, with the only commotion being prior to the meal (they had decided to let each child customize their sandwich to their liking, which had resulted in much taste-in-food related insults such as, 'pickles are nasty!'). Her husband must have noticed her relief as they all ate in relative silence, the sounds of the children's chewing cushioning the sounds of the wind chimes swaying by the door to the porch. He gestured to Seifer, who was sullenly munching on his sandwich and sporting an angry red mark on his shoulder. She could only shrug and shake her head in response, cocking her head towards Quistis, who had her napkin spread in her lap, and was taking exactly one sip of milk per two bites of sandwich.
As usual, when she had finished and collected each crumb on her plate with a wet thumb, Quistis dropped from her seat first and began to collect everyone's plates.
"Quistis," Matron said offhandedly from where she was wiping a stubborn ketchup stain off of Zell's chubby cheek. "You don't have to help with dishes today, honey."
The little blonde girl paused, looking down at the crumb filled plate in her hands and biting her lip. "I want to," she said finally. "You're gonna have to do it from now on anyway, right?"
She stood beside Seifer's chair and reached over to tug at the plate before him. He raised his elbow up to block her hand.
"Not done yet," he said curtly. He could feel her glowering at him, and Matron giving him another Look, but he ignored them both.
"There's nothing on your plate," Quistis pointed out.
"So?" he challenged.
"I'm done, Quisty!" a full, and therefore, happy, Selphie interrupted, waving her plate towards them and spraying crumbs all over the table. Quistis forgot about her impending argument with Seifer and the dirty plates took priority, continuing her circle around the table until only his plate remained, which she ignored.
She put the pile by the sink, then carefully stepped onto the stool in front of it and placed each plate inside one by one, making sure to spray water on each of them. He scrunched his nose in distaste as he observed her, always bound to her procedure and her duty as if the rightness of the world depended on it.
Cid must have noticed Seifer's face becoming a bomb-timer count down because he quickly stood up and clapped his hands. "Everyone full?" he asked.
When six young, round faces with varying expressions of curiousity looked back at him, he smiled and began pulling their chairs back. "Then let's all sit in the living room together," he suggested. "I just finished putting together a new photo album." The last one.
Matron had just about ushered everyone in front of the television where Cid flashed through the channels, lingering for a bit on the boring news ones where the only words the children caught were 'sorceress,' and 'war,' and other strange words that right now, had no real meaning to them. She paused where she was retrieving the new album from atop a display case, listening to the descriptions of the war happening on the other side of the world. Her thoughts wandered to Ellone, then to Squall, then to all the other children who would never know their parents...
Cid noticed the stiffness of his wife out of the corner of his eye, and changed the channel.
--
Sometime during the laughter that had exploded around the room at a photograph of a red-faced, crying Zell, body submerged under the sand with only his head sticking out, Matron had quietly took Quistis from the room.
Quistis knew this must be about something Important. They were never given free reign of Cid and Matron's quarters. One always had to knock before being allowed in, and everything inside was so crisp and immaculately clean that she was always afraid to touch anything.
Matron beckoned her over towards her vanity, a cherrywood structure with a large mirror mounted atop. Wayward dust was visible by the shafts of light that shone through the room, and Quistis resisted the urge to blow softly through the rays to keep it from settling all over Matron's brushes.
She sat down where Matron patted the cushioned seat in front of the vanity, and relaxed as her warm hands settled on her shoulders. She was entranced by the image opposite her in the streakless mirror, of a little girl, with blue eyes that could stare a hole straight through your head, and the Matron behind her, tall and regal and pretty, rubbing her shoulders and smiling at their reflection.
"We are going to miss you, little Miss Quistis Trepe," Matron said after a long stretch of silence -- the comforting kind.
Quistis beamed at her nickname. It made her sound like a real lady, like Matron.
"Am I never going to see you again?" she asked. The notion made her visibly deflate.
"Don't say things like that," Matron chided. "Everyone that is meant to, crosses paths again."
Quistis tried to look like she understood that statement, nodding in feigned agreement as Matron finger combed her hair and tutted as stray grains of sand disloged themselves and scattered on the floor.
She began to take a brush to Quistis's blonde strands, pulling to the rhythm of the tune the little girl was unknowingly humming. She took a few moments to observe her from above, bright piercing blue eyes peeking out from beneath too long, fluttering dark eyelashes. The bridge of her nose sloped a little longer than usual, ending with a darling, button tip. Her bottom lip pouted considerably more than the top, and they were permanently set in a straight, neutral expression.
The subject of the woman's study looked up at the reflection of the pair in the mirror, feeling scrutinized. Her humming song slowly faded into a slight embarassed silence, a rosy pink stain running the length of her cheeks.
"What's wrong, Matron?"
In spite of herself, Matron chuckled in response, and then again at the confused look that was now crossing the little girl's features.
"I'm just thinking of what you'll look like when you're all grown up," she explained, now seperating her thick blonde hair into sections.
"And you're laughing?"
Matron laughed again, thinking that maybe if she kept on laughing, and smiling, she wouldn't shed a tear in front of the young girl. "I know you're going to be beautiful. All of you will."
Quistis flushed, always unable to handle such praise. She loved it, but once it was achieved, she never knew how to react to it.
When her hair was neatly braided into a fishtail, Matron held a handmirror up behind her head to show Quistis the results of her handiwork.
"Thank you!" she said instantly, wanting to touch it but resisting. It was too pretty to touch.
"One more thing." Matron reached around her and opened the top drawer of the vanity.
Quistis's eyes focused sharply on the item dangling from Matron's hands and her head tilted slightly, something she always did when she was thinking.
"When Cid took you and Zell to town to get your special papers, the rest of us had nothing to do," Matron said mischieviously. "It was kind of hard to get him to agree, but Seifer let us use his marbles for crafts. One each, of course," she added with a smile that crinkled the skin between her eyes.
"Seifer's?"
Quistis touched the black braided ribbons that hung loosely around her neck and felt the weight of the marble pendant drop on her chest as Matron tightened the knot at the ends.
Her smile slowly faded as she ran her fingers over the smooth glass, staring down at the marble there for a moment before her eyes began to cross. It was green, housing a pattern that looked like a tiny, contained explosion.
"He hates me," she said softly, tucking it under the seams of her shirt.
Matron watched her for a moment as confusion and sadness freely reigned Quistis's young face, her lips downturned and her brow furrowed, marring the smooth skin of her forehead.
"One day," the woman said finally, bending to rest her cheek against the top of the little girl's head, "you'll know enough of hate to know what love is too."
Quistis's mouth immediately opened to politely demand an explanation but she was interrupted by a swift, sharp tapping.
"Are you girls ready?" came Cid's muffled voice from behind the heavy wooden door.
Quistis nodded with a small half-smile, suddenly nervous, and left the rarely felt comforts of Matron's quarters behind.
--
Seifer watched in the distance as Quistis dutifully stood by Matron's leg as she and Cid talked to the smiling man and woman in front of them. Almost instantly, he felt that familiar, fiery feeling searing from his stomach and up his throat, down his wrists and to the very tips of his toes.
He recognized Them. He had seen Them before. They came in a little plane that woke them in the morning and sprayed water and dust as it flew past. They had started showing up every few weeks, not speaking to anyone but Cid and Matron, until recently.
That day he had been trying to get Squall to fight him when Quistis would throw herself in between, as usual, and inadvertently get hit, resulting in a scuffle between them. It was then that he saw Them with Cid and Matron out of the corner of his eye, and both Squall and Quistis had gotten cheap shots in on him.
When they noticed he was no longer paying attention to their battle, their gazes followed his own, fixed on the pair with blurry faces and big smiles. They were walking along the edge of the grass where it met the sand, watching the children play. One had pointed, the woman, and Matron had called Quistis over, and obediently she came running. Of course. Seifer had rolled his eyes then, and he did it again now in memory of that moment.
Now, she was smiling shyly, and Matron had braided her hair into a thick golden plait with a little white ribbon that swayed when she moved her head. She wore her 'special' dress. The one that she had to put on when Matron took them on special outings to nearby villages, or when they all got to go on the boat that carried them across the ocean when the weather was nice and there was a good breeze. It was white with sea-foam green trim and she only wore it when something 'important' was happening... and today, he supposed, was only important for her since he didn't have to wear his own stupid 'special shirt and tie'. This day was only for her, for her to leave, and no one even cared. They were supposed to be happy.
Of course. He never did or felt what everyone else wanted him to anyway.
Years later, he'd tell himself that's why he marched over to the adults, ignoring any inquisitory glances or looks of dread from Matron. Then he'd bury that memory forever somewhere no one would ever find it.
"Can I talk to Quisty?"
Matron looked hesitant, looking from one to the other, but was interrupted by the prospective mother standing across from her.
"She can say bye to her little friend if she wants," the woman said kindly. Seifer gave her a dirty look, which she either ignored or failed to notice.
Quistis ventured towards him and came nearly nose to nose against him.
"Are you going to say sorry?"
"Thay thorry for what?" he asked rudely, emphasizing each lisped word.
"What do you want then!" she responded, annoyed.
"I – You – Stop --"
Your eyes hurt me when you look at me like that!
"Stop what?"
She put her hands on her hips.
"-- too much honey in your oatmeal," he mumbled.
"What?"
"One teaspoon only, but you use at least three."
"So?" she snapped, suddenly very irritated.
"You get mad when I don't follow the rules but you don't – not always!"
"Shut up, Seifer, know-it all. Know-it-all!"
"Thut Up, Thifer," he echoed, getting angrier himself. "Thupid Quithty, bothy Quithty!"
He had no idea who had started it this time, but she was upon him in a second, fists flying as he only half-heartedly attempted to dodge them. She wouldn't be getting in trouble tonight anyway. She wouldn't be here anymore.
They rolled, and he tried to grab for her hands, successfully catching one.
"One more game," he panted, sitting up, never letting go of her hand. "Same rules, if I win, you do whatever I want. If you win, you can go wherever you want, forever."
"No," she said. "I don't wanna play now."
"Come on," he demanded, pulling at her arm, which had gone slack.
There was a glaring grass stain that started in a splotch of dirt on the fabric covering her hip that streaked upwards across her stomach.
She looked down at her skirt and up at him, equally as ragged. There was a small spark of satisfaction in her eye that she had gotten him as good as he'd tried to get her, but he blinked and it was gone, now clouded over by silent fury and a thin, glazed layer of – sadness?
"Always gotta be you," she whispered, rubbing her knee where she had fallen on it. He glanced over at the raw, red, peeling skin and back over to his own, similarly wounded kneecaps.
"What about me?" he demanded, even as a murderous looking Matron descended towards them. If he glanced over Matron's shoulders he could see Them with their mouths slightly open, taken aback. He gave himself a mental pat on the back.
"It's gotta be all about you," she said, staring at him with her head tilted slightly.
"SO!"
"You two!" Matron's voice exploded above them. "How many times is it today, now?" She knelt beside Quistis and hurriedly picked grass from her now dishevelled hair. "You have to go now, sweetie. It's time. Seifer, let go."
With that, she pulled their hands apart.
Quistis drew herself up and allowed Matron to lead her away towards her new parents and made vain attempts to brush the dirt off of her dress. Her hand brushed against the once neatly folded (and now crumpled) sheet in her pocket and with a sudden start, she pulled away from Matron and began running back towards Seifer, still sitting, ignored, in the grass.
"Goodbye, Seifer Almasy!"
"Bye Quithtith," he mocked, scowling.
She looked unhurt. "I know you hate me the most. But you will be okay now, I think. Here," she said simply, throwing a ball of paper at him. He stared at her.
She returned his gaze for a few seconds before shrugging and running back towards Matron. "Leave Squall alone!" she shouted over her shoulder. He shot her with his worst glare, but she had already turned away.
Matron had turned to follow Quistis exasperatedly after she had broke free from her and ran back, presumably, to punch Seifer again. She was relieved when they only exchanged a few words and Quistis gave him a crumpled piece of paper. She took her hand again and led her over to the waiting couple, making a harried face and sighing. Cid grinned apologetically, rubbing the back of his neck with one hand.
The little girl holding her hand began tugging, and Matron obliged, kneeling to her level.
"I'll miss you Matron," Quistis declared, throwing her arms around the woman and grabbing on to her hair, being careful not to pull too hard.. "Make sure everything goes okay without me! Sefie and Zell need the nightlight, and Squall needs to eat dessert, and Irvy should go to bed on time," she said into her shoulder. "Love you." It was muffled against her dress.
"Bye Cid!" she said loudly. She broke from Matron and moved to hug his leg but he bent down and swooped her upwards into the air, letting go for a split second as she shrieked before he caught her into a great, crushing hug.
"We love you Quistis Trepe," he said softly into her ear as he put her down and smoothed back her hair. "Be a good girl, and maybe one day we'll see you again."
"I'm always good," she replied with a grin. "So you will!"
She bowed and curtseyed to them, a final, polite goodbye, and turned bright blue eyes to the couple in front of her, bowing and curtseying to them. Hello, new life.
--
By the time he had brought himself to get up and shamelessly approach Matron again, everyone else had already approached to say goodbye to Quistis as well. He saw her awkwardly embrace Squall while he did his best to look uncomfortable. Selphie was wailing. Quistis hugged her too. Then she waved, the People with her waved-- and they were walking away.
It was at that moment, that he really, really wanted to tell Matron something, and maybe she could fix all of this and make it normal again.
"Matron, I --" he stopped himself, thinking what good his next words would do. One of the rare times he would do so.
"Seifer," she said softly, gazing down at him with a strange look in her eyes – as though her heart was breaking for him.
"Matron, I know I wasn't supposed to make fun of Quisty's lisp! But I thought that – I thought that if she said the words over and over, I'd fix it!" It all came out in one long breath, and he paused, breathing deeply. "Now she'll talk like that forever."
Matron knelt next to him with her hand on his shoulder as the little plane's engines began to whirr. She gripped a little tighter than usual, perhaps to hold him back, he thought. Maybe she was concerned he would run, and not look where he was going, and fall into the sea, inhale a breath of water, and be so distracted by thoughts of flying upward and freeing Quistis from her airbourne prison that he wouldn't notice himself sinking to his own murky grave.
The other children stood scattered around them looking in awe as they always did at the gigantic, heavy machine getting ready to fly into the air like a big, metal bird. And with a loud, mechanical grunt, and plenty of dust and sea-spray, Quisty was gone.
She was no longer here to try and boss him around and get in his way. Or make sure he followed all Matron's rules and then tattle on him when he broke them. She couldn't defend everyone from his taunts and insults. She couldn't call him Thifer Almathy while perfectly pronouncing Squall as she begged him to join her in whatever game she was playing. And if he ever felt like Squall needed a good face remodeling, Quistis most certainly could not intervene.
--
In the coming months after that day Cid had all but disappeared. But he wasn't the only one. Shortly after Quistis had left, Zell had followed, though Seifer didn't really care all that much. Zell was too much of a crybaby chicken, and true to that, had cried the whole way out the door. Next was Selphie, who was given a gigantic furry hooded parka that she had absolutely hated as a going-away present. Irvine was complete wreck and downer after that, and between him and Squall, every room they were in together found two corners occupied at all times.
He tried to pick fights with Squall regardless, and some days it would work – to a point.
"Wimp! All you do is talk about is being strong, for who? She's gone, she didn't want to be around you anymore." Seifer shook Squall by the collar with each word.
The brown haired boy shook his hair out of his eyes, his expression unchanging.
"Well, nobody wants you either."
One night Seifer had gone into the girl's old room and destroyed it, kicking Selphie's forgotten teddy bear across the room – she'd left it and was surely wailing about it with every breath...wherever she was. He jumped on Quistis's bed with his shoes on and punched her pillow, long washed and covers changed. He punched it until his arm was sore and he had collapsed on the bed, feathers sticking all over his clothes and hair, before being found and awakened in a messy heap by a concerned Matron, a Matron who didn't even have the guts to be angry. She would place him in her lap and sing a little song that made him sleepy.
"Time to go Seifer Almasy," she sang softly into his ear. "Get your special shirt and tie on."
"Where are we going?" he asked sleepily.
"A new big adventure," she replied. He knew he was supposed to be excited about this news, but not when Matron did not sound excited at all -- she sounded apprehensive, and almost...fearful.
In the name of adventure he was herded onto a ship for an agonizingly long time with no one but Squall to antagonize. His bags had already been packed for him while he was asleep, and during that time Irvine and a few others had taken off seperately on a plane he thought he had dreamt.
"Are we going to Ellone?" Squall was inquiring, tugging on the pant legs of one of the adults standing near the front of the craft.
"Are you ever going to stop asking that?" Seifer asked loudly from where he was looking over the sides of the ship at the ocean in the distance, watching the lighthouse get smaller and smaller as they moved away from the orphanage...and home. He was already a bit dizzy from a turbulent attempt at a nap on a moving structure and not in the mood to listen to Squall trying to be 'strong'.
"Strong people don't whine for Sis," he shot at him.
Squall looked at him, expressionless, and disappeared below deck. Seifer clicked his tongue restlessly, tired of looking for pebbles or splinters of wood to toss to the water below. He was stuck on a vessel where he recognized nobody and nothing, and after many hours, would arrive at a disturbingly large, oddly shaped building. He was tired of this constant shift and sudden change, and he was too young to understand why, why, why this was happening and now.
Maybe he had lost, Quistis had cheated and managed to win and what she wished was for everything to change, for her to go away with Them, and for him to be sent with Squall on a boat ride full of people he didn't know to an island far away where a giant, strange looking building loomed in front of him, like a mutated monster that would swallow him whole.
She wanted him to be led like a stray dog up not-quite-finished concrete steps and through half-installed turnstiles, down long curving hallways and into this flourescent, white-walled cage.
Two big suitcases with coloured handkerchiefs tied around the handles were sitting against the wall, large stickers with his name scrawled across them stuck to their fronts. He glared around the room, at the three beds all equidistant from one another, to the large table and three chairs opposite them on the other side of the room. He scrunched his nose at the smell of just-dried paint, and newly mounted light fixtures that had just been installed into freshly spread plaster. Everything was so...new.
He didn't agree to this. It wasn't fair.
He threw himself into the nearest bed with his face in the pillows, turning his head only when his blasted, needy lungs burned for air. He stared at the wall, breathing heavily, for what seemed like hours, until his body gave way to fatigue, and his mind begged him to as well, and he slept, dreamless, hoping he'd wake to a time where everything happened the way he was promised it would.
1. The first to say mercy is the Loser.
2. Cheating is not allowed.
3. Loser agrees to the wish of Winner.
"There," Seifer said, presenting the sheet of paper to Quistis for approval. She glanced over it, brows furrowed in concentration as she took the paper from him and brought it nearly to her nose.
"Fine," she said shortly, and grabbed a nearby red crayon, holding it in a fist and writing her name with a flourish at the bottom of the sheet. Seifer followed similarly, signing his name in large, black, blocky script that took up most of the remaining space. She picked up the sheet then, and folded it twice into a neat square.
They ventured away from the porch and onto the warm sand by the ocean. He quickly scanned the area around them for anyone wandering too closely, or any adults called Cid or Matron. Satisfied, he met Quistis' defiant expression with a smirk, holding up his hands in invitation.
"What happens if you win?" Quistis asked suddenly. "Even though you won't," she added as an afterthought.
"I don't lose, Quisty," he replied, twining his fingers with hers.
//
NOTES// I have not written anything for a Long time. Obviously. The game they're playing is called 'Mercy' if it was not evident. You have to hold your opponent's hands, and bend them back or twist them until someone is in so much pain they yell out mercy. Then the other person wins. :)