II.
So, what should I talk about when Rinoa gets here?
He was kneeling before Angelo, who was staring out into the field beside the orphanage, silently awaiting answers. Nothing about the sorceress, huh? I'm sure she's trying not to think about it. Who cares if she's a sorceress, right?
Rinoa could hear footsteps through Squall's ears, heels clicking on the cobblestones. Her footsteps. She was waiting at a distance, and Squall was trying hard to pretend he hadn't heard her approach, just for a few seconds more of solitude thought, a chance to hide and think of a way to act.
You don't care either, do you? he asked the dog. Angelo glanced his way and started wagging his tail, panting. Rinoa's just Rinoa.
When she walked behind him to gaze out over the flowers, he couldn't pretend she wasn't there anymore. Angelo bounded off to some unseen game neither of them could join. Squall stood, trying to still his heart unsuccessfully.
He turned to see her watching her dog go. Rinoa had forgotten how she had been in youth. Her hair touched her shoulders still, black as jet, streaked with sun-coloured copper. Her skin was as flawless as a doll's, her shape slender and flat. For a moment Rinoa yearned to be that girl again, but the moment was all too brief. Instead of meeting his eyes, this girl dug her toe into the earth and kept her head bowed. "What will become of me?" she asked, voice still sweet and high. The president felt embarrassment.
"Don't worry about it," Squall said, in that way only seventeen year-old Squall could say, all cool attitude and impassive outlook. He had spent more of his life being racked with past demons than he had being the withdrawn introvert he'd intended to be forever. "There've been many good sorceresses. Edea was one. You can be like her."
Even stuck in Squall's mind, Rinoa could remember how she felt about his words. Edea had been a kind woman when she finally met her, but possessed by Ultimecia, Edea had been a source of Rinoa's nightmares, even years after she had disinherited her sorceress' powers.
Rinoa still could not look Squall in the eye. "But Edea's still...I can't guarantee anything either. If Ultimecia possesses me again...You saw me. She controlled me in outer space and made me break Adel's seal. What might happen next time? What will I end up doing? Will I end up fighting everyone?" She put a hand to her chest, clutching at the Griever charm Squall had let her keep. "Scary thought, isn't it?"
Squall turned from her and walked away silently, the way he'd always been wont to do—go away inside while in the middle of a conversation like he could pause life anytime he wanted—and thought to himself, Rinoa...Even if you end up as the world's enemy, I'll...I'll be your knight.
Suddenly years of tumultuous fights and grim coexistence fell into place. Rinoa wanted to reach out to him from the future but found no words. It was conflicting to find her former husband had made such a bone-chilling oath.
"If I fall under Ultimecia's control again," Rinoa continued to tell Squall's back, "SeeD will come kill me, right? And the leader of SeeD is you, Squall. Squall's sword will pierce my heart..." And Rinoa could feel Squall's own heart grow heavy, like her past words had sapped the strength from him to continue on. "I guess it's okay if it's you, Squall. Nobody else. Squall, if that ever happens—"
He turned on her. "That's enough!" He waited until she finally looked him in the eye. "I'll never do anything like that. The sorceress I'm after is not you, Rinoa. My enemy is the sorceress from the future...Ultimecia."
"Ultimecia lives in the future and possesses me. She uses my body as her extension in this world." She explained it to him as if he hadn't been present for those past few months, in that condescending manner she used to personify so often as a teenager. Then she stood tall and eyed him sadly, dropping her voice. "How? How will you save me?"
"I'll come up with something," he said ineffectually. "There's gotta be a way..."
Her eyes carried over the scepticism and the pain she held.
"Don't worry. Trust me."
She sighed. "I trust you." She shifted her weight back and forth. "Well, until you find a way, maybe...maybe I should stay in Esthar, at that memorial? Wouldn't that be better?"
Rinoa could not want anything less. She had been so scared when they led her up the steps to her cryo chamber, the same they had trapped the tyrant Adel in nearly two decades before. Squall had come to cut a path for her escape
my knight came to rescue me
and they had flown far, leaving the country behind, Rinoa clutching Squall's arm close the entire way.
"No, that'd be pointless. I'd just end up going after you again." It had given her such sweet relief to hear him say it, unbeknownst to him. "Rinoa, just stay close to me."
He had said that almost every day for fifteen years, though those words had taken on a much different meaning for their marriage as the years sped on. Right now they lit a candle of hope and despair for Rinoa, but in the past nothing could have made her happier to hear.
"Oh! Those words!"
"What?"
"That's what started everything."
"What are you talking about?"
"You don't remember?"
"Something I said?"
"Oh, just forget it."
The happiness quickly receded from her eyes. Rinoa could feel the confusion and desperation within Squall to set everything right, though passing it off as inconsequential. "No, it's because of the GF. That's why I forgot."
Once they had learned junctioning themselves with Guardian Forces displaced memory, Squall and the team used it as an explanation for nearly every forgetful moment. "That's just an excuse," her past self said, to drive home the point.
"Feeling better?"
"Yeah," she answered, voice quavering. She looked to her boots again. "Can I tell you a story?"
Squall waited in silence. Even if he had tried to dissuade her, Rinoa knew this girl version of her would tell it anyway.
"I had a dream. It was a scary dream. We make a promise. We promise to see shooting stars together. I get dressed up and put on your ring. But the thing is, I can't remember where I'm supposed to meet you. I start to panic. I really want to see you, Squall, but I don't know where to go. I start running through the mountains, the desert, the plains...through Timber, Balamb, and Galbadia...When I realize I can't run any longer...I...I just want to see you so badly. So I scream, 'Squall, where are you?' Then I woke up. I was crying."
She had had that nightmare on occasion throughout the years. Almost nightly after the divorce went through.
She was hunched over, as if trying to disappear on the spot. "I'm sorry. You don't have to say anything. I just felt like I had to tell you."
Squall looked out over the field. "It was just a dream. It doesn't mean anything. Don't worry about it." His words were halted, for he was thinking about his same fears as well. Rinoa whispered, It's not just a dream, but Squall mistook it for his own thought.
"I guess you're right."
He gestured vaguely. "How about this...I'll be here."
Rinoa studied his face and Squall resolutely watched the flowers. Finally she asked, "Why?"
"The reason you couldn't find me is because we haven't promised yet."
"Promised?"
"I'll be waiting for you. If you come here, you'll find me. I promise."
She would have cried if she had eyes, but the young girl in front of him smiled so wide it was hard to imagine this memory would become heartache. "I'll be here too. It's a promise!" She hopped up and down. "Thanks, Squall! Next time
next time
we'll meet for sure!"
They'll all be—angry at me. I'm...scared.
I don't want the future. I want the present to stand still. I just want to stay here with you...
I'm scared, Squall. I don't wanna go back.
