Just a quick word of warning: the first couple of chapters is mostly character development. The REAL romantic aspects happen in like… Chapter 5? Well, slightly in Chapter 4.

And yeah, I guess you could say it's a side character story, haha.

Flower Garden
Rawr It's Kizami

Chapter One: Garden Life

Selphie fidgeted in her steps and pulled at the yellow ascot tied as a loose accent around her neckline. She felt so very uncomfortable in her new uniform, almost to the point of uckiness. Everything felt foreign to her, like all the other students were speaking a language that only she could not understand.

She was thankful for one thing, and it was that, being Sunday, the school was emptier than usual. After the drama with the Garden had unfolded and she accepted their scholarship offer, the demonstrators had ceased their tirade outside the gates, finally presenting the students with the opportunity to go home, a chance that the majority of them jumped at.

She hung her head slightly as she walked, trying to avoid the judgmental stares she received. All the girls looked so beautiful and perfect with their hair styled perfectly in lovely halos around their features and their makeup done perfectly on their delicate faces. They would look better, Selphie thought to herself, if they would only stop glowering at me!

Finally, Selphie stopped in front of her new dorm room. A slight pout had found its way onto her face as her hand hovered above the keypad. Even the door looked better than her old apartment's, so she could only imagine how ornate the inside would be, and, ohhh, what was that four digit code again?

She wracked her brain. Did it start with a three? Yes! She was sure it was a three! Or was it an eight? …Five maybe? Well, there was definitely a three in there somewhere. Maybe it was eight-zero-three-six? Selphie shrugged her slender shoulders. It was worth a shot, and what was the worst that could happen?

With her tongue sticking out of the side of her mouth in deep concentration, she slowly entered the four digit code. For a few seconds, nothing happened.

Then the light turned red.

And her keypad let out a blaring buzz, causing the students around her to look on with suspicion and confused neighbors to peek their heads out into the hallway curiously.

"Um, everything's fine!" Selphie yelped meekly, holding her hands up defensively. "I'm just new here!"

Accepting that as a legitimate reason, the students returned to their own businesses as the brunette breathed a sigh of relief before turning her attention back to the evil evil keypad. Maybe it was three-zero-eight-six? Yes, that had to be it! She shifted her eyes around cautiously, not wanting the damn thing to gain everyone's attention for a second time.

As soon as the hallway cleared of students, which, surprisingly, didn't take very long, Selphie swiftly entered the second code into her keypad and waited with anxious eyes focused intently on the light.

It suddenly flashed green.

"Booyaka!" the petite girl cheered, jumping at least a foot into the air and pumping a triumphant fist. When she landed, Selphie immediately glanced around her and saw a pair of wide, blue eyes stare back at her. "Take a picture, it'll last longer!" she told the reading student playfully as she pulled her door open.

Bouncing into her new dorm room, she was quickly overcome with awe as the door slid shut behind her. It was humble, but nevertheless still exquisite compared to her former living arrangement, and there lay her worn luggage in front of the newly sheeted poster bed. ("That one suitcase is all you brought?" the bellboy had sneered. That one suitcase was all she needed to fit everything she owned! Never mind that this school had a bellboy!)

Selphie squealed with delight; maybe attending Balamb Garden wouldn't be so bad after all!

-x-

Selphie sighed and continued her walk through the campus. She had been walking for the past half hour and all she had seen were the dorm building and half of the first floor of the main building. She suddenly paused for a second; she had a strange feeling in the pit of her stomach.

Then her stomach let out a low grumble.

She immediately realized that she had completely missed breakfast that morning due to her procrastinated packing. Upon a hasty decision to find the cafeteria next, the brunette quickly made her way into the front foyer, and was instantly barricaded by a large group of students gathered by the front door.

"I saw the helicopter land outside!" a feminine voice amongst the crowd squealed joyously. "They're here!"

"You know," one of the male students in front that Selphie, due to her small stature, could not see, boasted proudly, "There's only two of these necklaces in the world, and I've got one. You know who has the other? Seifer Almasy."

"No way!" another male voice gasped in surprise.

Confused, Selphie tilted her head and started up the stairs for a better view on the second-floor landing. Whatever everyone was waiting so watchfully for piqued her curiosity terribly. Leaning against the railing with her chin rested against her hand, the slender girl sighed and allowed her mind to wander. She wondered what everyone could be waiting for; was today special somehow? Her eyes widened wistfully as the image of her all time favorite band, Pandamona, bursting through the front doors of her new school appeared in her mind.

As though on cue, the large double doors suddenly flew open. Selphie perked up and watched expectantly for some sort of celebrity to enter. To her dismay, four guys waltzed into the building. The entire group of students below her instantly came alive in a cacophony of delightful squeals and uproarious cheers.

Selphie could not, for the life of her, understand what could make four normal (if not wealthy) students hold such a power over the student body. To her, they looked like regular boys; two blonds and two brunets. The only remarkable thing about the small posse was that there was nothing similar about any of them; the substantially shorter blond had a unique tattoo adorned on his face, and one of the brunets had a much longer mane while the other's expression showed considerably less excitement than his comrades'. The latter of the brunets seemed familiar to Selphie, as though she had seen him somewhere, but at the moment, it was lost on her.

She let out a small giggle. At the way all the students fawned over the very presence of those four boys, maybe there should have been a glamour-shot type of backlighting when they entered.

"You," a deep voice from the first floor rumbled, gaining Selphie's attention.

The taller blond who had entered ahead of the other three was looking, or glaring, she couldn't really tell which, at one of the boys crowded at the front.

"Me?" the boy yelped, quivering in fear. Selphie recognized his voice as belonging to the boy who had been boasting about owning the same necklace as someone named Seifer.

The blond lowered his right hand to the hilt of what she assumed to be a sword on his left side. There was a flash of light and a small snap of metal clashing on metal, and, suddenly, he was holding a gunblade against the student's neck.

As the necklace snapped in half and clattered to the floor, the student, who had been frozen in fear, visibly paled despite his lack of physical injury. His eyes slowly rolled to the back of his head and his body went limp as his friend struggled to support his weight.

The blond smirked at the fainted boy and sheathed his weapon. Apparently he hadn't been too keen on the idea of being similarly accessorized as a common student.

From her vantage point, Selphie frowned in disgust. How could he just do something like that to another person? It was painfully obvious that the boy idolized him, and what did he get in return? A trip to the infirmary.

"What a meanie," she muttered. "He's crazy." After a moment of contemplation, she vocalized her thoughts out of frustration, "They're all crazy! Why didn't anyone stand up for that boy?"

"NEGATIVE," a voice stated in an authoritative tone behind her, causing Selphie to whirl around. In front of her stood a white-haired girl with a muscled student by her side. "NEW," the girl continued in the same tone, "UNDERSTAND. NOT."

"Yeah, ya know," the largely built man beside her agreed, "The S4, they rule this school. They're like, ya know, our overlords."

"INCORRECT," the white-haired student argued. "NOT. OVERLORDS. PRINCES."

"Those are the same things," the dark-skinned man said with an inflection at the end making it sound more like a question than a statement. "It just means they're in charge, ya know?"

With a defiant look on her face, Selphie rebelliously crossed her arms. "I'm not afraid of them," she told the two hotly. "They're just people. Who are you anyway? Their lapdogs?"

Unimpressed, the girl refused to withdraw and instead, gave Selphie an ever-so-slightly smug look. "DISCIPLINARY," she said with a slightly haughty voice. "FUJIN. RAIJIN," she threw her associate a nod in his direction, "COMMITTEE."

"I'm a King Bee, ya know," Raijin added without hesitation. "And Fuu here's a Queen Bee."

"MAKE. NO. SENSE," Fujin argued, giving the heavyset man a swift kick in the shins. "NO. KING. BEE."

"But, Fujin," he continued as he hobbled on one leg and held onto the other in pain, "I can't be a QUEEN bee, ya know."

"JUST. BEE."

"That ain't fair! I'm just as much a part of this group as you, ya know!"

As the rather comical scene unfolded before her, the idea of sneaking away crept into Selphie's mind. As long as Fujin and Raijin were distracted by each other, they would never notice that she was missing! Genius!

"OW! Fuu, that hurts, ya know!"

Raijin grabbed his other shin as he hobbled on the other with Fujin looming over his pitiful figure ominously. Selphie took this as her cue to disappear. She turned around grinning mischievously and prepared to sprint down the steps, but as the small girl took her first step, she felt someone tug at the back of her collar. With a high-pitched squeak, she whirled around and found herself staring into Fujin's narrowed eye. The girl meant business.

"CAREFUL. YOU. SAY."

"Yeah," Raijin agreed behind her, rubbing his still sore shins, "You better watch what ya say or you'll be sorry, ya know."

"BE. WATCHING."

With a gesture pointing from her eye to Selphie's, Fujin turned around and shoved Rajin in the opposite direction, leaving Selphie alone. She stuck her tongue out and made a juvenile face at their backs. Associates, lapdogs, they were all the same but with different names. Sighing, the brunette knew that the so-called Queen Bee (and King Bee) would be watching her from now on. Fujin had told her just that from what she understood of the girl's one-word speech pattern. Disciplinary Committee. She had to giggle at that. As if the S4 weren't disciplining enough.

Her stomach grumbled again. With all the commotion that had lasted for all of five minutes, the starving girl had forgotten about her hunger. Glancing at her surroundings, Selphie quickly decided to finish going down the first floor hall, a plan she had concluded upon before being distracted by the S4's grand entrance.

The cafeteria, however, was much emptier than she had thought. She wasn't quite sure what she had expected for a school such as this, but certainly she had anticipated more than five people. Still in disbelief about the lack of hungry students, Selphie made her way to the ladies in hairnets behind the counter and glanced up at the prices.

Her mouth hung open in shock; the least expensive item on the menu was a hot dog, which was fifty gil (the price for ONE of her own deliveries at her former job!), and a simple bottle of water was twenty. She dejectedly pulled out her yellow Chocobo wallet from her jacket pocket. At least she knew she had the fifty gil (and NOT from Mr. Adera who had inadvertently received his delivery FREE of charge), and since there was a mini-refrigerator in her dorm, she now planned on making weekly trips to the market for some dorm-made food.

"One hot dog, please!" she requested cheerily.

"Sorry, we're all out of those," the surprisingly dressed cafeteria worker answered in a supremely bored voice.

"What?" Selphie whined, unable to believe her ears. "How? There's like five people in here!"

"Mr. Dincht comes every morning and purchases our entire stock."

Despondently, Selphie thanked the cafeteria worker and sullenly left the lunch room as several students stepped inside. She had all even she could take in one day, and it wasn't even noon yet. Now all Selphie wanted to do was find a place to relax that didn't require her to walk all the way back to the dorm building. What else could she do in unfamiliar territory? She started to wander, letting her legs take her in whatever direction.

Not long after, she found herself on the alfresco stairway in the west wing. Finally, a place where she could be alone! Selphie rushed to the railing and let out a very uncharacteristic groan. As much as she wouldn't admit it, Selphie Tilmitt was downright frustrated with the way this school worked! Or lack thereof, seeing as how the faculty allowed four rich boys to influence the entire student body! When they had entered, she half-expected someone to genuflect at their feet!

"Stupid, stupid, stupid S4!" she vented, stomping her feet. "What does the S stand for anyway? STUPID?"

Suddenly, she heard a strange strangled sound, as though someone were choking. She searched wildly around for the source, but saw no one. When she heard it again, it suddenly hit her that whoever it was must be on the stairs above her somewhere. Determined to save whatever poor soul had unfortunately choked on their food, Selphie rushed up the stairs, and nearly bowled over a blond sitting on the steps on the floor above.

"Sorry!" she yelped as she helped straighten him up.

The blond grabbed at his throat, his eyes pleading for her to DO something other than sit him up, because his posture wasn't exactly the most important thing on his mind as his face turned an interesting shade of blue. Selphie's emerald eyes immediately flashed with recognition as she gave his back a firm slap.

A rather large chunk of food flew out of his mouth and down over the railing in front. A loud scream could be heard, soon followed by another voice shouting, "What the HELL is that?"

"Whew!" the blond breathed, leaning back against the steps after the color returned to his face. "Thanks for that! By the way, the name is SeeD 4," he told her with a chuckle, "if you're gonna rant against us, you might as well get the name right."

"Oh, is THAT what it stands for?" Selphie asked in sarcastic bitterness. Just then, his words hit her and her eyes widened in complete surprise. She scanned his face for any hint that he was even remotely kidding, but when she took sight of the tattoo winding from his temple, she knew that he wasn't. "You… you're?"

He nodded and flashed her a gleaming smile. "Yup. Zell Dincht."

"Selphie Tilmitt," she greeted, smiling for the first time since she had successfully guessed her dorm code. "You seem normal," she added abruptly, instantly taken aback by what she had said and covered her mouth with her hands ashamedly. "I didn't mean it like that! Well, I did kind of mean it like that…" She fiddled with her hands. "I think… But it wasn't supposed to sound so mean."

"I know exactly what you mean," he laughed, clearly amused by Selphie's words. "We're a weird group. We almost have nothing in common, except that we're all the richest guys in school."

"But that guy this morning," she said sulkily, not particularly pleased at the memory, "he was such a meanie-face!"

"Oh yeah." Zell's smile faded. "That was Seifer. He's an ass."

Selphie frowned. "Yeah, I see that. Are the others buttheads too?"

"Well…" He shifted his gaze upward and tapped a hotdog thoughtfully against his cheek. "Squall isn't so bad, but that's mostly because he doesn't talk much, and Irvine… he's the stereotypical ladies' man."

With her eyes glued to the hotdog in his hand, Selphie could feel the same painfully empty feeling in her stomach and, soon after, her tummy let out a low growl. Her cheeks flushed with embarrassment as beside her, Zell laughed and thrust another hotdog in her face. Her eyes twinkling with delight, she gratuitously accepted the generous offer.

"Wai do yew hab so much?" Selphie asked between bites, her mouth full of hotdog.

"I always buy all the hotdogs first thing in the morning," he told her proudly before taking a bite himself (the unquestionably largest bite Selphie had ever seen). "Badamb's hotdawgs awe da best!"

Selphie nodded. She couldn't argue with him there!

The only thing that gave her more relief than Zell's hotdog salvation was the solace in knowing that not all Garden students were pompous jerks.

-x-
(To be continued.)

Firstly, yes, I know, the GF is spelled Pandemona, but I just thought Pandamona would be kind of like a cutesy-twist of a band name. Sounds like something Selphie would like, right? Also, I'm aware that not all of what I described is what Balamb Garden looks like… So it's not architecturally correct (it's not exactly the swirly, circle style it's supposed to be… OR IS IT?), sorry! I haven't played the game in a while (though after writing this, it does make me want to play it again).

Does it seem kind of weird that Fujin and Raijin are the only ones in the Disciplinary Committee? Maybe I'll expand on how that came to be later… Well, I was gonna have them have like a leader type figure and then the three of them would be the stereotypical group of mean girls… but I have plans for Rin-Rin and Quisty.

By the way, I advise against slapping someone on the back when they're choking! That's a big no-no! (waggles finger) But I've read in some places that giving a firm slap between the shoulder blades does help, I, however, am unconvinced. :s To each their own, I suppose.

Let me know what you guys think! Is it good? Bad? Ehhh? Thumbs up? Down? Critiques? Flames? Anything is welcome!