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CHAPTER FOUR

Seifer looked mildly surprised when Selphie plonked a paper cup of coffee in front of him, but that was hardly surprising considering she had walked straight through the security barriers and was probably his first and only visitor.

"I just went with regular joe 'cause I have no idea how you take it," she said conversationally. She plucked three packets of sugar from the top pocket of her bright yellow jacket and dumped them all into her double expresso. "I got three more where these came from. You want sugar?"

He eyed the packets dubiously. "You, caffeine and sugar should not be a combination."

"Huh? Why?"

Seifer downed his coffee. "Fuck me, I needed that." He hesitated. "Thanks."

"'Welcome." She sat down on the edge of his bed and studied his cell. It was very… Estharian. A far cry from D-District prison with its opaque blue walls and force-field door (now deactivated). There was a bed that looked way too small for him, a table and chair, a latrine and a sink, and… that was it.

"Wowsers, you must be bored," she said.

Seifer stared into the bottom of his empty cup. "It's preferable to the tests, trust me."

"Oh yeah? Are they bad?"

He gestured vaguely. "Just boring, really. Makin' me junction, unjunction, measuring brain frequency and responses. I even opted in for stimulation tests and cardio obs, just to break the tedium."

"Oooh, did they cut you up? Set you on fire?"

"No, you fuckin' weirdo. Controlled electrocution."

"Oooh, now there's some irony."

"Yeah, yeah." He eyed her suspiciously. "Did Rinoa send you here?"

Selphie stopped swinging her legs and blinked at him. "Hah? No. Just thought you might want some coffee."

"…And Odine just let you in here to bring me coffee?"

"Nope! I disabled the security system and magicked the guards." Selphie beamed. "I was kinda bored at the palace too. Apparently, I have to tone down the stalking of Sir Laguna, and Irvy is doin' recon for Squall, and Rinny is having bonding time with her future father in-law soooo…."

Seifer leaned back in his seat. "So the rumours were true."

"About Squall's dad?"

Seifer snorted, glancing askance. "Of course he'd have a father."

Selphie brushed that aside. "How's the hollowing going? I asked Sis about it, but she doesn't know anything, either."

"Why would she? She's not a sorceress. She could've been something, maybe, but Cid and Edea ensured she stayed useless."

"That's not nice," Selphie chided. "She's useful in her own way… She helps us remember the stuff we've forgotten."

"If I don't remember it then it ain't worth remembering."

Selphie got up and punched him lightly on the arm. "Sheesh, why d'ya gotta be such a bummer? Hey, I know! Let's bust outta here!"

Seifer pinned her with an incredulous look. "Were you hit on the head as a child?"

"Probably. Probably by you. Multiple times."

"I opted to be here," Seifer said slowly. "Because I owe Rinoa."

Selphie shifted her weight and clasped her arm. "Well, yeah but like… this hollowing thing. Even if there is a cure, it might take years. You wanna spend years in this cell, day after day enduring all those tests? That sounds borrrring. Like, what if you die here? Odine might freeze your body and do weird stuff to it!"

Seifer ran a hand over his face. He looked tired. She should've bought a third coffee.

Eventually, he stood up. "Fine. I wanna know what they've found so far anyway."

"Woo-hoo! Partners in crime!"

Seifer pinned her with an irritated look but chose not to comment.

She followed him out of the cell, and they got as far as the first set of control terminals before the walls of the prison turned from blue to red and a blaring alarm cut through the silence.

"Tee hee, the guards must've come out of the Sleep spell!" Selphie said, entirely unapologetic.

Seifer rolled his eyes and carried on walking. "Y'know, I'm pretty sure you could've pulled your rank and they would've just let you in. Now you've damaged Garden's reputation and they might limit your access."

"Naaah, that won't happen. 'Cause then Rinoa wouldn't come back and Doc Odd is all about one-on-one Rinny time. And SeeD for that matter. We're kinda his guineapigs for his paramagic experiments, y'know." Selphie briefly stopped by a control panel and punched in a few numbers, which stopped the blaring alarm. "Besides, this is waaay more fun. And Doc Odd is kind of a grade A nerd so…."

Seifer acknowledged that with grunt. Though after watching Selphie hack into the mainframe to disable the alarm, he added, "If anyone's a nerd here, it's you."

"I'm a techy," Selphie rectified. "Totally different."

"You keep tellin' yourself that, Messenger Girl."

They managed to progress surprisingly far before several Estharian soldiers caught up with them. Selphie chirpily explained they were looking for Odine, and they begrudgingly agreed to take them on the condition Seifer was handcuffed, and Seifer even more begrudgingly let them and smirked when he noticed the guard's trembling hands.

Odine was unamused by the interruption, but largely relieved his experiment wasn't out for blood. He sat in a levitating chair that he manoeuvred between four enormous holoscreens and various keyboards and personalogs, all of which projected an inconceivable amount of data; graphs, lines of numbers, disjointed notes and diagrams ran at a dizzying rate across every surface Selphie set eyes on.

"The analysis iz not complete," he raged, "and interruptions do not hasten ze process. You vant half answers? Speculations? No. You demand facts from Odine but hinder his work. Return to your cell at once! And you, girl – disappear back to Esthar."

Selphie ignored him. "What have you found out so far? Can you cure it?"

Odine flapped his hands in such agitation Selphie almost thought he would fly away like some weird owl-Odine bird. An Owldine? And Odowl?

"H-how do you expect me to concoct a cure so rapidly? Do you even know what 'it' is? No. No! Stupid girl! Leave me in peace to –"

"Tell me what you know so far," Seifer demanded. "I ain't got nothin' to lose, but you do. Reckon you can still type with broken fingers?"

Odine ogled in disbelief. "You threaten Odine? Foolish boy, biting ze hand zat feeds you. It matters not to ze Sorceress whether you live or die; there's no motivation to find a cure in your lifetime. However short zat might be."

Selphie felt that knot in her stomach again. She closed the space between herself and the doctor, breaking and redefining the rules of personal space as she placed her hands on either side of the chair's arms to lean in close. She smiled a smile so sweet Hyne himself might have been fooled.

"Demotivation is such a bummer. Maybe I can help encourage you to work faster? It'll be fun! For me, anyway."

"You… you can't… you wouldn't do zat. I'm too valuable!"

Selphie straightened and tapped her lip with a finger. "Yeaaah, you're right. Intimidating uncooperative old men isn't in my SeeD contract. But Rinoa, on the other hand, isn't part of SeeD and I have it down for a fact that she does not appreciate tardiness –"

"Alright, alright." Just the mention of Rinoa's name had caused a line of sweat to appear on Odine's brow. Clearly, he had difficulty differentiating Rinoa from her malevolent predecessors. "I'll tell you everything on ze condition zat you leave me alone afterwards. Though I am telling you, I do not have a cure yet. I can only tell you vat I've learned so far."

Selphie sat cross legged on the floor in front of him. "Woop! Story time!"

Seifer remained standing, his expression carefully blank.

"Do you know where ze GFs come from?" Odine asked.

"Well, everywhere, duh," Selphie said. "We just find 'em layin' around. Finders keepers!"

"No, stupid girl. Originally, where are they originally from?"

Selphie cocked her head and guessed. "The… moon? Like all the other monsters?" Thinking about it, she'd never bothered to ask the GFs their origins. Currently, she had Alexander junctioned in her mind, and he seemed unbothered by the question. She thought she caught an idea of mountains from him, but nothing solid. He wasn't the most talkative of GFs, anyway.

"What do they teach you in those silly Gardens?" Odine twittered. "To understand ze GFs origins iz to understand ze source of magic itself. How can you wield a weapon without understanding its workings first? Oh, nevermind. It iz unimportant. Magic originates from ze moon, but ze GFs do not. They were –"

"They were made by the sorceresses," Seifer said.

Odine nodded, pleased. "Yes! A sorceress' magic is magic in its purest form, and its power iz such zat she can create new matter. Ze GFs are physical manifestations of her magic, sourced from her experiences and memories, moulded for whatever purpose suits her at ze time. Often ze GFs take on ze personalities of their creator, but to survive they must adapt, and to adapt they take on information presented to zem. With zat information, they grow stronger and so does ze magic zat flows through our world."

"Information?" Selphie mused. "You mean… our memories? They take our memories so they can evolve? Wow, I didn't know that. How did you know, Seifer? Did Ultimecia tell you that?"

Seifer said nothing, just nodded at Odine to continue.

"Magic in its purest form cannot exist on our world without something to bind it. There must be a link zat grounds ze magic to this world, be it a rock, a monster, a person… The GFs are pure magic, and so they cannot exist without a form on this world to tether zem. If they lose this link, ze magic will return to its cycle and its source respectively; to ze origin of all life. However, ze seed of magic inside of a sorceress iz an exception. It cannot return to ze source, and so it must be passed along, over and over, until there iz not a single vessel left for it to ground itself in. And then who knows what would happen to it?

"To be a knight iz not just a title," Odine continued. "It iz a magical link cast by ze sorceress. There have been no cases of the link being reversed. To link them together, ze sorceress infuses her magic into ze mind. You could say…" He rolled his wrist. "She junctions him to her. Or junctions her magic to him. As you know, humans are capable of wielding paramagic, but the human mind iz too fragile to hold pure magic. The GFs could easily overwhelm a person's mind, though if they did zat they would lose their link to this world, unravel and likely return to ze source."

"It has happened," Seifer said. "There was a kid in B-Garden, eight or nine years ago. He was messing around with junctioning, abusing his GF. Cid tried to discipline him, but he wouldn't stop. Then one day they found him… He'd had a fit or something. Blood running from his ears, nose, eyes. He'd torn out his own hair and bitten through his tongue."

"Gross," Selphie said.

"Cid covered it up, but I found the files," Seifer said contemptuously. "He always left important shit lyin' around his office. Kadowaki described it as 'a lapse of control resulting in total severance of the junctioning bond.'"

"I mean, we're generally taught not to annoy the magical beings squatting in our heads," Selphie added, tapping her temple. "Common sense."

"Anyway," Odine barked, clearly not used to being interrupted. "Ze powers of Hyne iz so great even ze sorceress iz at risk of being consumed. Afterall, she iz only human. So she must find a second vessel to ground her magic. In flowery terms: a knight. But such an overwhelming infusion of pure magic irreversibly alters ze brain constructs, so she maintains them through even more magic, lest ze vessel deteriorate. However, when ze sorceress dies, ze knight cannot pass on her seed of magic like she can and ze human body cannot sustain it without ze sorceress' help, so ze magic begins to erode ze vessel, consuming first ze mind and then ze body."

That knot in Selphie's belly had returned. "So, it's… what? Killing him?"

Odine looked cross. "No, no. Zat wouldn't do at all. Ze magic needs its vessel to sustain itself for as long as possible – to protect itself. So, it eats away anything superfluous – emotion, memories and such – and leaves behind ze fighting instinct so ze vessel can protect itself and ze magic respectively. A Hollow Knight. A somewhat useless, unthinking fighting machine."

"Oh," Selphie said. "So… how do we like… unjunction Ultimecia's magic or whatever? That would stop the hollowing, right?"

"You can't," Seifer deadpanned. "It's too assimilated."

He didn't sound defeated. Not even sad or frightened. He just sounded resigned. Like he'd accepted his fate. But Selphie didn't accept that. They'd done way crazier things, and besides, they'd defeated Ultimecia once, they could do it again. To her magic, anyway.

"There's gotta be a way to get rid of it!" Selphie exclaimed, jumping to her feet. "Couldn't we just… Dispel it?"

"It's not a status effect, idiot," Seifer said.

"Magic cannot be erased," Odine said. "It iz energy, it iz infinite. It can be contained, used, recycled, transmuted, but never destroyed. When a human iz tainted to such a level by pure magic, they have become something else, something different. It iz… complex."

"But there must be a way." The voice belonged to Rinoa. She had appeared at some point in the corner of Odine's office, wearing a formal blue dress and heels, like she'd just left a function or meeting.

"Ah! S-sorceress! I apologize I thought –"

Rinoa waved him into silence. Probably literally. She did that now and insisted it was an accident, but Selphie wasn't so sure. "Magic can be moved between different vessels. GFs can be unjunctioned. Magic can be transmuted. This is more complicated, but not that different."

"The issue iz the destruction of matter in the wake of its excision," Odine said. "I could not forcibly extract ze magic no more than I could forcibly extract yours, sorceress. For such powerful magic to be excised would take nothing short of death of ze vessel."

Rinoa gnawed on her lip, then nodded resolutely. "No. There has to be a way. Edea lost her powers but still lived. We just gotta keep trying."

"Some problems can't be solved with just good intentions and hard work," Seifer said derisively. "Just let it go."

"It's not for you," Rinoa said. "I did this to Squall too. I… didn't mean to. I was stupid. I didn't know what it meant to let him be my knight. And now he holds some of my power too."

Selphie reached out and gripped Rinoa's arm wordlessly. Rinoa was two parts good intentions, one part naivety and one part pure resolve. That concoction generally meant she believed she could get anything done if she worked hard enough.

For Selphie's part, she just wanted something to believe in.

"We can totally figure it out," Selphie said with a bright smile.

"Yeah." Rinoa turned to Odine. "I'm happy with everything you've found out so far. I'm sure if anyone can find a way to shift the magic in Seifer's brain, you can."

Odine bobbed his head. "You flatter me, sorceress."

Selphie fist pumped. "Yeah! If you can find a way to turn Ellone's power into a machine that transports evil sorceress' minds back in time so they can compress time and space, this should be a piece of evil-scientist cake!"

Rinoa supressed a giggle, then turned to Seifer. "Go back to your room and be nice, okay?"

"It's not a room, it's a prison cell," Seifer snapped. "And I'm always nice."

This time is was Selphie's turn to suppress a giggle, but Rinoa soon turned a bossy eye on her too. "And you. No more prison breaks! He's in there to protect others. You heard what Odine said."

"As ze magic consumes its vessel Seifer exhibits more acts of uncontrolled violence," Odine said, eyeing Seifer cautiously. "He remembers nothing after ze act."

Selphie cocked her head curiously. "Huh. He's been fine around me."

"I believe it's still in early stages," Odine explained. "Our experiments thus far have shown zat magical stimulation accelerates the hollowficiation, causing a temporary lapse of lucidity and a spike in violence. Though as it advances, he will exhibit violence sporadically and spontaneously."

"It's not good for him to be around GFs. Or me, for that matter," Rinoa added.

A squad of guards came to escort Seifer back to his cell, and Selphie watched him depart pensively. He didn't seem to have an ounce of regret in him. He didn't even seem troubled by his hollowfication.

He deserved this. He deserved to suffer. At least, that's what she kept telling herself. She knew she should hate him, or at the very least resent him, but for some reason she didn't, and that bothered her, too.

Everything bothers me at the moment, she mused. Maybe I should've taken that vacation time…

And then it came to her. The most batty, impulsive, poorly-thought-through idea she'd maybe ever had. It made no sense, and perfect sense. She spun on the spot, stopping right in front of Rinoa.

"Rinny, I got a crazy idea! Hear me out?"

Rinoa looked at her warily. "Okaaay. Now?"

"Over coffee!" Selphie chirped.

Rinoa pawed her fancy clutch bag and pulled out her vidphone. After scrolling through a few messages, she nodded. "Squall is still busy and isn't expecting me to check in for a while yet. I don't have any meetings scheduled either." She grinned. "Let's go!"

Selphie and Rinoa were two of the most recognisable women in the world, especially the latter, so it was hard doing 'normal' things now, things they'd taken for granted before the war. Rinoa was a walking security hazard; a target for hired assassins and anti-sorceress groups that probably kept Squall awake with worry, despite her remarkable and newfound ability to maintain a constant Shell and Protect. Regardless, it was a pain walking around nowadays. Rinoa had cut her hair short and dyed out the blonde streaks, and Selphie had begrudgingly retired her bouncy hair style and adopted a pair of space-buns (as dramatic as her last hairstyle but at least not as recognisable). Out in the streets of Esthar, they both wore sunglasses and plain clothes just in case. Rinoa pushed her hair under a baseball cap that read 'TIMBER TIGERS' and Selphie wore a sweater that said 'DELING UNIVERSITY '08'.

They picked a café not far from the main shopping parade. Its ultramodern architecture was offset by colourful cacti and wicker chairs, and the scent of incense entwined pleasantly with fresh coffee. There were no waiters; Selphie tapped her order into a holoscreen, and two minutes later a steaming mug of hot cocoa with extra whipped cream was delivered on the back of a miniature drone.

"Thanks!" Selphie told it before giving it a spritely pat on the head.

Angelo yipped enviously while Rinoa batted Selphie's hand away from the drone with a giggle. "You'll break it!"

"I think it's cute."

"Give me an old-fashioned puppy any day," Rinoa said. She stared out the window at the bustling city and her spoon continued to stir her mocha on its own after she moved away her hand. She didn't seem to notice.

Selphie tugged her gaze away from the magic-moving-spoon. "You don't like Esthar?"

"Mmm… It's just so… busy. Do you know it doesn't get dark here? Not properly. There're always neon lights, flashing signs… You can't even see the stars. It makes Deling look like a back-water village." She sighed. "I miss Timber."

"You don't like Garden?"

"I didn't say that! Garden is fine, I suppose. I'm just happy being with Squall, for now."

Selphie drew a smiley face in her whipped cream. At length, she said, "I miss Trabia."

"Why don't you ask Squall to post you at Trabia Garden for a while?" Rinoa suggested. "He's been thinking of setting up a long-term team there as a sign of good will. You know, manual aid, better communications, that sort of thing. Plus, I'm sure they could do with the help rebuilding."

"Well, sure. It's just… I don't miss Garden." She searched for the words. That was weird. Words usually came easy to her. "I miss… I miss Trabia. I miss the pines and the snow and the cold. I miss something that… that isn't Garden. Even though I've only ever known Garden." She searched Rinoa's face. "What is that? What does that mean? How can you miss something you don't have?"

Rinoa leaned back in her chair and her gaze caught on the spoon. She plucked it out of the coffee and set it aside. "You want to leave Garden."

"Balamb? I do have my vacation time –"

"I mean SeeD."

Selphie blinked at Rinoa, then looked down in time to watch her whipped cream smiley face melt into the hot chocolate. She absently dunked a packet of sugar into it. "I don't know. Maybe. Is that awful? Am I a bad person?"

"No, no, of course not –"

"It's just that since the war I don't even know why I'm still fighting. I don't even understand what SeeD is for. Why was I fighting in the first place? It feels like my whole life was planned by someone else and…" She rubbed her eyes. "Hehehe, I sound like Squall. Maybe I'm overthinking things."

Rinoa sipped her coffee and rubbed Angelo's ears. After a moment, she said, "You should go to Trabia. As a… an unofficial envoy of B-Garden, maybe? Or just, like, as a morale booster? See how you feel, take it day by day. Squall won't mind."

"Xu would mind," Selphie said grimly. "I – us – the Orphanage Gang… we're Garden's big earners."

Rinoa wrinkled her nose and waved a hand. "Who cares what Xu thinks?"

"She is Headmistress, Rinny. Besides, I can't let B-Garden down like that!" Selphie took a deep breath. "Actually, I was thinking… I was thinking about taking Seifer with me."

Rinoa set her coffee down with a clunk. "What!?"

Selphie dumped another sugar packet into her hot chocolate. "I know, I know. It's crazy. But! He's dangerous, right? And super strong? So he shouldn't stay here. What if he got out? He could hurt people!"

"Those are very specific reasons for why he should stay here! Esthar has the best security in the world! Could you defeat him alone if he became fully hollow? Would T-Garden even accept him? He… he blew them up! Also, we need him at Odine's so we can research hollowficiation."

"I'll bring him to Odine's once a week," Selphie said. "Odine has a ton of information to work with already, plus from now on he's just working on an extraction process, right? He won't need Seifer all the time. And we'll… we'll set up security measures. I mean, I'm ninety-nine percent sure I can take 'im on, but we can totally think of some back up plans. And actually, I wasn't planning on going to T-Garden…"

"What do you mean?"

"T-Garden owns a bunch of cabins up in the mountains. They were used as training outposts, but they've been out of use since Garden got bombed. We used to have crazy parties up there, back when we were cadets. They're proper out of the way of civilisation, have good communication lines and are kitted out to outlast the Trabian winters –"

"Why are you doing this?"

"Hah?"

Rinoa frowned a small, puzzled frown. "For him. With him. I… don't understand. He blew up Trabia Garden, killed your friends, betrayed everyone. You didn't even know him at Balamb Garden, not like Squall, Quistis and Zell. Even I have more of a connection with him because of… you know."

Selphie opened her mouth, shut it again. She bobbed a shoulder and managed a half-smile. "I dunno! I guess… I can't stop seeing him as part of the Orphanage Gang, y'know? Sure, he's a massive d-bag but he's been dealt some bad hands too. This idea of him sittin' in a cell waiting to die… it doesn't sit right with me. I also think he'll go crazy way faster!" She nodded resolutely. "He can't go to T-Garden, but maybe he could help in other ways. He's paying for everything he's done, but he hasn't made up for it. If that makes sense."

Rinoa stared at her for a long while, then let out a gusty sigh. "He might end up driving you insane, you know that?"

"I'm already insane," Selphie said seriously. "He should be more scared of me!"

"I suppose Squall could draft up another fake mission." Rinoa tapped her nails against the side of the mug. "Helping the rebuilding of T-Garden, something like that. And it would keep Seifer well out of the way. I mean, he might eventually be discovered in Esthar, and it would be such a shame for Esthar and Galbadia's political climate to sour so soon. And I would hate to drag Laguna into this too…"

Selphie fist pumped the air. "Woo-hoo! It's decided!"

"Well, I have to run it past Squall first…"

"He'll defo say yes! Squall's a real trooper like that."

"He's a rationalist. As long as all the details add up then he'll be satisfied." Rinoa eyed her again, a tad suspiciously. "He'll be sad to see you leave, though. I'll be sad. Everyone'll be sad! But hopefully a break in Trabia will make everything clearer. I want you to be happy. It's just unfortunate you'll be bunking with Seifer…"

"Feh, he's a kitten," Selphie said dismissively. "Let's hope he doesn't mind the cold!"

Rinoa grinned. "I think the cold will be the last of his worries."