Guado weren't traditionally monks. They had their own holy grounds to watch over.

Still, Seymour found he wasn't the only one from Guadosalam that stayed in the Macalania temple.

Whereas Seymour had inherited the density that comes from humans and looked as if he intimidated narrow doorways, this man looked as if he could fit between pages of a book. His dark green hair always caught the dull light in the temple and turned it into a beautiful chiaroscuro effect or became a set of thin forest of green mirrors when the strands caught the light reflected by the thick snow.

The green falling down his forehead and past his dark blue eyes over his pale skin resembled the magical and haunting forest of Macalania below the snowline in the moonlight…as if home had become more beautiful and sought him out.

"Hey…" the stranger said, leaning against the wall as if he owned it and would smack it if it talked back. He'd been doing this for days with different walls. What exactly did he think he was doing with the temple?

Seymour stopped sweeping. The man obviously wanted something, but Seymour had no idea how to reply.

Why did everyone stop to stare at the boy who treated sweeping snow and killing vicious yetis in the manner?

"You're cute," the man said.

Now Seymour had even less of a clue. None of the men knew why he was confused when they hit on him, but most thought it was cute. Then again… no one ever asked.

They asked other questions.

……………..

"Whatever ideas you're getting about—" Paine said.

"It's not what you think," Seymour said, and hoped to leave it at that.

"Then what is it?"

For a moment, Seymour contemplated not telling her. He was like that. Usually, if people asked, he'd tell them stuff they didn't even know they didn't want to hear, but he always had the choice of not going where he didn't want to go. He had precision steering in conversations.

However… Paine had a large sword, was Yuna's right hand… person, and a nasty attitude. Saying you didn't want to tell her was like insulting a Ronso's mom.

"You remind me of someone who invited me to restaurants frequently," Seymour said. "That's all."

They were sitting down now. He didn't know how that had happened. She'd been steering their movements and he'd been trying to steer the conversation. Neither had been looking where the other had been going.

Paine was sitting next to him. He didn't like that. It was bad enough when she was just the prison warden complaining that she really wasn't. Now… Now what?

It was a trick. It had to be. There was no other possible explanation. Yuna was cooking something. Either that or she would be once she found out and Paine would be smiling the whole way through.

"Well, if whoever she is, is still around and sing—" Paine started. Great. A plan. They'd get it on, he'd cheer up, nothing would eat people or landscape anymore, and most importantly, she could forget about him.

"His name was Tiranel," Seymour said, putting no emphasis on any of the words and stopping Paine's suggestion skidding in its tracks. "He developed a rather nasty attitude like yours and left me."

Paine was already working overtime trying to crawl out of the pit she'd driven into. Something kicked the back of her brain fiercely, but she kicked it in the nadgers before it decided to kick her mouth and get out. There were some things he didn't need to know. Just because fate threw you a coincidence didn't mean it mattered. It wasn't like she was his sister.

"He said what we'd done was wrong and blamed me. Considering the last time I saw him, he threw a clock at me, I'd say he'd either dead or unhappily married," Seymour commented. "Either way, I doubt he'd be interested."

'He must've been trying really hard at that marriage for being unhappy about it,' Paine thought. 'Damn, just damn.'

Grabbing the wheel of the conversation deftly, Seymour refused to be outdone at articulation topic management.

"Why am I always… dealt with by you?"

"What's wrong with me?"

Seymour stopped himself before he muttered 'Would you like a list?' "Why not Yuna or Rikku?"

"Rikku's… Rikku," Paine said. Explaining things to Rikku was difficult. Explaining Rikku to others was practically impossible. "I'm not sure she knows what's going on."

"Well, then, that would put us on equal footing."

"You don't know anything about Al Behd or machina."

"She doesn't know anything about Guado or temples."

"She… she's not much of a conversationalist."

"Good. I don't like talking all that much."

"How long have you known her?"

"Half as long as I've known you, which has only been a few days."

"Let's just say she thinks you're still picking flowers and leave it at that."

"If you say so," Seymour said.

Paine sighed. What just happened? It felt as he'd won something and she'd lost.

Seymour didn't care. It shut Paine up so maybe he could be in the same room as her and spend some energy sorting out his thoughts instead of tangling them up with dialog. The brain and mouth were never speaking the same language and were only barely connected to each other.

"Yuna found a group of Guado," Paine said. She'd show him…right? "They were scattered when Guadosalam exploded. There was this group and it turned out there were a dozen of them and only one guy was defending them from some jerks. Turned out the group was nothing but one giant family."

"And?"

"And the guy defending them knew some stuff about you she didn't." And Yuna'd killed his brother, who had tried to defend you. And Tida was the guard's sister. And the kid was hers… by Tiranel. Who was missing. "And that they are a family and how crappy yours turned out and all that."

Food was set in front of Seymour. He wasn't really interested with so much on his mind, but he started nibbling on it in order to put everything in his mind aside.

However, fate never seemed to let that happen.

Seymour was not someone to trust guilt with. He'd find someway of accidentally turning it into a disaster and then feel worse.

"I was thinking…" Seymour started.

"Never a good thing with you, but go on," Paine said, then slapped her forehead. Damnit, she thought to herself, think first, then talk.

"When I said you wouldn't understand last night… I had no right to say that. I know nothing about you." It seemed an innocent enough way to see if she was a serial murderer or the type to turn her back on stupidity.

"…Like?"

"When I was a child I was kept from interacting with anyone but my parents. Even the palace staff would have nothing to do with me but keep me from someone else. When I was eight my mother and I were sent to Baaj Island to protect us from a civil uprising, which was over me. Before I returned to Guadosalam, my mother took me to Zanarkand and took her own life. My father found me wandering around alone and accused me of murdering her. I was nine or so at the time. After that, my father shut me in my room, now and then threatening to kill me. Only a few years after that, Donna told me to run away. Some monk at the Macalania temple was wandering around and found me. I learned something there, and I've carried it with me ever since I murdered my father." Throughout the entire speech Seymour was calm. He was completely unreadable. Whatever had happened had affected him deeply that it could almost always be read in his eyes, but he spoke as if reading from a book on taxes.

Seymour blinked. Paine swallowed.

"I have a right to live." Seymour turned away and stared at the plate.

"…That's it?" Paine asked.

"I have the same right as everyone else. No matter how much they deny it, it's my choice, not theirs."

Then Paine realized what he meant. People had denied it. Profusely sometimes.

The fact that you were just like anyone else wasn't something you carried around with you twenty-four hours a day. It was something you kept on a shelf and took down and held for a while after a bad day.

"You have the same look in your eyes."

"It's not as impressive as you'd think."

"But it's there."

"Look, I just don't wanna be treated like a girl, okay? I had eleven brothers and my dad when I was a kid and everyone thought I'd ruined their lives by just being there. Everyone thought they needed to stop what they were doing because I was female."

"Perfectly understandable."

"But I don't want to be treated like a dyke, either."

"You mean, you don't want to be treated like a LITTLE girl, is that it?"

"…Yeah," Paine said, somewhat embarrassed that he'd been correct. "Look, I… I'm gonna go, and… I think I can…I'm gonna go."

Seymour shrugged. He didn't seem bothered by it.

In fact, he was bothered by the fact that there was a thought floating around in his head that he should be, and he didn't like unsolicited thoughts soliciting him. Part of his brains said he should put more effort into finding somewhere to run to. Another part answered 'Where, the moon?' A third part ignored them and said there's an attractive woman over there in tight leather and she not only seems to constantly want to talk with you, but to make you happy.

At that moment different parts of his brain started to argue about how to put two and two together and none of them came up with four. This made it harder to talk than a second ago.

"Miss?" Seymour asked, standing up.

"Paine," Paine corrected.

"…Is there anywhere to do laundry?"

…………………

Rikku was reliable at two things: machina, and chores. Chores were just instructions for machina to her anyway. She could outchore anyone on the airship. She chore knew what to do.

This wasn't that surprising. Even buddy knew how to wash his socks. He just didn't.

What was surprising was that Seymour knew how to do everything the unautomated way.

The first thing you learn about religion is that the temple doesn't clean itself.

Seymour loved chores. He got out into the world, even if it was picking up the trash other people left there. He got exercise and light and made himself useful enough that no one wanted him to leave.

This wasn't the first time anyone was surprised by it when they considered his birthright. The servants became annoyed when he made his own bed and put his own clothes away. Eventually they had to hide the brooms in order to make him stop. He still managed every now and then to do some manual labor. It confused his enemies and kept them from talking to him.

The only surprise for him was that the machina didn't explode.

……………………..

"Yuna—"

"It's not fair!" Yuna screamed.

"Yuna, I—"

"Where is he?" Yuna asked, but that was only because she put a question mark in it. She tried to storm past Paine, who stopped her by grabbing her, but Yuna was putting up an especially good fight. Never underestimate wiggling.

"Whoa! What'd he do?"

"Who cares?" Yuna yelled. "I'm tired of being in the shadows! I'm tired of standing here! I'm gonna go find him and tell him to cheer up whether he likes it or not or else!"

"Yuna, listen to yourself."

"I am and I don't care. I'm not gonna do just nothing."

"Exactly, now you're gonna give him a heart attack."

"He'll get over it!"

"Yuna!"

"Let go!"

"Yuna, those things are from his damn head! THEY don't want to get close to you. Get it?"

"No." Yuna wasn't screaming, but she was still loud.

"Yuna, he is very scared of you. You chase away all other weird shit in his mind. You made his own trauma almost wet it's pants. If you go near him, he's gonna jump trying to get away."

"We'll catch him again."

"He's gonna jump ship while still in the air."

"I'm tired of—"

"I heard you. That's what I want to talk to you about. Do you like interior decorating?" Paine asked, pronouncing the last two words as if they were very foreign and contained many symbols she didn't know how to pronounce.

Yuna nodded.

"Look, I have an idea, but first I want you to know it's not a date."

"With me?"

"Definitely not with you."