"She is not as strong as when you last saw her," Cid explained. "I know she would want to be out of bed for your visit, how about you take a walk through the garden and I'll fetch you?"
I nodded – and exited the house through the patio. The garden area was where I would previously walk and talk with Matron on my infrequent visits, always at a slow pace due to the injury which I never asked about. She had never struck me as strong when I had visited – she remained thin and pale, and she relied on the cane to move about. And now she was really unwell according to Cid – how had no one known of it? Why had Squall not said anything? Did Quistis even know? I reached up into a blossom tree and grasped a bloom of flowers, I ran my fingers over their crumpled petals – they broke apart instantly at the slightest touch. I let the detached petals pick up the breeze and glide away from my hand, I watched them – they always struck me as being simple and beautiful.
I remembered sitting under this tree as a child, watching them fall. When a strong sea breeze moved through the Garden I would always squint just a little, and watch the petals tear through the sky like a snow storm in pink. Don't think too hard, you might break your pea sized baby brain! Seifer, so many of my memories of him were unkind ones. Had he ever been kind? It still didn't make sense that our happiness was linked somehow – what had made him hate me so much? My memories of our time at the orphanage were disjointed at best.
"Zell!" I heard Cid's voice from afar.
"Coming!" I responded, I reached up into the tree again and carefully tore a blossom of flowers so that they didn't break apart and headed back to the house.
"Zell," Matron smiled at me as I entered the living area. She was seated on the ornate armchair; a blanket had been placed over her legs. Beneath it I could see the knobbly knees that protruded and her hands lay thin and fragile in her lap. I was struck with a sudden memory of thin thorn like claws and pushed the memory away.
"Matron," I smiled and approached her. "I'm glad to see you again." I reached out and placed the flowers in her palm. She looked down at the delicate flowers, touching the edges gently.
"Oh they are blooming again – I thought perhaps you might outgrow your fascination with them."
"They're still beautiful," I sat down on the couch beside the armchair. "How are you?"
"I am as well as can be Zell, I am getting old – and do I feel it!" She smiled at me, and I noticed the creases in her face, mostly worry lines. "Tell me about you – I have not seen you in some time."
"I'm…" I wanted to say fine – but the word turned to ash in my mouth and I looked away from her back out to the Garden. I took a deep breath and closed my eyes for a moment before returning my gaze to her. "I'm terrible really. My Ma – she passed, not too long ago," Matron immediately leaned towards me reached out her hand and placed it over mine on the armrest. "I led a practice mission with my Cadets – it – it didn't go well, seven died," her hand squeezed mine firmly and did not release. "One is in a coma, one is paraplegic, one lost their arm, others were injured," tears began to spill again and I wiped at them angrily – I had not wanted to talk about this.
"I'm so sorry Zell," she whispered firmly
"Was it an accident?" Cid asked, I looked up – not even realising he was there. He gripped my shoulder firmly, reassuring me. I stared at Matron's hand clasped around my own.
"I took them to the Trabia Mountains – there was a small avalanche that destroyed three teams' encampments." It took me several moments before I could meet her eyes again; they were filled with concern and compassion. It took longer still before I had the courage to look at Cid standing beside me, his face was firmer, but there was compassion there. "I was responsible for them,"
"Death is a part of a SeeD's life unfortunately," Cid interrupted me quietly.
"I feel as though I've been surrounded by death most of my life – I don't," I stopped, looking away from both of them. I don't think I can handle anymore death, and in that moment I desperately do not want to be a part of SeeD anymore. "I don't want death to be a part of my life anymore."
"You would leave Garden?" Cid asked.
"I don't know, it might be out of my hands, I'm under review for disciplinary action." I sighed, covering my face with my hands. I took several deep breaths. "This isn't why I came though – something has happened – and I need your help Matron."
"My help?" She looked at Cid for a moment and some silent exchange occurred, he left the room. She looked back to me once we were alone again. "What do you need of me?"
"I need you to tell me about Seifer,"
"Seifer?" She repeated quietly.
"About what really happened, it's important, and I don't know if you'd believe me as to why. But something happened in time compression – my memories of it are fuzzy at best, but something terrible happened and I need to find a way to bring him back."
"You believe he is struck in time compression?"
"I'm certain of it – he's alive, I know that I saw him there – but I can't remember what happened, I think it might be my fault he's stuck. There was a woman – I don't know, maybe a Guardian Force? Her name was Leaheora –"
"Leaheora!" Matron exclaimed with shock.
"You know who she is?" I leaned forward – I finally felt a grip of hope – she knew who she was and I was on the right track.
"I remember her from Ultimecia's memories, while she occupied me – we shared some memories, some consciousness. I told you it was difficult to separate consciousness when she was inside me. But there were a great deal of memories that she shared – forcibly with me." Matron sighed, closing her eyes and looked sombre. "Those memories of her are what she used against me – they were of her childhood, a tortured and horrible one – one that had twisted her into the bitter rage of what was left."
"Ultimecia wanted you to know of her past?" Matron nodded, I sat watching her quietly as she either remembered, or quietly struggled with what to say to me.
"In the future, a time I didn't recognise – it was discovered that one of the Ellone Junction Machine's side effects could be a desirable power to harness. It caused rifts in time – this is something that few people know now, and it should remain so."
"Of course – Ultimecia was using it to compress time – so she found that out,"
"No Zell," Matron said vehemently, clasping one of my hands in hers in a tight grip. "Someone else found this out – tried to use it as a weapon and discovered Leaheora – and then it was her powers they desired. Ultimecia was simply a child with sorceress powers, she was but a tool, a means to an end – she wasn't a person to them at all."
"Like how Odine used Ellone?"
"Much worse, it tore at my heart – those memories of Ultimecia's – she used them against me to, weaken my ability to push her out. I love children – have dedicated much of my life to protecting them. It was terrible what happened to her. When the Ellone Junction Machine was used it caused a temporary rift in time – through the rift sometimes Leaheora was there, a Guardian Force with immeasurable power to exist across time. They wanted that power but the machine needed to be used with a sorceress' powers, and so they acquired Ultimecia."
"You knew!" I exclaimed loudly. "I told you I thought I had encountered a Guardian Force in time compression – you didn't tell me you knew who she was!" I spoke with accusation – hurt, she could have helped me regain memories when they were fresh but had withheld this information from me. I felt betrayed.
"I thought – I believe it best that as few people know of her existence as possible. Why rush into the future where a sorceress is forced and pushed into attempting to harness this Guardian Force?"
"And you couldn't trust me?" I tore my hand out of her grasp and stood from the couch. I walked to the entrance of the patio and stood looking out over the garden, the blossoming trees. The silence went on for several moments before Matron spoke again.
"She was ordered, forced, they were always unkind, unforgiving – pushing her over and over again." Matron didn't answer my question about trusting me at all, but I listened as she went on. "Ultimecia got better at manipulating the machine, but not any closer to harnessing Leaheora. The memories she shared with me are unclear as she grew older, but some kind of cataclysm occurred when she was older – somehow she destroyed Leaheora or caused such a terrible rift it destroyed Leaheora, all I know is it tore a part of her world apart – and she somehow absorbed remnants of Leaheora's powers. It was this power that she harnessed and learned to use against her world and that lead to her discovering the possibility of time compression."
"Ultimecia's world…" I touched my hand to the full glass windows, feeling the coolness against my fingertips. "It looked destroyed – she had her castle, I'm sure Squall told you about it… I mean it was amazing – huge and I've never seen architecture like it, but the rest of the world looked like it had been ravaged or torn apart." So unlike the world we lived in today – looking outside on the Garden, beautiful and rich – full of life. There was nothing like that in her time.
"It could have been the cataclysm or it could have been her doing after it – but the future she shared with me was… grim." I turned around to look back at her, she was worrying her hands in her lap, looking at me.
"So – this, mind sharing, control thing – last time – when you spoke to me about Seifer you spoke about…" I swallowed thickly, "hurting him."
"What Ultimecia did to myself, Rinoa even Adel was –" she paused touching her lips with a far off look. "It was a violation of – one's soul? I don't know how to describe it – it was awful. She tore through who you were like paper in a fire."
"And with Seifer?" I crossed my arms over my chest tensely, I could feel that her answers would be hard to hear. But if I was to save Seifer, or what was left of him I needed to know what kind of state he was in. Once I found him – it would an important part of bringing him back.
"He is not a sorceress – it was very different, there were times where we controlled him – sometimes it was just her. Oh Zell," Matron covered her face to hide tears that had begun to form. "Each time there was less of him, less of Seifer – it was like driving a wedge through his very being till there was but shreds of him."
"Fuujin and Raijin said he was like an empty husk, I don't think they thought there was… any hope for him?" I tried to phrase it like a question – it was important that I actually find Seifer – not an empty human without memories or feelings. I had no chance of bringing back an empty souless human being from time compression.
"I don't know Zell – even I struggled to, centre myself after her possessions. How does it feel – in your mind when you junction a Guardian Force?"
"Oh," I thought for a few moments – of course Matron would have never done that having natural powers herself. "Uhm, it's like – having a foreign oddness? Uh – like a slither of someone other than you in your head, I suppose. I don't junction as much anymore, I don't like the feeling anymore or the memory loss."
"Then take that slither of oddness and turn it into a serrated blade of malevolence – brutally tearing at your mind to make space for itself, wedging deeper each time. You would have barely noticed the Guardian Force's nature of making room for itself by burrowing out your memories, but its process is slow – careful – unnoticeable. We were brutal to him – tearing everything we didn't need away – leaving only what we could use – anger, hatred, rage all of the dark corners of him and twisted him to our will."
"Matron," I watched her hands wringing over eachother in her lap as she turned to look up at me. "Why do you say we –"
"I've told you – it is difficult to separate, my consciousness, Ultimecia's consciousness – sometimes they felt the same, maybe they were the same. They feel real to me even now, but I don't know if they are my own or hers. How we hated his failure – we punished him brutally every time."
"I don't think – I want to know the details of that." I watched Matron nod her head silently. Knowing that Seifer had suffered was enough information – my chest clenched painfully remembering everyone who had said the same; Fuujin, Raijin, Rinoa... Rinoa had memories of it and was traumatised by the knowledge of it. "Rinoa told me that she had remanets of Ultimecia's memories and your own being jumbled in there."
"Oh," Matron exhaled quietly. "I understand why she…" Matron didn't finish that thought, and I watched her silently as she retreated and mulled over her own thoughts. I conceded and sat back down on the couch beside her armchair finally.
"Matron – can you tell me about Seifer – his memories? What you and Ultimecia left behind? I think I'll need it to be able to bring him back from time compression."
"You truly believe that he is alive?" Her eyes bored into mine with an intensity that I don't understand, but I feel a sense of courage lighting like a small flame in my stomach. I lean forward and fix her gaze with a new sense of determination.
"Right now – yes – I'm going to find him, I'm going to bring him back. He might be dead, or the worse for wear – but I swear I'm going find him."