28
When the White SeeD ship docked in FH, Zell said his goodbyes to Ellone with a hug and a muttered thanks for coming to his rescue. Behind her, Seifer watched without so much as a hint of his usual smugness. Zell pretended Ellone's pity didn't sting.
He gave her the keys to his house before they disembarked, in case she needed a place to stay.
"Give 'em to Selphie if you don't plan to stick around Balamb," he said. "Tell her to look in on the place every now and then, okay? And tell Seifer stay out of my room if he knows what's good for him."
"I'm right here, chicken-head. You can say that to my face."
Zell wasn't in the mood to fight. "Just don't touch my stuff."
Seifer opened his mouth to retort, but Ellone's glance shut him down.
She certainly had him wrapped around her finger, didn't she? Zell never thought he'd see the day when Seifer deferred to anyone.
"What about the Garage?" Ellone asked.
"Guy I know's gonna take care of it for now," he said.
Ellone laid her hand against his arm and Zell stared at the healed, but still pink scar across her cheek. That, too, was his fault.
"You take care of yourself, Zell," she said. "Relax. Get some rest."
"You too," he said. "And don't let Seifer boss you around."
"Me? She's the bossy one," Seifer scoffed.
"Assertive," she said. "Not bossy."
They bickered all the way down the gangplank, and Zell waved when Ellone turned around and lifted her hand. Beside him, the children lined up along the side to wave back.
An hour later, they were headed out to sea, and Zell's stomach fluttered in anticipation of the days to come. It wasn't a vacation – there would be plenty of work to keep him occupied, and that was exactly what he needed. A distraction.
And boy, did Edea keep him busy. The ship needed a lot of minor repairs, and there was always something to do.
In the mornings, he trained with the White SeeDs and helped Matron with breakfast. He fixed the ancient stove in the galley and re-wired the navigation console, repaired the bilge pump when it failed, and repainted and sealed the deck. In between, he rough-housed with the kids and read them stories and taught them basic martial arts forms.
In the evenings, he played cards or read in his bunk. He tore through his small stack of paperbacks one by one and when he ran out of things to read, he borrowed from the White SeeDs or from Matron. Anything to fill the time, anything to keep his mind occupied and clear of thoughts about the mess he left behind.
There were nightmares the first couple of weeks. Dreams where he not only beat Squall, but killed him, and he woke, drenched in sweat and convinced he'd murdered his best friend.
On those nights, when he couldn't fall back asleep, he would go up to the deck and watch the stars. Out here, with no city lights to pollute the view, there were too many to count. If he looked too long, his wonder turned to despair, to certainty that he was insignificant in the grand scheme of things. He was a speck of dust in comparison to the vastness beyond, not even a location on the world map. In the long run, he would not matter.
These nights were the hardest, when there was too much time to think, and no distraction to keep him from beating himself up.
Thalia wasn't wrong. It was the idea of family he loved. He craved it so desperately, it hurt.
Rinoa and the kids were a ready-made version, one that partially satisfied that need without bothering to try, but they weren't his family. They didn't belong to him, and they never would.
More importantly, he didn't belong to them.
He supposed he should count his blessings. He couldn't even imagine what might have happened if Squall was gone long enough for Zell to claim them as his own. That kind of heartbreak was too gross to even think about. If Rinoa was asked to choose between them, Zell would not be the guy she picked in the end. He knew that all along, but he was so desperate to belong to someone, he got lazy.
This truth stung, but better to accept it than continue lying to himself.
And none of that was the real problem. Thalia's illusions revealed to Zell a side of himself he always feared – that he was like his Pa. Deep down, he knew of his own potential to be abusive, whether learned from years of being the victim of an abuser, or not. His temper, once piqued, was nasty and violent, and sometimes it was difficult to tell when he crossed a line until it was too late.
The years of being a SeeD didn't help. His Pa's fists hurt, but the man never struck him with intent to kill. Zell knew how to do that. It was so easy. Too easy. And if he hadn't checked himself, Squall might be dead at his hands.
In the days that followed this revelation, Zell stayed away from everyone. He didn't eat, barely slept, and got out of bed only to complete his daily self-assigned maintenance chores. The rest of the time, he stayed in his bunk and brooded.
Edea left him alone at first, but after days of hiding in his bunk, she visited him one night with an offering of fresh baked cinnamon rolls and a glass of milk. It smelled delicious, but his stomach recoiled at the thought of food.
"You need to eat something, Zell," she said. "You've barely eaten anything in days."
"Not feeling well."
"I gathered that, but I don't think it's because you're sea-sick," she said. "You don't have to tell me what's bothering you, but you need to eat."
To pacify her, he accepted one of the rolls and the milk. His appetite was gone, and he barely tasted it as he choked it down, but some of the heaviness in his limbs lifted when the much needed calories hit his system.
As he set the empty plate on the table, Zell burst into tears. He wept quietly but intensely and then spilled his guts to Edea.
He told her everything.
He needed to hear that he wasn't a piece of crap, that his motives were pure and only borne out of a need to protect someone he loved, but then he killed that possibility when he admitted the one thing he avoided admitting all along, even to himself.
"I was so glad he came home, even as messed up as he was," he said, "but then I saw the way he wouldn't look at her or Ari, and it was like he didn't appreciate how blessed he was... And the way he looked at me. Like he hated me, and I sort of wished he never came back."
He broke down and sniffled into his palms. Edea said nothing.
"I know it wasn't his fault," he said. "A part of me knew he would never hurt her, but I was so pissed about everything, I couldn't stop myself."
Edea rubbed his back, they way she used to when they were kids and Seifer did something to upset him. The way his Ma used to do after his Pa knocked him around or when he woke from a bad dream.
"I hate myself for that," he said. "I'm such a damn selfish prick... Sorry, jerk, I don't even deserve to be their friend. I don't deserve to be with anyone."
"I don't think that's true, Zell," she said. "I think you're being a lot harder on yourself than you need to be. Isn't it possible your feelings and choices were manipulated in the same way Squall's were? That your actions were colored by what she made you believe?"
She stroked Zell's cheek and pinched his chin like he was still three. He wasn't even mad about it.
"It's possible, I guess," he said. "But she couldn't have pushed me into it if it wasn't already there to begin with."
"True," Edea said. "But I doubt you would have laid a hand on Squall if she left you alone to work through it on your own."
Maybe this was true. Maybe those stupid fantasies of making their family his own were just a warped version of the truth, something Thalia put in his head and he never knew the difference.
Or maybe, that was only what he wanted to believe so he didn't feel so bad about himself for his behavior. His romantic attachment to Rinoa might be fading, and his reasons for the attack less clear two weeks removed from them, but that did not change what happened.
"If you really fear there's a part of you that could potentially hurt a loved one out of anger, then you need to deal with that before you can move on. It isn't enough to acknowledge there's an issue."
"How do I do that?" he wondered.
"Well, I suppose you need to do the work and learn to manage your anger so that the next time a situation like that presents itself, you don't react with violence or do something you can never take back," Edea said. "If it helps, see a therapist. There's no shame in it, if that's what works."
Therapy was a sensitive topic for most SeeDs. Aside from going to Dr. K to vent over a cup of tea, it was an unspoken thing that if you wanted to make rank or get promoted, you suffered in silence. It wasn't something Squall himself condoned, though he too was adverse to help, but the board was known for denying advancement to those with visits to a therapist on their record beyond those required for debriefing. Other SeeDs could be just as cut-throat about it and viewed it as an admission of weakness – a sign one was a risk and not fit for duty.
Which was messed up, because at some point in their careers, every single SeeD Zell knew could have used it. They all suffered from nightmares and from the ill-effects of bad missions. They all saw things that were too awful to forget and startled awake at night from the softest of sounds, fearful of attack. Every one of them suffered trauma, whether physical and emotional, and while it was perfectly fine to treat the physical wounds, it was frowned upon to treat the psychological ones.
"You have a lot of love to give, Zell," Edea said. "Don't sell yourself short just because she was able to use your feelings and your past against you. I don't believe that's who you truly are, no matter how poorly you perceive yourself as a result."
Zell could not agree with her, and he didn't know how he would face them when he finally went home. Not that he planned on that any time soon.
"They'll forgive you, Zell," Edea said. "I'd bet money on it."
Zell wasn't so sure.
Ellone participated only peripherally in the raid on Accountant's shack in FH. She was on-hand for identification purposes, and outfitted for combat but was she was not among the first to enter the scene.
It wasn't even necessary in the end.
The Shumi was long dead, by more than a year if the coroner's estimation was correct. His corpse, or what was left of it, lay on the mattress, shriveled and shrunken, barely more than bones.
Ellone stared at the remains, unsurprised and unmoved by all the ways Thalia duped them.
Once the body was removed, the house was searched from top to bottom. There were hundreds of childish drawings done in crayon, similar to the ones they found aboard Squall's floating prison. Ellone sifted through the sketches of spiders and sharp-toothed monsters with a heavy heart, but found nothing new or surprising among them, just more evidence of a lost and confused child trapped inside the body of a woman driven mad by her own power.
She should have known better than to find closure here.
Beneath the floorboards, they found bundled stacks of Gil and other items of value. Gemstones and jewelry, deeds to property, weapons, detailed floor plans for government buildings, hotels and shopping centers – all were carefully sorted and stashed, for what purpose, Ellone did not want to imagine. Thalia did things because she could get away with it, but also because of the false war she believed she fought against the rest of the world.
They found more cash in the walls – so much it boggled the mind – and Ellone was no longer able to stay and watch them rip the place apart.
She crossed the marketplace in front of the train station, where a crowd of citizens gathered to whisper among themselves as Estharian soldiers loaded the stolen cash into an armored vehicle. This was a win, but for Ellone, this victory fell flat.
For a while, she wandered the streets until she found herself above the disk and sat down on the steps. The day was cool, but the sunlight reflected off the panels and warmed her as she thought about where to go from here, now that the job was all but finished.
Returning to the White SeeD ship was no longer an option. Laguna planned to buy a house in Balamb, now that his retirement was official. Ellone could stay in Balamb too, at Zell's place, if she wanted, but that was temporary. Eventually, she would need to choose a path and commit to it, but what did someone without a home or a purpose do with themselves?
"You could teach," Seifer said from behind her. "You're good with kids."
He sat on the step next to her and stretched his long legs out in front of him.
"Is it finished?" she asked.
"More or less," he said. "Don't avoid the subject."
"How do you find your place in the world if you never had one to begin with?"
"You already have one, El," he said. "It's just different. You don't need to be like everyone else, because you're not."
"That's not comforting," she said.
"Well, I'm not going to lie to you," he said. "Maybe for you, that place is wherever you happen to be at the time, doing whatever it is you happen to be doing."
Ellone considered that for a minute.
"Did you enjoy doing Esthar's dirty work?" she wondered.
"Mostly," he said. "I was good at it."
Ellone lapsed into silence and stared at the lines in her palms. She wondered what fortune lay there, in the whorls and creases, what future awaited her. Up until now, she existed without purpose or direction and the thought of moving forward, of finding solid ground was both enticing and daunting.
"One day at a time, El. You don't need to decide your whole damn future right now," he said. "But you do need to decide on where we're going to spend our vacation. You've put it off long enough."
Ellone looked out at the town below the disk, and at the ships and boats in the distance, at the people on the docks.
"Here is as good a place as any," she said.
"Here?" Seifer asked. "Of all the places in the world, you want to stay here?"
"Why not?" she asked. "We could rent paddle boats and I'll teach you to fish the right way, and how to sail. We'll eat oysters drink beer and I can get to know your friends a little better."
Seifer leaned over and kissed her temple.
"We're not staying in that hotel again," he said. "We'll find somewhere where the room doesn't come with cockroaches, sand in the bed, and potential fungal infections."
"It does leave something to be desired."
"I'm not eating oysters, though."
"Oysters are delicious," Ellone said. "What's wrong with you?"
"It's like swallowing snot," he said. "No thanks. And since when do you drink beer?"
"I drink beer every now and then," she said. "Just, not as a competitive sport."
Seifer threw an arm around her shoulders. "So no keg stands, huh?"
"Unlikely," she said. "But knock yourself out."
He laughed, brought her tighter against his side and she dropped her head against his shoulder.
"So, tell me, now that all this is over," she said, "was it you or Thalia who dumped Dr. Odine in the desert?"
His laugh turned into a cackle and his smile was full of mischief.
"Me," Seifer said. "She would have killed him."
"Why didn't you?"
"Because I know you wouldn't want me to," he said and his smile fell away. "But, maybe what I did, he'll remember the next time he thinks about testing a little kid's pain threshold, if you get my drift."
Ellone could picture it. Perhaps Seifer used Odine's tests and simulations against him for a while, made him bleed a little, then dropped him off somewhere to fend for himself. She should have been angry about that, but she didn't care. Odine, and his questionable ethics, was in the past and she was ambivalent about what happened to him, whether on her behalf or not.
"I didn't ask you to do that."
He cackled again and turned his face to the sun, and cast a smug sideways glance at her.
"He had it coming," Seifer said., then his expression darkened. "I read the files. I know what he did."
He knew some of it. What was on paper in Thalia's files, it didn't compare to the experience, but she imagined some of the childhood training he received wasn't so different with the exception of their differing levels of agency. He was given the tools to fight back, Ellone was not, and it only occurred to her then that maybe some of his animosity toward Odine was rooted in his own experiences during childhood. Even with combat training, much of it would look abusive from the outside.
"Are you pissed?" he asked.
"No," she said. "Just wondering what kind of world we live in that we need people like Odine and places like Garden. How we got to a place where that kind of thing is normal."
"Yeah," he agreed. "But, if I've learned anything over the years, there's stuff that makes it worth sticking around for, even when you're as messed up as we are."
"Such as?"
"I don't know, little things. Good whiskey. People who get you. Washing the blood off after a battle," he said and paused to rest his chin against the top of her head. "Those times when you can forget for a few minutes how fucked up this world really is."
He lapsed into silence and combed his fingers through her hair, his eyes focused on something far away, lost in thought or reliving some seldom-visited memory.
"I could go for a burger right now," he said after a few minutes. "Why don't we go grab some lunch at that cafe by the docks? Have a few beers and maybe find a place to stay that doesn't have a few thousand roommates."
They chose a small, one-room house near the docks to rent and paid for two weeks with the option to extend if they wanted to stay longer. It wasn't much, even by Ellone's standards, but it was clean and had a view of the sea. They bought groceries from the market, and on the nights when they stayed in, Seifer cooked meals too fancy for the tiny kitchen and unadorned table.
Ellone taught him to sail on a small, rented sailboat, and showed him the proper way to fish, something Seifer proved he didn't possess any patience for. Those days, in spite of Seifer's ill-temper when the fish didn't magically hurl themselves upon the deck, Ellone's itch to run was eased.
The days when they stayed on land, she got to know Fujin and Raijin. They were easy to love, especially Raijin, who was essentially a walking cardiac muscle, but she developed a particular fondness for Fujin. Her abruptness could be easily mistaken for hostility, but time spent with her revealed there was a kind, if not broken, soul beneath the veneer.
Some afternoons, Ellone accompanied Fujin on near-silent scavenging trips for interesting bits of refuse Fujin used to make jewelry to sell in the shop. Metal washers, screws, broken glass and pottery, links of rusty chain were collected and put to a new purpose at a small table in the apartment Fujin shared with Raijin. Ellone liked to watch her create the pieces, almost envious of how well Fujin knew her tools and of her talent for turning actual junk into something beautiful.
Time spent in their company also revealed a complex and sincere love between the two. It was a strictly platonic relationship as both parties made clear, but no less beautiful in Ellone's eyes than any other genuine partnership she'd witnessed over the years, and tender in its own way. The two looked out for one another, took care of one another. They shared meals and occasionally roughhoused in a playful way, and there were times Ellone noticed the unspoken communications between them, as if they shared the same kind of connection Ellone allowed with Seifer.
At the end of their two weeks, it was hard to say goodbye to them, but it was time to move on. Ellone expected and accepted Raijin's fierce hug and promised to keep Seifer out of trouble and another visit in the near future.
What she didn't expect was Fujin's parting hug, or the gift she thrust into Ellone's hand as she stepped away. Earrings, made of a pair of screws with all the sharp edges filed down and elongated and twisted into a neat spiral adorned with pale green glass beads.
Ellone slipped the hooks into her ears and admired the gift in the small mirror next to the register in the shop. She'd joked with Seifer about wanting jewelry, but in truth, no one had ever given her any.
"These are beautiful," Ellone said. "Thank you."
Fujin eyed the earrings critically and gave a curt nod.
"PRETTY," she declared.
"I think so too," Ellone agreed. "They're perfect."
"Damn, Fu," Seifer said. "If I didn't know better, I'd think you were trying to steal my girl. Way to one-up me."
Fujin kicked him. "STUPID."
Seifer rubbed his wounded shin and smirked at his old friend, but retaliated with a gentle squeeze on the shoulder in lieu of a hug.
Once their goodbyes were said, they lugged their respective bags to the docks, where Ellone expected to board a charter bound for Balamb, but instead, Seifer led her to a small sailboat. His smile was smug and secretive as he took her bag from her and guided her onto the craft.
"Think we can make it to Balamb on this thing?" he asked.
"Of course," she said. "But why?"
Seifer didn't answer and took her by the hand. She followed him below deck and into a small but comfortable living space with a tiny kitchen. Fore and aft were berths. If they were headed to Balamb, there was no need to care about these spaces and Ellone turned to Seifer, confused about what he must have planned without her knowledge.
He rubbed the back of his neck, and cast his eyes around the room – everywhere but at Ellone.
"Seifer?"
"You know how you said you couldn't imagine staying in one place for long?" he asked.
Ellone nodded.
"Well, I thought maybe I'd get us a place that didn't have to stay in one spot if we didn't want it to."
"...so you bought us a boat?" she asked in a small voice.
"Yep."
Ellone burst into tears. It was the compromise she never knew she needed.
"Goddamnit, don't cry," Seifer huffed. "How am I supposed to know if you're happy or pissed?"
She laughed through her tears and threw her arms around his waist.
"This answer your question?"
Squall fell into an easy rhythm after his first chaotic day as a homemaker. He didn't expect it to be easy, and it wasn't, but once he divided his day into segments and devised a plan of attack for the daily chores, it got easier and he was better able to focus on the kids, his rehabilitation, and his still-uncertain relationship with Rinoa.
They didn't fight, and it wasn't lack of love that interfered, but the traumas that lingered well after Thalia Blackheart's death. Some days were better than others, and it was easy to put aside his doubts and believe it was really and truly over. Other days, it crept up on him, sometimes without reason, and paranoia would set in. He would see her reflection in the window or hear her cruel laughter from the televisions set in the living room or his skin would crawl as though he was set upon by a thousand spiders all at once.
In those moments, it was tough to convince himself it wasn't real, that he wasn't going to wake up to find himself still locked away, sick, starving, and half-mad with untreated wounds and broken bones and no hope of escape. He choked on it, found it difficult to breathe, and it would paralyze him with fear for minutes or hours without warning.
His nights were often troubled by dreams and doubts and insomnia, and not even the comfort of Rinoa's arms could chase it away. Thalia might be gone, but a part of her stayed behind in his consciousness, and there wasn't much he could do to erase her. Sometimes, he stared at Rinoa while she slept, convinced she would turn into someone else.
The tediousness of housework helped. If he couldn't control his off-kilter mind, he could control his environment. Laundry folding and lawn maintenance were things he didn't like or dislike before, but now they served as therapy and it gave him comfort to fold towels into crisp squares and cut the blades of grass in the yard to a neat, uniform length.
Day by day, the worst of it faded. Through daily strength training and a healthy, protein-rich diet, his weakened body grew stronger and his ribs and hips bones no longer showed so prominently. His clothing fit better, and the face he saw in the mirror every morning looked more and more like the man he once was.
He became less and less reliant on his cane to walk, but there were days when the weather was cool and his leg ached and his limp heavy enough that he didn't discard it completely. He came to terms with the fact that he would probably always need it.
There were still moments of intense and irrational fear, but they grew fewer and shorter in duration, though the dreams persisted and he woke at least twice a week covered in sweat and with a scream in his throat.
But he loved his life, as it was. He loved his family. Without SeeD to interfere, he devoted all his energy to them. It wasn't always easy, especially when both kids came down with colds at the same time and were hot and sick and cranky, but he wouldn't trade his time with them for anything.
Laguna bought a house near the beach, and he was around almost more than Squall could stand. That, he wouldn't trade either. Laguna could be annoying, he could be a giant, overgrown kid when he wanted to be, and they never talked about the really important things, but as the weeks rolled into months, Squall never felt closer to his father, nor so grateful for his presence.
Ellone was around more often than not, almost always with Seifer at her side. He expected the relationship to fizzle after a while, but he would have to be blind not to see there was a strong bond between them. He also would have been blind not to notice which one wore the metaphorical pants in the relationship, and it sure as hell wasn't Seifer.
It might have rankled to think about them together, but every time they visited, Squall pictured his sister leading his former rival around on a jewel-studded leash, and his irritation turned to smug glee at the thought of Seifer secured squarely under Ellone's thumb.
He met the pair and his father for lunch one afternoon, where Laguna was all but giddy with some secret he could barely hold in. For a second, Squall suspected it involved Seifer and Ellone and some ill-thought-out elopement or some such thing, but Ellone wore no ring and neither seemed to be in on Laguna's excitement. He could barely sit still as the waitress took their drink and meal orders.
"I'm going to run for President," Laguna declared, once the waitress walked away.
Nonplussed, Squall said, "Of what country?"
It would be typical of his father to buy a house and then change his plans on a whim.
"Balamb, of course."
"Balamb doesn't have a President," Squall said. "Just a Mayor."
"President, Mayor," Laguna said. "Whatever! I'm going to run! Local elections are in six months, so we have a lot of work to do."
Squall exchanged a glance with Ellone. She rolled her eyes and propped her chin on the heel of her hand to peer at Laguna.
"We?" she asked. "What do you mean, we?"
He pointed to Seifer. "Muscle." Then, he pointed to Squall. "Brains." Then to Ellone. "Vice President."
"Why do you get to be VP?" Seifer complained and elbowed Ellone in the ribs.
"If you have to ask..." Ellone teased.
Seifer swatted her arm lightly and she swatted back.
Still baffled by Laguna's announcement, Squall said nothing.
"I thought you were enjoying retirement," Ellone said. "Now you want to jump back in the fray?"
"Comparing Balamb and Esthar is like comparing chocobos to donkeys," Laguna said. "They're not even the same flavor."
Squall choked on a laugh and caught Ellone's eye again. Her smile was knowing. Same old Laguna. He never changed.
"So, Squall, are you in?" Laguna asked.
"Thanks," Squall said, "but I have to decline. Let Almasy have a chance to be the brains for a change."
"Gee, that's mighty nice of you, Leonhart," Seifer said, "but I think I'll pass. I prefer it when people underestimate my intelligence. More fun that way."
Ellone snorted and Seifer clapped a hand over her mouth.
"Pipe down, peanut gallery," he said. "I'll have none of your sass today."
"Mummurfubbr!"
"If she just said what I think she said, you two are spending way too much time together," Squall said.
"It's a pet name, right El?"
Squall rolled his eyes as Seifer released his grip on her mouth and grinned that love-struck puppy grin at her.
Gross.
"Can we focus?" Laguna said as he deliberately refrained from looking at Ellone or Seifer. "Come on, guys! It'll be fun."
"Nepotism," Squall said. "Time away from my family. Political exposure. No, thanks. You're on your own."
"Way to kill my dream, son."
"Your dream is to be Mayor of Balamb?" Squall asked. "How long have had this dream? Five minutes?"
"Dream might be the wrong word," Laguna conceded. "But people like me for some reason, and I did a lot of good for Esthar, even when I didn't know what I was doing. I think I can do some good for Balamb, too. Starting with the old Garden building. I wanna turn it into a school, where kids can learn Estharian technology and make cool stuff. I think that would be great for Balamb's economy, don't you? It'll bring back some of the revenue lost when Garden closed."
It wasn't the worst idea Laguna ever came up with. Noble and idealistic, but not terrible.
"Anyway, if you don't want to be on my staff, maybe you could teach," Laguna said. "Or at least let me pick your brain about a school operates."
Once his father got something in his head, there was no stopping him. Squall consented to discuss the particulars some other time, but declined Laguna's second campaign to join his team. Better Squall stay at home, where he belonged. His days in the limelight were done, and good riddance.
After lunch, he picked Ari up from daycare, where he went two days a week to give Squall time for larger projects where he might not be able to supervise Ari's activities. He checked the mail on his way into the house and found a postcard from some small port in the south of Galbadia.
It was from Zell.
If Squall had any lingering regrets, it was the way things ended with him. Zell left town without giving Squall the chance to discuss it, and there were a lot of things Squall wanted to say. Maybe, if he'd been able to, Zell would still be around.
He peered at the picturesque little harbor on the front of the card and turned it over again to read the message scrawled in Zell's sloppy handwriting.
Hope all is well. Give my love to Ari and Ella.
-Z
Squall smiled at the card and held it up for Ari to see.
"It's from your Uncle Zell," Squall said. "He misses you."
"Unka Dood?"
"Unka Dood," Squall confirmed.
"Dood go bye," Ari said in such a sad voice, Squall empathized.
"He'll come back," Squall said. "He'll come back."
Squall hoped it wasn't a lie.
Zell adjusted the tuning on his guitar and strummed the chords of the Alphabet Song as a gaggle of kids settled in around him. He was no virtuoso and knew only a few chords, and his singing voice was on the reedy side, but he could carry a tune. The kids didn't seem to notice his shortcomings as a musician, anyway. They were happy enough to have his attention.
They sang along and clapped to the rhythm of his strumming, one or two of them off-beat and off key to the point of distraction. Zell took it in stride, glad they enjoyed his afternoon performances enough to give him their undivided attention while Edea enjoyed a few minutes of quiet in her study and gave the White SeeDs that looked after them a break from the organized chaos.
After a few weeks of moping and brooding, Zell's funk evaporated like pre-dawn fog burned off by sunlight. The guilt lingered, and he still suffered from the occasional nightmare, but he gradually came to terms with what he hoped was an isolated incident. For now, he was content to be here at the Orphanage, where little by little, his spirits lifted and he began to feel more like himself again.
Being around the kids helped. It was hard to stay down in the dumps when they demanded most of his attention, and they noticed when he was in danger of slipping back into a mood.
There was one boy in particular, one of three they picked up at port in southern Galbadia, who intrigued Zell. The kid was tall for his age, which was about six or so, and he wore thick glasses that magnified his dark brown eyes. His ears were too big and stuck out too far, and there were long, ugly scars along one mahogany-toned arm, like the scratches of some beast, but too clean to have been caused by anything but a blade.
His name was Micah, and Zell never once heard him speak. He didn't sing along with the others, and instead, watched Zell from the back row with liquid, unblinking brown eyes.
The others teased him for his silence and for his reluctance to join in their play. He didn't like to be touched, either, and would shrink whenever a well-meaning child attempted to include him or an adult offered a hug.
Whatever the boy endured before his arrival, it left deeper scars than the ones that showed on his skin.
Zell could certainly empathize.
He played a few more songs, read a story, and then it was time for their afternoon naps and quiet time, something Matron insisted on, likely for the sake of her own mental health. The constant motion and din of voices could be maddening without an hour or so of unbroken silence.
Normally, Zell took his own mental health break while the kids were resting and would go down to the beach to watch the waves crash against the rocks, but curiosity got the best of him. He sought Edea out in the kitchen, where she sat before a list of needed repairs for the house and the cost of each.
A lot of the minor work, Zell could do himself. All he needed were the materials, but there were a few things he couldn't do, and those were the most expensive.
He helped himself to the hot water on the stove and brewed a cup of tea before he joined her.
"Ready to go home?" she asked as he sat down and stirred the contents of his cup.
"Naw, not yet," he said, "but I wanted to ask you... About Micah."
Edea pushed the stack of estimates away and sat back in her chair. The way she looked at him was strange, almost calculating.
"What do you want to know?"
"What happened to him?"
"I don't know a lot," she said. "But his step-father was abusive, and... he saw some things no child should ever see."
"Like what?"
"His step-father murdered his mother," she said, matter of fact. "Micah was under the bed when it happened."
Zell's eyes misted over. He expected something ugly, but not that.
"Does he ever talk?"
"No" Edea said. "But he will, when he's ready."
"Poor kid," Zell murmured.
He wondered why some kids were born into loving families and others were screwed from the beginning. Zell got lucky. His Pa was a piece of work, but his Ma was a kind woman, and she'd loved him like he was her own.
Hyne, he missed her. Maybe that was half his problem. Missing the one woman in the world who had loved him, regardless of how bad me messed up.
"It's hard enough placing the older kids," Edea said distantly. "It's easier than it used to be. When you were little, my options were limited at the time because of how many displaced children there were after the war, but even now there aren't enough qualified people willing to take them in, especially the damaged ones. A child like Micah... It might be a long time before I find the right placement for him. He needs a lot of love."
Zell's heart went out to the kid and he wondered what it would take to draw him out enough that some family might see how deserving he was.
Edea focused on him and offered a tiny smile. "How are you, Zell?"
"I'm good," he said. "Better."
"Are you still having nightmares?"
Everyone knew of Zell's night terrors because he sometimes screamed himself awake. He wasn't alone on a ship full of broken kids who had bad dreams of their own, but he was the loudest.
"Sometimes," he said. "Not as bad as before."
Edea nodded and her gaze drifted to the doorway behind him. Beyond was the room she once shared with Cid, the place where Ellone and Seifer found him dead.
Until now, Zell hadn't spared even a thought on what happened here, or what Cid may or may not have done to himself, but as he watched her expression shift from her usual calm to grief, Zell wondered how she could stay here. Even if ghosts weren't real, his skin prickled at the thought that Cid might haunt this place.
It was plain that he haunted Edea, whether real or not.
"You miss him," Zell said.
"Yes," she said. "I miss him. Even though he was a damned fool..."
She blinked at the empty doorway and collected herself, back to business. For a few minutes, they discussed the repairs Zell could do, and he offered suggestions about ways to save money on materials through a few inexpensive short-cuts that were just as effective as the more expensive version, and then made plans to start work on the back wall, which was currently sealed off from the elements with a tarp.
That evening, Zell took a walk down the beach as thoughts of Cid and Micah and Squall tangled up together and formed a knot of doubt inside his head. The wind was stiff but warm, and the sea was tumultuous, but there was no sign of bad weather on the horizon. He watched the surf for a while, and as the sun began to set, he turned back for the house to help with dinner. It was hot dog night.
As he was about to climb the steps, he spied a kid's shoe, attached to a dark brown leg sticking out from behind a nearby rock. He paused as worry took hold and went to investigate.
Micah sat behind the rock, his cheeks wet with tears and his clothes soaked from the waist down from sitting half in a tidepool.
He sniffled when he looked up at Zell and wiped his nose with his sleeve.
"Hey," Zell said and crouched down beside him. "What are you doing out here?"
Eyes magnified by thick lenses blinked at him, but the boy didn't answer.
Zell sat a safe distance away and drew his knees up to his chest. He suspected he knew why Micah was out here and not inside with the others. It was the same reason Zell used to run away and hide.
"The others being mean to you?" he asked.
Micah blinked at him and nodded.
"Yeah," Zell said. "Sometimes kids can be mean, especially when you're different. I used to get picked on because I was smaller than everybody else. It sucked."
That piqued Micah's interest. He still said nothing, but the shutters behind his eyes lifted and he cocked his head at Zell.
"You know what I learned though? Bullies are cowards," Zell said. "The second you stand up to them, they run away. They can only bully you if you let them."
It was then that Zell noticed a bit of dried blood on the boy's lip.
"They hit you?"
Micah nodded.
"Okay," Zell said. "Here's what you do the next time they mess with you: you open your mouth and roar like a T-rexaur. Scream like you're crazy and flail your arms."
The corners of Micah's mouth lifted, almost a smile, but his expression was doubtful.
"I'm serious," Zell said. "Do it just like this:"
He stood, gave a roar of anger and flailed his arms like the tentacles of a berserked Malboro. It earned him the tiniest of giggles from the boy, so Zell continued until his whole body thrashed and the sounds he made were less T-rexaur-like and closer to that of the Zombies in the sewers of Deling City.
"Blleegghhaahhgghhh," Zell said and contorted his face into a twisted and comical sneer. "Ggggahhhhhahbbleeeggh!
Micah giggled uncontrollably behind his hand and Zell was pleased to be the first one so far to make him laugh.
"Now you try," Zell said.
Not only did this tactic work pretty well on bullies, speaking from experience, it was also fun. Zell long ago learned that if he wasn't in a position to fight back, if his attackers were human, they tended to back off if they thought he was nuts. And the nuttier, the better. Getting loud helped.
Micah didn't talk, but he could roar and growl, and he flailed around until the giggles overtook him again and his glasses fogged up from the effort.
"Feel better?" Zell asked as he crouched down in the sand again.
Micah nodded.
"Good," Zell said. "You hungry? We're late for dinner, and it's hot dog night."
As they climbed the steps, a small hand slipped into Zell's and held on tight.
Such a little thing, but it meant so much.
Notes:
I do this every time I'm at the end of a story – think I'm done and realize, I'm not. Something was missing from the final chapter, so I kept adding things to round out everyone's story, until there was enough to (again) split it into two. But, that actually fixes my dilemma - I have a thing about odd chapter numbers, and the idea of ending this at 29 chapters instead of 28 or 30 really bothered me. I know. It's weird.
Many, many thanks to those that reviewed – y'all are seriously what has kept me from abandoning fanfic writing when personal stuff made me want to quit and delete everything, so to those of you that have encouraged me to keep going with your kind reviews, THANK YOU and great big Selphie hugs for being awesome.
