Chapter 28 has NOT been revised.
Dark as Rain
By Scutter
scutter1200@hotmail.com
This fic is dedicated to yaoifantasy aka Julie, for her life-altering fic, 'Star Light'.
Disclaimer: I don't own Final Fantasy 8. And I'm living off frozen microwave dinners. It's not looking good...
Rated R.
Chapter 28
POV of Squall, Squall, Kirsten Davis, Squall.
"It gets more complicated," I explain to eight worried faces, as my friends, Xu, Cid and Edea listen anxiously in my office. "There are several factions that we have to worry about, and it's not entirely clear who is on which side. As far as the reports indicate, the residents of FH are being terrorised as an angry mob loots the town, in search of Seifer. From what I've heard, via the Mayor of FH, the rioters are demanding anything from a court trial on a charge of war crimes, to a public hanging, to evisceration on sight. The trouble makers consist of Galbadian soldiers, Timber rebels, students and SeeDs from Galbadia Garden, and, unfortunately, some students from Trabia Garden." I hold my breath, as I wait for Selphie to respond to this news. She has never fully relinquished her ties to her home Garden.
As predicted, she is infuriated. "What the hell are they doing? Garden has never prided itself on force or aggression! It's supposed to protect people, not bloody well go rioting! They should know that!"
"Alright, sweetness," Irvine puts a firm hand on her shoulder. "Let's hear the rest, ok?"
"There is some better news," I continue, trying to reassure Selphie. "There is also a faction of Trabia students attempting to calm the riots. It's not clear how many are on each side, but some of them, at least, are doing whatever they can to help. There's also several teams from Dollet Military en route to engage in riot control, and, somewhat surprisingly, a lot of the residents from FH are fighting back, not just to defend their homes, but also, apparently, in direct defence of Seifer. Rumor has it he's made quite an impression there, and people are willing to defend him. Several messages have been sent to Esthar from both myself, and the Mayor, but we haven't yet received any replies." I refrain from mentioning how disturbed I am by the silence from the powerful continent. "The downside is that no one has yet been able to figure out exactly what caused this, or why it's happening at this particular time."
Fujin speaks up next, voicing a question a lot of people were probably asking themselves. "Seifer?"
Succinctly put, as always, I think to myself. "They haven't found him," I reply, equally as concise. I can't help a slight smirk, at my next piece of news. "Would you believe me if I said he was hiding?"
"Rajin?" Fujin asks again, without missing a beat.
"Likewise, or so I expect. He's not likely to be far from Seifer, wherever he is," I reply confidently. One thing I have always admired was Rajin and Fujin's unshakeable loyalty.
"So what's the plan?" I am surprised, much to my disconcertion, to see it is Zell who voiced the question. Somehow I expected something more antagonistic from him.
"ETA at FH is four hours. The majority of SeeD, including a team consisting of Selphie, Irvine and Zell will advance into FH and control the rioting. Trouble makers on either side are to be arrested or immobilised. You'll be given a list of acceptable magic you can use on them. Please keep in mind that some of these people are civilians. Only use as much force as is necessary. Fujin, Quistis and myself will attempt to locate Seifer. Hopefully, he can shed some light on what caused this, and maybe give us some ideas on how to resolve it. Fujin, would I be correct in assuming you can give us an advantage in locating him?"
"Affirmative."
"What about Ultimecia?" Irvine's question renders the room absolutely silent, and I feel my stomach turn at the idea.
"As yet, I've heard nothing to indicate her presence or involvement. No monsters, no unexplained magic, no suspicious characters. Currently, the plan is to cross that bridge when, and if we come to it."
*
*
*
It had occurred to me on the way out here that FH would be a nightmare to get into. Seeing it in front of me doesn't lift my spirits. The long, narrow metal arm of the docking bay stretches out from the second floor observation deck to the elevator designed to transport visitors into FH. Right. Only three serious problems with this. Firstly, the narrow path will severely limit SeeD mobility until we hit the city proper, secondly, the fighting has not been confined to the city, and brawls are breaking out on the narrow path - not only blocking SeeD passage to the city, but any fighting on the overpass risks a deadly fall over the edge, the thirdly, the elevator is out of business.
"Alright SeeDs," I address the group assembled in the second floor hallway. All are heavily armed, junctioned and ready for battle. Looking over their stern faces before me, I could almost pity anyone standing in their way... "It's going to be a rough and thorny path down to the railroad. Stay in your teams, and look after your team mates as first priority. As you know, the elevator has been damaged by grenades, so the first group out will lodge grappling hooks down the elevator shaft. I want a permanent team of firearms handlers at the top of the shaft to cover passage down into the city, but only fire if it is absolutely necessary. We're here to subdue and capture, not to kill. Move out."
As the hallway empties, I feel Fujin and Quistis moving to stand beside me. I frown at that - this is one of the few times when I have fought without Zell there watching my back. It's the first time in living memory that I don't want him there. I glance over to my comrades, as the last of the SeeDs leaves the stairs up to the observation deck. No words are necessary - all I give them is a simple glance that says 'Ready?' Dual nods are enough of a reply, and we move out, into the salty air of the Horizon.
Urgent cries fill the air outside, some close by, others muted by distance. Thankfully, the overpass has been cleared by the waves of SeeDs ahead of us, and we have only a few Stopped bodies to bypass. It takes scant minutes to reach the elevator, where we half climb-half slide down into the city, and like flicking a switch, the entire scene changes.
Dozens of SeeDs are engaged in combat, the smell of magic heavy in the air. It's impossible to identify all the scents, with the jumble of Stops, Sleeps, Slows and even the odd Dispel, but the overall effect is to create a scent which, strangely, is a lot like burnt mud. Once we reach the railroad, Fujin wordlessly turns right, down the tracks instead of into the city center where most of the SeeDs are headed. We haven't discussed where Seifer may be - I want absolutely minimal risk that anyone else will find him before we do, and so, the less said about it, the better. Instead, Quistis and I merely follow, as Fujin leads us like a hound on the scent of a fox.
Avoiding battles as we progress is neither possible, nor desirable. As far as anyone else knows, we're just another team in a peacekeeping effort. Avoiding combat would draw almost as much attention to ourselves as waving a banner. Even so, I find myself snarling in impatience as we're confronted by yet another Galbadian troop, this one, unfortunately, equipped with Magic.
Before the first spell can be cast, however, a military crew from Dollet dashes out of hiding, surrounding the rebels, and clearly outnumbering them. "Nice day for a jog, eh, Commander?" the Dolletian Captain greets me, grinning, as his troops disarm the Galbadians. I offer him a grateful salute.
"Much obliged, Captain" I reply, already moving beyond the averted battle. "Good luck to you."
Given the density of people in this sector, I don't bother sheathing LionHeart again, and then wonder why I didn't think of this sooner, as we pass into the small shopping center virtually unhampered. The paramagical blue glow of the gunblade issues a warning that even one of my glares can't match, and more than one group of rebels baulks at the sight of us.
Suddenly, Fujin pulls up short, scanning the street around us furtively. Unbeknown to me, she has been working overtime already, scanning the surroundings, much more familiar to her than to me, for telltale clues as to Seifer's whereabouts. She pauses for a moment, then with a cry, plunges us right into battle with a faction from Timber, untrained but determined. Even so, the battle is over in less than a minute, half a dozen Stops doing their work easily.
Without pausing, Fujin darts up the ramp to a store entrance way, kicking the door open without hesitation, then slamming it shut behind us as we crowd into the room.
The interior of the shop - a bar, I realise, as my eyes adjust to the gloom - is surprisingly untouched, as if this is one of the few places in the town not yet reached by the chaos outside. Only one table has been upturned... Just as I bring LionHeart up into fighting stance, ready to tackle the shadow lurking behind the table, a shaken voice calls out of the darkness, "Fujin! Thank Hyne, I hoped that was you!" Fujin places a gentle hand on my forearm, and I let LionHeart drop, frowning as a man I can only assume to be the bartender crawls out from behind the table. "Uh..." He seems at a loss for words suddenly, eyes flitting nervously over to Quistis and myself.
"They're with me," Fujin mutters concisely.
"Oh... well I suppose that's all right then," he stutters, still clearly nervous as hell. Mercifully, I sheath LionHeart, the room becoming noticeably dimmer without its glow. "If you're looking for a break from the battle, there's fresh water in the cellar," he tells Fujin deliberately. "Please, help yourself."
I look sharply to Fujin, feeling a frown settle over my face again. But her nod of acquiescence is just too slow for it to be natural, and, trusting her to know what she's doing, I don't argue, as she leads us down a narrow flight of stairs, to a door at the bottom, wedged firmly shut when she tries to open it.
Stepping back for a moment, Fujin knocks softly instead. "Water!" she demands, and somehow, I'm not surprised to hear a scraping sound from beyond the door, like a chair, or box being dragged out the way. Seconds later, Fujin tries the door again, and this time, it opens easily.
I find my eyes need no time to adjust to the light, though it's brighter than the shrouded room upstairs, and as much as I was expecting to see him there, I freeze, on the bottom step, as fierce, cold eyes regard me from a low seat inside the room. It's like looking at a ghost from the past... his humourless smirk, his face, his body, all exactly as I remember them. And the scar, a mirror to my own... Hyne, it's been a long time.
"Well, Squall," he drawls, running his gaze up over me, from heavy, worn boots, to carelessly windswept hair, in a caress I can almost feel. "Seems like you get to keep that promise after all."
*
*
*
As far as dorm rooms go, they're not bad. Pretty comfortable bed, regulation sheets that are nice and soft, instead of having that scratchy feel. A closet that's actually big enough to put stuff in, rather than that stupid size where the boxes you have just won't fit inside. But, in the end... it's still a dorm room. As in, not somewhere designed to have cadets spend a lot of their time. Hence the reason that after four hours cooped up in here, we're going stir crazy with boredom.
Oh, and the other thing about dorm rooms? They're not designed to fit 5 people into one at once. But that's where we find ourselves, me, Justine 'teen' Bailey, and Ulrick Andrews, more often known as Rick, from Irvine's class, Silver Jerome, from Zell's Combat Class, and Dominic Blake, a friend of Andrews', who's becoming a gunblade specialist. With the dorms all on top of each other, it's not hard to get to know the other specialists, even the ones not in your classes. Every now and then, as well, they throw all us specialists in a room together and give us a joint class. Usually on stuff like Sorceress magic, or Global politics, the kind of shit we're all going to have to get our hands dirty with, no matter our area of expertise.
"You reckon anyone's going to die today?" Bailey suddenly pipes up, from her beanbag.
"Huh? Hey, morbid much?" I reply. Geez, what a cheerful train of thought… Then again, there's not much left we haven't talked about. Everything from 'how much does a SeeD get paid?' to the weather... which was actually a pretty interesting conversation, given the ripper of a storm that hit, as Garden was leaving Balamb.
"No, it's just... I know that the SeeDs have been ordered not to hurt anyone, just detain and immobilise, or whatever. But what if the others, the bad guys, decide they want to take SeeD out? What would a SeeD be thinking? 'Oh shit, he's going to kill me, but I can't defend myself, now what?'"
"That's why peace keeping is such a shitty job," Andrews mutters, from where he is cuddled up behind Bailey. "Everything we've been taught so far is 'how to kill things most effectively'. Must be a pain in the ass to then be told to go out and fight, but not kill anything."
"AnyONE," Silver corrects, blandly, from where she is perched on the table, her only other option being to sit on the floor. Like I said, dorms weren't made to be very comfortable, unless you're asleep in them.
"Do we get any lessons on that? Like "How to be Diplomatic in Battle 101'?" Andrews continues, after conceding to Silver.
"Ask Irvine," I reply. "I reckon they'd give us something like that if we asked for it. Shit, a couple more weeks, or months, and it's going to be us out there. I wouldn't want to go into that without knowing something about it."
"We should all have a word to our instructors," Blake says. He, being the last one into the room, is sitting on the floor, but he's snagged a pillow from one of the beds to make it a little more comfortable. "Squall could probably organise a joint lecture on it, so we all get to hear it."
"Man, that still rocks me," Silver drawls, swinging her legs happily. "You get to be taught by The Lion. That must be so cool."
"Ha!" Blake chortles. "It's pretty scary. I mean, besides the reputation and all, we've actually seen him handle a gunblade. I would NOT want to see him get pissed off with that thing."
"Hey, speaking of Squall, where's his number one fan today? Wasn't she gonna come join us?" Andrews points out.
"Who, Ash? Oh heck, man who knows," Blake replies flippantly. "She's probably off with her head buried in a book or something. You know her. Never takes her head out of her ass long enough to look at the real world."
"Where as look at us," Bailey shoots back, without missing a beat. "Five of us locked in a tiny room drinking coffee for 5 hours. We're really achieving things here!" Despite the sarcasm in her words, there's no sting in her tone, and the irony of it draws a laugh from all of us.
"Speaking of which, where's Kendon?" Blake asks me innocently.
"Don't know, don't care," I explain lightly. "We split, and he found someone taller, blonder and more annoying." Despite the trashy way Kendon broke up with me, I wasn't sorry to see him go. After getting to know him, I realised he was a little too much into his own self-image to actually give a shit who I was. "Like Irvine said," I shrug, "Normal Ammo. It ain't gonna do anything spectacular," I finish, imitating the cowboy's drawl perfectly.
"Man, I can't believe Irvine that day," Bailey laughs. "Took us all for a ride for a while."
"And I," I throw back, "can't believe you and Rick are still together, Mr. Fast Ammo."
Andrews smirks, and reaches around Bailey to pull her closer to him. "Yeah, well like he said. Bein' Fast Ammo means Teen's gotta keep up with me."
"I believe what he said was that you needed a firm kick in the ass," Bailey mutters, accepting the hug at the same time.
"You reckon the rumours are true?" Blake asks, after a minute or two of silence. He's staring out the window at the growing storm clouds that seem to have followed us all the way from Balamb.
"Which rumors?" Bailey asks, getting up for more coffee. She fills her cup, then offers around the pot. "This is Garden, remember? There's enough rumors in this place to keep a tabloid in business permanently."
"About the Commander," Blake explains, suddenly uncomfortable using the Lion's name. "Him and Zell. Y'know?"
"Who cares," Andrews replies. "Even if there is anything, whatever it is, it goes on behind closed doors."
"Not all of it," Blake mutters.
"What? You've seen something?" Bailey asks, sceptically. "Given who they are, it's not likely anyone would catch them off guard, know what I mean?"
"I haven't seen anything," Blake concedes, "But someone has..."
"Hey, I don't think we should be gossiping about our instructors," Silver snaps suddenly. "Garden's supposed to be a respectable institution, and rumors like that have no place here."
With a scowl, Silver turns to stare out the window, bring our attention back to the growing storm outside. Is it me, or does she seem a little more upset than necessary?
*
*
*
"Something must have set this off." Hyne, it's like trying to reason with a two year old. "To my knowledge, no one even knew you were here. We can't go from secrecy and privacy to civil war in a single day for no reason." Behind me, Quistis and Rajin have taken seats on the boxes lining the walls, while Fujin perches near Seifer, who sits on the room's single chair.
"I didn't invite this, Squall," he snarls back at me. "Even I can see what the world thinks of me, and believe me, I'm not enjoying it. But I've done no one any harm since we came to the Horizon."
I close my eyes, and take a deep breath, and stop pacing to stand directly in front of him. "Then how do I get them to stop?"
Staring up at me from his seat, not two feet away from me, my mind supplies an image suddenly of a time that seems so long ago, when Seifer was in a position very similar. A little younger, a little prettier, with his hand, and mouth, between my legs. I banish the image quickly, as I realise, for the first time, why I have been so nervous about finding Seifer. His breath hitches for a split second, and I recognise that he's caught on to what Fujin, Rajin and Quistis have missed. Yes. I still care about you, Seifer. I dragged Garden halfway across a planet to stop a war. But I brought myself here for you. Just for you.
He glances behind me, apparently exchanging some silent idea with Rajin, and then meets my eyes again. "There was... one... incident..." he amends, then falls into silence again. Hyne, this is going to be like wringing blood from a stone.
*
"You cast a Float on him? Hyne, Seif, what where you thinking?" I barely notice as the old endearment slips out.
"I was thinking that he was fifteen years old, half my size, and rooting for a fight. What did you want me to do? Chuck a couple of Flares at him, and see if the little pile of ashes had any attitude left?"
"Okay, okay." I hold up my hands in protest. "Where exactly was this?"
"A couple of miles north of Timber. A little wilderness area. Real pretty for a picnic," he smirks ironically.
"Rajin?" I turn around to face him briefly. "Anything else I should know?"
"It's like he said, y'know. Punk kids, causing trouble, y'know?"
"Yeah..." I turn back to Seifer. "Why didn't you tell me when it happened?"
"Oh fuck, like you're my father now? Shit, they were a couple of kids, and I didn't do anything to them. How the hell was I supposed to know this would happen?" He gestures up the stairs, as if to encompass the havoc across the entire city.
"So this has been brewing for what, three... four months?"
"This has been brewing since the war ended, Squall," he snarls. Suddenly, he leaps to his feet, tossing the chair across the room. "This has been brewing ever since Ultimecia sucked a bunch of derelict hero-wanna-be's into Time Compression so they could beat the shit out of her, and she could leave me stranded here, of all places, with jack-shit in the way of Magic to help me and my friends out. 'What happens to my loyal followers if I'm NOT the all powerful being I claim to be? Oh gee, I guess I didn't think of THAT when I was taking over the world'."
He slumps down on a crate near the door, and takes to glaring at me sullenly. I don't ask whether he blames her, for what happened, or if he blames me, or perhaps himself, for where he is today. I don't ask what I should do next, or ask him where he'll spend the night – here, or in some other hole. I simply stand up, gesturing Fujin and Quistis out of the room, as I make to follow them. "We've got a riot to stop, and a city to protect," I tell him softly. "Once we've got it under control, I'll go see the Mayor, and find out where he stands on all this. Then we'll just have to take it from there."
He doesn't reply for a moment, and then, "You ever been scared, Squall?"
Scared? A dozen images flash through my mind in that instant. Lying beneath Seifer, terrified I would never feel a real emotion in my life. Lying above Zell, terrified I would hurt this brazen, reckless creature with my carelessness. Standing before my father, terrified of the pain he could inflict... again... if I let him in. Standing before Ultimecia, wondering what life would have been like... if she had chosen me... instead of Seifer. Scared? "Yeah," I tell him firmly. "I have." He nods, and waves me to the door.
"She's coming back," I tell him as an afterthought, as I reach the stairs.
"Huh?"
"Ultimecia. Some time in the future." I repeat. "She's coming back."
Seifer sneers at me in disdain. "No, she's not." I open my mouth to argue, but he beats me to it. "I was her knight, baby. Her General. Her right hand. If she was coming back, I'd know about it. And she ain't."
I don't reply, slowly trudging up the stairs with this new weight of information in my head. As I step out into the street, the heavy clouds finally break, and it begins to rain.
*
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*
I don't know if anyone has actually smelt burnt mud, but I once had to cook some in a chemistry class, and let me tell you, it stinks... It's kind of like a mixture of burning hair, and the smell of rain. Nature-ish, but still gross.
Feedback will be served with deep-fried noodles. Flames will be grilled until they become inedible charcoal.
Redrum: Thanks for the review... there'll be a lot more Seifer coming up soon.
Platinum Angel: Odine's explanations are meant to be confusing at the moment. I don't think even Laguna knows what's going on yet. Don't feel bad for not getting it - really, that's the whole idea.
yay!: um thanx... I think?
