Disclaimer: Nope, still don't own 'em.

The Fall

Chapter 5: Walking Away

"Shut up!"

The single cry tears through the cloying, almost unbreathable air. A little mobility returns to my limbs, the terrible numbness receding just a bit. My heart soars; that's the Seifer I know--defiant no matter what the odds, unbending, unbendable. I feel like laughing at the way the air clears a little, I want to cheer on the boy who would stand up to the monsters who have crawled out from under his bed.

The bird-masked figure says something then, but I do not understand the words. There is only a tightening of an invisible web in the air, and the brief brightness of Seifer's desperate defiance flickers out. My feet scrabble uselessly on the floor as I try to stand. Seifer hears and his head flinches as if to turn. But he can't turn, not with the woman holding his eyes on a string of dark fascination.

"I'm not... Stop calling me a boy."

My heart sinks at how lost he sounds as he shakes his head, even Deling forgotten under Hyperion's black blade. The web, the unseen noose tightens once again and the pressure is impossible to fight. The floor is cold as I sink against it, and chilled perspiration slides down my back. Seifer, I try to call, but it's useless. I hear nothing but quick and irregular heartbeat for a moment, trying to stop what I don't know. And then the air explodes.

"I am not a BOY!"

I catch my breath as something intangible wavers, then cracks and shatters. Reality fractures into lines like the threads of a web. The fragments fall away, each an image, too quickly to see and understand. I only glimpse a few, stray grains of sand glinting in the sun as they run through my fingers on a beach so long ago--

A hundred million little pieces of light are in the air as he falls, so beautiful... He reaches for them, those pretty fragments of color, but he's falling and they are not, and his hand closes on empty air. They fall into the blue as he falls away, and the sharp little bits of light watch uncaring and the ground wrenches up close too close too close

A hard blow to his face and his back is to the wall, the wind rushing out of him. He's made her angry again. He tries to say sorry and doesn't know what to apologize for, but already the slender white hand with the red-painted nails is in the air again-

You ain't my Ma! She's caught him again running from her home, the black-haired lady in black. She doesn't understand, he has to go back so he can be found. He aches with the knowledge and knows he has to get away, somehow, from the lighthouse by the sea, back to that street corner in Deling. But the lady holds out a hand and he can't take his eyes away from that calm, warm gaze, so sad. Come with me, Seifer...

"...to a place of no return." I flinch, trying to blink the strange images out, but it doesn't work. Only the voice is real and hard, the acoustics in the room giving it an eery echo... Different tone, same voice. Why do they have the same voice? My eyes are hot with tears and I have no idea why. Then the onslaught of images drowns out every other thought.

His scalp burns as the ungentle hand yanks as if to pull out all his hair. He's being bad again, he knows that and he's sorry, but it hurts and he's so scared-- Look at you, jeers the slurred voice, the stink of her bottles so strong he retches. Look at you, boy. Boy, with girly hair. Then the drunken and lazy click-clack of the scissors, sometimes in empty air, sometimes in his scalp until he's bleeding. Little wisps of reddish golden hair tickle his face as they fall.

She is silent as she watches them go, raven hair rising like smoke in the wind. She raises a hand, a sad smile on her face, and he's turning around and running to her one last time, throwing his arms around her waist. I'll never forget you, Matron.

"...say farewell..."

Wait here. Her long golden hair falls across his face as she bends over him, the long strands mingling into his own butchered hair. She grips his shoulders, a little too hard so that he winces. Wait here, okay? Be good, boy. She turns and walks away from him where he stands alone on an unsavory street corner in inner-city Deling. He tries to stand still, wanting to be good... But he calls to her as she walks away, can't help but call to her, and hates himself for the weakness. She smiles mockingly over a shoulder, lips red as fresh blood. Be good.

He trembles with the effort of stopping himself else he'd go running after her like a baby, crying to her not to leave him alone. He's a big boy, and a good boy. This is what he tells himself as he watches her retreating back. She turns a corner and is gone from sight. He listens to her receding footsteps for a long time, or tells himself that he can hear it, waiting for it to end. For her to come back and tell him how good he's been.-->

I come back with a rush to the cold dankness of the dressing room. The woman turns her back to Seifer, and suddenly the prop room's wall is shimmering and rippling before her. For a split second it's like I see her through Seifer's eyes, the slender retreating form... He releases Deling with the air of a child discarding an old toy. As Deling scrambles away Seifer turns to me, his green eyes lit with a mad kind of joy, as though he's found something he has searched for so long. Don't, I try to say as he waves farewell, his smile disturbingly peaceful.

Rushing footsteps from behind and I can't even shout a warning before the woman raises a hand and my students, too, go tumbling paralyzed to the floor. I can only watch, unable to act, as Seifer turns away from us. He won't just stand there and watch her leave. Not this time.

The shimmering wall swallows her form as she steps gracefully through, then his, and abruptly air rushes back into the room. The dreadful sense of wrongness, the web of that loathsome magnetism lifts. I can breathe freely again, and find that I can move. My legs are unsteady when I stand and run blindly to the wall where he disappeared.

"Seifer." The dressing room wall is solid now and cold, with nothing to distinguish it from any normal piece of masonry. But only a moment ago two people stepped through it--was it all an illusion? Then which is reality, that insane dream or this remembering? I shiver at the memory and instinctively push the thought away. There was madness here and it still lingers like a bad taste on the tongue, it was madness I saw in Seifer's face when that... woman-thing was through with him.

I turn wearily back to the others, and see the same wordless questions are reflected in their eyes. What is she? Where is he?

Running footsteps break the silence. "Hey everyone!"

She breaks in on our confusion, all fresh-faced excitement and coltish nervousness. The girl from the graduation ball, I remember now. Or rather, how could I forget? She catches her breath for a moment, hands on knees.

"Where's Seifer?" Her eyes go uncertainly around the room as she straightens, her hands going to a ring she wears on a chain around her neck. She was wearing that even at the graduation ball, I recall.

"We don't know," Squall's answer is flat and final, and I feel like smacking him upside the head when the girl's face falls.

"He'll be okay, right?" She casts each of us a hopeful glance that none of us can return with equal hope. She swallows, then turns and flees outside.

I run after her and catch up at the bottom of the emergency stairs. "Rinoa?" I venture, guessing Zell was referring to this girl earlier in the broadcast room--it feels like so long ago, yet can't have been more than ten minutes.

She turns to me, a touch of moisture in her wide chocolate-brown eyes and one of her hands holding the ring at her throat in a white-knuckled grip. At a loss for words at the sight of her upset, I simply say the first thing that comes to mind. "Quistis Trepe. I was Squall and Seifer's instructor at Garden." I hold out my hand.

She barely manages to take it, then blurts out the words: "What happened?"

"We're not sure." He walked into a wall and disappeared. "There was a strange woman, and..." I shrug helplessly. I remember the miasma of fear, the strange images, and have to suppress a shudder.

"Oh." Rinoa looks as confused as I feel. "Will he be okay?" Her voice is very small as she repeats the earlier question. She seems so vulnerable as she stands there, almost child-like in her open innocence. Whatever her background, the girl has led a very sheltered life and is clearly in over her head. My heart goes out to her.

"I'm sure he will be." I give my shot at an encouraging smile. "Seifer's nothing if not tough."

"I know!" She smiles back, if a little shakily, her eyes wide as a puppy's. "He's really amazing, isn't he?" Her tone is obviously more hero-worship than romantic interest, and I'm relieved--and then kick myself for that.

"Rinoa!" I whip around as man in a railroad worker's overalls rushes towards us out of an alley. Instinctively I'm on guard, but Rinoa runs forward to meet the man.

"Cory! What-"

"The base was destroyed by those goons!" The young man gasps out, bending down with hands on knees to catch his breath. "You have to get out of Timber, fast."

"What about everyone else?" Rinoa's hand goes back up to the ring.

Cory smiles in spite of the situation. "We're used to lying low. Just take care of yourself, okay?"

"I will! You too, Cory." The man waves and disappears the way he came.

"Well, it looks like seeing each other a while longer, Rinoa." It's been a long day, but I try to keep my voice and heart light. I almost can't seem to help it around this girl. "You can leave Timber with us." Whether we can make it to Balamb Garden or end up heading to Galbadia Garden instead, Rinoa is a SeeD client and is guaranteed safety in any Garden.

"Would that be okay?" Her eyes light up with hope--she must have been a lot more lost than she lets on.

"Of course. You're a client. It's your privilege to order us around." She breaks into a grin at that.

"Seifer always said it's an easy life, just following orders without having to think..." she trails off, her smile fading away at the reminder. The light mood turns pensive as we both wonder what's become of him. I'm no less in the dark than Rinoa is, for having witnessed his strange departure. Already the memory has taken on the surreal quality of a dream, the woman's achingly familiar voice, her words I couldn't make sense of, Seifer's sudden change of heart from alarm to obedience.

I see again the blond woman walking away, around a corner and out of sight... But never out of mind. Somehow I feel like crying, and I know the emotions aren't all my own.

Footsteps clatter down the rickety fire escape behind us, and presently Squall and the others descend into view. The distraction is welcome, but my attention drifts while Rinoa fills the others in.

Seifer's nothing if not tough.

But will he be tough enough, this time around? There are too many unknowns, too many unanswered questions. I can only hope he'll be all right long enough for Garden to get him out.

Stay alive, Cadet. That's an order.

I can almost hear the snort of laughter he'd have given at the words, and there's comfort in the thought as I hurry with the others into an alley, in search of whatever fragile safety we might find among the streets of Timber.

Bleh. I can't get this exactly the way I want it, but decided to throw it out there first. Thank you very much for all the kind reviews, they got me started on this project again. And of course, the bad haircut scene is an idea lifted straight from altol's magnificent Fire and Ice.