FFVIII: Betrayals at Peace

The blue ocean was tranquil and calm. Fish of colorful patterns and various sizes swam freely, unmindful of the great train that ran on the tunnel made of metal and fifteen-inch clear plexiglass which ran from Balamb town towards the continent of Galbadia. The occasional adamantine tortoise swam into view, snapping at the gray-streaked Balamb fish; one of the most delicious delicacy of Balamb, and the favorite of the tortoises.
Quistis wished she could be just like them, the fish. They looked so calm just swimming there, so placid, even if the world above them was ravaged by a storm. As if they didn't have a care in the world, except maybe for the occasional razor-backed angler. Predators and prey. Was the world ever nothing but a combination of those?
She had been sitting there in her train cabin cushion seat, head leaning against the glass window, hugging her knees close to her chest. She was wearing a way too-oversized pink sweater, a part of the collar falling loosely around and below her right shoulder, showing the white brassiere strap, and a hip-hugging blue jeans. For once, she put her golden hair on a ponytail. She was vastly different from the tight and orderly SeeD Instructor, which she was just hours ago before finally making a decision which, she had to agree, was more of an impulse than a well-thought out decision. Right now, she didn't want to be associated with that Instructor. As if wearing very casual clothes would wipe her of her guilt.
She had to admit that after arriving in Deling, she didn't have any idea where to go next, or what to do. She had no relatives that she knew of whatsoever. For as long as she could remember, the Garden had been her home and she couldn't see it any other way. Well, except maybe for the Orphanage. The thought did struck her that, maybe, she should go back to the Esthar continent and to Edea's house. After the Sorceress war, she hadn't gone back there again. Edea went back there, that much she knew. Maybe it would be better if she'll go back there and stay for a while. They would never think of looking there, wouldn't they?
Quistis sighed, absentmindedly tracing her finger on the window. She was hoping that they'd forgive her for her decision. She wanted to tell them that she didn't abandon Garden. That she didn't abandon them. She just wanted some time to be alone. For a while. Or for many whiles. She wondered what they were doing now. She hoped that her decision didn't leave much of a ruckus. It does not matter, she thought. That was precisely why she was on this train right now, to destination unknown. So that all of them wouldn't have to be in this mess for long. So that everyone could be happy again. Especially Rinoa. With Squall.
Oh Squall, she thought mistily. You don't have to fight with your feelings anymore...

"Hahahahah....you...are pathetic," Seifer said, groggily standing up and supporting himself with his Hyperion. Blood was trickling out of his mouth, but he did not seem to notice it.
Squall was lying facedown on the wet ground. His back was heaving up and down, in a drained manner. His black leather coat was ripped in many different places, and his matted wet hair was somewhat disheveled. After a few moments, he planted his left hand on the ground, and tried to push himself up. His right was still grasping his Lion Heart. He opened his eyes for a bit, seeing double visions of the rocky ground before him. He closed his eyes again and shook his head, and then opened them. He was staring at a small pool of his own blood, no doubt coming from his busted lip and nose. He looked up, to face the refreshing torrent of rain, which washed away the blood. But more trickled still.
"Look...who's talking..." Squall managed to shoot back, looking at his opponent. Seifer's right cheek suffered a deep cut from his gunblade minutes ago, after he managed to parry a left hook. If Seifer had been any slower, his head would have been skewered like a melon. "You look...like hell...Give this up...Seifer...before one of us...gets seriously hurt."
"One of us...is already hurt..." Seifer said. "No physical pain...could ever compare with all...the betrayals today. And that...is what I want you to feel...even if it means driving my blade...through your guts."
"You're crazy..." Squall said. "Insane. You were never hurt by...all these events...you're just using...that as an excuse...to get back at me..."
"I could care...less...if you rot...in hell..." Seifer said, his eyes slanting in fury again. "What...I care about...is Rinoa...only Rinoa...you hurt her...and now you pay..."
With this, Seifer seemed to have renewed his strength and sprang to the still-kneeling Squall. The first punch connected. Blood flew from the commander's mouth.
"Even if..." A backhand which snapped Squall's head back.
"...I'll have to bring you..." Another straight, which brought another cough of blood.
"...to the brink of death..." Seifer gave Squall a punch with the hand which still clutched his gunblade. The added weight of the weapon made Squall spit out blood again, and a molar.
"...to do it!!!" Seifer raised his Hyperion above his head, intending to deliver the finishing blow. Lightning struck, framing the enraged Sorceress' Knight. "I want you to think about everything...while you're floating in near-death, Squall..."
Suddenly, Squall, swung Lionheart with all his might. The flat side caught Seifer squarely on the head, spinning the fighter back several meters. Squall, eyes blazing with hazy fury, seemed to have glown in pale yellow aura. Against the darkened storm, it seemed to have become like a beacon for an angry soul.

"You don't have to come out with me in this storm!" Zell shouted back to Rinoa, even as the rain lashed his face. His grip on the young sorceress' hand tightened.
"I want to!" Rinoa shouted back, drenched and shivering. "I owe it to both of them. To Seifer...and to Squall!"
"Damn those two idiots!" Zell said. "Only a stupid moron would dare have a duel in a storm like this!" And only an even more stupid moron would go out looking for them, he muttered to himself. Like us.
It was just fortunate for them that someone in the Quad overheard what Seifer said to Squall. The Devil's Seat, he said. When the young cadet mentioned how Seifer punched Squall on the face, Rinoa's eyes began to show even more worry and concern, if that was even possible. She placed a hand on her mouth, as if she was about to go faint. Zell, however, could only shake his head. He didn't know how Seifer fit into all of this yet, but if that was his greeting to Squall, he wondered how they were doing now?
Rinoa, for her part, couldn't even bear to think what the two were doing now. She knew Seifer wouldn't hesitate critically injuring Squall. Those scars in both their faces were a testament to that. Seifer was the kind of man who usually went to extremes, whatever the consequences might be. Just as long as he had a reason to.
It's your fault.
Not now, she thought to herself. Now was not the time to argue with her conscience. She had been through enough, and the last thing she needed was her own self telling her this was all her fault.
It's true.
"Damn you," she muttered to herself. "Get out of my head. Now's not the damn time to tell me I'm wrong."
If something happens to Squall...
"I'll kill myself," she answered her own self. "Hyne, please don't let something happen to Squall!"
That's how it goes, doesn't it? We only realize how much we've lost when we've asked them to go away.
"Squall..." she muttered to herself. "Please live..."
Just Squall?
"...Seifer..." she said softly. "Don't hurt Squall. Please....if you hate me...don't include Squall..."
It's your fault.

Seifer tried to clear his head from the blow. It felt as if his head had been put in a blender, and the setting set to maximum. He blinked and unblinked his eyes, trying to form the four figures a few meters in front of him into one. The glowing figure of pure, raw, aura.
A glowing aura...?

"Look!" Zell suddenly shouted, pointing in the distance. "I see something!"
"What is it?" Rino asked, running beside Zell. She strained her eyes against the battering rain and looked to where the young martial artist was pointing. Lightning crashed, and in the deep neon blue that lit the distance for a few brief moments, she saw two figures atop a flat-topped hill. Two figures outlined in the blue light. One was glowing with an aura. The other was kneeling down.
"Squall and Seifer!" she cried.
Which was which?

Thinking quickly, Seifer cast a double dose of Protect spell, even as Squall charged at him in Limit fury. He couldn't have timed his spell more quickly. The moment he felt the whole barrier form around him, he felt the start of deadly sequential slashes from the adamantine blade of the Lion Heart. But even the Protect spell proved to be not full protection enough. He felt the sharp edges cut through his trenchcoat, forming deep, long slashes that went through skin. Specks of blood started to appear suddenly from out of the multitudes of cuts which seemed to appear from out of his body. The storm was out of the field of his senses now. All he felt were just multitudes of small pain which added up to large ones.
But even then, he tried to think clear. Renzokuken--the Sequential Sword Slash--was only a prelude to what he knew was the greatest and deadliest limit the Garden had ever seen. He had to admit that even his famed Fire Cross and No Mercy deathblows were nothing compared to Squall's Lionheart. And he knew that even a Protect won't be enough to shield him. Even now, the spell was beginning to show its strain from the Renzokuken. The Limit blow following it would shred his body to pieces.
Timing the barrage of attacks with his quick eyes, Seifer managed to bring forward his Hyperion to block an attack coming straight up. For the first time since Squall's limit attack started, a clash of metal against metal was heard. Squall, in his hazy state of mind while under the Limit influence, seeing that his sequential blow had been interrupted, grew more furious even as he started to shift into his deadliest attack. Forming a vacuum as Squall brought his gunblade downwards, a wind stronger than that of the storm started to generate, and almost immediately, Squall seemed to have become like a blur as he started the chain of deadly songs of death.
It took all of Seifer's skills to block all of the attacks. The only sound he could hear were the various angry clangs of metal as they meet. It seemed that Hyperion and Lionheart also both share a deep enmity between them much as their masters had with each other. Neither seemed to want to break apart. Who ever thought weapons had no pride?

"Oh shit!" Zell said, even as they approached the foot of the hill. He saw that attack before. He'd seen it countless times during their war against Ultimecia. Far as he knew, not one had survived under that barrage of assaults.
Rinoa, too, knew that form. She had seen it been done. Every slash, and every form. It was one of the reasons why she fell in love with him. The ferocity. That wild animal unleashed within Squall.
But now, it was an attack she didn't want to see. She didn't want to lose both of them. Not Squall. And not Seifer. She didn't want to!
"STOP!!!" she screamed, and her voice pierced through rain and wind, echoing through the afternoon.

The voice seemed to have penetrated Squall's hazy mind. Through the thick mists of the fury inside him which allowed him to draw forth a blow so fatal that it decimated everything he had ever encountered. It was a voice that sang him to sleep months ago. It was a voice that tickled his fancy even as it laughed and teased him. It was a voice he had heard crying hours ago.
Rinoa.
Seifer, too, heard it. The voice that he had fought for. The voice of the reason why he still managed to stand even against his opponent's greatest attack. The voice of the one who broke his heart and replaced it with an icy void.
Rinoa.
And they both looked down, to see the raven-haired angel looking up at them, together with Zell. That face of hers which captured their fancies in their own respective time. Her eyes were misty, even as tears joined with rain.
And Seifer turned back to Squall, and his eyes narrowed.

Everything seemed to be happening in slow motion.
Rinoa saw Seifer bring down his gunblade. His white trenchcoat was splashed with blood. Every motion seemed to have been played in frames by her mind. Frame by frame by frame. She saw Seifer tighten his grip on his blade. And she saw Squall turn back to him. And as lightning struck, framing the two fighters, she saw Seifer bring up his gunblade at point blank range in a deadly arc. And her voice seemed to have been lost for one moment as she saw Squall fling back his head, his brown hair flying against the wind. The Lion Heart he was holding in his right hand fell, even as she saw blood gush out from his body.
It was then that she screamed. And the thunder seemed to echo her cry.

Thankfully, the storm lessened when they were halfway to the Galbadian continent. Irvine had been right when he said that the storm may have only been concentrated at the Balamb part of the world.
Now, he was leaning on one of the metal posts of the Deling train station. His impatience was evident on the many times he looked at his watch, and of the way he kept tapping his foot on the ground. The train would be arriving any minute soon. He just wished it would be sooner.
"The train arrived yet?" came Selphie's voice from the com-link. It was the fifth time she asked that since they arrived.
"No," Irvine replied.
"People are starting to stare at the Ragnarok," Selphie said. "Whose idea was it to land in the park anyways?"
"You said you needed a wide open space," Irvine retorted, getting a bit annoyed. He didn't need another argument to muddle things up. "And let them stare for as long as they want, damn it!"
There was a long pause at the end of the com-link.
"Look, Sef...I'm sorry," Irvine said, trying to soothe her. "It's just that I hate waiting. I'm sorry I snapped at you like that."
"I won't be disturbing you, then. Selphie out."
Oh great, Irvine sighed. Damn you, Squall. When this is over, I'm gonna personally wring your neck.
It was then that he heard a train whistle from the distance. Other people who had been waiting same as him started to mill on the arrival platform.
"It's about damn time," he muttered.
It took about ten minutes for the passengers to finally get out. Irvine looked at each of the passengers. It was a good thing he was tall, so he didn't have to strain his neck trying to find that familiar golden hair.
Finally, his sharp eyes spotted a bespectacled golden-haired, young woman. And although she was wearing her hair in a ponytail, there was no mistaking that exquisite face.
"Quisty!"

She did not know how she got there, but the next thing Rinoa knew, she was cradling Squall's head on her lap. Blood was pouring out of his mouth and nose, and one of his eyes was bruised and half-closed. Smoothing back his wet hair, Rinoa cried profusely, her tears falling on the young commander's battered face.
"Squall...Squall...you'll be alright...tell me you're alright, damn it!"
Zell went to kneel beside Squall and he immediately laid his hands on top of him. Almost immediately, the unearthly green glow of Curaga started to envelope the wounded man's body. But still, it didn't seem to have taken much effect.
"Damn it!" Zell muttered. "We have to get him professional help, and fast! Curaga can't help him much now!"
It was then that Squall's eyes fluttered for a bit, and slowly opened. The first sight he saw was Rinoa's crying face, looking down at him.
"Ri..noa..." he said, trying to let out each word. More blood went out from his mouth. "I...am...sor...ry..."
"Don't speak!" Rinoa said, brushing away hair from his face lovingly. She tried to smile at him. "Everything's going to be fine...you'll be fine...don't talk..."
Squall closed his eyes again. Rinoa crouched lower, still cradling Squall's head, and kissed his forehead.
"I'm sorry..." Seifer said softly.
They turned their look at Seifer, who was kneeling there, very much exhausted and bloody. He was leaning on the Hyperion, which was stuck on the ground. He was as battered as Squall.
"Damn you Seifer!" Rinoa said angrily, her eyes narrowing at the former Knight. The sadness mingled with her anger. "I can never forgive you for this! Never! You hear?! NEVER!"
Seifer looked at Rinoa, and then closed his eyes and leaned his forehead on the gun part of Hyperion. And in the rain, he wept.

Quistis turned around at the sound of the voice, and saw Irvine walking towards him, trying to brush past the crowd. She turned around and tried to quicken her pace as best as she could with the bag she was carrying.
"Quisty! Wait!" Irvine said. Finally, he was able to break away from the throng of people and caught her hand.
"Leave me alone!" Quistis cried, trying to break free from his grasp. "You don't understand why I had to do this! So just...leave me alone!"
"I know," Irvine said. "I know everything, Quisty."
At that, Quistis stopped struggling, and looked at the young cowboy's eyes. He knew?
"Squall confided in me," Irvine went on. "And no, I didn't tell anyone."
Quistis looked down, vulnerable. "I cannot face them. Especially not Rinoa."
"And you think running away will help solve everything?" Irvine asked. "You think...burying the past by turning away from your friends is the only thing to do?"
"You don't understand!" Quistis said, starting to cry again. "I can never rest, knowing I'm carrying this guilt! This pain!"
"That is precisely why running away isn't the answer," Irvine said softly. "Wherever you go, you'll still carry that inside you. And it won't ever go away. Not until you are personally forgiven. Not until you can hear from Rinoa that it's alright."
"She won't!" Quistis shot back. "She won't ever forgive me, and I can't blame her! I broke her trust..."
"How do you know that she won't forgive you?" Irvine asked. "You won't, until you try. And you can't ever give up trying. That is the least you can do. For yourself, and for Rinoa. And for us who cares about you."
Quistis looked at the young Galbadian SeeD. Was he right? Can she ever be forgiven?
It was then that the com-link came alive with the sound of sobbing. It was Rinoa's voice. Amidst the sound of static, what came through sent a chill on their veins.
"Irvine...Selphie...! Squall...he...he's near death...!"
And Quistis dropped her bag, and placed a hand over her mouth, even as she fainted.