He somehow managed to get out of the palace undetected. He didn't want to see his parents for fear of not wanting to leave that day. He knew she would be sad if he wasn't there to meet her later in the day, so he was off to get her from Garden early. He also wanted to gather up everyone and tell them the wonderful news about Raine. Hell, they might even want to go back with Rinoa and himself to see it with their own eyes!
He flew Ragnarok into a landing position, and entered the correct information to make it a smooth landing.
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"Don't you think she would like to eat?" Selphie asked Quistis as they sat down with their food.
"Well....I don't know. She's been up there all day. It took Edea to tell us she was up there because Squall left...Judging by how she ran off like that, I'd say she's either still crying, or asleep," Quistis replied. "Besides, if she was awake and hungry, she would be back down here by now."
"Yeah," agreed Irvine. "When that girl has to eat, she eats. Sometimes I think that if my hand was in the path of her fork, she'd bite it off!"
Selphie and Quistis let out slight chuckles.
"Still..." Selphie added. "I think I'm going to go check on her. She should at least eat something...she hasn't hardly been down here today for food...."
"Leave it to Selphie to think of food..." Irvine teased.
Selphie leered at him, then chuckled. " I'll be right back."
"Don't want your food to get cold, eh, Sephie?" Irvine joked again, and burst into laughter.
Selphie rolled her eyes, and ran off in the direction of the dorms.
A few moments later, Quistis admitted, "...You know...I think I am kind of concerned about Rinoa. She's always so happy...I hope she didn't take Squall's absence too hard. I mean, he'll come back...right?"
Irvine nodded. "Yeah, he'll come back. He's not the type to abandon people, ya know? Plus he's a SeeD. Duty's one thing I don't think he'd ever leave."
Seifer nodded, and looked up from the conversation. "Speaking of which, here he comes now.."
Quistis turned her head. "SQUALL! You're back!"
"Yeah...." he looked around. "Seifer? What the He....I'll ask later. Now, where's Rinoa?"
"She's been in your dorm all day since you left," Irvine explained. "Selphie just went up to check on her--"
"Thanks." Squall ran off toward the dorms.
"HEY! Wait....." Seifer called after him. "Geez. What's he all in a hurry about?"
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Squall took a moment to rest, slightly out of breath from his run. Selphie was outside his dorm, to the left of the door, huddled into a tiny ball. "Selphie, is--"
Selphie looked up. "SQUALL!!!!" She ran to him. "I....I tried to get her to open the door for me, but she wouldn't...it's locked from the inside and I don't have the code for your room, so I couldn't get in to check on her. She didn't even reply..."
"Rinoa..." He went to his door and knocked. "Rinoa, are you okay? It's me. Please open the door...."
...No answer.
Squall quickly punced in the five-digit code for his door, and turned the handle to open it. Rinoa was sound asleep in his bed. He walked over to her, and called her name quietly so as not to wake her suddenly. "Rinoa...wake up...."
...No response.
"...Rinoa...?" He brushed his hand along her right cheek. "I'm here......."
...No warmth.
He placed his hand over her slightly parted mouth and her nose.
...No breath.
He moved his hand to her neck in search for a pulse.
...No heartbeat.
His eyes fell to a small crimson circle around a tear in the comforter of his bed over Rinoa's chest.
Selphie walked into the room. "Is she...okay....Squall?"
"I...." he slowly pulled back the comforter. Another stain on the sheet, and another tear. Except this stain was slightly larger than the first.
Squall's vision blackened, and he almost passed out. He regained control of his sight in a moment, and began to pull back the sheet.
The sheet was slightly stuck to Rinoa's cold, pale skin. It took every ounce of his control to pull of the sheet, and reveal a crimson slit on his beloved's chest. Around her, on the sheet beneath Rinoa, a crimson stain had spread.
Selphie screamed.
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What happened.
Why would someone do this.
To her.
She never hurt anyone.
Was it someone who didn't understand?
Maybe a new SeeD who misunderstood their Mission.
Because Garden was created for the sake of "destroying the sorceress"...
Squall shuddered again as he sat on the bed in the infirmary.
I should have never left her.
I could have saved her.
I promised I wouldn't leave her side.
I was her Knight.
And now I have no one...am no one...
Zell entered the room. Squall maintained his constant stare at the wall in front of him. "Man...I don't know what to say..." Zell began nervously.
Whoever killed her...killed me...
His thoughts flashed back to when he was there in his room, holding his Fallen Angel, fighting back the tears that would never fall...
Zell remained silent for a little while, then spoke again, "Selphie's a wreck. She never stopped crying, so Doctor Kadowaki gave her something to help her sleep. Poor thing...We're all really upset over this, but I can only imagine what you two are going through...I know you're the worse of the two..."
Squall remained motionless.
"Man, at least say something! Don't keep everything locked up!"
Squall closed his eyes, and stood up.
"Moving. Good. Movement is a start."
Squall turned toward Zell, and walked toward the door.
"Um...but walking is bad. Kadowaki doesn't want you going anywhere for a while..." Zell chuckled nervously.
Squall paused when he was blocked by Zell. He opened his eyes, and glared at Zell with such intensity that it sent a chill down Zell's spine.
Figures. I had to be elected the one to check on Squall, and now it looks like he's on warpath mode... Zell took a step to the side, afraid of him, if not terrified. You never know what one could do after having such a horrible thing happen. Besides, the look in his eyes was either one of emptiness...or homocidal tendancy....and Zell didn't want to be in his way to find out which look it was for certain.
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Quistis, Seifer, and Irvine were in the other room of the Infirmary with Selphie. Cid and Edea were speaking to Doctor Kadowaki and a pair of special investigators, trying to relay every detain they knew about everyone's whereabouts, habits, strange behaviors, everything. The investigation team relayed the news, via these two investigators, that there wasn't so much as a shadow of evidence in the room. There was no sign of break-in, no sign of struggle, no fingerprints, no murder weapon, nothing. Only bloody bedding and a corpse was the evidence of a crime. It was, of course, only obvious that Rinoa was killed by stabbing, but the woundand tears in the bedding were too clean for any weapon, and too thin and deep to be made by an ordinary weapon. Even a dagger would have to be razor-sharp to create the wound, but in order for a daggar to cut through bone, it would have to be pointed. The strange thing about the fatal wound is that it went straight through her body, and did not damage a single thread on the sheet under her.
Edea had to stop the men from explaining the details to her several times so she could absorb all of the information without breaking down. It wasn't simply the fact that someone she knew died, it was that it happened in her Garden. And it could happen again if they didn't catch the guilty culprit soon enough...
Squall walked past Edea, Cid, and the men (whom had already questioned all who were in the Infirmary while the rest of the team was questioning all of Garden), and into Selphie's room.
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Seifer and Irvine were the only two awake in the room. Irvine was too startled and concerned for Selphie to sleep. Seifer was upset about a dear friend of his being murdered, and couldn't move for fear of Quistis waking up from the sleep she cried herself into. He sighed, and shook his head. The combined weight of her head on his shoulder and the compression of her arms around the same arm made it almost impossible for him to feel his hand. He twitched a finger just to make sure blood was getting to it, and was satisfied when it moved slightly.
Squall entered the room slowly, and hardly made a sound. Irvine was the first to nitice his entry. He stood, and took a step toward Squall. "Squall...I'm so sorry...."
Squall flung Irvine out of his way, and grabbed Seifer by the collar of his shirt, lifting the man from the chair and waking Quistis in the process.
Quistis rubbed the sleep from her eyes, then realized what was going on. She stood, and took to one of Squall's arms that had a grip on Seifer. "SQUALL!!! Let him go!!"
Squall spoke the first word he had for hours. "YOU."
Seifer began to sweat. "Me? Wha...I...."
"WHY did you COME back here? DID YOU DO THIS??!! to HER?!?!" Squall's grip tightened, much to Quistis' dismay.
"NO, he didn't do it, Squall!! He was with us the whole time!! Let him GO!!" Quistis pried at his fingers, trying to get them open to free Seifer. Irvine was doing the same. Both had no results.
"DID YOU DO THIS?!?!" Squall repeated.
"NO!! Why would I EVER hurt her?!" Seifer yelled, the sweat building by the second.
"Let him go, SQUALL!!" Irvine yelled.
By this time, they had attracted the attention of everyone in the Infirmary, including a few who had just showed up.
Squall didn't loosen his grip in the slightest. "You bastard. By Hyne, I'll send you to Hell where you belong!!" He summoned a spell from deep within him. "DEATH!!"
"SEAL!!!" came a loud yell behind them. There was a bright flash from the direction of the door, and everyone turned to face them.
"Wha....." Irvine asked. "What the HELL was THAT?!"
"...Rinoa's gift." Ellone stepped forward. "I...would have gotten here earlier, but I was still unconscious. Rinoa passed her powers onto me before she died. That's how we first found out about her death, but I couldn't tell anyone until I came to...I'm so, so sorry..."
Squall let go of Seifer and stood there as Ellone wrapped her arms around him. "I'm sorry, Squall. I'm so terribly sorry..."
"Ellone..." Squall looked down at the girl.
"She...she wanted me to tell you...to not worry about her...that she's okay now....she'll watch over you....I just...feel so horrible about having to accept her powers...I didn't ever want something like that...even my old Gift was too much for me to handle, and now there's this..."
"Ellone..?" Squall felt her trembling.
"This....I didn't want to accept them....they're too much for me, Squall...but I couldn't let someone else become a Sorceress...Hyne, it hurts..!" Ellone dropped to the ground.
Doctor Kadowaki pushed her way forward through the small crowd that was packed into the room. "Look, everyone, please get out of here! there isn't even enough room for her to breathe!" she pleaded as people began to file out of the room. Only Squall, the doctor, the unconscious Selphie, and Ellone remained; the latter of whom was sitting in one of the newly vacated chairs. Kadowaki studied Ellone. "Will you be okay now, dear?"
"I...." Ellone shook her head, "...I don't..kn-know..."
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AuthorNotes:
A moderately long chapter this time. Heh...sorry about that. I kind of combined two chapters into one this time. Now that I'm out of school and finals are over with, I can finally write again =D Two chapters in one day isn't bad, ne? Oish...gory details are wonderful to write when someone gets 'iced', but not when it's about someone who you're going to cosplay as (ERK!!). And, sorry about that to all Rinoa fans out there. I don't hate her, it just...had to happen T.T And so the story gets worse, and begins its freefall....