Note:
If you're a returning reader, please be aware that I have added more to chapter 3, and you should read that before you continue here. Also, even if you have read the last update, I ask that you go back and reread it again (just the last scene of chapter 3, though, not the whole thing), since I added some important information to it in this update. If you've done all that, then read on, don't let me keep you any longer. :)
--
Day 4 – Forgotten Secrets. Hidden Talents.
Squall watched helplessly as part of his past sang and danced in front of him on stage. He said nothing to Rinoa, who resorted instead to listening to his thoughts.
The song was a familiar one, not too old. Squall hadn't heard it often, but enough to remember it. Not an uncommon theme, either, the song of a woman who had lost her man to another woman. The tune itself wasn't unpleasant, but the words stabbed at him like a blade. Is this where she ended up because of me?
Despite his wish to remain unseen, Squall stared back up at the singer, his face hardening into an impassive glare. No. People are responsible for their own choices. Not each other's. But he didn't reject Rinoa's hand when she placed it over his, and he couldn't help the feelings of guilt that had shrouded his heart. His teeth clenched unconsciously. This sin was too old. He hadn't thought about it for nearly three years.
Thirteen days-a-daisy
And my life is goin' crazy
Don't tell me where he's goin'
'cause he's gone.
I can't look in the mirror
If my life gets too much clearer
I'm afraid I'll fall apart
Before too long.
Short bursts of memory flit past his eyes. Two weeks before the final SeeD exam. One night in Balamb. A weekend. A group of the students in his class had wanted to escape from the drill of the written tests. He'd tried to stay behind. Quistis had talked him into going. He was first in his class. Meila had been second. They'd been in field tests together often.
Everyone knew it was against Garden regulations to party off-campus. Breaking that rule would jeopardize their place as students. Just one mistake. One person to get caught, and they might all have kissed their uniforms goodbye. There had been no one there to watch them.
In all eighteen of them, only Seifer and Squall had stayed relatively sober.
Squall closed his eyes, replaying the memory. Meila had gotten drunk with the rest of them and passed out briefly on the floor. Concerned for a fellow student's safety, he'd taken her to the local hotel. She'd…
This tragedy of nature
should never have occurred…
She'd been drop-dead drunk. He'd had a few himself, not enough to make him tipsy, but enough to cloud his mind. Everyone had known Meila was taken with him, even if he never returned the affection. It had been a foolish effort on her end. Everyone knew that, too. He'd wanted no part of her, or anyone else for that matter. Taking her to the hotel and away from the bar had been a choice of what had seemed to him to be clear logic. A choice which had ended badly. Seifer had accused him of the unthinkable at that hotel…
Thirteen days-a-daisy
And my world is goin' crazy
Don't tell me where he's goin'
'cause he's gone.
Now I'm gazing out my window
I've been down, but never this low
And the whispers in the wind
Just carry on.
They'd all made mistakes. It had cost many of the students their enrollment, including Meila. Seifer had gotten out of it with a formal reprimand. Squall had been cleared of any wrongdoing, having proven he wasn't guilty of Seifer's accusations. Not guilty, not innocent, either. But it hadn't been anyone's business to know.
I can't go on
Like she was never there
But day fourteen come,
I'm sure that I won't care.
Squall had made a point of forgetting the incident. He'd followed protocol. He'd been disciplined for breaking Garden's rules. He'd gone on to pass the SeeD final exam. In the events following his first mission, it had been easy to forget Meila and his own embarrassment…
And the whispers in the wind just carry on.
And I don't want to admit my heart was wrong.
He'd grudgingly considered Meila a friend before that night, if only because she always seemed to be nearby somewhere, and he had been used to working with her. He'd always ignored her passes, refused her invitations, and it had never bothered him for an instant. He'd known she was infatuated with him. He simply hadn't given a damn.
He should have taken the fact into account when he'd dragged her out of the bar. He should have told someone else to take her to the hotel.
As he watched Meila now, she finished her song, hung up the mic, and departed the stage with slightly more applause than her predecessor had received. Only then did Squall dare to look at Rinoa, knowing with terrible certainty that she'd heard and seen every thought and image that had crossed his mind in the past five minutes. He found her face uncharacteristically stolid, devoid of frown or smile. Desperately, he waited for a response from her. This wasn't something he had told her before. He just hadn't thought to—hadn't remembered—it wasn't important enough—it hadn't been relevant—until now.
Slowly, Rinoa's dark eyes blinked, as if she'd just come out of a trance, and the life returned to them. She didn't look angry, or even particularly upset. But Squall could feel the sadness swell inside of her. For him, or for herself, he wasn't sure. His stare fell away. He wondered if he had simply forgotten, or if his Guardians had obscured the memory. Or if he'd made himself forget.
I'm sorry, the thought came from the darkest corners of his mind. There was nothing else he could say, and nothing at all he could do.
Unexpectedly, he felt Rinoa's arms wrap around his shoulders, and sat up in surprise when she leaned against him. His breath trembled involuntarily as he felt his soul similarly embraced by hers.
A small, sad smile had creased her cheeks. Nice try, she thought softly to him, but I still love you. Staring so closely into her eyes, Squall saw nothing but the truth of her thoughts, and despite himself, smiled just a little, too.
It wasn't within Squall's ability to cry in public. He wished he could, just now. All he could feel was a stone in his gut and a colder pulse in his chest. "How stupid do I have to be," he whispered beneath the din of the room, relying on his thoughts to carry his drowned words to her, "before I do something you can't forgive?"
Rinoa hid her face in his shoulder, hugging him tighter. "Not stupid," she answered tightly. Just human. She did not need to remind him that there was nothing she would not forgive him. Even betrayal, which they both knew he was practically incapable of.
Squall shifted uncomfortably, glancing around him. He tilted his head so his voice was soft in Rinoa's ear. "Do you wanna leave?" He certainly did. He wanted to be alone with her. He didn't want to just sit in this place, waiting for Skip and his band to surface while his own conscience gnawed at him from the past.
But Rinoa shook her head. "I've changed my plans three times today, already, just because I felt uncomfortable with the situation I was in. I don't want to make a habit of it."
"But what about—"
She silenced his protest by renewing her strong hold, hugging him for all she was worth. "Squall, please? It's important to me." Her expression begged his understanding. "I don't think I can talk about it right now. All I know is that I love you, no matter what. Is that okay?"
Squall hesitated, warring feelings of fear and relief plaguing him. What do you mean, you can't talk about it?
Rinoa glanced at the now-empty stage. I just don't know how. I have to think. Don't worry so much. Her lips pulled back in a distant smile. You can't get rid of me that easily.
Squall trembled at the very idea of the implied catastrophe. Please don't say things like that, he pleaded, leaning heavily on the table, feeling suddenly weak with the weight bearing down on his shoulders—the least of which was Rinoa's gentle arms.
Sighing, she nuzzled the side of his neck. "I'm sorry," she said in his ear. "I wasn't trying to scare you. It's just so much to think about…"
"I know, I know." Squall grit his teeth as he spoke past them, trying to swallow his gut, which had somehow made its way into his throat. He grimaced at the burning feeling of bile in the back of his mouth. The rising heat in his chest wasn't helping. Rinoa, I can't take this, I need to get out of this room! He felt suffocated, needing to shout, to hit something, lose his tears or his stomach—none of which he could do here. Stiffly, he picked up his untouched glass of wine and downed some, just to force himself to gulp the acid that was building in his heart. Images of the past, the present, Caraway, Angelo, Rinoa, himself, Garden, Meila, Marley's gang, all swam in his mind, all issues and thoughts needing to be acknowledged. He could release none of them. His head felt bloated, a bubble of chaos on the verge of exploding. He could contain it no longer.
Rinoa frowned at the sudden well of emotion building inside Squall. Something's wrong…
Squall put a hand to his forehead, pressing against his scar, which suddenly burned like the day it had been drawn. His mind became a blur of thoughts even he couldn't decipher. He trembled. Rinoa, what's happening to me! The feverish heat in his chest expanded, and he gripped the edge of the table with his other hand, instinctively bracing himself for a release of power he hadn't realized he'd been gathering. He felt his heart burn in his chest, heard a bestial roaring in his ears that overpowered all other sound. Rigid as a board, he lost his balance, and started to keel sideways. Only Rinoa kept him from toppling to the floor.
It took her only moments to realize what was happening to him, saw the distant, intense expression in his eyes, saw the faint, telltale glow outline his body. If she didn't direct the built-up energy somewhere, her knight would tear himself apart from the inside out.
She pressed her hand against his chest, closing her eyes and searching for some place, anywhere, to send the power. The only direction she could think of was straight down, into the earth. She didn't have the time to think of another option. Without a sound, her soul wrapped around him, enveloping the energy, focusing it inside his spirit, and then releasing it in pulses, opening a floodgate of power in his soul and channeling all of it into the ground beneath her feet.
A thousand things happened at once. The building shook, an earthquake-like tremor rocking the ground beneath its foundations. A few stage lights broke away from their clasps on the ceiling and came crashing down on front-row tables as patrons scattered in all directions to avoid being hit. Some people dropped to the floor, some sought shelter in corners or beneath other tables. Plates and mugs fell everywhere. Squall's wineglass struck the hardwood floor, stains of bloody red through shattered crystal.
Rinoa fell from her chair and tumbled to the floor with Squall still in her arms. She didn't hear the screams and shouting around them. Likewise, no one paid her any notice. Everyone was too busy trying to keep their footing amidst the terrible shaking. She slammed her eyes shut, clinging as close to her imperiled knight as possible, hand against his heart, driving the seemingly endless flow of invisible power from him into the earth.
Squall's self-awareness returned to him after he'd been pulled to the floor. Regaining his senses, the focus came back to his eyes, and he felt Rinoa clutching him. The awful heat in his chest had been transformed, rushing through his entire body like a soft fire in his blood, and then out of him, using Rinoa as a conduit of release into the bucking ground.
But how is that possible, he thought blearily, staring down at himself and watching for a brief moment as crimson curls of energy bled from beneath Rinoa's hand on his chest. I didn't…
He decided to act now, ask questions later. Haltingly, he managed to raise himself to a crouch, and Rinoa sat up with him. Half-dragging her, he backed up against the trunk of their table as a few tiles of sheet rock fell from the ceiling, clattering to the floor where Squall and Rinoa had been only seconds ago. A heavy crash ricocheted though the room as the lights flickered out. Something heavy and hard fell on his foot. He barely noticed the shooting pain that resulted.
Sorceress and knight concentrated on working together, directing the flow of raw power away from themselves, and the city, away from anywhere it could cause direct harm. To anyone watching, they would have looked to be simply taking refuge in each other's arms, flinching away from falling pieces of roof as the building threatened to crumble around them.
As abruptly as it had begun, the shaking stopped. The constant roar of the earth quieted to a low rumble, then ceased altogether. A few more breakable items fell from shelves and still-standing tables, the last token objections of a severely offended building. A hushed murmur began to filter through the air as people debated the wisdom of trying to stand up again, fearful of another quake.
Squall released a still-shaky breath as Rinoa slumped against him. Still clinging weakly to him, she cowered closer, too tired to speak, too burned-out to think. Similarly exhausted, Squall held on with what strength he had left, blinking sweat from his eyes and leaning his forehead against Rinoa's. Minutes of blessed quiet passed. Squall wheezed painfully. His chest felt like it was encased in wrought iron. He couldn't seem to get his heart to stop pounding, and each heavy pulse sent pain radiating out through his ribs, as if the burning in his lungs wasn't enough punishment for his troubles.
If that's what happens to sorceress' knights when they pen up their feelings, he heard Rinoa whisper weakly in his mind, then we really need to figure out an stress-management program for you.
Squall closed his eyes, trying to gather what wits he had left about him. He appreciated Rinoa's ability to retain some sense of humor through all this, but he didn't share it. His face flushed, in embarrassment as much as exhaustion. A shocked feeling of anger and humiliation sent an unwelcome shudder through him. He felt like he'd been walked in on while making love. And whether or not anyone had "seen" him, he felt exposed, and tightened his protective hold on Rinoa in defiance of the sensation. His bond with her went beyond the body, or even the mind. A mating of souls, it was too intimate a connection to be shown openly to anyone. He wasn't sure what had happened to him, just minutes ago. To his knowledge, only when he released his will to Rinoa, let her command him, reach into his spirit and bring out the pure power in his life force, could a well of energy like that have formed inside him. No such thing had happened. He'd been thinking, and…it had just…entered him.
Somehow, something had triggered such a climax of emotion and power, that only through a reunion between them could it have been released, lest Squall might have destroyed himself from sheer inability to handle the overflow. Squall's vision narrowed as he rested. Ever since he'd come here, he'd felt like he was being watched. Now, he was almost certain. After what had happened here, he could see no other explanation. It would explain not only the uneasy feeling, but also the incident at the massive city gates, as well. A coincidence that this violation of his soul had happened at The Gate? He wondered. Memories had been plaguing him since he'd set foot in the city. What if it wasn't just the location?
Then there was something here, watching him, teasing his mind.
His cold stare darkened to a vicious scowl. A ruthless protectiveness slowly crept over him, gaining in strength as he cast about the place with his mind, searching for a presence, relentlessly trying to sniff out whatever it was that had dared to interfere with his connection to his sorceress.
It was the only way he could use Rinoa in the fashion she used him, "borrowing" her ability to see into the souls, minds and hearts of others. Normally, Squall wouldn't have expended the concentration on such invasive questing. Rinoa usually kept herself closed to other people, considering mind-reading an inexcusable invasion of privacy, and completely out of the question except in extreme circumstances.
Squall considered the discreet invasion of his soul "extreme." Rinoa agreed.
So he closed his eyes, searching through the minds of the people around him with animalistic persistence. He looked for anything incriminating; someone who knew his name, recognized him from the attack on Edea, knew Rinoa was a sorceress. Nothing. No one in the building had a clue who he was or why he was here, what he had done in the past. No one knew, and no one cared. Except…
Meila. Squall opened his eyes just a hint. She was not far away. She had seen him. She had been thinking about him before this fiasco. But she knew nothing of what had happened, here. He turned his attention away from her. He would deal with that later. What was more important now was finding whoever—or whatever—it was that had violated him and Rinoa.
When it was clear no human present was responsible, Squall turned his attention to any source of energy he could sense—anything complex enough to be intelligent. Just because something wasn't human didn't mean it couldn't still wreak havoc. Again he found nothing. No one.
Squall was angry. He hadn't felt this angry in a long time. In frustration, he screamed a mental message in every conceivable direction, to anyone or anything capable of hearing it.
Where are you?! I know you're watching. You've toyed with us enough! I want an answer!
He got one.
The ground began to shake again. This time, it was not in response to anything Squall or Rinoa had done. A huge, booming presence made itself painfully known in their ears and minds. A bestial screech echoed somewhere far off, and the ground continued to tremble, though not as violently as it had when the sorceress and her knight had caused it. The source of the shaking appeared to be more distant, this time, if not any less powerful.
Rinoa and Squall winced at the voice in their minds that raged over the rest of the din.
DO NOT QUESTION ME
Clutching Rinoa close to his chest as the floor rocked and the air rumbled, Squall spat back at the commanding tone, You don't frighten me. I'll question you all I want.
I WILL NOT ANSWER
Who are you? Why are you interfering with us? What do you want?
Silence.
Who are you!
Nothing. The ground once again stopped shaking. But Squall continued to sense the lingering presence, had his mind tuned to it like a radio frequency. Whatever it was, it was still there. It was either ignoring him or choosing not to answer.
Sickened, frustrated and tired, Squall finally retracted his awareness from the world around him, effectively turning off all notions and knowledge of anything beyond his five senses and personal thoughts. Rinoa remained curled up beside him, shaking in exhaustion.
They began to hear people milling around them. A few flashlights came on, illuminating pieces of the powerless building. Wearily, Squall kept his eyes open, watching the waving lights and listening as people found each other in the darkness. He watched idly as Rinoa drifted into a light sleep at his side. He was content to sit and wait while everyone else in The Gate reoriented themselves. Someone was bound to come across them soon, and he didn't have it in him to stand or call out for help, nor did he particularly want to. It belatedly occurred to him that one of the larger stage lights had fallen on their table, half-crushing it. If he hadn't dragged Rinoa directly under it, they both might have been hit, either by the light itself or by flying debris. The two chairs they had been sitting in had toppled, creating a loose barricade between them and the rest of the room. A large, flat bit of ceiling leaned against the crooked table, completely obscuring Rinoa from view. He winced as a new pain shot up his foot when he tried to move it out from beneath a fallen piece of sheet rock. His ankle was badly twisted. Feels like there's some glass in that leg, too.
Rusty old gates, thugs with knives, errant glass shards. It seemed like everything wanted to stab him, lately.
"Hey! Yo, I found someone over here! Gimme a hand, guys, looks like he might be hurt!" A bright flashlight beamed directly in Squall's eyes. Even as he flinched away from the glare, an alarm went off in his mind. The tone, if not the voice itself, was…extremely familiar.
"Aw, hell, wouldja look at all this shit? This place is a mess! I'm gonna hafta find another joint."
Someone hefted one of the wooden chairs separating Squall from the voice, flinging it away like it weighed mere ounces. Then the other chair went sailing. Again the flashlight lanced Squall's eyes.
"You okay, man?"
Squall cringed and hissed through his teeth, "I will be…if you get that damn thing outta my eyes."
"Oh! Sorry!" Quickly, the flashlight was averted from Squall's face and placed beam-up on the floor.
Squall blinked a few times, trying to clear the green spots from his eyes so he could see the face of his "rescuer." When his eyes finally adjusted, he stared in stolid, dumbfounded surprise at what could have been Zell's twin brother offering to help him up.
A boy about Squall's age crouched with his hand extended. Despite the darkness, the resemblance to the plucky SeeD was obvious, almost sorely so. The spiny hair, sky-blue eyes, and wide, white grin were unmistakable. He looked to have the same height (or lack, thereof), and similarly built, powerful-looking without being stocky, if not as "pumped" as the Zell Squall knew. His eyebrows pulled up in the same, foolish look of impatience. Even his voice was almost identical. But there were differences. His hair was dyed jet-black, tips of purple coloring his erect bangs. He lacked Zell's tattoo. He wore no gloves. His clothing was darker, though Squall couldn't see it clearly in from his position.
It took a second longer for the Zell-lookalike to realize that Squall was not alone in his distress. "Whoa, my bad. There's someone else under there? No wonder you wouldn't move. Is she okay?"
Squall glanced at Rinoa, silently sending the Zell-lookalike's image to her unconscious mind and asking her if this was Skip. The answer came back affirmative.
"Yo, you can talk, right? Say somethin'!"
Finally, Squall looked up again and nodded. "She's fine. Just passed out."
The Zell-lookalike motioned to someone behind him. "C'mon, lets get 'em outta there." Then to Squall again, "Don't worry 'bout a thing." With a strong one-handed push, he knocked the thin strip of ceiling away from the table to reveal… "What the—Rinoa? Izzat you?!" He made as if to shake her awake, but Squall batted the arm away. Startled exclamations and oaths erupted behind the Zell-lookalike, and four of what Squall assumed to be members of Skip's band came running to join in staring.
"She can't hear you," Squall coughed, leaning a little closer to Rinoa, a forbidding arm draped protectively across her.
The Zell-twin held up his hand in a signal for his buddies to back off. "Hey, it's cool, man, it's cool. We're here to help. We know Rinny, she's our pal. If she's with you, you must be from Garden, right? Heard that's where she was holin' up."
Squall interrupted before Skip could launch into anything resembling one of Zell's rambles. "Yeah, that's right. Look, is there someplace you can take us?"
"Sure can! My apartment's right out back, baby! Well, what's left of it, anyway. We'll take you there. Nero here can carry Rinny. Don't worry, we'd never hurt 'er. Like I said, she's one of us!" Reluctantly, Squall allowed Nero, a hulking, dark-skinned fellow, to gingerly lift Rinoa from the heap. Again, Skip offered Squall his hand. "That leg looks like it's cut up pretty bad. Think you can walk?"
He nodded. "I'll try." Grasping the extended arm, Squall let Skip pull him from under the mangled table, and painfully managed to stand with the shorter boy's support; he could put no weight on his right leg. Slowly, Skip helped him maneuver across the glass- and rubble-littered room, following the other four band members through a back door to the right of the deserted stage.
Love, love, give me guidance! I should not have delved so deep.
The boy has discovered me. Is it right that he reveal me, or should I remain hidden as I am? I fear I may be running out of time, either way. That fool army is on their way to make another attempt at dislodging me from sleep. I will not give up so easily. But I cannot hang onto this ancient death much longer. If nothing is done to stop these fools, they will have me, and I will be under their command. Oh, love, help me! Tell me I have more to rely on than this boy and his young sorceress. I believed in the power of love once before, and the truth reared its head and dashed every shred of hope I once stood for. How can I trust it again, and—what ho!—a love that I am not part of, no less, no more!
I shall wait, and watch. If he attempts to speak to me again, I will remain mute. I may talk to his mate. If she ventures to wish a conversation. Only then. I will give no clues. Only answers to questions deserving of them. I will open a doorway. It will be up to her to step through it.
I will do as I am meant to do. No more. No less.
"Well, all things considered, looks like it's not too bad. Hey, even my posters stayed up. You can stay in the den—just keep outta my room, and we'll all be just fine."
Squall glanced weakly around Skip's "den" as he was led in. His eyes, feeling dry and old, worked to focus on a black and white poster tacked to the far end of the small room. He blinked in languid surprise. Zell's tattoo. Black on a white background, the design was exactly the same. There were no words on the poster. Not even a copyright date. He cast Skip a suspicious look as Nero walked in carrying Rinoa. The uncanny Zell-lookalike directed his big friend to lay her on the nearby couch. "You and everyone else get outta here. I gotta take care of our guests." Squall waited long enough to wait for Nero to leave, and to hobble over to the couch himself, but couldn't resist his nagging curiosity any longer once he sat down.
"…What is this," he asked, gesturing at the poster, "a cult?"
Skip gave him an equally incredulous glance, one that hinted at injured pride. "No, man. Last time I heard, it was a band."
"What band?"
"My band, dumbass! The Gate band. Geez." Stretching until every joint in his body cracked, Skip let loose a big sigh and dusted his arms off, as if to cleanse himself of any residue Squall might have left behind. "I drew that logo myself." Looking suddenly suspicious, he squared his shoulders, seeming as ready to pick a fight as Zell did every time hotdog day rolled around. "Why're you so interested?"
This is too weird. "It's nothing." Wincing, Squall turned his attention to his injured leg, bending forward just enough to pull back the torn leather of his pantleg here and there, and finding a total of five fair-sized pieces of glass embedded in the flesh beneath. Scowling at the bloody mess, he tried turning his foot, only to find that, sure enough, it was too painful to move an inch. Definitely sprained. Possibly a torn ligament. Either way, he wouldn't be going anywhere fast anytime soon.
"Erm…you want me to get you a towel or somethin' for that? I got some antiseptic stuff." Skip pointed hesitantly toward the closest door—what Squall presumed to be the entrance to his room—but made no more attempt to draw attention to it.
Squall shook his head. The glass shards, at least, he could deal with. "I can handle it."
"Y-you sure? I don't want any of your blood on my carpet, man!"
"Calm down," Squall snarled. "You're won't have to replace your floor. It just takes a second." It seemed Skip was as oddly fastidious about his living space as Zell was.
"What does?"
Squall ignored any further questions. Closing his eyes, he touched his hand to his forehead, recalling the specific magic he'd need to dissolve the glass, remove it without having to pull it out. Esuna, he thought the name, searching his stores. He hadn't used the spell in a long time, and it was buried deep in his mind. Then, finally, he found it, brought the magic to the front of his awareness. His hand moved away from his face, and lightly touched one of the glass shards. The magic enveloped his leg, analyzed the problem that was keeping him from healing, and took the appropriate action to solve it. In moments, the glass shards had vanished. The wounds they left behind began to bleed freely.
Squall made good on his promise to keep the room clean. A quick cura spell closed the cuts in seconds, the blue-hued magic trailing around his body to search for any other obvious injuries.
As Squall tested the use of his newly mended leg, Skip—well, flipped.
"WHOA! That's one of the most awesome things I've ever seen! Never seen magic up close like that before. You do that a lot? What a light show! Where'd you learn it?"
Squall sighed. His ankle still hurt. It must have been more than just a sprain. Gingerly, he removed his boot and felt for a broken bone, but found nothing obvious. Either it was a small fracture, or he'd torn something. Or both. Either way, normal healing magic wouldn't help. "Three years of constant training will teach you to cast basic spells like that," he answered Skip's question as he put his boot back on.
Skip's expression sobered. "Oh," he muttered glumly. "That sucks."
"Do you have a bandage wrap, something I can immobilize this with?"
"Uh…nnnno." The Zell-twin shrugged. "Sorry. I got a billion bandaids. Don't think that's gonna help you, though."
Squall glanced at Rinoa, who was sleeping deeply beside him. She could heal whatever was wrong with his foot. But he decided to let her sleep. She needed the rest, after today and yesterday. "Is there anyone else in this complex that might have one?"
"We-e-ll…" Skip's eyes rolled to the side. "Meila might. She used to study medical stuff, I think. She lives two doors down, at the end of the row."
Meila. Squall almost laughed aloud in disgust at his life. Of course. What else could go wrong in his day? Then he remembered it was past midnight. Technically, his day was only beginning. He fought the urge to just give up and pass out beside Rinoa. What a trip this was turning into! "So," he ventured, fearing the answer, "could you go ask her for one? I don't know if my ankle is broken or not. Part of the roof fell on it." He wasn't one to cop out of something he could take care of, himself. But this was different…
Skip laughed. Long and loud. Squall wondered Rinoa didn't wake with a start at the noise. "H-ho, no! Hell no. The lady's a flat-on-her-ass bitch. She hates me. Says I reminder her of someone she doesn't like. Won't talk to me if she can help it, wouldn't give me a bandage if I was bleedin' to death in front of 'er."
Squall bowed his head into his hand. "I need something to wrap this with."
"You wanna go take your chances with 'er? Be my guest. But I ain't doin' it. She'll eat me alive."
"Fine." What the hell. It can't get any more awkward than this. Using the arm of the couch to brace himself, Squall stood up, and carefully put his weight on both feet. Though his right ankle pulsed with pain, he was able to walk on it. Swallowing his pride, he limped from the couch to the door.
"Good luck," Skip called from behind as Squall let himself out. "You'll need it."
An upturned garbage can rattled outside the door of a collapsed building. Sneezing from the dust settling around him, Angelo squirmed out from between the can and the fallen awning he'd been caught under for the past twenty minutes. Shaking his bushy coat free of most of the grime, he turned his nose upward, testing the air, sneezing once more before he was finally able to clear his clogged nostrils.
Dust and the smell of structural damage surrounded him. What his eyes couldn't see, his nose revealed; most of the buildings on the block were still standing, but the closer one came to the building Rinoa had gone into, the more destruction there was to see.
One section of the building he stood before had collapsed completely. The lights were out all the way down the strip. Angelo spied the last of a herd of people headed away from the site of the small, but severe quake. The only other people he saw were sifting through the wreckage. They smelled of leather and metal. Security officers?
Angelo padded across a now-silent street, crossing between two abandoned cars. He headed straight for the building he'd been told not to enter. Rinoa's command was obsolete. It mattered more that he could find her.
Her scent was easy to follow. Nose to the floor, Angelo twined between overturned tables and broken chairs, finding the place where she had lingered the longest. A chair near a table that had been crushed by a giant light fixture was saturated with her smell. But he couldn't see her anywhere. He stood up, sniffing the air.
"Hey, pooch. What're you doin' in here?" A passing security guard who had been searching the building with a flashlight reached out and rubbed the nervous dog affectionately on the muzzle. Angelo snorted and whined, letting the man pet him for a brief time before moving away. The strange human's smell got in the way of Rinoa's. It was becoming increasingly clear to Angelo that she was no longer here. Again he tested the air, eventually gravitating toward the crushed table. Her smell was strong there, as Squall's deeper, more musky scent.
Angelo passed a broken wine glass, burying his nose in a rubble of sheet rock. A low whine formed in his throat, and he snatched his head back momentarily at the unexpected, tart trace of blood. Carefully, he tested the smell again. Definitely familiar, it wasn't Rinoa's. The dried smears held a slightly smoky taint to it; the blood must belong to Squall. Again Angelo cried to himself. If Squall was injured, he wouldn't be as able to protect Rinoa if there was danger. But it was another trail to follow; wherever Squall had gone, Rinoa wouldn't be too far away.
He sniffed the air around him, then the floor. He followed two trails, both of them relatively new, both of them leading to the same door near a high rise in the floor. But one thing Angelo noticed puzzled him. Squall's trail was easy to follow. Rinoa's was much fainter; he could only smell it if he stood up and turned his snout to the air. Squall had left the room on foot. Rinoa had been carried out; not once did her scent touch the floor on its way to the exit.
Confused and worried, Angelo started to pick out other scents. Someone had either preceded or followed Rinoa and Squall to that door. Those smells, too, were vaguely familiar, and it was a good familiarity. This made him feel a little better. At least she had gone with friends. Still, if Squall was hurt, she could be in trouble, too. Angelo still needed to find them.
Without further pause, he followed the trail through the open door. A lightless, narrow hallway curved around behind the stage, and ended in a heavy fire door. Angelo stopped here and stood up on his hind legs, pressing his front paws against the glass. The door was too heavy for him to push open. But the trail led beyond it. He had to get through somehow. Panting thoughtfully, he sat on his haunches, looking around him. Sometimes there was more than one way to get a door to open.
There was no light from inside the hallway, and the stars outside offered little illumination. Save for the recent trail, the walls and floor were relatively sterile, having been recently cleaned with one of the foul-smelling liquids Angelo had seen people rub floors with. Without much light and with his nose inundated with the aroma of heavy-duty floor cleaner, Angelo felt sensually blind, and took to pacing restlessly at the foot of the door, glancing up at the menacing barrier as if expecting it would open for him on its own.
A low buzz startled him. Angelo backed into the wall as an orange EXIT sign blazed to life above him. Elsewhere in the building, he felt the telltale charge of electricity in the air. His whiskers twitched at the sensation. He looked at the door and sat down.
The tops of his perked ears brushed against something. Again startled, Angelo looked over his shoulder. A lever protruded from the wall. A sign with bold-letter writing on it labeled the switch.
Angelo didn't have to be able to read the words to know what they meant. He'd seen people who traveled in rolling chairs use these levers to open doors for them. Maybe this one would open this door so he could go find Rinoa. Standing to the side of it, Angelo pressed his muzzle against the handle. It wouldn't budge. He couldn't remember which direction it was supposed to go—up? To the side? No good. In frustration, he put his paw up on it, trying to balance himself so he could be taller and get a better look at the device.
His weight carried the lever down. Behind him, the fire door opened on its own, as if moved by a ghost.
That solved that problem. Before the door could ease shut, Angelo slipped through it, once again setting his nose to work.
The door led outside to a short stairway that in turn ended in a yard of old pavement. Wire fences separated this area from the rest of the shopping strip's back roads. Around the corner to his right stood an old building, a two-story set of living places, from the smell of it. The trail led in that direction.
Angelo sped up to a trot, keeping his nose high to follow the scent.
A low, malevolent growl stopped him in his tracks. He licked his nose nervously as a big, black dog emerged from behind the tire of a parked car. The well-scarred fur of the rough-looking mutt's neck and shoulders was on-end, tattered ears laid flat, muzzle pulled back to reveal yellowed, well-used fangs. It stalked toward Angelo cautiously, stepping between the intruder to its territory and the apartment complex.
Angelo whined, backing up a pace and giving a slight wag of his tail. He didn't want the other dog's territory. He just wanted to find Rinoa.
The black dog—a scrawny, scruffy-looking female—didn't seem to buy the show of non-aggression. Instead it came closer, growling threateningly.
Usually Angelo would have turned and left at this point. Clearly, the alley mutt wasn't about to let him pass without a fight, and she was much larger than he was. But he stood still, looking from the brutish dog to the building behind it. That's where Rinoa was. He was sure of it. He had to get to her, had to make sure she was safe.
Angelo's muzzle twitched. A low, quiet snarl built in his throat. The mutt was mere feet away, the only thing standing between him and his best friend. He refused to be turned away now. He took a step toward the building.
The alley dog loosed a growling bark, and lunged for Angelo's throat.
This must be it. Squall stopped at the last door on this end of the apartment complex. Trembling apprehensively in the chill night air, he leaned against the side of the building, resting his injured ankle. The moon was huge and forbidding on the horizon beyond the city, its silver light penetrating the hole in Deling City's glow where several blocks had lost power. The soft luminance lent a ghostly sheen to the darkened strip, highlighting the rims of car bumpers and powerless shop signs in ethereal white. The wind breathed lightly on the land, whipping up stray pieces of paper and carrying them in circling currents around the streets.
The place looked like a patch of dead flesh in a fast-fading city, and staring at it, Squall couldn't help but feel a little pity for its inhabitants. What was it like to live in a city with a crumbling economy and even more international problems, watching your home wither and die around you as the days passed, like an ill-kempt garden? He shivered at the poorly-chosen metaphor, and fervently hoped he would never know the answer.
He took a breath and composed himself, standing as straight as he could and facing the door. Finding no bell to ring, he sighed and resolutely knocked. He waited, got no answer, and knocked again, a little louder this time.
He heard someone moving around inside, heard the lock click, watched the doorknob turn. The door opened just a crack. A sleepy-looking young woman peered out from behind it. Her large black eyes widened at the sight of him.
Squall looked directly back, eyes cold. What possessed him to ask his next question, he would never know. "Can I come in?"
Meila said nothing at first, just stared at him. Finally she backed away from the door, opening it wide enough to allow him through. "Sure," she muttered tonelessly. "Sure, come in." She turned away from the door and left it open, leaving him to walk through on his own.
Squall did his best not to limp, but his ankle was hot with pain, and he stumbled halfway through the entrance. Catching himself on the frame, he used it to support him until he was fully inside. He took the time to quietly shut the door before turning back toward the room—
And promptly suffered what was quite possibly the hardest slap on the face he'd ever received in his life.
Before he could recover from the blow, he'd been roughly shoved backward into the door, and almost fell when his bad leg buckled under him. Only through a good sense of balance and by bracing himself against the door did he manage to remain standing. He shook his head, reorienting himself, and glared angrily at his attacker.
Meila stood back, folding her arms in spite of his scowl. Her dark sleep-robe wavered as she hissed her rage at him. "I'm surprised you had the nerve to show your face here." A few moments she glowered at him as he just stared back, wordless. A cruel sort of humor crept into her pale face. She raised a thin eyebrow as she looked over him. "You look like hell."
Squall tried to stand a little straighter, though his foot complained mercilessly. "Yeah, well…actually, I was gonna ask if you had a bandage wrap. Someone told me you might have one." He indicated his foot. "Sprained my ankle."
"I can see that." Unmoved, Meila brushed a strand of long brown hair from her face. "So you limped all the way over here just to ask for a bandage?" She sneered. "You're breaking my heart. Do you really expect me to believe your bullshit?"
Snarling, Squall looked at the floor and tried to contain his frustration behind clenched teeth. "Do you have the wrap, or not? If you don't, I'll go somewhere else."
Finally seeming to take interest in his situation, Meila stared at his foot. Shrugging, she nodded. "Yeah. Yeah, I've got one. Looks like you've got more than a sprain though, from the way you're standing. Wait here."
Squall leaned his head back against the door, closing his eyes and trying not to make a sound while Meila went to rummage through her cabinets. He was beginning to wish he'd just stayed with Rinoa. He could have waited for her to wake up. She would have had no problem fixing his ankle. He wondered if he had used it as an excuse to make himself come to Meila's door. What did he think he could accomplish here? He'd gotten her kicked out of Garden, humiliated her in the process. The damage was done. He could only make things worse. He briefly considered if he shouldn't have himself tested for some kind of emotional masochism. It seemed his choices were always dumping him into situations he didn't want to have to deal with. Did he…?
Meila came back with a bandage wrap and a flat strip of plastic to use as a brace. She walked over and handed both to him, then backed away and pointed to the wooden table in the center of the den. "Sit there if you want. I might as well clean up the kitchen while I'm awake. It hasn't been done in days." Without another word, she turned on her heel and marched off into the kitchen, leaving Squall to deal with his own problem. Angry sounds of clanking plates and running water erupted from beyond the wall after she'd disappeared.
Squall made it to the small square table by virtue of the wall's support. Pulling a chair, he sat down heavily and placed the bandage and splint on the table's edge. He tried to direct his thoughts elsewhere as he went about removing his boot and sock. He thought about the voice he had spoken to during the quakes. Though he had not heard it in the sense he could hear verbal speech, there had been a distinctly feminine feeling about the tone. The few words it had spoken had seemed deep and old.
Carefully, he set the plastic strip to keep his injured ankle from moving, and began the tedious process of wrapping the bandage. The sense he had gotten from the voice was a familiar one, not at all unlike the booming in his mind when a particularly powerful Guardian Force was speaking to him. Whatever it was, it had not been at all human. The arrogance in its words and the surprise it seemed to show at Squall's overt defiance of its authority again pointed to the idea of a Guardian. It would line up with the power Whatever-it-was had to impose itself on something so complex as the connection between a sorceress and her knight. But, apart from the Minotaur brothers, there were no Guardians known to inhabit this area. Granted, a GF could travel wherever it wanted, anytime it wanted. But Squall got the impression somehow that this…thing…had been here for a long while. At least long enough to have watched him the entire time he had been in Deling City. He wasn't sure he wanted to stay and find out the details. The more time he spent here, the more he wanted to leave. He had nothing to do with what was going on in this place. But Rinoa had to get Angelo back. Squall was determined that she would, too, even if he had to intervene to make it happen. What Caraway was doing was wrong. Everything was wrong, here. He felt like he was sitting on a box of explosives. The way trouble seemed to follow him around, he might be just the stray spark this city needed to blow itself straight to hell.
Well, at least it made his life interesting.
More of his "interesting" fate walked back through the kitchen door as he finished wrapping his ankle. Wordlessly, Meila handed him a pair of scissors to cut the end of the tape with. He took them, nodding an acknowledgement would have been hard-pressed to be seen as a thank-you.
His host stood over him, arms folded, as he replaced his sock and boot. When he tried to get up to leave, she pushed him back into his chair. "No, you don't. You're not going to come lurching in here, patch yourself up with my supplies, and leave without saying a thing."
Reluctantly, Squall sat back, not quite looking her in the eyes. "There's nothing to say," he growled, knowing it was a weak defense.
"Make something up."
"Like what?"
"Oh, I don't know." Backing up against the kitchen door frame, Meila looked away from him and seemed to hug herself for warmth. Her voice sounded choked, like she was fighting tears. "How about a lie? 'What a surprise, Meila, didn't think I'd find you here.' Or, 'Long time, no see, friend.' How about that?" Her sharp glare returned, pinning him. "You took the same courses as everyone else. What's a nice, clean, social lie? Come on. Make yourself look casual, Squall. Fool me into thinking you're just an everyday guy. You were the head of your class. Let's hear an 'A.' Let's see that one-hundred percent, first-rate performance." Her hands went down by her sides. She trembled.
Squall stared back into the eyes of judgement, pokerfaced. He wanted desperately to get away from her, to avoid having to once again realize the reality of his own sins. He didn't want to carry the pain he'd caused others on his own shoulders. No one was perfect. He could accept the fact that he had been in some way responsible. He just didn't want to punish himself for it all over again, didn't want to relive a past that could not be changed. What good would it do? He could only learn from it and move on. He could not mend other people's broken hearts. His eyes strayed to the door. He was not coward enough to try and run for it, much as he wanted to. But what else could he do?
He motioned to the chair nearest him. "Sit down," he said levelly, and waited.
At first it looked as though Meila would stand there forever simply for the sake of defying him. Then, reluctantly, she relaxed somewhat, breathed, walked to the table, and sat down. She sat upright with her hands on he knees, staring straight ahead like a pale-faced idol.
Squall closed his eyes, thinking. Silence filled the room.
"So that's it?" Meila blurted, tapping a finger on her knee. "You don't wanna say anything? Even now, you don't wanna talk? No, 'I'm sorry about what happened,' or 'I was wrong.' I guess it was a little too much to hope for when I saw you standing at my door, huh?"
Squall's scowl hardened. He flicked his wrist at the air, as if swatting at a fly. "I didn't do what Seifer said I did."
She rolled her eyes. "Of course not. But you got drunk along with everyone else."
"No I didn't." Squall had never purposely gotten drunk for any reason. People acted stupid when they were drunk. He never wanted to be included in the list of idiots who had danced around in their underwear because they were too hot to stand their shirts and too fuzzy-headed to care. In the case of the night in question, he'd been something of a wallflower, keeping to himself in his booth while the others partied around him. It was more a case of inattention than anything else. He'd been irritated at being dragged along, and lost himself in his thoughts. He just hadn't noticed…every time he'd drained half his mug—a slow process, since he didn't particularly like beer, or anything else that remotely resembled human urine, for that matter—someone would refill it. He'd never thought to tell them to stop. He'd been too busy mulling over how moronic everyone else was acting. By the time Meila had passed out, about six hours into the ordeal, he had felt groggy and overheated. Still, no one else had helped her off the floor. He'd seen no reason not to get her out of the place, and it had given him an excuse to leave. It had seemed like sound logic at the time.
"Well, fine," Meila spat, losing her meager store of patience. "You didn't come onto me, and you weren't drunk as a pig. That was my crime. You just had enough sudsy to throw yourself off a little." Her fingers curled, cutting into her palm. "All you had to do was tell them that, tell them what really happened, and it would have saved me the humiliation. It might have cost you your career, but you were just as guilty, anyway. You could have at least done that much. But no, you decided you fight. You told them exactly what I did. Not a word about you."
Tired of having his actions repeated back to him, Squall sliced at the air with his arm, as effectively cutting her tirade short. "I had no idea what that would lead to."
A junior court-martial. Seifer had contested Squall's story, implying that Squall had used Meila's vulnerability to satisfy his own gratuitous desires. Squall had never been accused of anything so heinous in his life. He'd never take advantage of anyone like that. He hadn't encouraged anything.
In fact, he'd stopped it. Too late, but he had. He had stopped Meila, who'd "miraculously" awakened once he'd gotten her to the hotel room. He remembered, he'd laid her carefully on the hotel bed, and had been about to leave her when she'd opened her eyes and called out to him…
What followed had been the source of whispered controversy in the Garden until the war with Ultimecia.
Neither Squall nor Meila had been able to give a clear account about what transpired. Seifer asserted he'd seen the whole thing. The picture he'd painted was one in which Squall was the monster, and Meila the innocent victim. Meila rejected his claim as fervently as Squall had. But while Meila had maintained she remembered nothing, Squall had told a rather different story.
He'd explained to Cid and a host of judiciary SeeDs how Meila had behaved in that hotel. In defending himself, he'd subjected her to an embarrassing investigation. He'd been indirectly responsible for getting her dismissed from Garden.
Squall's fists clenched as he remembered that day. He'd never wanted to go in the first place. It hadn't been his choice, not completely. There were extraneous circumstances. He'd been accused of something he hadn't done. He'd had a right to defend himself. He'd acted according to what he'd been asked to do.
He'd never apologized to her. He'd discarded her from his mind and gone on with his life. He'd never given any thought to what had happened to her after she left.
Now he was here, facing her again, and he was regretting every second. Meila scoffed at his poor excuse. "You betted that they wouldn't ask you how far you let me go," she barked with increasing volume. "They didn't. They saw only what I did. You did just what you always do—whatever you please, and everyone else can go screw themselves."
"I wasn't trying to ruin your life!" Squall snapped. "But I had a right to defend mine. It makes no sense to apologize for what I said. There's nothing I can do about it now."
"But you could have, then! You didn't. I got dismissed. You stayed. You gambled, I lost."
"I gambled?"
Seemingly satisfied that she'd gotten such an abrupt reaction out of him, Meila tilted her chin up and stared triumphantly down her nose at Squall's startled expression. "That's right. I got the short end of the stick because you were too selfish to admit your own mistakes." Fearlessly, she approached him, taking the edge of his open jacket and turning it to the light to the light, revealing the thumbnail-sized SeeD insignia embroidered near the top of the zipper. Her face took on a look of utter disgust as she released the article and stepped back. "Look at you…SeeD…" Her face twisted in a sneer. "You don't deserve that emblem. You're just as cold as you ever were. Squall, you make me wanna puke."
The room became empty of anything beyond sulfurous animosity. Even the air and the silent light that drifted in from the kitchen and windows seemed hollow. To Squall, this place had become suddenly too dark for his liking. He could say nothing to brighten the decaying mood, so remained silent. He only sat in his interrogation chair, in the shadow, staring at Meila, who stared back, wordlessly daring him to argue with her, as he likewise refused to grant her the right to trounce on his dignity.
"Nothing to say, huh?" Meila muttered, almost too quietly to hear. "Well, isn't that typical? You haven't changed at all. Not one damn bit."
"Meila…" Squall leaned his face into his hand. "If I could take it back—"
Snorting rudely, Meila slammed her fist against the wall, decapitating Squall's sentence. "Don't even start." Her voice burned in his ears. "Don't tell me you would have taken it back." She pointed sharply at him. "If you'd taken it back, you wouldn't have gone on that mission and met that girl you're so attached to over there." Squall's second incredulous look seemed to please her. "Don't think I wasn't part of the crowd when you tried to take Sorceress Edea," she purred, waving in the general direction of the city gates. "I'll admit that was a pretty nice trick you pulled off, charging in there after you'd trapped her. But I saw you get nailed, too. I saw that girl on the float with you. Found out later that she's General Caraway's brat. He's the one who hired you, I hear." Brief silence. "Guess she found a way into that dark heart of yours. Well, kudos to her. I'm sure you're real dedicated."
Not sure if she was being sarcastic or not, Squall's scowl wavered between anger and indifference. He reminded himself that Meila had no idea what she was flaming. She was too wrapped up in her bitterness, she would say most anything to get a reaction from him. He dared not respond. It seemed nothing he could—or would—say was satisfactory to make up for her suffering. He lowered his gaze to the floor, remorseful, but unwilling to acknowledge the emotion. He'd had his reasons. He had nothing to apologize for.
Meila's next words to him surprised him, her voice having lost some its hardness. "…I honestly hope you two are happy together."
For a moment, Squall wondered if he'd misjudged her disposition, but the respite was momentary. Within the next few syllables, her acid tongue had returned, and he found himself disarmed; he had let down his guard, taken the bait and dared to think for a moment that she might have been about to forgive the sins and release him from this impasse. Instead he listened in jaded silence as she took the opportunity to tear at his raw guilt.
"But don't you tell me you're sorry. Don't you dare tell me you would take it back." Her scowl deepened when she saw him wince. "That's just a lie, made up to make me feel better. You always hated it when people did that to you. So don't you start doing it to me. You just stay there and don't say anything, like you normally do. Because there's not a damn thing you can say." Pointing at the door, she backed away toward her room, and jerked her head toward the exit. "Go enjoy your life, Squall. And think about what you did every time things get just a little too good to be true. That's all I want from you. Don't even think about handing me sympathy." She gave an aggravated toss of her brown hair, faded red light from the window chasing the edges of each blade-like lock, blood on her ruthless words. Her eyes zeroed in on him, she closed in for the kill. "You can't offer me something you don't have."
Cornered by the predatory threat of her bite, Squall stayed very still. When it was obvious this old beast had finally broken off her attack, he went back to contemplating the floor, lending most of his attention to the edge of the room where the wood met the base of a blank wall. He sat there, breathing, hiding his expression behind the shadows of weeping bangs. "…I wish you'd thought about that three years ago."
Meila froze in place, stricken. She hadn't expected Squall to speak. She almost forgot to think about his words, so stunned that he'd said anything at all. When his sentence finally registered, she shook her head, narrowing her eyes to slits, aghast. "W…what?" Her own question was breathless with shock.
Squall looked away from the floor. It was Meila's turn to be immobilized with a stare. But he didn't seem angry with her. Instead his voice was quiet, calm, maybe even gentle. As such his words cut her deeper than if he had stood up and shouted. "You know, this whole thing isn't really about you getting dismissed from Garden. That just made it worse. What really hurt you was that I refused you…and even more, I refused to understand." Careful not to move too quickly, he stood up and balanced himself with one hand on the table, facing the door with his side to her. After he was sure of this footing, he turned his head to look at her. "I was in the wrong place at the right time. I know I'm at fault, too…but the end result was inevitable, after what happened. I just wish you'd realized then that you can't take love from someone who never had any to give you." Slowly, he made his way to the door, trying his best not to limp. Still, he had to stop to rest once he'd reached it, put one hand flat against the wood and bowed his head until it was level with his shoulders. He closed his eyes for a moment, then spoke again as he stared at the warped plaster of the doorframe. "We both lost something that night. The difference between us is that I kept what was really important to me. You lost everything that meant anything to you." Wearily, he made as if to look over his shoulder, but his stare never quite made it past his supporting arm. "Sex is a fickle thing, Meila. You can't judge someone's seriousness by the way they accept you. …You can by how they reject you, though."
Meila had taken to falling back against her own door, gnawing on a knuckle in an attempt to keep herself from crying. Her efforts only succeeded in making her tears silent ones. She struggled for many seconds to say something of her thoughts, but it was like trying to speak past mud in her throat. Finally, after many failed attempts in which her lips moved but no sound came out, she managed a few meek, choked breaths of speech. "I…I thought, maybe…if I could make you see what it meant…to me, I could…get you to open up. …I didn't plan on it. If I had been thinking…clearly, I… I just wanted…to reach you, somehow. I thought I might be able to do that, if…" She trailed off, not sure where she had been going with her words, less certain still of where she was inside her mind. Everything was so unpredictable, and the chaos in her brain was becoming so thick, it was threatening to halt her senses altogether.
There was little outward reaction from Squall, either to her words or to the silence that followed. He leaned on his shoulder against "his" door, facing the wall, away from Meila. "A person is a lot deeper than what you see on the exterior," he said after a while. "You can try to scratch the surface, but you can't touch what's inside." He folded his arms in thought, shifting his weight slightly so he didn't put as much weight on his bad ankle. "Not unless that person lets you."
"I suppose you'd know a lot about that, wouldn't you?" The question wasn't a particularly serious one.
His answer was. "Yeah…I know a few things." He ignored the skeptical look she gave him. "I know that you can't deal with the pain completely by yourself, and I know how a single choice can determine if you live out your life in misery or happiness. I know that love doesn't always have to have a reason. I know what it's like to have to accept that by putting your trust in someone, you risk losing everything." His gaze strayed to the window, watching the moon's tireless patrol across the sky. "I've been out there," he whispered, not sure what exactly he meant, if he was speaking to Meila or to himself. His eyes took on a glassy sheen in the soft lunar glow. "A lot of things have changed."
Watching him, Meila blinked tired eyes, rubbed at the last of her tears, and took a deep, cold breath. "Including you?" she asked.
Squall nodded once, slowly. "I think so."
"Squall…I wasn't as drunk as I acted, that night."
"I know." A short pause convinced him to ask, "You faked passing out, didn't you?" He didn't have to look at her to know the answer. Her silence told him enough.
"I knew you'd do what any good captain would do. Article 24, line 5."
Squall almost laughed. She still remembered the Garden Code. That particular creed was an easy line to recall. He recited it aloud: "If a squad member becomes drugged or intoxicated, he or she is to be transported by the fastest available means to Garden, or in the case such action is not possible, the nearest friendly residence, and confined in said location until the effects of the mind-altering substance subside." He shook his head, hiding a sour smile. "Just doing my job, I guess." Regaining his composure, he glanced over his shoulder at Meila. "Rinoa is always telling me I'm too stuck on protocol. I guess she's right…"
"Rinoa? Is that her name?"
Squall stood a little taller, finally holding his head high enough to allow his face to be seen from Meila's perspective. Once more, he turned his eyes on the window, regarding the giant moon with a solemn reverence that even Meila could recognize in his cold eyes. He whispered his answer to the night beyond the glass. "That's her name."
"How'd she manage it?"
He turned so that his back was against the door, so he wouldn't have to look over his shoulder to see her. "Manage what?"
"You."
His response was a small smile, a pleasant one, a shock to behold. She had never seen Squall smile. Ever. The expression seemed so out of place on him, Meila briefly questioned if it was indeed Squall she was speaking to. Any moment, she half-expected him to vanish into the moonlight, an apparition of her overactive imagination. When he turned a strangely un-callous stare on her, though, and she was able to look into his eyes, she knew he was real. For a moment, she saw no mask, no soulless brick wall. A soul rested behind that face, and a deep warmth crept freely into those icy eyes.
All this at the mere mention of this girl's name. Was the word alone enough to make him drop his defenses? Meila wondered that she had misjudged Squall's feelings for Caraway's daughter. What she saw in his eyes now confirmed it. Somehow, clearly, this girl Rinoa had pierced his armored exterior, straight through to his heart. For an instant, Meila saw happiness in his eyes, and felt her heart flutter with guilty pain. How could she scorn a young woman for taking what Meila had so coveted, when Rinoa could accomplish a miracle like this simple, honest, beautiful smile? What right had she to denounce the daughter of a Galbadian general, when the girl had somehow found a way to give Squall this simple blessing? Meila had once sought to do the same, but every attempt had been a miserable failure. "W-well?" she stammered, needing some kind of verbal answer to the question to free herself from the entrapment of his eyes.
"I guess she just wouldn't give up."
Meila swallowed a lump in her throat and force herself to keep her voice steady. "Neither did I…what's the difference?"
"…I don't know." In an instant, the comfortable smile was gone, replaced by a thoughtful calm. "Words never meant that much to me. I guess it was more what she did than anything she ever said. She…offered me a different perspective." Squall shrugged his fur collar closer about his shoulders. "She loves life. She can…fill you with it just by looking at you, whether you like it or not." Another smile flit past his face, but this one was fleeting, and vanished again before Meila had the chance to see it clearly. "In some ways, she was everything I'd forgotten how to believe in."
Meila shivered, a cruel knowledge slowly seeping into her heart, despite her every attempt to deny it. Try as she might, she could not ignore a fact of life both she and Squall had bitterly agreed on. She had wanted to show Squall happiness.
But one could not give what one did not already have.
She closed her eyes to prevent more tears from falling, feeling naked under Squall's new stare. She might as well admit it. It didn't matter much at this point. "It's just that…in three years, I thought I'd be able to forget…and now you're here again, and seeing you just…what I feel hasn't changed."
A sudden snarl rose in Squall's throat, and came out in his voice as he took a plaintive step toward her. "Don't do this to yourself."
"No?" She smirked weakly, shoulders shaking, barely managing to keep from breaking down in front of him. "It's not like I can just shut it off! If only I could."
Frustrated, Squall sighed. His voice got louder, a little angry, a little scared. "I don't wanna be responsible for someone else's self-torment."
Meila's composure snapped. Her eyes opened to glare at him, releasing pent up tears. "You already are!"
Squall's eyes hardened once more. He said nothing.
Trying uselessly to quell her shaking breath, Meila pressed herself closer to the door, as if she could somehow fit herself into the jamb. A humorless, pain-filled smile formed from her blushed lips. "Listen to us. Fighting like we're married." Then she started to laugh, a terrible, agonized sound, but for all the world, she couldn't keep herself from doing it. "I guess you're right. I should just let it go…even if I had been able to start something with you, it would've ended up just like this, wouldn't it?"
Seeming to consider this for a moment, Squall glanced at the window again, then nodded. "Probably." He clutched his fist to his chest. "I'm not out to hurt people. I just wanna live my life."
Meila seemed about to say something else, when their tense conversation was interrupted by a loud commotion outside. Squall looked over his shoulder at the door, tensing as though readying for battle. Meila stopped crying immediately and mirrored his example. They listened for a few minutes to the sounds of loud snarling and yelping below them, somewhere close. Meila maintained an aloof silence. She didn't look particularly concerned.
Squall glance at her. "What is that?"
"We have a lot of stray dogs," she answered blandly. "Sometimes they fight over turf."
About to dismiss the matter, Squall nodded slightly. Then something in his mind clicked. His brow furrowed. Stray dogs… "Damn!"
Before Meila could question his outburst, Squall whirled and rushed back to the exit. He fumbled for a moment with the knob, then flung the door open and rushed outside, moving as fast as his injured foot would allow. He stopped and looked over railing to the parking lot below and stared at the scene.
Black-alley fury forced its enemy to the ground, angry yellow fangs bearing down on soiled and bloodied fur that had once been white.