A/N: Gosh, another update! We must all be dreaming. On top of that, I started on a new Quistis/Seifer piece I'm very excited about! (I refuse to pick sides on the Seiftis/Quifer issue.) Might be a while in coming for ya all, I want it to be very well thought out and complete.

Chapter 14: Surviving the Night

The light morning snowstorm had turned into a blizzard before Seifer and Quistis were forced to stop. Neither of them could see further than five feet in front of them, and an indention in the side of the mountain they had been working across suddenly seemed like their best bet to survive the night. Both of them were cold, shivering uncontrollably as the storm raged around them.

Seifer watched Quistis stumble toward the spot with a frown etched across his features. She wasn't doing well. She was too cold, too unused to weather and terrain of the region. He could tell that she had been pushed to her limit and had gone on past it. She was worn thin, and he wasn't at all positive that she would make it through the storm. Worry crumbled all of his good sense, and turning slightly so that she couldn't see him, he slipped the ropes off of his hands. He'd been able to do so all day long, but for some strange reason he had chosen not to. Presently, he was more help to her fully able.

She flopped into a sitting position against the rock. He'd picked out the spot because the rock was worn enough that there was an overhang he could stake a lean-to against. In the very least, it would keep away some of the wind. Quistis didn't say anything to him when she noticed that his hands were free. After all, where did he have to go? They were as trapped now as they had been back in the tavern. If anything, there were less options for him now. She didn't seem particularly worried that he would get away. He hoped that she wasn't getting hypothermic.

"Quistis...I need Hyperion," he squatted down in front of her, easing he forward just enough to pull his gunblade from it's snug place against her back.

"Seifer..." her teeth chattered, interrupting whatever she'd been about to say.

"Don't worry, Quisty," he shook his head, then retrieved his trench coat from her pack. "Lay down, tuck yourself under the overhang."

Amazingly, she did as she was told. Even more amazing was the fact that both of them fit quite well into the little nook. It was shallow and higher than Seifer would have liked, but he figured he would take what he could get. He hastily built the little lean-to using his gunblade and trench coat, effectively blocking out a good amount of wind and snowfall from their shelter.

He laid beside Quistis, but she had her eyes closed and buried herself within her coat so only the crown of her head was peaking out.

"Quistis," he nudged her. "Quistis, look at me."

"Hmmm?" her face slowly peeked out of her coat.

"Unzip your coat," he told her.

"What?" For the first time she seemed shocked.

"Just do it," he shook his head, already unzipping his own.

"Why?" she asked suspiciously, bringing her mittened hands up in front of her chest.

"Dammit, Quistis," he reached for her zipper to do it himself. "Hurry up, I'm freezing." She didn't seem to understand what he was about, but she let him unzip her coat anyway. That finally settled, Seifer opened both of their coats and pulled them bodily together. Wrapping the coats back around the both of them, and then his arms around her small body, he relaxed once again.

"Oh..." she cuddled against him, realizing that he meant to utilize body heat. Quistis wasn't helping to warm him up yet, but she was relaxing more and more by the second. That covered, he then turned his attention to appendages. They both had on good boots, and as far as he could tell his feet weren't wet yet. Quistis' boots were even better than his (she was somewhat of a boot connoisseur) and he was relatively confident that she wasn't going to loose any toes from the experience. If the storm went on past the next morning, he figured he would start to worry about their feet.

"Feeling any better?" he asked, his chin on top of her head.

"Yeah," she murmured against him.

One position he never dreamed that he would find himself in was holding Quistis Trepe tightly to himself. The whole series of events that had led up to their current predicament would have been impossible to forecast. There was a sort of sick pleasure that he got from the fact that she was depending upon him. Her life was literally in his hands. He had the choice of whether to save her or not, whether to save himself of not. Not even thinking about it, he'd already made his decision.

Outside of their shelter the blizzard was picking up in intensity. They were fairly high up on the mountain, and he was hoping that the snow wouldn't bury them. From the sound of it though, there wasn't much hope of any snow accumulation. The wind was howling, flapping his coat and threatening to pull Hyperion from it's seat. He'd driven it slightly into the rock to give it that extra hold, still, he knew that both the gunblade and the coat would have to be replacing following this particular endeavor. The gunblade and a few other anchors he'd decided to use were already tearing the coat to shreds.

"Seifer?" Quistis moved her head under his chin.

"What?"

"Thank you." She settled back against him again, her body warming slowly.

"No problem," he smiled a little.

Earlier, when they had discussed the Treppies, he'd been unwilling to admit that he'd used his power to strike fear in every Treppie heart. Quistis didn't know the half of it. He'd heavily discouraged public displays of affection toward the dear instructor, which included speaking about her charms. Not everyone knew that he was the face behind the force keeping them down. At the time, he hadn't even fully understood why he'd been doing it. All he really knew was that listening to them spout about how beautiful she was made him feel sick and angry.

Presently, as he held her, he was coming to an understanding with his reasons. Maybe, just maybe, he liked her. Or, in the very least, wanted to protect her. He was certainly doing all of that on their way out of Timber.

"Keep talking to me," he instructed her.

"Hmm? About what?" she asked.

"Anything, just keep talking." There was the very real fear that Quistis would become delirious and hypothermic. He wanted to keep her awake and somewhat lucid as long as he could. Also, the sound of her voice was oddly soothing to his own nerves.

"I don't have anything to say," she announced after a short pause.

"Well..." he searched his mind. "Tell me a story, recite a poem, anything. Tell me about what happened in Garden after Ultimecia."

"Squall and Rinoa got all lovey-dovey," she replied a little bitterly. "Selphie and Irvine have lasted a surprisingly long amount of time. I think that he genuinely likes her. He get's a bad reputation because he's suave, I don't think he realizes that he's flirting half of the time. But, you know, I don't really think he's ever cheated on her in all this time."

"What about Squall and Rinoa?" he asked.

"Oh, Hyne," she rolled her eyes. "Those two make me sick sometimes. Rinoa's got Squall whipped, he does anything and everything that she asks. Luckily, she's grown up a bit since you knew her. She's not quite so childish anymore, and I think she's past that flitty stage where every guy is the one she's meant to be with. As much as I hate it, I think they'll be together for a long time."

"Really?" he was making small talk, keeping her going.

"Then there's Zell," she laughed. "That guy is oblivious. Even now."

"Chicken Wuss couldn't handle a real woman," Seifer chuckled. "What about you?"

"Mmm...me," she frowned.

He tucked her a little closer, feeling a slight draft. She didn't seem to mind, so he held her there, relishing the feel of her body against his.

"I could take the world prize on being able to pick guys who don't want me back," she replied.

"You mean Squall?" he asked.

"More than just him," she shrugged. "There was one guy, Devon. Hyne, I was so in love with him and he had no idea. He was a new SeeD, transferred to Balamb a few months after the whole Sorceress War fiasco. Tall guy, dark hair, hazel eyes...every girl in Garden wanted him. I met him at a dance, he was standing over by the punch. Anyway, I asked him to dance and we hit it off...so I thought. We were close friends for quite some time, up until he learned that I wanted to be a little bit more than that."

"He turned you down?" Seifer asked, surprised.

"Dumped like a bunch of rocks," she shook her head.

"He just jumped out of your life like that?"

"Well, it was more of a slow thing," she replied. "I started to see him less and less until finally I never saw him at all. But, I couldn't let go of him, and it was torture."

"That have anything to do with you cutting your hair?" he arched an eyebrow.

"Not really." One of her legs entangled with one of his. "I cut it because nobody was expecting it. I've always been the same old Quistis, you know. And I needed people to get over whatever they thought of me."

"Did they?"

"No...not really," she admitted. Then, pausing, asked a question he'd been slightly hoping that she wouldn't but was all the same a little flattered that he cared. "What about you?"

"In terms of relationships?" he asked.

"Well...yeah."

"Hard to have a relationship of any kind when you're a wanted man," he answered. "I've gone from town to town on the run for the past two years and haven't stopped. Quite honestly, you're the first women to come within a few feet of me for a long time now."

"That's too bad."

"Yes it is."

They sat in silence for a few minutes, the both of them searching their minds for a less intrusive subject to discuss.

"How is Matron?" he finally asked.

"Oh, she's doing very well!" Quistis perked up. "She misses you. I guess you and her share a sort of bond that no one else has with her. You were with her when she was possessed. She wants to see you when we get back, she made sure that was clear to me before we left. She spends most of her time back at the old orphanage. We all helped her rebuild, and she's taking in more kids now. That woman never stops."

"She misses me?"

"Very much."

Seifer reflected over that. He'd always felt very strongly toward Edea. She was the only mother he had ever known, and all but the worst people in the world loved their mothers. She was at the top of his list of people he cared about. He would do anything for her, and being away from her was hard at times. There was a little boy inside of him that wanted to have her make everything better again.

"Seifer?" Quistis lifted her head.

"What?"

"My fingers are numb."

"Shit," the expletive slipped out before he realized that he was going to say it. "Give me your hands."

Obediently, she brought her mittened hands up for him to see. Not quite sure what to do, he stared at them for a second. There were only so many places to put them, and not all of them were ones that she would be happy with. In fact, he couldn't really think of any that wouldn't make her cringe.

He pulled off her mittens with his teeth, tossing them aside. He didn't want to let go of her even for the short moments it would take to remove the mittens.

"You're not going to like this," he announced, preparing her.

"Do what you have to," she replied.

He slid one of her cold hands up his shirt to rest against his stomach, which quivered unhappily against the cold thing resting against it. He held his breath for a moment, waiting for her hand to warm enough so that he didn't have to concentrate quite so hard on simply laying still. There was another excellent place for her other hand, but he honestly didn't think that she would go for it, so instead he slowly eased her fingers into his mouth.

If she hadn't known that she desperately needed the warmth, she probably would have pulled her hand away and given him one hell of a black eye. But, her sanity won out and she relaxed, allowing him to suck lightly on her fingers. They were cold, but started warming up quickly against his tongue.

For a moment, he was struck by the intimacy of the scene. They were snuggled together, her fingers warming in his mouth and against his stomach, her legs tangled with his. Never in his life would he have dreamed they would end up in such a position.

It was all in the means of survival, he had to keep reminding himself of that.