AN: I'm gonna b cruel to Martine and leave him not knowing what's goin on - mainly cause I don't - and I'm gonna let Squall and Seifer off the cliff - I guess they've been hanging there long enough

Rating: R (I tried to keep it lower, but it just wasn't destined to happen - unlike other things [which are responsible for the rating])

Disclaimer: SG characters are (c) MGM (thankie to Morrigan for that :p).  FF8 characters are (c) Squaresoft, original characters are mine – ask nicely and I might let you play with them, s'long's you don't break them...

Warnings: SxS - Yaoi (guyxguy) later - if u don't like, don't read.  Character death.  Maybe angst (I do like to torture my characters sometimes :p), language (prob nothin u aint heard b4, but still...)

~Chapter Twenty-Three: Just a Dream?~

Squall woke in a bed, a damp cloth across his forehead.  For a moment his mind flashed back through time, and he half expected Dr Kadowaki to appear and lecture him on fighting Seifer...  Seifer.  Where was Seifer?  He sat up, irritably throwing the damp cloth to one side as it slid over his eyes.  Now he was upright Squall could see that he was in a bedroom, one of the guest rooms in Laguna's mansion if he was precise.  Across the room was another bed, with Seifer in it.  The blond appeared to be quite comfortable, not tossing and turning in a fever dream, and looking, if anything, slightly less skeletal.

Squall stood, using the headboard of the bed to steady himself when his legs wavered.  He wondered how long he'd been in the bed for his legs to be so weak.  Pulling a sheet around his nakedness - purely because he didn't know who might walk in - he padded over to Seifer's bed.  The blond was scrunched up in a foetal position, around - Squall was amazed to discover - his own jacket.  Seifer's trenchcoat was nowhere to be seen, but obviously in his fever delirium he'd latched onto Squall's fur collared jacket and had refused to let go.

"Bout time you got up."  Squall spun around at the sudden voice, losing his balance and falling onto the edge of Seifer's bed.  The blond groaned and shifted.  Immediately Squall started to stand, aiming to retreat to the safety of his own bed, across the room, but his legs turned traitor and refused to take any weight.  The old woman at the back of the room chuckled at his efforts.

"Oh, I shouldn't worry about moving dear.  If he," she pointed at Seifer with a knitting needle, "loves you as much as he loves your jacket, he won't complain."  Squall stopped trying to get up at her words.  He'd never really allowed himself to entertain the thought that perhaps, just perhaps, Seifer might love him as much as he loved Seifer.  He'd shied away from everything that had happened so far, explaining everything away with logic.

"It was a fever dream."  He stated firmly, unaware that Seifer was awake behind him.  "That's all.  Just...a fever dream."  His voice nearly cracked at the end.

Seifer felt his heart sink as Squall made it quite clear that he considered Seifer's actions the product of delirium, nothing more.  OK, so most of them had been, but not the jacket.  He'd fought tooth and nail with the old hag in the corner to retain the jacket, and she'd only desisted after he'd blurted out that he wasn't going to lose Squall again.  Of course, she would have to know exactly who Squall was, wouldn't she, and now it appeared that she was trying to play matchmaker.  He was grateful for her efforts, but it seemed like there was nothing, from Squall's point of view, going on.

The old woman cackled at Squall's statement, and picked up her knitting before rising slowly to her feet.

"Laguna's gone to Centra, so there's no one except me in the place.  If you want anything you'll have to find it yourselves seeing as I'm deaf as a post."  She winked at him then slowly walked to the door, where she paused and looked back at Squall and Seifer, who was still feigning sleep.  "If you don't wager anything, you'll lose it all.  Forever.  And that'd just wouldn't do."  She walked out.  "I've never seen two more made for each other..."  The comment drifted around the edge of the door just as it closed.

AN: Hee...  Who was that old woman?  Cause she really reminds me of Noranti...  Just before you start screaming "yes/no (delete as applicable) it's gonna cross with farscape too!"  No it's not (on the same subject – how could they axe farscape???  :O – I could rant for hours, but I won't bore you... :)), so you can all cry "nooo!/hooray! (delete as applicable)"  If you're not into farscape, you probably have no idea what the hell that was all about, but if you're not into farscape, why the hell not?  Farscape is the ultimate sci-fi show AND I CAN'T BELIEVE THEY'VE AXED IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (sorry) :(