Confessions, Death & You

Author's Note: Don't own the characters or their personalities but this story… I do own.

Chapter I: The Brave Coward

"But then I sigh, and with a piece of scripture,
Tell them that God bids us do good for evil.
And thus I clothe my naked villainy
With odd old ends stolen forth of holy writ,
And seem I a saint, when most I play the Devil."

-William Shakespeare, King Richard III

He saw it.

The bodies crumble to the ground, watching the fresh blood spill to the outfields. He strolled down the rows of body, sometimes breaking his stride to kick a body part away from his black boots, designed to show his importance, his promotion and his greatness. He didn't care, bodies were bodies and deaths were deaths. Everybody was going to die sometimes and sometimes, dying was just the beginning. It was the maze to enlighten that he so desperately seek. The death of the weakness that lied vacant here.

He kneed to a smaller crumbled body, its arms hung loosely from its sockets and the dull brown eyes showed the pain and the fright it experienced. His heart pounded against his chest, bringing the young child's body to his chest.

He saw everybody's body being torn apart, right in front of his very eyes as he hid beneath three already fallen bodies. He could name each of them if anybody wanted, Seth, Ryu, and Baxter. Within hours they began to stink, their death wounds began to spill all over his face, he spat, drunk, and inhaled fumes of blood. It made him queasy, his head danced with inane thoughts. Hysteria crept upon him, he used to dance with hysteria but the one he dealt with was the one he couldn't shake.

A coward. They couldn't dare to see that within him. They sent him because he was the best, because he didn't smell the scent of fear. If they known that behind those vacant green eyes of his was fear quivering in him, drenching in his blood, in his veins. He smelt it, he felt it. His once blond hair was proof of it, blood scattered in his hair, dripping to the ground. His whole body quivered in adherence. Whole body, his blond eyebrow twitted and above crimson soaked bodies was the breathtaking sight of the moon rising and the world darkening.

A world so beautiful. He sighed as petals of white roses floated in the air. Wings. They were wings. His eyes watered as he sniffed, blinked, not daring to let the threatening tears spill. He had his pride. He sauntered with his shoulders drooped, his grey trenchcoat tarnishing behind him, ripping across teeth of the dead bodies, but he had pride. He wouldn't fall; he wouldn't discarnate, even if he was his own audience.

It was so much easier being an outlaw. Deaths of others didn't affect him; it didn't destroy him but became him. It was easy to disappear into the night, seeing the blood bled into the pavement. It was easier that way, not having friends. I killed them all, he thought as he jadedly sighed, you don't know the half of it.

"You dance with fire and you burn in hell," he whispered.

It was like a fucking poem. He couldn't get it out of his head; it was engraved in his mind. Dancing with fire and surely you burn. Burn so hard, so fast. What the hell was he talking about? His green eyes darted around the sky, watching the stars flicker, and turn on. He didn't know what it all meant. Maybe, maybe he wasn't cut out to be a killer like he supposed. Underneath the hard interior he was, was this soft mushy, pathetic…coward.

He closed his eyes. It was too much, too fucking much, he thought. He couldn't have stood there. Fear, fear pierced his heart. Battling fear… did he want to win? Didn't he win? Didn't he conquer all? Didn't… he hide? God, what was there else to do? Hide the evidence. Hide his failure. What failure? He forgot about it already.

Well, mission completed, unsuccessful but completed. No survivors, other than himself. No survivors, none. Zilch, zero, naddah. It was the wonderful world of nothing. He was the only survivor, that made him… stunning. Imagine how many history books he would be written in. Many, plenty, and the mission… It was completed. The Gils they received was delirious. B-Garden was the best. The winner.

He saw it.

Seifer Almasy dropped the child's body to the ground as he walked towards the camps. The moon shined brightly there, not an ounce of blood manage to be spilled. The yellow tinted tents flapped its wings into the gusty winds as old food scattered into the middle of the tents. Seifer kicked the food out of his way as he made his way into his porch. Seifer pushed away the white cloth that hung over the doorframe, entering inside.

He ripped off the white paper from the bullet board, mentally checking off all the assignments that got done. Red blinking lights.

Seifer immediately tore his eyes from the trash basket, which the paper was sailing to, to the phone that began to blink.

"Mission completed."

"Good. Any survivors?"

"No Squall." Seifer eyed the outside, watching a papercup trail away, lost probably, looking for a way out, "Nobody but me."

"Come home and good job."

Seifer quietly placed the phone onto the hook as he continued to watch the paper cup float into the distance. He couldn't wait to come back home and tell everyone about his… invisibility. When they ask him how he done it, he would reply "it's easy, hid beneath bodies of your dead friends, dead friends that you could've easily saved if you had the guts. Once everyone's done killing each other and is killed itself, come on and declare yourself the victor." He couldn't wait. Seifer chuckled bitterly. They would respect him and spit upon his name. A coward… what a cowardly man he was.

Quistis…

She would laugh at him.