Amy walked towards the console. "What's up, Kira?"
"The black hole you..you know, fell into...it's expelled something."
"What?"
"You heard me. Something small. Metallic."
Amy felt a pounding in her throat, a rushing in her ears. "Get me a scope on that object." No one moved. "NOW, Goddamnit!"
"Yes, Major!" People saluted; she'd been given a promotion upon return. Their careers depended on obedience.
The object turned out to be an obviously man-made spacecraft, although it was of a design no one had seen before in this history of mankind.
Of course they wouldn't. Amy thought absentmindedly. She ordered a tractor beam on it and brought it into shuttle bay two. It barely fit.
She hurried down and pushed everyone out of her way, fighting to get to the front of the curious queue of people.
Blonde hair, long eyelashes. Beneath those eyelashes, she knew, lay sparkling emerald green eyes.
Seifer... Amy felt a wrench in her chest, and ordered the survivor to sick bay.
"That was really stupid, you know." Seifer opened his eyes and saw the most beautiful sight in the universe; Amy, staring down at him.
"What, plowing headfirst into a black hole that I wasn't sure could even bring me out safely?"
"Something like that." Amy said. She sighed.
He stared up at her and felt something well up in him. He pushed it down. Later.
"Seifer..." Amy looked unbearably sad. "Why?"
He gave her a clueless look.
"Why did you follow me?"
Seifer stared at her, and then burst out laughing. "Why, she asks." He settled back into his hospital bed and chuckled to himself for a few minutes. Amy, used to this sort of thing, waited patiently for him to finish.
"You gave up everything. You'd finally made SeeD, Seifer. After Hyne knows how many tries..." She grimaced. "You gave me some bad habits, Almasy....anyway, you finally made SeeD. You excelled. And you gave it up. Why?"
"Because I can't imagine living without you near me." Seifer sat up. "Wow, I ache."
"Yeah, that's the downside of not having hi-potions." Amy smirked.
"Yeah, well, this world sucks ass." He looked up. "But it's worth it, I guess."
"You guess?"
Seifer smiled and caught her hand in his. He focused on the hands. "Amy...I love you. You don't have to be with me, just as long as you're my friend. I can't...I don't want to live in a world that doesn't have you in it."
"Seifer, you lived in that world for nineteen years."
"I know, but...now that I know what I'm missing..." He trailed off.
A moment of silence, and then he was being hugged by strong, slender, olive-toned arms; his face was buried in shiny, dark hair, normally kept up in a bun, but loose now.
"I missed you so much." Amy murmured into his chest.
"Then why did you leave?" Seifer asked.
"Because I thought...that nothing could ever be the same." She held onto him tighter. "I thought I'd lose you, and you were all I had in that world."
"Well, you're stuck with me now."
"Thank Hyne."
Seifer chuckled.
"This world really does suck, you know." Seifer commented. He wasn't bitching; it was a fact. Both of them knew it.
"I know. I'm not fond of it either." Amy said.
She was leading his now-healed self to her quarters; she was trying to keep him from the researchers. He wouldn't know what questions to answer and what ones to claim ignorance on.
"Don't talk to anyone other than me." She said. Seifer raised an eyebrow. "Trust me."
It was weighing on her mind. Everything she had gone through. She itched to be at her observation post; she also yearned to be at the training center, sparring with Seifer.
"Amy, hon, what's wrong?" Kira asked, startling her from her thoughts. Amy sighed, and made a decision.
"Kira, come with me. I have some things I want to tell you."
They made their way to her quarters, where Seifer was. She introduced them. "Kira, this is my friend Seifer."
"He's the one who came through the hole."
"Yes. I met him while I was on the other side." Amy closed her eyes. "What I'm going to tell you has to stay in this room, Kira, and you have to promise me."
Kira looked at her friend, than at Seifer, and then back to Amy. "I promise."
Colonel James Henderson expected nothing short of perfection, and he was used to getting it. With his second in command, the newly promoted Major Amy Durham, he got what he expected.
"Where is Major Durham, Lieutenant Field?"
Kira gulped compulsively. "I believe she reported in sick this morning, Captain."
His bushy eybrows raised; nearly reaching his hairline in his shock. "Major Durham is never sick, lieutenant."
"I'm aware of that, sir. There's a first time for everything, I suppose." She gulped again. "I offered to cover her shift at the observation post, sir."
"As long as the post is covered, lieutenant." Colonel Henderson did not seem pleased at the blip in his perfection.
I only hope I'm still a lieutenant after this is all over. Kira thought to herself. She didn't waver; she knew she would do what was required. Amy was her best friend, and Kira knew this was what she wanted.
"Sir, a vehicle was just registered as leaving the bay."
"Excuse me?" Colonel Henderson replied. "There are no scheduled launches today."
Kira swore under her breath. The newest second lieutenant was ruining it.
"Lieutenant Field, what's on your screen?"
Kira keyed in the last bit of code. "I've got nothing, sir."
"Pardon me?"
"I've got nothing, sir." She repeated. "Green across the board."
"Sir, on the viewscreen!" The nosey second lieutenant pointed.
"That's the vehicle that was brought across the hole." The Colonel said.
"Yes sir."
"Open a hailing frequency, lieutenant."
A few seconds later Amy's face popped up on the screen. Kira made a sign; all clear. The tractor beams wouldn't function.
"Colonel." Amy said, respectfully.
"Major, just what the hell is going on here?" Colonel Henderson barked. "I expect perfection from you; not blind disobedience and the theft of a..."
"Actually, sir, the vehicle belongs to me." Seifer's face appeared on the screen. "And as Major Durham is driving it under my direction, it hardly constitutes theft."
Kira bit her lip; she knew, from her brief acquaintence with Seifer Almasy, that this sort of speech rarely escaped him.
"That vehicle was found by the United States Army Corps."
Seifer smirked. "Well, sir, I've got the reciept. If you wanna see it."
The screen blanked out. Colonel Henderson shook with rage. "Lieutenant Field, bring them in with a tractor beam."
Kira went through the motions of activating the beams, and then spread her arms with helplessness. "Sir, the tractor beams have been deactivated."