Sunrise
Laguna stared at the strange device from which he had heard Squall's holographic message. Well, he had no choice. It was either risking and using that device or getting stranded in the future; and he didn't like the prospect of having to spend his life in this kind of future, with Balamb destroyed and the world in the hands of Ultimecia...
Let's give it a shot...
He got up and picked up the remote. The button which was previously green had now
turned red. Laguna pressed it, and felt like he missed a step going downstairs. Then
all the colours faded and everything was blurred...
He was having a shower after a rough mission in the Galbadian Desert, something about catching some fugitive who escaped from their jail... it seemed like sand had got onto every inch of his skin... why the Galbadians needed SeeDs for the job was beyond him...
Then he heard, above the sprinkling of the shower, something hitting his punch bag, someone cursing loudly and falling to the floor. He put out the water, wrapped a towel around his hips and opened the bathroom door with a frazzled look.
"Kinneas, I thought I told you never to touch my stuff!", he said, and then saw that the man on the floor wasn't Irvine Kinneas. It was a man almost in his thirties, with long charcoal-black hair and light turquoise-green eyes. He was dressed in a tattered pair of trousers and a shirt.
"Laguna?" he said. Laguna rubbed his head and looked up. His eyes widened.
"Zell? " Zell Dincht stood in front of him, still wet from the shower, his hair lying flat and water dripping down his neck, arms and legs, creating small puddles on the floor. To see Zell like this was fairly upsetting, since the last time Laguna saw him Zell was dead, his neck broken and his empty eyes staring...
"Hey man, s'up? You look pale," Zell said.
"What? Naw, it's nothing. I'm cool," Laguna replied.
"You sure? Want me to get you a glass of water or something?" Laguna got up and looked around the room. It was a single SeeD dormitory, a bit larger than the usual rooms. An open bag with clothes thrown pell-mell around it lay on the bed, Zell's gloves on top of the pile. Outside the window, he saw that the sky was slowly changing from grey to shell pink. It was going to be dawn soon.
"Going somewhere?" he asked Zell, pointing to the pile on the bed.
"Nah, just got back from a mission. What's up with you, man?" Zell asked. "Bursting just like that into my room, without announcing that you were coming or anything."
"Did you go to Timber?" Laguna asked, fearing that he may be late. He looked at the device in his hand: it was broken. If he was too late, there was no coming back.
"Timber? No, Galbadia Desert."
"Look," Laguna said, "I need to talk to Squall. Is he around?" Zell shifted his weight a couple of times and stuck his fingers into the towel.
"He should be," he said. "I haven't seen him in a while, though. It'll be no use looking this early: he's probably snoozing, the lucky bastard. As is the rest of the Garden, except for me and Kinneas. What made you come here so early? I thought the old guy at the gates never lets anyone in before nine."
"It's a long story," Laguna said. "I'll explain it all to you as soon as I speak to Squall."
"Whatever turns you on," Zell said. "You can crash here if you like," he said, walked to the bed and tossed the things from it onto the floor. "I got... an arrangement. You'll be fine alone, right?"
"Sure," Laguna said. He could use some quiet time with his thoughts after all the things which happened to him.
"Cool." With that, Zell grabbed his usual clothes from the pile on the floor and vanished into the bathroom. He reappeared a few moments later, his hair spiky again, fastening one of his red-and-black tennis shoes. He waved good-bye to Laguna and went out.
Zell entered the Training Centre and walked towards the "secret meeting place" which was still called that by Balamb Garden's students, although the Instructors had discovered it ages ago. Headmaster Cid refused to block it up and explained that there had to be a place where "the students could forget their daily dilemmas", and that he himself had once had "an interesting adventure" in there.
Snogging spot's a snogging spot forever.
He walked towards the high railing and leaned on it. The terrace looked out onto the east, onto the sleepy main Garden building and the forest of Balamb beyond. The sky had now turned a pale red; the sun was rising.
"Zell Dincht," someone said. "You're late." Zell grinned inwardly. He didn't need to turn to recognise who it was.
"Glad to see you too," he said.
Quistis - for it was she who spoke - joined him and leaned against the railing, looking at the horizon. Zell turned his head away from the sunrise and looked at her. She was wearing her usual coral skirt and sleeveless vest, her hair raised to her head with a clip and two locks of honey falling down to her chest in her trademark hairstyle. He remembered how, three months ago, at the SeeD graduation ball, held after Ultimecia's defeat, Squall had beaten him in asking her out to the ball. He could still see the Trepies' angry expressions as Squall led Quistis dressed in a beautiful, deep red dress, down the stairs into the ballroom. He went out with the librarian girl with pigtails, but she was so ecstatic of finally having asked him out that she barely spoke a word and Zell went to talk to his friends. Somehow, he and Quistis ended up alone on the balcony and she told him that her feeling towards Squall were strictly sisterly... and they had been, more or less, dating ever since. He grinned boyishly and Quistis turned towards him.
"I thought we were here to look at the sunrise?" she said, grinning too, as the rising sun coloured her features beautifully. "Zell, you said you wanted to meet now. I thought you wanted to rest after the Galbadian mission." Zell leaned towards her and kissed her on the cheek. His warm lips left a moist trace on her face, but she didn't pause to wipe it off. Zell coiled his hands around the small of her back and pulled her close. He looked into her cornflower-blue eyes with his sapphire ones and saw her blush. His warm hands around her waist made her feel safe and wanted. Quistis took a long, breaking breath and looked towards the horizon with a kind of hope.
"Zell, the sunrise...?" she started. Zell raised a hand and caressed her soft jawline.
"It can happen without us," he said. His fingers brushed her delicate neckline, followed by his warm lips. Quistis didn't know whether to approve or to push him away. After all, only three months ago - it seemed like three days - she had thought of Zell as her friend: not quite someone she could really identify with, rather a reckless, rash and childish overgrown boy. She laughed into Zell's mouth as he kissed her. He backed away and looked at her, smiling with his boyish charm.
"What?" he said. "Am I doing anything wrong?"
"Not at all," she said. "I was just thinking; you haven't changed at all, Zell Dincht." He tapped her nose with his finger and kissed the spot where it had been.
"I'll take that as a compliment," he said and kissed her again.
Two hours later, Balamb Garden was slowly waking up. The women working in the Cafeteria had began preparing the hot-dogs, the Garden Faculty turned on the lights, the Library Committee member dragged themselves towards the Library, yawning slightly, and the disciplinary committee was already prowling the walkways and Garden areas, telling off anyone who did something which didn't suit them.
Zell returned to his dormitory, his collar loosened and his hair slightly ruffled, looking a bit glassy-eyed but full of adrenalin. He was surprised to see Laguna on the exact spot where he had left him.
"Man, you didn't sleep at all?" Laguna shook his head. "You must have a heck of a metabolism," Zell said and started practising his hits on the punch bag. Laguna stood up from the bed and walked to the door.
"I'm going to find Squall," he informed Zell. The SeeD was too busy concentrating on his hits and didn't hear him, so Laguna just left the dormitories.
The walkways of Balamb Garden were crawling with students going to classes, off to the Training Centre, to SeeD missions, or just strolling about. Laguna's throat clenched at the thought that they would all be dead if he didn't do something. Brooding on this, Laguna didn't see where he was going and only noticed that he collided with someone when she said:
"RAGE!" Laguna snapped from his musings and saw Fujin looking at him angrily with one red eye. "SEIFER. VIOLATOR!" She said. Almost at the exact same moment, Seifer and Raijin appeared by her side. The trio was exactly the same as Laguna remembered them: Seifer still wore his grey trenchcoat and his sly grin. The only thing missing his overall superior and gilt-edged appearance was his black gunblade Laguna had last seen lying next to his dead body, broken in two. Sometimes Laguna thought that Seifer deserved what he got.
"Well, well," Seifer said cockily. "Look what the cat dragged in. What are you doing here?"
Trying to save your butt from death, not like you deserve it, you big -
"I'm here to see Squall." Laguna said.
"The commander?" Raijin said. "He's busy. Directing an important mission to Timber, ya know. Ordered not to disturb him, ya know?"
"Shut up," Seifer ordered. "What do you care where he is? We, the disciplinary committee, have to punish you for harassing one of our members."
"Harassing her? I just bumped into her! Anyway, I'm not even a student here!"
"That doesn't matter," Seifer said, his nasty grin spreading. "The Garden Code Of Conduct states that any physical or mental fulmination by a member of the Garden or by a visiting guest is prohibited and should be punished according to the judgment of the disciplinary committee of the said Garden."
"That means we gotta throw you in the brig, ya know?" Raijin said.
"Really?" Laguna said skeptically. "I'll bet that you've just invented that rule."
"Fujin," Seifer said. "Apprehend him."
"AFFIRMATIVE!"
"What's going on here?" someone else said. A cloud passed over Seifer's face as he frowned. Fujin, seeing his expression, turned around. Laguna glanced over her shoulder and saw Quistis Trepe in her SeeD uniform, her hands crossed over her chest, not looking pleased at all. "Seifer, you're a SeeD now," she said, "You should learn to act like one."
"He was breaking protocol, ya know," Raijin said. Fujin turned her back on Quistis with a defiant: "... IGNORE."
"How?" Quistis rounded on Raijin. "By bumping into Fujin? That can happen to anybody, but that's not a valid reason to throw someone in the brig." She looked at Seifer again. "I thought you were already above the level of bullying people for no reason, Seifer." Seifer frowned, but didn't say anything. Quistis looked at Laguna and smiled, which made her face instantaneously more beautiful. "Will you walk with me?" She asked him. "We need to talk."
Laguna joined Quistis and they walked through the Quad. The crowd was thinner here and they were able to walk freely without having to sidestep out of someone's way every few minutes. For a while, they walked in silence, each in their own thoughts, and then Quistis started talking.
"Zell told me that you came before dawn," she said. How did Zell have the time to tell her, Laguna thought, when I've just left his dorm? ... He did say he had an arrangement... "What's the occasion?" she asked him.
"Nothing good," Laguna told her. "I've just returned from the future..."
"The dream world again?" Quistis asked, because that kind of time-travelling wasn't unfamiliar to her.
"No," Laguna said, "something completely different..." And he told her all about what he had seen. The images had sat in his mind for so long, and he really needed to share them with someone. Quistis didn't interrupt him or ask any questions, she just let him talk. Laguna tried to skip the part when he had seen her and the others dead: hearing about your death, no matter how far in the future, was not a pleasant prospect.
When he had finished, they walked on silence. Quistis was weighing out his words. Then she stopped walking and said:
"Well, if that could really happen, then we have to do something," she said. "A squad will be sent out to Timber in a day or so; I wonder if that was what Squall from the future meant? If he did, then the device sent you earlier, which I think is just as well, since you have more time... But how much more? Either way, you have to go and talk to Squall now . I don't know what he - the Squall from the future - wanted to say about Rinoa..." A jingle from the loudspeaker interrupted her as Headmaster Cid's voice echoed across the Garden:
"Quistis Trepe, please report to the Headmaster's office. I use this opportunity to remind our students that all facilities except the Training Centre are out of limits after hours. " The Headmaster coughed, and the loudspeaker emitted another jingle before it was shut down again.
Author's Notes:
Hi folks! I've finally decided to speak! ... Expect all the following chapters to be this long, give or take a few pages. Did I disappoint you with the snogging scene? There'll be more, although I'll try focusing on the main plot... Yeah, the plot! What happens next? A new pairing, hot-dogs, hiding, sorcery, and a new SeeD mission! If you have any comments, critiques or rantings, PLEASE review! It means a lot to me! And also, tell me if I've done something wrong, e.g: "Squall/Rinoa/Zell/any other character would never do/say that!" Thanks! I love you, everyone who's reading!
