"Idiot!"
Zell paused outside the door, keycard in hand.
"Moron!"
He took a deep breath, preparing himself to open the door.
Zell opened the door to find his worst fears confirmed: Seifer 'watching' TV. In this case, 'watching' meant clutching the remote in one hand and flipping channels faster than the eye could follow while pacing, ranting, and gesticulating like a spider monkey on speed.
The television rested on a home shopping channel for a half-second, as a woman showed off an ugly piece of jewelry.
Seifer muttered incomprehensibly, jabbing the remote control in the direction of the TV.
The channel flicked to a quiz show for an instant. Zell didn't have time to read the question printed on the screen.
"1846!" Seifer yelled, changing the channel again.
This time, the TV landed on a fishing program. Seifer roared in rage, not even forming words.
Zell stood in the doorway, watching Seifer in his rage. In an instant, Seifer noticed the martial artist standing there and whirled on him. Zell felt like Seifer could attack at any moment.
"Hi," he said.
Seifer's face fell and his shoulders slumped.
"Hi, Zell," he replied.
"Fujin, huh?" Zell asked.
Seifer's face hardened again and he resumed pacing one more, arms flailing as he spoke.
"Of course it's Fujin! He's got her, he's got all of them, and we're just supposed to sit here with our thumbs up our asses and take it? How long are we going to wait for Squall to come out of the damn coma?"
He paused by the windows, slumping once more.
"We were almost out. The ship was right there. We almost made it. I could have saved her, and then..."
"Seifer, don't—"
"No!" he slammed his fist on the windowsill, and the glass trembled in protest. "I could have saved her, and then I stopped. Why did I stop?" He turned on Zell. "You made me stop. You and Quistis. I could have saved her and you stopped me."
"We were only doing—"
"You stopped me and now I'll never see her again. She's dead or in chains now, and I could have saved her! And instead of making things right, I'm here, thinking about what I should have done."
"You can't—"
"I was supposed to protect her! I was supposed to look out for her. We were a posse, a team, and I deserted her when it mattered the most."
"Stop!" Zell commanded. Seifer's eyes filled with fury and his hands clenched into fists. "Sit down."
"Don't start with me," Seifer hissed.
"Sit down!" Zell shouted, his voice echoing off the walls of their room.
Seifer nodded, mute, and plopped down on the floor without protest. Zell walked over and sat on the floor facing him.
"There's nothing we can do right now, nothing that wouldn't get us killed in the process. We're no good to Fujin dead."
"But we can't just sit here—"
"What do you want?" Zell asked. "You want to fight someone? Let's go to the training center and kick the crap out of each other. Will that make you feel better? Will that get Fujin back?"
Seifer shook his head.
"Will shouting at the TV help anything? Or pounding on the walls?"
Seifer shook his head again, looking more like a sullen child than a trained mercenary.
"Believe me, Seifer. I want to get Fujin back. I know how much she means to you. For years, she was all you had and you were all she had. You two depended on each other, and I know how much it hurts. I hurt for you. When I see you like this, it pisses me off that there's nothing we can do about it. I hate seeing you hurt like this."
Zell reached out and took Seifer hand, intertwining their fingers.
"But I'd hate it more if you got killed. And Fujin would too. You know as well as I do that she wouldn't want you to risk your life for her. She knows the job. She knows the risks. And she knew what she was doing when she threw herself at the guards. She knew exactly what she was doing. And she did it for you. So you could get away, so you would survive, and so you would be able to rescue her. When the time is right."
Seifer opened his mouth to argue, but Zell silenced him.
"You can't do this half-assed. You can't rescue her by running off into the night. It's stupid, and you'll get yourself killed. And then who would rescue her? She needs you, Seifer, she needs you to save her. But to do that, you have to be alive. Understand?"
Seifer nodded.
"So I want you to promise me: no crazy schemes, no half-formed plans, no suicide missions. No blackmailing Nida to fly you to Garden in the dead of night. Okay?"
Seifer nodded again.
"Promise."
"I promise, Zell," Seifer said, leaning in and sealing the promise with a kiss.
Zell smiled as he pulled away.
"I have an early morning tomorrow, so I'm going to bed," he said, rising to his feet.
"I'm pretty tired, too," Seifer said, standing as well. "All this ranting takes a lot out of me."
"Not too much, I hope," Zell winked.
Seifer gave Zell a brisk push on the chest, sending the shorter man sprawling on the bed.
"You wish, Chicken-Wuss."
* *
Seifer waited until Zell's breathing took on the regular rhythm of sleep. He listened to the fighter breathing for a long moment, and then stood up, moving soundlessly across the floor as he dressed.
He opened the door just wide enough to slide through, and then glanced back at Zell, still curled up in bed.
"Sorry, Zell," he whispered.
Zell smiled to himself, somewhat sad and somewhat satisfied as his lover closed the door. Zell's heart lurched a little in fear.
"Come back safe," he whispered in response.
* *
He flew. Sometimes lazy eights, sometimes death-defying barrel rolls. He darted between clouds and hedgehopped over city streets. Birds scattered to get out of his way and pedestrians shook their fists in envy-tainted-anger.
He looked over at his co-pilot, his father, who smiled, giving him the thumbs-up. Nida grinned in response and punched the engine, swooping into an Immelmann. He pulled back hard, causing the ship to dart into the sky. Nida felt the pressure of gravity tugging at him, angered by his defiance.
They leveled off and Nida turned to his father once more. "Watch this," he said, savoring his father's barely-contained fear, as the ship started a horrific descent. "Someday, they'll be calling this the 'Nomura Drop.'"
Then, the ship exploded.
Three blasts, each sounding like the crack of doom rocketed through the ship. They plummeted, not with the perfect control of the Nomura Drop, but a wild, unplanned dive. The ground rushed up at them and Nida envisioned, for a moment, the spirits of gravity taking their revenge.
He sat bolt upright in bed, panting in terror, the dream ended. But the explosions remained, echoing through his foggy skull.
It took Nida a moment to pinpoint the origin of the sound: the door. Someone pounding on his door, the sound vicious and insistent.
"I'm coming, I'm coming," he mumbled staggering to his feet. He pulled on some pants and a t-shirt and punched the button to open the door.
A hand lanced through the opening and seized him by the collar. He had an instant to recognize Seifer's face, and then he felt himself pulled down the hallway, powerless to resist.
Seifer ignored Nida's protestations and questions until they reached the hanger. They entered the massive room and Seifer released the pilot, pointing to the Ragnarok.
"Fly," he commanded.
"Seifer, what the hell is going on here? You wake me up out of a sound sleep – and a very nice dream, I might add – only to drag me here in the middle of the night and—"
"Fly," Seifer ordered again.
"No!" Nida exclaimed. "Not until you give me some answers!"
Seifer grabbed Nida by the collar once more and pulled him close, close enough to feel Seifer's hot breath. Nida couldn't help but noticing the threat implicit in the gesture.
"You owe her, damn it, you owe her," he snarled.
"What? Who?" Nida didn't fight Seifer's grasp. He knew he couldn't get away, and while he didn't think Seifer meant him any harm, Nida hadn't seen the blond this hostile in years. It reminded him of the Seifer who ran the Disciplinary Committee, punishing all those who annoyed him. And yet, something seemed more calculated about Seifer's rage, more focused.
"When we were on that survival hike in Trabia, you drank all your water early on in the day. Six miles to go, all of it uphill, and who shared her canteen with you? You wouldn't have passed if she hadn't done that. You would have had to drop out."
Now, Nida understood. "Fujin," he whispered.
"You owe her," Seifer said again. "And I'm here to collect on the debt." He released Nida, but did not step back. "Now fly."
Nida nodded. "Ragnarok is too conspicuous. They'd notice it missing and call in Laguna's fleet. They'd be all over us before we even left the continent."
"That's a problem, isn't it?" Seifer growled.
"Hey, no worries," Nida said, putting up his hands and taking a step back. "We'll just take the Discovery."
Seifer balked. "Huh?"
"Have you forgotten?" Nida asked. He gestured over to a corner of the hanger where the ship recovered from Videlic Arms sat. "The Discovery."
"It works?"
"Zell and Irvine and I have been working on it. Flies like a dream."
"No 'bugs' this time?"
Nida shrugged, then turned away and started strolling towards the ship. "What's the worst that can happen?" he called over his shoulder. "We lose power over the ocean and die horrible, screaming deaths or get shot down by the Apocalypse." He stopped walking and turned back to Seifer, his eyes glittering.
"But that's what makes it interesting."
AN: Two chapters in two days! What can I say – Seifer gets impatient.