The Delinquent

Poor ol' Lucas only wants his girlfriend back…

Squall found himself in a familiar position. He lay on his bed, his hands behind his head staring at the ceiling. Confusion racked through his brain, he'd experienced with Rinoa something that he could only refer to with the word bliss and then hadn't heard from her for the rest of the day.

He'd expected her to come over at some point but it was getting on in the day now and he still hadn't seen her.

He usually wasn't one to gripe about something like that, it was actually usually a good thing. Most of his romances were better left as a one night stand; it was more uncomfortable when they did ring.

Every time he heard someone coming up the stairs he'd hope that it was Rinoa, so far he'd been disappointed.

He got off his bed and walked towards his window, opening his curtains for the first time that day, he could see Rinoa's house mere meters away. His vision turned off towards the ocean, something his house had a perfect view of.
Dark clouds were looming towards Balamb; it was definitely an unexpected ending for such a brilliant day.

For the first time in about three hours his thoughts shifted to something other than Rinoa. Today was Sunday so that meant that tomorrow he had to go to school. He hadn't actually planned on going but with the day starting to end he began to think it might be his only chance to see Rinoa.

'So much for not thinking about her,' He thought cynically.

He heard his phone beep from his bed side table. Diving at breakneck speed he grabbed the phone and eagerly read the txt message. Once again disappointment surged through him, Seifer being his txt-er.

: got hold of sum firewrks. U cumin:

Squall felt his troubles melt away at the prospect of causing some sort of damage. His fingers went to work immediately; destruction was just the cure for such a mental bender.

After finding out that everyone was at Irvine's, he took off out the door, only stopping to momentarily lie to Raine about where he was going and why.

She wouldn't approve of what he was going off to do; she was the more conservative member of the family. It was easy to see that Raine had more of an influence on Ellone than she'd ever had on him. He'd taken more to his Laguna's "you only live once" philosophy.

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Squall felt a droplet of water lightly fall on his hand and grimaced. That meant he would have to put the top up on his car which was a pain in the ass. Originally it had had a button but that had soon been fucked so now it had to be done manually.

'What the fuck do they expect to do with fireworks in this fucking weather?' Squall complained to himself.

Nonetheless he was soon zooming down the road, not bothering to slow down with the bad weather settling itself in. The rain began to get so heavy that he had to turn his lights on. Balamb weather was always erratic; being so close to the ocean left them open pray for fucked up weather.

Squall pulled up at a rather rustic house, it had been built about sixty years ago so it went with the fashion of the time, much like many houses in the Balamb area. It was a pretty old town so most of the houses could be as old as a hundred years or more.

It didn't really have a front lawn; it just went from sidewalk to house. There was a backyard though, but even that wasn't something to brag about it. It was a two story home with Victorian looking white railing along the roof of the entrance area and a big rusty looking door bell.

The house itself was a light greeny colour but had been worn away quite severely over the years, the window frames were white and it had a big black pointy roof.

Squall had to park his car down the street a bit, everyone else's vehicles already taking up most of the closest parking.

He put the collar of his shirt up as he exited the car, not liking the feeling of the rain on the back of his neck one bit.

He rang the doorbell and breathed on his hands, trying to warm them up a little. It was times like this that he wished he'd thought of bringing a hoodie or something.

The door opened and Squall recognised the woman behind it as Irvine's mother.

She was quite tall; it was her side of the family that Irvine got his height. Her hair had nearly turned completely grey but there were parts that still remained her original colour of black. She had a pair of dark brown sweat pants on with a slightly baggy white t-shirt that had some sort of nasty gold design on the front of it.

She had a certain kind of young-ness to her that made her easy to talk to. Her face radiated a childlike curiosity to it that you never really saw on most old people. It was almost the same as his father but not in an annoying way.

She smiled cheerfully at him; she liked it when Irvine had friends over. She always tried to join the conversation and learn all the gossip.

"Come in Squall come in!" She said as she ushered him in.

Inside the house was one of the tackiest houses on the face of the earth. There was some sort of brightly coloured pottery for every occasion, place and shelf.

"I brought some new ornaments today." Irvine's mother said excitedly.

She reached up onto a particular shelf and pulled down a yellow, pottery, birds' house with two blue birds perched on top of it. It was only about the size of a fist and the paint on it wasn't exactly the most artistic work ever done.

"What's it for?" Squall enquired monotonously.

"You put your steelo in there."

Squall raised his eyebrows, not exactly knowing what the hell a steelo was. He couldn't actually say he'd heard the reference before but didn't want to get her into a drawn out lecture about every little tiny thing about it.

"Well isn't that clever." Squall replied sarcastically.

"I thought it was." She beamed as she placed it back in its location.

Squall took his chance to zip out of the room before she started on about something else. He darted up to Irvine's lounge, knowing that that's where they'd all be.

Irvine's mum had left his dad about two years ago and his mother liked the company.

"Finally," Seifer grumbled as he entered the room.

Squall flipped him the bird and sat down on the last available seat.

"So, what's this about fireworks?" Squall asked.

"I hope you kids aren't planning anything." Irvine's mother sang out from the kitchen.

Irvine rolled his eyes but didn't make any sort of reply to his mothers claim. She was more than used to it; as long as he didn't get caught she didn't really care.

It was then that Squall noticed both Rinoa AND Zell's absence. He didn't want to ask about either though, if he asked straight out about then both then he was leaving himself open and it was the same if he just asked for one of them.

His friends were like angry sharks, they'd take any opportunity to feed off someone's ridicule. Never publicly, unless it was someone that they didn't like, or who just happened to become a casualty of there antics.

"That was a lure, we're on the hunt." Irvine replied.

Squall mentally cringed, not liking the sound of that one bit. All he could think about was that Zell must be late and they were all going to barricade him with questions, accusations and lots and lots of shit.

"For what?" Squall enquired casually.

"Zell was spotted earlier today entering the Balamb hotel, why would he be going in there? And it's obviously a secret or he would've just paraded her up to his room like usual." Selphie said.

"So you're thinking of barging in and humiliating him." Squall finished.

"Not exactly…" Quistis chuckled.

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Squall flipped absent-mindedly through the pages of some chick magazine. He threw it on the stack of magazines that he'd already looked at and grabbed another from the ample pile that sat beside him.

He felt something wet touch his collar bone and shrugged Selphie's sleeping form off his arm. She'd fallen asleep about fifteen minutes ago; they'd only been waiting about two hours.

"Why did I agree to come here?" Squall asked no one in particular.

No one answered either, everyone probably thinking exactly the same thing. After about the first hour it had become a little tedious.

The plan was to wait patiently until Zell exited his suit and came downstairs, which he eventually would have to, then they would bombard him with precisely the same thing Squall had thought he was going to get.

"This is so boring!" Irvine exclaimed.

"Well I thought the sighting of him would be enough to make some sort of allegation but apparently we absolutely must see this with our own eyes." Quistis sighed.

"Well your ideas weren't exactly making headlines Quistis my sweet," Seifer grinded mockingly.

The onslaught of a potential argument started to rise up, something that they didn't need to happen. Zell was crafty, craftier than a lot of other seventeen year olds. Squall knew that if Zell heard their voices downstairs then he'd shimmy his way out some other way.

"You guys, we have to be a little bit more low-key." Squall snapped.

All that followed was a few hmph's and the violent turning of magazine pages.

About ten minutes later there attention was triggered when they heard Zell's loud, obnoxious laugh bellow throughout the hotel.

He could be seen making his way down the stairwell, waving goodbye to some mystery woman whose identity couldn't be determined.

He turned and stared towards the doorway, instantly noticing his friends sitting in the waiting area with smiles upon their faces.

It almost seemed to be happening in slow motion for Zell, his happiness floated away and a loud "NO" escaped his mouth. He stopped in his tracks, trying to think as quickly as he could. There had to be some sort of excuse, some sort of escape that he could take. He took his little black book very seriously and this catastrophe was going to cost him his dignity for at least a week.

This wasn't saying that he was ashamed of whoever this mystery person may have been it was just her position on the pyramid of social status was on completely different end of the board to his own.

"Snapped!" Selphie yelled excitedly.

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Lucas was more than a little displeased by the arrival of the rain. His temperament seemed to have gotten worse with its development and they'd now retreated to Lucas's car. Rinoa noticed that it was one of the shabby rent-a-car's that always flooded the streets of Balamb. Tourists used them frequently but Rinoa couldn't imagine anything like this had ever happened in one of them.

Rinoa fidgeted anxiously with her dress, not wanting to talk with Lucas again but not really wanting to sit in this uncomfortable silence for much longer. She wouldn't have to though; Lucas's cellphone began ringing once again.

He didn't move though, obviously having no intention of answering it at all but as the ring became more and more annoying he finally gave into it and picked it up with an angry "What!"

Previously Rinoa might've tried to yell for help but she feared another assault of Lucas's anger so she kept her mouth shut.

"I know Marcia…" Lucas sighed.

He glanced at Rinoa for a second and then forced his gaze back in front of him. He really did hate seeing her like this but as he'd come to realize before, it was too late. This was the only way for him and he'd be damned before he didn't give it one last try.

"Don't be like that! You know that you won't."

Hope, it finally entered Rinoa's system after being vacate nearly the entire day. Maybe Marcia was threatening to tell the police or her friends, anyone. She knew that Marcia knew what was going on; she could tell that from Lucas's side of the conversation.

Surely Marcia wouldn't just sit back and let this happen.

"We can't just let her do this to herself! I knew you wouldn't understand."

Suddenly a thought came into Rinoa's mind, Balamb wasn't exactly a big continent but it was big enough. Even if Marcia did tell someone would she really be found? Did anyone actually know where she was? She was a general's daughter but that only meant that she'd be televised when they found her dead and rotting corpse. She couldn't count on Caraway to worry anyway, with the tumultuous relationship that they had had recently he'd probably just think that she'd run away or something.

Her hope only lay in two possible outcomes; that Marcia finally gave in and told someone or Caraway went looking for her. And the first place he'd look would be Squall's.

"So you're willing to leave her with those freaks?"

"They're not freaks…" Rinoa whispered.

Lucas glared at her for a second but didn't say anything, Rinoa had kinda wished he hadn't heard that but obviously he had.

Considering the fact that his main mission here was to rid her of her feelings for them, she didn't expect anything good to come of saying those three words.

She leaned her head against the window and watched the rain cascade down the glass. For a second she actually felt as though she was sitting in her room, just gazing out her window watching her world pass by. Reality was a bitch though so she was quickly thrown out of this daydream.

"Rinoa, I have to go for a couple of hours." Lucas stated.

Rinoa nodded, she didn't have the strength to enquire about anything he had to say. Her fiery spirit had been broken in with all the fear she'd endured today. She knew things were only going to get worse as well.

"I'm going to have to leave you here but I trust that when I get back you'll still be here." Lucas continued.

He really was delusional; he actually believed that Rinoa wasn't going to make any attempt to free herself from his insanity. This opportunity was too good to be true.

He led her out of the car, the rain drenching her nearly instantly. He pulled out a length of rope and Rinoa's previous optimism shattered.

Her arms were tied around a tree and she flopped down in the mud, watching Lucas's retreating figure.

She watched him reverse out of the trees and disappear into the forest.

She got to work immediately, trying to wrench herself from the ropes. If she could get free then she could at least get away from him. She might not be able to run to Balamb but she could work something out when she got away.

The rain at least lubricated her hands a little but it made them hurt more when she tried to rip her hands out.

She heard an all too familiar sound of metal scraping against metal coming towards her. The sound made the hairs stand up on the back of her neck and her eyes widened. It was the same noise she'd heard in the ruins before the Grats came.

That's me done. It must really fuck you off that Rinoa was only mentioned in the last section of the story but I'm a bitch like that. She still hasn't been found but c'mon she's not ganna suddenly be saved hours after being nabbed.

I finally offended someone though! YE-AH! The only thing that pissed me off was that it was for something that I didn't even think was offensive! I know I shouldn't be happy about that but I've been waiting for TWENTY FIVE chapters for someone to be upset by something and it finally happened.

Enough of this shit though, what'd ya think?