Disclaimer/Note: I do not own Final Fantasy VIII, or any of the characters in this story (unless otherwise stated). I'm not making any money off this story; it is being written for my own sick twisted amusement. All original concepts in this story are original (duh) and belong to me. If you steal anything, then I will kill you. Several times. This story is a novelization of the game, taking place from slightly before the beginning until slightly after the end, and contains violence, language, angst, romance in varying forms, mind games, and psychological trauma/mental instabilities. Please enjoy.


Queen of All Time:
Chapter Two -- Change

The little boy was fidgeting -- wringing his hands as he bit his lower lip, tears streaming down his face -- by the bed when Cold Eyes woke up. In truth, those soft hiccups that always followed the little boy's broken sobs were what had roused him from the dazed black of his unconscious. Turning his head slightly to better see the boy, Cold Eyes watched him shaking, saw pale hands go up to cover wide and fearful eyes. He watched the little boy shift uncomfortably on the short stool where he was seated, gaze following as his younger companion tried to wipe the salty liquid from his face. Bright light came in through the curtainless window, and Cold Eyes sat up.

There was a sharp pain between his brows when he did so, and he reached up to his forehead in confusion. He felt his fingers brush across a wet and slightly sticky bandage, half-numbed hands sliding along the gauze that encircled his head, angling down and covering his right eye out of necessity. Vaguely, as if through water, he heard someone speak, head turning automatically in the general direction of the voice. Standing next to the boy was an older woman, her greying hair piled in a neat bun high on the back of her head. She was smiling, arms crossed over her chest.

"It's about time. Come on now, say your name for me," she had said, tilting her body back against the wall as she waited for his answer. Cold Eyes looked away. What was his name? The name the little boy urgently whispered to him now didn't feel right, didn't seem to fulfill the request. A word, something he was called, danced outside his reach briefly until he felt the familiar presence of ice in his mind, murmuring the correct reply.

". . .Squall."

"Good. So how do you feel, Squall?" the woman -- the doctor, the ice told him softly -- straightened, looking over him critically. Squall paused again before answering the question, thinking of how and what to say. He wanted to know why his forehead hurt, wanted to know if she knew what happened. But he didn't want to ask, and so chose a different response.

"Fine."

"That's all, just 'fine'?" she said, watching him strangely, then shrugging it off and walking back to her desk. "If you say so. . . You need to start taking it easy in training, though. Next time you might not be lucky enough to get away with just a scar and a couple burns." Squall jerked at that last statement, another abrupt surge of pain when he did so, and his hand fell from his face to rest on one knee. A scar? He was going to have a scar? With a heavy groan, Squall slowly eased himself back on the bed, laying an arm over his now-closed eyes. He didn't want any goddamn distinguishing marks. . .

"Let me guess. . . you were fighting with Seifer; again. Do you realize that the only time I ever see you is when he drags you into my infirmary?"

Maybe he just likes seeing me high on the morphine you pump into me, you heinous bitch.

"Have you ever even tried ignoring him, Squall? Or at the very least telling him that you don't want to fight?"

". . . I can't just run away." From where the doctor was sitting, Squall could hear her tapping the small phone on her desk rhythmically with a pen. She was thinking about what he had said -- he knew that -- and it bothered him. Why should she care, anyway? It was none of her business whether or not he fought with the white knight in his spare time. Hell, they weren't even fighting. They were dueling.

"So, you wanna be cool, huh?" and here the doctor chuckled, shaking her head as she picked up the receiver and began to dial. "Well, I guess boys will be boys. . ." Squall scowled, shifting his arm to glare at the smudged reflection in the glass wall next to the bed. His mind drifted away from the doctor's casual conversations restlessly. He wanted to leave. To get out and move and. . . and what?

"So we meet again, Squall. . ."

A slow blink, and he refocused his vision to look at the girl on the other side of the glass. From somewhere in the back of his subconscious -- slowly drifting out of the ice -- he recognized her. He remembered seeing that sweet smile and those soft, brown eyes. The ice moved, bringing cold limbs up to ward off the idle inquiries, trying to get away. It did not want to give anything back to him, did not think that it was needed. She's not important, you don't need to know her. . . it said, quietly brushing frigid fingers through his mind. He shuddered involuntarily, looking back to the ceiling as a sign of reluctant consent.

The infirmary door opened with a soft mechanical hiss, the light click of heels on the clean-swept floor Squall's only warning of an entry. He heard a woman's exasperated sigh, the same sigh he heard everyday, third period, at least once a day. The woman -- your teacher, Squall. . . the ice informed him, the touches almost a caress by this point -- walked to the side of the bed, leaning over slightly to look at him. She had a mother's look about her, like she was here to see her son rather than her student.

"I knew it'd be either you or Seifer," she said, crossing her arms over her chest before taking a step back. "What am I gonna do with you two, hm?"

You could always kill us.

"Can you make it back to class?"

He narrowed his eyes, brows furrowing for a moment before he winced, waiting for the throbbing pain to subside. His teacher smiled, shaking her head knowingly as she turned from the bed and headed back to the door. Unsteadily, he got up to follow her, teeth digging into his lower lip with every step. He had to shift most of his weight onto his left leg, knowing that his limp was agonizingly clear to anyone, to everyone. The ice pressed its gently burning lips to the inside of his skull in hopes that it would deaden the wound, but to no avail.

Squall brushed the silent voice aside, banishing the ice and all its searing cold to the back of his consciousness, turning his attention to his chattering teacher:

"--xam's today. Is there anything you want to talk about, Squall? You look like you've got something on your mind."

Why does everyone ask me that? If I wanted to say something, I would.

"No, n--"

"Not really," she finished in unison with him, trying to suppress a fit of giggles behind one hand and failing miserably. Squall bit into the side of his tongue, vivid eye scanning down the length of the bright hallway. He hated it when she played this game; she didn't even do it right. But maybe Seifer was right. . . maybe he should be a little more unpredictable. He stood there, head cocked to the side with one bruised and bandaged hand on his hip as he glared back at her.

"What's so funny?"

"Oh, nonono! Sorry. . ." she took a moment to compose herself enough to speak before finishing with a radiant smile. "I'm just happy, Squall. I'm starting to feel like a know you a little."

You haven't got a clue.

Turning, they walked in silence for a short way, until the lack of sound began to grate on Squall's nerves. His teacher -- Instructor Trepe, Squall, the ice said, in all its infinite patience -- was usually talking, and when she was just watching him, quietly watching and smiling at him, it was irritating. It almost made him want to hit her. Instead, though, he broke the silence:

"I'm more complex than you think."

"Then tell me," was her immediate response as she took his hand and stopped walking. "Tell me more about you; tell me all about yourself. Tell me everything."

Even if I told you, you wouldn't know me. You wouldn't understand. Nobody could ever understand. I don't want you to know me. Stop pretending you care, and just leave. Me. Alone.

"It's none--"

"Of your business," again, she ended his sentence with him, and again she didn't notice his dark glare because she was laughing too hard. Wiping happily at her watering eyes, Instructor Trepe continued down the halls with him, giggling and smiling like--

Like she was on a date with her goddamn boyfriend.

"Oh, come on, Squall! You know I'm just playing around; can't you at least try smiling? For once?" she pleaded as they stepped onto the elevator for the second floor, knocking him lightly in the arm and painfully aware of how he flinched at the contact. But Squall just stared ahead, that apathetic, rigid look unmoving -- and totally unnerving -- on his red and blistered features.

"Is that an order, Instructor?"

"No, Squall," she said with a sigh, stepping out into the second floor hall when the doors opened again. "It's not an order; it's just a request. . ."

He didn't bother to respond, knew that it wasn't really necessary. She wouldn't expect him to anyway. He was glad; now she'd shut up. Now she'd stop trying to play this game with him. She could never really play any of their games right. There was always something wrong with the way that she went about it, like she wasn't quite sure how it was supposed to be done. It didn't really matter, though. Instructor Trepe paused just inside the door, smoothing her skirt as he walked into his third period class.

All sound died at his entry.

Oh fuck you. Fuck all you bastards. I don't look that damn bad.

Taking a deep, steadying breath, Squall limped over to his seat in the back of room, ignoring the stares of his fellow students. His teacher was still standing there, offering him a sympathetic smile before addressing the class:

"Well, since I have your attention, we'll end the lesson with the alternate schedule for today, and only today, class," the smile that touched her lips grew. "The field exam for SeeD will be taking place later this afternoon. For those who are not participating, you are to remain here in study hall. All field exam participants will have free time until the exam. At sixteen-hundred hours you will meet me in the entrance corridor. I will announce the team assignments there." - Instructor Trepe removed her glasses, leaning back against the door frame. - "Now then, if there are no questions, you may be excused."

The words barely registered with him, and he made no active show of acknowledgment when she asked him to stay after class for a few minutes. He simply kept his head down.

("Hey, pay attention.")

Squall jerked, looking up and to his right at the owner of the voice he couldn't hear. His vivid gaze passed a dirty uniform and an oddly out-of-place grin before meeting with a pair of sharp green eyes -- a white butterfly-stitch between them holding a deep gouge shut. A hand reached out then, flicking the bandage on his forehead lightly with a laugh.

("Nice scar, Leonhart.")

He blinked slowly, confused, as the white shadow -- the hallucination seeming more real than the little boy and the ice, in a way -- left, still snickering at its own private joke. Again his hand came up, touching the gauze covering his right eye, fingers barely straying over the bridge of his nose where it was wet. It was red. Squall stared, not-quite fascinated as he rubbed the liquid -- just enough of it there to taint his fingertips -- between thumb and forefinger.

It's bleeding again. . .?

"--Squall? Are you listening to me, Squall?"

Instructor Trepe was sitting on the edge of his desk now, hands folded in her lap. He dropped his hand, wiping the blood off on his pantleg. The Beast was awakening now, letting out a low growling sound, like a big cat's attempt at a purr. Squall nodded, trying to block out the rumbling in his mind.

"Will you tell me what happened then? You know it's my job to ask," she quickly added at his dark look. "And besides, I'm worried about you. I know that you two fight all the time, but it's never been this bad before. What on earth got you two started this time?"

Squall didn't say anything for a long time. He just closed his eyes and turned his face towards the floor. The cut was throbbing again; the unspoken words and unfelt touches from the ice doing nothing to soothe it. Another deep rumbling, retractable claws digging into long-forgotten thoughts and memories with agonizing clarity, and he held back the look of pain and sound that threatened to press pass his lips into reality.

". . .Nothing," he murmured as he touched the chains and pretty metal collar that fitted loosely around their necks. "It's none of your business. . ."

She said something when he stood, reached out to him when he walked past her to the door, but he chose not to hear her through the roar of his own psychosis.