DISCLAIMER: Stiiiiiiiiiiiiiiill not mine. Hell, I don't even know where my glasses are right now, which is a severe problem.
AUTHOR'S NOTES: And chapter six! Believe it or not, I had chapter seven done before I ever wrote a word for this one - when you see chapter seven, you'll see why. So a lot of this was trying to bridge the gaps between five and seven, and set up for things I need to happen beyond seven. This story's coming to feel more and more episodic to me - that's not necessarily a bad thing, but it's not the usual form I write in, and so it jars me just slightly when I reread it. But I have so many people and so many things going on that if I didn't hit the high points like I'm doing, it would take absolutely forever to do this.
Anyway, varied chapter coming up - but one that I think is pretty fun. Don't forget, review replies and fun facts are up on my livejournal, www . livejournal . com / users / tairako (copy, paste, delete spaces, hit enter), and sit back, relax, and enjoy - because chapter seven is gigantic. Now I'm off to hunt my missing glasses. See ya (no pun intended)!
(Soundtrack: "Melissa" by Porno Graffiti, from Full Metal Alchemist - the first opening song.)
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
Sora wasn't entirely sure how it happened, but somehow a week passed without him really knowing it. What with Namine avoiding him, Kairi trying to wrench information out of him, finally agreeing to practice against Leon (and getting beaten just as badly as when he fought Cloud), and trying to prepare for the Competition, keeping track of time completely got away from him. It was only as he returned from a rather uncomfortable night of hanging out with Kyo, Yusaru, and the girls (who apparently didn't know about the Namine situation specifically, but knew that something had happened) that he realized there was only a little over two weeks left until the Competition. The subject had become such a regular part of his life that he ignored it now; the repeated references passed right over his head. They still didn't know if Leon was going to participate or not, as he hadn't brought the subject up again and both he and Cloud knew better than to repeat themselves. He had no idea how he had lost that much track of time, but it had happened, so there was no use lamenting over it.
He'd gotten in the habit of spending a little time every night going over the math he was supposed to help Kairi with the next day so he would look like he knew what he was doing; she was improving in leaps and bounds, and one day she'd probably surpass him. But for right now he was still ahead of her, and intended to stay that way, so his credibility wouldn't go down in flames. He was fully intending to go back to his apartment and hit the books as he walked home – but when he entered the Third District, something caught his eye.
Any nightlife Traverse had (which wasn't much, unfortunately) tended to be concentrated in the First District, with only private parties given by residents drawing crowds in the Second and Third, and those were few and far between. So if someone wanted to avoid large crowds of people at night, the Third District was a good place to do it in, just as Cloud was doing right then.
Except he wasn't avoiding them alone.
Cloud was once again seated in front of the small fountain in the corner of the district, where there was enough light to see by, leaning against the wall behind him and one arm (the metal one) propped on his knee. With him, sitting with her legs tucked neatly under her body, was the pink-clad girl Sora had seen him with before: Aerith. Yuffie's friend and, he now knew from Kairi, Riku's cousin.
Sora started to grin. There was no way Cloud could avoid it this time.
Neither of them had seen him yet, as they were talking quietly with each other, Cloud looking more genuinely relaxed than Sora could ever remember seeing him. With his friends, Cloud smiled and made jokes, but the smiles were never untainted by something else and the jokes were usually at least a little acidic. Apparently there was something about this healer girl that put him at ease, that drove the bitterness out of Cloud Strife, an amazing, almost impossible feat.
She heard him first as he crossed the square and turned to look at him; her eyes widened a little and she nudged Cloud, pointing to him. Sora knew very well the look of resignation that passed over Cloud's face when he saw his friend, but Sora just grinned and stopped in front of them, looking at Aerith. "Hi, I'm Sora," he told her, sticking out a hand for her to shake.
With a light chuckle, she took his hand, not shaking it but simply holding it and smiling at him. "I'm Aerith… Though I suspect you already knew that." Her voice was almost musical, and very gentle, yet lively, and Sora began to understand just how Cloud could be so at ease around her. She radiated peace the way Leon radiated intimidation to the uninitiated. It would probably be interesting to put them both in a room and see which "radiation" came out on top – or if Leon softened at all. He could even see how Yuffie would like her – she just felt like one of those people it was impossible not to like. Someone that even Cloud could talk to.
"Nice to meet you at last, Kairi's talked about you a little – and him, too," he added, indicating Cloud almost as an afterthought. "Though more Kairi."
Aerith looked at the blond young man with an amused smile, letting go of Sora's hand to rest one on Cloud's arm. "You haven't even told your best friend? Cloud, I'm disappointed."
"There's nothing to tell," Cloud said, shrugging a little, though without the annoyance that Sora would have expected. "We're friends, every once in awhile we meet up and talk."
She smiled and shook her head, looking up at Sora. "I'm his healer. But I'd like to think I'm his friend, as well. Thank you for being there for him; you've helped him quite a lot in the past few weeks."
"Aerith," Cloud protested, turning – Sora was completely shocked to see this – somewhat red at the young woman's comment. "You're gonna give him a bigger head than he already has, and that's the last thing I need."
Sora grinned again. "It'll end up almost as big as yours, then." He laughed at the half-indignant, half-guilty look on his friend's face. Deciding to give them their privacy now that he'd actually met the ever-elusive girl, he started to turn away and raised a hand to wave over his shoulder at them. "I've gotta get in, I'll see you guys later."
"Maybe I'll see you at the infirmary – and next time, come to me instead of picking any locks." The hint of laughter in Aerith's voice just made him laugh and give her a mild salute, and then he began trotting home once more.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
"Kairi, for the last time, no," Sora insisted as they walked to the library the next day, turning his red face away from her.
"Soraaaaaaaaa." The girl dragged his name out in both a groan and a demand, and he knew that she was just not going to give up on this. "I'm your best girl friend, I have a right to know."
Fortunately the angle of his face prevented her from seeing his wince at her phrasing. Ever since the Namine incident, Kairi had been trying to get him to tell her the name of the girl he liked. He half-suspected that she didn't think there was a girl at all, and was only using that as an excuse to not go out with Namine. The thing was, if there really had been no girl, he would've just made up a name to get her to stop saying anything, but since the girl was Kairi herself he didn't want to tell a lie that would come back to bite him later. So he put up with it; she only did it for a few minutes a day, and it could have been a lot worse.
"Kairi, please, just drop it."
And finally she did, as he knew she would. "All right, all right." She sighed, kicking along a small stone with her shoe. "But someday I want to know."
"Someday," he agreed. Someday he would tell her – but not right now, not with their friendship still building and Namine and Riku and… the whole mess.
"…Sora? What kind of girls do you like?" she asked suddenly. He looked at her half in shock, and she hurriedly justified the question. "I'm not asking what's she like, I just got curious! I mean, we've been talking about this for days now, and… well, I know what my other friends like, so what about you?"
He didn't answer for a minute, but she could tell he was thinking, trying to pull everything into order. "I like… girls I can be friends with, and who can laugh."
She giggled, hiding her mouth with a hand. "I could see how you'd need that."
Oh god she looks so cute when she does that. He grinned back at her, managing not to blush at his thought. "And someone who likes jokes, and having fun, and getting into trouble…"
"You bad boy," she replied with another grin.
"Not too much trouble, though, 'cause then people start to think you're the cause of all the trouble around and that doesn't help anything. And, uh…" He tried to come up with something else, but anything else he said would point Kairi directly back at herself, which wasn't what he wanted. "I guess that's it, really. What about you?"
She blushed faintly. "What about me?"
"I just told you what I like in girls, it's your turn to tell me what you like in guys." So I can see if I have even a little chance with you…
As he had, Kairi didn't answer for a few moments, still that barely red color as she thought it over. "I guess… a lot of what you want. I mean, crushes are fun, but after that's all gone you need to be friends, you know?" He nodded in perfect understanding. "And someone who can laugh… and make me laugh. Someone who listens to me but can think on his own, who doesn't take himself too seriously. Oh, and tall is good."
Damn; tall was reserved for Cloud and Leon, not him. Still, her other stuff wasn't too far off the mark with how they already were… Maybe he really did have a chance.
Maybe. If Riku vanished off the face of the world.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
Riku was frowning at them from his place around the corner at the other end of the alley where Kairi and Sora were standing, the two having arrived at the library but not gone in. He could tell just from watching them that they were close; and really, that didn't matter to him – well, only a little. It wasn't his place to say who Kairi could or couldn't be friends with, and he knew if he ever even thought about trying it she would kick him in the knee, but he respected her too much to even try. But watching Sora proved to him that the new kid did, indeed, like his best friend – the girl he himself had had a crush on for a year. It was all too obvious if you were paying attention for it, in the way that he spoke, that he moved, that he looked at her.
But Riku wasn't going to do anything about it. Hell, he couldn't blame Sora for falling for her, either; Kairi was just one of those girls that was made to draw in the guys. He also knew that Sora would never admit it to Kairi; he would've done it long before this if he was going to. And he knew that he was the better fighter. Unless Kairi had something to draw her attention away from him, she would go on liking Riku as she had for he didn't know how long. And when the Competition rolled around, he'd fight Sora and win, and Kairi would congratulate him with that special smile of hers and they'd walk around the festival hand in hand, enjoying the rest of the day together.
But that didn't mean he had to like Sora having a crush on her. Not at all.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
Leon couldn't believe he was out this early, but there were the facts. Even though he wasn't a late sleeper, Leon wasn't in the habit of leaving his apartment in the First District before one in the afternoon, what with one thing and another to take care of. But now it was before nine o'clock in the morning and there he was, walking through the doors that separated the First and Second Districts, heading for the little room where Cloud and Sora spent a good portion of their waking time when the three of them weren't together.
Now that Sora's mother had finished her unpacking and arranging, she had turned him loose in the mornings and he was free to take his "private" lesson along with Cloud, who was his teacher almost as much as Master Bersi. They both looked up as he pushed open the doors, shock registering on both their faces at seeing him there, and both stopped in their warm-ups without really realizing they had done it.
Master Bersi was no less surprised than they, but unlike them he didn't know Leon as anything other than the rather alarming young man who showed up in public once in awhile. Before either of his students could react, he'd planted himself firmly in front of Leon, frowning as though he was trying to solve a difficult problem, arms crossed but still clasping the hilt of his sword. "Can I help you?"
If there was one thing Leon knew, it was how to behave towards people who were armed when you weren't and outranked you. Stamping down his own frown at the man's assumption that he was going to try and threaten them or worse, he bowed quickly and respectfully. "I'd just hoped to watch, if that's all right with you."
Cloud shook his head, finally moving up next to his teacher. "Come on in, Leon, we're just about to get started."
"Yeah," chimed in Sora, with his rather odd gift for diffusing a situation. "He's about to kick my butt again, if that's still interesting to you."
Bersi turned to look at his students, asking the expected question with his expression rather than his words, and Cloud simply shrugged. "He's our friend." Despite Bersi's rather startled reaction, he didn't try and explain any further, instead simply pointed out to Leon the best place to stand to avoid the occasional flying weapon or body. After a moment, Bersi just shook his head and placed it firmly from his mind, and, as Leon settled into the place Cloud had indicated, began barking out orders.
These lessons were nothing like the free-for-alls that he'd inflicted on Sora in the boy's first week; these were controlled, precise drills, repeated over and over and then sped up until Sora was moving at the speed he would in a fight. It always started simply, with the most basic attacks and defenses, and as the hour went on would grow more and more complicated until when they finally did do them at full speed, it was almost as if they were fighting for real. Neither of them used a live weapon for this, but rather the wooden practice swords, which could still break a bone if swung hard enough.
Leon stayed in his corner, watching, and despite the bad start slowly felt his respect for Bersi grow. While he was trained, and trained his students, in a different style than Leon himself used, he was clearly a good instructor, an accomplished fighter on his own merit, and was good at judging when a fighter's resources were failing and what a pupil still needed to learn. He had the definite feeling that whatever the man with the eye patch chose to teach stuck with his students, whether they wanted it to or not. In that way, he reminded Leon of some of his own former teachers.
It was clear these types of lessons were only for Sora's benefit if you took it in terms of mechanics, but Cloud was certainly learning something as well – how to be an instructor. Fighting was Cloud's life; his injury made him unsuitable for some other jobs, but he pressed on with his fighting even with the pain that wearing the artificial arm brought him occasionally. Bersi definitely knew that, and so he was doing everything he could to prepare Cloud to find work he would like when his training was complete, which would only be a couple of months in the future, not too long after the Competition. Whether he stayed in Traverse and signed on to help Bersi out, or went somewhere else, he had as much, or more, of a chance at landing a position than anyone else.
After an hour, the last ten minutes of which had been spent in improving reflexes with Bersi calling out attacks and defenses that Sora had to immediately perform, the master called a halt to everything and told them both to cool down before they left. Leon hadn't said a word the entire time, and finally Bersi turned to look at him again, the frown still on his face but much less severe. Leon waited for him to decide how to best phrase whatever question he was going to ask, and finally the instructor simply came right out and said it. "Why in the hell are you really here?"
"I just wanted to see one of their practices. And see if I could speak to Master Carran."
"Wha'd'you want with him?"
"I was hoping he would be willing to teach me the trick to jumping from tall things and not breaking my head open."
"Huh?" Sora voiced from where he was stretching out his aching arms.
"Really, Leon? Why?" Cloud asked.
He simply shrugged a little. "It seems useful."
Bersi's frown hadn't disappeared, but it had lightened as Leon explained, and now he was staring off into the mid-distance, obviously thinking about something. "Carran… Carran… Y'know, I haven't seen him in over two weeks. Strange, now that I think about it…Used to be he barely left this place."
A subtle frown also crossed Cloud's face as he stored his practice blade in the rack and came up next to his teacher, Sora only a step or two behind him. "Two weeks? It's been that long?"
"Yeah, came down here to get somethin' in the middle of the night and found him snoozin' on the bench over there," Bersi confirmed, motioning to the heavy wooden bench shoved in the corner. "He does that a lot; I just woke him up and sent him home."
"I don't remember him ever being around the couple times I walked in on Yuffie practicing here…" Sora added. "I don't even know what he looks like."
Bersi shook his head, stepping over to put his own sword away at last, having held onto it for the entirety of the lesson. "I think I'll drop by and see what he's up to. As for you two, we're done for now, so run off and destroy somethin'." Sora just grinned at that, and turned to head out of the dojo, whistling on the way, with Cloud following. Leon was about to go as well when Bersi caught his eye once more, and somehow he knew that the man was no longer wary of him. "You interested in joinin' our classes? You move like a fighter."
Leon shook his head. "No, thank you." He hesitated, but then decided to just go ahead and ask. "But if you have a moment, could you tell me a little more about this 'Competition' of yours?"
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
Aerith was getting quite adept at reading Cloud. She was a perceptive person; after moving in with her uncle and cousin a year before to study healing under Machie, the elderly woman who ran the Traverse infirmary, Cloud had been one of her first patients, and she could immediately tell that he would be a hard nut to crack. But something about him kept compelling her to try and crack it, talking to him every time he came in for his monthly checkups about nothing at all, until finally he began responding. She'd actually gotten him to smile, and to laugh, and she'd been right: it looked quite natural for him to smile. He wasn't meant to be so isolated, even though it was of his own making, and she felt privileged that she was one he would let in.
And Sora's arrival had helped him even more than he knew, she thought. It had been after the island boy came that he'd sent that note to her and they'd begun meeting, and talking, outside the infirmary and the roles of patient and caregiver. She got to know more about him than just the facts of his life in those talks, and she was plenty smart enough to realize that the attraction she'd felt from almost the beginning was mutual. Still, neither of them took the next step – actually saying something about it – being content with the way things were for the moment.
So it was incredibly obvious to her that he was preoccupied when he came in for his checkup, absent-mindedly detaching his sleeve and setting it aside for her to inspect his arm, making sure that everything was still working and that no infection had slipped in. With these new mechanical limbs there was always a risk of that, one they hoped to avoid by simply having his healer check up on him every once in awhile, and before the Competition was a logical time to do it. But aside from a "hello" at the very beginning, he hadn't said anything to her or reacted in any way to her probing, even when she spoke directly to him. Finally she raised an eyebrow and dug her fingernail into his upper arm – not painfully, but sharply enough to get his attention.
It worked; he jumped and blinked, only then realizing how out of it he'd been. "Oh, sorry Aerith…"
"Want to talk about it?" she asked, moving to sit next to him on the examining table, hands folded in her lap.
"It's nothing, it's just…" Cloud shook his head a little. "It's just that I realized I don't really have anything to do here anymore."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean in less than three months I won't have anything else to learn from Bersi and Sanero and I won't have anything keeping me here. I've been… thinking about leaving," he admitted to her finally. "When I'm done with lessons. Maybe get a job teaching somewhere else… But all of a sudden now I do have things keeping me here, because of Sora, you, even Leon."
Aerith wasn't surprised to hear that – she'd known for a long time that Cloud didn't belong in the place he'd been born anymore, that one day he'd get out. He just had to decide to take the step for himself. "Where would you go?"
"I don't know," he admitted. "Somewhere bigger than this, that's for sure. Maybe I'll check out those Isles that Sora's from, the way he talks about them makes them sound like some sort of paradise."
She smiled. "They might be his paradise, but somehow I can't see you lazing around on a beach all day."
He chuckled, arms resting on his legs as he shook his head. "Me either… Where would you go?" he asked suddenly.
"Me?" The question took her aback for a moment. "I don't know… Perhaps back home. I miss it there sometimes."
"I wonder if I'd like it there…"
"Most likely not." She smiled again at his silent question. "It's even smaller than this town."
"Definitely not, then…" He trailed off, looking down at his gloved hands, and she waited for him to continue with whatever he was going to ask. "Do you… think you'd like to come with me?"
If he was expecting her to be angry for suggesting that, he was going to be disappointed. Instead, Aerith's smile only widened, and she calmly answered, "Yes." When he looked up at her in surprise, she leaned over to kiss his cheek. "As long as I get a say in where it is."
"Definitely."
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
Four days after Leon's visit to the dojo, Bersi relayed to Cloud some rather startling news. Carran, Yuffie's teacher, had disappeared. The swordsman had gone by his apartment every day since their discussion but no one had answered the door, and finally he borrowed Sora's "talents" (though how Bersi knew about them they didn't know) to open the door. The small apartment hadn't had anyone in it for weeks if the layer of dust everywhere was anything to go by. But everything was still there, and they hadn't found the ninja slumped to the floor, so at last they determined there wasn't anything to do but wait for him to turn up. Even asking Yuffie, once Bersi visited her normal practice hour, couldn't tell him where Carran was.
That was also the day that the normal four o'clock group entered to find not one, but two men standing there waiting for them. Master Bersi had been joined by a man slightly older and much shorter than him and not quite as in shape, dressed in clothing, including a hat that Sora was soon to learn he was never without, that appeared to have been washed so many times that all shape had entirely gone out of it. But even with his disheveled appearance and his almost-white hair, his eyes and the movements of his body were spry and alert.
"Master Sanero, you're back!" Uo cried gladly.
"Yeah, to torment us more," Kyo tossed over his shoulder in jest. "Why couldn't you just stay out there on the edge of nowhere?"
Master Sanero aimed a playful cuff at Kyo's ear that the boy easily dodged. "You only get to make fun of me if you've finally managed to stop me kickin' your rear." His voice was lighter than Bersi's, but Sora could tell would be infinitely louder if he shouted.
"Come on, you need to meet him," Cloud said, moving in the direction of their teachers. Sanero immediately noticed Sora following him and raised both eyebrows at Cloud in a silent, but amused, question. "Got a new one for you."
"I'm Sora," he introduced himself, also not as intimidated by Sanero as he had been by Bersi. He held out a hand. "I moved here about a month ago."
What he did not expect was for Sanero to crush his hand in what seemed to be a grip of iron. Sora's eyes bugged out as he tried to wrench his hand free and failed, and after about five seconds Sanero let him go so he could cradle his hand and try and rub some feeling back into the nerves.
"Lackin' the brute strength you got," he said casually to Cloud, as if nearly breaking someone's bones was something one did every day. "Workin' on his speed?"
"Yes, sir."
Sanero grinned, and Sora wanted to moan at the gleefully sadistic look in his eyes. "One fer me, then. It'll be fun to have a raw one again."
"For me or you?" Sora muttered, still rubbing his hand.
"Me, of course," Sanero replied with no pity whatsoever, grabbing his shoulder and giving him a push towards the rack of practice blades. "Warm up and let's get goin'!"
As Sora stumbled off towards the other side of the room, Cloud shook his head and turned once more back to Master Bersi. "And I have a message for you from Leon."
"What's that?"
"He says he'll compete."
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
By now, Yuffie had figured out that it was impossible to escape from this guy – Leon, she reminded herself. Not that he ever really chased her down, not after the first time they'd met, but every time since then she'd been drawn into something resembling a conversation, even if they were short, and her normal tactics for keeping people away never worked on him. She had no idea why they didn't; he seemed to be wound so tight that it would be easy to set him off, but for some reason it never happened.
So when, barely a week before the Competition, she ran into him yet again in the Third District, she just groaned a little and held her ground.
"You act like you aren't happy to see me," he commented neutrally, stopping in front of her and crossing his arms.
She had to look up to see him; he really was too damn tall. Only Cloud and Cid topped him. "What're you going to ask me this time? I still don't want to fight you, by the way."
"Actually, I wasn't planning on asking you anything," Leon replied, staying still.
"You mean I stopped for nothing?"
"If that's how you want to see it."
She rolled her eyes. "Great, now people'll think I want to talk to them."
He shrugged a little. "I can't see how you would like making everyone around detest you, but you seem to be doing a good job of it."
"Waaaaait a minute." Her eyes narrowed a little, and she poked him in the chest with one finger. "You don't exactly go out of your way to be Mister Sunshine, you know. That's pretty hypocritical, coming from you."
"I frankly don't care enough about most of the people in this narrow-minded place to try and make them think better of me, but I can tell you that I don't go out of my way to make people dislike me even more than they already do. How is saying that you do hypocritical, then?"
Yuffie opened her mouth to fire back a retort – and for once, found words utterly failing her. She did that, she knew she did that, because it kept people off her back; she could tell him that she didn't, but they both knew it would be a lie. "You… You…"
"I'm only telling the truth."
She could feel her face starting to redden, and she quickly said something to change the topic before he could bring it up. "So where are you from, Mister Open-Minded-Know-It-All?"
Her color had to be incredibly obvious, but to his credit – only a little, but still credit – he didn't make any mention of it or seem to laugh at her in any way. "Hollow Bastion, actually."
That brought her up short, and what she said came as a surprise to him as well. "You are? Weird, so are we."
He blinked. "Really? Strange, I don't remember any Kisaragis… or Highwinds…"
"Probably from a different part, then."
"I suppose so."
And both of them ran out of words, but neither moved away, watching each other carefully. Leon didn't seem to mind, but Yuffie began to feel a little uncomfortable when the silence stretched on, and after almost a full minute she shrugged and began moving away. "Well, see ya."
"Think about this," he said suddenly, making her turn back to him.
"What?"
"You're not supposed to be this angry. You know it and I know it. Maybe you should ask yourself what you're really angry about." And before she could stop gaping at his rather unexpected statement, he simply turned and walked away.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
"Yuffie," Kairi called through her stepsister's closed door. "Yuffie, dinner's ready." In the past year Kairi had taken over almost all the cooking from Cid as it was something she just liked to do – and Yuffie couldn't be trusted not to burn toast.
"Hey, Kairi."
Kairi blinked in surprise at the door. That was Yuffie's voice all right, but that tone… definitely wasn't. It sounded almost… contemplative? "Yeah?"
"Come in here, will you?"
Well, that was more Yuffie-ish, at least. She shook her head a little in disbelief, then pushed open the door and stepped in. Yuffie's room was in its usual mess, and she was sitting up on her bed, which was a relatively good sign – if she was being depressed about something, she would always lie down. "What is it?"
It took Yuffie a minute to pull the words together, which was something else so completely against her character that Kairi wasn't sure whether to be worried or not. "Am I… Am I a bitch?" she asked, her tone honestly wondering.
That was entirely the last question that Kairi expected from her. Yuffie, caring about her image? The world was going to end. "Why do you ask?" she questioned warily, not at all convinced that this wasn't some new elaborate ploy for them to fight yet again.
"Just wondering what you'd say." Kairi gave an unladylike snort, definitely not believing that was the only reason. "Look, I was, okay?" Yuffie replied to that, her tone only minorly irritated. "I know I'll act like one when I want to, but I didn't think I was one."
"So what made you start thinking you were?" Kairi asked, putting off having to answer Yuffie's question.
For a moment, she was certain Yuffie wouldn't answer that either. But her stepsister surprised her once again. "Some guy today said I was 'too angry.' He said that I should think about what I was, quote, 'really angry about,' unquote."
Kairi sighed a little and stayed by the door – she wanted to be ready to run if Yuffie took this the wrong way. "Yes, Yuffie, you can be a bitch." Yuffie's reaction to that was milder than expected, at least, as she merely glared fiercely at her. She definitely hadn't wanted that answer. "See, there you go, looking like you want to kill me just for telling you the truth. And what in the hell was hurting Riku like that if not a bitchy action?"
"Hey, he provoked it."
"I'm sure you didn't help it, though," Kairi shot back. "And the way you treat everyone, even me, even Cid sometimes for god's sakes, it's like you're bound and determined to make everyone hate you."
Yuffie hid a wince; that was far too much like what Leon had said to her earlier for her comfort. "People aren't worth it. Especially not the people here."
"Damnit, Yuffie, listen to yourself!" Kairi was getting fed up with it all. If Yuffie really was starting to worry about all this, then she was going to listen to the hard truth whether she wanted to or not. Kairi was just glad she wasn't armed at the moment, though her shuriken had to be around somewhere. "I don't know where you got the idea that the people here aren't worth it, but you're dead wrong! You're friends with Aerith after all, so she has to be worth it. Whatever guy told you that actually got you to talk to someone, which you never do if it's not Aerith. Okay, maybe you and Riku will never get along again, sometimes people just don't click, but come on, stop treating everyone like dirt! Find Sora, damnit, not even you could be mad at him! You're going to turn into this bitter old hag if you don't stop pissing everyone off on purpose and try and communicate!"
Kairi couldn't believe she'd just said all that, and apparently Yuffie couldn't either, as silence fell between them and stretched on for a long time. It was so quiet, in fact, that they could hear the sounds of Cid in the kitchen, dishing up his own dinner as he decided not to wait for them anymore. Yuffie wasn't looking at her, but she was frowning a little.
"You've been wanting to say that for a long time, haven't you?" she finally asked.
"No." Kairi shook her head. "I've been saying it for a long time. You just haven't been listening."
Yuffie made no response to that, still watching ahead of her, and Kairi finally decided to just let her be for the moment. Whether she chose to face the truth or not, it had been said, and it was now up to her to do something about it if she wanted. "I'm going to go eat. Come join us if you're hungry." Her stepsister still didn't respond, so Kairi simply left the room, shutting the door behind her.
She'd almost reached the kitchen when she heard a knock on the front door, and she made a detour to answer it without really thinking about it. She was very surprised to see Sora on the other side, fist raised to knock again, and his own eyes were similarly wide when she opened it. "Kairi! What… What's happened?"
Apparently she couldn't hide the tension that the confrontation with Yuffie had wrought, and she just shook her head with a sigh. "It's… a long story. Come in, I'll tell you about it." She stepped aside to give him room to enter, completely forgetting for the moment all of Cid's rules.
"Something to do with Yuffie?" he asked as he shut the door.
She gave him a bit of a tired smile. "How'd you guess?"
"I learned to read your mind." The silly statement combined with his usual grin made her laugh at last, and if the laugh wasn't as hearty as some he'd heard in the past, it was still a laugh.
Kairi shook her head as the laughter finally stopped, still half-locked in her mental study thinking about her stepsister. "She… isn't really herself tonight. She was actually thinking about being nice to people. She asked me if… if I thought she was a bitch. And I just said a lot of things that she finally heard and it's just making me wonder what the heck is going on, because everything seems to be changing."
"Like what?" Sora asked, more concerned for her than he dared show.
"Like… well, her, and Riku too, he's been acting strangely lately and won't tell me why, and Namine, and I promise I won't try and push you into it again but she's more withdrawn than I've ever seen her. Maybe the way we had everything before wasn't perfect, but there were a lot of things that worked about it and aren't working now. It's all changing and I don't know what to do for them because neither of them will tell me what's going on and it's all so confusing and they're my best friends and I can't help them."
She'd really, really needed to get that off her mind. Things were changing now, had indeed been changing ever since Sora had moved to Traverse. Maybe Yuffie was right; maybe things here were too isolated. Everyone knew each other and all their habits, and they got into ruts that they didn't get out of because they were familiar. Even Kairi and even Cid, to an extent, both of them technically foreigners, were in those ruts; being in this town seemed to freeze people in time. Sora, someone from a completely different way of life, could shake things up in a place like that just by being there. Maybe that was why Yuffie was the way she was – refusing to get stuck in the ruts and just going about it in a very bad way, trying to fight the confines but finding them unbreakable. That had to be enough to drive anyone crazy.
Suddenly she felt an arm around her shoulders and she was pulled in to lean against Sora as her friend responded to some signal she'd given to comfort her. He wasn't much taller than her – the perfect height, in fact, for her to rest her cheek on Sora's shoulder, which she did. She needed human contact right then, needed grounding, and Sora easily provided it. And he was very warm, as if he was still in his tropical home with warm nights and hot days. Not even Riku had done this for her, and she was very, very thankful to have Sora as a friend right then.
"I'm sorry everything's confusing, Kairi," he said, and she knew he wasn't apologizing, but rather sympathizing with her. "Sometimes things like that just happen and we can't change it. But if you ever want to talk, you know where to find me."
"Thank you," she responded, hugging him back.
He hadn't been able to stop himself from pulling her to himself, but he did manage to not kiss her, though he definitely, definitely wanted to. But that would only confuse her more, which wasn't at all what he wanted, so he settled for finally having an excuse to hold her and not let go until she asked. It was a step, definitely a step-
"A-HEM."
Sora sprang backwards as if he'd been burned, eyes wide, turning to look at the door to what he assumed was the kitchen. Standing in the doorway was a very tall blond man, built a little more solidly than Cloud from years of heavy lifting, clothed in a pair of tan pants, a light denim jacket, and a pair of goggles pushed up over his forehead – and wearing the most alarming expression Sora could ever remember, Leon included, as he just glared at him.
"Ah heh heh… Cid, this is Sora," Kairi said in a small voice from her new position far away from the boy. "He's the one helping me with math."
"An' what's he doin' here right now?"
Sora hurriedly plunged his hand into his pocket; seeing Kairi's expression earlier had driven from his mind the fact that he'd originally come on an entirely innocent mission. "Kairi forgot this in the library today," he said quickly, pulling out a rather plain slim blue wallet, "I just wanted to give it back to her. And, uh… Yeah, I gotta go now, see you later, bye!" Somehow he managed to give Kairi the wallet while running for the door at the same time. He practically dove through, just before Cid slammed it shut, barely missing his heels. He sprawled on the pavement outside their home as a shouting match erupted inside between Kairi and her guardian, Kairi yelling for chasing him off and Cid yelling for inviting him in in the first place.
It really was a wonder they didn't get evicted.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
In the end, Cid grounded her for two days, something she thought was horribly unfair but couldn't get him to budge on. Kairi made a quick phone call to Mela while Cid had gone to retrieve something from the shop to spread the news around, then retreated to her room so she wouldn't have to look at him. He was so overprotective, and it was getting ridiculous. Fishing through the stuff piled on her desk for the book she was currently reading, Kairi curled up among her pillows and opened it to the marked page, eyes falling to the words and determined to ignore Cid for the next two days.
The ignoring worked fine for the most part, but over those days her thoughts were more muddled than she was used to. Everything she'd said to Sora had been true: Riku and Namine's behavior (though at least she knew the reason for Namine, unlike Riku), Yuffie acting oddly, even Kyo, Mela, Ileen, and the rest, everything was changing and for two days she couldn't see any of them to try and figure out what was going on. Cid wouldn't even let her go to her math lessons, even though he was the one who'd wanted her to start them in the first place, but instead took her to the shop with him. That wasn't so bad, as she at least got to see other people as she helped behind the counter, but when there weren't any customers her thoughts would drift. Had Sora heard she was grounded, and if he had, would he blame himself for getting her in trouble? He probably would, knowing him. It was just the type of thing he would do. But he'd been so nice to her that night, just when she needed it, and she didn't regret it at all.
It was on the second day, as she was leaning on the counter and staring at the old-fashioned fireplace before her, that the revelation suddenly hit her.
Could it be…?
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
Sora had indeed heard about the grounding – from Yuffie, surprisingly, who once again came by the library the next morning to inform him of Kairi's absence. Something was different about her – he couldn't quite tell what, but she was just a little quieter, moved just a little slower, not looking like she'd been shot out of a slingshot for the moment but still very energetic. Sora was severely tempted to ask her about it, but he got the not at all uncertain feeling that if he did, she would explode, and so he left her alone. And he did indeed blame himself, but there wasn't anything he could do about it – and he knew that Kairi would just tell him to not be silly because she was the one who broke the rules. So he put it from his mind as best he could and turned to other things to keep himself occupied.
There wasn't a lack of things to do. With the Competition less than a week away, training had kicked into overtime, and Cloud and Sora found themselves both roped in to helping Sora's mother paint the entire apartment as the paint she'd ordered had finally arrived. She paid both of them for their time, though, ensuring they'd have money for the after-Competition festivities. And then once Kairi's grounding was over there were the math lessons again, then still trying to dig around for information about Carran, then Sanero "claiming" him as a personal project and working him into the ground to train up his speed, then helping Cloud assemble some shelves from one of those incomprehensible do-it-yourself kits…
So what with one thing and another, Sora didn't realize it was finally the day of the Competition until Cloud came knocking at his door, buster sword already in its holster on his back.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
AUTHOR'S NOTES II: Yaaaaaaaaaaay Clorith! I thought it fairly appropriate that the first "romance" I officially began in this story was the one that's technically the smallest - though seeing as how I've juggled the characters and everything, maybe it's not fair to say that Cloud's a less important character than Sora. Ah well, in any case, I finally started something for real, and managed to get Aerith in at last.
And Iris, no, the climax isn't soon .:grins:. High point soon. Certainly a high point soon. But we have a lot more to go before the ninja is "tamed" - though Yuffie'll never really be tamed. But stick around and see for yourself!
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