I want to take this moment to once again thank all of the people that have reviewed so far. I'm very happy that you like my story, and I'll try to push in all the remaining clichés that have been suggested.

Note: This chapter features a big chunk of story that a friend of mine sent me as a suggestion. Who she is will be a secret until you get to the part, upon which you might be able to guess. Otherwise, her name is mentioned at the bottom. The part she wrote will be between the two *, so that she'll get the full right to her stuff! Read on and enjoy!

Chapter 9, Someone else's input

Squall awoke with a groan and pressed a hand against his eyes. A cold weight was resting on his forehead, and its moist, unruly fabric stroke his thumb and pointing finger upon his move.

With a grunt he pulled the towel from his forehead and propped himself up on his free hand and arm.

"Are you feeling better?" came Rinoa's worried voice from his right.

He turned his head and blinked at the far too sharp light, after a few moments seeing her sitting hunched on her toes with her knees against her chest.

"Where...?" he muttered, looking around.

And scowling.

They were in...

... wait for it...

... his office.

In more detail, he and Rinoa were on the middle of the floor, while Seifer, Quistis and the other young heroes - including Selphie, but where she had come from was, once again, a mystery - were assembled on the carpet before the massive collection of overfilled report-filing boxes. Zell and Irvine's once again drenched clothes were making two puddles on the carpet, but nobody had the time to be interested in thoughts of dry-cleaning. The SeeDs and once-upon-a-time-SeeD-cadets' expressions ranged from a variety of worry and suspicious anticipation.

Susan might have been the cause of these emotions, sitting on the commander's desk - he would have to burn it later, Squall figured - with one leg casually hung over the other. Inspecting his long, painted nails with great care.

Pink nail polish, of course. What did you expect?

"... I thought you were going to take us to your lair for a few torture sequences?" Squall said after a couple of silent seconds during which he and Rinoa cautiously stood, though the words made him cringe in bad, bad, BAD memories.

"I was," Sandra said without looking up, blowing on his nails.

He bent his fingers inwards and rubbed the nails casually against his chest, only then meeting Squall's stern iron gaze. Smiling brightly so that every single perfect tooth showed.

"But then some of your pretties decided to start arguing about that Plot Compression wasn't really a spell, but an author power. They even claimed that I was a Gary Stuart or something."

Squall gave his allies a rare glance of appreciation for their clear-sightedness.

"Aren't you?" he then demanded.

Susan shook his pretty head, smiling a little more naturally.

"Nope, not me. I'm not that evil. If you want proof, regard the fact that none of the women here has thrown themselves at my feet in sudden and unexplained love."

There was a moment of silence. Again. They were getting horribly common, don't you think?

"... Whatever."

But despite his word, Squall was shuddering at the thought, and he clearly saw everyone else of his allies do the very same.

"Yes, yes, I know..." Susan said, stretching his legs before he stood, "well, since you people don't believe me, I'll just have to prove it to you. Shall we?"

He smiled and raised his right hand, pressing the thumb and middle finger against each other as well as anatomy allowed.

"To prove that I master plot, I shall twist your minds and blatantly use an established author's plot to prove my power to you!" he exclaimed as the smile turned to a malicious smirk.

He snapped his fingers. And things went straight to hell.*

"Hyne, what have I done? I couldn't make it in time to the Sorceress Memorial… and because of me Rinoa is still sealed forever in a frozen tomb. Doomed to live out my mistakes… How could I have failed!?" The commander fell to his knees, looking up at the heavens for forgiveness that would never come.

"Um…Squall what are you talking about?" Rinoa asked confused, tilting her head to one side in that completely in-character way - strangely similar to a canine that hears a high pitched dog whistle. "Squall, you…saved…me. Remember? Orphanage, the promise, the balcony, that night we snuck back on to the Ragnarok and were caught by Kiros, yada, yada, yada…"

"Uh oh…" Seifer smirked. "I know what's happening…"

Fujin nodded in acknowledgment, "WHAT IF."

"What?" questioned Selphie uncertainly. "Isn't that AU?"

"No, no, no…" Explained Quistis pulling out her fangirl/fanboy guide to basic plot structure. "What if is where the author takes part of the plot and changes it. Usually altering the entire outcome of the story for dramatic purposes."

"BAD!" Fujin exclaimed, looking down at the commander on the floor now seeming to be hyperventilating in guilt. Ironically, around that time, 'Chocobo Boy' made a rare cameo appearance holding up a sign simply stating, 'For your academy award consideration.'

"Oh why Rinoa, why? Why couldn't I save you? Why must your memory hound me and your ghost drive me to the brink of insanity? I have always loved you, and if I had been stronger back then, I would have never let them take you away underneath that desert sky. How ever shall I atone for my wretched sins?"

"Squall, again…I'm right here…see. You can stop the overacting now." She jumped up and down in a vain attempt for anyone to notice her. But instead, they ran to the side of their comrade, offering him their support for his personal failures.

"It's better this way." Irvine stated patting his shoulder, "Think of how much she would have cost you in the shoe bills alone."

"Hello…I'm right here. I can hear you guys!" Rinoa screamed in aggravation. "I'm not frozen darn it to Shiva!"

"Wait," Seifer announced raising an eyebrow at his friends. "What if Rinoa had been a Timber spy masterminding the entire plot of the game and we fell for it?"

The group all looked at her now, eyes throwing the proverbial daggers. Squall stood up from the floor angrily, shaking a fist at her. "How could you? You tricked me into falling for you and this whole time - you were just using me."

"Or wait," Seifer interjected again, having way too much fun with this. "What if Rinoa dumped your sorry butt right after your pathetic attempt at a kiss on the balcony. Coming back to her one true love…me." The blond former/ex knight/lapdog/table dancer walked behind the sorceress, wrapping his arms gently around her waist. "Hi honey, don't worry. Seify won't let them hurt you."

"Wait, wait, wait!" Rinoa screamed, still trying to get the pet name 'Seify' out of her head. "Stop it people! I'm not frozen, a spy, or out buying shoes! Or worse yet, in love with a guy who can't even wear his SeeD cadet uniform for the test in Dollet! Trench coats are so mid nineties Mulder Boy. I'm in love with Squall! This is as ridiculous as putting Squall and Quistis together!"

At that moment, Quistis looked over at Squall. "Hey, that thing I said about it being a 'sisterly love' was a complete lie."

"Yeah, okay that works for me." The commander shrugged agreeably, before pulling her into a deep embrace. As they were about to kiss Rinoa yelled again, trying to stop this absurdity.

"I meant Quistis and… um Cid!" The group gasped in unison, looking horrified at the instructor. She slinked away from the man with the unruly, yet sexy hair, falling to the ground.

"I admit it. I'm secretly in love with the headmaster. Why else would I hang out upstairs so much? It certainly isn't for Xu or Nida." There was a collective amount of coughing and gagging from the group. Out of nowhere Edea appeared, wearing a sequined outfit strangely reminiscent of a professional wrestler.

"Catfight!"

The guys all screamed in unison as Seifer handed out the popcorn, which too seemed to appear out of nowhere. Even Susan/Sandra had to get in on the action, opening up a small wagering booth with the Card Queen. Who incidentally, is also not pleased at all with how with the amount of cameos she gets in fanfiction.

"I'm working with morons." Rinoa grumbled as the chanting and cheering continued. Although, she did have to participate in two rounds of the 'wave' that Selphie had accidentally started when Irvine pinched her rear.

Convinced the 'what if' writers had completely lost sight of the game, Rinoa figured the best thing she could do was play along with this until the group somehow all remembered the original plot. Thank Hyne she'd printed a transcript out of all four disks, including side quests - for the fanfiction that she and Squall wrote in their spare time. Sadly, it was all removed from the net when they banned NC-17 stories.

"Hey guys, look I'm unfrozen!" She screamed as Quistis was just about to do a belly flop onto Edea. The group stopped immediately, running over to her as if they hadn't seen her in um…seven or eight years.

"You're back!" Squall yelled in uncharacteristic joy, as he gathered her in his arms and spun her around lovingly. Strangely the whole room was spinning in slow motion like a fairytale romance or corny movie on the Hallmark channel… Oh wait, no… it was just Seifer who sneezed accidentally casting a 'slow' spell on the entire group. But hey, the effect was still as dramatic as when the boat sank in Titanic.

"What?" Zell screamed looking concerned at the narrator/typist. "What do you mean it sank??? I was just reading a story on the internet the other day and it safely got into port."

"Damn what if writers," Rinoa grumbled again under her breath.*

As things seemed to have calmed down, Edea quickly slunk out as soon as she could - since the plot compression ignored her for a moment she managed to break free. As she disappeared through the door she gave her husband a quick hug and then rushed on towards freedom.

Cid just gave her a quick hug back and then stood still for a moment, watching all the commotion in his old office. Then he decided that he was better off in his new office, silently taking care of the stuff Squall didn't have to handle. And continuing to stay out of everything even in the future, as nothing more than a side character whom people would now and then run to for extra advice to further whatever plot they found themselves stuck in for the moment.

"Sooo," Sandra said, crossing his arms and sitting back on the desk, "are you convinced yet?"

He smirked in amusement as the characters backed away from each other, pressing their hands against their heads as the plot pressure left them.

"Yes, yes, you've proven your power now... we get it..." Zell groaned and fell over.

"Eeexcellent!"

Susan clapped his hands, and the purple-green-blue carnivore cannibalistic aliens from outer space ripped through the walls, wrapping the heroes up in their constantly transforming bodies – while Fujin, Quistis and Rinoa loudly thanked all gods they knew that they weren't Japanese schoolgirls - to take the world's last hope into true imprisonment.

"Now, let's go back to the original evil plot of forcing Squall into becoming my knight!" Sandra happily said, tilting his head with a huge grin that he had learnt from Kefka.

Squall was just about to groan that at this point he'd be just peachy about that if it meant an end to all this insanity, but before he could do that he was knocked out cold by a purple-green-blue carnivore cannibalistic alien from outer space's... errr... arm or whatever it was supposed to be.

The last thing he heard was Sandra's chuckle. The bishie really needed to practice that evil laugh of his...

The world went black again.

~*~


Meanwhile, in another world...

"Sluuuurp!" came from the general area of a darkly blue teacup while a free hand scrambled for a pencil.

A black, theoretically straight line then crossed over the words "What ifs", "AU", "blatant ripoff", "hints at random celebrity", "Edea and Cid" and "show of power" from a list in a cluttered note block.

But there was still a long list of words remaining.

'Does this count as a "real" self-insert?' the author pondered, hoping to avoid having to use that cliché.

The pen hesitantly hovered above the note block.

Then the author's bleary eyes, peeking between the slit eyelids, noticed the word below "blatant self-insert", and the author cursed.

"Aw, crap..."

"SLUUUURP!"

~*~*~*~

And I want to thank Ashbear for her addition to this story. You rock, woman! Now all of you go read her stories too! I mean it, you don't want to miss out on them!