Catharsis
By: Nagurikorosu
Disclaimer: I don't own Final Fantasy VIII. Well I do actually, but not the way you're thinking. I also don't own the lyrics to any songs used in this fic. Also, a few quotes from Chef! are in this chapter, guess which ones. They've been modified somewhat.
And sorry if the storyline isn't too original, mainly, I just wanted to write something, I haven't written in months, literally. Thanks for your comments.
General/Romance
T for Teen
From now on, I will only think more strongly of you
There's so much I want to say in so little time
My eyes are only on you
"Something is starting..."
- VIVID, Fairy Fore(?)
Chapter One: The Gathering Squall
Irvine growled annoyed at how the engagement/SeeD graduation party was going, nearly dropping the camera he had.
Of course, it was all going horribly, horribly wrong… No gifts were being opened, Squinoa, as a couple at least, was nowhere to be found, as was Quistis and two very important men, the food was awful; there was almost no one here.
He'd never expected his SeeD graduation party to be awful. Though honestly, since he was a Galbadia Garden student, he hadn't expected a party at all. Still, here he was all dolled up in his SeeD uniform.
The cowboy had even managed to slick his hair back and put it in a low ponytail, a few tiny, brunette tendrils lazily framing his face. And to his complete horror, the party was dead before it had even started. Now there was only one option left…
A woman carrying a tray of cocktails passed by, and Irvine pounced on the alcoholic drinks. Absently he wondered who exactly would be taking the wrap for the "Worst Party Evar!" It was between Selphie and Rinoa.
"Uh, Mister? I t-think you've had enough, I r-r-really gotta make the rounds y-you k-know," The poor cocktail waitress said nervously.
She'd been warned of Irvine--his womanizing ways…and his drinking habits at parties. If a party was good, then his drinking would be light. A bad party meant heavy drinking. And the way he was gulping down the drinks, this could get ugly…
Ignoring her pleading, the lone gunman began chugging the drinks at an incredible rate. Halfway through his fourth glass (of six), he finally broke down and spit out the offending concoction.
'This tastes like Death!' Irvine thought, hunched over the tray, face scrunched up in disgust. Needless to say, the drinks weren't very good. Selphie herself had told him that, why the fuck hadn't he believed her.
Who could make a cocktail this bad...and why? Honestly, people are just…evil…or dumb. Really dumb evil people.
"Somebody bring me a knife, very long and razor sharp! I need to castrate the person who made these cocktails and I don't want to cause any unnecessary suffering! I'm not a vindictive man, I'm not out to cause pain, but with this person's DNA in the gene pool, humanity is doomed!" Irvine griped loudly, frustrated and annoyed.
Selphie had a rather classic and priceless "burned" look on her face. Throwing her back her head, she giggled like there was no tomorrow.
Her gorgeous green eyes flitted over to Irvine, who was currently glaring at nothing in particular. She idly grabbed at her stomach in pain from laughing so hard, as her body shook with laughter. Her eyes were closed and his mouth was open, allowing her loud laugh to roll out.
How Irvine wished she would just stop laughing!
"Selphie! Shut up, please," Irvine hissed dangerously, but it was too low for the spunky brunette to hear it. Still the look on his face made her sober up.
Selphie, for her part, tried to turn her attention to the handful of partygoers (that actually bothered to come out) behind her, but their leering only added to the discomfort she felt. When one person was upset, then the feelings were likely to spread like wildfire and make everyone else uncomfortable.
"Good evening," came Quistis' voice from behind, and most generously lightening the mood a little.
Turning around in surprise, a very nasty looking smile graced Irvine's boyish features. Quistis stepped back, somewhat frightened of the crazed look. Those kinds of look only came when Irvine had knocked back a few…
"Quisty!" Selphie cried happily, pushing the blonde back a little. The younger girl hugged her and stepped back to inspect her clothing.
"You look great!" She said approvingly. "So, how do I look?"
Quistis cocked her head and looked over the girl's gown. The gown was a very tasteful pale yellow with two spaghetti straps tied around her pale neck. It went along the curve of her body and had a split just on the side. The girl's accessories—a thin diamond necklace and two silver bracelets—were white-ish in color. Her heels though were a similar pale yellow.
What really looked nice on Selphie though was her hair. It was styled in it's usual fashion, but it looked softer then usual, with a little more bounce to it. Absently, Quistis noted that she'd probably been to the new salon in Balamb, The Fringe, or something like that.
"Very nice," Quistis said with a gentle smile.
Before either two girls could say anything, Irvine stumbled between them and held up his wrist, tapping his watch gently. "You're late," He said flatly, pausing when Quistis flashed an apologetic smile, "Now all we need is Zell and Ami…and Squall."
This was supposed to be the debut of Miell at a major public event in Garden since Ami and Zell had gotten together nearly two months ago. The least they could do is make this dead party good for something…
Quistis unconsciously began looking around for the pair, wanting to stop and question where Squall was exactly. After all, it was his engagement party, was it not? Instead, her sapphire eyes landed on the newest member of SeeD, Rinoa Heartilly.
'Same old, same old,' Quistis thought idly, staring at Rinoa's dress.
She turned to tell Selphie that Rinoa was headed their way, only to hear something that sounded suspiciously like, "Couldn't she have found a better dress. True it's like their first anniversary as a couple, but still, a new dress dammit!"
Quistis shot her a funny look, Irvine doing the same.
"I said that, didn't I?" Selphie nearly groaned.
The other brunette and the blonde woman made no response. Instead, the trio watched Rinoa go off in another direction for the time being. It was then another familiar face popped up, Zell had finally appeared before the trio half a room away.
Crossing over to the threesome, noticeably alone, he snatched up a cracker and cheese snack from a passing waitress. And in an equally enthusiastic and cheerful manner chomped it down greedily...
Quistis thought he looked rather like a greasy lizard, but then again the greasy lizard had someone, didn't he? She almost groaned at that.
"Yo, Quistis, Selphie, Irvine!" Zell greeted in typical form, halfway across the room. Like most other males in the room, dressed in his SeeD uniform. His hair was slicked back as well, though his looked a tad bit greasier than Irvine's.
"Zelly!" Selphie greeted warmly.
"You're late!" Irvine accused loudly.
"Hm, interesting…have you considered that I am early for tomorrow?" Zell said, a confident smile gracing his face.
"Oh," Quistis said, raising an eyebrow, "taking a break from the 'bell rang before I got here,' bit, Zell."
The blonde male's smile broadened as he leveled his azure eyes on his female counterpart.
"Yup," he replied simply.
A smile was shared between the two blondes.
The joke however was lost on Selphie and Irvine though, sometimes the pair felt left out and lonely as compared to the relatively closer bond of Squall, Quistis, and Zell. The bond was weird and strange and not even Rinoa's (relationship with Squall) could compare to the trio. It was an odd combination of teacher-student and big sister-little brother.
Still, Irvine gave another creepy grin to the young man, who stopped and eyed him warily. Zell had caught the last part of his announcement while he was searching for Ami… But Zell flashed him a wary smile regardless though, he hadn't been the one to pick out refreshments—Squall had.
And it had been the only thing he did for engagement party aside from approving it. At that, Zell's smile broadened unconsciously.
It was then Rinoa once again reappeared and began approaching the Orphanage Gang, minus one (or two depending on how one looked at it). The frown marring her face spoke volumes, though neither Zell nor Quistis knew why the bride to be looked so unhappy. It darkened her whole appearance, even though her skin was ghostly pale and her dress, the same one she always seemed to wear, were very light.
"Oh, oh, looks like there's a Squall approaching," Zell said almost flat, but there was tale-tell twitching going on around his mouth.
"No, no!" Selphie said looking mock horrified, "For the love of all things sunny and bright, NO!"
"Yeah, being the only person here to have suffered through four of those awful drinks makes me the only one entitled to feel that way, dammit," Irvine added, suddenly appearing beside the blond male.
Zell quickly slunk away, a drunk Irvine, even only slightly drunk, was an unwanted Irvine. "I thought they were good."
"No way. They were totally gross," Selphie stated with a frown, "In any case, where's Ami? I thought you two were supposed to be here together. You know, all your devoted fans are interested, Miell is the next Squinoa afterall…"
"Yeah, well the Library was backed up because of the exam, so the Library Committee had to stay a bit late. She promised to show up though, I just don't know when," Zell replied quietly.
"Have any of you seen Squall?" Rinoa questioned quickly and rather heatedly, suddenly appearing from seemingly nowhere.
If the foursome was taken by surprise, they didn't show it.
"Not since the party started," Selphie replied, "but didn't a faculty member drag him away? I think it had something to do with the review, didn't it?"
Irvine shrugged, Quistis and Zell, however, were silent. Rinoa honestly didn't know, she'd been distracted by Irvine and his camera.
"I don't see what's so important about the stupid review! I am his fiancée!" Rinoa announced in a wholly bratty fashion.
Irvine almost snorted, and wondered where his video camera was. He'd hate to miss a meltdown.
"Don't pop Rinoa, I fully intend to return this dress tomorrow," Quistis said dryly, earning a rather pitiful glare from the sorceress, and amused smiles from the rest.
"Shut up," Rinoa snapped, "All I want is for this day to be memorable for the good things… So far, everything's been a mess. The party is dead, the food and drinks are horrible, and almost no one's here, including Laguna and Daddy, and Squall's disappeared."
"Well, he is the Commander," Selphie pointed out matter-of-factly, "He's on call 24-7, you'll probably have to put up with that if you're gonna be married to him, Rin."
"But he still has obligations to me!" Rinoa declared indignantly, "I am gonna complain, I'll talk his damn ear off."
Quistis resisted the urge to roll her eyes, while Zell rubbed the back of his slightly greasy head. Irvine almost smirked behind the camera and Selphie just kind of looked away.
Admittedly, when things weren't going her way, Rinoa either got all haughty and upset (often running away) or bitchy and then tried to do something about it (often ending up with her goofing up). Huffing in an un-ladylike manner, Rinoa stalked off, presumably to initiate her search for Squall again.
"I hate to say this," Quistis began before the the words died on her lips as a camera appeared in her face.
She proceeded to give Irvine a "what-the-fuckety-fuck" look as the camera dared to inch closer. An icy glare was recorded on Irvine's camera as it zoomed up to close on the most experienced SeeD of the six.
"Sorry," Irvine said realizing his mistake, though sounding none too apologetic, "do go on. Do tell, do tell."
"I was going to say something, but now that I see that camera, I just thought better of it," Quistis finished.
That said, the blonde woman in navy turned her attention to the raven haired girl in the tan dress. She hated that dress, it was of poor taste in terms of length and color. She always thought the dress was unflattering, especially, since it seemed like Rinoa was practically naked. But apparently no one else thought much of it, aside from Selphie.
Faintly, she could hear Rinoa in the background, giving some poor cocktail waitress a piece of her mind.
"Let me explain the order of things for you! There's the commander, the faculty, regular members of SeeD, clients, dumb animals, waiters, creeping things, head lice, people who eat packet soup, and then you!" Rinoa all but screamed at the woman, "And guess what, I'm the commander's fiancee and a regular member of SeeD no-"
Yes, that was quite a piece of mind Rinoa had.
At that point, Quistis tuned it out and cringed in embarassment for the cocktail waitress and Rinoa. It didn't take a genius to realize that Rinoa didn't handle stress well. She'd better reign that in or else that would affect her performance and ranking evaluations in SeeD.
"Hey, hey," Zell said, interrupting her train of thought, "I think Irvine got that on tape!"
"Woot!" Selphie cheered in an undignified manner, "Oh, wait she's still going!"
"Shut up, or we won't be able to hear her," Irvine whispered harshly as he moved closer.
The cowboy turned around, still focusing the camera on the angered SeeD. "You know, one day we'll look at this and laugh ourselves silly."
"Now please go away… and please re-arrange the contents of this plate so that someone in the latest stages of malnutrition will at least take a passing interest in it," Rinoa growled.
"Ouch!" Zell proclaimed in an exaggerated fashion, "I hope that cocktail waitress is getting paid a lot of money for this."
"Oh, she is… At least, now she is," Selphie said, beginning to move towards the poor (and stunned) cocktail waitress.
"She looks familiar," Irvine said distantly, staring at the beleaguered waitress.
Quistis shook her head, slightly amused and slightly annoyed at her friends antics.
-
I rewrote this chapter multiple times. It never seemed good enough, but I eventually had to break it up into two chapters. Heh. Expect the summary to be truly relevant next chapter. I'll try to post it in the next week, that one needs work as well.
2 votes for a Quall
1 vote for Quirvine
1 vote to leave Squinoa the Hell alone : )
While I'd like to contribute to Quall, I was also thinking of Quistis/Laguna. Quirvine is also pretty interesting as well. Irvine is overlooked a lot in fan fics, but he's pretty essential to the plot and tiny subplot for GFs in the game.