Disclaimer: I don't own the characters, I do not own the places. I don't own anything related to FFVIII, all I own is the plot.

- Chapter sixteen: The End -

She looked up at him and he could see she was keeping more tears back. He wanted to say something but didn't know what and neither did she. Suddenly she threw her arms around him and started shaking.

"...Selphie...what happened?"

She sobbed.

"I don't know what I did wrong..." she cried softly. "I thought we were doing alright. I thought that this would make him love me again."

Squall hugged her.

"What do you mean?" he asked.

She looked up. "We- well...Him and me...you know...We slept together, Squall...But then he got up and left and-"

"What!" he nearly shouted. "Why? What happened?"

"I don't know." She cried. "One minute we were just fine, talking and stuff. And then he heard something over the intercom and he jumped up and left."

She wiped away a few tears. Squall felt his grip on the sheets of paper tighten. Selphie was a wonderful girl, but she was also a bit naïve and too sweet sometimes. How could Irvine have used her like that?

He gripped Selphie's wrist.

"Come on." He said. "I want you to let the doctor check you out. Better safe than sorry..."

Selphie allowed herself to be dragged off. She had never felt so humiliated before and she was thankful that Squall didn't tell her off and that he didn't laugh. He made her feel that she was important after all.

'Thank Hyne Squall was here.' She thought bitterly.

They reached the Infirmary and Squall pulled her inside. The doctor looked at them with a worried frown.

"Squall...have you found anything?"

He silently placed the pile of paper he had been holding all this time on the desk.

"Selphie needs checking up." He said, ignoring Kadowaki's curious glance. "...What kind of check up."

Selphie shuffled her feet and looked away.

"Boy trouble." Squall muttered, not looking at his friend.

Kadowaki nodded, a sudden understanding look of sympathy on her face. Then, raising his voice, Squall slammed his hand down on the pile of paper he had brought along.

"And I want the Headmaster here. I need to discuss all of this with him."

"He has already been informed of Rinoa's situation. He's on his way down."

Selphie sat down and Squall placed his hand on her shoulder. He squeezed it encouragingly for a moment, silently cursing Irvine to hell and back for everything he had done. Kadowaki walked away and bustled around in one of the empty rooms. Then she came back out and looked over at the two of them.

"Miss Tilmitt, this way please."

The door closed behind them and Squall finally let out a sigh. The rush of things that had happened these last two days was just too much. What was he supposed to do, to think? How could he ever forgive Rinoa for what she had done to him?

He walked over to her room and looked through the mirrored glass window. He could see her lying on the bed, looking helpless and so vulnerable. The bandages around her wrists had just been changed. He raised his hand to tbe glass.

Sitting on the edge of the bed was Irvine, holding her hand. Squall tightened his hand into a fist, biting on his lip to fight back tears once more. He felt so betrayed. A sharp pang struck his heart. Seeing them this way, he could only wonder how long the two of them had been seeing each other secretly. With an unbearable pain in his heart, he turned his eyes away from this sight.

The door behind him opened. He jumped to attention when she saw it was Cid who had entered.

"At ease, Squall." He said, slightly surprised.

"Sir...I need to talk to you. I think I know who it was who posted the stories an the drawings...and the threats to Rinoa."

"You do? Well, what are you waiting for?"

"Sir, it's just that I don't understand. What made her do it?"

"Made who do it, Squall?"

"Rinoa, sir...She did it herself." He said defeatedly.

Cid looked up. "She killed her own dog? She threatened herself? That's a serious accusation, Squall. Taking everything, from the posters to the fire and the dog, into account. Without any proof it'll be hard to convince anyone."

"I have proof, sir. Those papers on Kadowaki's desk are pages I found in her desk. It's her handwriting and there are earlier sketches of the drawing in the pile as well. She must have been planning this for a while..."

Cid rested his head in his hands. "But why...why would she do all of this. It's just so..."

"Unbelievable?" Doctor Kadowaki said.

They looked up and saw she had come back and she was now standing in the opening of the examination room door.

"...Yes." Cid said, sinking down in a chair behind the desk.

Kadowaki gave Squall a reassuring look. "Selphie's fine. There's nothing to worry about."

"Thank Hyne." Squall sighed.

He couldn't have handled a pregnant Selphie on top of everything else. And he could hardly imagine Irvine taking care of her.

"And Rinoa?" Cid asked

"She's fine too...for someone in her condition."

"You mean her self-inflicted injuries." Cid said with a nod, his face contracted in a serious frown. "That's good to hear."

"...No...not just that." Kadowaki said hesitantly. "I think there's more to it than that. There's something more going on with her than any of us expected. The fact that she inflicted those wounds on herself shows us that she was trying to cope with something that was just too much for her. She couldn't take everything that was going on. But...I believe that she didn't know what she was doing at the time."

"What do you mean?" Squall said.

His head was spinning. Had it really all been that bad for her? He hadn't even concidered that it might have been hard for her. He had just assumed that she hadn't cared and that he was the only one who had ended up hurt.

"Are you saying she did it in her sleep?" he asked, trying to get an answer.

"No." Kadowaki said firmly. "I'm saying she did all of this, and probably a whole lot more, without knowing so. I'm saying that she suffers from MPS."

"...What's that?"

"It means Multiple Personality Syndrome. We've been watching her the last few days. She was twitchy, moody, developed sudden allergies she normally didn't have...She would ask for something and then never remember. I thought about it once, only quickly. It was a look she gave me. But I didn't dare say it aloud. Only when you said that she had written the posters and the notes did I think I had enough proof."

Kadowaki leaned down on her desk with her hands and closed her eyes for a moment.

"She never had any recollection of writing or drawing those things and was just as surprised as the rest of us."

Another door opened, the one to Rinoa's room. It was Irvine who came out.

"Not just as surprised...but even more. And scared too." He said. "I know that because she blamed me, thinking I had written them. The things on the posters were often the same words we had used in conversations. Come the next day, they'd show up on the wall for everyone to see."

Squall didn't look at him. So he had been reading their conversations without knowing it...He had been looking at the truth about her all this time and he hadn't realised.

"So she really did write it herself." Cid said. "But you said she didn't know. And what does this MPS explain?"

"It would explain why she couldn't remember all those things if she had, for some reason, created another personality inside her. Someone else in her body besides Rinoa. Someone who could do the things she herself could not."

'Bluejay!' Irvine thought suddenly.

"Can you think of a reason?"

"...Guilt." Squall muttered.

Everyone but Irvine looked at him.

"Guilt?"

"She had an affair with Irvine behind my back." He said loudly.

Irvine looked at the ground. "It's true. But she found it so hard to do anything that could hurt you like this. She still loved you so much."

Squall glared at him.

Kadowaki was the one to break the tense silence first. "A strong feeling of guilt could be the reason why. It is very plausible."

"Is there a cure? Some way we can help her?" Cid asked, leaning his chin on his hand.

"Not really. Extensive therapy might do some good...but there's no guarantee that she'll get over it. It could take years..."

Irvine closed his eyes. She was ill and it was his fault. This had happened to her only because of their relationship.

"I never meant for this to happen." He whispered, barely audible.

Squall still ignored him.

"It's alright." Kadowaki said soothingly. "No one could ever mean for this to happen."

But he shrugged off the hand she had placed on his shoulder and ran for the door, leaving them behind in the infirmary. Cid stood up.

"I will have to inform her father. And we'll need to make some arrangements too..."

"And I will need to check up on my patient. Why don't you look in on Selphie for a moment?"

"...If you both don't mind...I'd like a mometn alone with Rinoa..." Squall said quietly but firmly.

They nodded silently and let him enter her room. He let his eyes travel all over the room as he went inside. As he sat down on the side of her bed, he realised he was sitting where Irvine had been sitting. Taking her hand, he realised that Irvine had done the same only minutes before.

Rinoa's eyes were open and she stared at him without saying a word. How could he forgive her for what she had done to him? He knew he couldn't hate her anymore now he saw her like this, hurt and vulnerable. The bandages only accentuated her vulnerability.

She raised her arm and tried to stroke his cheek, but he pushed her hand away. He knew that, from now on, whenever he'd see her, he would see Irvine too in his mind. Whenever she would touch him, he would know that she had done the same to Irvine. Seeing her would only remember him of the hurt they had caused him.

Without having said a word to her, he left again. He knew that he would never see her again. Even if he had the possibility to, he wouldn't.

(AN: There's one more chapter to come, an epilogue. So don't think this is the ending, even though the chapter title does imply it :D)