Disclaimer: I make no claim whatsoever to the characters or world of Final Fantasy VIII, which is the property of Squaresoft/Square Enix.
Chapter II
They made their report to the grateful Duke, filed the paperwork back at Garden, and sat through the debriefing with Xu and Squall. Later, Selphie could recall barely any of it. The only memory that stuck was of the way the magic buzzed under her skin, a thousand new sensations pulling her mind in different directions as Irvine, Squall or Xu talked. She vaguely remembered how Squall had gripped the sides of his chair when Irvine relayed their discovery of the dying Sorceress.
Xu's eyes had been wary, even fearful. "So Selphie-"
"Yup. Succession. The whole thing happened so goddamn fast, I barely had time to blink before Sefie got her powers."
Irvine had patted her knee, then. She'd wondered why. Maybe he'd taken her silence to be nerves. Did he think she was embarrassed?
Never, she thought. I'll never feel shame for this. This is me, now.
Squall was saying something, but she tuned him out to listen to the crackles and sparks of energy that resounded inside her skull.
"Selphie," he repeated.
"Hm?"
"You need to tell us how you're feeling."
"Fine."
There was a white seabird, far-off, gliding through the sky outside the large window of the Commander's office. The way it soared and dipped stirred something inside Selphie. It felt like a memory at first, but gradually presented itself as a realization.
I could do that, she thought with surprise. I can fly. Any time I want.
She dragged her gaze back to the room. They were all watching her. Squall's eyes were half-lidded, his expression unreadable. Xu's intense frown was radiating a heat that would have melted a line of junior cadets in one fell swoop; Selphie paid it no heed. It was Irvine's face that irked her most. The wide eyes. The hesitant smile of encouragement. The concern.
She blinked back at them. "I feel fine."
She found out the next morning that Squall had removed her from the active SeeD roster for two weeks. He'd been saying something about "time to adjust", towards the end of their meeting. Probably. She hadn't really been listening. Selphie discovered that she didn't care. Her usual perpetual excitement for receiving her orders and learning what the next mission would be had dissipated entirely. She wandered about the Garden in a state of detachment, lost in the sea of sound and color that swirled, unfurled and transformed inside her. The dull predictability of external reality had little to offer in comparison.
She began to have the odd sensation of drifting away from people while they were talking to her. It was as though she was looking down from somewhere above, thinking how impossibly small everything looked. When that happened, the Garden and its inhabitants seemed barely bigger than a doll's house. Too small to contain her, now. She felt a tug at the edges of her mind, whispering new possibilities to her. Telling her that it didn't have to be this way. That her world need no longer be confined to Garden. And once the thought appeared, it swelled and grew, day by day.
Her Garden Square blog went untouched; she didn't even bother to log in. She left the Festival Committee without any fanfare, and responded to the members' pleas to return with a disengaged shrug. It seemed so meaningless now. Just a bunch of kids putting on a show to distract themselves from the fact they were child soldiers. Raised to kill for profit. How on earth had she let herself be so brainwashed? She'd been the proudest SeeD of all. And for what?
Rinoa's hug on hearing Selphie's news was the only interaction that cut through the thick wall that surrounded her. Rinoa clung to her tightly, and whispered in her ear, "I'm here for you. I always will be. Never forget that."
As the days passed, Selphie's numbness only intensified. Irvine knocked on her door every evening, eager to talk. Sometimes she half-listened, nodding, other times she brushed him off. The only person she felt any desire to spend time with was Rinoa. If only they could speak, Sorceress to Sorceress, without Squall or Irvine present. But Rinoa's eyes seemed to grow troubled every time Selphie attempted to share her excitement at the new world that was opening up within her.
Maybe it didn't matter. She didn't need Rinoa's advice. Selphie already knew what she had to do. The first step, anyway. She watched the library printer churn out the resignation form and snatched it from the paper tray, blowing on the fresh ink.
It was just as well, she thought as she scrawled her signature, that neither Zell nor Quistis were around. Zell had been assigned to oversee a training camp in Centra for the past six weeks, while Quistis was leading a mission in Esthar, for which Selphie was privately grateful. She had no interest in arguing with Quistis' inevitable lecture on why Selphie should remain a SeeD, nor to see Zell's stunned, disappointed face when he discovered she was leaving.
She hesitated over the dots in the 'i's, one in Selphie, two in Tilmitt. Her trademark signature had always featured a daisy on top of the first 'i', and stars in the place of dots in her surname. A child's signature, really.
She wasn't a child, though, was she? She was a Sorceress.
Selphie clicked the pen and dotted the 'i's neatly, three sharp pinpricks of black ballpoint ink.
Squall held the document in both hands for a long time before he spoke.
"And you want to go for immediate severance? You know you won't be entitled to your lump-sum payout if you don't give three months' notice."
"I don't care about money. I just want to leave."
He laid it down carefully on the desk. "You didn't state your reason on here."
"Conflict of interest," she shrugged.
"How, exactly?"
"SeeDs were raised to destroy Sorceresses. Now I'm one myself."
"There's been no suggestion that you're a threat to Garden, Selphie. You're no more our enemy than Rinoa is."
Squall was rattled. She had been around him long enough to know what Rattled Squall looked like. The tight jaw, the twitch at his temple. Selphie wondered idly which he was more bothered about, the loss of a Rank A SeeD from his roster, or Selphie as a friend.
"I don't fit in here any more," she said.
"You should take a few days to consider this carefully, at least."
Selphie's eyes wandered over to the dark peaks of the Gaulg Mountain range, looming behind Squall at the window. "Nah, I'm good."
"Selphie-"
"I'm good, Commander."
What would it be like to fly over those mountains? To stand on the highest peak and channel the lightning from the sky? How would it feel when it merged with the etheric lightning that hummed under her skin?
He was still talking, but she didn't hear a word.
Irvine barged into her dorm room while she was removing her personal possessions and packing them up. Selphie was too distracted by the call of her magic to force him out. She carried on emptying the closet, then moved onto stripping the bed of the bright yellow sheets.
"I don't get it. SeeD was all you ever wanted."
She stuffed the sheets haphazardly into a plastic bag. "I just... don't feel like that anymore. I've got a different way of looking at things now. The world seems bigger, y'know?"
"Because of the magic? What does it change? Tell me, Sef. Help me understand."
"You'll never understand. You're a man." She threw him a disdainful glance as he sifted through a pile of her clothes. "I'm a Sorceress now, and... SeeD, Garden, it's all so small."
Selphie pulled a pair of green pajama bottoms out of Irvine's hands and rolled them up tightly, before shoving them into the canvas holdall on the floor. "I want... more. More than this."
"So what're you going to do? Where would you even go?"
She didn't answer, and started to bag up the contents of her desk. The nunchaku gave her pause, but she folded it carefully and slid it into the holdall. A Sorceress had no need for weapons. It was little more than a trinket to her now.
Selphie zipped up the holdall and shoved it into Irvine's arms. "Here y'are. Keep it."
"What am I supposed to do with your stuff? Pretty sure none of your bras will fit m-"
"Whatever you want. I don't need any of it."
Irvine opened and closed his mouth, then nodded in resignation. "I'll put it in storage for when you come back."
"Not much point. Toss it into the sea for all I care. It's just stuff."
"So why give it to me?"
"Thought you might want to have something to remind you of me. I know how you get. Sentimental."
"Wha-? Nope. No goddamn dice, Sefie." His mouth set into the thin, downward-curling line it always did when he was upset. "Don't you come out with any 'we'll never meet again' bullshit. 'Cause I won't hear it."
"Hear what you like. I'm done."
"You're done?" he echoed, dumbfounded. "That's... it?"
"Yeah. That's it." Something thawed in her for the briefest moment, and she stepped onto her tiptoes to kiss him on the cheek. Irvine jerked back as if her lips had left a burn.
"No. You don't get to do this. I won't stand here and take a goodbye from you."
"I won't say it, then." She reached up to tip his cowboy hat. "See ya, Irvy."
He stood in the stripped-bare room, still clutching the bag of clothes, staring after her as she walked away.
"Squall?" Rinoa mumbled sleepily.
The tapping at the door had roused her from her doze on the sofa, Angelo sprawled across her thighs. She rubbed at her eyes. No, Squall wouldn't knock. That didn't make sense. He had a keycard to his own quarters.
She squinted at the clock. Ten-thirty. It was still too early for Squall. The Commander would be shuttered in his office still, glaring at his computer screen, and another night would pass with the barest minimum of intimacy with his girlfriend. He might put his arm around her while she slept, if she was lucky. Rinoa sighed.
"C'mon, girl." She lifted Angelo off her lap. "Let's see who it is."
She knew before she opened the door. A soft glow of magical aura was seeping slowly through the doorframe.
"Selphie. D'you want to come in?"
Selphie wordlessly walked past Rinoa, into the living area of the Commander's quarters. Angelo padded towards her, then stopped abruptly.
Selphie glanced down at the dog, eyes blank, and Angelo shrank away, confused. Rinoa knelt, placing a calming hand on the fur around her neck.
I know, girl, she told Angelo silently. I know she's different. We just have to show her that we're still here for her. No matter what.
"Did Squall tell you?"
Selphie's aura flickered as she spoke. Rinoa tried not to look at it. The fabric of Selphie's sorcery was in constant flux, and had been ever since her return from Dollet. It made Rinoa feel dizzy, almost nauseous.
"Tell me what?"
"I resigned today."
"Oh." This couldn't be good. "No, he didn't. He hasn't come back yet."
"It's you I wanted to talk to, not him." There was a thoroughly unfamiliar gleam in Selphie's eyes, and Rinoa had the unshakeable feeling that another person was somehow looking out of them. A slow shiver trickled down her spine.
"Come with me, Rin."
"Come with you... where?"
"I'm leaving Garden. Come with me."
The fervent excitement that lit up Selphie's face was infectious, and had Rinoa's teeth not been on edge, she might have been swayed by it.
"We could go anywhere. Do anything." She reached out both hands, and curled her fingers around Rinoa's wrists. "Team Witch. What d'you say?"
"Selphie, I... I can't ever leave Squall. You must know that already."
Selphie surveyed her dispassionately for longer than was comfortable, and withdrew her hands. "Thought you'd say something like that. Was worth a try, though."
She turned, and stretched out her arms above her head, the lazy strength of a leopard ready to hunt. Rinoa let out a held breath and rubbed her wrists gently. Selphie's magic was brimming over, its effervesce spilling into Rinoa's own aura of sorcery. She would need a moment to recover.
Selphie tossed her a backwards glance as she headed for the door, a smile laced with pity.
"If you ever want a different life, come and find me."
She left Garden that night, alone, unafraid, untethered to possessions or companions.
It was for the best, she realized. Nothing, and no-one, would limit her.
She was free.