A Love on the Sidelines
By: 4quintessence
Disclaimer: The characters belong to Square Enix, the fanfiction to me.
Pairing: CliffxFayt
Rating: PG-13
Summary: It's the day after a night of too much drinking by everyone on the SO3 team. Fayt and Cliff have to deal with what Albel did the night before, and the Klausian decides to take matters into his own hands. We end with Maria feeling sorry for past actions and making up for it.
Shout Outs - Zel: Hey! You wanna know the weirdest thing? I'm also waiting for some stupid person to bring back a Furuba volume to the library! It was due on Feb. 20th and how many days late is it now?? ARG! HAHA the cucumber part is my fav. part of the chapter. OMG u should so draw Cliff with his tattoo and Fayt in his belly dancing dress and then scan them and send them to me!! Cuz i cant draw! Speaking of sister harassement, i have 2 younger ones so i know all about that. at least im older than them tho :D I can't wait for your dark FaytxCliff story. Spectral: I bet you'll love what Cliff does in this chapter :D I tried to be very descriptive about it. Anywho, like i said to Zel you should draw something and send it to me! I like the school uniform idea.
Chapter 10 (yes a day late but i had to do this presentation for school! not about SO unfortunately):
Fayt awoke the next morning shivering for two reasons. One, Cliff was sleeping on his side facing away from Fayt and he had pulled all the covers over with him. Two, the bluenette was naked from the waist down from last night's escapades. Thinking nothing of this and feeling the tinge of a headache spreading up his neck and into his head, he quickly grabbed the sheets and pulled them back over himself as Cliff let out a loud grunt. The calming warmth that followed allowed a light sleep to take him once again.
Cliff woke up a few hours later, after the sun had risen over the eastern mountains. Throwing his arm across the bed to stretch, he felt a sour sensation in his stomach that signaled a lovely hangover. The blond rubbed his temples in response to his sore head and then noticed Fayt had woken up as well.
"Mornin'. Now you had a rough night didn't cha? Does your head hurt as much as mine?"
"Uhhh...oh ya. I don't think I can get up yet."
"No worries. I gotta ask ya something though. So what happened with you and Albel yesterday, huh?"
Fayt eyes widened like the ripples of a raindrop on a puddle as he searched his mind, trying to recall the events of last night. "What are you talking about? I don't remember anything," he responded truthfully.
Cliff shook his head, his blond bangs falling from side to side. "Ouch. You completely forgot? Well it figures since ya had so much to drink. You might be interested to learn that he dragged ya outta the pub and took ya here without telling anyone. Now I guess I won't find out if he did anything to you. Ya never know with him...all that staring at ya when we're travelling..."
The bluenette felt a strange sinking feeling as he contemplated what he was being told. Next it felt like someone had punched him in the stomach as he realized there was nothing between his dick and the sheets. Sneaking a peek under the blankets to confirm this, he turned back to Cliff with a guilty look on his face. Something had gone on, and he hadn't stopped whatever it was.
"Cliff, I don't have any pants on," he said, pointing downwards. "Is that an answer enough for you?"
The blond put two and two together before letting out a low growl and cursing under his breath.
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It was a good thing the play that they were planning to attend was in the late afternoon since most of the crew members weren't feeling well enough to leave the inn until after lunch. Fayt tried to eat something in the morning and was rewarded by having to throw up a little while later. He ended up taking a pill to calm his upset stomach as he enviously wished that he had the alcohol tolerance of a Klausian.
Cliff didn't say much to Fayt all morning or when the group headed to the theatre later in the day. He and Albel completely avoided eye contact as they walked down the elegant streets of Aquios. When they arrived at the playhouse and headed inside, a perky attendant pulled Albel aside and declared that he was the 500th person to enter and that he would receive a free backstage pass to watch the show. Excited about not having to sit with the others, Albel disappeared behind some curtains as the rest of the party went to take their seats.
When the lights dimmed and the play about the history of the Aquarian Kingdom was about to begin, Fayt was finishing a conversation with Sophia over what had happened, which she spread down the row to Mirage, Maria, and Nel. About thirty minutes in, during a scene involving some war over a princess, something about the story irked Cliff and helped him come to a decision.
"That's it," he whispered to Fayt, slapping a hand down on the other's thigh. "It's either him or me and this will decide it." The blond stood up and started to move down the row.
"CLIFF! It is you! Get back here...what are you doing?" the young man hissed.
"I'm teaching him a lesson or else he's just gonna keep comin' after ya."
A small chorus of 'shhhs' came from the people around them. Brushing off Fayt's hand, the blond continued on to the aisle and vanished behind a drape on one side of the theatre. The bluenette cupped his hands over his nose and muttered 'oh my god' as he bent over in his seat. And then the sound he dreadfully did not want to hear…
"COME 'ERE YOU SLEAZEBALL! We're gonna settle this here and now!" It was Cliff's voice coming from backstage.
Some of the actors onstage ceased their pretend battle and glanced towards the curtain with puzzled looks. Next they heard objects crashing around behind the scenes and shouts of 'Get away from me, worm!'. Sophia and Mirage covered their mouths to stifle cries of disbelief as they deciphered what was going on. Fayt attempted to make himself as small as possible in his chair, hoping that by doing so he would just disappear. He even thought about calling the Diplo and asking to be transported to the ship, but he dismissed that idea quickly.
All of a sudden Albel came crashing backwards through a slit in the curtains into the middle of the play with Cliff following behind him, fists clenched. Albel's fall knocked two of the performers to the ground and the rest swiftly scattered to one side as the audience let out a collective gasp.
As a hush fell across the room, a full-out duel commenced between the two at centre stage in front of hundreds of spectators! Actually it was more of a fistfight since Albel hadn't brought his katana because he never would have imagined needing to use it at a play. The peculiar part was that the audience's shock soon subsided and turned into cheers as they began to think that this was all part of the show's cleverness — a feature battle within the larger one over the princess.
Completely immersed in their combat, everything around Albel and Cliff faded to black. Albel was still on the ground as Cliff marched towards him, ready to deal another blow. The Elicoorian suddenly slid forward as smoothly as a snake and swung out one leg to trip up the blond before he knew what hit him. As the latter was plunging towards the ground, Albel leaped up and punched him in the stomach, sending him flying across the stage. Cliff hit the floor with a piercing smash, crushing the whole side of a tent that was set up as a base for the play's battle. He quickly jumped up again and glared at his target through squinted blue eyes that burned hot like embers from the pits of hell.
He bounded back towards Albel, who was leisurely adjusting his artificial arm, and flew the last few metres using his high-speed Charge move. His knuckles made contact with the side of Albel's face as the power of lightning wrapped like a prickly vine around his forearm and pulsed into the other's cheek, causing him to fly backwards across the stage in a haze of sparks. Clutching his jaw in one hand, the Elicoorian bent down and drew a small runology on the ground with his index finger. A stream of fire trailed his tracing motions and when he was done he pressed his entire hand onto the blazing symbol. A river of magic shot across the surface of the stage and erupted into a mini earthquake right under Cliff, making him teeter back and forth violently before losing his balance and falling hard onto a pointy prop, bruising his right shoulder.
Albel sprinted over to the collapsed Cliff and swiftly kicked him in the back, causing the latter to cry out in pain as he lifted into the air and was knocked back down again. But then the former brigade captain found himself unable to move as Cliff reached around and grabbed tightly onto his left leg. Sweat was forming on the Klausian's brow as he prepared for his next move. A violet veil of shimmering sorcery surrounded his hand like a cluster of stars and when the blond finally let go, a shockwave sent the Elicoorian up into the air as he shrieked in agony from the invisible ripples that pummeled his body.
As he plummeted back towards the ground, Cliff jumped to his feet and finished Albel off by plowing him with his Uppercut move, knocking the younger man unconscious in the process. Someone in the audience shouted 'K-O!' as thunderous applause filled every corner of the building.
Abruptly coming back to reality, Cliff glanced around at the multitude of people watching him and blushed a colour that matched the bruise on his shoulder. He stuffed some Fresh Sage into Albel's mouth to resuscitate him, and dragged him backstage again — to cries of 'take off your shirt!' from people in the front row — so the play could continue and so they could have a little 'talk'. Fayt, who was feeling rather faint at the moment, felt about one thousand other emotions simultaneously as he sat bewildered in his seat.
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Sitting on a bench by a lovely little pond under a trellis of royal sunset roses outside the Aquios palace, Cliff and Fayt summarized to Maria what had happened behind the scenes. Fayt had finally snuck backstage following the 'incident' and after waking from his beating, Albel had confessed his wrongdoings and actually apologized in a roundabout way to Cliff. The blond then set down some ground rules for Albel as he explained the seriousness of his and Fayt's relationship. As he had with Maria, the bluenette asserted that he was not attracted to Albel beyond their friendship and he pleaded for him to respect that. Fayt then tried to tend to Albel's wounds, but he just stormed away saying he didn't need anyone's pity.
"So whaddya think Fayt? Did we get our point across?" the blond asked, winking contently.
"Well...as best we could. It seems nothing gets through to that man unless you have him cornered," Fayt sighed. "Albel only speaks one language, and it's called violence."
"Ya got that right, kid. I totally nailed him too! Did you hear all the cheers? Aren't ya proud of me?"
The bluenette rolled his eyes upwards and shook his head. "Cliff, you could have dealt with him somewhere where there weren't hundreds of people watching! If you wanted to embarrass me, it worked really well."
"I didn't mean for it to happen that way, I'm sorry. It's just that stupid play got me thinking and I had to do something right away cuz...cuz...I'm yer bodyguard! Your protector from other horny men! Plus I love ya so much I couldn't not do anything….I bet you enjoyed it Maria."
"If you want the truth, I'd have to say that it was actually quite amusing. You did what you had to do Cliff and that's all there is to it. Let's just hope you don't want to do that to me too," she replied.
Cliff was genuinely baffled by her comment until Fayt (who never told Cliff about what Maria did to him) spoke up to break the silence.
"OKAY THEN! Cliff, look at me. So anyways...the Queen asked us to go to the plains near Arias to get rid of this monster that keeps attacking the town at night and we're also suppose to talk to Clair about coordinating with Airyglyph to prepare for the next Vendeeni attack. I wish we didn't have to leave so soon though…"
"Don't then," Maria offered. "I'll take care of it for you. I'll go with the others and we'll finish off this creature and then you can come meet us later at Clair's house. You two need some rest anyways. Cliff's got some bad new bruises from that battle and we need him to be in top fighting form. And you are still recovering from that fall — which seems to have messed up your judgment seeing what happened yesterday. Haha. Just stay here where it's peaceful and spend some quality time together. It's probably best that you and Albel are separated for a while as well."
Fayt didn't know what to say. He really did not yet want to leave the soothing ambiance of Aquios and it was such a kind offer that he couldn't say no. She must still feel bad about manhandling me in my room…
"Okay, sure that sounds great. Thanks so much Maria."
"It's settled then!" Cliff piped in. "Look at that Fayt...that's what you call good parenting. Mirage and me raised little Maria to be such a selfless person…" The blond tried to pat Maria on the head but she leaned away.
"HA! Says the man who doesn't have time to help poor Niklas on Vanguard III," Fayt shot back. He then imitated Cliff's gruff voice with his hands on his hips: "I still think you shouldn't have gotten involved with those kids from Whipple."
Maria chuckled and poked Cliff in the side. "You got to admit, he's always good for a laugh!"
Fayt burst into hysterics as the Klausian tackled Maria without warning and wrestled her off the bench into the grass below. She alternated between screaming and giggling as he tickled her all over and as she tried to push him away. She attempted very sternly to say 'stop it!' but couldn't get it out.
"Hey, look who's laughing now!" Cliff roared, as a tiny toad jumped into the pond to get away from their playful antics.
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After everyone else had left for Arias, Fayt and Cliff finally went up to their room at the inn for some much needed rest and relaxation. Cliff turned the handle on the door and then abruptly let out a shout.
"WHA? What's goin' on here?"
Fayt squeezed under the blond's arm and peeked into their room. Some sort of garbled exclamation came out of his mouth as he looked around, awestruck. It seemed as though they had walked into a romance novel. There were candles of all different sizes and colours laid out around the room, each one happily burning away and creating an ambient glow that glimmered in the eyes of the beholders. At the base of each candle lay a gorgeous red blossom that sent out a wave of splendorous aroma that beckoned them to come inside.
The entire bedspread was covered with an ocean of red and pink flower petals and a bottle of champagne sat on the bedside table. Fayt ran into the room and went to look in the bathroom because he noticed that the light was on. He found the bathtub freshly filled with water coated by a layer of bubbles and sprinkled with a few petals, and on one side of the tub sat a giant bouquet of roses and a big box of the finest chocolates.
"OH MY GOD! Who did this? It's amazing!" Fayt yelled, turning back to look at Cliff. The sight of the room made his heartbeat quicken, but he hardly noticed it over his excitement.
"Hmmm, let's see here. There's a note by the champagne bottle…" he said, picking it up to read. "MARIA?! NO WAY! What has gotten into that girl? First she offers to take over our mission and now...well look at this place! It's incredible! I've never seen anything like it."
"Looks like today's our lucky day Cliffy," the bluenette replied seductively. He proceeded to run towards the bed to jump on it, sending blossoms flying up into the air and out off the edge of the bed. He almost disappeared under the flowers since only his face was visible above the soft curves of the petals. "Perfect."
"Guess I'm not complainin' then!" The blond marched over to the bed and swept Fayt up into his arms. The young man used to hate being carried around by Cliff, but now he couldn't think of anything better. "I think it's time for a bath...and then we'll see where it goes from there…"
Looking up into the calm, navy eyes of his boyfriend, the bluenette responded: "Kiss me Cliff, kiss me forever."
"Okay, but we eventually have to…" The Klausian was cut off by Fayt's lips pressing against his own and all his worries swept away as if they were riding a receding tide. For a split second an image flashed through his mind — he saw himself, at least it looked like him except that he had dark auburn hair. He was reaching out to a woman who was being dragged away from him. The image soon passed, Cliff paused for a second perplexed, but decided to think nothing of it as he sunk into the eternity of Fayt's kiss.
I like where you sleep,
When you sleep, next to me.
I like where you sleep...here
Our lips, can touch
And our cheeks, can brush
Our lips can touch here
Well, you are the one, the one that lies close to me
Whisper's "Hello, I miss you quite terribly"
I fell in love, in love with you suddenly
Now there's no place else I could be but here in your arms
- Hellogoodbye 'Here (In Your Arms)' (from Fayt's perspective)
TO BE CONTINUED!