Sorry about the possible bad quality of this chapter, but my writing tends to be worse when I write straight on to my computer and not on to paper first.

Advancing

Chapter 2: Conversations

He walked like a brainless zombie, he couldn't help it. He just didn't find the strenght to do anything, only enough to lift his legs so he could step forward without falling flat on his face, embarrasing himself once again. He couldn't even see what was in front of him, other than his nose. His eyes were closing, no matter how much he tried to fight it, he needed sleep and he needed it badly. If Zell hand't been completely worn out before his misson with Selphie, he definitely was now, he felt like he would fall into a coma as soon as he saw a bed, any bed, and never wake up again.

He thanked Hyne that Selphie was still as hyper as always and hopped before him, leading him by his hand so he couldn't walk into too many walls on their way to Squall's new office. Squall had gotten it after the second sorceress war, it wasn't anything magnificent, it was a tiny cube really (1). Zell often wondered if he had some secret room attached to it so he could have some space to turn around.

Zell brushed weakly his sweaty bangs away from his face with his free hand and then took hold of Selphie's small hand with both of his own so the brunette was literally pulling him along. Selphie looked back at him for a second and flashed him a big encouraging smile before starting to go faster. The blond let out a small moan of discomfort that was not much more than a breath because the muscles in his arms protested against the handling as Zell's body couldn't keep up with the girl.

Anyway there was a small smile lingering on the martial artist's face, even when he was too damn exhausted to bother with his usual grin. Despite the weakness in his limbs he was in a good mood. When they left he had been the complete opposite, he had been something between depressed and pissed off, but Seilphie's constant happiness had rubbed off on him. Now there was a strange feeling of content lingering in his veins. Unfortunately Selphie had kept her endless suply of energy all to herself.

Their mission hadn't gone how he had wanted it to go, all simply and easily, but Selphie on the other hand had loved it. She was always estatic when they got to blow shit up. It had been the only option after Zell had sneezed quite loudly when some dust landed on his nose, and blew their cover. Zell had instantly taken a defensive position and Selphie had drawn her weapon, ready for a good fight. They had found themselves staring at more monsters that they had ever before seen at one place, all of them slowly stalking towards them. They could have possibly won the fight if they both had been in top condition, but with things as they were they didn't have a chance.

At that point he had thanked Hyne (and forgived him for everything that had happened lately. ) for having Selphie to pack the most effective and dangerous explosives she had found, just in case something like this would happen. Luckily the monstrers had done something extremely bizarre to give time for Selphie to plant the bombs and for them to escape afterwards.

When the monsters had gotten close enough to attack them they had stopped like to a wall and just looked at them warily. It was clear that the monsters had the upperhand over an injured prey and Zell and Selphie had known that the monsters knew that too. They hadn't thought about it at the time, they had been just happy to get the hell away from there before the bomb went off, but now it was all coming back to him. A part of the group had looked scared and the rest confused, like they didn't know should they believe what their senses were telling them or to attack. It had been a close call, because as soon as the brunette had gotten the bomb ready the confused monsters had made their minds and launched them selves at the two with the scared ones following the example.

All in all the mission had went well since only a couple of new scrathes adorned his skin and Selphie hadn't even gotten that much injuries if she had at all. She certainly didn't seem to have, even if you looked closely.

Zell closed his eyes completely as they entered Balamb garden and it's familiar hallways where he didn't need to bother to look at were he and Selphie were going and even if he made a mistake in calculating the distances between places Selphie would surely warn him if he was about to walk into something. Or not if she was too far before him to notice anything as small as her friend shouting in sudden pain of connecting his nose with a random obstacle.

It was a small miracle that they both got to the headmaster's office without any incidents in a relatively short time, as it was a good thing that they had lifts at garden, because the blond boy was quite sure he wouldn't have been able to walk any stairs. His every limb felt like they weighted more than a ton. He absent mindedly quessed Selphie didn't have any problems like that since she looked like she could still run a marathon, or two, as she bounced to Squall's door and rapped on it gently with her knuckles, that gentleness in her actions made the blond behind her frown as he witnessed it. / Why can't she knock on my door like that? Does she really enjoy that much causing me heart attacks. /

There was a short pause, rustling of papers and a sound of drawers opening and closing before Squall started to call them in, but before he even finished his sentence Selphie was opening the door and rushing inside to greet their mutual friend. Zell smiled a little at the brunettes antics and shook his head in a way that was barely visible and then pushed himself off the wall he had been leaning against and disappeared to the office. The brunette girl was already squeezing the life out of their friend before the was even gotten fully into the office. / Damn the takes things fast. /

"Umm... Hey Squall." He mumbled as he observed the situation, he didn't know what would be the best way to approach things, Squall didn't look like he was enjoying the hug quite as much as Selphie. He let out a deep breath and relaxed when Squall nodded his greetings and waved for him to sit in a comfy looking chair before his desk, pushing Selphie off him at the same time so that the meeting could officially begin. As Squall cleared his throat and was about to start his speech, Selphie too took a chair for herself and sat down, swinging her legs to satisfy her need for being on the move, Zell too anticipated the awaiting boredom and leaned back on the chair and rested his head on his hand for a more comfortable position.

Squall gazed at their actions rather disapprovingly, but chose to remain silent on the matter and just go on with the show since the was only a very small chance that he could change their behavior for any longer that few minutes.

"Selphie already infoed me briefly about the mission before you even left the site, so I will start with the question, what went wrong? You are both high ranking SeeDs, yet you couldn't complete the mission without taking actions not informed in the folders (2) I gave you!"

They both blinked in disbelief at the abnormal outburst of their usually solemn and silent friend. "You blew the whole cave up, if you had been any slower you both would be dead. Do you have any idea how I felt when there was now answer from either of your intercoms!"

They both still sat there in complete silence, all their motions ceasing, excluding their blinking eyes. Oh yeah. Squall had definitely lost his mind. Or he had been possessed or something, there was no way this person was the person they knew. The silence continued for a while, until Zell opened his mouth and broke it with a question of his own, "Um... Squall, what the hell have ya been smokin' while we were gone?"

Now it the brunette's turn to blink, he hadn't even noticed that he had gotten out of his chair at some point and was now standing, leaning over his desk with both of his palms pressed to its smooth surface. He drew a breath as he calmed down and sat again, straightening his uniform and cleaning it for unexsisting dust particles.

"Sorry." He said silently, "I am pleased that you both got out safely." With no more explanations than that he went on with his usual speech like nothing had happened. Selphie smiled warmly at their friends display of emotion, it was nice to know that he cared under that ice cool facade. She was actively participating in their discussion with Squall, but Zell was slowly falling asleep as he droned on, once in a while waking up as he was asked a question.

"Zell! Anyone home!" Selphie yelled into his ear, starling him and making him almost jump out of the chair. Squall was frowning at him.

"Uh. Sorry, go on."

"Zell, there is now use to have this conversation with you now if you can't stay awake. Go get some sleep, I'll see you later if you can then keep your eyes open for longer than ten seconds at a time."

Zell thanked, nodded in agreement and got out of the chair, slowly so he didn't crash on the floor. He said his goodbyes to Squall and Selphie, getting a hug from the girl in return. He walked out and as he was closing the door he could see Squall shaking his head with a small smile on his face at something the other brunette had said as he shuffled through the papers on his desk, looking for one thing or another.

-

"Ahh."

Zell closed his eyes in extasy as he finally fell into his soft bed. He hadn't even bothered to take off his clothes yet, the thought of a warm and safe place to sleep too good to prolong. He laid still for a few minutes suddenly not so tired anymore as the longer he laid there the more he felt like he was being watched, there was no way he was ever going to get any sleep if he expected something to jump him at any second now. Huffing he opened his eyes slightly to look if there was anyone in the room with him. Not seeing anything from the angle he was in he rose to his elbows so he was a little bit higher and blinked a few times, it was quite dark in his room as the curtains in front of the bedroom window were closed.

What he saw, or what he thought he saw shocked him to the core and had him twisting to get out of the tangled covers. It all happened in less than a second and the hurry made him fall out of the bed with a loud thump instantly. So he now laid on his side on the floor, the tangled covers still with him and wrapped around his body even worse, he was unmoving like a marble statue, not even breathing. It was eerily quiet and if it would have been any less stupid not to check if he had seen right, he would have been very much against breaking the silence by any kind of a movement on his part.

The blond mumbled curses under his breath and jumped up from the floor to see around the room, it was, thankfully, completely empty, like no one but him had ever even been in it. He listened and couldn't hear anything unusual. Just for a second he thought he had seen a golden dragon with blazing green eyes at the end of his bed. / But that would have been impossible, the door is locked and there is no way in hell something as big as it had been could move in the garden and go unnoticed. /

The need to sleep coming back to him he stretched and laid back on the bed, this time succumbing to sleep instantly. There was a small rustling noise after Zell was too far gone to care anymore or to remember it in the morning and then the door to his rooms opened and closed.

-

He woke up in the evening feeling more rested than he had for days, there had always been something preventing him from getting uninterrupted sleep and recharging his energy (3). The blond streched and rubbed his eyes. He was warm, somehow he had crawled unted the covers in his sleep and was now feeling nice and toasty, that was making him happy too. Or maybe it was the dream he had. He couldn't recall much of it, but he had felt safe and content and fluffy all the way through it and the emotions had stayed even after when he had awakened.

"Mmm..." / Feels like someone had filled my mind with clouds... Don't wanna get up... / He thought, but pushed the covers away anyway, he had a headmaster to find.

-

Later, after taking a shower, of course not using his own since it was still in a pretty bad shape (he was lucky that the water still didn't flow or he would have been accused of nasty water damages), he got dressed and left for cafeteria. He was dieing of hunger so he was hoping he would run into Squall after eating, any sooner and he would have to say good bye to all the yummy hotdogs.

He got in the line, waiting for his turn. In a far away corner in an almost empty table was eating someone who caught his eye, Squall. / I guess talking to him while eating is okay too. /

Zell got his food - hotdogs, four of them – and walked over to Squall, dropping his tray on the table and taking a seat opposite to his friend.

"Hey Squall, you wanted to see me?" The blond greeted, getting a wordless nod in return. "So, what ya wanted to talk to me about?"

Squall frowned in disgust as he watched Zell speaking with his mouth full. He was tempted to brush a hand through his hair to make sure that there was no bits of food in it, but that would have meant he cared about his look more than Rinoa. Even she didn't do it and then if he did it, it could be considered girlish and vain. There was a lot of things Squall knew could be said about him, but he hoped girlish and vain weren't on that list.

"Selphie already informed me about your mission, I only need your report."

"Huh? Okay, so that was all?" He waited few minutes for an answer, but went back to eating his hotdogs as it was clear that there wasn't going to be one.

The rest of the meal was silent, or would have been if you excluded Zells constant chattering and the natural sounds of the cafeteria that filled the air. There wasn't even any grunting from Squall that usually meant he was still listening and Zell was noticing this as well. The brunette sat there looking all calm and collected, but small things like the lack of grunts gave away that something was bothering him today.

"Hey, are you okay man?" No response, not even a blink. "Yo Squall!"

"Hm?"

"Is somethin' bothering you?" Zell swallowed what was left of his hotdogs and reached over the table to put a reassuring hand on Squall's shoulder. Normally the other would have removed said hand so it surprised the blond when there was no such movement. Squall seemed to think hard about should he tell him and finally choose to.

"There was an… attack near Garden. Four cadets were injured." / Hyne. I hope no one I know was injured. /

"What happened?" The blond asked his eyes wide.

"The cadets insist that they were attacked by a dragon and that they couldn't get even one hit to land on it, yet somehow they survived. The wounds on them support their story, but I have never seen anything like them, they were placed so that no permanent harm was caused. Whatever did it had no intentions of killing them."

"So are ya saying that this thing's like, intelligent?"

"More so than average monsters." / / Great, sounds like my lizard. Nothing with no intelligence could be that... Sick. /

"Who were they?"

"None you knew, Ryan Stenberg, Ingervo Dantchev, Alexander Valkeavirta and Damien Lishman."

"Oh." / Them. Why it had to be them, now they're going to be more pissy than normally when they will be released from the infirmary. On the brighter side, this is one more reason to rid world of the firelizard. /

"Are you listening to me, Dintch?"

"Huh?" / Damn. I ignored him. /

"You knew them" It was more a statement than a question.

"Not really." / Yeah, I wish. / "Umm… Squall? I think I've seen that dragon before, on the mission I had just before the one with Selphie." Zell said, nervousness practically coating his voice.

"You didn't state an encounter with a dragon on your mission report." / Oops. Caught. /

"It kinda slipped from my mind." Zell said and rubbed the back of his head in embarrassment. This had been one shitty week for him and it didn't seem to be getting any better,

"Hn. The dragon is dangerously close to garden, we need to exterminate it. I will leave tomorrow morning at 0900 hours." / Alone? But that means he's going to kill it before I even get a chance to beat it up! No way! I'm so going with him/

"I'm comin' too! I know where to look for it!" Squall shot him a pointed look that's meaning went straight over his head. The brunette sighed.

"You need to rest."

"I have enough strength in me to kill one bloody dragon. I'm goin'!"

"Where are you going?" Selphie inquired as she plopped down on the seat next to Zell.

"Dragon hunting." Zell stated, crossing his arms and looking overall very unmovable on his decision.

"Sounds like fun. " She looked at Squall with a sunshiny smile, there was no way he was going to make her stay at Balamb Garden. The other brunette just took it like a man and grumbled something under his breath.

"Talking about me?"

"Oh fuck off Almasy! There's nothing in you to talk about!"

"Seifer! We are going dragon hunting, you gotta come too!" Selphie squealed latched herself on his sleeve.

His brows furrowed and something inside him shifted. "Sure." He glanced at Squall for confirmations.

"Whatever. We are leaving tomorrow at 0900 hours. Be ready at the front gates or you will be left behind." With that he rose from the chair and left, Selphie not far behind him.

"So Chicky, it's just you and me now. Wanna go to watch chocobo racing with me someday?" His head was tilted to one side, he was watching Zells reactions with slitted eyes and there was a hint of a smirk playing on his lips.

"Dream on Almasy! I know this is some kinda sick joke to you!" The shorter blond replied before turning harshly his back to Seifer and storming off. On the table was left his empty tray to mock the blond that had just been coldly rejected. He stood there for a second, feeling idiotic, and something in him rose to reside right under his smooth skin. Swirling under the surface. / I just thought you would have liked that... / (4)

He had never cried before, but now the tears just... Came.

(1) I really use that word way too much.

(2) I just can't get into my mind right now what those mission briefing things are called...

(3) Just noticed that every time I have been tired I have written Zell to be tired too and now that I have taken a nap and eaten my caffeine candies he is rested as well... I should stop letting my moods influence my writing.

(4) In case s9omeone doesn't realize, this is Seifer's thought.

Author's note:

This chapter was meant to be longer, but I just wanted to get it done so it wouldn't be nagging in the back of my mind all the time. Last week was a test week for me, so this chapter was delayed because of that, I had to study and there was no time to write this at all. It twill most likely take even longer before I get the next one out, 'cause I have so much to do. I need to read a whole book in English and write 8-page-long thing of it (a hell for me) and I also need to do a 20 minutes long lesson about sexual ethics in Christianity. So until the next chapter, bye!

Ps: Don't forget to review if you want that next chapter!