"...then she jumped from the roof and bit him."
Quistis had never before had a hero, but after being regaled with the Adventures of Selphie Tilmitt, Fairy Warrior, she knew that she had to get Selphie's autograph.
Dinner was exceptional. Being cast into the very bowels of insanity had done nothing to dull Edea's cleverness in the kitchen. Seared scallops, heavy with herbed butter and pepper, a crisp salad of sweet and bitter greens from the garden, even a fragrant honey beer brewed with cinnamon and vanilla. Necessity was the mother of invention, if one believed the old saying, and Edea was clear evidence of that. Nothing more than a garden and a lot of free time had the four of them bent over their plates like they were paying homage to a goddess. There might have been a collective sigh at the table, except for the fact that Quistis ate so quickly that she was going back for seconds while the others were still eating their salads.
When Cid hoisted the small keg onto the table, grinning at everyone like the jolly elf in the holiday cards, Edea told them that she had been saving their homebrew for a special occasion. Freshly caught scallops were reason enough, she whispered to Quistis, but she didn't want Seifer to think that he could expect the same every time he left the house. She would only serve it if he brought home a fine catch, like he did earlier.
Quistis didn't miss the way Seifer rolled his eyes. His t-shirt had been stretched by the weight of the scallops they had carried between them and he was still grumbling about it. She doubted that he even caught the compliment Edea had given her.
Then again, he was a pitiful fisherman. It was only to be expected.
"And she had wings?"
Cid began clearing the plates while Edea continued her tale. She could make the heavens pour fire or the seas swallow entire nations, so wondrous were her story-telling skills, but on this night she was simply describing events that she had witnessed on a fine summer's day many years ago. The only people that could truly weave this tale were Selphie herself and the brooding fellow staring at Quistis. "Of course she did. She said they were fairy wings, but they looked to me like she had plucked them from a giant pink bat."
Seifer poured another glass of beer. Thick and sweet, it hissed as he lifted it to his mouth. He took a long pull and frowned. Edea was getting the story all wrong. It hadn't happened like that at all.
"Demon wings, more like it."
Edea waved him off. "I tried to help him when he came running to the house, bleeding everywhere, but that wasn't good enough."
He wouldn't stop staring at her. It wasn't enough that he tried to drown her. He was trying to will her to death with his eyes just because he couldn't drown anyone properly. Quistis returned the stare, lamenting the fact that she couldn't execute Seifer over dessert. Even in a wild place like Centra, such behavior was frowned upon.
"He had to have you. Do you remember that?"
Quistis blinked and instantly regretted it. The battle had been lost before it began. Seifer lifted his beer in a silent gesture of triumph, the victor of another war with his favorite enemy. It might have seemed a hollow victory had his opponent been anyone else, but Quistis hated to lose just as much as he did, especially at something as juvenile as a staring contest. It was beneath her and he loved it.
"No, I can't say that I do."
Cid wiped the crumbs from the table and kissed Edea on the top of her head. His hands were much different, calloused and rough. Quistis was surprised to see that he was thinner as well. It made perfect sense given that he wasn't sitting at a desk all day, but it was surprising nonetheless. He pretended to not see her look of confusion. Seifer had done the same thing, though he was far more vocal about his impressions. "I'm not surprised. You had to bandage more cuts and scrapes than..."
"And devil fairy bites."
"Watch your language, Seifer." Edea's eyes flashed. She was fiercely protective of all her children, though she leaned closer to Quistis and mischievously mumbled, "And yes, devil fairy bites. You were the one he always ran to when he had hurt himself."
"I didn't hurt myself. That maniac attacked me with those glow-in-the-dark fangs of hers."
Cid was laughing as he carried the stack of plates to the sink. They heard the rush of water and the odd submerged clink of ceramic plates beneath the suds.
"She bit me."
Edea looked at Quistis. Quistis looked at Edea. By some unspoken agreement, they agreed that laughing at poor Seifer would be a bad idea. It would likely hurt his feelings and bruise his fragile ego.
They were doing so well until he rubbed his throat in the exact spot where Selphie had once tried to drink his blood. Their cackles were so loud that they were surely heard in Dollet.
Quistis' eyes were watering by the time she caught her breath. "Oh, come on. I'm sure you deserved it. You weren't exactly a saint, you know."
And there she went again, taking the side of her little cast of misfits. Seifer finished his beer and went back for yet another. It might have tasted like something he could have gotten at a medieval fair, and it might not taste like real beer, but damn, it was good. It almost made up for the fact that Quistis was trying her damnedest to embarrass him. "I never bit anyone."
"You did too. You've bitten me before."
"You asked for it."
"I did not."
She was almost too easy sometimes. He downed half of the glass, smacking his lips loudly, then leaned back in his chair and glanced underneath the table. "You mean that scar has faded on your inner..."
Quistis smiled sweetly at Edea and prayed that she failed to notice how her boot was connecting with Seifer's shins. Edea was smoothing a crease on her skirt, either completely oblivious or trying very hard to make it appear that she missed the entire exchange. "Shut up..."
Wiping his hands, Cid came back to the table and refilled everyone's glasses. Noticing that Quistis had barely sipped hers, he kindly asked, "Not drinking with the rest of us?"
Seifer muttered "She hates beer." just as Quistis declined with a polite "No, thank you."
"Well, it's technically mead, but..." Cid pushed her glass to Seifer and sat next to him. If the others had been home, it would have been perfect. There was something comforting about the squabbling, though there was also a quiver of guilt behind that comfort. He should have known that about one of his own children. "So what were you guys talking about?"
Edea reached across the table and patted his hand. "Just old stories, dear. We were trying to decide if those wings of Selphie's belonged to a bat or a fairy."
"Fairy? I thought she was an alligator. She had those green teeth, as I recall. I had to hide them from her in my sock drawer."
"No, darling."
"That girl. Heh. There were times I wondered about her." He nodded to Quistis. "We never had any problems from you or Squall. Irvine was pretty well-behaved as well. Zell cried a lot, but we just had to give him some ice cream and everything was fine again. It was always Selphie and Seifer here that caused us so much worry."
Seifer shifted in his chair. He would have gone straight to bed if he had known that he was going to be the topic of everyone's conversation. Why weren't they bombarding Quistis with questions about that damned school? It was their baby, wasn't it? Did retirement mean that they just didn't give a fuck anymore? Why weren't they asking about precious Squally and Mrs. Future Psycho? Shouldn't they have been asking why Quistis wasn't knocked up with Xu's rubber baby?
Belching slightly and in a fine mood, Cid rested his hands on his belly and began to reminisce. "Remember that time he ran off and I had to chase him down in that old rusted..."
Edea's smile might have curdled milk. "I remember very well."
Cid drummed his fingertips over his shirt. Wrong thing to say, especially on one of her good days. "Um...Well, I think I'll turn in. Long day and all that."
Edea said nothing.
"Are you coming?"
"I've a few things to tend to."
The floorboards that he and Seifer had installed over the stone floors creaked under his weight. Edea watched him go, her eyes following him like a mother cat suddenly wary of a roaming tom.
"Would you two mind cleaning up? I'm suddenly very tired."
Quistis felt Seifer stiffen, though he lounged in his chair as if nothing had happened. The table was spotless. "Of course not."
"Thank you, Quistis."
Edea gathered her skirt and picked at the hem as she walked to the living room, humming to herself. They watched her leave in silence, only looking at each other when they heard her settle into the old green couch.
Seifer passed his glass to Quistis, pointing to the keg when she curled her lip. "I'm not offering you a drink. I know you hate this shit."
"Then why are you...oh." She filled his glass again and sniffed the pretty amber liquid. "Haven't you had enough?"
"Not nearly enough. I can still only see one of you. I'm hoping to see double sometime really soon. Maybe I can convince your twin to suck my cock."
"Funny. Really funny."
It was getting close to midnight, but even as exhausted as she was, Quistis knew she wouldn't be able to sleep. She could feel one of her nightmares coming on, footsteps in the darkness and whispers in her ear. They had been increasing lately, fueling this sense of urgency, the desire to run. Rubbing her eyes, she looked across the table and asked Seifer, "Don't have your cards on you, do you?"
"Your turn."
The sunburn suited her, he decided. The skin flaking off her nose was kind of nasty, the ointment she smeared on her face made her look like she was sweating, and she would undoubtedly have a faint smattering of freckles when the burn healed. She looked younger, less of a bitch and more of that girl that used to help him catch frogs.
"Hey. Your turn."
Quistis was nervous. Had her opponent been Xu or Zell or anyone else, she wouldn't have worried, but Seifer didn't play like a gentleman. She agreed to the random rule before thinking it through, and now she only one card left to play.
"Yes, yes. I know."
She laid her beloved Gilgamesh next to one of Seifer's Propagator cards. Was she sure? She held her finger on the card, carefully checking every possible combination. Thankfully they had agreed against the elemental rule. His Shiva might have given her some trouble, but as the board was set up, she felt safe.
"Ooh,..."
Why was he smiling? Why the hell was he smiling?
"Wait... Seifer, what are you going to..."
Fuck me running, where did he get an Odin card?
"Bad move, Instructor."
Seifer held the edge of his card against his lower lip, relishing the defeat that he was getting ready to hand to her. He wanted to savor every second of it, from her horrified stare to her shaking hands. Her eyes had never seemed so blue before. If losing made her look that damned good, then he fully intended on kicking her ass at every competition he possibly could.
"I didn't even want to play the random rule!"
She never wanted to play the random rule. That would take far too much control out of her hands and prevent her from plotting every possible scenario. She was good, but she was good because she made it that way.
"Sucks to be you in that case." He placed his card next to hers, admiring the effect that his somber dark knight had against her gaily-garbed adventurer. "I think that's my match and I think that I will take..."
Game now over, he was free to choose his prize and oh, how he wanted that ugly-ass card. Rising from his seat, he circled the table, once, twice, then stood behind Quistis and looked over her shoulder. She could smell the alcohol on his breath when he leaned closer.
"Don't you even think of..."
Fingers dancing over her deck, first one, then the next, Seifer meant to prolong her agony, but found that he couldn't do it. He wanted that card too much. Selecting the Gilgamesh card, he held it over his head and propped his foot on Quistis' thigh, the mighty dragon slain and the warrior triumphant. He wanted a camera. This was the most glorious moment of his entire life.
Quistis pinched the hair on his calf and yanked it free.
"I've had that card for years."
He laughed merrily and waved it in front of her lips. He knew exactly how long she had it and how much she cherished it.
"Then I'll let you kiss it goodbye."
Jerk.
"Fine. Take the damned thing." She wouldn't give him the satisfaction of seeing her disappointment. It was nothing. It wasn't a Club match, so it didn't affect her ranking, but it was still her first loss in years. In the grand scheme of things, it wasn't important, but damn it, why did it have to be him? He would rub this in her face every day for the rest of his life...
"Thank you, I think I will."
...which might not be very long if he kept grinning like that.
"Asshole."
The grin vanished.
"What was that?"
Quistis was gathering her remaining cards, carefully stacking them together so that their edges aligned precisely with one another. She would slip them into their custom-made brass box, then into their plush velvet bag, and then she could pretend that Seifer wasn't next to her being all...himself.
"You heard me."
He slipped the card in his pocket and promptly forgot about it, then knocked the deck out of her hand and spun her chair around to face him.
"Alright, Trepe. What the fuck is your deal?"
She pushed him back and stood as well, hating once again the fact that he was so much taller than her.
"My deal?"
"Yeah. Your deal." Haughty and bitchy and completely full of shit. She was trying to slip into that damned teacher mode again. "What do you want from me?"
"I don't want anything from you."
"Bullshit."
Self-absorbed bastard.
"Why can't you believe that I'm here just to..."
He pushed her back down and forced his foot between her knees so that she couldn't stand again without her chest meeting his knee. If he had to trap her again just to get her to talk to him, then so be it.
"Don't play the Lady of Wounded Pride Manor. I know better than that."
Frustrated, Quistis pulled the elastic band from her hair and shook it free. It was still damp from her shower. She briefly considered snapping it around Seifer's throat, but decided that she didn't want to drag his body out back and bury him.
"You know, I really don't understand you. I try to be polite and you turn into the same sarcastic jerk that..."
Snatching the band from her hands, he wrapped it around his wrist. With nothing left to distract her, she had to look at him. Evasion and diversion. She was an expert at tactics, but when faced with something she couldn't evade, she collapsed.
"There you go again. You aren't a polite person. Stop that shit."
"Like you would know anything about being polite."
He had to give her credit. She had the most attractive sneer he had ever seen.
"I know a hell of a lot more about it than you do. You're the one that salutes because you're told to do it, not because you actually give a damn about showing respect. You just know that smiling and being pretty and using the right fucking fork at dinner will get you what you want with the least amount of effort. I'll give you points for efficiency, but you..."
She wanted to slap him. He must have sensed it because he held her wrists to her sides.
"Just because you're a rude, narcissistic, self-serving bastard doesn't mean that I have to behave in a similar..."
"Narcissistic? Self-serving?"
Seifer could feel the heat of her sun-burned skin against his palm. It contrasted with the cool flesh on the underside of her wrist, where his fingertips met. She must have passed out on her back to be burned on only one side. She looked miserable. The walk to find him likely exacerbated her burn. He almost felt guilty for holding her.
"Among other things."
Not that guilty, though.
"Well, we can't all be vain, glory-seeking, attention-starved whores that will smile politely at anyone that gives them a second's notice."
Quistis violently shoved the chair backwards, causing both of them to stagger against each other until they found their balance.
"I can't believe I came all this way just to listen to your bullshit. I should have known that you ..."
Seifer laughed. "Honey, this ain't Garden and I ain't your fanboy. You and I both know that didn't come here to have someone worship you."
And with that, he dropped her wrists and went to bed.
"I take it Seifer lost interest in the game."
Quistis flopped into Cid's favorite chair and covered her face with her hands.
"You might say that."
Edea didn't stop reading.
"Or I might say that he just handed you your first defeat in quite some time?"
Fantastic. First Seifer, now Edea. Was the entire world bent on making her miserable?
"You...might."
Edea grunted and continued her reading.
The red serpent shall be crushed...
She turned the page.
He carried her for a hundred years and a day, 'til her eyes turned as gold as her voice, and he wept to see that he was too late...
Again.
In the beginning, there was Void...
Again.
And her voice brought about the fourth birth, and there was much sorrow in her song, for she bore the blood of her blood and he would be the traitor foretold to her...
Again.
Again.
Again.
It was fascinating material, reminiscent of the stories her grandmother used to tell her, though each of the sections were clearly parts of much larger works. Whoever had bound the book had been a novice, likely more interested in arranging the illustrations instead of ordering the narrative. It looked very pretty, but it made little sense.
"Gave you a bit of a challenge, did he?"
"Challenge? He cheated."
Edea finally looked up. Her eyes were briefly vacant as she returned from the land of fairy tales and songs. She was there and not there and it had nothing to do with the period of possession. These tales were older than sorceresses. "Cheated? Seifer? I find that very hard to believe."
A pout was dangerously close to forming, so Quistis bit her lower lip until she had it under control. Seifer hadn't cheated at all. He had won fairly, which stung more than it would if he had cheated. She had been beaten and she hated it. "Well, he distracted me."
Edea was searching through the pages, trying to find the easiest place to split the binding. She stepped into the kitchen and retrieved a short-bladed knife, then sat down again and started picking at the ancient cords. "How so?"
"He was looking at me." It sounded ridiculous and she knew it.
The first string snapped and Edea pulled it away. The cores of the bindings were solid enough, but a fine dust formed on the pages where the outer fibers disintegrated. She blew the dust away and began on the next. "Oh my. Dreadful thing, that. I do so hate to have someone handsome admire me. Unbearable, really."
"He wasn't admiring me." Admiration didn't have a thing to do with it. He was just staring at her to try to force her into a mistake, just as he had since they were children. Mumbling through her fingers, she tried to make her mother understand what it was like trying to speak to Seifer. "He was trying to pin me to the wall."
Another thread snapped, but Edea had to turn a few dozen pages to reach the next set of laces. These were a cheaper material, thin and wispy. It was a wonder that they hadn't broken long before now. The previous scholar must have died and his apprentice taken up the work. Edea pitied the original bookbinder. Where his work ended was where the chaos began. His student didn't have his patience and every clumsy page reflected his haste. "It's the same thing with him. You should know that by now."
"I should know a lot of things by now, but I always seem to..." Quistis moved her hands and saw Edea tearing her book into pieces. She stumbled to the couch and grasped handfuls of loose pages. "What are you doing to my book?"
What on earth was the matter with her? Wasn't it clear that she was making sense from madness?
"You foolish girl, can't you see that I'm repairing it?"
Tears splattered and were quickly absorbed on the dry leather cover. Quistis made no attempt to hide the fact that she was weeping. That book held everything, if only she could somehow figure out what information was hidden within its pages.
"Get out of the floor."
Sharp. Authoritative. Demure and kind, almost disturbingly soft-spoken, it was sometimes easy to forget that Edea had once commanded armies. The soldier in Quistis moved before she thought, rising to her feet and clasping her hands behind her back.
"Now open your eyes and look."
The only pages with any damage were those that Quistis had clutched in her fingers. The others were in neat stacks arranged in an even neater semi-circle around Edea's feet. Separated as they were, Quistis noted that some of them appeared to be made of vellum, others of nearly transparent parchment, and others still that appeared to have been rolled at some point. Through her readings she had been so concerned with the translations that she never bothered looking at the book itself.
"I'm arranging it according to what is being told. There are hundreds of stories in here."
Of course she was. It wasn't a single book. It was a collection bound in one leather casing. Quistis had never felt so foolish.
"You can read this?"
Slightly confused, Edea answered, "Of course I can."
Dinner tried to climb back into her mouth. Quistis swallowed hard and pushed the pages she held into Edea's hands. "What does it say?"
"Begging for a bedtime story?"
Double, double, toil and trouble...
"Not at all the same girl you used to be, are you? 'Let me do it! I'll do a great job! Let me show you!' Sound familiar?"
They were once many and fierce, and they split the earth and ravished her...
"Vaguely."
Edea patted the seat next to her. "Here. Sit with me for a bit. Tell me about this book."
Quistis opened her mouth and promptly shut it again. The construction was making it impossible to read in her room, so she had wandered to the opposite side of campus to find some peace in the library. And as usual, she was instantly pestered by hordes of students. She smiled and chatted with them, but soon lost patience and ducked into the stacks, leaving her students to wonder where she went.
"I found it in the library, but I can't read some of the text, so I..."
Edea chuckled. "I thought libraries were just giant computer rooms now. You mean they still have books?"
"Well, sometimes we need them to prop up crooked desks, Matron."
Little brainy Quistis. Edea worried about her children for various reasons. Zell would likely end up hospitalized because of some strange food-borne parasite he ingested during one of his eating contests, Irvine would have his heart broken by the girl that got away, Selphie would likely be that girl, but getting away would mean that she would end up in prison for blowing up a taco stand for not having her favorite hot sauce. Squall and Seifer were too cautious for true concern, but that in itself was worrying. Their insistence on building such huge walls between them and the world was frightening at times, though lately she had been able to relax when it came to them. Squall was being force-fed everything he had ever missed by Rinoa, and Seifer was close enough to be carefully monitored. She feared that Quistis would prove to be the problem child. She was far too inquisitive to leave a question unanswered, and that curiosity might someday teach her the true meaning of sorrow.
"...and Xu thinks I've lost my mind, but she just doesn't understand how much this means to me."
Edea snapped to the present again with a jolt. She had allowed Quistis to tell her everything, yet hadn't heard a word of it.
"And how much does it mean to you, darling?"
Quistis carefully straightened one of her bent pages, smoothing it out over her thigh. Everything she had ever wondered was in those pages. She was certain of it. "There's something in here. I can almost smell it, like when I'm fighting and it hurts so much and the world changes and there's this scent and..."
Edea shushed her and gathered the pages. "Enough. It's too late to get so upset over it."
"I'm not upset. I just..." She just what? Felt that Xu might be right? That she had finally lost her mind? That this was bordering on obsession? "...feel like I'm starting to remember who I am."
Dust and grit coated the bottom page in each stack of leaves. Edea made a silent note to sweep again, though it would do little good. It was impossible to keep the sand off the floors. She felt Quistis watching her, so she took her time blowing the dust off each page as she considered what to say next. "Be careful of what you try to remember. Some things are more than just memories."
Quistis said nothing. This wasn't the same as recalling the first time she tasted ice cream or when she learned how to read. These memories weren't her own, though their existence was threaded throughout her essence, humming like harp strings.
"I imagine you spend a lot of time trying to summon every thought you've ever had."
Every thought? No. Just those that her mind deemed unsuitable for daily use and retrieval. Junctioning had only a temporary effect on memory retention. Without the guardian forces scraping her mind clean, she was slowly gathering information on everything she had forgotten. It was a slow process, and sometimes painful, but she knew she would eventually recall what had been forced from her mind. She couldn't quite explain why this felt so different to Edea. It was almost as if her brain was refusing to let her access what she needed. "It's natural to want to regain what one has lost, isn't it?"
"Is it?" Edea's smile was soft and sad. She could read every word in Quistis' book, though she spoke only Common. Ultimecia wasn't the only one to leave shadows in her mind, to tell her stories more horrifying than anything found in a story book.
Drop the pebble into the water. And the next. Now all of them. Yes, throw them all at once. See the ripples, my love? How they bounce and destroy each other? I can never be around still water. I hear them, all the time. They beg and they sing and they plot and they whisper. Take me from here. The sea washes out their voices. Please, Cid. Take me there and stay with me. I only want to hear you.
Pages gathered and tucked neatly into their cover, Edea set it aside until morning. She would clean and rebind it later. She wanted to read it in its entirety, without having to skip from section to section. "I have quite an impressive number of memories I'd like to lose and never recall again."
"That isn't the same thing."
Foolish, selfish girl. She had no concept, no idea what it meant to remember. Edea stood from the couch and moved to the door., her skirt clutched in her hand like a hawk might hold a fish. "No, it isn't. It isn't fair, either. You want to remember everything and can't, and I'd like to forget that I'm cursed to remember eons."
Shamed, Quistis fidgeted with her hands. "I didn't mean..."
Edea looked up the hall, eager to step into the darkness away from the lights of the living room. She wanted away from everyone for a while, to take a walk in her garden and listen to her slumbering bees. "No. You didn't. I'm sorry, Quistis. I'm sometimes very...envious of certain things. It's one of my greatest faults. I lust and obsess and covet and it drives me mad."
She looked so old, leaning against the doorframe like that. Quistis fought the urge to take Edea's elbow and lead her to bed. She should have been more considerate of what her questions were doing to her. Turning off the lamp and forcing herself to leave the book on the end table, she stood next to Edea and hugged her. "Everyone does that sometimes."
"Not everyone." Edea broke the embrace and took a step back. Without seeing how old her daughter was, it was easier to be her mother. "What is he to you?"
"Who?"
"Don't be coy. It doesn't suit you."
Back to Seifer. Why did everything go back to him?
"I don't know. I don't think I'm anything to..."
Edea's sigh was lost in the darkness. "That isn't what I asked. You know very well what you are to him. Is he the same to you?"
"I...don't..."
Edea spun her around so that she would be headed to her room. The girl was blind sometimes, though it was now clear that she refused to be any other way. "Don't expect him to fall into your lap just because you've graced him with your presence. It isn't fair to him and it certainly isn't fair to you."
"I..."
"Go to bed. We'll talk more tomorrow. I think we both need some sleep."
Thunk.
Seifer's eyes flew open.
Thwap. Rustle, rustle, rustle.
Somebody was in his room. He could see his cactuar boxers on the floor and hear the crackle of someone stepping on his magazines.
A series of heavy thumps sounded from the window, almost like someone was trying to search for hidden recesses in the stone with his knuckles.
Bang.
"Who's there?"
The sound of someone trying to hold his breath filled the room. Seifer waited for the intruder to exhale so that he could determine his position, but was surprised when he heard a deep voice say, "Nobody."
Not for the last time, Seifer wished that he had kept his gunblade under the bed instead of in the closet.
"What?"
I'm too drunk for this.
"Er...Nobody."
Okay, so I'm hallucinating. Note to self: Fancy cinnamon beer makes me crazy. That's all. It's just like that party we had second year, when Fu drank that funguar tea and spent all night arguing with that tree in the quad.
"Then who's saying Nobody?"
Logic. Take that, drunk voice in my head.
"Er..."
There was movement along the wall. This was no fucking hallucination. "Show yourself or get your arms torn off."
"Mwahahahaha! Fool! I am far too mighty for..."
An enormous shadowy form stood in front of the window, obscuring the light of the moon. The figure was very large, obviously a juicer. Seifer decided that if it did come to an altercation, he wouldn't even waste time trying to kick this guy in the balls. It looked like he had been on steroids for so long that his nuts had probably receded into his crotch for protection from the cold, cruel world.
Wait. Did he just laugh?
"Did you just laugh?"
What kind of drugs was this guy on?
"Mwahaha! Why yes! I made mockery of your boast!"
"No. Not that. You just said "Mwahaha." Like, I heard you say the M and the 'wa' and all of it."
And what the fuck was he wearing? Was that a cape? Seifer sat up and squinted. Yep. That was a cape. A big, red cape. With a hood. Holy bloody hell.
"T-that was...that was the sound of your doom, knave! Behold!" Beefy arms lifted high above his head, the figure sought to reach behind his back for his weapons, but instead banged his knuckles on the ceiling.
"Ow..."
Great. He was being stalked by a bodybuilding drag queen that majored in theatre.
The giant looked to the door. Seifer saw the direction of his gaze and jumped to cut him off. If he planned on running, then he would have to fight his way out. Nobody broke into Seifer Almasy's bedroom and threw his favorite underwear on the ground without dying. The cactuars glowed in the dark, after all.
"And who the hell walks around saying things like "I am far too mighty."? What, are we in a comic book? Nobody says shit like that!"
Stomping his feet, shaking the entire bedroom, the figure advanced on Seifer, then fell back when Seifer mirrored the movement.
"I...Enough of these games!"
Could he reach his gunblade? The closet was just to his right. It would only take...
The figure was busy flourishing his cape like a matador in the Galbadian behemoth arenas.
Could he reach it? Probably. But why waste the effort?
"Who's playing? I just want to know who the fuck is wandering around my room!"
The cape was thrown back in a grand sweep. If his voice had been low before, now it threatened to turn Seifer's insides to water. He felt much as he did when his posse had seats next to the speakers at the Blood Soul concert.
"I am...a shadow, a whisper on the wind, a traveling warrior on a quest to find my homeland else tragedy befall my..."
Seifer rolled his eyes. "You're a dumb fuck on a quest to get his ass beaten. Now tell me what the hell you're doing in my room!"
A thick finger poked Seifer in the chest.
At least he hoped it was a finger. The dude was really tall, after all.
"Impudent wretch. You were rude to my lady and I am here to retrieve her property."
Seifer slapped his hand away. "Lady? What lady?"
"The fair jewel that even now rests in her chambers below."
"Below...? You mean Quistis?"
"The very same."
Seifer blinked. "We don't even have stairs! How the hell can she be below?"
"You would do well to remember your place, dog. Address her as a peasant should, with the reverence due her station."
Who the fuck was this guy? And why was he wearing a ceiling fan on his back? And why...wait a second. Did he really just call Quistis a lady?
"What?"
"The lady wishes to be called Instructor and you should..."
"Instructor? She hates that name!"
"She loves it!"
"She hates it!"
It was Seifer's turn to poke his finger at the intruder. "Listen to me, buster. I've known her for years..."
"As have I, Lapdog."
Ooh, he wanted to hit him. Seifer had his fist ready to tear into the guy's chest and make him eat his own heart when he heard a soft knock at the door.
"Seifer?"
He looked to the door, then back to the window. The figure was gone.
Well, mostly gone.
He was struggling to untangle himself from his cape just outside the window. He made a rude gesture to Seifer, then ran off into the night. Perplexed and pissed off, Seifer locked the window and grabbed his gunblade from the closet and tossed it on the bed. If that asshole had the hots for Quistis, he was going to slice off his dick and feed it to him before he could use it.
"Seifer? Is everything okay?"
He opened the door and found Quistis standing in a t-shirt and those ridiculously sexy girl boxers. It was a cruel trick of physics that even though part of her legs were covered, they seemed even longer than they normally did in those damned things. And who decided that she should be allowed to walk around in a t-shirt that was two sizes too small for her? She planned it this way. Evil, conniving bitch.
"What the hell do you want?"
She peered over his shoulder and noticed the mess. It looked like the place had been ransacked.
"Are you okay? I heard voices."
"I'm fine."
She didn't believe him. "I heard you arguing with someone. Were you having a bad dream?"
Nope, Trepe. No dreams here. I've just lost my damned mind.
"Just ...talking to old ghosts."
She smiled, though it wasn't a very amused expression. Ghosts had been her only companions for a long time. "I know the feeling."
Seifer leaned on one shoulder in what he hoped was a casual, nonchalant pose. He was entering that dizzy period of inebriation that meant he should either sit down or go back to sleep very, very soon. "What do you want?"
She closed her eyes, likely to rehearse the script that she had written at the door. She was maddeningly thorough that way. "I wasn't myself earlier and I just came to say..."
Did she realize that someone knew where she was sleeping? She didn't act like she knew. Some sack of shit had probably followed her off the ship. She could no doubt hold her own if someone meant her harm, but Seifer didn't want it to come to that. "You're getting ready to say something that will really piss me off, aren't you."
"Well, I thought I should apolo..."
"Shut up, Trepe." His hand snaked out and caught her collar. She tried to pull back, but he twisted it in his fist and kissed her before she could break free. She tasted like mint and baking soda, some expensive toothpaste that could probably clean the grout between tile. He expected her to try to bite him or at least call him a bastard, but she was eagerly returning everything he was giving her. "You talk too fucking much."
