Curve Ball - Epilogue
If it hadn't been for his trademark scar and that deliciously distinctive ass, you might not have recognized Leon. No, he hadn't cut his hair or abandoned his belts, and yes, he was still wearing his signature leathers and fur-collared jacket, but there was something different about him. Perhaps it was the slight spring in his step or the more relaxed set of his shoulders, or maybe it was the dreamy look in his eyes, but something was definitely different.
It was Friday night again, exactly one week and a whole lifetime later, and Leon was once again on his way to Aerith's. His boyfriend had sweet-talked him into going dancing again. Okay, bribed.
You do like having sex with me, don't you, Leon? It was said so sweetly, looking up at Leon with those big, blue, innocent eyes. Yeah, his boyfriend was getting far too good at manipulation, and if Leon didn't get him away from Aerith's influence soon, it could only spell trouble for him.
Well, no worries about that; Leon fully intended to take care of that little problem this very night; it was just a matter of timing. A couple of drinks, a couple of dances. Get Cloud good and relaxed, get himself good and relaxed, and then boom. Yeah, Leon was going to pop the question.
No, not that one – the other one. He was going to ask Cloud to move in with him. They should live together for a while first to make sure they were compatible, right?
Right. Who was he kidding; if they were any more compatible they'd be conjoined twins.
Although Leon wouldn't necessarily mind being permanently joined at the hips with Cloud ... and the fire started smoldering in his belly as his mind took a sharp detour towards the gutter.
But yeah, wrenching his mind out of that old proverbial gutter and back to the topic at hand; he was going to ask Cloud to move in. There was plenty of room at the castle, and Leon had it all to himself. It was nice and private. No need to be quiet. You could walk around naked...
And the four-poster bed he had dragged out of storage was much too big for only one person. And you could walk around naked... Yeah...
Cloud.
The thought of waking up beside his boyfriend every morning tugged at the corner of Leon's mouth, and he had to struggle to tamp it down, but the dreamy look in his eyes was a lost cause. And to make matters worse, his little trip to the gutter had added a thick glaze of lust on top of the dreamy, which maybe explains why he didn't see the other man turning onto Aerith's walkway until he bumped smack into him.
"You," Leon growled. "I thought I told you to stay away from him." And before poor Zack could even open his mouth in his own defense, Leon decked him with a solid right hook to the chin. He quickly cast a sleep spell to make sure the nuisance stayed down and out for a while, then grabbed the taller man by the boots and dragged him behind the bushes. After brushing the dirt from his hands – more a symbolic gesture than an actual need to remove any dirt – Leon started towards the house, but abruptly stopped and turned back, snatching the bouquet of flowers from Zack's tightly clenched hand as an afterthought. Then he stomped up to the house and knocked on the door, which was promptly opened by Cloud, who was wearing a very flattering pair of black slacks and a softly ribbed, blue v-neck jersey.
"Hey," the blond greeted his boyfriend.
Leon blushed and thrust the flowers at him. "Here."
"Um, thanks." Cloud responded with a peck on the cheek. "I'll, ah ... I'll just go put them in some water."
Leon nodded and followed him into the kitchen, watching his hips sway sweetly. Yeah, Cloud was sexy as hell in a dress – in fact, he carried it off a lot better than most women, in Leon's opinion – and if he wanted to spice up their sex life with a little occasional cross-dressing, well that was just fine by him – not that their sex life needed any spicing up – no indeed, if anything, it could probably do with a little less fire – not that Leon was complaining, mind you – and he blushed again just thinking about all of the things they had done this past week ... and the places they had done them ... and the positions in which they had ...
Besides, he had a few kinks of his own that he couldn't wait to try out on his boyfriend, and just as soon as he figured out where Cloud kept those damn handcuffs hidden, he was going to make sure that the blond was the one chained to the headboard for a change – but as he was saying before his mind took another well-traveled trip to the gutter – as good as Cloud looked in a dress, Leon would have to say that he much preferred him in form-fitting trousers. Mmmm, yeah. The way they hugged his sweet–
"Aer, do you have anything to put these in?" Cloud asked, interrupting Leon's dirty train of thought.
Aerith turned from the sink and smiled when she saw the flowers. "Aww, how sweet of you, Leon."
"Whatever."
"Here," she said, taking the flowers from Cloud and retrieving a vase from the cupboard. "I'll take care of these if you'll put the lasagna on the table for me." She glanced up at the kitchen clock and added with a sigh, "And I suppose you might as well call Yuffie down, and we can go ahead and eat. Leon, would you mind taking in the salad and the bread?"
After quickly arranging the flowers, Aerith joined the others at the dining room table, setting the lovely bouquet in the center with a forced smile, but it was obvious that something was wrong. She was uncharacteristically quiet throughout dinner, leaving Yuffie to single-handled carry the conversation while she dejectedly poked at her salad and peeked at the clock.
When poking the salad lost its appeal, she attacked her lasagna, dismantling it noodle by noodle, glancing up at the clock after each successive layer. Then she put it all back together again, much more messily than before since her attention was still focused mainly on the clock.
Next she went after her innocent slice of bread, tearing it into itty-bitty pieces and pushing them around on her plate as she continued to glare at the clock, then returned to stabbing her lettuce, and finally, after one last, disappointed look at the clock, she set her fork down and folded her hands in her lap with a defeated sigh.
Cloud offered her a sympathetic smile and attempted words of comfort. "Maybe he just got lost."
Leon's attention perked up, and an uneasy feeling stirred in his stomach. Or maybe it was just the lasagna.
"Maybe," Aerith said softly.
"You think your date stood you up?" Yuffie snorted. She could kinda sorta see why somebody might skip out on her, but why would anyone in their right mind want to ditch Aerith?
"Maybe." Aerith smiled sadly.
Alarms started going off in Leon's head, and his brow broke out in a cold sweat. "Date?" he mumbled around the wad of bread stuck to the roof of his mouth.
"Yes." Aerith sighed. "You remember Zack from the nightclub last week?"
Leon swallowed the dry lump of bread and washed it down with his wine. "Zack?"
"Yes, Zack," Aerith repeated, scrutinizing Leon suspiciously.
"Um ... I'll be right back," he choked out, jumping up from the table and running out the door. "I just remembered something I need to take care of."
-The End-
Author's Notes:
So, geez. This was suppose to be a short little one-shot, but it seems to have gotten snagged on a passing Energizer Bunny and dragged away. And away ... And away ... And away ...
Yeah ... I blame the bunny.
Or Reno.
And no, I don't have any idea as to why everybody knows Rufus and the Turks but not Zack, so don't ask. None of them were even supposed to be in the damn story.
Everything was going according to plan – we had just arrived at the nightclub, and Leon was dictating his internal monologue – when Reno decided to crash the party, and of course, he brought back-up. Friends, he called them, but that didn't fool me for one minute. I knew exactly what they were: Reinforcements.
Annoyed at being bullied by the Turks into submitting to their unreasonable demands, I offered some feeble excuse about them not being KH canon, but you and I both know that Reno didn't give a rat's ass about that. Then Elena pointed out that Hojo and Mukki had been mentioned in the story, to which Reno added, yeah, as well as that total dickwad Don Corneo, at which point I threw up my hands and said, "Fine. You can all work at the nightclub."
Yeah, I know it's shameful how quickly I caved, but I figured it was the fastest way to shut them all up so I could get back to writing. At least Rude had the common courtesy to be quiet. I jotted down a few notes and then pointed my pencil at Reno. "Bartender," I said.
"Yesss!" he sibilated softly and did one of those arm-jerk/air-punch thingies.
"Waitress," I told Elena.
She rolled her eyes and popped her gum. "Gender stereotype much," she mumbled under her breath.
I studied Rude for a moment and finally settled on, "Doorman." Rude gave me a dirty look as if to say he didn't appreciate being relegated to such a lowly task ... well, actually, I'm not sure what kind of look he gave me – he was wearing his dark glasses, and the rest of his face remained motionless – but just to be on the safe side, I added, "Look, it's the only non-speaking role available. Unless you'd rather be the hatcheck girl?" Well, that certainly shut him up, metaphorically speaking, of course, since he hadn't said a word to begin with.
"Just have a seat until I'm ready for your parts," I stated dismissively, returning my attention to the sexy man leaning against the wall next to Cloud, who was still dressed in drag for his part.
"Nice dress, Toots," Reno smirked, strolling over to make himself comfy on my elegant Renaissance-Revival Rosewood Parlor Couch, creating quite the study in contrasts, while Elena painted a more modest picture in the matching armchair. Rude staked out a spot in between them and proceeded to imitate a boulder, standing with his feet spread shoulder width apart and his hands folded over his privates.
"Now where were we?" I said apologetically to Leon, but no sooner had I started reading back the last paragraph, when Rufus walked in with Tseng and demanded equal time in the spotlight. When I politely told him I was all out of room, he threw a little prima donna hissy fit, and when that didn't work, he snapped his fingers at Tseng, who solemnly pulled out a long, intimidating-looking document and started spouting off a lot of legalese about Exclusive Rights and Contracts and Turks, the basic gist of which was, I think, that Rufus – on account of being the Last Known Living Shinra and therefore Heir to the Kingdom, even though said Kingdom was in ruins – owned said Turks, and if I wanted to use them I was going to have to cut a deal with him. "Fine," I grumbled. "You can be The Nightclub Owner. And you," I said, pointing at Tseng, "can be The Floor Manager."
"Frankly," Rufus replied, "I had something a little more important in mind, something along the lines of The Mayor."
"Well, that's all I've got," I snapped. "Take it or leave it. Leon is unofficially considered the mayor."
"Fine," Rufus grumbled. "But I want my name in lights."
"Fine," I grumbled. "Now go sit down."
"I am not the goddamn mayor," Leon grumbled.
"Dontcha think that Rude would make a better bouncer?" Elena suggested, still popping her gum.
"Are you kidding," I scoffed. "Tseng is way scarier than Rude. Compared to Tseng, Rude's a big teddy bear."
Suddenly realizing that the highly trained kidnapper-assassin-demolitions expert-martial artist might not appreciate being likened to a child's cuddly-wuddly stuffed animal, I flashed Mr. Teddy Bear the most obsequious grin I could manage, and I swear I saw the corner of his mouth twitch in what might have been a small smile.
Feeling slightly more confident that he wasn't going to come back in the middle of the night and blow me up, I continued. "Seriously though, all Tseng has to do is walk around making himself highly visible and patting his pocket from time to time, and I guarantee there won't be any bar fights."
"We could start one for you," Reno volunteered.
"No," I replied again with an exasperated roll of my eyes. "Now all of you shut up before I change my mind about the whole thing.
"All right, Leon," I huffed, once more attempting to get back to his monologue only to be interrupted yet again, this time by Zack.
"Hi guys," he said cheerfully, waving at everybody as he walked in and plopped down unceremoniously on the edge of my desk. "I hear you need somebody to dance with Cloud and date Aerith." He dazzled me with his bright, cocky smile and then jerked his thumb at himself. "That would be me."
Leon stood up a little straighter and shifted closer to Cloud.
Aerith walked over and offered Zack one of her freshly baked chocolate chip cookies. "Hey Babe," he said, wrapping his arms around her waist and pulling her in between his legs, opening his mouth like a baby bird begging to be fed.
"Zack," I explained patiently, "the part calls for somebody that nobody knows. I was planning on using some random two-bit actor. And don't get crumbs on the carpet."
"So why don't they just pretend they don't know me," he said around a mouthful of cookie, as if it was all as simple as that. I watched in slow motion as a chocolate chip rolled off his lip, bounced off his thigh and hit the freshly vacuumed floor.
"Because how am I supposed to explain why they know Rufus and the Turks, but not you?" I countered, staring at the wayward bit of chocolate. I should probably pick that up before somebody ste– oops, too late.
"Well, gee, I don't know." He scratched the back of his head. "Couldn't you just chalk it up to Cloud's memory issues or something? I mean, he forgot me once before."
Cloud shot him an apologetic look, Zack smiled back at him, and Leon shifted closer still.
"And Aerith and Yuffie?" I asked.
"It's contagious?" Zack shrugged.
"Zack, I refuse to resort to such a cheap plot device," I humphed. "I know it's hard to believe, but I do have some principles."
"Well then, why not just consider it a nod to Square plot holes – if they can do it, why can't you?" And then he gave me that look – yeah, that look, you know the one – and how the hell was I supposed to say no to that? "Fine," I growled. "Just ... go sit down with the others."
Yeah, I was getting downright grouchy, but the morning was well on its way towards noon, and Leon and I were still in mid-monologue. "FF7 characters," I grumbled under my breath. "You don't see any FF8 characters making such a fuss, do you?"
Talk about calling the devil...
As if that was the very cue she'd been waiting for, in walked Quistis, calm and cool and regal as always, looking very sharp in her crisp SeeD suit.
"That's because, despite FF8's undeserved reputation in some circles as an inferior installment of the Final Fantasy series," she stated, looking disdainfully at Reno, who was slouched on the sofa with his limbs spread out like unregulated suburban sprawl, shirttail untucked and chocolate chip cookie crumbs littering his chest, "we have Standards." By which I assume she meant high standards, which sort of miffed me a bit. Was she implying that my story wasn't good enough for her?
"Fine. I can give you a small cameo as the hatcheck girl," I retaliated.
"I'm not here for a part in your little production," she stated in a patronizing manner, as if I were one of her slower students. "I'm only here on behalf of my client, who has a problem with your misrepresentation of his character."
Client? Since when did Quistis become an attorney?
"Yeah," Seifer seconded, sauntering through the door. He strolled over to my desk and loomed over me threateningly. "A big problem."
"That's not my fault," I squeaked, chicken-wuss that I am. This was, after all, the original, six-foot-two, fully-leaded Seifer, not the beanie version. "It's Nomura's fault," I pleaded. "Blame him! Or talk to Leon; he's the one who said it. I just wrote it down."
"Oh, I fully intend to talk to Squall," he answered, fingering the sharp edge of Hyperion. Yes – Hyperion. No blue foam bats here, just cold, hard steel.
"Oh yeah?" Leon bristled, pulling Lionheart from its sheath. "If you've got something to say to me, come on over here and say it, Beanie Boy."
"I'd love to, Puberty Boy."
"Both Boys!" I yelled. "Please! I just cleaned house." Oh dear, this was getting way out of hand. "Can you do anything?" I begged Aerith pitifully. Could things possibly get any worse?
Of course they could. Quistis must be right; I just don't learn.
"And who's calling who dickwad, dickwad?" Don Corneo waddled in and poked Reno in the chest.
"Me, dickwad," Reno countered, jumping up and scattering cookie crumbs everywhere.
"Ewww ... somebody get that perverted asshole out of here!" Elena screamed.
"Sicko," Yuffie added, slipping my Vincent Play Arts Figure into her backpack.
Reno pulled out his rod. Rude cracked his knuckles. Tseng patted his pocket.
"Cookie anyone?" Aerith offered.
Corneo had just noticed Cloud and was staring at him lustfully, fat little fingers twitching, and Leon turned Lionheart on the sicko dickwad instead, forgetting all about Seifer. Then Mukki walked in and started eyeing Cloud too.
"Gawd, put some clothes on, you overgrown gorilla," Yuffie gagged, sneaking my Personally Autographed Collector's Edition of Advent Children Complete into her backpack.
Leon kept looking from Corneo to Mukki to Seifer and then back again, obviously trying to calculate whether he could take them all, and then looked to Quistis for help. Quistis cracked her whip.
"Hot damn," Reno said.
"... ..." Rude seconded.
"... ..." Tseng thirded.
"Why you little ..." Elena seethed, grabbing Quistis by the hair and tackling her to the ground. "That's my man, Bitch. Keep your your grubby whip off him."
Tseng quietly ushered Rufus to a safer spot in the corner of the room.
Then Reno let out a battle whoop and dove in after Quistis and Elena, with Rude diving in right behind him, and Cloud shoved Don Corneo, who was trying to cop a feel under his skirt, sending Corneo flying backwards into Mukki, who tripped over Reno's leg and bumped into Aerith, causing her to drop her plate of cookies, which pissed Zack off, who jumped up and crashed into "My Mother's Heirloom Vase!", picking Mukki up and throwing him against the wall and shattering "My Antique Gold Leaf Mirror!", and then Leon shoved Don Corneo for trying to feel up his boyfriend, this time sending Corneo smashing into "My Chinese Chippendale Tea Table!", at which point Seifer punched Leon in the jaw just for the hell of it, knocking him into "My Cherrywood Grandfather Clock!", so of course, Leon punched him back and then tackled him onto the top of "My Queen Anne Mahogany Desk!", knocking over "My Crappy Old Gateway Computer!" while Yuffie, who had finished cleaning out all "My Final Fantasy Memorabilia!", embedded her shuriken in "My Original Renoir!" and then somersaulted into the fray.
Cloud gave Don Corneo one last shove for good measure, kicked Mukki in the balls, and then grabbed his boyfriend by the arm and pulled him out the door. "Come on, Lee. Let's go get a beer."
"Guys, wait!" I yelled, jumping up from my chair and running after them. "Can I go too? ... Hey guys! Wait up! ... Guys?"
... ... ...?
... ...?
...?
I seriously need to find a new fandom.
(And no, I don't really own any of that stuff except for the crappy old Gateway computer, not even the Vincent Play Arts figure. Woe is me.)
Take Two: Two Weeks Later
I shuffled down the hall towards my office, clutching my first cup of coffee, bleary-eyed. Two certain someones had kept me awake all night long. Yeah, that's right: Cloud and Squalleon.
I had invited the two of them to spend a few days with me to work on an upcoming story, and the wall between my bedroom and the guest room was much too thin. Maybe I could at least get them to tighten the bolts on the bed so it wouldn't bang against the wall so hard, though I had my doubts it would do much good – not with the way they went at it.
I turned into the open doorway and slammed straight into a solid brick wall, which I promptly dumped my coffee all over. "Oh shit." I pried opened a bleary eye and looked up into a pair of dark glasses. Double shit.
"Sorry, Rude," I mumbled, pawing pathetically at his wet suit. "Ha ha. Wet suit. Wetsuit. Get it?" He didn't. Or maybe he just didn't think it was funny. Actually, neither did I.
Rude moved aside to let me pass, but I soon wished he hadn't, because with the brick wall no longer blocking my view, I could see the future flashing before my bleary eyes, and it wasn't pretty. For there, camped out in my office was a whole office full of unhappy campers. Triple shit. Yeah: Shit, shit, shit.
I immediately made a u-turn and ran right into Rude again, who was now blocking the only way out. Well, a least there wasn't any coffee left in my cup to dump on him. I slowly turned back around to face the heavy metal music.
"Good morning?" I tried, but I don't think it came off half as well as I envisioned in my head because twelve pairs of angry eyes turned on me menacingly, and twelve pairs of hands began brandishing fistfuls of printed pages. Well, eleven pairs of hands; Don Corneo's were tied behind his back.
"Why is Don Corneo tied up and gagged?" I asked. "And why is Mukki sitting on him?"
"Don't ask," Reno advised. "You don't want to know."
No. I probably didn't. I slunk to my desk and into my chair, feeling only slightly better with the solid slab of hardwood between me and the angry mob in my office. "So, what's up?" I tried next, another poor choice on my part. "One at a time! One at a time!" I shouted over the ensuing din.
Then everyone deferred to Rufus, who nodded to Tseng, who indicated with a gracious sweep of his arm that Quistis could take the floor. Elena glared.
Quistis nodded to Rufus, smiled at Tseng, glared back at Elena, and then walked over to me, dropping her copy of Curve Ball on my desk with a impressively loud thud. "So what's the problem?" I asked. "I gave you a nice little cameo, even threw in a couple of Trepies, and you got to handle Squall's gunblade. What more could you possibly want?" Other than handling Squall's other gunblade, of course, but even I'm not stupid enough to cross Cloud.
"I told you I didn't want a part in your ridiculous story," she stated, shooting me with a glare just short of laser eye. "But that's not why I'm here. Seifer asked me to drop this off." And she handed me another piece of paper. Just what I wanted.
What I really wanted was a cup of coffee, but I was pretty sure I wasn't going to be allowed to leave the room, and I wasn't about to ask one of these guys to go get one for me. Maybe I could just suck some out of Rude's suit ...
Or maybe I didn't need that coffee after all, because the piece of paper I was holding did a pretty good job of waking me up once I finally looked at it. WHAT? "For what?"
"Defamation of character," Quistis answered with a satisfied smirk. "His attorney will be contacting you shortly."
"WHAT?" Yes, I fear I actually shrieked it out loud this time. "Why doesn't he sue Nomura? I'm just a lowly fanfic writer – a poor, lowly fanfic writer. And I thought you were his attorney."
Quistis rolled her baby blues and let out a deep, exasperated sigh, obviously fed-up with having to deal with such a moron. "I'm an instructor," she stated. "If you're going to write stories about us, couldn't you at least get your facts straight?"
"Well yeah, but you said that ... you said ... that ... I trailed off as I noticed the way her eyes were beginning to narrow and her hand was inching towards her hip. Yep, I had pushed her to her limit and laser eye was just a few precious moments away. Well, at least she didn't have her whip, I noted, though she probably knew a bazillion other ways to finish me off if laser eye didn't do the trick.
When her hand finally reached its destination, I saw a brief moment of confusion flash across her face before she spun around and hissed at Reno, "Where the hell is my whip?" Reno shrugged his shoulders and raised his hands in a 'How would I know?' gesture of innocence, but Quistis wasn't buying it. She buried her face in the palm of her hand, doing a pretty good imitation of Leon, and then stalked off towards the door, having obviously already reached her maximum daily dose of dealing with morons – and it wasn't even nine o'clock yet. Rude stepped aside to let her pass and then resumed his post in the doorway.
I looked over at Reno to thank him for saving me from forty lashes, but swiftly changed my mind when I saw the look on his face, which looked something along the lines of 'What good is Quistis's whip gonna do me with no Quistis to do me?' And why did he seem to think that was my fault? He quickly enlightened me.
"Don't you know anything?" he grumbled. "The bartender's always s'posed to get laid. A quickie in the closet with the hatcheck girl couldn't have been that hard to arrange."
Well, yes, it could have been, and no, I wasn't aware of that rule. As a matter of fact, I'm pretty sure Reno just made it up, and Yuffie must have thought so too, because she let out a loud snort. She and Zidane were sitting on the couch next to Reno, snuggled up together thick as thiev– Oh shit, that can't be good.
"You know, Quistis does sort of have a valid point about getting your facts straight, though" Zack chimed in with his two cents worth. "I mean, I hardly think that Leon would be able to deck me with one blow. I'm a First Class SOLDIER – Mako-enhanced and injected with Jenova. Heck, I seriously doubt he would be able to even hit me. Do you have any idea how fast a SOLDIER's reflexes are?"
Slowly ... silently ... I shook my head, hoping I wasn't about to find out firsthand. Aerith was sitting on Zack's lap, curled up protectively under his wing – figuratively speaking, of course, since Zack seemed to be the only First Class without one – looking sad and blue, er ... sad and pink, and Zack didn't look one bit pleased about that. Or maybe he was just upset that she hadn't brought him any cookies.
"What's Aerith upset about?" I asked him, but Aerith raised her teary eyes and answered for herself.
"You promised me a date with Zack," she sniffled. "I was really looking forward to that date."
"I'm sorry, Aerith," I apologized. "It's just that ... well, the ending was funnier that way." I don't think she saw my point.
"Aw shoot, Aer honey. Don't cry." Zack patted her awkwardly. "I'll take you out someplace real nice tonight."
"With dancing and everything?"
"With dancing and everything," Zack nodded.
Aerith immediately perked up, smiling at him sweetly and batting her big green eyes. Damn, she was good. Zack, being male, didn't notice it, of course, but Yuffie did and snorted again. So did Elena. She rolled her eyes and popped her gum.
"So what's your beef?" I asked her.
"Well, you kinda sorta made me look like a ditz."
"Well, you kinda sorta are a ditz, Elena."
"Well yeah, but you still didn't hafta–" She was cut off by a stern look from Tseng.
Then Rufus walked over to my desk and dropped his copy of Curve Ball on top of Quistis's. "Could you please point out precisely where within these never-ending pages of drivel one can find my engaging performance?"
"Uhh..."
"Our agreement was for equal time in the spotlight. I didn't even make an appearance."
"Well, uh ..." I picked up his copy and started hastily flipping through it. "... if you'll just turn to page ... uh, page twenty ... uh, page twenty-six ... you'll see that I did at least get your name in the spotlight."
"Yeah, and I didn't even get my name in the credits," Zidane complained, but he didn't look like he really cared all that much. He was too busy tickling Yuffie on the tummy with the tip of his tail.
"I'll see to it that you never work in this fandom again," Rufus stated imperiously and stalked out the door.
"But you're not even in Kingdom Hearts," I grumbled to his departing back.
Tseng came next, laying his copy down very gently and neatly with a look which promised that my demise would be neither, and Elena followed close on his heels, depositing her own tome on top of the growing pile. Then she pulled the wad of gum from her mouth and smushed it onto the title page with her thumb like a sugarless cinnamon seal on Tseng's silent promise of doom.
Leaving their copies scattered on the floor, Mukki stood up and hoisted Don Corneo over his shoulder, then followed Tseng and Elena out the door, mumbling something about Leon having all the luck, to which Don Corneo, still bound and gagged, added, "Uhhm hhh huhm mmm hmm hmm huhh hmm."
"Speaking of Leon, where are Cloud and Leon?" I asked.
"Um, I think they went back to their room – something about practicing for the, um ... smut. scene," Zack mumbled, scratching the back of his neck. He looked at Aerith and blushed.
"What?" I cried. "They already practiced it all night long!"
"At least somebody's getting laid around here," Reno groused, giving all four limbs a good stretch before climbing off the couch and ambling towards the door, pausing briefly in the middle of the room to toss his copy of the script in the air, and some seventy-something pieces of paper came fluttering down around the room like a midsummer snowstorm. Rude shrugged his shoulders, tossed his copy as well and then followed his partner out the door.
Zack gently removed Aerith from his lap, and the two of them walked over to set their copies on my desk – Aerith with a disappointed sigh and Zack with a disapproving shake of his head – before walking out together, leaving only Yuffie and Zidane still in the room. Then they too stood up and departed, leaving their copies on the sofa and me all alone with all the dead trees.
A few minutes later, Cloud came staggering into the room, looking like he had been through a long, hard night of rough sex – which wasn't very surprising, considering that he had been through a long, hard night of rough sex – dragging an equally disheveled-looking Leon behind him, but both of them were wearing grins like the cats that had gotten the cream. And the canary. And some tuna, and a couple of mice, and then more cream for being such very, very good little kitties.
Leon wasn't wearing much of anything else – namely, just his griever necklace, his boots, and the bottom half of Cloud's dress, which was looking much the worse for wear, though not as bad as the top half, which was ripped and hanging down around his hips. His hands were secured behind his back with one of his arm belts, and the other two had been buckled end to end around his neck to form a makeshift collar. A couple of his hip belts had also been buckled together to serve as a leash, with one end attached to the collar and the other end attached to Cloud, who was wearing Leon's pants and had his shirt on backwards. In Cloud's other hand was Quistis's whip.
"Hey," Cloud grinned, glancing around the room. "Everybody gone?"
I nodded grumpily. "You know, I could have used a little help here. While you guys were busy humping each other's asses, I was getting mine handed to me on a sharply spiked platter."
"Sorry," Cloud said, though it didn't look that sincere with the shit-eating grin still plastered on his face. "At least you'll be happy to hear that we finally got that scene all worked out."
"Yeah," Leon agreed, staring dreamy-eyed at his boyfriend. "Well, except for that one part – you know – that part – where you pound me into the mattress while suck– uh, you know, at the same time, uh ... yeah. well. um ... I think that part could still, uh, you know, still use a little more work – just ... a little. like – just a few more times, maybe ... or, um – a couple. at least ... yeah ... well. um..."
Yeah ... well. um... At least he had the decency to blush as he tore his gaga-eyed gaze off of Cloud long enough to glance over at me.
"You can't possibly imagine how limber he is." He sighed dreamily. "Must be all that yoga."
"Well come on then," I said with a sigh of my own. "I suppose you had better show me to make sure I get it right."
And that, I reminded myself as I followed two sets of very sexy hips down the hall, is precisely why I'm still with the Final Fantasy fandom!