Lost in the Familiar
Chapter 1: Do I Know You?
By Oneiromancy

A teenaged blond boy watched his two companions in practice combat. Slouching on a bench in the vast sandlot, his green eyes scanned the graceful movements of the silver-haired girl and the pounding strength of the brawny male. They were evenly matched. The girl could not match her practice partner in strength, but she made that up in speed. She was quick in dodging all his punches, while he had a great defense for all the hits she did get in.

"C'mon Seifer..."

Seifer glanced around, briefly taking his eyes off from the others. It was that voice again. The voice he kept hearing in his dreams. Her voice… Seifer frowned, scratching the faint pink scar between his eyes and adjusting his hat.

Usually his dreams consisted of winning struggle tournaments and tormenting Hayner's gang, but for the past couple of days the dreams he had been having where now becoming a recurring nightmare. He never saw the faces in his dreams, he just heard the voices, his and hers. Now is not the time to be worrying about random voices that plagued his dreams, no matter how familiar it sounded, his mind chided him.

"OUCH, y'know!" Seifer looked up in time to see the scene in front of him. The girl was standing over the tanned boy who was bent over clutching his left leg. His face contorted in pain, "That's not fair, Fuu. We're supposed to practice on punches, y'know."

Fuu tried hiding her smile, "Forgot."

Seifer shook his head pushing all thoughts of that voice and concentrated on the situation in front of him. "Enough." The two turned to look at him. "Rai, if your opponent is much faster than you then go on the defense and wait the right moment to punch. A strong defense is a good offense. Fuu, you did well, but Rai's right, you were supposed to work on an upper body workout."

Fuu shrugged and started some cool-down stretching, while Rai got up from the ground and started punching air.

"Hey Vivi, why don't you get us some sea-salt ice cream," Seifer said turning to the little boy with the patched pointy hat sitting on the ground near the bench. He reached into his coat pocket and tossed a pouch of munny at him.

The smaller boy caught it but then dropped the pouch, "Sure thing Seifer." Vivi hastily picked it up, got up, and waddled away.

Once again green eyes scanned the sandlot. There was a little bustle going on. The town was setting up for the struggle tournament. It was the sport that had the whole town in a crazed frenzy. It was based on fighting techniques and skills. The opponents used certified struggle bats to attack each other. The bats were covered in a colored chalky substance so when someone was hit with one it'd leave a mark. Points were awarded depending on how many marks you left on your opponent. The players would battle until the end of the allotted time. It was simple and Seifer was the best in the town at it.

Seifer grinned to himself just thinking about beating Hayner up. Hayner was the leader of his own little gang of friends, Pence and Olette. Pence was a know-it-all lamer and Olette was always nagging about summer homework that he could care less about.

He looked over at his 'gang' members. Fuu, which was short for Fujin, had to be one of his oldest friends. She was a poised girl who hardly talked more than one or two words, but she always got her point across. He studied her features while she sat on the ground stretching her legs. Silver-haired and red-eyes, she was like an exotic creature. His gaze shifted over to his other posse member. Rai, a nickname for Raijin, was also and old friend. The tall dark boy punches cut through the air as he practiced boxing.

He had known them for as long as he could remember. Well, as much as he could remember. He couldn't bring back memories before Twilight Town, but he was pretty sure that since he couldn't remember them that they weren't even important.

"Seifer!"

Seifer turned to look at who was calling his name. He saw Vivi sprinting towards them. "What?" He cringed as he watched Vivi trip nearly dropping the four bars of ice cream into the sand. Fuu rolled her eyes and walked over to help the little boy up.

Out of breath, Vivi handed each of them an ice cream. "I have news."

Seifer raised an eyebrow, "News?" He licked his ice cream that messed with his taste buds. "What about?"

"Yeah, there's a new girl in town."

"A new girl, eh?"

Vivi nodded vigorously and did a sweeping hand gesture with his arms, dripping melted ice cream onto the ground. "And Hayner and his gang have already gotten to know her. She's hanging out with them right now!"

"She isn't a resident of this town until she meets the Disciplinary Committee and knows all the rules." He smirked and finished off his frozen treat.

"Yeah y'know!" Rai exclaimed while Fuu nodded.

"C'mon guys, let's go and welcome the newcomer." Seifer walked away towards the back alley where Hayner's gang hung out at. Rai, Fuu, and Vivi followed along after him.

"So this is where you guys hang out?" An unfamiliar girl's voice asked.

"Yeah, it's pretty great, isn't it?" A different girl's voice answered which Seifer immediately recognized as Olette's.

Seifer approached the doorway and moved the blanket flap over and swaggered in. The four teenagers in the room were sitting on various sized boxes turned to look at him. Seifer crossed his arms and sneered at the three familiar faces, but frowned at the new girl.

She was different than what he expected. Actually he wasn't quite sure what he expected but it definitely wasn't her. She was the same height as Olette, maybe a little bit taller. Her blond hair was pulled back into a ponytail with her long bangs framing her face. He noticed that she was rather pale and her blue eyes stood out in contrast.

Hayner glared at Seifer, "Didn't cross your mind to knock?"

"Can't knock if you don't even have a door." Seifer said coolly, his gaze still analyzing the new girl. "Besides heard that there's someone new in town and I have to set the rules straight."

Pence shook his head and turned to the blond girl, "That's Seifer, he's-"

"I'll do the introductions." Seifer interrupted him. "He's right, I am Seifer and I'm head of the Twilight Disciplinary Committee. We make sure everyone is following the rules or else they'll have to face us."

"Yeah y'know!" Rai chimed in.

"True." Fuu simply stated.

"Oh, c'mon Seifer, she's not going to cause any trouble." Olette said. "By the way," she pointed to each of Seifer's posse. "That's Rai, Fuu, and the one in the back is Vivi."

Silent during the whole exchange the girl finally decided to speak, "I'm Quistis."

"Quistis, eh. What a weird name."

Quistis pursed her lips together, "It's not like Seifer is any better."

Hayner and his companions stared at her in disbelief. Here was this new girl and she was already standing up to Seifer's bullying. It took years until Hayner actually did it, but always had to face the punishment for doing so.

Seifer smirked down at her. He wasn't going to let her get away for making that comment. "That's a violation of the rules. No smart ass cracks. I think a day's work pushing cargo will do the job."

Quistis rolled her eyes. "You give out punishment if you can't take the comment." She scoffed. "It wasn't much of a 'smart ass crack'."

"Make it two days. Vivi inform ol' Johnny that he's getting some help later."

Vivi perked up, "Okay." He left the room to inform the man.

"Want anymore?" He challenged her.

She stood up and walked towards him. Everyone in the room was quiet watching the exchange of the town's 'defender' and the new girl. "No." She looked him in the eye and made an attempt at a smile. "You haven't changed." With that said, she airily left the room leaving everyone in bewilderment.

Seifer's eyebrows furrowed together. What did she mean by that?


A/N: I was going to make this story an oneshot but uh… now it's not. We'll see how this turns out. As a reminder this is my first KH story (probably will be my only). Feedback would be appreciated. Like it? Hate it? Think it needs work? Please do tell. I'd like to be told if I'm going against some type of Kingdom Hearts Code of Conduct or something. D: (which as the story goes on… I probably will. :l) But, as long as you go about telling me in a polite way. Thank you for your time.