Foosh! Rina here! My dear God it's been a long time, and I'm really sorry about that. I don't have the lie of saying that I was busy, the only thing I was doing was playing video games.

Number ONE thing right now. Forgive me for Squall's anger….

Being Human

They say that there are five stages that occur within a person when they deal with hardship. They say that you go through them to help you accept the horror that you just had to face.

Denial.

"Rinoa that's... that's not funny." No reaction. "Please don't joke like that..." My voice was weak. No reaction. She had to be joking. She does that. All the time. So she had to have been joking right now.

"I'm sorry mister... are you talking to me?"

I began to laugh. It wasn't joyous laughter. It was dry, humorless, and vain. There was no emotion behind the sound. Yet, I continued to do it. I laughed loudly at first, almost sounding evil. Like a villain's laugh from an old super hero show. But when I noticed Rinoa's frightened face my laughter died down. She wasn't laughing with me. Why? Wasn't this suppose to be funny? A prank? Something that even I would find humor in a couple of years?

I stopped and looked into her eyes dead on. "...Again. Not funny."

Her hands gripped the blanket near her for comfort. She tried to make it unnoticeable. "I...I don't know what you're talking about mister. P-please stop staring at me like that... it's scary."

No way is this happening. "You really don't remember who I am Rin?"

She just shook her head. "I'm sorry. I really don't. Umm... can I ask you a question?"

My hands clenched into fists. My head was low, enough for me to stare at the floor. This wasn't happening. I wanted her to giggle at me say something like "Do you realize how silly you look right now?" I was hoping that would be her question.

"What is it?" I asked.

"Do... you know… who I am?"

My head snapped up.

No.

"Rinoa... you really... don't remember a thing?"

She looked at me in disbelief. "Sir... I just told you... I don't know where I am, who I am and who you are... please can you just answer me..? I'm... scared..."

With that said, Laguna and Dr. Odine had walked in through the automatic door to the room. My breath hitched and it soon became a growl of rage. Laguna was ecstatic to see Rinoa awake, so much so that he ran to her side and immediately began asking questions, such as how she was feeling, is she hurt anywhere, etc.

But my attention was turned to the other being within the room.

Anger

With my fist clenched I ran to the doctor and threw his body into the next wall. As soon as I had heard the sound of his back against it my fist resumed to make contact with his face. Then my other hand quickly the helpless man's collar and proceeded to smash his body into the wall once more.

"What the fuck did you do to her Odine?" I shouted in such a rage I never knew I had. Soon I began to punch him again. Laguna quickly made his way to us and pulled my arm away before I could make the third punch to his stomach. Laguna had to restrain me by putting both my arms to my back and sweeping me so my body would hit the floor. He then rested a knee on both my arms and held my head.

Both Laguna and Odine were in great shock, but not as much as Rinoa. She seemed to be so frightened of me, that tears were coming from her chocolate orbs. Seeing that I calmed myself enough to stop squirming in Laguna's grip, but my rage did not subside.

"Have you gone insane Squall? What is wrong with you?" Laguna was shouting at me, but not in anger, his voice shook with worry, and his face was to match.

"It was him!" I began to scream back, my eyes still on the sorceress specialist. "Because of the fucking experiments he did on her! He did it!" I should have explained what the hell I was talking about, but instead my mouth only sounded words of blame and hatred. "Because of him! All those checkups he did on her with that gas! With that scan chamber! It's his fault!"

I had no logic. No reasoning. I assumed that the medical procedures Dr. Odine had done to Rinoa was the cause of her memory loss. I didn't have the thought in my mind until said doctor walked in Rinoa's room. I needed someone to blame.

Anyone.

And to me he seemed to make the most sense.

I was hurt and confused. To place the blame on someone else was a way to escape my emotions.

"You're scaring her."

My screams stopped as the scientist said those words to me. I raised an eyebrow at his statement. Sobs. I heard sobs fill the room. I tried to look over to the direction of the sound.

Rinoa was the source of the sobs. She was so terrified of me that she had the blankets to her face, covering her lips. She made the effort to look away when I met her gaze. Damn it. There was no way I could comfort her if I'm the one she was scared of. As my emotions calmed down, Laguna slowly made his way off me. His hands were at the ready in case I lunged for Odine again.

I rose and started to walk over to Rinoa, she sobs only grew with each step I took to her direction. It hurt more since I knew that I was the cause for her fear. She inched away from me when I sat down on her bed. Slowly I reached out for her face… She stiffed, and hit to the side.

"Don't touch me!" She screamed, the tears fell faster.

Laguna proceeded gently pull my shocked self away from her into the hallway. "The Doctor will see what's wrong with her okay? In the mean time you tell me what happened Squall."

Despair.

I fell against the wall and weakly began to punch the ground under it. "She doesn't know who I am…" I choked out. "She thinks I'm a monster now Laguna…"

My old man knelt beside and stopped my hand from hitting the floor again. "Squall you're going to have to explain that better."

"My whole life… Laguna… has been one step forward… three back. I finally get courage to propose to her… and she forgets who I am."

Laguna sighed and then sat down "Squall, I'm not following."

"She has no idea who I am! Where she is, why she's here, and now she's terrified of me!" I shouted.

"Who, Rinny?" Looking up gave me a clear view of our friends. Selphie's hand was carrying a bouquet of white roses. "I was hoping to give her these … Squall is everything alright?" I shook my head slowly and gazed at the floor.

Irvine 's voice perked up "She dump ya?" He chuckled slightly

"Might as well have…"

"Oooh, that bad eh? Can we go see her, maybe we can talk her out of it." Irvine joked.

"… if you can talk someone out of amnesia."

Irvine made his way over to me "Amnesia? You mean-"

"Rinny forgot about us? Some best friend she is!" Selphie exclaimed.

"…Yeah. I don't know how. She… just doesn't know who I am."

Irvine whistled loudly "Ooh boy what the hell is going on with that girl…?" He followed Laguna's example and knelt next to my defeated self. "You sure she's not just joking Squall?" I nodded weakly. "Damn… Look we're going to find a way to fix this. We promise."

"How can you promise that Irvine? You don't know how she looked at me. She's terrified of me." I held back tears that threatened to spill out on my eyes.

"Hey that's only the first impression she got of ya. It's a new Rinoa right now, so you can't expect her to understand why you're so upset. When I first met you I thought you were a moody, anti-social, jerk."

"Gee, I'm so thrilled."

"I'm not done." He chuckled "Now I know you're a great leader that cares for his friends but just doesn't express it. I know that Rinny will see you the way she used to. We'll find a way to get her memory back, and everything will be fine. I swear. For now we should be thankful she's awake."

I nodded weakly, it was reassuring to know someone had my back. It was false hope, we didn't know for sure if Rinoa will ever remember us, but it was hope nonetheless, and that was all I had right now. Laguna had walked back to Rinoa's room when we talking, so hopefully he had calmed her down.

"Now let's get you off the ground alright man? Your depressing atmosphere is killing me." Irvine smiled at me, and reached out for my hand.

Selphie patted my shoulder when I got up. "So how about we see what the doctor has to say about this okay?" She grinned widely and help me make our way back into Rinoa's room.

As we entered, Odine seemed to be done with his tests, we caught him putting away a needle and several other objects. I hated that man beyond all reason, I never trusted him and the way he talks about Rinoa just pisses me off. Unfortunately for Rinoa's sake I have to deal with it until she gets better.

"So what's the word Doc?" Irvine inquired. Odine began to chuckle, and that chuckle grew into a great big roar of laughter. I hated that man.

"Oh zis is quite simple children! For you zee, it iz only her powas. Nothing fatal. 'Az a matta of fact, the young zourcerzz zhould be zatble zoon. You vorry for not." I hated that man's stupid accent.

Laguna grinned "That's good news. Thank you Doctor." Good news? But this doesn't explain anything!

"But why can't she remember anything!" I asked.

"Vell you zee zhe doez not have control of her powas quite yet. Dey need a place to form and zettle, but Da girl haz not let dem do dat. Da girl zeemz to dink dat dese powas aren't good. Yadda yadda. Az her powas manifested dey needed a place to be harbored, but diz child did not let dem."

"That's great old man, now get to the part where you make sense." I was growing rather impatient.

"Zimple boy! Dey dook da place of her memoriez! Memoriez aren't hard dingz to be rid of, dey are not natural intinsct, nor do day hold together the way your body functions! Derefore dey are eazy to eraze. Vhy don you dink vhen there is a big accident and a person hitz dere head dey know how to do day to day functions but cannot remember a zingle ding? Zilly child."

"So that's it? No big deal?" Selphie asked, her voice filled with hope.

"Vell, it dependz, da girl might not remember everyding eva again."

I took a couple of steps over to him "You just said she should be fine soon!"

"Nu nu nu child, I zaid zhe zhould zatble, not with all of the memories." He replied cockily.

"So what do we do?"

"Vho knowz, now if you vill excuze me I have to get back to woak. Goodbye." With that the bastard left the room and us to ponder our next move. We couldn't just wait around, Rinoa might not even remember. Not to mention her powers might go haywire again.

"I heard Rinoa woke up!" Zell rushed in, he must have ran far, because his breathing was uneven and labored. "Is she okay?"

Laguna pointed to where she was laying, and Zell, Irvine , and Selphie quickly made their way over. Rinoa was bombarded with "How are you feeling?" and "Are you doing okay?" Poor Rinoa didn't know what to do, she just kinda nodded fast and smiled cutely at them. I sighed, I wanted to be near her, hold her, and tell her that I would fix everything. It would be all lies, because I didn't know what we're supposed to do.

I was lost.

At a time like this Rinoa would be my guide, she would help me travel the path that I couldn't see. Without a guide I had no way of knowing what I would do. Depending on people was something I hated to do but now I'm blind without them. In the end I was left on my own to make my own choices, just as I once believed. It wasn't fair.

Bargaining.

Maybe if I showed her places she would remember something. If I can get to remember the things that meant something she will realized who I am, and then we can both be happy. There had to be some easy way to do this, I mean she can't forget me forever can she?

God I had to do something before I go crazy!

"Um excuse me?" I looked up to find Rinoa uncomfortably smiling at me. I nodded showing her that she had my attention. "I'd like to say sorry for … uh… crying like that I guess. I didn't mean to make you feel bad…" She averted my eyes and looked towards the sheets on her bed. She gripped them tightly, she would do that sometimes when she was nervous, I was glad to see that at something stayed the same.

"It's alright, I'm sorry I scared you. I shouldn't have done that." I smiled weakly back at her.

"No listen. Mr. Laguna told me some stuff and now I know that you were just... worried about me. So I'm sorry." I couldn't help but make my over to her and wrap my arms around her. She was taken back and tired to push me away at first, but she soon accepted it. She hugged me back and whispered a thank you that was only audible to me.

"So now we have to find a way to fix this." Irvine stated.

"Fix what?" Poor Rinoa had no clue what was going on.

Selphie sat on Rinoa's bed and smiled softly at her. "Rinny, you have no memory of who you are, where you came from, what you're doing, and who your family and friends are. We're going to help you get your memories back."

"You would do that for a complete stranger?"

"Yes, but you're one of our best friends, so even more so." Zell responded this time

"That's right." I told her. "We'll be there to help you through it."

Irvine leaned against the wall and tilted his hat up wards "Question is, how do we do that?"

Zell grinned wildly "Quistis said she would look up things to help Rinny get better earlier, we can relay this to her and she what she can find."

"That isn't fast enough. We can't just wait around for research."

"Then what do you purpose we do?"

"I have an idea!"

All our gazes went the doorway where Rina, of all people, stood. She skipped her way to our group with a wide smile on her face.

"What idea do you have sweetheart?" Irvine inquired.

"The Shumi Tribe! They have a whole bunch of information on old spells that will definitely help a girl like her!"

Laguna smiled wildly "That could work! They're really nice people and intelligent!"

Selphie turned her head towards me "What do you think Squally-oh?"

"Get packing."

Acceptance.

We boarded a big dragon looking thing. Rina had explained to us that the…Shumi I think it was called, were ancient tribesmen that have been around for a long, long time. She said that they should have some kind of clue on what to do for a person like me.

Like me?

Was I any different from anybody else here? What made me so special? I was scared unlike the rest of them. Maybe it was that. They seemed to be completely confident of what they were doing. I had to put my trust in them.

Selphie had helped me get dressed and prepare for our trip. Irvine held my hand as I walked up the ramp to ship. He says a troubled lady shouldn't be walking on her own. Zell carried the supplies and Squall? Yeah Squall, he just looked sad.

We were almost in the ship when we heard someone call out us.

"Hey wait for us!" Rina was running in our direction with her two friends.

"You're not coming with us!" Squall called out.

"Yes we are!" Rushi replied. I had gotten to know them when Selphie was picking out my clothes, Rina made many suggestions.

Squall had thrown his things to the ground and marched back to the trio. "No. You. Aren't."

Rushi shot a glare at him and before I could blink she had pinned against the wall with a dagger to his throat. "We're coming. We never asked for your permission Commander. There's a task we're to do, and if you get in our way I will kill you."

Do not worry, I will explain these horrible OC's in due time. Forgive the lack of updates up now I have a way to write more so I WILL!

The next chapter will be all Rinny's point of view. The only reason I switched was cause Squally got a bit of the last chapter.