"What Would I Be Without You"
-Kawaii Hana-
DISCLAIMER:
I don't own anything from FF8. Too bad... I would have made a direct sequel from it, though... (Ehehehehe...)
NOTE TO READERS:
- Italic – - represents thoughts
(Italic) – don't mind them
Bold – "emphasized" words
SPECIAL NOTE: A short chapter to commemorate the start of the sem-break!!! xD
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Chapter 11: Thoughts of Their Matron
I remember him to be a very small boy around 3 years of age … gifted with pale cyan eyes… swollen red from all the crying and sobbing… when he first came into the orphanage…
His small sad face might have what urged me to take him in… His eyes, most especially… It bore the dreadful pain of losing a family… In his case, it was his only family… his beloved mother died a noble death, protecting her son from an unexpected fire in Dollet…
This loss is just unbearable…especially to such a small boy… His father is nowhere to be found… I was in the impression that the man might have left them a long time ago…
And thus, little Seifer became the last child to be part of my orphanage… But, the 1st child to come in our home already knowing how to walk and speak… All the others were mere little infants when they first came here 3 years prior…
I find it really amusing right now as I write this passage because I remember the very first child that I introduce the young Seifer to was… that little blonde girl playing with her doll who just happened to by the front door…It was Quistis…
Her story was quite different… While Seifer still has memories of his mother to hold on to, this little blossom…has no memory of her family at all…
It was just one uneventful evening … That is, until Cid and I heard rushed knocks on our door and went to see who our unexpected visitor was…
And what we found… was a peacefully sleeping 4 month old baby girl left alone in our doorstep in one of our past homes in Deling City, in short, an abandoned child. Along with her was a note saying to take care of her little girl and that her name was Quistis… And that the mother promises to come back for her… The sender was probably a young teenager who couldn't raise the baby on her own… Knowing that Deling City houses the elite and rich families, she probably kept the pregnancy a secret… I remember feeling much sympathy for this young mother and her child… And without any hesitant gesture, I took the baby girl as part of the orphanage.
(Soon, 3 years later, that baby would grow up to be a very outspoken child, so mature for such a very young age…)
Although Seifer and Quists's backgrounds and personalities highly contrast each other…they are very special. Special in a way that they are the only two of the orphans whom I have taken in whose parents were not lost during the brink of the 1st Sorceress War…
Before they were all brought to me, I decided to build an orphanage dedicated to the poor children who have lost their families from the war between a power-hungry dictator of Galbadia and a tyrannical Sorceress of Esthar…
The day after I had made that decision, Baby Quistis came into our doorstep. Well, she was not really technically a war orphan but a child deprived of a home, nevertheless.
Little Squall might have lost his mother because of complications due to childbirth…. But his father was in Esthar as young Ellone then had mentioned him to be a Galbadian soldier… And if I have to consider what I have learned much later more about Ellone's real parents, she and Squall are, in a way, war orphans…
The same could be said for baby Selphie, Irvine and Zell. All unfortunate infants from small villages plunged into a war they are not even involved in. And by a twist of fate, they will all grow up to become heroes in yet another war…
I have only become like their mother for only 5 to 6 years…Well, 3 only in Seifer's case… But I have loved them like they all have come from me… And it pained me for having to let them go… but I had to… Back then, the threat of Ultimecia scared me to death that I have brought my children to danger…
One of my most memories of these children is when they play that game they called the "PLAYHOUSE"… I never grew tired of watching them play that game… Selphie and Irvine "Garamonde" playing as a couple who have lived in Edea Town with their adoptive son, Zell ; Ellone playing as a mother to Squall while she works in her own PUB, and of course… Seifer and Quistis "Branforde" always playing the pair that just moved in their make-believe town…
I have always loved watching them play that game… I would remember them playing it for hours and hours… until I find them asleep still in their make-believe homes…
Those are my most precious memories that I have spent in the orphanage… And I will always keep those in my heart…
Edea breathed a sigh of relief and paused from writing in her diary… She made a small smile… Life has been comparatively been more peaceful than two months ago…
For the past two months since Ultimecia's demise, Edea Kramer has busied herself overlooking the rebuilding of her ruined orphanage in the Cape of Good Hope. It would not become an orphanage as it was before… but rather a permanent home for the White SeeDs and the children they take care of… She planned to have that home quite bigger than the last to facilitate its would-be residents but still keeping its Centran look… as a tribute to the lost civilization that once lived in that continent…
As for herself, she planned to stay in Balamb Garden with her husband and of course… with her already grown- up children… But until the renovation for the new White SeeD 'Garden' has finished, the former sorceress comes to Balamb Garden at least two days a week to visit her husband then returning to Centra to check up on the reconstructing house… (Although in view of the circumstances, Cid does most of the visiting… ^^)
In the middle of supervising the reconstruction of the old stone house, Edea found herself a rare time to stay in Balamb Garden for a week… and she was just in time… Selphie, Irvine and Zelll have just got back from their Timber Owls mission… And boy, do they have lots of stories to tell… (xD)
Well, obviously, the very first story the trio will tell was… all about their mission with Rinoa and the Timber Owls – on how they created a devious plan to scare off unsuspecting soldiers by means of… a good-old teenage prank…
Edea could only sigh and shake her head. OK… Maybe they were not that 'grown-up'… But oh well, at least, it was a mission accomplished.
But their other story was what made Edea to listen intently… from start to finish… and even she was dying to know more…
Yeah… It's pretty obvious… It was all about Seifer and Quistis…
The trio (and even Squall had to join in… err… against his will…xD) told the whole story from the beginning…
The very, very beginning…
For the past two months of peace, all those two blondes ever did was argue… and argue…although not in a very damaging way…
And so in taking advantage of Seifer's desire to become SeeD and Quistis' to have a mission, they just simply put them together in the first mission request that came up… And the one that did came up involved having to be away from the Garden… and having to work together in order for their mission to succeed.
Each person described to Edea what Seifer and Quistis acted like when they were told what their mission was… when they had to pose for wedding pictures on the spot that very same day… when they seem to be ignoring each other for a week… only to be seriously conversing to each other at the Cafeteria causing to whole Garden to go wild with rumors…
And of course, there was that not-so-good-way-to-start-off journey to Deling City…
"Well, hope they won't end up killing each other… Matron…" Zell mused, remembering very well how Quistis stuffed a pillow in Seifer's mouth making him go… purple… or was that… violet? (xD)
Edea laughed. "Oh no… I'm sure 'that' happened for one time only."
"Gee, Matron… You seem really happy!" Selphie said.
"Well, with the way things are going for them… I just can't help but think about when they were children…" Their matron said and that got them interested…
"Hey that reminds me, Matron… Our memories are kinda fuzzy but… could ya tell us more about Seifer and Quistis when we were all still living in the orphanage…" Irvine asked.
Edea smiled even wider. "Interested on how they first came there..?"
And yeah… That was where Edea began to tell them how both of those blonde little ones came to her in the first place…
Edea looked at her clock. It was already 10:30 pm. –Quite late- She thought and began to write in her little diary again, thinking about those two blonde 'children' of hers…
I have always wondered what had happened to those two. Now that their memories of their childhood are slowly coming back… I know they would be happy knowing the bits of their past…
I have always loved to watch when they played that PLAYHOUSE game…
And from what I hear from Selphie, Irvine, Zell and Squall… Seifer and Quistis are forced to act like a newly-wed couple moving in Winhill which they "supposedly" chose to settle in…
Just like what they also did in their PLAYHOUSE days…
I hope… somehow… that would bring back memories lost from their GF training…
But…
There is one memory… that I hope they won't remember… And even now, it pains me to think about it… When I told about this to Selphie and the others earlier, they all had their shocked… then soon, sad and worried expressions on their faces… (I probably should not have told them…)
Neverthless, I wish both of those two the best of luck in their mission…
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AUTHOR'S BACK!!! YEY!!!
Woot… After a tiring, energy-draining, blood-sucking and late sleeping five-month semester, it was FINALLY OVER… except…
The Sembreak…. is like… two weeks only… (What the- You call that a sembreak!? For crying out loud… -.-") I mean….. how can you possibly recover from all the- uh… sleeping hours that you've missed when you wanna catch up with the manga and anime you put on hold… for like what… oh yeah… FIVE MONTHS!!!
Yeah… well… A new chapter's here….. But it's waaaaaay too short…… Think of it as a filler chapter, perhaps… Something to make you think…. "Huh? What bad memory was Edea talking about…. Ooooh….. I wanna read more…"
Hehehe…. Yeah, That is such an OLD strategy….. xD
But oh well…… I'll try to come up with a longer chapter within the oh-so-short sembreak… (That would be impossible… ne? -.-")
Anyways, as usual, thanks for reading and…
SAYONARA!
^_^