Back For More

Sazh woke to someone banging on the front door of the house. He stumbled out of bed with a cry and fumbled blindly for the gun he kept in one of the drawers of his bedside table. He might not going looking for trouble much anymore, but there was still plenty of trouble looking for him. As he got his head together, he chanced a quick look out the window. The moon was there, big and bright and pale, and that only made him more suspicious. No one decent turned up banging on someone's door this time of night.

"You get that door right this instant Sazh," Lahna growled as she pressed her face into her pillow and snatched his pillow to cover her ears.

Sazh didn't need to be told twice. A cranky Lahna meant all kinds of trouble, and not the kind that he was cut out to deal with. He might be a fair shot with a gun, but he'd never been able to raise a hand to Lahna, whereas she had no qualms about raising a hand to him – or a frying pan, for that matter.

"I'm going," Sazh muttered. "Hold your horses."

Still half-asleep, he trudged over to the front door, glad that the racket hadn't woke Dajh. His son took after his mother when it came to sleep, and a bad night's sleep could push the boy from mischievous to downright aggravating. It didn't help matters much that the boy's chocobo, Chirpy, could get pretty vicious when bothered too. Honestly, now that he thought about it, he was the only one in the house who didn't get downright murderous from a lack of sleep. Wasn't that just grand?

Finally at the front door, he eased the hammer of his pistol back and opened the door.

"Oh." He stared at Fang and Vanille. "It's you."

Then he shut the door.

"Damn it, Sazh!" Fang screamed as she hammered on the door with one fist. "You open this damn door right now!"

Sazh leaned on the door and did his best not to scream. He should have stayed in bed. Only trouble came from getting the door this time of night. "Go away!" Sazh shouted back. "I heard about that trouble you two caused round Bodhum!"

Still hammering on the door, Fang yelled back. "Come on, Sazh! Let us in."

Sazh opened his mouth to reply but was cut short by another shout, this time from inside the house.

"Who is that at the door, Sazh?" Lahna shouted. "Tell them to go away!"

Sazh looked down the barrel of his gun and wondered if it would make too much of a mess if he turned it on himself. How Dajh hadn't woken up yet, he had no idea, but he'd take what little luck he could get. "It's Fang and Vanille, honey."

"Oh," Lahna shouted from the bedroom. "In that case let Vanille in – it must be cold out there."

With a deep sigh, Sazh opened the door and yanked Vanille in before he shut it again.

"Hey!" Fang roared as she pounded on the door even harder. "What are you doing? Let me in!"

Vanille looked over at Sazh and smiled, her big eyes shining brightly. "Do you think you could let her in? She's not feeling too well."

Sazh braced his shoulder on the door, half afraid it was about to break. "Sounds to me like she's feeling just fine."

"Please, Sazh."

Damn it. Vanille was just too darn cute to say no to, what with those big, almost tearful eyes of hers, and her lip jutting out just so. Besides, from the sounds of things the door wouldn't last much longer and he just knew he'd get it if Lahna woke up to find the door all banged to bits. "Fine, I supposed she can come in," Sazh muttered as he opened the door.

Fang staggered through the door, fire in her eyes and her fists clenched. "Damn it, Sazh, I should slug you for that."

"Do that and you're back outside, Fang." Sazh yawned and staggered back toward the bedroom. "The spare room's still set up for you two to use. Sleep now and we can talk things through in the morning."

Vanille ran over and grabbed Sazh by the arm. "But, Sazh, Fang's hurt!"

Sazh turned and with one eye closed walked back over to Fang. "Where are you hurt worst?" Sazh asked. Fang pointed at her side. "I see." He poked her with the barrel of the gun and Fang gave a sharp hiss and swung out at him with one fist.

"Damn it, don't do that, Sazh!" Fang groaned and rubbed her side. "That hurts."

There wasn't even a hint of sympathy on Sazh's face. "I figured that. But you'll live. So go to sleep or I'll go get Lahna." Fang paled and Sazh smirked. "Yeah, I thought so. Now go to bed you two or I'll have a cranky wife, cranky son, and a cranky chocobo to deal with and if that happens well… I'm not so far gone that I can't put a bullet in you."

Ignoring the twitching muscle in Fang's jaw, Sazh headed back to the bedroom and shut the door. Honestly, he was getting too old for this.

It was midmorning when Sazh woke up. He'd had a pretty odd dream the night before. In his dream he'd woken up in the middle of the night to find Fang and Vanille at the door. He chuckled. It was an odd dream, but certainly not the strangest he'd had. In any case, he was feeling pretty good. He could smell breakfast and by the smell of it, it was going to be a good one. He could also hear Dajh talking quickly to someone, along with the chirps of his chocobo.

He got dressed with a smile on his face and stepped out of the bedroom and walked over to the dining room. The second he saw who was there, he almost turned right back around. Fang and Vanille were there. At the table. Eating breakfast.

Shaking his head slowly and rubbing at his eyes – please, he thought, let this be a dream – he looked things over more closely. Vanille had a big heaping of flannel cakes (AN: a flannel cake is like a pancake) on her plate, complete with a big dollop of syrup and what had to be far too much butter. The little read head was tucking into the food like she hadn't eaten in days, which knowing her and Fang, might not be too much of a stretch. Dajh also had a heap of flannel cakes almost as big as he was on his plate, and even the chocobo had a bowl of syrup. As for Fang though, all she had on her plate was a single piece of toast, mostly burnt, and by the look on her face, that's all she'd been given.

Sniggering at the furious look on Fang's face, he took his place at the head of the table. His plate had some toast on it and a couple of flannel cakes and there was a hot cup of coffee there that was brewed just how he liked it. Taking a sip of his coffee, he looked Fang and Vanille over more carefully. Even though he'd been a mite frosty the night before, it wasn't like he minded them too much. The truth was, he liked them well enough otherwise he wouldn't have put up with them so much when they were younger. As of late though, they'd only ever come around when there was trouble and he was too old for the kind of trouble they'd be bringing.

Vanille seemed okay. She was still wearing the same clothes as the night before and while they were a little bit singed in places, she didn't seem to be hurt. Fang, on the other hand, looked like she'd just gone ten rounds with a pack of rabid coyotes with nothing but a toothpick.

"How're the flannel cakes, Vanille?" Lahna cooed. "You poor thing, it's like you haven't had a decent meal in days." She cast a cold eye at Fang and brandished a spatula. "You degenerate, I'll just bet you haven't been taking care of Vanille, have you?"

Fang drove to her feet and leaned across the table. "I'll have you know I take care of Vanille just fine." She scowled at Lahna and stretched out one hand. "Now can I get a flannel cake or something?"

Lahna rapped Fang across the wrist with the spatula. "Now you listen up, I'll not be bossed around in my house by a criminal. So why don't you sit down and eat what I've given you." As Fang sat down with a sullen look on her face, Lahna let out a long suffering sigh. "Fine, if you want something else to eat, here."

And with that Lahna dumped a miserable, burnt, misshapen flannel cake on Fang's plate and flounced away.

"Hey!" Fang roared. "What is–" She was stopped short when Lahna turned and flung the spatula at her.

"No yelling at the table," Lahna said.

Hiding his chuckle behind his cup of coffee, Sazh frowned and quickly brought his knife around to block off Fang's attempt to sneak some food off his plate. "So, what's going on with you two?"

Vanille took a few moments to chew and then swallow, her cheeks puffed out like a chipmunk. "We ran into some trouble a few days back. I got out okay, but Fang got hurt a bit. There's also some stuff we want you to take a look at."

Lahna rolled her eyes. "I'm not too surprised. It's not like Fang's the smartest person. She's got a nose for trouble and she's careless too."

"Hey!" Fang shouted.

A spoon flew at Fang's head. "What did I say?" Lahna growled. "No yelling at the table."

Vanille stuffed another flannel cake into her mouth whole, a sight that got a quick round of applause from Dajh and an incredulous look from Sazh. "Your flannel cakes are the best, Lahna!"

"Why thank you, Vanille," Lahna said as she came back with another plate of flannel cakes. Quickly, she put a few more on Vanille's plate. "Why don't you have some more, Vanille?"

Vanille nodded happily. "Thanks!" She spread some butter on the flannel cakes and then poured some more syrup on them for good measure. "Do you think you could take a look at Fang, Lahna? I did the best I could, but I know you did some nurse work."

Lahna looked at Fang and Fang recoiled at the look of vague distaste on the older woman's face. "Well, I suppose I could take a look at her for you, Vanille. We can do that after breakfast and after that, I guess, if you're feeling well, you could take Dajh around town. You could use some civilisation and I know Dajh would be glad to go with you. Actually, I might go with the both of you."

Dajh nodded happily. "It'll be fun!" On his shoulder, Chirpy made a happy noise of agreement.

"That sounds swell." Vanille smiled sunnily and offered her plate, which had somehow, already been emptied. "Could I have some more?"

The rest of breakfast was mighty awkward, at least for Fang. Eventually, Sazh ended up pawning some of his food off on Fang. As much as she could aggravate him, she just looked downright pathetic staring at Vanille's plateful of food while the red head ate with clueless gusto. It also helped quiet the growling from Fang's stomach, which was getting a bit too much for him to ignore.

Once breakfast was over, Fang and Vanille headed back to the spare room with Lahna while Sazh pulled out an old newspaper and got to reading it at the table. Dajh stayed at the table too, staring down yet another plate of flannel cakes.

Back in the spare room, Lahna glowered at Fang. "Take off your shirt."

Fang hissed as Lahna poked and prodded at her injuries. After she and Vanille had fled the Cocoon place out near Bodhum, she'd felt good, better than good, actually. But the next morning, well, that had been a different story. She'd felt like she'd been run over by a train. Not only was she covered in bruises – Lightning hit damn hard – but the graze she'd taken from the shot that Lightning had fired through the wall had been a fair bit deeper than she'd thought at first. The graze had gotten infected and without the proper things they needed to clear it out, the two of them had been forced to head over to Sazh's place.

"What do you think, Lahna?" Vanille asked. "It looks pretty nasty doesn't it?"

The dark-skinned woman hummed and then prodded the graze. Fang screeched and tried to jerk away, but Lahna's hold on her was firm.

"It does look pretty nasty," Lahna said. "I'd say it's probably infected. Did you try cleaning it out?"

Vanille nodded and prodded the wound, drawing another screech from Fang. "I cleaned it out as best I could, but we didn't have everything I needed to do it right."

Lahna leaned over and looked at the wound again, running one finger along it. "I think there might be some bits of wood stuck in here," she murmured before she glanced back at Vanille. "Can you fetch my medical back, it's in the sitting room by the books."

A few moments later, Vanille came back with the medical bag and Lahna pulled some things out of it and got to work. After what felt like far too much prodding to Fang, the other woman sighed. "Yes, there are a couple of little bits of wood in there. They must have gotten lodged in there somehow." She looked over at Fang. "How exactly did you get this?"

Fang grimaced. "Gunshot." Thinking back on things, she supposed it was possible. She'd been pretty close to the wall when Lightning had shot a hole in it. It wasn't too unlikely that some of the bits of broken wood from the wall might have gotten her along with the bullet. "So, what now?"

"Well, I'm glad you asked Fang." Lahna smiled broadly and pulled out some wicked looking instruments from her bag. "Now, we pull those pieces of wood out."

"What?" Fang tried to inch away but there was nowhere for her to go, not when she was sitting on the edge of the bed. "Can't… you know, maybe…. Uh… Vanille do it?"

Lahna's smile only widened. "Oh no, I wouldn't want to leave something this delicate to someone else."

Fang whimpered.

"Now, just hold still. This won't hurt… much."

Back at the dining table, Sazh flipped another page of his newspaper and took another sip of his coffee. Well, wasn't that something, apparently cattle prices were on the up and up. Not too far off, Dajh patted his stomach and leaned back from the table, a big smile on his face.

"GAAAAAAAAAH!"

The sudden, sharp cry made Sazh flinch and he had to scramble to keep his coffee from spilling. Once he had his coffee sorted, he went right back to the newspaper.

"What was that?" Dajh asked, tugging on his father's sleeve.

Sazh took another sip of his coffee. Ah, Lahna always had made the best coffee. "That, son, is the sound of woman in great pain."

Dajh nodded slowly. "Shouldn't we… help?"

"GAAAAAAAAAAH!" Another scream rang out and Sazh set his cup of coffee on the table.

"Son, when you get to my age, you'll learn that there are just some things you're best keeping clear of." Sazh sighed. "Getting between your mother when she's in a mood is one of them." He pointed to the door that led to the sitting room. "Why don't you get yourself a book and I'll read it to you?"

Back in the spare room, Fang lay on the bed curled up into a little ball.

"Well," Lahna said as she put her instruments away. "It looks like I've got all the pieces out."

Fang smiled weakly. "So… it's over?"

Vanille shook her head. "We still need to disinfect it."

"Disinfect it?" Fang's eyes widened as she took in the bottle in Lahna's hand. She knew what was in that bottle and she knew just how much it would sting. "How about we just wash it out with water?" she asked, crawling backward until she was pressed right up against the wall.

Lahna would have none of it. "Do you want it to stay infected?" She smiled sweetly. "Why don't we do it on the count of three?"

Fang nodded. "I guess we could do that."

Lahna leaned over and opened the bottle of disinfectant. "One…" Fang took a deep breath. "Two…" Fang closed her eyes.

"GAAAAAAAAAH!"

Fang's eyes shot open to see that yes, sure enough, Lahna had poured the disinfectant onto the wound, and damn if it didn't hurt worse than being shot. Writhing around on the bed, she cast a furious glance at Vanille. She just had to remind Lahna about the disinfectant didn't she?

"Oh, stop being such a baby," Lahna said as she put the disinfectant away. "You still didn't tell me why somebody shot you." Her eyes narrowed. "You didn't try and ravage some poor, innocent young woman did you?" She glanced over at Vanille. "You would tell me, wouldn't you, if she was mistreating you?"

Fang's jaw dropped and she struggled to sit up. "What are you talking about? I don't go around ravaging people."

Vanille giggled. "She had a run in with a sheriff."

"Oh." Lahna looked strangely disappointed. "Still, what else can you expect from a degenerate criminal." She looked over at Vanille. "Now, I'm planning to head into town with Dajh. Why don't you tag along? There are some spare clothes you can change into and I know you've got a wig in your things that you can use to look different."

"That sounds like fun," Vanille said. "How about you, Fang, do you want to come?"

Fang took one look at the downright evil glare on Lahna's face and smiled shakily. "No… no, you go and have some fun, Vanille. I think I'll just stay here and rest."

Fang waited for Vanille, Lahna, and Dajh to head out before she hobbled over to where Sazh was still leafing through the newspaper with yet another cup of coffee. She and Vanille had another reason for turning up at Sazh's place apart from her needing to be patched up. Over the last few days, she'd taken a closer look at those paper's she'd filched from the Cocoon place near Bodhum and she wanted a second pair of eyes on them just to be sure she'd understood them right.

"From your screaming earlier, I'd figured you were dead," Sazh said, his eyes still on his newspaper.

"You don't sound to sad about that," Fang growled. "One of these days, Sazh, I swear I'll get back at that wife of yours."

Sazh chuckled. "Oh, I don't doubt you'll try, Fang, but as tough as you are, Lahna's got your measure and then some." He looked away from the newspaper. "Now what are those paper's you've got there?"

"These?" Fang pushed the paper's she'd stolen from Cocoon over to him. "I picked these up in a place out near Bodhum. I was hoping you could take a look and tell me what you think."

"That all?" Sazh breathed a sigh of relief. "For a moment there, I thought you might've wrecked your gun again."

Fang grimaced. "Oh, the gun's fine, it's just me that's all beat up. Besides, I might have a fair hand for turning a profit, but five hundred gil is a bit too much for me to be paying every time I drop by."

"Speaking of that gil, you still owe me some." Sazh pinned her with a stare.

Fang laughed nervously and held her hands up. "Look, I said I'd get it to you, and I will. If those papers are what I think they are, then you'll have your money plus a fair bit extra."

"That so?" Sazh asked. "Well, I guess I'd better take a look at those papers."

As Sazh looked through the papers, Fang got stuck into the leftovers. Sure, the flannel cakes weren't warm anymore, but with a bit of butter they tasted just fine and with some added syrup, well, they tasted just about heavenly. A frown crossed her face. It just wasn't fair. She'd been practically starving to death at breakfast and all she'd gotten was a lousy piece of burnt toast and the sorriest flannel cake she'd ever seen whereas Vanille must've eaten at least twice her own body weight in fresh, hot flannel cakes with butter and syrup.

"So, what do you think?" Fang asked between mouthfuls.

Sazh pursed his lips. "I'm thinking you've got some pretty serious leverage here. What are you planning to do with it?"

Fang chewed for a moment and then swallowed. "I can't use it myself. Nobody would believe someone like me, but Cocoon's got a lot of enemies. I've got a contact back in Eden City who could hook me up with some interested folks. I get money, they get leverage, and Cocoon takes a kick in the guts."

"Sounds like a plan, but how are you going to get these papers to Eden City?" Sazh asked. "You can't just post these or send them by courier, they're too tricky for that."

Fang groaned. "I was really hoping to just send them by post, but if you don't think it's a good idea…" She banged her head on the table. "Don't tell me I'll have to…"

Sazh smirked. "Yeah, it looks like you'll be heading east to play dress up."

"I was afraid you'd say that." Fang was not looking forward to heading back east at all. Cities and her didn't mix one bit. Vanille would probably drag her all over the place shopping too, and in her book that was almost as bad as getting into a gunfight without any bullets.

"Ah, relax," Sazh said. "Think of it as a holiday from all that thieving you've been up to."

A couple of hours later, Lahna, Vanille, and Dajh came back.

"Welcome back," Fang drawled, only to stop and stare when she realised just what Vanille was holding. "Vanille," she murmured. "Is that blasting powder?"

Vanille laughed and nodded. "It turns out little Dajh here hasn't ever seen fireworks. I figured I could put some together if I had a little blasting powder and Lahna was kind enough to foot the bill."

"Really?" Fang couldn't help but wince and looking over at Sazh she could see a similar look of agony on his face. Oh yes, they both remembered what had happened the last time Vanille had tried to put some fireworks together. It hadn't ended well, and by the time everything was said and done, the camp they'd been staying at had been reduced to a crater. Some of the others who'd been staying there were still after them.

"Say, Vanille, you wouldn't have happened to have practiced a little since the last time?" Sazh asked.

The red head shook her head. "Not really, but I'm sure it'll work out this time."

Fang and Sazh just lowered their heads to the table and, almost together, began to bang them on the wood.

X X X

Author's Notes

As always, I neither own Final Fantasy, nor am I making any money off this.

Well, here we have the return of Lahna, Sazh, and Dajh. I've been wanting to bring Sazh back into things for a while now, but I couldn't fit him in until this chapter. For those of you who are curious, I chose to use the term 'flannel cakes' rather than pancakes, because it's a much older phrase, and was actually used in the West. Strangely, the phrase isn't used much anymore and when I asked my twin sister if she knew what it meant, I got a definite 'no'. Hence, I added the author's note in the text to explain the term.

As always, I appreciate feedback. Reviews and comments are welcome.