"This ends now," Seifer leered, his ice-blue eyes sparkling in triumph as he held Tifa's foot in his grasp.
Tifa gritted her teeth, there was just no way she could win. Jerking her foot back out of his grip, the young brawler made one last desperate move to break him. He dodged her aggressive strike almost lazily and wound up his sword-arm to finish her.
Tifa was about to resign herself to her fate when she sensed movement to her right. Instinctively shuffling back, she heard the crack of a whip, and saw it land where she had stood only moments ago.
Seifer had dodged backwards as well, and stood gazing at the wielder with an unreadable expression. Following his gaze, Tifa saw a woman a few years older than herself, wearing a salmon-pink coat and black pants. She also had short blonde hair pulled into a short bun and blue eyes.
With an expert twitch of her wrist, the whip had curled itself back onto her hand.
"Fighting is not permitted in the cafeteria, or any other Garden facillities for that matter," she said sternly, coming to stand between the two of them. "If we have any problems, sort them out in the Training Center, alright?" Her eyes searched Tifa's guilty face for a second before coming to rest on Seifer. "Seifer, why am I not surprised to find you in the middle of this?"
"Instructor Trepe," Seifer said, his tone dripping with disdain he wasn't bothering to conceal, "pleasure as always."
"Save it!" She cut across him. "Don't you have a class to go to? And that goes for the rest of you too!" She barked at the assembled audience.
Muttering to themselves as they dispersed, the students went back to eating or chatting, or simply left the cafeteria now that the excitement was over.
Seifer, having gathered his two lackeys, shot the instructor one final ugly look, before strutting out without a backward glance.
Intructor Trepe walked over to Tifa, who stood still, a little shell-shocked by the entire ordeal.
"You're bleeding," she said simply, pointing to Tifa's split lip and knuckles.
Tifa wordlessly touched her fingers to the spot the instructor had indicated, feeling the warm wetness on her lip. Now that she knew it was there and the adrenaline rush was fading away, it began stinging.
"I don't think I've seen you here before, what's your name?"
It took Tifa a second to realise the Instructor was speaking to her. "Oh uhm- my name's Tifa Lockhart ma'am, its my first day," she said quickly.
"Well Miss Lockhart, I think you should head to the Infirmary and get yourself cleaned up. First day and already in a fight?" Instructor Trepe said shaking her head. "Well I just hope this doesn't become a habit. Do you know where to go?"
"I'll take her Instructor!" Yuna said jogging towards them before Tifa could answer. "I was just showing her around today!"
"Alright then Yuna," Instructor Trepe replied. "Well then, I hope not to see anymore tussles from you Lockhart, good day."
Tifa watched the instructor's retreating back as she absently rubbed the left side of her ribcage, where a dull pain from Seifer's glancing blow was throbbing.
"Come on, let's go!" Yuna said, tugging on her arm.
Tifa didn't say anything and just allowed herself to be lead to purple hall of the Infirmary.
"I told you not to mess with Seifer!" Yuna said sadly.
"Someone had to stand up to that prick! Didn't you see what he was doing to that kid!" Tifa shouted, outraged.
"Tifa, please stop shouting!" Yuna said with a nervous look over her shoulder. "It wasn't right, I agree with you but starting a brawl in the middle of the cafeteria?"
"That's how you deal with-"
"No that's not how you deal with it!" Yuna said sharply.
"So I was just supposed to let him beat the crap out of an innocent kid!"
Yuna sighed, deciding to admit defeat this time. "We can argue about this all day, but point is Seifer isn't gonna change! You stood up to him, so he won't screw with you again in a hurry, so I guess one good thing came out of it!"
Tifa raised an eyebrow. "I'm not sure I follow. I kinda...lost pretty badly. If that woman hadn't walked by I woulda been toast!"
"Well, Seifer may be a nutjob, and a sadist, but he's got a warped sense of honor. He probably admires you for standing up to him, so I think you've earned his respect!"
Tifa nodded, words failing her as the stood staring blankly at the doctor's door. The small golden plague read: Dr Kadowaki, along with a list of qualifications and certificates.
Yuna knocked on the door and waited for an answer. It swung open to reveal a young woman with long chocolate brown hair that was pulled into a braid that fell almost to her thighs. She was wearing a bright pink dress under a long white doctor's coat.
"Hello! How can I help you? I guess its silly to ask," she said in a breathless voice, her green eyes shining as she took one look at Tifa's lip. "Come in!"
As she was ushering Tifa inside, she noticed her companion and her face brightened into a warm smile. "Hello Yuna! What brings you here?"
"Hi Aerith!" Yuna replied shyly, also smiling. "I'm here helping Tifa out! Aerith and I are first cousins," she explained, catching Tifa's questioning gaze as Aerith lead them into the office.
"Dr Kadowaki's off to Balamb Port to get some supplies right now, so I'm in charge at the moment," she said, guiding Tifa onto a small bed in the corner. "So, wanna tell me how you ended up with a split lip and a couple of other injuries?"
Tifa opened her mouth to answer, but Yuna got there first. "Seifer," she muttered simply, before exchanging a dark look with her cousin.
Aerith gave a dry chuckle. "Still up to his old tricks I see, some people never do figure out how to grow up! I saw him walking past a few minutes ago, refused any help of course! But from the look of things you gave as good as you got!" She sounded impressed as she checked Tifa's lip, before examining the rest of her.
Only once Aerith had scrutinized every inch of Tifa's body did the brunette begin to feel the pain. It was as though the bruises had appeared only as Aerith pointed them out.
"Got you hard in the rib I see," Aerith said, holding Tifa's shirt to expose her rib-cage where a nasty purple bruise was already blossoming. "And your arms are hurt too, but as long as you don't over-exert yourself they should be fine. As for that one, keep rubbing this," she handed Tifa a small tub of orange paste from a nearby locker, "on it, it should heal up soon."
"What about this!" Tifa almost wailed, pointing at her lip which had swollen considerable by now.
"Well I can clean that up for you," Aerith said, wrapping her index finger in a roll of cotton wool and dipping it into a small bottle of alcohol.
Tifa hissed in pain from the stinging alcohol as Aerith cleansed her lip.
"There you go!" Aerith said with an encouraging smile, retracting her finger, seemingly oblivious to the glare Tifa was shooting at her offending phalange.
Tifa took one look in the mirror hovering behind Aerith's back, her lip had stopped bleeding but was now nearly twice its usual size.
"Can't you do anything else?" She pleaded.
Aerith seemed about to say something, but hesitated. "I'm not really supposed to..."
"Its her first day here Aerith!" Yuna commented.
Aerith nodded in understanding. "Okay, just this once I'm gonna do things the easy way. But this stays between us, alright?"
Tifa nodded fervently, grateful for anything that would return her face to normal!
Aerith rummaged in her coat pocket for a moment before pulling out a small greeen orb. It was no larger than the average pebble and perfectly spherical, an unearthly glow seeming to emmit from within.
"Is that?" Tifa said, gazing at it in awe.
"Materia?" Aerith finished for her with a smile. "Yes it is! I'm not really supposed to use it unless its an emergency, but I think we can make an exception after Seifer's welcome!"
Tifa's jaw nearly dropped as the small materia, disappeared into Aerith's open palm.
"W-where did it go?" She sputtered.
Both Aerith and Yuna gave a small laugh at that.
"Materia in its natural state can't be used by humans," Aerith explained, holding her open palm over Tifa's face. "One its absorbed into the user's body, we can use it to cast magic! Like this!"
Aerith waved her hand over Tifa's face and for a moment Tifa's eyes could see nothing but ghostly green light. A strange warmth came over her face, soothing, yet somewhat scary.
Aerith moved her hand away and the light instantly died. "There! All done!" She said brightly, dusting her hands off.
Tifa daintily touched her fingers to lip, there it was! As good as new, almost as though the injury had never happened.
"Thanks!" She said, grinning up at the older woman.
"Don't mention it! By the way, I'd get settled in for the day, term officially starts tomorrow!" Aerith mentioned, as she stowed the materia safely in her pocket.
"We're in the same dorm room," Yuna mentioned, as they left. "I got someone to move your bags while Instructor Trepe was giving you the third degree."
"I was wondering where they disappeared to," Tifa said idly, her thoughts elsewhere. "Tell me Yuna, do you by any chance know someone named Cloud here?"
Yuna's eyes widened at the news. "You mean Cloud Strife? Oh my goodness," she looked striken at Tifa's nod. "Know him? Everyone knows him! He's only one of Garden's best SOLDIERs! An inspiration to pretty much every student here!"
"Wow geez!" Tifa laughed, although she was certainly intrigued. "Minor fangirl moment right there!"
Yuna laughed along with her as they made their way to the dorms. "So how do you know him?"
"We come from the same hometown," Tifa answered. "He used to be my neighbour!"
"Oh my!" Yuna clapped her hands over her mouth in yet another fangirl moment. "He probably hasn't even heard you're here! I'm sure he'd be real happy to see you!"
Tifa giggled at her new friend's stunned expression. "I'm not so sure to be honest."
"Why's that?" Yuna asked, as they passed a group of giggling girls.
"Well, we were next-door neighbours, but we weren't really that close. He was...something of a loner," Tifa explained.
"Oh I see," Yuna said, looking somewhat disappointed that she wouldn't be getting a personal introduction. "Here we are!"
Yuna had pulled out a key and unlocked the door to Tifa's new room. It was alright, she supposed, not much in the way of personal space. It certainly was neat, they had a small space where a bed and a few cupboards a piece, while the main area held two small study desks and a table for dining.
"Looks good!" Tifa said happily, seeing her trunk sitting against the bed. "I better start unpacking," she added, eyeing her trunk with mild distaste!
"I'll help you!" Yuna offered.
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A few hours later, Tifa's trunk was fully offloaded into the cupboard and thrown unceremoniously under the bed.
"Whew, well now that we got that done! We better get some sleep! You heard Aerith, classes start tomorrow," Yuna said, collapsing on Tifa's bed.
"Oh damn! I totally forgot!" Tifa burst out slapping her forehead. "I haven't signed up for any classes! How am I gonna do anything! I'll have to speak to the Headmaster first thing tomorrow!"
"Tifa, chill," Yuna said soothingly. "We all have to do a month of basic classes, before we decide what we want to branch into!"
"Oh, so where do I get the timetable?" Tifa asked.
Yuna laughed again. "We have all the same stuff together so just stick to me and we'll get through it! Now let's get some rest for tomorrow!
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