A/N: As part of my effort to update/finish this story-going through a reevaluating the foundation of the story by sweeping through the original chapters and changing them around in an effort to grow the characters and match more closely towards the final goal of the story. Thanks for bearing with me, reader!

Will be focusing on my other story not long after I clean this one up.

A First Encounter

Lina took a deep breath as she headed down the hall towards Zell's room—this meeting was either going to be extremely uncomfortable, end in a matter of minutes, or some combination of the two. A couple days had passed since they made their deal, and Lina was starting to question how on earth she could help her mentor land a date with someone she'd barely ever spoken to. But, true to her word, she'd give it a shot at least.

She strolled slowly down the hall, her bookbag of encyclopedias and history textbooks bumping lightly against the side of her thigh with each step. As she stopped a few yards away from the door to Zell's room, she took a deep breath, and noticed out of the corner of her eye—a familiar figure, leaning arms crossed against the railing far down the hall, a smug look hugging his face.

She recognized him from somewhere, photographs maybe, but she couldn't quite recall the name. It was on the tip of her tongue now—the name.

He just smirked at her as her footsteps slowly brought her in his direction.

"Lina?"

Lina turned her head down the hall and saw Zell poking his head out of his room inquisitively before he started wandering into the hallway towards her. Lina quickly turned back towards the figure, only to find that he had disappeared from where he had been leaning against the wall.

Before Lina could process what had just happened, Zell had strolled to her side and said with a chuckle, "You here to work or just stand in the hall?"

"Yeah," Lina said, clearly distracted. "I think I just saw... Nevermind." Zell raised his eyebrows and gave her a funny look.

"Who?"

"Wha—?"

"Who did you think you saw?" Lina paused for a second, recalling. The face, she'd seen in photographs pinned to Selphie's wall, always with a smug smile or smirk, a dark shadow cast over his eyes—what was his name.

"Seifer," she finally said. Zell shot his head down the hall, but the figure was gone.

"Can't be... he's not welcome here," he scoffed. "Well don't just stand there," Zell said, walking back into his room. Lina followed cautiously, with each step recalling her earlier pre-Seifer-sighting anxieties of how to follow through on her end of the deal.

As Lina stepped through the doorway, the first thing she noticed was Zell's room was nearly twice the size of her tiny little guest room. It was unbelievable—a king-sized bed sitting comfortably in the middle of the room across an area of thick carpeted floor from the doorway, and a comfortable sitting area to the left of the entrance furnished with a small couch opposite of a small media center and television. Along the far wall, a large set of windows, blinds filtering the afternoon light in dim trails of white across the carpet.

The second aspect she noticed was that Zell's room was definitely a boy's room. Nearly every furnishing and open space of floor in the room was covered in miscellaneous articles of clothing (that Lina didn't want to see) and other belongings scattered around as if they'd been slung around in boredom.

Zell watched her reaction to the room, catching on to the slight blush and aversion of eyes to her hands.

"Uh...one sec," he said quickly, and told her to stay put as he scurried around the room like a tornado, picking up items and tossing them in a not-so-hidden pile behind the television.

Lina invited herself to sit at the edge of his couch, pulled out an encyclopedia she'd carried with her from her bookbag and flip through the delicate pages with her thumb as Zell continued to tidy up what he could.

"So, you know Seifer?" Zell finished up his cleaning and plopped down in front of Lina on the carpet. She looked up from her book and met his hard blue eyes.

"Not in depth. Just heard about him from what Selph's told me," Lina said as she licked a finger and flipped the old fragile pages of the book with a light flick.

"He's a bad crowd," Zell stated, leaning back and shifting his weight to his palm, a look of muffled irritation on his face. Part of him wanted her to ask why he thought so, so he could explain their longtime feud, how Seifer had singled him out unjustly from a crowd, how he lied to everyone in SeeD, and how he's a traitor to their cause now.

Zell held back his thoughts as he watched her work through the book pages, it was the first time he noticed her presence in the room as an inconvenience to his privacy. Zell eyed her as she pursed her lips in thought, flipping daintily through the pages with a nimble finger. Something about her struck him; he watched as she licked the tip of her finger very subtly, then turned the page, methodically folding it back twice to smooth out any wrinkles, then tuck it behind her thumb.

"Sorry," she said quickly snapping up to meet his gaze. "Is it a problem if I study while we chat?"

"Well, I mean...hard to chat when you're distracted." Lina's eyes narrowed as she dog-eared her current place in the book and slapped it shut.

"Alright, you have my full attention," she swung a wide gesture in his direction theatrically, trying to throw him a friendly smile. "What do you want to work on?"

"I don't know..I'm not really well-versed in.." Zell mumbled, glancing away towards the ground. Lina realized just how uncomfortable Zell was talking about this topic.

"Okay, let's see.. what's her name?" Lina asked, trying to start small talk.

"Sadie," Zell said after a moment, looking at the floor. Clearly, talking about feelings was not common practice for him.

"And are you particularly into reading, or did this romance blossom outside of the romantic aisles of the library?"

"Ch..." he scoffed, ears turning pink. "A few weeks ago mid-mission, she offered us a spare mega-Phoenix when we took shelter in the library."

"That's so sweet. So, what's the usual topic of conversation?"

"What is this—twenty questions?" Zell fired back, then settled back into his seat, a little uncomfortable himself. "Go on." Apparently, apologizing wasn't common practice for him either.

"By now she must know you feel?"

"Not quite.." Zell mumbled, ears red again, visibly flustered. Lina smiled a little, she couldn't help it. It was kind of cute, how worked up he got about talking about feelings.

"That seems like the next logical step here. It was pretty clear in the library, she's interested, so take her out for a nice meal and movie. See how compatible you guys are."

"We are compatible," he stated, determined. The red had sunken into his cheeks now.

"I'm not questioning whether or not that's true. Just saying.. ask her out to dinner." Zell thought about it for a while Lina snuck open another book and flipped a page and sighed. This research paper was going to be tougher than she had thought, and her mentor's priorities were elsewhere. Zell looked up at her as she worked, deep in thought about what she'd just said, his brow crinkled into a hard line.

"Okay," he finally said. Lina glanced up from her book; she caught a heavy glare in her direction. She sighed and put the book back down. "What would you suggest is the best way to go about this?"

"Hm..what's an ideal date sound like to you?" Lina leaned back on her palms and smiled lightly—this was the most civil conversation she'd had with him yet. It was pleasant getting to see him in a new content, not so gruff, lighter on his mannerisms and thoughtful on a subject he cared about.

"Umm..." he looked flustered. Lina mused in her mind that all this thinking might be a little too much for him to take. Her smiled widened at the thought, but tried not to let it show. He saw anyway. "Is something funny?"

"No, no, not at all—" Lina shook her head.

"Then why're you smiling?"

"No reason, just a passing thought."

"One doesn't just smile at nothing," he challenged.

"I like smiling—that a problem?" She retorted.

Zell sat there, dumbfounded at her question. Did she really expect him to answer it? Most likely not—he sat in silence as she stared at him with hard defensive eyes. She sighed.

"Well make up your mind about that and where you'd take her. I don't feel like I can help you much before then," she said, getting to her feet. She was tired of this weird mind game he seemed to be playing. It wasn't an inviting game.

"What, you're leaving?" his voice sounded offended, but that didn't stop her.

"Yes. I'm trying here, Zell. I'm going to do research where I feel a little more welcome."

"And this welcoming of you into my room and pleasant conversation doesn't feel welcoming?" She couldn't tell if that was rhetorical or a genuine question, but she wasn't planning on sticking around to find out.

"Not quite... I'll see you later," Lina said. She gathered her things, ignored Zell's appalled expression, eyes wide, jaw dropped, and with that—walked away. Zell watched her go