Squall is lost to time compression…Laguna grieves.
A Father's Lament
Let's talk when it's all over. I have a lot to tell you…
Laguna still mulls over those words some nights as he tosses and turns in his sleep. He had meant every word of them and thought he would have the opportunity to prove it. Not that he didn't think it would be hard, for how do you just sit down your teenage son that you had never met and tell him that you were his father? Laguna was nothing if not stubborn though and he would do anything to make sure he had a place in the son he had never known abouts life.
Life and death are not always so kind though.
They came back one at a time at first, the young martial artist the first to break the barrier into the world of the present. The blonde instructor was next and then the small girl with the nun-chucks and almost immediately, as though he had been following her: the sharpshooter. Zell, Quistis, Sephie and Irvine were their names but what did it matter when the name of the one he most looked for was not there among them?
It was almost a full day before they found Rinoa. She was in a field of flowers near Sorceress Edea's orphanage. She held in her arms a leather clad young man whose face in death bore the strongest resemblance to Raine. It was agony to see and to hear Rinoa's lament that she should have gotten to him sooner.
Laguna dropped everything then, and just ran to the only place he could think of. Raine's gravestone was a reminder of all that he had lost so long ago. He thought he couldn't lose anything more when he heard of her death seventeen years earlier. Fate had a cruel way of letting one know they were mistaken.
"He looked like you, Raine," Laguna said as he stood at the tiny grave. "He looked just like you. He had the same serious look I used to see in you sometimes. I remember when you used to scold me when I did something dumb. Ellone used to laugh to hear it. I wish you could have seen the man he became."
Let's talk when its' all over. I have a lot to tell you…
"I had so much to tell him," Laguna continued. "So much about us, about why I wasn't there for him. My only excuse is that I didn't know. I wish I had known. You know I would have done anything to take care of him, right Raine?" She couldn't answer. Seventeen years Raine Loire had slept in the ground. Part of Laguna's heart slumbered with her.
"I thought we would have years…a lifetime to talk. I'd have told him all about you, the war, anything he wanted to know. He was so serious looking…maybe I could have lightened him up…or maybe that girl Rinoa…" He trailed off as the tears came. "She loved him Raine…I think he loved her too. He was seventeen…he had so much to live for." Nothing Laguna said or did could change the past. Raine was gone, long lost and only a memory from the past but he at least had her memories to cling to. Laguna had nothing but a brief meeting to cling to when it came to Squall.
"He was a hero Raine, and you would have been proud of him. He saved the world. Our son Squall saved the world. I'm so proud of him. I know you would have been too."
"If he is somewhere with you then take care of him for me. Tell him everything I wanted to say. It's a lot but you know what I mean." He trailed off as a hand fell on his shoulder. It was Ellone. Ellone squeezed his shoulder in sympathy.
"I am so proud of him too," she said softly. She smiled at him. "I knew him for a few years and I have so much to tell you about him."
"About him?" Laguna took her hand then.
Her smile was teary but bright. "Rinoa, Zell, Quistis…they all have so much to say about him…how brave he was…how hard he fought…let them share their memories with you."
Let's talk when its' all over. I have a lot to tell you…
"I have a lot to tell you…we all do." She looked as sad as he felt but her smile didn't waver. "He thought that he had no one to care for him…how wrong he was. He took the world on his shoulders…and it should not have been his alone to do…we all wanted to help him. Now we will help keep his memory alive."
"I had so much to tell him," Laguna knew he would be haunted forever by this. How close he had come to having his family back…how short he had fallen. The nights would be haunted by dreams of what if.
But Ellone was there and so would Rinoa, Zell, Quistis…his memory would live though it would never replace what he had lost.
Let's talk when its' all over. I have a lot to tell you…
If only they had talked then…before it was too late….