Baby Blocks

[theWallflower]

Summary: Squall learns that Selphie and Irvine are about to have a baby. With two weeks before the wedding, how will the 'children of fate' cope with their personal convictions that threaten to break their friendships apart?
This is something of a non-traditional romance drama (extremely light on romance, heavy on drama) with some angst, but plenty of humor to break it up. Enjoy!
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This story is in no way intended to infringe on the established copyrights and trademarks of Square-Enix Co., Ltd. It is for entertainment purposes only and is not intended for sale. It may be freely distributed providing that no alterations to the story are made.



The characters and incidents portrayed and the names in this story used herein are fictitious and any similarity to the name, character, or history of any person, living, dead, or otherwise, is purely coincidental and unintentional.



Dedicated to Samantha "Sammy"



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Baby Blocks
By
Eric J. Juneau
E-mail: juneauej@gmail.com



No, I don't know what I'm going to do about it.

I hate to use that word, but it's true.

What about your future plans?

This is a good thing.

Can you imagine what his reaction must have been?

You could wait.

She really only has herself to blame.

How do you tell someone something like that?

Maybe. I was just thinking.

You have to take the consequences for your actions.

We've all been lied to about this.

Life is full of surprises.

People only see what they want to see.

What goes through your mind when you find something like that out?

She's not a little girl.

It's not like either of them wanted this.

Oh my god, I'm so happy for you.

Did you ever think about what this means?

It's never gonna be the same with them. They're not gonna be the same people we knew.

She's making a right decision.

If you mention bad things, they're going to happen.

He's the only thing she really wants.

It's gonna be great.

She says she 'thinks' it's right.

I still don't regret anything.

I don't want to judge.

You can't help but judge. That's what life is, evaluating your situation and surroundings.

I have no opinion.


Sometimes when I close my eyes, I can still remember it happening. I can still remember the emotions I felt. I can still remember the surprise, the shock, the anger, the hatred, the prejudice, and everything else. When you're struggling with just day-to-day ordinaries, those really big bumps in the road can wreak havoc on you, so much that you stop completely before you realize what you'd hit. Those obstacles can't be avoided, because you never see then coming. There's no way you can see them coming.

I never told her afterwards about all this, and I don't think she'll ever know. I can only hope that the mistakes of the past aren't repeated. I can only hope that she's doing a good enough job to make sure this never happens again. Everything had already been set in course by the time I knew about it. It was far deep in the thick of things. I probably couldn't have prevented it even if I had been able to go back in time and do so. I wouldn't have known what to stop, so many little things add up to one big one. It was those two weeks that were the hardest. I can remember exactly what happened during those two weeks, but everything else after that I don't, because it's all insignificant to me.

But it can't amount to one iota of what they were going through.



DAY 1 - MONDAY



Squall scooped up a pile of dry gravely sand in his leather-gloved hand. Tiny grains sparkled in the hot sun against the smooth matted black. He opened his fingers for a quick look at the sandy stars, then tilted his palm to let them fall. The wind blew off the dust into brown smoke and the grains dropped like a waterfall back onto the ground.

The brief interlude of tranquility gently nudged Squall away from the tedium of his location, but only for a second. The parched air of the Nortes Mountains was so unlike the briny scent of his Balamb island continent that sometimes those little slices of serenity were what he needed. They especially kept his mind off the sounds going on behind him.

He turned to check on the progress of his team. Several men in white and blue-trimmed uniforms were unloading packages to the milling SeeD members and other personnel, grumbling and heaving noisily. Despite the grunt work, the mood seemed to be light and enjoyable as the team members took the supplies and ran them to their respective depots with enthusiasm becoming to a SeeD and annoying to their commander.

Squall turned away from the bustling and looked down into the valley. The mobile science camp was currently situated on a level shelf-like table of the mountain, not relatively far from ground level. Half was shaded by the sierra range, the other half left to roast in the dry equatorial sun. Loose dry sand and gray pebbles loaded this mountainside like a landfill. Every once in a while, a small mound of dirt would tumble down into the sloping basin, but that was about the limit for excitement here. Very few animals or monsters existed this high up, only a few sprigs of dry, arid plant life, not even enough for goats to munch on. Essentially a wasteland, albeit a brightly illuminated one, judging by the high sun in the sky.

He noticed a SeeD cadet jogging towards him, a young boy with silky medium brown hair. "Commander Leonhart, sir, we're running out of room in the tent to put the supplies. What should we do?" he gasped, either out of breath from running or heavy lifting.

"Put them outside the tent."

"Oh, ok, thanks," he ran back to the activity at camp.

Squall furrowed his brows with contempt. Quistis had once told him in class how there were no stupid questions in this world. Sure, practical for a teacher, but in the real world where time was never on your side and people weren't always there to answer questions, it was different. These new SeeDs coming up in the program were seeking more adventure and less work. They didn't have any idea of the duress it took, just the glory afterwards. If any of these SeeDs were going to be taking leadership roles in the future, then they had better start taking more initiative. They didn't need to come to him with every single little problem when the answers were obvious. It wasn't hard. All you needed to do was take responsibility when things screw up. That was about fifty percent of his job.

Squall figured the position of Garden Commander was somewhere in between being the headmaster and a SeeD. At Garden he had administrative duties to perform, but he was still called on from time to time to do these mercenary missions. After time compression though, the world quieted down and everything seemed dull. Too many SeeD missions these days dealt with menial security - security for concerts, security for parties, security for cities. They were not the world's bouncers. SeeDs were capable of so much more - covert ops, military training, search and rescue. The worst one was when they were asked to clean up trash after a parade. Such was the life of a mercenary - you didn't get much say in what jobs you could take. This mission he was on right now was so simple and safe they had arranged a group of students to experience real fieldwork firsthand. Sort of on-the-job training. Usually cadets didn't take fieldwork this early, but circumstances had changed.

Since time compression and the defeat of Ultimecia, the world was free from fear of the Sorceress. With the sweet-tempered Rinoa being the only known one in the world at present, conflicts were at an all-time low. Along with that came the notoriety of Balamb Garden being the origin of the fine upstanding heroes that made the peace possible in the first place. So everyone and their mother wanted to become a SeeD. Before, the rigorous training program of Garden translated to fewer students who made the cut and a lack of positions to fill. Now they couldn't keep up with all the submissions and new students. The lack of qualified teachers meant having to do two, sometimes three, jobs at once. And money was stretched tight as ever, with not enough mercenary work for the people who wanted to do it.

So that left him here, practically stranded somewhere in the Nortes Mountains in Esthar with a boatload of rookies and a stuffy research team. Apparently they were mining for some ore here in the bluffs and needed a security team to help protect them from the monsters that roamed the region. Despite their worries, attacks were actually more rare in the mountains than they realized, which resulted in a bored commander. Watching them pick apart rocks was not exciting stuff. This, plus his negative association with Esthar, made it a tiresome chore. He missed his friends, he missed his work, he missed Rinoa.

Squall spun around and trodded back into the research camp to see how progress was being made with unloading supplies. The covered off-road truck was nearly empty of its boxes. Underclassmen were unpacking and storing the food, medical packs, and other necessities in their designated areas. Researchers wearing dirt spackled white jumpsuits with utility belts walked back and forth between the dig site and the camp, interweaving between the white standing tents and a few army green mobile lab units distributed along the cliff top. Squall thought this was the most activity he had seen in quite a while. A testament to the tedium of being posted out here in the middle of nowhere.

"Bolcor, can you come over to the site? I think I've found something!" shouted one of the clients from the sloping elevation above them. This caused quite a stir among the population down there and nearly every geologist not doing something important dropped their business and followed up the incline. Squall followed as well, digging his ankles into the sandy cliffside. There was a sneaking worry in the back of his mind, as the dig site was away from the protected domestic area and a collection of monster snacks were heading towards it.

Squall breached the top of the steep incline, poking his head over the ledge like Carbuncle. The scientists were heading to a point around the corner of a stone steeple, far away from the site and protection of the students. Alarm bells went off in his mind, unnecessary as they might have been. He looked back down to the camp below him and spotted the two closest cadets. "Harper! Elrim! Get up here!"

The students looked at him on the crag, a little stupefied for a moment at being roused out of their daily duties, put down their packages and began the rigorous climb. Squall didn't wait for them, they would find him and follow him. He hoisted himself the rest of the way and hotfooted it to the researcher's location. About three-quarters of them were huddled around a small crack in the cliff face as one of them tried explaining things.

"You see this vein here that looks kind of silvery and sparkly. Right next to that. I tested it for dioxin and there was a point oh-two variance," he explained as he made a circling motion with his finger. Squall crept up behind them and listened in. He wasn't overly concerned that they were beyond a safe boundary - nowhere here was one hundred percent safe. He just wanted to keep an eye on them. The lean-to spire they were under shaded them deeply from the noon sun. The ledge continued somewhere around the bend, back in the sunlight.

"There's not much deviation from the hardline face," said one of the onlookers in amazement.

"Yeah, that's what I thought."

"Is there much refraction when you look at it through the spectro-analyzer?"

"I don't know. I haven't tested that yet. But if there is, gentlemen, I believe we may have found what we're looking for." Murmurs of joy scurried through the crowd.

Through his time there, Squall had gathered they were looking for some sort of metal like adamantine, but that was about it. The geologists now began to talk about back slopes, glaciation, loess, and stratification, all of which Squall tuned out. The babble that he was forced to listen to made him long to be back at Garden.

Thankfully, tonight was troop rotation. This was the last day of Squall's mission here. They would be sending in a fresh load of students and overseers and he would get to go home. Even though his stint here was a week, the fact that he felt like it was a waste of his time made it feel longer. As the only SeeD here, there wasn't anyone to associate with. He had to take on the role of authoritative instructor and nothing else. Being back home would be sweet.

On and on, the scientists droned about what they would have to do in order to move the dig site over to this cliff, about the length of the vein, the type of equipment, crunching numbers out loud. One of them even pulled out a map they had brought up and was looking at it with a couple others. Squall rolled his eyes, figuring he would be up here a lot longer than he wanted.

The way his eyes rolled, they came to rest on the path that curved around the ledge in the sun's light. A small unusual shadow was poking out. Squall grimaced. The shape and movement told him it wasn't a person behind there. A low grunt sounded, confirming his fears.

Before he could react, the red snaking head of a Ruby Dragon snapped around the corner and roared at the group, its sharp tooth-filled mouth gaping wide.

The geologists screamed in terror and chaotically darted in the opposite direction, crawling over each other in the narrow passageway. One of the researchers on the outside began to slip down the cliff face, having been pushed off. Squall instinctively grabbed his hand and used the momentum to swing him up and forward, back on the ledge. He kept going, not even breaking out of his run. As soon as the last one passed by Squall immediately hurried after them, protecting the rear as the Ruby Dragon followed the humans, pounding its claws into the cliff top.

The commander noticed the two cadets he had called for earlier just now approaching and getting nearly run over by the stampeding geologists. They flailed their arms in the air, letting them pass without getting knocked over.

"MOVE!" Squall shouted to them. "Move back!"

The students stood there dumbly in his way until Squall caught up with them and pulled on their uniforms to get them to follow.

"Move back!" he said. "We'll get him into a better position and take him down."

"The dragon?"

"No, the geologists. Of course, the dragon!" Squall snapped. He sprinted down the plains and further into a flat open area of the cliff, bathed in bright sunlight. The Ruby Dragon screeched like piano wire as it pursued, coming out of the shadow of the cliff face, gnashing its ivory serrated teeth. Squall could feel the vibration of its flat clawed limbs hitting the ground as it ran after them. He pulled out his trusted gunblade and turned to face it in one smooth motion.

"Battle formation!" he shouted. These students were first and foremost trained in battle so he knew they could be relied upon. How much was another matter. The scared cadets spaced themselves out, creating a triple-sided barrier between the dragon and access to the camping site. They pulled out their swords - the basic weapon all students were required to learn - and held them ready to duel.

The dragon pounded its forelimbs as it reached the barricade, shaking its gargantuan head violently. Its massive black horns swung dangerously back and forth, threatening to club them. The monster backed up, stomped its feet, and opened its maw. Fiery breath billowed forward.

Squall bounded back out of the range of the familiar scorching waves, bringing his arm to his face for additional protection. The other two, unfamiliar with the attacks of this monster, skittered back and forth, finally getting the sense to duck on the ground as the full brunt of the blow swept over them.

Harper on the right jumped back onto his feet. Figuring he would need to beef himself up with protection if he was going to survive this fight, he began casting a spell. Brandishing his sword in the air, he shouted "Reflect!"

"No! You id-" Squall started to say but stopped himself. It was too late anyway. A shining opaque shield glimmered in front of him and then faded out of visibility.

Immediately, the dragon pounded its fist into the ground, casting its own Reflect spell, just as Squall expected. The same opaque shield came up around it and then washed out.

"Wait for my instructions," Squall shouted. "Ruby Dragons cast Reflect when you cast Reflect."

"Sorry, sir," the offending student said.

Squall sighed. "Does anyone have a dispel?"

No one piped up, as they looked at each other dumbly. Now no one could use magic against it, making the battle doubly difficult. He didn't have any himself, because he stopped using Guardian Forces a long time ago.

"Does anyone have any ice magic?" Squall shouted angrily.

"I do!" the second student shouted above the din.

"I do too," the first said.

Finally, a little luck. "All right, both of you put ice on your blades, and guard against fire attacks. When I say go, both of you flank him on either side and start hammering at him. I'll drive up the middle. Don't try to be a hero. And don't do anything stupid. Understand?"

They nodded. "Yes, sir!"

"All right, go!"

The two students barreled forward towards the dragon, their arms held stiffly in front of them. They began attacking its peripheries, slicing up and down with their swords. The dragon snapped its head back and forth, becoming confused at two targets attacking it on either side, moving its head between the two, slowed down by the bulk of its horns.

Squall dove in and thrust upward into the dragon's chest with his gunblade, just below his turned-away neck, not only further distracting him, but creating more damage. He pulled upward on the handle until the blade was buried deep in the thick hide, almost halfway in, and pulled the trigger. He heard the muffled boom of his exploding round tearing its way through the monster's body - a devastating hit. The dragon reared its head back, roaring with agony as Squall yanked the blade out of its chest. Acting on pure instinct, it slashed Squall away with its massive ebony claws. The commander rolled away on the grass, not fighting against the momentum, coming to a dead stop at the beginning of a sand hill. He shook his head to reorient himself. The blow wasn't that powerful, meaning the dragon wasn't very strong, another bit of good luck. Elrim looked at Squall, distracted for a moment and getting ready to run over to help.

"Keep attacking!" Squall shouted, before he had the chance. "Don't let up! No matter what!"

Without delay, he kept lacerating the Ruby Dragon without missing a beat. Squall adjusted his gunblade and rushed forward, immediately hacking and slashing at the monster with incredible speed. With his skill, the Ruby Dragon suffered through each blow on its tough hide, snapping at its assaulters. But there was no telling if it would be enough before the dragon decided to unleash its full potential.

The dragon, as if realizing what strategy it was being subjected to, focused its attacks on Elrim, swinging its snaking head over and snapping its jaw at him. Elrim narrowly avoided getting his arm scissored off and stumbled to the ground. Squall saw his vulnerable position and ran up to the dragon.

"Hey, hey!" he declared as he sliced thinly along the neckline with the end of his gunblade. The wound was like a papercut, nonlethal but attention getting. The provoked dragon turned away from its prey, looking murderously at the commander. Squall continued poking it like a pincushion.

With animal reflexes the dragon smashed into the puny human with its head, then slashed cross-wise with its claws. Squall took the blow, purposefully standing in reaching distance. He was tossed around like a rag doll, his shirt ripped apart down the front. Sweat flew off the wet hair matting his face. As the dragon turned to its next victim, Squall wobbled back up to fighting stance.

"Get over here! Come after me!"

Sparks surrounded the dragon's head and he cast Fira on Squall. A burst of magic flame enveloped his body, and he stood there and took it, suffering through the heat.

Harper moved forward to help his commander. "What is he doing?" he stammered, incredulous that the commander was purposefully provoking the dragon to take hits meant for his students.

"No, wait," Elrim stopped him. "I think..."

Squall then felt the power, a great emotion building up in him that had to be released in a furious blow.

A circle of light spread out from Squall on the dirt, surrounding him as he held up his gunblade. He rushed forward towards the monster and bounded to the sky, slashing upward with a monstrous blow. He seemed to stay suspended in mid-air for a moment. Then he dived down again, slicing with his blade straight and true into the dragon's neck. In a rage, he peeled off a flurry of slices and strikes, swinging the blade up and down repeatedly, creating an energy trail behind it as he ran around its body. The Ruby Dragon snapped back over and over as he felt each hard blow delivered.

Squall returned to its front and powered up again, this time to perform the Lionheart maneuver. A coil of energy formed out the air and spun down into him, as he held his gunblade to the side, charging up power like the light of the sun. He rushed forward and delivered an unyielding pattern of rapid strikes, almost inhumanly slicing through the Ruby Dragon like a blender. The monster breathed heavily in and out, taking the hits without retaliation. With a mighty final blow Squall channeled his energy and struck forth. The dragon swayed back and forth in place and slumped to the ground, lifeless.

Squall cocked the gunblade back, opening the chamber, and reloaded it with specialized bullets from his belt as the two other students whooped and hollered in excitement, having taken down their first strong monster.

"Oh my god, did you see that? That was awesome!"

"I can't believe we did that! We took down a Ruby Dragon!"

The group of scientists who were watching on the sidelines, scampered up the hill and approached Squall.

"Are you all right?"

Squall nonchalantly resheathed his gunblade. "Fine," he said emotionlessly.

The research team gathered around him, lauding him with praise.

"Thank you so much!"

"Congratulations!"

"That was a Ruby Dragon!"

"I can't believe we're still alive!"

"That was almost single-handedly done."

"SeeD is the greatest!"

"Thank you! Thank you!"

It seemed no matter what these geologists did, Squall was irritated with them. "All right, all right, thank you. It was nothing. Just... go back to work... or something."

The scientists began to disperse, still discussing the great accomplishment, as Squall approached the two students. "And that's why we study monsters. If we know their weaknesses, they can be defeated when we're at a disadvantage."

"Yes, sir," they responded.

"Good work. Get to the medic and get treated if you need it."

Suddenly, Squall felt something in his pocket vibrate. The shock startled the hell out of him, much to his chagrin. It was his PHS phone. He struggled to tug it out of his pocket, flip it open, and get a grasp on the antenna with his leather-clad hand. Without looking at the display, he clicked the green button, and held it up to his ear.

"Hello?"

No answer. He repeated his greeting, but all he could hear was some muffled, excited talking. The sound disconnected to silence after eight seconds. He took it off his ear and read the display to see who was calling. The read-out said 'Recent Calls: (1) RINOA'.

"Problem?" Harper asked.

Squall realized he had made a face, prompting the question. "No, just get going," he commanded.

The students sped off back down to the camp. It was unusual for Rinoa to call when he was on the field unless it was something special or important. On the other hand, it was also possible she had accidentally sat on the call button or something. He had gotten misdirected calls before. These new communication devices were something of an experiment, using defunct satellites to track the signals, so Squall was wary of them working properly. More specifically, he hated the fact that he could easily get interrupted at any time now, even while working. He put the phone back in his pocket and walked back down the hill to the camp.

As soon as he was halfway down he felt his pocket vibrate again. Ready for it this time he pulled it out, flipped it, and hit the receive button. Again, the display ID said it was from Rinoa.

"Hello?"

"...Hello?"

"Rinoa?"

"Hi, are you still on the field?" Active, mumbled voices continued in the background.

"Yes." Of course, he was. The troop rotation wasn't scheduled until later that night and she knew that.

"Guess what?"

"What?"

"It's a surprise."

Squall rolled his eyes, half-watching the camp. He really hated surprises, but he decided to humor her. Rinoa wouldn't have called unless it was something big. He began to rattle off predictable possibilities of 'big news' in a blasé manner.

"All right, um, you found a new job, Cid is stepping down, somebody's moving, they found another Sorceress, somebody's pregnant, somebody died, Zell is getting a promotion-"

"Wait, go back, you were close on the pregnant thing."

"What? Somebody's pregnant?" Squall's heart sank. No matter what, this was going to have a drastic change in life as he knew it. "You're pregnant?" Squall knew this wasn't true, but had no other guesses.

"Nope," she said gleefully.

"Uh, who else do I know that's been married recently?"

"Come on, who do we know?"

Squall tried to think of all the girls he knew. "Uh, Quistis, Xu, you, Selphie, Fujin, Matron-"

"Wait, go back."

Squall repeated his list slower, "Xu, Quistis, Selphie-"

"There."

"Selphie? Selphie's pregnant?"

Oh god.

"And guess what else?"

"What?"

"Guess."

"Just tell me." The guessing game had now lost all its fun.

"No, guess."

"Just tell me."

"Selphie and Irvine got engaged and they're getting married in two weeks!"

"Oh... I see."

"Isn't that exciting?"

"I thought they were broken up."

"Well, they... got back together. I think it happened on the trip down to Galbadia two weeks ago."

"Uh-huh," he said dryly.

"We're going shopping for dresses tomorrow. We kinda gotta hurry, since the wedding's only a week from next Sunday."

"Uh-huh."

Oh, dear god, it's not happened.

"Yeah... so... I thought I'd tell you." Rinoa was sounding like she'd run out of things to say. "I really wanted to tell you now instead of waiting until you got back."

"Right." The conversation hung in the air.

"...Okay, well, I'll let you go now."

"Okay."

"Bye."

"Bye."

Squall closed up the PHS and put it back in his pocket. He glared outwards into space for a while.

Squall waited for something inside him to build up until it broke open and hatched, but it didn't come. He was unsure what he was feeling. There wasn't any pattern to this. Before he knew what he felt, but this... Selphie is pregnant. The news was so mixed he couldn't tell how he was supposed to react, so he simply didn't. Rinoa seemed so happy, so did everyone else in the background on the phone. Marriages were supposed to be happy. Selphie and Irvine were a happy couple now. The last Squall heard they weren't really together anymore. And now this. He had no response, save looking down into the dirt. He remained professional, keeping a proper demeanor. Selphie is pregnant. Those words kept repeating in his head. Selphie is pregnant. Selphie is pregnant. And Selphie and Irvine were getting married. This was not right. How was he supposed to react? These were his two friends, they'd had a relationship, but it never seemed right to him. Why wasn't he as happy as Rinoa?

Squall had a craving to get home, to be amongst his familiars. More than ever, he did not want to be there right now. He was missing out, he needed to be there in the thick of it, for some reason he could not understand. He needed to be there. Not here in this mountainous wasteland surrounded by strangers. He felt like he wasn't fulfilling his role here. The only problem was he had to oversee the troop rotation. That would be in only a few hours. Squall grumbled inwardly. He could have used his power to get on a train, but it made more sense to wait than to tread all the way to the train station and spend a bunch of money on a last-minute ticket. Practically speaking, he might as well stay. He wouldn't save more than two hours. There was nothing he could do about it.

The white tent flap nearby opened and an older SeeD emerged. "Commander," he said. "The transport carrying the troop rotation just radioed in, they say they're a little behind schedule, by a half an hour."

Squall suppressed a frustrating grunt. A half-hour more than what he expected. He just wanted to get out of here.

"Fine, you take care of it. Let me know when its finished and I can go home."

"Sir?" he said confusedly.

"I'll be in my tent until then. Don't bother me."

"Sir-"

"I said don't bother me."

Squall stormed away across the camp, thinking of what to do next, frustrated that he had to stay here in this massive waste of time. He didn't even need to go on this mission, he just volunteered to get out of Balamb for a while. He knew there was nothing more for him to do here. That Ruby Dragon attack was a fluke and the first of its kind. Any other monsters the students could easily handle themselves, and they were few and far between. Squall was just here to supervise, to run the show that didn't need running.

He wished he knew how to deal with this. This sort of thing had never happened before in his life. SeeDs and garden students were too busy with assignments and work and training for this sort of thing to ever come up. Families weren't even a concept for them. They were individuals, working individually, not couples.

"Sir?"

Squall looked up and saw Elrim coming over to him, presumably from the medical tent.

"Did something happen over the phone?"

"Nothing you need to know about," Squall rasped and walked back to his tent. This would be the longest two hours ever.

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The Stealth & Covert Operations class he had taken as a cadet went wasted as Squall opened the door to his room much louder than he would have liked. His teacher would have been very disappointed, but he wasn't really trying. The only goal was to try and not wake Rinoa. She would not have waited up for him, not this late. He walked through the apartment quietly though.

This was a special double room, the largest dorm in Garden, especially for him and Rinoa to live together in. They added on new floors, new rooms, part of a whole new renovation made a year ago. The addition of new dorms included this for the... privileged.

The clock on the coffee machine said 2:30. From the moonlight breathing out from the window blinds he could see there were still dirty dishes everywhere on the sink and counter, waiting to be cleaned. Despite their age and maturity, they still treated the place like a dorm, like a temporary residence. Dishes were always a problem in this house. Squall usually ended up doing them, because he had to in order to make room for more.

He entered his bedroom, sending his feet out ahead to make sure not to step on Angelo, if he was waiting underfoot. He quietly unraveled his clothing, stripping down to his underpants and shirt. Rinoa was already scooched over to her side of the bed, and Squall peeled back the covers and slipped in, moving onto his back stiffly. He adjusted his body to make himself comfortable on the pillow, and breathed deep. Rinoa turned over and put her arm around Squall's chest, scooting over to cuddle with him.

"Mmmm... you smell good," she whispered. Unfortunately, he had roused her from sleep.

"I took a shower on the train," Squall responded.

She kept quiet after that, content to stay next to her boy. Squall stared up at the ceiling, knowing he wouldn't be able to sleep much that night. This position was unusual to him because he usually slept on his side. But now, his eyes were wide open, staring at the textured ceiling, with Rin's arm draped on his chest. The thoughts in his head were spreading like a virus. Wondering about Selphie and Irvine. Wondering. Stuck in some state he couldn't describe. The conflicts were growing by the minute, and the solitude on the train hadn't helped any.

"Are you cold?" Rinoa asked quietly. "You're shivering."

"A little."

Rinoa snuggled in closer, tucking her head on Squall's chest. "You okay?"

"I'm fine."

"You sounded kinda weird over the phone."

Squall said nothing to this.

"Is there anything you want to talk about?" she asked.

"No."

"Are you afraid I'm gonna get the marriage itch too? Don't worry."

"I'm not. Rinoa, sleep."

"Oh, okay. Good night."

"Night."

[Demon]

I can't help but wonder just how messed up their relationships arre going to be.

[TRUE Sephiroth]

This....should be interesting...

[Viki]

I'm interested to see where this is going. ^^ I hope it doesn't go the way I think it's going to go. Do continue!

[theWallflower]

DAY 2 - TUESDAY


Squall woke up early, before the alarm went off. Hazed out of his sleep, he had no remnants of dreams or inclination to get back to bed - fortunate for him, as he usually strived to stay under the covers as long as possible. Then he remembered what had happened yesterday. Selphie and Irvine were still getting married. Selphie was still pregnant. Great. There was this to deal with, and he still had a full day of work ahead of him.

It was still dark as he pulled off the sheets, just before sunrise. Probably six in the morning. He put on the clean clothes he found in the dresser and walked out to the bubbling coffee pot in the kitchen. Trying not to think as he pulled a ceramic mug from the cupboard, he peered through the darkness at the level of the coffee. Still not done yet. He was surprisingly awake for having gotten very little sleep that night. Only about three or four hours, he calculated. He would have a ton of work to do today, just having come back from a week away from his duties. It's not that there weren't people to do his work, they just had a lack of applied knowledge that was the killer. If they didn't know the subtleties of how he liked things done, or the most efficient way, they got screwed up. So they'd sooner put off the thing rather than make a potentially consequential mistake. So he'd be swamped today, probably work late. Just as well, anything to get his mind off the current events.

Agh, that's just what he didn't want to think about. Every time he thought about it there was a twinge of something in his stomach, like he had just drank a shot of some emotion. And it was something everyone was going to be talking about today. And he just wanted to avoid it. How was he supposed to cope with something like this? It felt like Selphie had just died.

The coffee machine's burbling slowed to a few sporadic pops and Squall turned it off. Holding his cup out, he took the pot and poured it close to the rim. Finished with this, he took a collection of papers he had set out on the counter the night before and quietly exited the room.

Garden at six in the morning was deader than dead. Disconcertingly silent. Hallways were big enough that they were supposed to have an abundance of students wandering between sections of garden. Classes didn't start until 7:30. Students didn't wake up until 7:29.

Logically, people were going to want to see how he was going to react, what his treatment on the Selphie situation would be. He was the figurehead of Garden and his view might affect how a lot of people thought on the matter. That was the last thing he wanted, for people to take his opinion just because it was his own, trying to emulate him because he was in power. The best way to treat the situation would be professionally, not personally. A good leader had to remain emotionless and opinionless, just like he had been doing in the beginning. This was to show he was not vulnerable to little things affecting him. Just as on the battlefield, being emotionally swayed during the heat of the moment was a nasty weakness, potentially devastating. It was better if he just treated it rationally and logically. Since Selphie and Irvine had nothing to do with his immediate job, it was a non-issue as far as he was concerned. He had no opinion.

The elevator dinged as it reached the third floor. At one point he needed special permission to come up here. Now he did it everyday. This floor had been renovated as well, especially to accommodate the piloting mechanism for mobile Garden. Now, Xu's secretary desk was the first thing one saw once they got off the lift. Beyond that was Cid's office. Squall's was to the left.

Xu was apparently an early riser as well. She was working busily at her desk as if it was the middle of the day.

"Morning, Squall," she said politely.

"Morning. Here's my report from the mission," he said, handing her the folder full of paper.

"Oof, already?" she said as she took it and put it on her desk.

"I did it on the train on the way back."

"Did you hear the news?"

"Yeah, I heard it."

"It's gonna be great. I haven't been to a wedding in a long time."

"What-" Squall halted himself. He was trying to stop saying 'whatever' anymore, part of his rehabilitation from being so distant and rude. "Yeah, me too," he said instead.

"Cid let me take most of the day off so I could go shopping with all the girls."

"Uh-huh. Is there anything that happened while I was gone that I should know about?"

Xu picked up a mass of papers in a tray on her desk. "Nothing too major happened while you were gone. Here's the business for today."

"I probably have a lot of clients that need reviewing."

"Yeah, there's a pile on your desk."

"Thanks," he said as he took the work and headed to his desk. The cluttered, but organized office was like a smaller, less grand version of Cid's, made from part of a closet and Cid's old office. Squall sat down at his desk and turned on his computer console. While waiting for it to boot up he took a look at the heavily laden 'in-box' for paper. In it was an assortment of SeeD request applications by various clients. The first job in choosing to hire out SeeDs was researching the hirers, finding out whom they worked for and their political ties. Then they would arrange an interview to see what kind of job they needed done, perhaps finding out what skills were needed, negotiating the fee and terms of the contract, possibly whether it would be a good candidate for a SeeD test. The underlying objective was to find out if one could trust the client, whether it wouldn't simply be a case of sending good men to their immediate deaths or conflict with other clients. Mercenarianism was a dangerous job, but that didn't mean it had to be suicidal. Squall picked up the first page and started reading.

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Selphie and Xu took their tubs of ice cream away from the counter and went to find a seat. Rinoa and Quistis stepped up and looked at the clerk.

"I'll have a small chocolate with sprinkles," Rinoa said.

"I'll have a small vanilla," Quistis said.

The man went to work filling their orders, first Rinoa's. The raven-haired girl turned to her friend and continued their conversation. "I guess I could just blame it on the lack of sleep. But even on the phone. I mean, that doesn't explain the way he acted on the phone."

"He's just being standoffish."

"But he didn't say a thing. Don't you think that's a weird reaction?"

Quistis thought back to all the interaction she'd had with Squall over her life.

Rinoa stammered, "Er... don't answer that."

The clerk put two paper dishes of ice cream, one dark brown, one white, on the counter. The two girls replaced them with a few coins each and turned around to see where Selphie and Xu had sat down. The outdoor dining plaza in Balamb City was very beautiful. It was right in the middle of the city and surrounded by a variety of food kiosks and green potted plants. The four girls had chosen a round metal-grated table in the middle of the eating area.

"I just thought it was different from his usual standoffishness," Rinoa said as she scraped out the hard plastic-mesh chair and sat.

"Are you guys talking about Squall?" Selphie said.

Quistis then explained for Rinoa what had happened concerning the phone call she made last night and his behavior once he got home.

"Wow, that's weird," Selphie said. "And he was doing so good."

"I know. It's like he closed up all of a sudden," Rinoa said.

"I thought it was just a fluke," Quistis said, "You know, the shock. It'll wear off sometime."

"You know what I think," Rinoa said. "I think Squall is worried that I'm going to get the marriage bug. Cause we've been together for long enough, he's afraid that this is gonna put ideas in my head." There were some slight nods to that statement. "But that's way off. I told him I'm not even thinking about that yet."

Xu said, "If I was a guy I'd probably be worried about that. You guys aren't ready for... oh, I mean..."

Dead silence. All their eyes turned downward to their ice cream. Everyone felt like somebody needed to say something right now.

"Anyways..." Rinoa tried.

"Come on guys, don't be sad," Selphie chirped. "I'm getting married! I know what you guys all said about the train, but I still don't regret anything. This is a good thing. If you mention bad things, they're going to happen. Right? Now..." She pulled out her notepad and pencil from her yellow sundress and put them in front of her ice cream. "What other stores do we need to check out? We've still got Michael's and Glamour House to go."

"I think we can cross off Priceless Apparel," Rinoa said. "They were so rude to us."

"I know, they wouldn't even help us out." Selphie laughed as she crossed out their name on the list. "Well, screw them, they don't get none of our business. Ha."

As the girls talked about their experiences in the previous shopping establishments, Quistis quietly nibbled her ice cream, thinking about the sweet subtle taste touching her tongue. The white vanilla color reminded her of the first dress Selphie had tried on. She perched in front of a box before three angled mirrors, looking at herself. Not swishing around to see the different angles of the dress, just herself. Her face, staring directly at her face, the pale peach of her skin lightened by the pallor of her dress. The expression on her face was... indescribable. It was a somber combination of incredulity and sadness. Once all the girls saw that face, they knew Selphie realized the magnitude of what she was into.

The aching pain in her feet roused Quistis back to the table conversation. She reached down to rub her ankle while Selphie continued listing her shopping itinerary breathlessly. "Okay, next time, tomorrow, we're going to have to shoe shop."

"I have a test tomorrow," Quistis said.

"For what?"

"No, I'm giving a test."

"Oh, right, duh. I keep forgetting we're out of school now. Heh, it's only been a year, you'd think I'd stop doing that by now," she laughed. "Okay, how about Thursday then?"

"That sounds good."

"Ugh," Rinoa said. "I can't believe we've been shopping for so long." She slumped back in her chair in fatigue.

"And there's still more to go," Selphie said excitedly. Quistis looked at her in disbelief. That girl had tons of energy to spare, like she ate sacks full of sugar for meals.

"Just how much are you willing to spend?" Xu asked.

"Well, I'm a 22-rank SeeD. I got enough salary coming in to spend on this. You only get married once, right?"

An awkward pause shrouded the table. The four girls quietly ate their ice cream, relaxing their weary legs. Every one of them had a thousand questions on their mind, all too inappropriate to ask. Neither did they want Selphie to feel like she was on an interrogative game show. She was their friend, so they were stuck in between seeming tactless or satiating their curiosity.

Xu broke the silence. "Did you ever think about waiting? I mean, you don't have to have the baby while you're married. You could wait."

"Yeah, that's true," the two other girls agreed. Xu was secretly relieved. Fortunately, no one in the group was fundamental enough as to not consider this at least as a possibility.

"We're getting married mostly for the financial reasons. Cause of the insurance money if Irvine dies on duty."

"Oh, yeah, I suppose," the girls agreed again.

"What about your future plans?" Quistis asked.

"Well, I don't know. I think I'm gonna keep working until I have the baby. Not on missions, of course, but other things in Garden probably. And then I'll take a year off to take care of it."

"Where are you going to stay?"

"Yeah, Garden doesn't have daycare facilities," Rinoa said, "Or anything set up to take care of a child."

"Right," Quistis concurred.

"No, no, I know. We talked about getting a place on Obel Lake, maybe, if we can find something affordable." Selphie popped her pencil in her mouth and studied her notepad. "I can't decide whether I like the formal or the informal dress."

"Quistis looked better in the formal than you did. I think she should be getting married instead," Rinoa said. To make things go faster, each of the girls had been trying on dresses, which led to many giggles.

Xu said, "I think you should go with the formal. Everything else about this is just about as informal as you could get, so you should try and get what traditions you can in there. Maybe. I was just thinking."

"That would mean Irvine would have to wear a tuxedo," Rinoa said delightedly.

"He doesn't wear his SeeD uniform?"

The three girls looked to Quistis for an answer, as if she was the leading authority on all things Garden.

"Um, I'm not sure. I'd have to check the regulations. I think he has to wear his SeeD uniform. It applies to boys, not girls."

"That sucks. I always wanted to see Irvine in formal wear," Rinoa said. "He always wears that duster all the time."

Selphie sighed, "Yeah, believe me, I've mentioned it many times."

"Hey, at least it looks good on him," Xu said.

The three helper girls blinked at each other. They all knew what they wanted to say, but they were trying to choose a spokeswoman with their eyes. Rinoa decided to volunteer.

"So have you... picked out a maid of honor?"

Selphie rocked back in her chair and laughed. "I was waiting for one of you guys to ask that," she snickered. Returning upright she said in a more serious tone, "OK, I've given it a lot of thought. And I wish I could have all you guys up there, but then there'd be no one in the audience," she smiled. "But I decided I want Quistis to be my maid of honor."

Xu and Rinoa smiled at Quistis. The blond was so surprised she nearly choked on her ice cream. "Me?" she asked.

"Yes, and I'll tell you why. When I was taking Strategic Tactics in classes, I was failing miserably. Remember? And Quistis helped me through it. She took time out of her day to tutor me. She even stayed up all night and studied with me for the final exam."

"Aw," Rinoa commented.

Xu said, "I can't deny you wanting her then."

"Yeah, so I figured if any of you guys deserve it, it's Quistis."

"I'd never stay up late studying for a test," Rinoa said. "Wow."

"Thanks," Quistis said.

"Ooh, that means we have to get you a dress too."

"Oh." Quistis thought of her aching feet. "Goody."

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Squall entered his name into the computer panel log next to the entryway to the training room, slightly below the large green stripe that encircled the doorway. This had been newly installed to tell where students were, purely for safety reasons. In case a cadet went missing, and was injured in the training center, he or she could be found. It was not, as many students thought, a way for the administration to survey and monitor them. Just something so they could keep tabs, since the training center had its risks, no matter what skill level one was at.

Without much more than a cursory glance at the panel confirming his entry, he walked off into the heart of the jungle, fingering the sheathed gunblade on his belt. He followed a cut dirt path, brushing against the ferns and palm trees encircled by metallic wire fencing. This tropical environment was quite humid. He would be sweating before long, which was fine by Squall. He came here to sweat, to work off some steam. Maybe that would help him with this unnameable feeling.

His keen eye caught some movement behind a bush just before he crossed the metal bridge. Quick as a whip he pulled out his gunblade and spun to face it. It was a grat, wriggling behind the foliage, dragging its tentacles behind its sickly green pitcher plant body. Squall lowered his weapon and continued over the bridge. The grat was so weak it wouldn't be worth his time to fight, so he ignored it and continued over the breeding pit chasm.

He kept on his way, farther into the center. It was basically designed as a circle except for one stem-off, a thick gray door Squall was searching for. He found it before long and flipped open the lid to reveal the keypad lock.

Suddenly, two junior students ran up to him. He groaned inside.

"Commander Leonhart, Commander Leonhart!" they shouted, trying to get to him before he disappeared behind the door. Squall slapped the lid back down and faced the two encroachers.

"Yes?" he asked.

"We have a question about an assignment. We were hoping you could help us."

"What's the assignment?"

"We have to develop a combo attack for class, but we have no idea how to set one up."

"Didn't your teacher give you any more specific instruction than that?"

"It has to involve us using two enemies to our advantage. And we can't use black magic of any kind."

The other student piped up, "I was thinking we had to use some sort of draw attack, but I'm not sure that's what the teacher is looking for."

Squall grumbled. He had hated these sorts of creativity-based lessons when he was a student as well. Trying to figure out what the teacher wanted to see was like pulling teeth. Too little work to find the answer and you failed, too much work and it was a waste of time you needed for other studies. But Squall was a commander and that meant also being able to teach those under him when they needed help. Fortunately he had a strategy in mind.

"All right, follow me," Squall said, walking back into the training center. "Find a pair of grats."

After a short while, a student yelped, "There's two."

"All right," Squall said, pulling out his gunblade once again. "Engage."

The three rushed at the pair of monsters. The botanical fiends whipped around to their attackers and threatened harm by flailing their ridiculously long tentacles. One of the students almost tripped backwards as a vine snapped at his feet.

"No fear," Squall commanded. He was in a relaxed battle stance, not apprehensive at all of the monsters. "All right, now, if we can't use black magics, what does that leave? White magic and status ailments. Since white magic doesn't really do any good here, we can use ailments to our advantage. Lots of ways we can do this, but I'm going to show you my favorite one. Do any of you have a Confuse spell?" Squall hoped, as he remembered he carried no magic.

"I do."

"Fine. Cast it on one of the grats, then follow it up with a Blind on the same one."

The student did as he was told. First he waved his arm out and shouted the spell's name. The plant-beast began wobbling back and forth like it was drunk. He then cast a Blind spell and an inky cloud formed over the monster's head, presumably where its eyes were, or whatever it used to sense the outside world. The grat, falling into a panic, began whipping its vines dangerously to and fro, hitting its partner grat in the process, as it was the closest strikable object.

The students smiled as they began to realize what was happening. "Do the same thing to the other grat," Squall commanded.

The student who had performed the magic before did the same to the second enemy.

"Don't suppose any of you has a Haste?" Squall asked as the grats began to combat each other.

"I actually do," said the second student.

"Good, cast it on one or both of them. It'll speed up the process." Most junior classmen would never think of using a spell that would give an advantage to an opponent, but in this case, it worked wonders.

The student did so, casting it on both. The temporally enhanced beasts shredded each other to ribbons with their lacerating vines. In no time they collapsed, peeling apart like bananas, bleeding acidic green liquid.

"The Blind magic combined with the Confuse blocked them from sensing our presence. The Haste added to the mix. Then they found the nearest object to fight, each other." Thus endeth the lesson, Squall thought curtly. He put away his gunblade.


"Wow, that's really cool. Thank you, sir."

Squall didn't bother fully acknowledging the praise, he simply nodded and headed back to the gray door in the back of the training center.

"Hey, what does that door lead to?" the students asked.

"It's a forbidden area," Squall responded.

"Well, we know that, but what is it forbidding?"

"It's an advanced training center for graduated SeeDs. It's restricted access, and believe me, you do not want what's beyond that door to break through to here."

That bit of scare tactic shut them up. Squall freely entered his access code into the numeric keypad as the students left to wander the rest of the training center. The pneumatic lock released and Squall pulled the heavy door open and closed it quickly.

This terrain was vastly different compared to the tropical jungle he had just come from. This was a strange dry wasteland of a forest. Thick stone-like trees peppered the landscape, their tops shrouded in humid white mist that obscured the ceiling. The trunks descended into hard gray soil, cracked into veiny apertures where they were implanted. This environment was conducive to the beast life they had transferred in. Desert for the chimera, forest for the hexadragon, and both for the death claw. Metal rings had to be used to reinforce the trunks as the soil was not very supportive. He wondered how the trees kept from drying to death. The faculty probably had to come in and water them manually, another one of their mysteries.

This was originally the 'secret area', where students met and hooked up after curfew, and was clearly against regulations. It was something Squall didn't care for very much, but he tolerated it, because he knew with the pressures of the work, kids needed some therapeutic way to lash out against authority. That's why he let it stay, until the opportunity presented itself with the remodeling. He then used the secret area and turned it into the advanced training center. Its geography made it the perfect place to have a part of the training center that was secured and sectioned off to normal students so they wouldn't be attacked by the stronger creatures. After the time compression incident, Squall found he could no longer keep sharp on T-Rexaurs, so he built this.

Before he got very far in he heard a rustling in a dry bush behind him. Squall took out his gunblade, expecting a death claw to barrel out with its talons ready. Nothing happened though. He reached out the end of his weapon and poked into the bush.

Zell careened out, bringing his fist down in a hammer strike, screaming a kiai. Squall staggered back, bringing up his blade to defend himself as he fell back into the dirt. Zell quickly pulled away once he saw who it was, and stepped back to avoid a potential strike.

"Whoa. Sorry, Squall. Didn't see ya there," he apologized, bouncing up and down in a fighting stance.

"Likewise," Squall said as he stood back up, dusting his pants off.

"Hey, big news about Selphie, huh? I didn't even know they were going out. Our little girl's all grown up now."

"She's not a little girl."

"Oh, yeah, I suppose."

Squall heaved his gunblade to his shoulder and started to walk off into the forest. Zell followed behind him as Squall knew he would. He was obviously pumped from fighting and couldn't bear to stand still.

The blond asked, "Hey, have you heard who Irvine's picking for his best man?"

"No, I only heard about it yesterday."

"Yeah, but it's coming up soon. I can't wait. I've never been to a wedding before. Have you?"

"Not that I can remember."

"I wonder who else knows about it. I don't think it'll be a big wedding, like they usually are, you know?"

Squall kept quiet, keeping himself from saying the 'W' word. He really wasn't in the mood to put up with the energetic Zell today, but he was still a good friend, so he wasn't letting his temperament snap back at him. He just used the cold shoulder technique.

"Are you doing all right?" he asked. Squall again didn't say anything, just kept scouting for a monster to fight. "I mean, I was pretty shocked when I heard about it. Really nervous and excited and kinda overwhelmed. Heh, that's probably how Selphie feels. It's kinda hard to know how to react. One side of you says 'yay!' and the other is all sad to see her go." There was a short pause where neither one of them said anything. "I wonder if they're gonna name the baby after one of us."

Squall finally couldn't take it anymore and turned to Zell. "Did you ever think about what this means for Selphie? It means she's having a baby and she's marrying Irvine. Don't you think she's kind of young for that? She just turned eighteen-" Squall caught himself before he regretted it and clammed up. He was sharing his opinion, and he had to be impartial on the matter. "Never mind."

Zell scratched behind his head. "I guess it is kinda sudden. I dunno. I never thought about it like that."

"Well, just imagine yourself in either of their shoes."

Zell looked curiously at him as Squall moved off.

"Squall, is there something you're not telling us? Rin's not pregnant, is she?"

"No," Squall sneered, "Of course not."

"You seem kinda, I don't know, weird. I'd have thought you'd have a lot to say about this."

"Well, I don't."

"You are going, right? To the wedding?"

"Of course, I am." Rinoa wouldn't have let him skip out on it, even if he wanted to. "She'd make me go if I had something else I had to do. Girls love weddings."

"Oh, man!" Zell suddenly exclaimed and slapped his forehead. "I need a date for the wedding, don't I?"

"What?" Squall had completely derailed from this train of thought.

"How stupid is it gonna look when I show up there all by myself? Everyone else is gonna be with someone. Geez, I gotta get going. See ya, Squall."

"But you don't need..." Squall gave up. It was too late anyway, as he watched Zell's animated form jump away into the mist. He sighed and headed off into the forest, frustrated by his friend's glib take on matters. Sometimes, he just couldn't tell if he was dense or just didn't like to think about serious things like that. Some people tried changing the subject to something lighter if they didn't like the current discussion. Selphie was like that too. These people were having a problem seeing this for what it really was. It was frustrating dealing with a load of people afflicted with Blind.

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The cheese was finally starting to bubble, Rinoa noticed as she peered through the dimmed clear paneling of the microwave. The delicious smell also hit her, that sweet smell of cheese and baking bread. True, microwave pizzas were rubbery and a pale, pale shadow of the real thing, but she was way too tired to cook tonight. A microwave pizza was just what the doctor ordered. With their new apartment they could cook for themselves, not needing to suffer the whim of whatever the cafeteria wanted to serve. They had to buy their own food, but being able to have a choice in cuisine was much better. Squall could probably go either way, but Rinoa loved it. Self-sustenance was one of her prides, having been daughter of the Galbadia general.

Rinoa sat on the stool next to the breakfast bar to wait for the rest of the cooking time. Her feet were killing her. Shop till you drop really had a literal meaning, not just a cute rhyme. She was exhausted both physically and mentally, having rarely gotten a moment to herself all day. Now that she had, she found her mind ironically still latched to the current events. Selphie with a baby. Irvine with a baby. Both of them holding a cute little cherub wrapped up in a blanket and smiling over it. These strange images floated through her mind. What were their daily lives like now? How do you go from one minute being free and easy, and then having to plan a wedding and a baby. It must have been stressful. Was Selphie perched over a toilet with morning sickness while she was trying to pick out flowers?

She couldn't help but turn inward to herself in order to sympathize or identify. How would she deal with things if she were in the same situation? Would she get married? Would she tell Squall? Would she tell Cid? Or the others? Would she run away? Imagining herself with a full belly, walking around Garden like she had a package under her dress would be pretty shameful, she decided. Would she... would she...? She couldn't even bring herself to think the word. In Galbadia, that sort of thing was oppressively taboo. Here in Balamb, the population was a bit more liberal, so she would feel less scared about taking that option. But still... she decided that was a choice she couldn't make unless she was confronted with it. And she breathed a sigh and a prayer that she never would be.

What would her friends say? How would she even break the news? She could imagine Squall and herself walking down to the cafeteria arm in arm, happy as jaybirds, sitting down. Zell could make some comment about how the hot dog buns were never warm enough, they should put them back in the oven. Then Rinoa could make the quip that the cafeteria wasn't the only one with a bun in the oven. Then they would all stare at her, shocked. Quistis would drop her jaw open. Selphie would probably squeal with glee. Irvine and Zell? Who knows how they'd react. Well, Irvine would probably say something like 'you old dog' to Squall, nudging him in the side.

And then what? What about after? What about getting married? What about where they were going to live? Their jobs? How were they going to pay for things? Bills, doctor visits, groceries, toys, school, a place to live, and probably a hundred other things Rinoa couldn't even think of. They wouldn't be able to go out anymore. Who would they use for babysitting? How would she and Squall still maintain their relationship with a third wheel in the way? It was hard enough just now finding the time and motivation to do things together, with just the two of them, without some diplomatic invitation or Garden business getting in the way. All that nice couple stuff, that intimacy, would just float away with a child, because then they would no longer be a couple. They'd be a family.

She thought, just thought for the sake of thinking, what if she didn't tell anyone for a while. It seemed like she had just gotten Squall to warm up to her romantically, she didn't want to give him up as a father yet. That may have been selfish, but she just couldn't see Squall having a baby yet in his current state. He just wasn't 'mature' enough. Or maybe he was overly mature, she didn't quite know the right word. Either way, she just couldn't see him holding a baby, at least not at this point in time. Maybe someday. Squall seemed to be having a hard time dealing with just being around the idea of that. And talking with the girls today didn't really assuage her fears that he was regressing. She loved him so much she couldn't bear the thought of him becoming how he was when they first met again.

Squall walked in then. He looked tired and worn out, like he was carrying a camping backpack.

"Hi, hon," she chirped. "I haven't seen you all day. How was your mission?"

"It was fine." He hung up his ruffed leather jacket on the hook. Rinoa tittered at seeing his bare shoulders and white tank top. "It was just more security stuff. Nothing happened."

"You didn't mind that I called you last night, did you?"

"No." Squall sat down on the couch. "I wasn't in the middle of anything." He picked up the copy of the Balamb Gazette on the table. Truthfully, it did kind of bother him, getting interrupted by that damn PHS, even when he wasn't doing anything. But he had to have it on in case of emergencies.

"Do you want me to make you something?" Rinoa asked, gesturing to the kitchen.

"No, I'll get something later."

Rinoa bit her bottom lip. The behavior was really worrying her, but she couldn't do anything about it. She took the single-serving pizza out of the microwave and put it on a nearby plate. Licking her fingers of pizza grease, she came next to Squall, put her pizza on the coffee table and snuggled into his shoulder awkwardly as he was still holding the paper.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

"Needed a cuddle," she responded.

Squall was more than happy to oblige this display of cuteness. He released his grip on the paper and put his arm around her, tucking her in closer. Rinoa just needed a reminder that Squall loved her. He may not have acted like it sometimes, but he did.

Rinoa sniffed. "Were you fighting today?"

"Yeah," he said, a little embarrassed. "I'll take a shower before bed."

Rinoa giggled a little. It was nice just sitting in the crook of his strong arm, enjoying his essence while he read the paper oblivious. These were the kind of moments Squall would never understand, but it was okay, as long as he was there.

"Today was really hard," she said. "Doing a lot of thinking about Selphie and Irvine and the need to shop, trying to get as much of the shopping done in one day. It was really taxing."

"Uh-huh," Squall nodded. "Who else knows about the news?" Squall asked.

"Uh, all of us. Cid and Edea, Xu, Nida, I guess. That's all I know." Squall nodded affirmatively. Rinoa tried to keep the conversation going. "They told Cid and Edea first, and then the rest of us. Which makes sense. They didn't want any rumors to reach them first." Rinoa could only imagine how she would have told anyone she was pregnant and engaged, let alone Cid and Edea, let even more alone her father. She thought that sort of thing would have occurred to Squall and he would have said something, but he stared at his magazine wordlessly, listening but not responding. "I think everyone who needs to know, knows. And I'm sure it'll get around Garden. I don't think anyone's told Laguna or Ellone yet though." She looked up at him, no response.

She picked up her now cooled pizza off the plate and held it up to his mouth. "Pizza?"

Squall barely smiled and leaned forward, ripping a bite out of the pizza.

Rinoa looked up at Squall. "Do you wanna play some Triple Triad?"

"Sure."

"K. I'll get the decks," Rinoa freed herself from Squall and went to their room. At least he wasn't so withdrawn he didn't want to do anything with her. But still...

--------------------------------------------------------------

Edea, leaning on Cid's desk, picked up a pyramid paperweight, and bounced it playfully in her hands while her husband shuffled papers on his desk. The pyramid was made of some dense heavy plastic that looked like solid water. As she heaved it back and forth she looked out the wall window at the back of the office. The vast ocean covered everything from this height, broadening over the landscape like sparkling blue diamonds.

She turned back to Cid still filing papers. "Are you even working?"

Cid smiled, "No, I was just doing this to make you think I was working." He pushed his glasses up as Edea smiled.

"Dear, you aren't nervous, are you?"

"No, why, should I be?"

"Good question," she said as she put down the pyramid and picked up a snow globe. Shaking it up and staring out the picture window she said, "I don't know why she wanted to see both of us. She called me up from the lighthouse even. It's hard to get a boat from there to here."

"She knows I would certainly have contacted you with any information."

"Well, I think then it has to be something extremely good or extremely bad."

"You can't help but worry," Cid sighed.

The speakerbox clicked on with static. Xu's voice came through, "Sir, Selphie and Irvine are here."

Cid pressed the talk button. "Send them in." These were mere formalities forced by the lock on the door. Selphie and Irvine were always welcome in his office.

The doors opened and the two came through. Selphie bounced in wearing a little yellow sundress, Irvine swaggered in typical fashion, sporting his tan suede coat and cowboy hat like usual.

"Hello, young SeeDs," Cid said. "How's life been?"

"Can't complain," Irvine said.

"So what's this about big news?" Cid grinned with his hands clasped on his desk.

Selphie and Irvine looked at each other. "Well," Irvine said, "Do you wanna tell them or should I?"

"We already talked about this." She turned to the older couple with a quick breath. "Me and Irvine are getting engaged."

Edea clasped her hands together and gasped. "Oh, that's wonderful!" she yelped. She started thinking of all the elements of a great wedding she could start suggesting. It would be a great project for her. Cid sat back in his leather chair, swaying back and forth slightly, and smiled widely as if he always knew this would happen.

"When's the date? Or when-abouts are you planning?" Edea asked.

"Wait," Irvine, still grinning, said. "Also, Selphie's pregnant."

Cid froze in his chair. Edea gasped and covered her mouth. Their expressions solidified as if caught in time, their eyes glossed over. Even their thoughts stopped working, like their biorhythms had skipped a beat. For a brief second they were statues. "That's..." Edea said. "That's even more wonderful." She recovered her dropped jaw and smiled broadly. "Oh... what am I saying? Of course, this is wonderful!" Edea got up off the desk and hugged both of them. "I have tons of baby stuff at the lighthouse for you to use."

"Oh, we're gonna need it," Irvine laughed.

Cid stood as well and walked around the desk, patting his vest absent-mindedly. "I wish I had some cigars here or something."

Edea took Selphie's head in her hands. "Oh, my little babies are really growing up." She held Selphie tightly, tears streaming down her face. Irvine noticed that. But Cid approached him and touched his shoulder to get his attention.

"Congratulations, son," he said.

"Thank you, sir,"

"So, um, not to put a damper on this event, but what about... the mission?"

"Actually, that's something I need to talk to you about too."

"Good, no doubt, no doubt."

--------------------------------------------------------------

Rinoa looked up from the article on 'I Lost My Virginity to My Foreign Language Teacher' in the magazine when Squall walked in, wearing his white undershirt and boxers. His brown hair was matted down from the shower water. Rinoa put down the uninteresting magazine on her nightstand and pulled back the covers for him. He hustled into bed, curling up under the satiny sheets and rolling over on his side immediately.

"Hey, baby."

"Hey," he responded.

Rinoa draped her lithe frame over his side, and ran her hand down his brawny arm, traveling down his smooth, tight bicep down to his forearm, and fitting her small fingers into his. The soft velvety touch of his skin ended with a harsh, jarring sandpapery patch as she ran her fingertips up to his knuckles. She grabbed his hand and pulled it towards her to look.

"Oh my god, what happened to your knuckles?" she asked. The backside of his hand was marred with round patches of clotted blood at his finger bones, like stickers taped on.

"It's nothing." Squall turned to her and pulled his hand away.

"Oh, god, that's weird," she said as she put up her hand to touch them.

"It's just a funguar bite," Squall said as he settled down into the mattress, covering himself up and turning on his side. "He jumped up and bit me in the hand."

"But we don't have funguars in the training center."

"No, it was from earlier."

"They don't have them in Esthar either."

"No, I mean outside Garden, when I was coming home from the train station."

"But I thought you took a car."

"No, I walked home. I took a shortcut through the forest."

"Oh," she sighed. "Does it hurt?"

"No, it doesn't."

"You can take a potion."

Squall turned up to her. "Look, if you're so worried about it, I'll put my gloves on," he griped angrily.

"No, no, that's all right," Rinoa acquiesced. She turned over to her nightstand. "Ready for the light?"

Squall shrugged into his pillow. "Sure."

Rinoa twisted over and pushed the button under the lampshade. Then she twisted back and put her arm over Squall's torso, spooning her body with his. The noises in the room reduced to quiet breathing. Rinoa's hot breath reflected off of Squall's back. She moved her head out of the way. Getting comfy in the pillow, trying to get settled and not irritate Squall. She couldn't help but stay worried about the scabs on his knuckles. Something seemed very unusual about them. Especially since whenever Squall was in battle, he always wore leather gloves to protect his hands when he held his gunblade, and funguar teeth would not bite hard enough to penetrate them.

[Demon]

SQUALL SMASH!

..Other than that, I like the creeping sensation of darkness that's come along. Keep up the good work!

[savage daydream]

Interesting...I like the vague feeling of dread that appears throughout your story so far; the awkward silences, references to ambiguous events beyond the readers' knowledge - it's all very effective.

[theWallflower]

DAY 3 - WEDNESDAY


Doctor Kadowaki pulled off the next form sheet and looked it over, sipping some hot coffee. She pushed up her glasses on her nose. The pearl attaching strings tickled her cheeks - 'idiot strings' she called them. Upon finishing the review, she put the mug on her desk, picked up her pen, and started tapping it, wondering how to diagnose this patient. Complaints of stomach problems from greasy foods, off and on diarrhea. There were a few possibilities - it could be a stomach bacteria or a gastrointestinal virus. A remote prospect, but possible. The two might have been unrelated as well, sometimes patients diagnosed themselves wrong. Or maybe it was just an intolerance to greasy foods. She wrote down on the sheet, in the space provided, that she needed to get a stool sample from that patient, wondering if she was noticing any blood in the stool.

Smiling, Rinoa came out of the washroom, holding her drying hands up. "Okay, I'm all scrubbed up," she said enthusiastically. The doctor rolled her eyes before turning, so Rinoa wouldn't see, and swiveled her chair to match her gaze.

"All right, look. You're a sorceress and the significant other of the garden commander. I agree with you that you should find a place in Garden to 'earn your keep' or whatever you call it. But I'm not going to tolerate any monkey business from you. I've been a doctor for over thirty years and I've done this job fine without a nurse and I still can. All right?"

"...Oh. All right." She lowered her arms.

"Sorry," the doctor said as she pushed up her glasses again. "I don't mean to be harsh, but I don't tolerate nonsense in my infirmary."

"I understand. I'll do my best," she said with a determined expression.

"All right, there's a student here for a physical in room one. Peto Spander," she said as she handed her a file folder. "Give him the once over like I showed you."

Rinoa confidently nodded and took the folder into the room where Peto was sitting on the bed, dangling his feet off. He had fair hair and looked to be about fifteen or sixteen, wearing a denim jacket and jeans.

"Hi, Peto, I'm Rinoa. You're here for a physical?"

"Yes," he said quietly.

"All right, can you get on the scale here?" Rinoa said, gesturing to it.

The boy hopped off the bed and approached the scale. "Should I take my shoes off?"

"Um, I'm not sure." Rinoa checked the sheet where the weight box was and saw nothing about qualifications of shoes or not. "Why don't you do it with shoes on, and I'll write it here."

The boy stepped on the scale while Rinoa wrote 'with shoes' next to 'weight'. She took down the numbers of his weight and height and then had him sit on the table again. She took the armband for the blood pressure instrument and wrapped it around his arm, just like she'd read how to do, pumping up the small bladder and keeping the stethoscope on the elbow joint. The needle remained at zero though. No matter how much she pumped, the dial remained stationary.

"Hm," Rinoa thought. It was very weird. She tried taking off the wrapper and reapplying it, going through all the motions again. She knew she wasn't forgetting anything in the process. The needle stayed at zero. She was either doing something wrong or the thing was broken.

"Doctor? Can you come in here for a second?"

Kadowaki tromped into the patient room, seeing Rinoa holding up the blood pressure instrument. "I can't seem to get this," she said.

The doctor sighed and took the bladder. "That's fine. I'll do it. Why don't you go in the second room? Fara needs some blood taken."

Rinoa nodded and headed off. She could take blood, that was no problem. She could do this job, she knew it. This was just an unlucky piece of equipment failure, she couldn't let it bring her down. She was going to show that she could fit in this job. This was really the best place of calling for her. She wasn't a SeeD, she couldn't be sent out on missions, so serving Garden as a medic was the most helpful role she could play.

Fara was sitting on the bed with her sleeve already rolled up and arm bared. "Hi, I'm Rinoa, I'm going to take some blood now."

"All right," she said. Rinoa took a rubber hose from the nearby box and tied it around Fara's arm. Then she spread a little disinfectant on the elbow joint, at the same time pressing down to find a good vein to stick the needle in. Thinking she found one, she poked in just a little ways. It was like puncturing soft rubber. This part was a little squeamish for her, but she was a big enough girl to handle it. Doctors looked at blood and guts everyday.

"Ow," Fara said as a reaction.

"Oh, I'm sorry. Are you okay?"

"I'm fine."

Rinoa looked at the syringe. It was not filling up with blood. The normal pressure should have been pushing it into the syringe. The steps she was going over told her she was doing everything right. She pulled the needle out and injected it under the skin again. Nothing was flowing in. Where is your vein? she thought. She pulled the syringe out again.

"Ow," Fara said. Rinoa was concentrating so hard on getting it right she ignored the yelp of pain as she tapped the inside elbow. It should have just been flowing right in there, like Rinoa saw when Dr. Kadowaki did it earlier.

She came in right there, having heard the minor cries and becoming curious. "Jeez," she exclaimed as she rushed forward and grabbed the shot. "Be careful. Here, I'll do it." She held the syringe like a pro, pulling the plunger out slowly and extracting the blood. With no hesitation she turned back to Rinoa and pulled off the capsule from the needle.

"Be careful," she whispered as she handed her the vial. "If you inject her with air, it could cause a heart attack. Now take this to the centrifuge and run it."

"Okay," she meekly uttered. So she was 0 for 2. Not so great so far, but she could make up for it. She just hoped she didn't hurt the girl too much. When she was little she was scared of needles, as were most children, so she knew what it was like. But this centrifuge was easy. It was mechanical, no humans involved. Pretty simple. All it did was spin the vial of blood so the liquid would be separated from the solid. No problem.

She set the vial in the slot and set the digital touch pad for a hundred revolutions and hit start. The centrifugal force of the disc picked up slowly and began spinning around like a mobile. It seemed so fast. Almost too fast. Rinoa had never seen the centrifuge at this speed and began to think something had gone wrong with it. The motor inside began emitting a faint humming noise. She tried stamping the stop button rapidly, but the machine continued.

The vial of blood flew off its chamber and smashed against the blue wall, leaving a vermilion and glass supernova.

The doctor came in, as well as the two other students, upon hearing the noise. Kadowaki looked at the mess on the wall and slumped her shoulders, letting out a kind of reverse gasp. Closing her mouth she stared at Rinoa disapprovingly. The new assistant felt about two feet tall.

"Um, sorry," Rinoa sheepishly grinned.

Dr. Kadowaki remained silent, drilling her eyes into Rinoa.

Rinoa looked downward. "I think maybe I should take a break now."

"Maybe," the doctor said.

Like maybe a six hour break, Rinoa thought.

--------------------------------------------------------------

The rhapsody ended and switched to the next track of a symphonic piece as Quistis balanced herself on the highest rung to which she was going to risk climbing. Briefly confused as to how get a free hand, she decided to put the light bulb in her pocket for now as she unscrewed the small knob holding the dimmer plate in place, the shield that blocked the light bulbs from blinding her if she looked up. Delicately putting that piece on the ladder she reached up and removed the broken bulb. Just another part of her errands she was doing today.

Suddenly, a knock at the door sounded. Quistis dared not risk upsetting the delicate glass on the ladder so she just yelled, "Come in."

Squall opened the door and entered.

"Hi," she said.

He saw she was changing a light bulb on her ladder. Another man would have asked what she was doing, but there was no need for that if he could tell just by simple observation. The classical music didn't surprise him either, as he knew the intelligent woman preferred that genre. He approached her, holding a set of papers. "I was wondering if you had time to go over the SeeD test prospects now."

"Sure, just let me finish this up." Quistis picked the fresh light bulb out of her pocket and stretched out to the ceiling. "Do you know who Selphie took with her shopping?" she commented idly.

"She went shopping again?" Squall's eyes bulged out. Didn't they just go shopping yesterday? They were gone the whole day. "Well, she must have taken Zell, cause I haven't seen him all day."

"Yeah, she needs to get shoes, still."

Squall thought, Oh, god, did Zell know what he was getting himself into? "Rinoa and Xu didn't go? You didn't go with?"

Quistis sighed. "I'm all shopped out. I spent near the whole day with her yesterday and I've got all these errands to run, you see." She indicated the grayed out bulb she held as she stepped down the ladder. "I don't think Selphie's quite ready for something like this." For a moment, Quistis regretted bringing Squall into this internal debate she was having.

Well, duh. Squall kept tight-lipped with his opinions, but still thought them.

"She says she 'thinks' it's right."

"It's natural for her to feel overwhelmed or scared or excited," Squall said dryly.

"Yeah, she's definitely all of those. But she doesn't seem to be sure of herself that she's making a right decision."

Why is she talking to me about this?

"She didn't have many boy experiences, you know."

"None of us have had many interpersonal relationships. Being a SeeD doesn't exactly give you time or inclination to date."

"But still, that's no excuse for being so... naïve." Quistis walked over to the garbage and tossed the bulb in. "We all told her not to get on that train with Irvine. But she did it anyway. That's how this thing started in the first place. That's where it all... began." She coughed, implying what Squall already knew. "She's been making bad decisions even before this."

"I know."

"She still thinks she's gonna be a SeeD a year after the baby."

Squall kept to himself the thought Is she really that short-sighted?

"She doesn't know what a baby does to your body," Quistis continued, "It really puts you on a rack. I mean, that just shows she hasn't put the right amount of thought into what she's gonna do. Me, Xu, and Rin are gonna try and confront her today."

"What would that accomplish?"

"I don't know. Sit her down, get her to realize what's really going on. She's not worried about her situation and that worries us." Her voiced raised to an alarming tone. "I think she's in some sort of denial that she's changed her life forever. She's all starry-eyed over Irvine. He's the only thing she really wants. But she doesn't realize the cost of it." Quistis realized she was getting hostile and settled herself down. "Anyway, do you want to help?"

"I'm not her father."

"I think anything we could say would have a lot more weight coming from you. You're the commander, after all."

"It's not my place to speak. I'm not her parental authority."

"She doesn't need a parent. She needs a friend. She needs her friends to help her see what's going on. What do you think we should do?"

"She made her decision and nothing can change that about the past. Nothing."

Squall spun and left Quistis' room, shutting the door behind him, leaving the blond woman a little bewildered.

She turned and collapsed the ladder. "I thought he wanted to go over the SeeD tests," she mumbled.

--------------------------------------------------------------

Xu perused Selphie's requisition forms for the upcoming Garden Festival as she walked down the hall. They had just been turned in and she was curious what Selphie had asked for this time. The girl had a nice habit of asking for fifty times more than her appropriated budget. Xu wondered if she was doing this intentionally, if she knew one of the unspoken rules of negotiation was to always ask more than what you really wanted and then come down from there. It looked like this time would be no different.

When she entered the cafeteria she bypassed the food line and went straight for the coffee machine, where not too many people were. Energetic teens didn't need coffee. She held her ceramic mug up to the spout and pulled the tiny lever down. A thin stream of brown liquid dribbled down into the mug. As her cup filled, Xu once again looked at the cartoon of a stressed-out moogle with sweat drops flying off his head. Cid had given it to her for Secretary Day.

Just as the machine had finished and she took her cup away a female voice shouted. "Xu! Over here."

Xu perked up her head and saw Rinoa and Quistis sitting at a table amidst the medium crowd. Smiling, she walked over to her friends, holding her cup precariously so as not to get burned. Whatever it was they wanted, it would be a welcome diversion from the drudgery of the day. She set her mug down on the table. "What's up?"

"Have you ever had a boyfriend?" Rinoa asked.

Xu was visibly taken aback. "That's kind of a personal question, isn't it?"

Quistis leaned into Rinoa and chided her. "Rinoa, don't ask it like that."

Xu, who was not so offended, just surprised, said, "Why?"

"Cause we're having another 'figure out Squall' session."

Xu smiled, pulled out a chair, and sat down. These led to some interesting conversations, and there was no way she was going to miss one if she could help it. "All right, so what happened?" They were also preceded by some action of Squall's.

Rinoa said, "Squall hasn't been acting like he loves me anymore."

Xu said, "Now, I know that's not true."

Rinoa didn't react and continued. "He seems more closed off than he did before. Like his personality fell off the diving board and into the deep end."

"I haven't noticed myself," Xu said as she took a sip of too-hot coffee. "But I don't spend too much time with him."

"I think maybe with the wedding coming up so quick, it's sort of scared Squall from our relationship. Do you know what I mean?"

"I think so. Like, he's not getting scared of marriage," she explained, emphasizing 'scared', "But maybe he realizes that if he stays with you, he's going to have to do the same thing. He's kinda seeing his future right now."

Quistis nodded. "Maybe he's seeing himself here."

Rinoa directed her eyes downward. "But wouldn't you think he'd be happy seeing that? Doesn't he want to marry me?"

"Oh, yeah, that is weird," Xu agreed as she sat back in the chair, a little defeated.

Quistis interjected, her hands gesturing on the table as she spoke. "Rinoa, I can't picture him not marrying you. You've changed his life so much. You are so important to him."

"Then why is he so weird? Maybe I'm not what he wants anymore. That's why he's been distancing himself from me."

"Except that he's been distancing himself from all of us," Quistis said.

"How could you tell?" Xu joked and laughed.

"Kids," Quistis cut in. "Maybe he has an aversion to kids."

"Ohhh," Rinoa sighed. "But I want kids. You're not making me feel better, Quistis," she smiled.

Xu put her hand on her chin. "I didn't think about that. That kid's gonna be in all our lives. We're all potential babysitters."

"Yeah, in a way, we're all gonna be that kid's parents," Quistis said, glowering. Selphie was going to have that kid and there was no way she could do it all alone. Being friends with her, they were now forced into helping her, helping a friend, even if they had no parenting skills or didn't want to. Because of her irresponsibility, now they were all going to get dragged down with her for it. That fact angered Quistis a great deal, that Selphie hadn't realized how this was going to affect her friends as well.

"The whole thing just seems too odd to be true," Quistis said.

Rinoa said, "Well, would you rather Selphie have it out of wedlock?"

"Does it mater? You can have a child out of wedlock. It's not so big a deal anymore."

"Except society still looks down on it."

"Yeah, but society or not, the baby is going to come. Kerboom. And there will be two people there to take care of it, whether they're married or not."

"Unless Irvine skips out."

"But Irvine would never do that," Rinoa said.

"Yeah." Both Xu and Quistis nodded solemnly in agreement. "But some people aren't so lucky."

Xu said, "I think that's what marriage is for, so two people can be cemented together, so that one can't leave."

Quistis leaned over, "Not that that stops them."

"Well, it's harder to leave, legally. Or maybe it's subconscious. You think 'we're a legal family now. I can't leave'."

"Not that Selphie's thought about that," Rinoa said.

Quistis grumbled. "Selphie hasn't thought about much." She sat up straight and alert. "Where is she going to stay? In Garden? I don't think Cid would allow that. It's not a place for kids or families."

Rinoa, ever the hopeful, said, "Maybe Cid would make an exception?"

"I doubt it," Xu confirmed Quistis' observation, "Not after Garden became a mobile command center. And certainly not after the Galbadia attack."

"I guess Selphie was talking about getting a house on Obel Lake."

"With her money? I don't think so," Quistis, ever the realist, said, "She won't be making money if she's not in SeeD. She'll be a full-time mom. Irvine will have to send them 90% of his earnings."

"That's mostly why they're getting married. If Irvine dies on field duty, the SeeD insurance will cover him nicely, since he's a high-ranked SeeD."

Xu sat back in the chair. "Everything's happening so fast, she probably hasn't had time to think about the consequences. I mean, geez, they haven't even been able to send out proper invitations, everything's just been by word of mouth. I wish she had some time to stop and think about things with a little perspective. If only she'd never gotten on that train."

"I bet she's wishing that now, too. We all warned her it was a bad idea. She really only has herself to blame. But she never really made any good decisions regarding Irvine." Quistis sighed. "She really was the most naïve of all of us. I hate to use that word, but it's true. She's lacking a lot of street smarts."

Rinoa said, "Well, she grew up in Trabia. That's not exactly a bustling metropolis. I'm surprised there's a Garden there at all."

Quistis nodded and said, "And it's not that Selphie's not intelligent. She just hasn't had time to think clearly because of the speed this is all happening at. This couldn't be a worse time. Selphie was eleven months away from becoming a veteran SeeD. She would have gotten even more benefits."

Xu commented, "No one's retired and come back to work. You lose your edge."

"And she thinks she can come back after a year. If you're not ready to handle the responsibility of babies, you're not ready to have sex. At least not unprotected sex."

Xu nearly choked on her coffee, sputtering up liquid. "That's how? It was unprotected? Nothing... uh, broke?"

"He was using the withdrawal method," Quistis said with a sneer as she shifted her eyes to her.

Xu said, "Oh my god, how stupid could you get?"

"That's why I think we need to sit down Selphie and force her into a serious talk about what she's doing. Force her to face this reality. That Irvine loves her and it's gonna be a fairy princess story. She doesn't have any proof that Irvine loved her before the baby."

"Wait," Xu interrupted, "Irvine told me that he was thinking of marrying Selphie in the summer."

Finding a place to speak, Rinoa said, "That could have been a line. When did he say that? ... After all this?"

"Yeah."

"See?" Quistis said, holding up her palm, "All Irvine is concerned with is his image. I never understood why Selphie is so interested in him."

"I kinda wondered that too," Rinoa said. "I mean he's nice and all, but I could never take his ego or his flirting."

Xu said, "Their relationship has always been sort of cool. I guess because no one thought anything would come of it, since Irvine's such a ladies man. Especially after Selphie tried to woo him and got nothing, but then they still stayed," she made quote marks with her fingers, "'friends'. I think it's a combination of things - Selphie's need to be the center of attention, Irvine's forcefulness, his suaveness. She's always been head over heels for him. We all kinda were, in a superficial way."

Rinoa said, "Maybe it's the fact that he's a project, and she thinks she can change him."

"Kind of like Squall."

"Exactly," Rinoa chirped, not minding the crack at her expense at all, in fact, agreeing with it. "All women need projects to work on. It keeps them busy. Except in her case, Selphie thinks she can domesticate him."

Xu said, "I read, though, that men can't be changed like that."

"They can't," Quistis said, "That's why Selphie's plan is stupid. She's going to end up in a relationship with someone who doesn't really care for her."

Xu was agitated at that, "Hey now. At least he's doing the right thing."

"What? Living inside a lie? Is that the right thing? The way they're going now is based on an illusion. She's not seeing the forest for the trees. I have no idea what Irvine is thinking, but I know Selphie better."

"They're both good guys."

"Sure they are," Rinoa said, trying to return to a calmer and more rational tone of voice. "But they made bad choices."

"Yeah, and they still are," Quistis said, standing up with her cup, ready to refill it at the fountain.

Xu said, "Irvine and Selphie were never official in the first place. Irvine said they were just friends with benefits for a while."

"That's Irvine for you. I can't believe they were both so stupid."

"Hey, it's not like either one of them wanted this."

Quistis rolled her eyes at Xu. "Come on. It takes two to tango. It was only physical to both of them. She was easy and he was horny!"

She covered her mouth immediately, as if she was trying to prevent the words from reaching the ears of her friends. The worser part, she realized as she took her hand down, revealing a thin mouth, was that she meant it and stood by her statement. Gripping her mug, she stormed out of the cafeteria.

--------------------------------------------------------------

Birds chirped to each other as Squall walked through the open air hallway of Garden, holding a clipboard under his arm and looking cross. Students wearing their dark blue uniforms said hello and hi as he passed them, to which he returned a polite nod. They really only distracted him. This was the last item of the day to do and he needed it signed before he could leave. He was tempted to leave it till later, but his devotion to his duty nagged at him until it got its way. The reason he'd put it off was because he needed Irvine's signature to finish it.

Squall tapped the back of the clipboard against his thigh while looking down at the purple striped walkway. He was dreading this moment. Squall hadn't talked to Irvine since he found out. He had no idea how he was going to interact with him, how he himself was going to interact. Was Irvine going to mention anything to him about it? If he was, what was he going to respond with? There was no clean way about it, no way of getting through life without ever talking to him again. Especially as commander. It was no use avoiding the problem, so Squall was going to have to take it like a man. After all the times he'd cheated death, he couldn't believe he was nervous about something like this. He took a deep breath and pushed those feelings aside. They were inappropriate.

Squall turned the corner, walked down the rows of doors, counting the numbers, when he saw a girl standing in the hallway near Irvine's door. In fact it was Irvine's door, and in fact, it was Xu, for some reason. She was looking up at his door number dolefully, hugging a stack of books to her chest with one hand and holding an envelope marked with red in the other.

Hearing his footsteps, she turned to him. "Oh, hi, Squall," she said, almost surprised. She put the envelope on her stack of books and tucked them into herself.

"Hi, Xu. Is Irvine in?"

"Ah, no, I think he's gone."

"Gone? Where is he?"

"He said he'd be back Sunday."

"Sunday?" Squall asked incredulously. "He has a wedding to plan and he's gone for three days?"

Xu just shrugged.

Squall grumbled to himself and looked away. Another fine bit of change in this never-ending saga. The document he needed signed could wait, that wasn't what he was miffed at. He was just angry that Irvine's apparent indolent attitude was showing through even to his wedding. Just like a cowboy.

Squall said, "Well, if he's gone, what are you doing here?"

"Um..." she stammered, looking down.

"Hey, Squall," Zell piped up as he approached the duo from around the corner, deciding to make it a trio. Squall and Xu turned their heads. "If you're looking for Irvine, you're not going to find him there," the blond spiky-haired man said. "He's gone for three days."

"Yeah, I know. Xu told me."

"Hi, Xu, what's up," he waved to her.

"Hi, Zell."

"Do you know where he is?" Squall asked Zell.

"Dunno. Forgot to ask. Not too far, I think."

"Doesn't he realize he has a wedding coming up soon?"

"Yeah, but he's got some time. It's not like it's a huge gala celebration. Besides, the girls do all the planning anyway."

Xu looked back and forth between the two, caught in the middle, and kept her books held tightly like a schoolgirl.

Squall tilted his head to change his perspective. "Why does your tattoo look different?" The black tribal pattern that was normally black on skin tone had a distinctive red hue change.

Zell held his hand to face and turned away. "Oh, eh, huh. I tried asking one of the cashiers at the store out when I was with Selphie. I got my just desserts for it, I guess."

"Maybe she thought you were the groom and were asking her in front of your fiancée."

"Aw, man!" Zell snapped his fingers in a maudlin manner. Apparently, he was still on his quest to find a date for the wedding. "You're probably right. Jeez, what was I thinking? Should I go back there and try again?" he asked the two of them.

"Mm, no," Squall thought after no deliberation. "Maybe you should try someone new. Someone closer to home."

"Yeah, you're right," Zell kicked the floor glumly like a football player. Even despondent, he still had that bouncy energy. Squall rolled his eyes. Xu smiled and looked down at the floor. Zell continued, "You know, I was thinking. It's never gonna be the same with them. Selphie and Irvine, I mean. You were right about that too. They're not gonna be the same people we knew."

Xu said, "People don't change personalities drastically just cause they're in a relationship... or marriage."

"Ha, ha, yeah right." Zell held his stomach and doubled over. Squall couldn't tell whether the gesture was sarcasm or not. "You shoulda been there with me today. All Selphie talked about was Irvine. Irvine's gonna do this, he's gonna do that. He's gonna get this career. The kids are gonna go to this school. Before, she didn't know what she was gonna have for lunch until 11:59." Zell cleared his throat a bit.

Squall looked away. Apparently, Selphie was very stubborn about this relationship and the path she was going. She really did think she was going to be able to achieve all these goals she had set out for her and her family, and for some reason Squall was angry at her that she trying to be so controlling. But he kept his mouth shut, and didn't say anything.

Xu said, "I don't think Irvine's gonna change that much."

"Yeah, but the way we see them is gonna change. I mean, we're never gonna see the two of them alone again. Selphie's never gonna be without Irvine and Irvine's never gonna be without Selphie. It's like they're one, one unit. They're different people when they're alone. Before, me and Irvine could hang out and do guy things, but now it'll be different."

"What-" Squall caught himself again.

Xu said, "Maybe you'll still do that stuff, maybe you just won't be able to do it that often."

"Nah," Zell waved his hand dismissively, "Anyone I've ever known who went into a serious relationship just became someone else. They started hanging out with that girl 24/7. Lost a lot of good training partners that way. We'll probably never see Irvine again. Or at least we'll never see him the same way. He's got Selphie now."

"I know," Xu said quietly.

"But at least Selphie found someone she loves and Irvine's going through with it. He could easily back out or use the mission or SeeD as an excuse or something."

"I know," Xu said. "Excuse me." Xu walked quickly in between them and down the remainder of the hall. Both the guys thought the behavior was odd.

"Whoa, that was weird," Zell said.

Squall said nothing.

[TRUE Sephiroth]

Ah, a story with frequent updates. Not very often you see that around here. Keep it up!

[theWallflower]

DAY 4 - THURSDAY



Squall was using his break to nap on the couch, or at least rest himself, with Angelo below him. This was, of course, ruined by his girlfriend's entrance. She was playfully holding a box of kitchen knives. Squall twisted around sleepily from his position on the couch.

"What do we have knives for?" he half-mumbled.

"It's a wedding gift, silly."

"What do we need knives for? Oh." Rinoa's response didn't register in his head faster than his mouth could output. He was still half-asleep.

"I was thinking we could split it."

Squall raised his eyebrow.

"How much was it?"

"4,000 gil."

Squall was mildly offset. He hadn't agreed to get a wedding gift. And he hadn't agreed to give this gift. In fact, Rinoa hadn't talked about this with him at all. But he realized he actually hadn't thought of getting a gift at all and realized that he should have. Plus, he hated shopping. And this was more convenient.

"Come on, tightwad," Rinoa chided, watching the wheels in Squall's head turn.

"All right, that's fine." Strategically, and for the sake of convenience, he decided to go along with it. Part of being a leader was choosing your battles. Although he wouldn't have picked knives as a wedding present, he really didn't have any other ideas. Selphie and Irvine were going to need a lot more than that in their future life. Knives were going to be a luxury. They needed more basic things like tables, places to sit, baby stuff. Babies were especially expensive, and added to the normal cost of living.

Squall shook off the fatigue and got off the couch, moving to the kitchen counter to look at the box for his pseudo-approval. "Didn't you get knives for some other wedding present one time?"

"Sure, it's my favorite present to give. Everyone needs knives when they're just starting out." Squall had karmic visions of six boxes of knives as presents for their wedding. "Plus, I got it 30% off."

"I wouldn't put that on the card."

"Oh, the card," Rinoa lightly slapped her hand on the table. "I forgot. Shoot, do you want to help me get that one this weekend?"

Squall, of course, didn't want to. He hated shopping in the first place, and he needed a rest from this flurry of activity happening around the Garden that seemed to be localized in his group of friends. But Rinoa would want to spend time with him this weekend anyway.

"All right," he said nonchalantly as he went back to the couch and laid down, picking up a newspaper on the coffee table.

"Good, we need to pick up wrapping paper too." She took the box of knives and set them in an out of the way place in the kitchen. "So me and Selphie were talking about how you guys are gonna catch the garter."

Squall's eyes popped open. Oh, god, I forgot about that. Oh no.

Rinoa continued, "So we were thinking how just about none of you are gonna go for it. Since there's only gonna be four or five unmarried guys there and how all the girls are gonna practically be falling over themselves to get it." She laughed to herself. "We're all gonna be getting in shape," she said, flexing her arms.

"Uh-huh."

"Are you even listening to me?" she whined.

"Yes."

Rinoa tapped her fingers on the counter where Squall couldn't see, nor cared to, thinking of what to do. She haughtily walked over to the couch and pulled down the paper from his eyes. "Squall, what's wrong?"

"Nothing is wrong," he said straightly.

"You have been tight-lipped since I told you about what was happening."

Squall remained tight-lipped and said nothing.

Rinoa continued, "It's like you've reverted back to your old self."

"I just have nothing to say."

"Wrong, you've got plenty to say. I know you do. But you don't say it. That's the problem. You're upset about this, I know you are. I know that your injury didn't come from a funguar." She pointed to his hands.

"It's from a funguar. I was there. And I'm not upset."

"Then what is your opinion?"

"I have no opinion."

"The hell you don't. Everyone has an opinion. What is it?"

"I have none."

"Tell me, I wanna hear it."

"I have no opinion."

"Tell me."

"I have no opinion," he said, a little sterner, not losing his temper. "I have nothing to say, because I have no opinion."

Rinoa was starting to feel like she was talking to a brick Squall. She stood up and crossed her arms. "You have something to say, Squall. I wish you would say it."

"I have nothing to say. It's not my place to make a judgment."

They stared at each other for a few seconds, a stare that meant a stalemate, neither of them budging from their positions, but not backing down either. That thing about judgment had just clued Rinoa in more, and she was too stubborn not to find out what it was.

Squall, however, used a different tactic. He put his newspaper back on the coffee table and stood up. "I've got some work I need to do." His break apparently over, he exited the apartment, though Rinoa knew he would be back in time for dinner.

With the clanging of the door, Rinoa had the incredible urge to pout, but what would be the point when there was no one there to hear her. She sat down at the kitchen counter and stared up at the calendar near the door, looking at the last two weeks. She couldn't even sigh. She felt empty, the feeling you get from not winning an argument, but no closure from losing it either. No resolution about whether you were right or wrong. She was frustrated, and even starting to feel sorry for her own gossiping. Maybe she was just making a mountain out of a molehill, and it wasn't doing anything but making Squall mad at her. Maybe she should just write it off as Squall being Squall.

Suddenly, the phone rang. Rinoa jerked her head towards it, and walked the steps into the living room to pick it up.

"Hello?"

"Hello. This is Cyan Aldridge with the Balamb Train Station."

"Uh-huh."

"Uh, this is regarding this bill for the train car we received on Tuesday. We were hoping we could arrange a payment now."

"Payment?" Rinoa asked. She thought SeeDs already had a contract with the train stations about payments and such. She figured that sort of thing would be arranged through Garden. "I think you might have the wrong number. You might want Garden accounting."

"Ah..." Rinoa could hear papers being shuffled over the phone. "This is the number that was on the reparation form. I was told this is a separate bill regarding the damages received."

"Damages received?" What was she talking about? "What sort of damages?"

"Um, it says here the occupant's car, the SeeD cabin, had the bed mattresses and frames broken. The wall panel was crushed, with wiring ripped out in some areas. Some upholstery damage to the couch, couch cushions. And planter being destroyed."

WHAT? "What caused that?" Rinoa suppressed her urge to shout and scream into the receiver.

"It... doesn't say. Just that occupant was willing to pay for all damages, and to use this number to call him to arrange payment."

Rinoa bit her lip. "Um, I think you'll have to call back later. He's not here right now."

"All right. When would the best time be to call back?"

"In the evening," Rinoa said as she suppressed hyperventilating.

"Okay, thank you."

"Thanks."

"Bye."

Rinoa placed the phone on the receiver.

That couldn't have been Squall. It couldn't have. Broken beds? Crushed wall paneling? It sounded more like a caterchipillar had gotten loose in the room, than her boyfriend. She didn't want to believe it, but there wasn't a shred of evidence that didn't point to him. Squall was on a train Monday night, Tuesday morning. He would have been in the SeeD cabin. He would have given them his private phone number to prevent Garden hearing about this, to keep his indiscretion quiet. So they wouldn't see that he had... what had he done? What in the world was going on?

--------------------------------------------------------------

Xu typed delicately, but fast, on her computer, tabulating the monthly budgeting, paying particular attention to the Garden Festival. Secretarial duties for the headmaster included administrative leave, personnel archives, communication skills, and mostly financial records. Gil for Garden was stretched tighter than a rubber band, with money needing to be allocated for school supplies, the garage, even the food budget was skimpy. Xu hoped that Selphie could make do with a lot of streamers.

Zell's body rose from the floor in the elevator. Xu peeked out her eyes from her computer, then went back to filing until he came up to his desk. "Afternoon, Zell," she said cheerfully. "Do you have an appointment with Cid?"

Zell embarrassedly put his hand behind his head and scratched. "Uh, no, actually, I came to see you." He stared down at the floor. "See, the other day, when you and me and Squall were talking at the door. I thought, I don't know. I hope you weren't mad at me."

Xu stifled a laugh, "Of course I wasn't mad at you. Why would I be?"

"Well, I know, but was there was just something about the way you reacted when I was talking about Irvine and how they're gonna be different now, and I thought about it and thought about it and I slept on it. And, well, I just wanted to make sure we're cool."

Xu nodded and decided something resolutely. Zell was a good friend, he deserved better than just saying everything was all right. And besides, this might help her purge some of her feelings. She pushed out of her chair, stood up, walked around her desk, transferring from secretary mode to friend mode. She leaned up against it and sighed, hugging herself with her arms. "This news hit everyone pretty hard, didn't it?"

"Yeah, kind of a bombshell."

"No one had any idea this was happening."

"Yeah, not even Irvine. He was just being his usual flirty self."

"Yeah, he was charming. Or is, still." Xu didn't want to talk about him like he was dead. "When Selphie wasn't around... or sometimes when she was around and they weren't so... together... Irvine would come down to hang with us girls - me, Quistis, and Rinoa. There were a lot of times we'd stay up late, just talking. We all had a lot of good heart-to-hearts, shared a lot. It was fun. He was like one of us." She sighed. "I don't know. Sometimes, I thought we were closer to him than Selphie."

"So you were getting close to Irvine?"

"I thought so. I don't think that Irvine wants to marry Selphie, he's just sort of settling, cause it's the right thing to do. Otherwise, it wouldn't have been so off and on, don't you think?"

"Well, I don't know." Zell had the mind of a fighter, not a lover. "There's a lot I don't know about relationships."

"But I guess we'll never know now." Xu turned and went back to her desk. She pulled out a drawer and took an envelope out. Breathing deeply, she held it up to Zell. The word 'IRVINE' was written on it in red marker.

"See this? I was going to put this under Irvine's door, since he was gone, but you and Squall were there, so I couldn't." Xu thought briefly about the next thing she was going to say. "It's a love confession, I just felt like I had to get it all out of my system." Zell snapped his head back in reaction. "Now I'm really glad you guys were there. It prevented me from doing something really stupid. So, thanks."

"You're welcome," Zell was more confused then ever, but he was still a little proud of doing something nice. He was clearly taken aback though. He had no idea Xu had those kind of feelings for Irvine. But the more he thought about it, Irvine did have that sort of charm that drew the ladies to him. That kind of charm Zell wished he could get in the store. It was no wonder that one of them would fall for him as a result. "I had no idea that you liked him... in that way."

"Nobody really did, except for Quistis and Rinoa," Xu continued. "The more I thought about it yesterday, the more I realized that it wouldn't have worked anyway. It was just a stupid schoolgirl thing, just one last chance to try and tell him how I really feel, but that's all gone now. The last thing he needs is one more burden. I think I'm going to miss the friendship we had more."

"Yeah, me too. I guess this is affecting us all, in all different ways. I didn't realize how important this was to all of us."

"Well, I sorta did, but now it's out in the open. It's going to be hard on all of us when they walk down that aisle."

"Yeah," Zell scratched the back of his head again. "Say, do you have a date for the wedding?"

"Um, I'm actually going with Nida." Xu had already heard of Zell's quest to get a date, including the cashier incident, and hated to decline him.

"Oh," Zell said as he swallowed nervously.

"Yeah, he's also doing some photography and he needs a van to carry his stuff around in."

"Oh, okay."

"Don't worry, Zell, you'll get a date," she said as she chucked him on the shoulder.

"Yeah, I hope so."

--------------------------------------------------------------

These forms of Selphie's were getting to be a hassle. Squall swore that she filled them out incorrectly just to get him to talk with her, so he had to try and pry out the information he needed to have. The sloppy handwriting wasn't helping either. Plus, waiting till the last minute to send them in. Plus, having to correct her mistakes. Plus, knowing she would just make them all over again in the future when she forgot.

Squall headed for the quad, where he knew she would be, setting up for the Garden Festival. It seemed like she was in a perpetual state of setting up the Garden Festival, trying to make each year bigger and better than before, locked in a Sisyphusian state of the same activity for all time.

It looked like she had gotten a few more helpers this time too, as Squall shuffled down the stairs. A few students were painting pieces of wood covered in white spackled drop cloths. A skeletal stage was set under a large metal and wood scaffolding that stretched to the ceiling. Squall craned his neck up and saw Selphie's yellow dress hanging off the edge, where she was lying on her back painting something.

"Selphie!" Squall shouted alarmingly. "Get down from there!"

Selphie nearly fell off the platform as she peered over the side where an angry Squall was watching her. She put her brush down and climbed down the piping, jumping the last step.

"It's not safe up there," Squall said before Selphie had fully approached him. "You have to have more sense than that."

"I was fine," she dismissed. "I was careful climbing."

Squall flashed back to when she tumbled down a hill on their first SeeD mission, trying to deliver a message. Yeah, I bet you were.

Squall chose not to pursue arguing and stuck to matters at hand. He held up the 8 1/2 by 11s in his hand. "There's a problem on your requisition forms for the festival. You can't use the dormitory hallway as a refreshment area."

"Why not?"

"Because that's a fire hazard. And there's going to be people in the dorms who want to get back and forth without being blocked."

"Well, why aren't they coming to the festival? Everyone should come to Garden Festival," she quipped merrily.

"Not everyone should come to Garden Festival. Not everyone wants to come to Garden Festival," Squall said dryly. "Also, you cannot use the Star Room."

"What? But that's where we were going to have the costume ball."

"That room is going to be under renovation for the new infirmary by the time festival gets started. It was on the allocation sheet for this year."

"But, Squall, it's a costume ball. We've never had one. Don't you think it would be so cool? Jerry thought of it. We have to have one this year. I was gonna dress up as a tonberry."

"Not unless you find another room."

Selphie sighed and drooped down, rolling her eyes. "Fine, oh well, we'll do it next year."

"You're not going to be here next year."

"What? Of course I will."

"Next year you're going to have a child, remember?"

"I'll still be able to do some things."

"And Garden Festival is not one of them. Because only people in Garden get to have a Garden Festival, and you're not going to be here."

"I can still do things just fine with a child. Other people can. I could do it part-time."

"Part-time? SeeD is not a part-time job." Squall nearly dropped his papers as he flung his arm out in anger. "You're mom now. You're that and nothing else. Your career as a SeeD is over. All that work you ever did was for nothing. You can't be a SeeD when you've got a baby to take care of. You now have a full-time dedication to this baby and if you think that you'll be able to come back to SeeD after that then you're not thinking very well. You are responsible for that thing."

"Are you saying you're not going to let me come back to SeeD?"

"It's not in Garden's best interest to let you back. Every SeeD here is expected to be sharpened to a razor's edge at all times in case they get called for duty. Exactly how are you going to do that when you're pregnant? Or even after? Would you send a mother out into the Centra Ruins?"

"I think that's a little unfair."

"I don't care. Rules are rules. You messed up, not me."

Squall was beginning to grow red in the face. He was not yelling, but those in the sound of his voice slowed action to a standstill to eavesdrop as Squall lashed out. As far as the commander was concerned his universe only contained himself and her now. Selphie was like a candle in a dark room to Squall.

"You have to take the consequences for your actions. And not only did you take yourself out from the roster, but Irvine along with you. What kind of father is he going to be if he's a mercenary? Having to go off at long periods on a moment's notice. Risking his life repeatedly. Personally, I think he should quit SeeD too, but unfortunately, there is no rule stating you can't be a SeeD and a father at the same time."

There was no rule because no one ever had been a SeeD and father at the same time. SeeDs were too young for planned marriages and children and their careers were foremost on their minds. Squall hadn't thought of it before, but he wasn't just losing one good SeeD, he was losing two.

"You just had to have your little fling with him so you could ensnare him and keep him forever. That's why you let him have his way with you. Now you're stuck with him forever. You will never be without him and you will never be without his child. Don't act like you're a victim, you could have used birth control. And god knows why you didn't when you were doing what you were doing. Instead you just succumbed to your carnal desires." Squall was starting to say things that the back of his mind told him he'd regret later. His rationality started to poke through and Squall turned around to leave before he said anything else improper, but he looked back at her over his shoulder. "Of all the people in the world I thought you two would be smarter than that."

Selphie stood locked in place, staring at the back of his body. For one of the few times in her life, she was speechless.

[Perspective]

Interesting idea. I get the feeling that things are going on in the background That We Cannot Know for Plot reasons. It's a tough story to write (At least I always find it so) convincingly, but I liked the first couple of chapters. The thing about last one though... I get that Squall was supposed to blow up. The character writing is this story's big strength. I think that Rin/Squall are especially well done.

Its just that organisations like the US army have massive childcare (It's THE biggest one in fact) facilities. Hell, ask any rebel group with lots of women fighters. And I just have a hard time grasping the idea that no kids date before seventeen/eighteen or that there aren't any career SeeDs around the place- you know in the game you see Galbadian officers etcetc. They can't all die in the game!

I don't want to knock this story- far from it, (anyone who can update so regularly has my full respect), it's just that I'll be reading some fine inner monologue, when a real clanger comes along. That, and we definately need to see more of Irvine- he's the other half of the Damned Duo! Points on trying to work in domestic routines, that stuff is hard to portray convincely. Especially shopping. This is not an activity I understand much...

[TRUE Sephiroth]

Originally Posted by Perspective

Especially shopping. This is not an activity I understand much...

I agree. What is the point?

On topic: This looks good to me. Keep up the good work.

[theWallflower]

DAY 5 - FRIDAY


"...The most reprehensible behavior I've ever seen out of you for a long time. Out of any SeeD, even. Displaying absolutely no sense of tact, discretion, prudence, insight. Instead showing completely unprofessional behavior, unbecoming of a young SeeD such as yourself. Unthinking of the feelings of others, crass, rude, not to mention risking the respect of your peers, while destroying that of Selphie's."

Cid paced furious back and forth and around his desk, occasionally using the wooden obstacle to slam his hands down or bend over it, gripping it like eagle talons.

"Well? What do you have to say for yourself?" he exclaimed with no pausing breath.

Squall remained stoic, straight like a rod, gazing ahead stiffly like a lion. "I... apologize for my actions, sir. The act was done without thought or provocation. There is no excuse for it. It will not happen again." This was a military school and he was going to act military.

Cid looked at Squall's face, tilting back and forth like he was examining it or waiting for something. Squall thought he might have been looking for remorse in his expression, some sign of emotion. Squall had none to give. Cid finally took a cathartic breath and sat down behind his desk. He pressed his fingertips together, rocked back, and brushed away some of the wavy brown bangs that had fallen in front of his eyes.

"Squall, do you know why I selected you as Garden Commander?"

Great, another rant. Squall chose to keep all the answers he was thinking of to himself and only responded with, "No, sir."

Cid grumbled at the formality of his response. "It was because you were ready for it."

And I've always resented you for that. I was only eighteen years old. That was way too much responsibility for me to handle. You have no idea how stressed out I was. You put me through hell and I didn't even know why.

Cid continued, "Garden was starting to become divided among itself. With NORG splitting our own students and faculty against each other, we needed a unifying force. Someone for the students to look up to, to bond with. And that same person would need strategic command decision-making skills. The attack by Galbadia Garden was just the catalyst. There had to be..."

Squall drifted off as Cid continued haranguing about his purpose in his position. He was no stranger to being disciplined, but the headmaster was the only person he answered to now. He had already heard it before, mostly from himself. His sense of duty as a commander, that's what prompted him to lose it in the first place. There was no part of his life not ruled by his duty to Garden. This chewing out was just part of that. A formality to tell him he'd done wrong. Meaningless.

Cid finished. There was a pause as Squall waited for the next response from his headmaster. Something was expected. Cid continued, "Maybe I was wrong. Maybe I did it too soon, maybe I did it at too young an age." He shook his head solemnly.

If you're going to say something, just say it.

"Do you have anything further for your defense?" Cid said.

"No, sir." I know he wants me to say something more. Quit playing these mind games with me.

"Then you are dismissed... Commander."

Squall spun on his heel and exited.

--------------------------------------------------------------

Zell peeked in and found an empty classroom. Excellent. He quickly headed to one of the many empty desks and powered on the computer. It started up with a faint hum, which faded away. As soon as the initial program load completed he cracked his knuckles and accessed the Garden Network Boards. Navigating through menus he thought to himself how perfect this plan was. Zell was gonna get himself a date, even if he had to knock on every door in the city.

With the message board loaded, he headed over to the 'lovetastic forum', sponsored by the city of Balamb. Here he could find a match. The self-description indicated thousands of singles in his area had already met and thousands more were waiting. Zell certainly couldn't pass up an opportunity like that. Especially with a free membership awaiting him. He clicked on the prominent offer and was sent to a form to fill in.

He started by filling in the basics of his profile: name, age, height, eye color, hair color, all the boring stuff. Gender? 'Yes, please', he entered in the box with a smile. Then he put a finger to his lips and thought about it. Something about that seemed wrong, not as funny as when other people said it. He backspaced it out and typed 'male'. The selection for weight had a few options, ranging from 'slender' to 'large'. Zell thought for a second. He was pretty trim in the belly, but his arms were fully muscled. There was no option for 'buff', so he picked 'thick', figuring it was close enough.

Then there were a few more questions about education and employment. There was no selection for mercenary, nothing even close, so he checked off 'hospitality/travel'. There were also several checkboxes for living status. He thought about all the people in Garden and checked off 'alone', since he was in his own room, 'with kids' since there were underclassmen, 'with parents', since Matron was Cid's wife, and Cid lived here, 'with roommates', since his former roommates were still living here, 'family and friends visit often', since they did, and 'there is a party every night', since they were constantly graduating new SeeDs, plus other fun extracurricular activities.

The next section was a long list of political and religious choices. Since Zell didn't care much for either, he just skipped all that. Since he wanted a good selection, he chose to search for matches within 250 miles, with photos or not, in an age range of 17 to 39, and began clicking 'any' for eye color, hair color, weight, etc.

Finally, came the step he wanted - the descriptions and essay portion. Despite what he thought about the SeeD tests he had taken in the past, this was the part where he was going to really shine and get that date.

The first thing he wrote was, 'I am loking for date in 10 days to my friend's weddin.' He decided to get straight to the point right away. He thought for a second about his opening line and remembered one of the tips he'd read was to be as honest and specific as possible. He continued, 'who got pregnent by another friend and they are getting hitched quickly.' Now he needed a little something about himself personally. 'I'm into martial arts, metalorgy, and tatoos.' Zell thought and laughed a bit as he realized just how much those things don't go together. Oh, well. Just part of his eclectic personality, he guessed.

This needed something more though. All he had so far were two lines. Girls wanted a guy with substance. 'My friends think I'm a 'rich boy', but I think I've got a big heart, I like helping ppl. Im n outgoing guy, kind, honest, I luv the outdoors and fighting, and mountain skiing.' Zell added that last part as an afterthought. He had never mountain skied before, but he was sort of interested in it and someday he might. Besides, someone who liked mountain skiing would probably be his sort of girl. 'Im not really sur what kinda girl I like, so if u r interested, let me know what ur hobbys r. My job involves some travel, so DONT GET WORRIED IF I DON'T RESPOND TO U RIGHT AWAY' The extra caps would emphasize that well, so no one would run off and get another date too soon. Time was of the essence here. 'Please respond A.S.A.P. Maybe this'll turn into a wedding of our own. ' Good ending line. He finished it with '-Zell Dincht'. And hit the submit button.

Not too bad, he thought. Zell was all set to go to another page, but surprisingly, there was one more section before the ad would be set - uploading a photo. No problem. There had to be one in his personal directory. Most of them were of his friends doing stupid stuff, not of him. But there was one tiny one with him giving a thumbs up to the camera on his tattoo side. Yeah, that would be awesome. He selected that file and uploaded it. It was an awesome tattoo, no reason not to show it off. It would show the girlies what kind of fun loving guy he was. Plus it showed off his 'million-dollar' smile, as his ma said. Now the ad was complete. He hit the 'finish' button and the screen showed a confirmation message. All he would need to do now, with that awesome personal ad, was wait for the honeys to come in.

In the meantime, Zell decided to check what was going on at the Garden Center Message Boards, codenamed 'Garden Square'. The General topic always had some interesting threads to scour for the casual reader. Underclassmen liked to use the boards for 'what's your favorite...' and other jibber-jabber. Zell's friends rarely posted anymore, but the fun, 'say-anything' nature of the forum kept him coming back. Although these days it was less often than he liked. Man, when was the last time one of his friends posted? He scrolled down the list to see an unread thread started by Irvine's ID six months ago about gun-cleaning tips. The last responder was Quistis. Selphie had been on a mission then, and was going out with the gunslinger. Curious, since threads had a nasty, but interesting habit of derailing into off-topic personal conversations, he clicked on it and started reading at the latest message.

--------------------------------------------------------------

The obnoxious sounds of zipping backpacks and coats rustling that started even before class ended finally petered out as students filtered away. Two students remained at a desk, talking and possibly checking out the Garden message boards on their computer terminal. A few remaining Trepies stood around the door, conversing with themselves, and basking in the awe of their favorite teacher. Quistis paid them no mind. The more attention she gave the Trepies, the more they followed her around. All she could do was tolerate them, and besides, since she was reinstated as a teacher, she had more work on her hands than she could keep track of. This fifteen minute interval between classes was just what she needed to do a quick check on the grade progress.

Her slender fingers whittled along the keyboard to access her grading program. When it finished starting up she tabbed over to the classes she wanted to check. Peering through the obnoxious glare of the overhead fluorescent lights, she analyzed the numbers of the last assignment she gave. Everyone did about average on it, not too good, not too bad. She'd always believed that it was the fault of the teacher when the student failed, but since the events of a year ago, she started believing that she just couldn't save everyone. But there was no reason, if both parties put forth effort, that a student couldn't succeed. In fact, everyone in her classes was doing pretty well. Grades were starting to climb up out of the first term slump. Quistis attributed that to the fact she was putting her all into teaching this time. She was just so happy it was finally showing through.

When time compression was over, and things had settled down, Squall had reinstated her, making her not only a teacher again, but leader of the academics committee, overriding Cid's initial orders. Strangely, the headmaster made no arguments about it this time. Maybe her performance inspired his confidence again in her abilities. Maybe it inspired her own confidence. Maybe it was just the shortage of teachers for the incoming students.

She never really knew if teaching was her calling, given her lackluster results over the years. But if it wasn't teaching, she didn't know what else it was. When it was good, she loved teaching, and she loved being a SeeD. Both were part of who she was, both were her responsibility, and she signed up for both. So, she tried her hardest at being the best she could.

A white window suddenly appeared on her screen. A second later it faded in to a dual boxed message, from Rinoa. She forgot she was signed into the Garden instant message program, because no one ever messaged her during school hours. Gradually, her slow computer processed the information and displayed Rinoa's message on the screen.

"OMG, guess what," she said.

Quistis looked quizzically at the screen for a moment, wondering what could be so exciting for Rinoa to interrupt her at work, and waiting to see if she would type in any new information. When she didn't, Quistis asked her "What?"

"Selphie slept over at Irvine's last night."

"What?" she responded, genuinely stunned. She stared motionlessly at the screen. This came out of nowhere. Selphie and Irvine had spent the night? She had no idea they were becoming so serious so quickly. She typed in "How do you know this?" She wasn't suspicious of Rinoa, but Garden, like most schools, was bent on rumor-mongering.

While she waited for a response, she realized she hadn't seen Selphie that morning, but that wasn't too unusual. It's not like they were joined at the hip, they were just roommates. She had her teaching stuff, and Selphie had her own life, usually she had a lot of extracurricular activities to take care of.

Rinoa typed "Squall told me."

And then, "Irvine came to the door wearing the same thing he had on last night, and then he said something about how Selphie doesn't like breakfast and quick shut his mouth."

And then, "So I figured it out."

That was true, Selphie didn't like breakfast very much. So then it was probably true. Quistis asked, "Does that mean they're going out?"

"I don't know."

"Do you know if they," Quistis stopped, trying to find the right words without being rude, "Did anything?" Quistis was worried about Selphie moving too fast, hoping she wasn't being coerced by Irvine.

"I have no idea," she said, and then a moment later. "Don't you think it's cute though?"

"Yeah, cute," Quistis wrote back, "Fast, but cute."

"What, are you not happy?" Rinoa said. Apparently, she had a bit of the matchmaker in her, but Quistis never believed she or anyone else needed a significant other to validate her existence.

"No, I am," Quistis said, only a moderate lie. "I just never expected it from Selphie." She sent the message and then thought a bit more about it. The saving grace of the instant message program was that it gave you a chance to think about what you were going to say before you said it. "I'm just really surprised, that's all."

"Yeah, new boyfriends are always exciting."

New? Try first. For all she knew, this was Selphie's first romantic relationship. Selphie was as focused on developing her career as Quistis was, despite her devotion to the underclassmen. Then all of the sudden, Irvine comes into the picture, and starts distracting her. She didn't want to see her stop developing her life just for the sake of a relationship. If it turned out bad, she would be way behind if she was waiting for him. The only person in life you could count on was yourself.

Three students came into the classroom, talking loudly amongst themselves, and took their seats. The next class's students slowly started trickling in. Quistis quickly wrote to Rinoa, "Gotta go, class is starting."

"Ok, talk to you later."

Quistis signed off the program so she wouldn't get interrupted, and brought up today's lessons. She was still distracted by her concern for Selphie. It was going to be difficult to muddle through this one.

--------------------------------------------------------------

There was something about working on machines that made a woman feel aggressive, powerful. Maybe it was because they were such big pieces of mechanical equipment with such muscle and potency. And she was the key to making them all run smoothly. Maybe it was the satisfying feeling of working with one's hands. Rinoa looked down at her thin gloves, worn down to cracked leather and striped with grease. She smiled, knowing that these hands were capable of doing so much good and they were doing good right now.

She laid her back on the wheelboard and scooted under the car. Adjusting her cap, under which her jet black hair was neatly piled up, she grabbed a wrench and started unscrewing a set of hex nuts. The affirmative feeling of strength glowed in her veins like liquid gold. This giant vehicle was above her and she was manipulating it to her will, making it better. She was so happy she unconsciously started singing a little song to herself while she cranked the wrench.

"The hex nut's connected to the - lug bolt. The lug bolt's connected to the - carburetor. The carburetor's connected to the - ...thingy. The thingy's conn-"

The pipe she was working on burst open, spilling cups of oil onto her chest. Rinoa shrieked in surprise and averted her head as she spit out droplets of greasy bitter oil from her mouth, squinting her eyes shut. She tried reversing the hex nut she was loosening to stop the gush of oil, but it was having no effect and the liquid was just making her hand slip. Frantically, she grabbed the rag in her pocket and held it up to the hole. This slowed the oil leak enough for her to shove the towel in further, plugging it up. Still spitting out the vile matter on her tongue, she looked up at the busted pipe and wondered if anyone would notice.

"Hey, Rinoa? Are you here?" Zell's voice echoed in the garage.

Rinoa, daintily adjusting the rag one last time, slid out from under the car and lifted herself up. "Hi, Zell. What's up?"

"Ah, not much. Working in the garage now?"

"Yeah, I decided to give it a try. Seemed like a pretty cool job, I mean."

"Yeah, you really have to know your stuff too. I had a mechanics class in here for a semester. It was really fun, but the supervisor sure likes a quality job. No rag-tag hacks, you know?"

"Uh, yeah," Rinoa said, subconsciously covering a part of the underside of the car with her leg. "So what's on your mind?"

"I, uh," Zell reached behind his head and scratched. "I was on the Garden Square today. You know, the message boards."

Rinoa nodded.

"And I was going down the archive, just for reading. And I found some things about what Irvine said about Selphie back when they were going out. He was talking to Quistis and Xu about... not wanting a relationship with her."

"How long ago was this?"

"Uh, about six months."

"Hmm, maybe he changed his mind about that though."

"Yeah, maybe." Zell looked down at the ground and rubbed his head. Rinoa suppressed a giggle. Zell always wore his heart on his sleeve, he just never realized it.

"Zell, what's really bothering you?"

"Well, I'm worried that this isn't what Irvine wants, you know?" Rinoa nodded as he continued. "Like he's just settling."

"Well, Irvine said he was thinking of marrying her in July also. And that he was gonna wait until he came back from the mission."

"Oh, really?" Zell said brightly.

"Yeah, although the other girls and I thought that could've been a line."

"Oh, yeah. Could be." Zell slumped his shoulders, dejected. "I'm confused about what to think about all this. Irvine's real concerned about his image."

"Yes, he is," Rinoa heartfully agreed.

"There was also a post that said he didn't want her coming to Deling City with him. Cause he was afraid of what might happen. This was after they," he made quote marks with his fingers "'broke up'."

Rinoa nodded and leaned against the car. "I remember. He said he didn't want to get into something before he left. And Quistis and Xu both said it was a bad idea to Selphie too."

"So I don't know why he agreed to it."

"I know why."

"Why? Oh." Zell rolled his eyes at his own ignorance. "Man, I can see why you hate men."

Rinoa laughed. "We don't hate men, we just don't like it when men use us." Rinoa then realized this was coming from his attempts to get a quick date.

Zell said, "I feel like I've been lied to."

"We've all been lied to about this. Or at least the truth has been fudged. I mean, people just see what they want to see. And then they tell that to us, and we believe them. If you're really worried about Irvine, why don't you talk to him when he gets back?"

"I wouldn't know what to say. I don't want to make him angry."

Rinoa understood Zell. People mistook him for being childish because he was so child-like, but that didn't mean he didn't have an adult mind. "Don't worry, Zell. We've all got some reservations about what's going on, but we really can't do anything about it but be there for our friends."

"Yeah, all right. Thanks."

"Anytime, Zell." Rinoa picked up her wrench off the car hood as Zell turned to exit. "By the way," she said, "Do you know anything about cars?"

Zell's eyes lit up. "Cars?"

--------------------------------------------------------------

"And this is the engine center of Garden," Squall waved his arm to the labyrinth of clockwork gears and sprockets caught in a mish-mash that he wouldn't dare attempt to even try and understand. "This is what enables us to detach from the ground foundation and become a mobile command center."

The two gentlemen from Fisherman's Horizon, clad in ratty grease-stained clothing, stepped forward in the murky underdwellings and gazed over the railing at the iron and copper workings.

"Aw, yeah, this looks like good work from our end."

"I heard Coburn worked on this. Too bad he couldn't come."

"Excellent work on the cog ramps. Excellent."

Squall looked back and forth behind him. He couldn't imagine what sort of monsters were hanging around down here in the bowels of Garden.

Squall continued, "And, um, over here is the steering mechanism that the mechanics at FH constructed for us. When we first learned Garden was mobile we were in a bit of an emergency situation. And since it hadn't been used in so long, all the gears that controlled steering were rusted out, since mobility was only meant as an escape route. But now it uses a simple galleon-pinion apparatus so all direction changing is controlled by one simple pilot-stick at the top floor."

"Awesome."

"Ah, yeah, that looks like Harrah's work. I'd recognize it anywhere. See? He even put that smiley face on that gear over there."

"Hah, you're right. That's his signature."

Squall gritted his teeth. Indulging clients' whims of fancy was something he hated. This was not some sort of museum to show off. It was nothing to be gawked at by yokels. When pitching to clients about the hiring of SeeDs, this sort of 'booze-and-shmooze' bull was far from his forte. The representatives from Fisherman's Horizon had wanted to contract some students out for the rebuilding of Horizon Bridge on the Galbadia side, and in coming to Garden, wanted to see their city's handiwork in it. This was the least important part of Garden, in his opinion. The mobility system hadn't been used for very long, since it was expensive and bulky to uproot the military school every time there was an incident. Better to send out a small operation team. The only silver lining was that he did enjoy talking about Garden. This was his home, and he would defend it to the death. In fact, he had, on several occasions.

"Anyway," Squall said, "If this is all you wanted to see down here, I'd like to move back upstairs so we could discuss the mission specs."

"Oh, we can talk about that down here. I want to get a closer look at this work."

"Okay, fine," Squall grumbled through his molars.

"Yeah, I think it's pretty cut and dried," the second one said, "Thirty SeeDs for thirty days. Half of them as guards, half as construction."

"Actually, about that. I don't really know if you can expect much from SeeDs construction-wise. We aren't really trained in that area unless it's for a specific purpose, such as a long-term undercover mission."

"Yes, yes," he waved his hand, "That's fine."

"You can expect them to serve in a support capacity if you really need extra men down there."

"All right, that's fine."

"Yeah, that sounds good," said the other one.

Squall rolled his eyes and tagged after them. They skipped from station to station as if they were inspecting the electricity and plumbing. "Also, there's one more thing," he said, trying to get their attention, "We'd like to use this mission as a SeeD test. It's a field exam for potential graduates."

"Potentials?" the first one jerked his head away from the banister. "We don't want any potentials, we only want highly-trained SeeDs."

Thirty full-fledged SeeDs for a month of construction work and guarding? What a waste of resources. Was this guy trying to dump his bank account?

"I can assure you that everyone in the SeeD program is completely trained in all facets of being a SeeD before being considered for graduation. This field exam is meant to test those aspects, like teamwork, physical ability, composure, focus, decision-making. And there will be plenty of regular SeeDs on hand at all times."

"Well," he looked at his partner. "I guess that's all right."

The second one piped up, "But we want one of you from that group that saved us from time compression on the squad."

"Yeah."

The six of them (five if you didn't count Rinoa who wasn't a SeeD) were considered by the rest of the world to be the finest warriors in the land, since they were the ones who saved the world from Ultimecia. They were highly-skilled, but it wasn't like they were gods. None of them were on any missions that he knew of, so they theoretically could do it. This sort of catering to clients, giving them the world just to make them happy, was really grinding his gears now. Especially to these two hicks who didn't know how the system worked.

One clucked his tongue, "Yeah, we want what's-his-name... Irvine."

"The one with the gun."

"Yeah, he sure made an impact on us down at the depot."

Squall said, "Yes, he is prone to do that." This mission seemed like something viable to send Irvine on, similar to the one Squall was just on in Esthar. Irvine wasn't on any business usually, especially during the time span of this mission, he'd be well done with all the wedding stuff by then. And he could keep out of trouble, since he would be away from anything major.

"I think that'll be fine," Squall agreed. "Let me just confirm his availability." Squall picked up his PHS from his pocket and dialed Xu's desk. She picked up almost immediately.

"Balamb Garden, how may I direct your call?"

"Hey, it's Squall."

"Oh, hi." She returned to familiar demeanor instead of overly business-friendly. "Where are you?"

"I'm in the basement. Can you do me a favor? Can you check Irvine's mission avail for next month and then three months after?"

"Okay... Wait, the next month? He's booked."

"How about a month before?"

"He's booked." Xu's voice had a slight intonation to it that said this was something he should have already known.

"He's booked then, too? What in the world is he doing that takes so long?"

"Don't you remember? Irvine's being transferred overseas for a mission for a year and a half."

Flashes of light entered Squall's brain. "What?! Why didn't anyone tell me about this?" Squall walked away from the gawking eyes of the two clients he suddenly noticed.

"I thought you knew. Everyone knew. It was common knowledge. That's why he's getting married so fast."

"I thought it was for insurance." Squall had a thousand thoughts racing through his mind at this point.

"Well, that's part of it."

"Why? Where is he getting shipped?"

"The Island Closest to Hell."

Squall nearly crushed the phone in his right hand as his left found its way to his gunblade handle.

" ... Squall? .... Squall?"

[TRUE Sephiroth]

This is getting good. What could anyone be doing on a remote island for so long? Keep up the good work. I already said that, didn't I?

[theWallflower]

DAY 6 - SATURDAY


"This is the most ludicrous action I've ever heard of. I can't believe you allowed this to happen." Squall angrily threw out his arm as if he were clearing out the air.

Cid remained composed, sitting at his desk and holding out his palm. "Squall, calm down."

"Irvine is about to have a child. You can't send him away on a suicide mission! There's a reason it's called the 'Island Closest to Hell'."

"Squall, if you read the mission report, you'd see that it requires special skills that only Irvine can provide. He's the best of the best SeeDs we've got to offer."

Squall already knew the report. He had read it back and forth innumerable times, searching for a loophole, something to get Irvine out of it, something where they could send someone else. Irvine was to act as scout and sniper for a science team going to the dreaded island to put up radio towers.

Cid said, "The towers would allow entire continents to be able to communicate with each other again, just as when radio was in use. Now that Sorceress Adel is out of orbit and no longer interfering with radio communication, we can finally have global contact again. And the Island Closest to Hell is the best hub for intercontinental communication. Of course, you know the conditions surrounding that island as well as I do. Which is why the best of the best need to go there and protect that team. Irvine's job is to prevent frontal assaults before they happen. If a monster got through..."

"You can't give it to another sniper? Not even one from another Garden?"

"Irvine's the best sharpshooter there is. In the world. You know that as well as I do. I can't let him off. I can't reassign a different person to his position. And I can't make him quit. In fact, per the contract, he couldn't quit even if he wanted to."

"And he doesn't want to? Bullshit."

Cid ignored his cussing and continued. "The only way he could get out of it is to be dishonorably discharged and banned from SeeD forever."

I'd call what he already did pretty fucking dishonorable.

"That would mean throwing his entire life away. Irvine, Selphie, and I have already discussed this at length and we all came to the same mutual decision about what to do. Irvine accepted the mission before he... became engaged."

Then he knew. He knew. He knew he was getting shipped off in a few weeks and he still went and did what he did, with full carnal knowledge.

"We discussed the ramifications of what this meant for him before and after. After he completes this mission, Irvine will have more money for his family, of which he has none. He spent the last of it on Selphie's engagement ring."

Squall didn't know that. The way Selphie was talking and spending money on the wedding, he'd have thought they had enough money to at least get by. A bit of his anger subsided.

"I'm afraid this is simply a matter of unfortunate circumstances in unfortunate times."

Squall had so much to say, but Cid didn't want to hear it. He wanted to say Irvine and Selphie were making a mistake, that the SeeD contract needed to be ripped up regardless, that he was afraid Irvine wasn't going to be coming back, and even if he did, he would be jumping into fatherhood right away, six months after the baby was born, having missed the most crucial moments of its development. And Squall couldn't believe he was the only one who could see something wrong with that, that something needed to be done about it. Yet everyone was throwing up their hands at it all, afraid of getting dirty.

Squall said, "I saved the world from time compression. We saved the world. And yet I still can't make a difference in it."

"Irvine made his own choices. We can't do anything about that. I don't believe any further discussion will yield the results you want. Good day, Squall."

Cid picked up an ink pen and lowered his head to write on a document. Squall stared at him, wondering if Cid felt anything about this, or if he had seen so many missions that protocol was more important than the people he had built this Garden for, and Cid was telling him that was the lesson he should learn from this.

Cid looked up from his paper, knowing Squall was still there. "Dismissed, Commander Leonhart!"

Squall snapped to attention, saluted, and walked out.

--------------------------------------------------------------

Rinoa knocked on Dr. Kadowaki's door. The aging doctor looked up from her desk to see the black-haired girl cutely leaning forward in her doorway.

"Hi, doctor," she said meekly.

"Hello, Rinoa. How are you?" A sudden look of panic. "You're not here to try assisting me again, are you?"

"No, no. I decided not to pursue that line of work. I'm still trying to find my place in Garden, actually. Did you ever get that stain off the wall?" Rinoa asked sweetly, referring to the centrifuge incident.

Dr. Kadowaki turned to the wall in question and pointed. A framed poster of abstract art was hanging there.

"Oh."

"So, what brings you here today?" the doctor said in her professional medical demeanor.

"I was wondering about, um, Squall. He has some cuts on his knuckles, and I was wondering if he came in here for treatment."

"No, never heard if he did. But Squall doesn't always come down here for injuries, much as he should. What did it look like?"

"He said it was from a bite from a funguar."

"Uh-huh."

"And he always uses his gloves to hold his gunblade."

"Uh-huh."

"And, um, I got a call from the Balamb train station about somebody... wrecking the SeeD cabin car... on Monday," she breathed out. Rinoa swished her head back and forth, looking at the floor.

Dr. Kadowaki raised her eyebrow in curiosity. "These cuts. What did they look like?"

"Like blotches, they were thick and rough."

"Do you think they had that curved shape that a bite mark would have or from punching something."

"Punching," she mumbled.

"Uh-huh." Dr. Kadowaki put down her pen and clasped her hands together, looking right at Rinoa. "Tell me more about this cabin car thing."

"Um," Rinoa grabbed hold of her arm and let forth a shaky breath like she was holding back sobs. "I got a call a few days ago from the Balamb train station. They were calling about payment because the 'occupant' broke some of the beds, crushed the wall, the couch, um, some other stuff. But, but they never said that it was Squall. But it was on Monday, after I told him about Selphie and Irvine. And then they said that the phone number was what the occupant gave him... so..."

"I see."

"Would... would Squall do something like that?"

"Perhaps. I've noticed Squall's behavior sometimes when he is angry, he'll take it out on something else, like going to the training center, or punching a wall."

"Or wrecking a room?"

Dr. Kadowaki sighed and took off her glasses. "Perhaps. This incident happened on Monday right?"

Rinoa nodded.

"Well, I don't want to make any guesses, but it certainly seems likely. We all have different ways of coping with something, and this is Squall's way. No, it's not the healthiest way, but it works for someone like him. But in times of extreme emotion, someone taking out their anger on something else supersedes their ability to feel pain. They no longer care about their own well-being, just about getting the emotions out. They need to tire themselves out so their emotions fade out too. What Squall's doing is not about feeling pain, it's about control. People who do that have events or situations in their life that they just can't control. They feel helpless. They can't control their situation, they can't control their rage, but they can control the pain, and they can control themselves. At least that's one theory about why. You haven't noticed any incidents with others? Has he ever raised his hand to strike you?"

She shook her head. "Oh, god," Rinoa exclaimed as she thought of the possibilities. Her eyes became watery.

Dr. Kadowaki held out her hand to relax her. "Calm down. It's okay. I'm sure Squall is not that sort of person. I'm sure that this is just a reaction to the news about Selphie and Irvine. I heard about his blow-up. He might be lashing out. He has a strong, uncomfortable feeling that he can't find a name for. That's why he's been so destructive."

"What should I do?"

"Are these wounds fresh?"

"The only time I saw them was Tuesday."

"If it continues, get him to see me."

"No, I mean, what should I do?"

The doctor understood her mistake and reneged. "Oh, well..." She wasn't a psychologist, so she wasn't quite sure what to say.

"I mean," Rinoa said, "This is really different. Usually, if he's mad, he'll just punch the wall or something, or go to the training center. He won't destroy a room."

"Well, if he starts to lose his temper to that severity again, just get out of the room. I'm sure you know how to handle yourself."

"Is he psychotic? Does he want to kill somebody?"

"No. He's just trying to get some release. This is very unusual behavior for him, and if it were any other circumstances, I'd be worried, but this is a rather unusual situation. Its full of emotions. And if I know Squall, he's just not able to handle them yet. Just try and be there for him. Get him to face his problems. Let out his feelings. Just be there for him, encourage him to talk. You're the best thing in his life right now."

Rinoa nodded. She wasn't sure how she was going to deal with the taciturn Squall, but she had a little more information now and that kept her calm.

"Thank you, doctor."

"Anytime."

--------------------------------------------------------------

Zell bounded into the library, purpose furrowing his brow. Standing in the entryway, he cracked his knuckles under his fighting gloves. His hair was styled, his teeth were polished. The flirting tips he had found on the web had all been thoroughly memorized. He just had to remember to be confident. All right, let's make some magic, he thought, putting himself in stud mode.

Zell passed through the doorway. The library was rife with young ladies traipsing between bookcases, whispering in the corner, and studying at chairs. Some were in loose-fitting casual clothes, temperate for the season, others were in SeeD uniforms, looking very formal and professional. It seemed like a smorgasbord to Zell. How could he lose with so much variety?

"All right, which one of these lucky ladies gets a date with the Zellmeister," he whispered to himself, strengthening his resolve.

He strolled up to the library checkout girl. She was a thin, small teenager with short cropped yellow hair and oval-shaped eyes. Her skin was speckled with a few sun-induced beauty marks, but she had a pert smile and nice breasts. Zell propped his beefy arm on the counter as she bent down to put some books in a box.

She stood up and faced him, "Can I help you?"

"You can and will," he said glibly, flashing a toothy smile.

"Uh, do you need to check something out?"

"Are you available for check-out?"

The girl burst out laughing, doubling over, holding her side. She gripped onto the ridge of the counter to steady herself, then gave up and collapsed behind the desk, having hysterics. This was not the reaction Zell was looking for, as he watched her double up and spasm for nearly a minute, not sure what to do next. He was still waiting for an answer.

The girl took some short breaths, wiped the tears from her eyes, and composed herself. "Um, yeah, sorry, I've already been checked out. In fact, I'm a lost item."

"Oh," Zell said dejectedly. He guessed she was trying to say she was taken. He remembered his confidence and his tips. If they said no, it was their loss. "Your loss, baby," he scoffed and left the checkout counter.

Okay, that approach didn't work. No problem. He had a treasure trove of strategies to try. He scanned the panorama for a good successful candidate, listing them off in his head. Too old. Too young. Too mannish. Ick. Not sure if that one's a human or a Shumi.

Then he spotted a nice one at a reading table in the commons area, darting her eyes between her notebook and textbook. She had long brown hair and matching doe eyes. She looked very studious, not someone who could get through life on looks. Of course, that sort of person would not be hanging out in the library anyway. This time he would try for something more personal, to open with a tried-and-tested line, at least according to the website author.

"Hello," he said, trying for a pleasant tone. She immediately looked up. "You look like you're waiting for someone."

"I am!" she gleefully exclaimed. "I'm waiting for my study group. How did you know?"

Zell was about to say 'well, here I am' before she piped up. Now he was thrown off-kilter that she actually was waiting for someone. He had to just go with it, improvise at this point. "Well, um, er, I'm sick- uh, psychic. Do you study here a lot?"

"Every week. We study for Mr. Aki's math test. He gives a test every week, you know."

"Oh, yeah, I had that class," Zell said with genuine enthusiasm, momentarily forgetting his mission. He pulled out a chair and sat down, tired of leaning on it. "If it wasn't for study groups, we wouldn't have made it."

"Yeah, we were thinking of making it like a formal thing. Like if we could have a math tutoring room and students could come in and get help from upperclassmen."

"Hey, that's a good idea. Or like a night class, or-"

"Hey, Jen!"

The girl looked up and behind Zell at the blonde waving at her from the doorway.

She continued, "We're meeting in the Quad today. Didn't you get the memo?"

"Oh, shoot, I didn't check my mail." She scampered over her books, sliding them in her backpack and ran out, passing by Zell like he wasn't even there. Remembering her manners, she turned back and waved, "It was nice talking to you."

Zell waved back and smiled. Oh, shoot, he forgot. He was trying to pick her up. He got so wound up in the math class. Oh, well, couldn't dwell on that now. He was on a roll, and he was losing momentum by just sitting there. Next he tried diving into the bookcase.

A girl with glasses was in the G-J aisle, perusing the titles at a leisurely pace. She was in no particular hurry, just looking for the book number written on her piece of scratch paper. Thinking she found it, she grabbed by the spine and pulled it out. Zell's large face appeared behind the book, grinning madly. "Hi!"

"Eek!" she said as she jumped back into the other bookshelf.

"Are you checking that one out?" She said nothing as Zell filled in the void with rapid conversation, looking straight into her eyes. "That's a good one. It's hard to find too. I had to wait six months on the waiting list before I got it. I heard they bought more copies because there was so much demand for it."

"Uh-huh." She slowly took up her book and went towards the end of the aisle as Zell followed her parallel.

"That author used to be a Timber Maniacs writer until he got big. He traveled a lot on the Centra continent looking for ruins and such.

"Uh-huh," she said as she walked faster towards the checkout counter, clutching her book to her chest.

"Me and my friends went down to Centra one time when we found Garden was mobile and we found this huge old tower that was full of tonberries. You ever see a tonberry? No, probably not. Well, maybe in a book. They look kinda cute at first, but, man, do they ever pack a wallop when they get close. They kinda remind me of turtles without shells."

She stopped 'uh-huh'-ing and concentrated on the girl checking out her book as he kept on. "Cactuars are sorta the same way. I think he wrote a little about cactuars in that book, which is pretty rare, because they're so skittish, once you see one, it's usually gone. The only place I know where they are is on this island that's kinda east of Centra, where it's all desert, cause you know cactuars are desert creatures, obviously."

Having been checked out, she made a beeline for the door, almost running, while Zell held up his hand to her. "Yeah, he writes some good stuff in there. He... ok, see you later," he called to her as he stopped short of the doorway. That one had potential. He turned back into the library's main area.

He saw Xu happened to be in the library too, and was practically running up to him, gripping a book with her fingertips. "Zell, what are you doing?" she said in a harsh loud whisper.

"I'm trying to get some points for the Zellmeister," he explained confidently. "I'm just getting warmed up now, but I'll start racking up the ladies in no time."

"Zell, I don't think the library is the best place to pick up women."

"How come?"

Because they're smart, Xu thought, but there was no way she could say that nicely. "Well, people who come in here aren't looking for a date, they're looking to study. Their minds aren't into a real social state."

"Ohhh, I see." Man, he was never gonna find a date in time for the wedding.

"Whatever happened to the girl with pigtails? The one who gave us the mega-phoenix in Balamb."

"Oh, she moved to Galbadia Garden."

"Oh, sad."

"Yeah, and I still haven't gotten any responses to my online personal yet either."

Xu hated to cut down Zell's prospects. He meant so well, and his heart was in the right place, just his exuberance outweighed his good judgment and social skills.

"Come on," she said, "I'll buy you a hot dog."

"Really? All right!" he said as he pumped a fist in the air, much too loud for the library. At least he wasn't getting out of this empty-handed. If he couldn't have a girlfriend, he'd take a pity hot dog.

--------------------------------------------------------------

"Hey, Selphie."

Selphie turned around and found one of her female students and Garden Festival workers accosting her. Always eager to answer questions, she closed the gap. "What's up?"

"The festival stage construction. That shipment of mahogany wood we wanted is on back order, so we won't have it before the festival."

"Ha! At this point we'll have to chop down the trees ourselves," she joked. "Well, that's no problem, we can get another shipment of wood that they do have. And by then we can put everyone on its construction."

"Yep, exactly," the student agreed. "So, I'm wondering what wood we should get. I think the two best candidates are oak or cherry wood."

"Hmm, oak's traditional, but cherry looks so much more refined and cool."

"But it's more expensive."

"Maybe I can get some money scrounged up from donation. I think I know some friends in Timber who might be able to..."

Quistis, from behind the corner of the hallway out of Selphie's range, watched and listened to the exchange from her vantage point, drowning in a lake of worry.

Okay, she thought to herself, breathing deeply. Why am I so nervous? I'm a teacher, I shouldn't be this nervous, I don't get this way. Why am I nervous? Because it feels like I'm betraying a friend. More accurately, I'm stabbing her in the back. But I can't live a lie, I can't pretend to be something I'm not. Those morals superceded her own emotions, their truism was larger than that. I've got do this for my own peace of mind.

Selphie's and the student's tones of voice were indicating they were ending their conversation. They said goodbye to each other and Selphie started walking down the hall toward her. Now was her chance. Quistis turned the corner and walked up to Selphie.

"Oh, hi, Quisty," she started.

"Selphie, I need to talk to you."

"Okay."

"This is really hard for me to say... but I can't be the maid of honor at your wedding. I just can't support this decision. You're making it too fast."

Selphie's eyes widened. "But, Quisty, you can't just quit like that, not with only a week..."

"I'm sure one of the other girls will want to do it. Here," she took Selphie's hand and put the wedding ring that was entrusted to her back in her palm. "I'm sorry, I just couldn't stand up there with you and defend your decision to marry Irvine. Not like this."

"Well, I guess I can't make you be my maid of honor if you don't want. Bummer." She dropped her hand, enclosed around the ring.

"I just don't think you realize what you are doing. You seem so 'not ready for this'. Like, so unhappy."

"I am happy. I've just been kinda... overwhelmed."

"Do you think it's right to be doing this?" Quistis was asking her as an individual, without any prejudice or influences of others. "So fast? You're getting married so fast after just finding out."

"I think it's right." Her tone of voice made it hard to distinguish if she was confident with her thought.

"Selphie? Quistis? What's going on?" Rinoa walked down the hall and ran into the two of them. Each of them looked like they were about to cry.

Quistis said, "I just told Selphie I couldn't be her maid of honor at her wedding because I don't think what she's doing is right. Or at least it's not something I can go along with."

Rinoa shrugged. "Quistis does have a point. We all have some misgivings about it. Not just you, but Irvine too."

"What about Irvine?" Selphie said, "Irvine's very happy, he's positively glowing. Didn't you see him before he went to training? Didn't you see him when we told you?"

Rinoa said, "I think he's more concerned about what other people think of him."

Quistis said, "With this, he'll never be the same."

"You'll never be the same," Rinoa added. "And your decision making hasn't been exactly straight."

"How do you think you're going to come back to SeeD after the baby? After a year? Nobody's come back after six months. And who's going to take care of it? Pay for it? You can't ask Garden to do these things."

Selphie's eyes kept on the floor the whole time. "I'm sure I'll think of something. Look, I've got some things to do. I've got to finish some event planning before Irvine comes back. Bye, guys." She grabbed her stuff and stepped in between them to go down the center of the hall. She wasn't hurrying, she just left as if she had been in friendly conversation and run out of time.

"I didn't mean to make it into an interrogation," Quistis said. "Lord knows she's already had that from Squall. I mean, I meant to do it later, to sit her down. It just came out. I wish I didn't have to do that."

"She needed it," Rinoa said, squeezing her arm reassuringly.

"Yeah, but we shouldn't have been the ones to tell her. I mean, it's hard enough for her as it is. We can't possibly know what she's going through."