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At
an Arm's Length
A Final Fantasy VIII Story
by
Aligator
Chapter 21 - Black
At the whistle’s signal, the train lurched forward suddenly, propelling Quistis further into the plush seat of the official SeeD cabin. The corners of her mouth twitched slightly as she remembered her departure, yesterday, from Esthar.
Everyone, from Laguna and Kiros to Ellone, Estella and the newly-established Estharian Secret Service chapter of the Trepies (groan!) had shown up to see her off. Oh! I forgot to open the package ‘Stella gave me.
She reached into her briefcase and pulled out a small gift-wrapped package with a card attached. “Hope your Valentine’s Day is ‘lucky.’” Oh, Hyne. She’s more worried about my social life than I’ll ever be, Quistis grimaced to herself, and she opened the box to reveal a small vial of the trendiest new, pheromone-enhanced perfume.
The door’s lock jiggled, quietly, and Quistis struggled, but didn’t quite succeed, in cramming the package – wrapping paper and all – back into her carry-on before Irvine ambled lazily into the cabin.
“That stuff works, y’know,” he stated nonchalantly, before flopping down on the seat across from her.
She raised her head to face him, but her eyes stopped mid-roll when she caught her traveling companion’s unusual expression. “What you looking at?”
“You.”
“Why?”
“Why’d you do it?” He asked, reaching over to touch the loosely curled strands of blond hair that just brushed the upright collar of her SeeD uniform.
Quistis’ confident façade faltered slightly before she looked him in the eye and answered, quietly, but deliberately. “I decided it was time for a change.” Time to keep some promises.
“A baby step?”
She grinned slightly. “A baby step.”
The cowboy flicked up the brim of his hat and smiled broadly. “Then you’ll have to let ‘Irvine the Matchmaker’ set you up when we get to Deling so you can see for yourself how well that perfume works.”
“Irvine the Matchmaker? Does Selphie know about these activities?” she teased.
He crowed, “Hell, Selphie encourages these activities, particularly where you’re concerned!”
Quistis burst out laughing. “I’m thinking I’m glad for everyone’s sanity that this gig will be over well before Valentine’s. I don’t want to deal with you two as we get closer to that day.”
She leaned back into her recliner and looked at her watch. “You know, we’d better rest while we can. This summit is focusing on Galbadian war reparations, so we can pretty much guarantee that there will be some kind of trouble.”
“Personally, I don’t think that will be the biggest topic of discussion,” Irvine mused, settling himself under his travel blanket. “You did know that Laguna is proposing they pardon Seifer Almasy for his war crimes.”
“Hmmhm. In absentia,” she murmured, as she turned out the overhead light.
“What do you think about that?”
“Well . . . It makes sense, given that they pardoned Edea. . .”
“No, Quistis,” he interrupted evenly. “I mean, what do you think?”
He heard a soft sigh, followed by a brief silence.
Quistis gently bit her lip, “I … They’re making the right decision . . . I just hope that – ”
“He hasn’t done anything to himself, or that someone else hasn’t done it for him, yet?”
“Yes.” She turned her head just a shade so she was facing the window rather than Irvine.
“Me, too. Have you had much more luck with your memory?”
The unexpected answer, followed by such an unexpected question, was too much for her to play cool, and she sat upright, rubbing her eyes to head off unshed tears. “Not much. Just little bits here and there,” she responded, attempting to at least sound casual.
“Well, since most other people won’t tell you this, I will,” Irvine began, and she moved a little closer to the edge of her seat. “The Almasy I remember could be a brat, a bully and a pain in the ass – often in quick succession – but Quistis, he wasn’t a bad guy at heart. Y’know how I know this?”
She responded with a slight shake of her head.
“He was always loyal to Matron, but he loved you. Even then, as a kid, he’d have followed either of you through the depths of hell, if he thought there was a just a chance he could protect you.” He reached over and squeezed her hand. “Unfortunately, he ended up doing just that. . . But even when he was under the sorceress’ spell, he couldn’t strike the final blow against you.”
Quistis’ gaze dropped to her and Irvine’s clasped hands. She whispered, “You were there?” Without looking up, she could tell he was nodding to the affirmative. “Did you hear what I said to him?”
“No, but I can tell you what I saw.”
What you saw? “What you saw?”
Her confusion made something painfully apparent to the sharpshooter. She didn’t see it happen. God in heaven. She didn’t see what was happening *around* her. Around *him.*
“I was covering you – remember? – in the caves or passage ways, or whatever, in Lunatic Pandora, looking for him. Well, you got pretty far ahead of me, and you had been battling him for quite some time when I finally got there. . .”
We fought and fought. I was low on magic and had been hurt during previous encounters, so I was worn out, and eventually, he knocked Save the Queen away from me.
“Quistis, you had been knocked to the ground, and he was standing over you with his gunblade drawn. I raised Exeter as he pulled back to strike, but before I could squeeze the trigger, you were both surrounded by a blue light. Neither of you seemed to notice and continued talking. I couldn’t hear what you and he were saying.”
“So, Instructor. . . am I still your favorite student?”
*I hate being weak in front of Almasy. Hate. It.*
“You *were* my favorite,” I choked out, softly, almost to myself. “Not any more.”
My eyes widened, and I looked up at him. The gleam of the gunblade. . .
“Instead of striking you, he dropped it. It was like I was watching a video tape being played in slow motion. He dropped his gunblade and stared at you,” Irvine said solemnly. He gave her hand another squeeze. “For a split second, Seifer – the Seifer we knew, not the monster created by Adel and Sorceress Edea – Seifer was back.”
“Irvine, I said something so horrible to him. . .”
“But he couldn’t kill you. He didn’t want to. It was his will crashing through all of their brainwashing, and he wouldn’t kill you.” If I weren’t holding your hand, I wouldn’t know you are shaking, Irvine thought has he moved across the small aisle to sit next to her and drape his blanket around her narrow shoulders.
“I ran into him, in Time Compression,” she shuddered. “He apologized to me, but I never. . .”
“Quis, I think he knows. Wherever he is. . . he knows,” Irvine said softly, as he gently tapped her head into a resting position on his shoulder and fluffed her new, shorter 'do in a brotherly fashion.
*****
“All SeeD personnel at attention. Please respond to the affirmative, if you’ve reached your post and fully checked in.”
Irvine smirked to himself as he peered down at his commanding officer from his hiding place on the parapet. You have to hand it to Quistis: If Selphie and I weren’t her best friends, we’d never know that she had so much personal stuff going on.
“Tilmitt?”
“Check!” He heard his girlfriend’s voice answer.
Quistis continued her brusque roll call and, as was customary, reached his name last. “Kinneas?”
He quickly surveyed the now-empty room and tested his ability to adjust Exeter’s position one last time. “Check.”
“All right,” answered the disembodied voice in his earpiece. “This is perhaps the most critical day of the summit, since President Loire is planning to call for a vote on the proposal to pardon Seifer Almasy. It should go without saying: Be on highest alert at all times, and do not let your personal feelings affect your ability to do your job as a SeeD. Commence radio silence, unless you are talking to me. Over and out.”
The assembly room’s ancient clock started ringing. . . it was 10 p.m. “Open the front doors.” By the tenth chime, the room was full, and Quistis had given the command to lock down the entryway. Irvine loosened the stiff collar of his uniform and drummed his fingers on the overhang’s wooden trim, high above the podium where Laguna Loire was to call for the controversial vote.
“Kinneas? How do we look?”
“Fine so far, Trepe. Give me just one more second, before you give the signal.” His eagle-sharp eyes now surveyed the crowded chamber. “Nothing obvious. Crane? Shepherd?”
“Yes, sir,” answered his subordinate marksmen, from their opposite, triangular points.
“We clear?”
“Yes, sir.” “Yes, sir.”
“It’s showtime, Trepe.”
She scanned the tension-fraught room one last time herself, before giving the command to Kiros’ men. “President Loire may make his entrance at any time.”
Esthar’s secret service flanked the former journalist as he took the stage and made his way to the lectern.
Without a hitch. Kinneas lightly knocked on wood, when something metallic flashed in the crowd below and opposite him. “Trepe. On the main floor, 2 o’clock, fourth row from the back, third seat from the outside aisle.”
“On it.”
He saw plainclothes SeeD quietly make their way to surround the stranger in question. He blinked when he saw movement in the citizen’s gallery directly across from him. He shifted Exeter,training it on the area.
“Trepe, we’ve got a live one. I’m taking aim. Twelve o’clock, citizen’s balcony.”
“Squad Two, surround the suspect at that location immediately.”
“Crane, Shepherd, keep an eye on the crowd below,” Irvine continued. “Aw, shit, he’s drawing.” He quickly fired a stun round at the suspect, and a ruckus developed on the side of the room opposite from where the first suspect was located.
Simultaneously, SeeD moved to block all of the room’s exits and armed security surrounded Laguna.
And he’s on the run! Irvine cocked his rifle, this time loaded with real bullets, and prepared to abandon his position as soon as Esthar’s secret service gave their clear.
“Loire secure.”
Quistis’ voice came on line, “Hold until I’ve closed in on him. The hallway he’s trying to reach is a dead end. Let him into it, and we’ll corner him without civilians in the line of fire. Exit A-2, let him out, NOW!”
She followed close on the third suspect’s heels, and Irvine vaulted down from his perch to cover her with his long-range sites enabled. She scrambled expertly through the twisting passageway, until the footsteps of her prey ceased.
“Kinneas. I don’t hear him running anymore.”
“Hold up. I’m right behind you. I’m enabling my night vision.”
“The dead end is just around the corner. I’ll wait.”
In the dim light, Quistis leaned against the wall, tightened her grip on Save the Queen and allowed her eyes to adjust to the darker scenery. She heard a shuffle along the opposite wall and caught a dull flash of blue light. Seifer?!
“Quistis! To your right! QUISTIS!”
*****
Seifer bolted out of his bed at the sound of frantic pounding on his door. Before he could reach it, Rai and Fu burst in.
“SEIFER!”
“Seifer! You O.K., man?”
“YELLING!”
He looked down at his hands and realized they were shaking – adrenaline – and collapsed on a chair by his kitchen table, his head in his hands. I don’t think this was a dream. I need to know why. *I need to know if she’s O.K.*
He heard someone running the tap and felt gentle hands place a cool cloth lightly about his neck before his two friends quietly left the room. A few minutes later, he did the same. He felt an irresistible need to see the night sky. It always calmed him. It was one of the few things he still shared with the rest of humanity.
But tonight, the sky was black.
I
know someday you’ll have a beautiful life
I know you’ll be a star \ In somebody
else’s sky
Why? \ Why? \ Why can’t it be mine?
— Pearl Jam (Lyrics by Eddie Vedder)
To be continued. . .
Next week: Chapter 22 — Journeyman
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Official Disclaimer:
AT AN ARM'S LENGTH © 2002-2004 A.L.
Roberts.
FINAL FANTASY VIII © Squaresoft. They own these characters,
I’m
just borrowing them for a little bit. Buy their games, and give them your
money!
Lyrics by Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam. The song "Black"
appears on their album Ten.
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