It’s been building up for weeks now – or more, if he has to admit it to himself – and the more he thinks about it, the worse he feels. He can’t seem to do anything about it either, except treat everybody else like shit. He knows he’s wrong, but everything is just so… annoying.

This mission. Oh, what a mess he makes of everything. He yells at his party members for not timing the Awakening correctly, he fumes when they don’t manage to kick the rare Chim Chim in time, he cuts them off as soon as they try to make conversation. (Of course they stop trying.)

Even kindhearted and understanding Silabus has to give up in exasperation. He says something about “going back to the @HOME to hang out with Gaspard ” and disappears, leaving Haseo alone with Yata in the middle of the dungeon.

The two of them stare at each other.

Haseo’s shoulders drop, and he sighs.

“I should go apologize to him,” he says, and moves towards the portal. “And.. you too, Yata. I’m sorry.”

“Is there anything you want to talk about?” Yata asks awkwardly, and Haseo cringes.

Well, maybe he should. Maybe that would actually help. “Yeah…” he says slowly. “Yeah, but no offense, I think I’ll try to get a hold of Pi for that. Thanks, though.”

Pi? The hell did that come from? But sure. That might work.

Yata smiles. “Of course”, he says with that dark voice of his, and teleports out. There’s no use to continue with the mission on his own, so Haseo sighs again and logs out to check his email.

There is none.

That doesn’t improve his mood.

**

Later the same day, he steels himself, logs in, and sends a party invitation to Pi. She arrives promptly and greets him solemnly.

“Did Yata mention…?” he asks her, but Pi shakes her head.

“I haven’t talked to him today. Mention what?”

“Ah, it’s nothing,” Haseo says and scratches the back of his head. “Let’s go.”

He picks a rather easy area, ostensibly to find the next chaotic PK for the bounty hunter campaign – and there also seem to be a couple of players there who haven’t yet had Bikman’s latest flyer thrust upon them. Perfect.

Pi cocks her head questioningly when she realizes they’ll go like this, without a third member to complete the party, but she says nothing. She continues saying nothing throughout the mission, except for bursting out the occasional “Ol Repth”.

The silence is companionable rather than strained, and Haseo doesn’t break it either.

“Poison Lei Lei” is a joke, even with only the two of them. After she’s been sent on her way, Haseo and Pi quickly wipe out the remaining enemies and collect the symbol fragments.

Pi sits down just outside of the Beast temple instead of continuing in to the treasure. She pats the stone next to her, and waits for him to join her.

“So what’s wrong?” she wonders. Her uncanny way of figuring out what he thinks is one of the reasons he decided he could talk to her rather than anybody else, but it still startles him that he’s so transparent to her.

“What can I help you with?” Her left hand sneaks up to position her glasses correctly as she waits for him to begin, and she continues to fiddle with them as is her unconscious habit.

“Old hag…” he doesn’t say, because he doesn’t really think of her that way any more. It’s just his habit now – but not really the best way to start when he is earnestly looking for advice.

Instead he starts with, “About Endrance” – and then he stops again, because what about Endrance?

“Or rather”, he says, “Well, I’ve really changed my mind about how I think about him since when we first met, you know?”

That’s another false start, because what Haseo thinks about him is not the only issue here.

Pi just looks at him, saying nothing.

“Do you think he’s serious about.. all those things?” he tries.

He can’t bring himself to spell out what “those things” really are. He’ll try this from yet another angle.

“It would be nice,” he says, “to meet up offline. After all that’s happened, all the things we’ve done together in the World, and..”

..but Endrance wavers in his conviction, Haseo doesn’t tell Pi. Endrance does say he wants to meet up, but nothing ever happens and it could be that..

And Haseo has to start over again. “I trust him. I do. But you know, online is online and…”

And it’s so easy to play a role, he can’t say either, because the thought of it hurts.

The easiest thing ever, to just keep pretending to be someone you have decided to be. It’s just online. It’s just a game. Endrance is just a character, and his player might just be making the most of…

“I mean…”, Haseo says and trails off again. He doesn’t know how to continue this disjointed, rambling, stupid explanation. Half of it is still left unsaid because it is all so stupid, so he just falls silent.

He turns away from Pi, crosses his arms over his chest and stares fixedly at the portal and thinks to himself that this was a particularly bad idea. He’ll just go offline instead, and stay offline for a while, and maybe that will stop him from being both a mess and an ass.

Pi still gets it. She laughs quietly and it is not unkind.

“Didn’t you tell me he was a shut-in?”, she asks, and Haseo has to nod. Confirmed by Yata, at that, because nobody who spends that much time online can have a normal offline life.

“I don’t know for certain what he is and what he isn’t,” she says with finality, and of course he knew that already (even though he feels a sting of disappointment, like a punch to the stomach)

He still lets his arms fall down to rest a little more relaxed in his lap. It helps to hear it from someone else, somehow.

“…but don’t you think you owe it to yourself to find out?”

She isn’t half bad, this old hag. They fetch the treasure – another piece of low level light armor for Gaspard to sell off – and Haseo logs out. He has some thinking to do.

**

Haseo tells Endrance at the end of a mission. He has considered writing an email first, but quickly decided he would probably go batshit having to wait for an answer where Endrance could still have ignored to reply to that particular little question.

“Next weekend”, he says and grits his teeth. He hopes the motion doesn’t carry through to his PC.

“Mmm…?” Endrance wonders.

“If you’re not busy, that is,” Haseo amends.

“I’m free… But even if I weren’t, I’d take time for Haseo…” Endrance says dreamily.

“Oh come on, you don’t even know what I’m gonna ask,” Haseo says angrily, then tells himself to cool down.

Endrance smiles. “If it is for Haseo, it doesn’t matter what it is… I would do anything for Haseo…”

Haseo stares at the other guy and – as usual – doesn’t really know how to answer that. It could confirm either of his two theories about Endrance and the uncertainty of it all pisses him off to no end.

Because of this, his voice is sharper than he had intended it when he explains “I’m coming over to visit you. IRL. If.. that’s.. okay..?”

Haseo can hear, even through the M2D’s voice filtering, the sharp intake of breath from Endrance.

“Haseo….” he answers with a radiant smile on his face. That is a good sign, isn’t it?

Endrance makes one of his overly elaborate bows while saying one of his usual lines about their hearts being connected, or at least Haseo thinks that’s what he’s saying. His own heart is beating too loud right now and he can’t really focus on what’s happening.

They agree on the details, and if there is also an edge of hysteria to Endrance’s voice when he says he’ll mail over his home address, Haseo doesn’t want to think too much about what that means. Not yet.

**

Endrance’s mother is happy to see him. “You must be Misaki-kun,” she says, grinning like a fool, and invites him in.

“Nice to meet you,” he smiles stiffly, and hopes that Ichinose-san will see it as the sign of nervousness it is. He hands over a small box with the cake he brought as a gift for her and tries to quiet his heartbeat down.

She leads the way up to Endrance’s room and tells the closed door that “Your friend is here now” – and she relishes the word friend, he can tell that much – and that she’ll come back with food or a snack or some fruit later on. Then she leaves Haseo to stare at the door

He can’t focus on anything except the feelings of dread in the pit of his stomach. They rise with the bile at the back of his throat, and he wants to turn and run. What the hell is he doing here anyway? This is a bad idea. A really bad idea.

Then there’s no more time for thoughts; the door opens and “Wow, you’re tall!”, Haseo hears himself say, and then he curses because what the hell kind of greeting is that? But Endrance is tall, and thin, and has an unexpected mop of unruly blond hair covering half his face and he both is and isn’t exactly what Haseo had expected. Somehow, Endrance can’t really be anything else than this fair-boned stranger.

“Haseo!” Endrance gasps, as if surprised that his visitor actually arrived. A pink blush spreads on his pale, pale cheeks and he lets Haseo in.

At least the shut-in part seems to be true. He’s like a ghost. Haseo barely dares to breathe in fear that this stick-thin man will shatter.

“Nice to meet you, Kaoru-kun”, Haseo – Ryou now, he reminds himself, now that they are offline – mutters and tries to force his own awkward blush away from his cheeks.

It doesn’t really work; he can feel his face heat up even more by the added embarrassment of actually blushing in front of someone else, but Endrance – Kaoru – isn’t watching him right now anyway. He is walking around inside his room, fidgeting, moving items from one place to another and back again. His movements are awkward and almost clumsy but Ryou can still see some of Endrance’s grace underneath.

Finally he settles down in his computer chair, which leaves only the bed for Ryou. Ryou makes himself comfortable – which causes another fresh bout of blushing, but plopping down on the floor would be really weird – and lets his eyes sweep through the room.

It’s medium-sized, sparkling clean, not really what he expected – but then again he doesn’t know what he expected. Piles and piles of manga or Gundam models? Kaoru is really only interested in The World, so what use would he have for stuff like that?

Kaoru doesn’t say much more after the initial greeting, leaving an uncomfortable silence for Ryou to fill.

He tells Kaoru about his part-time job at the small convenience store, and that he doesn’t really need the money but wants something to do with his time. Then he winces, because that makes it sound like The World and his friends there aren’t enough – but Kaoru doesn’t comment on it.

He tells Kaoru about Shino, how she’s fully recovered now and doing fine – and Kaoru breathes “I’m happy to hear that…”. He tells Kaoru that he still doesn’t know exactly what happened to Ovan.

He tells Kaoru that Pi, Kuhn and Yata are planning an offline party and “it would be really cool if you’d come too. Kuhn’s inviting all the girls in his address book,” he laughs, “but I really doubt they’ll come.”

“Atoli insisted on inviting Sakaki too,” he continues with a grimace. “Apparently he lost all his memories of… well, AIDA, so he’s back to being a pompous bastard who doesn’t even know we already kicked his ass.”

Kaoru smiles, but doesn’t respond to the invitation. Ryou hadn’t really expected him to either, but he had to try.

Soon Ryou runs out of topics, because, really, how long can you keep up a conversation on your own? Unless you’re Atoli talking about kindness and world peace and Moon Tree and Sakaki, he guesses. Instead he suggests playing The World, and Kaoru jumps on the idea.

Endrance is unusually quiet while playing as well. There are none of his usual more or less risque comments. Even Alkaid, whom they invited as the third party member, points this out. Haseo tells her to kindly shut up and go kill that goblin instead, and she agrees with a boisterous laugh. He expects to have to send her an explanatory email later tonight, but that’s for later.

It’s weird hearing Endrance’s usual almost feminine lilt through the M2D and at the same time Kaoru’s real voice from just a meter away. The tones aren’t too different, but Kaoru sounds a bit more unsure, a bit more rough. The discordance between off- and online is jarring, and Ryou finds himself being distracted to the point of almost dying at one time. Endrance heals him up quickly, though, with a worried tone to his healing spells that is reflected by Kaoru as well.

The session is good, though. They manage to find a couple of monsters to fill in the Books of 1000, and Haseo maxes his scythe skill level.

**

It’s getting late, and it is time for Ryou to leave. He packs down his M2D in the laptop bag, and Kaoru follows him to the door.

As Ryou puts on his shoes, Kaoru starts speaking.

“Thank you… for coming to visit me…” he says. “I had… a really good time with Haseo… I will treasure this day… even if we never meet again like this…”

Something breaks inside of Ryou when he hears this. This is his Endrance coming through at last, and Ryou knows he has to do something now or it’ll be too late.

“I like you”, Ryou says, and is surprised himself by the words slipping out. I didn’t… I shouldn’t.. he thinks, and is prepared to just joke this away, but then he sees the look on Kaoru’s face and can’t.

Kaoru just looks at him. His eyes are very big and he looks incredibly vulnerable, as if prepared for Ryou to finish him off here and now. Ryou stares back. He doesn’t break eye contact, won’t do it until he knows.

“I really like you,” Ryou continues, “so if.. If all the things you’re saying to me online is just part of the game then… I’m sorry for spoiling that.”

“It’s okay if it’s just your character, ” he wills himself to say even though it would definitely not be. “We’re still friends. I just… needed to tell you this.”

..and then a radiant smile breaks out on Kaoru’s face before he steps forward, and lifts his hand to gently touch Ryou’s cheek, the way he always almost does but never dare to finish online.

Ryou closes his eyes. He grabs Kaoru’s hand which is still hovering shyly without touching a centimeter or two away, and presses it to his cheek. The fingers are cool to his burning skin.

He opens his eyes again, and smiles more gently than he thought himself capable of. He lets Kaoru’s hand go – it falls down to flail ineffectively at Kaoru’s side – and moves in to close the final distance between them. He takes a deep breath before he reaches up, grabs Kaoru’s shoulders, and kisses him.

It’s weird, at first, and he wonders again what the hell he’s doing. Kaoru stands perfectly still. He doesn’t push him away, but neither does he respond, and it’s.. it’s just weird.

I’m moving too fast, Ryou thinks. I’m doing it all wrong again.

Then Kaoru snaps out of his stupor and responds in kind, and all those thoughts evaporate.

He notices, somehow, how the door behind Kaoru – the kitchen door? – opens and then quickly closes again, but can’t bring himself to care.

“Next time”, Ryou says when he finally breaks away, because he seriously, really has to leave now before he misses his last train. Before he’d… do something which would definitely be moving too fast. “Next time you visit me. Give me a call.”

He doesn’t look back, but he walks away feeling revitalized. The grin on his face must light up entire blocks.

This is the right thing to do.

He’s brave, strong, smart, the best friend she could ever hope for; he’s just a kid worthy, more than anyone else. She’ll probably never grow to love him like he loves her, and this is wrong, wrong the happy ending they deserve.

Now’s the time. She follows him out to watch the sunset and… I can’t do this, she panics, until…

There’s Zuko, watching her over Mai’s shoulder. He grins, a strange crooked smile and he knows, and strangely this makes it bearable.

Katara nods.  If he can do it, why wouldn’t she?

Yuffie poked one of these arms with a stick, and noted with morbid fascination how fragments of it peeled off like cracked paint. Though anyone choosing to paint anything whatsoever in this particular color ought to go get their eyes checked. Or their brains, preferably.

Inside the bar and barely visible through the dark window, Cid – who had just arrived with the latest shipment of assorted alcoholic beverages for Tifa – and Barret had a lively arm-wavingly exciting conversation about… something. Whatever. Like she cared; she’d stopped paying attention when she realized she’d been hanging around for fifteen long, dull minutes and neither of the older men had mentioned anything remotely interesting. Cloud had been there too, a few chairs away: he was sipping on a dazzling green ‘Mako Dynamite’ while taking down notes on something that seemed important, and from time to time he’d inject some opinion or other into the conversation before returning to his drink and notebook.

And then Cid had lit up another one of his nasty cigarettes. God, they stunk; she even preferred hanging out in dingy Chocobo stables left unmucked for a week to these noxious fumes. One would think that Cid could afford to buy some high class brand of tobacco after all that happened, but no, he had to be contrary and roll his own from goddamn poisonous monster parts. Yeah, well, if he wouldn’t even extend the common courtesy of not smoking in a lady’s company – shut up Barrett, none of those faces – she sure didn’t see a reason to stay and grace them with her presence.

She evacuated the building pinching her nose pointedly, but alas, Cid didn’t even notice the death glare she sent him. Must be another unfortunate side effect of those damn cigarettes; they were slowly killing his brain cells and his perception – yeah, whatever perception an old man like him could have left anyway – along with his lungs.

Come to think of it, that puke over there could very well have been left by one of Cid’s crewmates. Or they were probably used to it by now, would have to be, ’cause Cid sure never listened to anyone’s complaints. Wow, the mere thought of being confined aboard an airship together with Cid and his smokes again was enough to make her stomach protest, and she felt all unsettled and wobbly.

No fear! The great Yuffie Kisaragi does not succumb to mere queasiness that easily! Instead she returned to her previous activities, and stabbed a particularly misshapen yellow clot vehemently – for great justice! In the process she discovered that someone seem to have eaten a bad curry sausage recently. Well, nice, that sure made her feel less nauseated.

Maybe she’d eaten a bad curry sausage herself, ’cause now she really needed to sit down. Preferably in front of the great porcelain god, worshiping it with all her might, maybe even offering up a few undigested sacrifices.

A thought came over her right then, and she got the weirdest feeling that something was off, horribly off; maybe it wasn’t just her stomach being sensitive all of a sudden after all this ‘sensory overload’ but something else entirely. So she sat down on the sidewalk with her head between her knees and tried to will the nausea to pass so she could focus on finding out the source of the tiny tendrils of wrongness twisting around in her intestines instead.

…and that’s when the door to the bar opened and Cloud marched out. His face was twisted into something ugly and angry, and he would’ve passed Yuffie by without acknowledging or even noticing her presence if she hadn’t looked up and greeted him with a weak “heya!”

For a moment or two she regretted making herself heard – Cloud spun around to face her and she saw his violent scowl for a fraction of a second until it turned into something else she couldn’t quite place – but she shrugged away her discomfort. She never were one to back away from a challenge, and this was Cloud.

“What’s the big deal?” she croaked and winced at the sound of her own voice. “Someone died or something?”

Cloud’s face fell and Yuffie mentally smacked herself. That’s really, really sensible, Yuffie babe, she thought, especially to him, especially after Aeris. Maybe she should just go back to playing with vomit again, that seemed to suit her current level of maturity.

Which lead nicely into having her stomach starting heaving again. Seriously, if this continued it was gonna make her throw a temper tantrum in the not too distant future. If it was something she hated it was losing control. Especially over her body, damnit.

She looked up at Cloud again. He still looked upset, but… it wasn’t directed at her, she realized.

“I,” he started, and then paused to take a deep breath. He smiled a little, then. It was a very lopsided, sad smile, and Yuffie’s heart started pounding like crazy in her chest as he opened his mouth to try again.

Oh no, Yuffie’s mind told her. Oh no, no, no! She knew, and it was bad, so bad, she didn’t want this no matter what had happened. Her stomach started dancing again and she swallowed, fuck this. “It’s my father,” she said almost inaudibly, cutting him off so she didn’t have to hear it, and she knew by the way Cloud drew his breath that she was correct. Not that she needed the confirmation; she knew.

She looked down at her feet then and noted absentmindedly that she’d have to buy new shoe laces pretty soon: these ones were worn out and frayed and only went three quarters of the way up her leg by now and would probably disintegrate any moment leaving her with shoes falling off right when she’d be charging toward an enemy and she’d trip and fall face down and skewer herself on the conformer, and that’d be an embarrassing end for her, especially if someone, like, say, Vincent would find her half-eaten remains. And not to mention, then he’d see with his own eyes that she had indeed been lying when she said she had no idea where the Odin Materia was. Not that it would matter by then, but it was the principle of the thing. You know, don’t get caught, ever.

“…and when Cid finally told me, just now, I wanted to strangle him,” Cloud was saying with his face contorted into an angry red knot, and he’d probably been talking for a while but Yuffie had no idea what he’d said.

“They’ve been calling,” she said, quickly, quietly, before he could ramble on even more and she would have to hit him to just shut him up, “but I never answered.”

Poke. Stab that bastard of a sausage, stab it dead.

Cloud was silent now, and stared helplessly at her.

“They keep bugging me about coming home,” she tried to explain, to herself and to Cloud and to Godo. “Always the same. ‘You need to fulfill your duties here,’ blah, blah, whatever. But I got better things to do with my time and they’d never shut up so I just stopped listening. But I never wanted it to… Didn’t want him to…” She stopped herself there, and shook her head. Don’t say it out loud; it’ll make it come true.

Yeah, and if I stay quiet it’ll all go away. I do believe in fairy tales, I do.

“Is there… still time?” Please please please, say there’s something I can do, please.

Cloud shrugged mutely. “Cid just said it was bad. I’ll… call them if you don’t want to talk to them right now? But you need to go home, Yuffie. Even if he’s… especially if…”

“Yeah, I know.” Yuffie stood up again, and stared dismally at the stick in her hand. Ew. “Yeah. Please call them. I need to…” Her voice trailed off and she looked at Cloud. Need to what?

He seemed to understand, though, even though she didn’t. He nodded. “I’ll take care of it.” And indeed, he was already keying in a number on his PHS and Yuffie slunk away, first toward the bar but no, not Cid or Barret, not now it’d be too much. She ran and ran, picking up her speed and weaving through the folk masses and maybe she pushed a few people out of her way (get away and leave me alone) and after an undetermined amount of time she looked up and found herself at the airport staring at the Highwind. There was a lump of something hot and dry and heavy in her chest and she didn’t know what to do, what do you do when your annoying, overbearing, useless father is dying?, and then Tifa was there, calm and sad and warm, and she just held out her arms, and Yuffie finally cried.

Quistis had always considered herself rather
patient and understanding, but she found herself more and more
lacking in both areas as the days flew by and they still had that
ominous threat of future sorceresses looming over them. Well, maybe
she wasn’t expected to understand the reasoning of someone bent on
destroying time, but it still bugged her, like the proverbial sore
tooth, that she couldn’t figure Ultimecia out.

As for patience, she suspected she’d spent it all
on her favorite problem students.

And now she was left on the Ragnarok while Squall,
Rinoa and Zell were off doing God knows what – something about a
research center, here, in the middle of the sea; she would’ve
loved to come along, it was right up her alley, but she would
have to let her broken arm heal a little longer first. Damn those
Malboros for being so selfish about their tentacles, and damn herself
for being so stubbornly decided on getting them too, for that matter.
(It had been worth it, though, she thought and touched the coiled-up
whip hanging at her waist lovingly. She just… didn’t need to think
about the details. Ugh.)

Selphie and Irvine were left aboard too, but she
didn’t dare to visit the cockpit. Her poor virgin eyes would probably
burst from the experience, judging by the excited giggling and…
other sounds she could hear filtering down.

She made another round of the premises, measuring
up step by precise step, and she could feel her face slipping into
Instructor mode again. Down the stairs, click, click, click said her
high heels against the hard floor, and she made her way over to the
air lock.

I wonder what it must’ve been like, she
thought idly, resting her fingertips lightly against the door
mechanism. Lost in space, just the two of them, and then a big
mechanical dragon appearing from nowhere; coming to save them like a
true deus ex machina. And for at least that moment, they were
alone in a new world just for them. Being born anew, huh? Well, at
least it seemed like Squall had been.

Damn! She formed her hand into a tight fist
and punched the wall. At least it worked as a distraction against
those tears springing unbidden to her eyes; it hurt, but physical
pain she could deal with.

Alone on the space ship serving as a monument to
Squall’s and Rinoa’s love? No, there existed far better places for
her to be right now, and that probably included being right back in
battle against the tentacled beast (even though she still had a bad
taste lingering like a hangover in her brain).

But it wasn’t like her to mope like this. Chin up,
deep breath, turn around and walk back to your cabin – and there’s Laguna behind you with a frown on his face.

Right. She’d totally forgotten about the
Esthar president, and some of that confusion must’ve slipped through
to her face, because he offered her an arm and “a game of
cards?”

Laguna was a crappy player, and Quistis cards were
far better than his, so they decided on playing with a random deck to
even out the odds a little and it seemed his skills were picking up
after a while. It surprised her, but as she placed an Oilboyle,
flipping over three cards in the process, she found herself having
fun.

“I don’t think he minds,” she discovered
herself saying, later, and Laguna scrunched up his face and sent her
a quizzical look.

“Squall, I mean,” she clarified, vaguely
shocked with herself for bringing this up, now. “We haven’t
talked about it, of course, but I do think he likes you. But don’t
expect him to treat you like a father; he’s been doing without for so
long.” If Quistis had been the type, she would’ve covered her
mouth by now. ‘Am I still talking?’

Laguna blushed faintly, and then his face split up
in a goofy grin which he quickly hid as he turned away to scratch his
neck. “You knew?” he mumbled into his hair, and then he
composed himself and turned to face her again. The grin was still
there, though, and it made him look so much younger, so
heart-wrenchingly happy she decided the indiscretion had been
worth it.

Quistis shrugged. “Ellone left clues all
over,” she said, “and somehow, when I see you together…”

“We’re that much alike?” Laguna guessed.

Quistis giggled. “Not at all, no,” she
smiled. “Polar opposites. But there’s something…” she
trailed off and shook her head. “Let’s keep playing. You should
have this talk with him.”

Laguna nodded, and put down a Buel in a completely
illogical position, and Quistis sighed and won the game with an Imp.
And then Squall and the others returned battle-weary, scarred and
joined by two new guardian forces (two! In the middle of the sea!)
and it was all business again.

Quistis couldn’t stop thinking about it, though.
Polar opposites, except for your shared total dedication to the
people you love, she mused, and suddenly the thought struck her
that maybe Laguna… He’s all that Squall isn’t but yet he’s almost
Squall, and maybe that would make the difference?

But no, she may be old beyond her years and adult
since the age of ten while he would never ever grow up, but it would
be too weird. Wow. Where did that thought come from?

Still, she couldn’t stop that peculiar notion from
returning later, when it all was over and they were supposed to live
happily ever after. Occasionally – far too often, and it didn’t
help that they now had “diplomatic relations” with Esthar
(too formal a word, really) – she would find herself mulling it
over, and think “Well, maybe one day?” before she
stuffed that thought right back into whatever deep, psychologically
unsound recess in the corner of her mind it came from.

Too
weird.

“Nonononono, they were frickin’ enormous!”

“Okay, ” Tifa acknowledged, “three enormous birds sweeping in over the city, homing in on your location, and stealing the Materia we graciously let you borrow despite our misgivings – right from your hands?” Tifa had a very uncharacteristic stern look on her face as she scolded the younger woman.

Yuffie simply nodded, and took another bite of her apple. Crispy and sour and 100% yummy. There was apparently more to Rocket Town than she’d expected.

“You couldn’t come up with a better excuse than that?”

Yuffie shook her head. “‘fff thrww, ” she said and continued chewing. Noisily. Then, with a loud painful-sounding ‘gulp’ she swallowed, and wiped her mouth and fingers on a handkerchief that she pulled out from nowhere.

“Damn thunderbirds! I would’ve kicked their asses from here to Nibelheim if you hadn’t confiscated my weapons. And why the hell did you do *that* anyway? ” she whined, and added a tiny little pout for good measure. “I promised I’d be a good girl!”

“That’s what you said in Cosmo Canyon too, ” Tifa grumbled, “but then you violated our trust by using that clothesline as a target practice.”

Yuffie giggled. “Yeah, right, forgot about that, ” she lied. In fact, she recalled in perfect detail the sight of 18 pairs of bloomers slowly descending to the red soil – slashed and torned into thousands of pieces by just one well-aimed throw. Panty confetti! Heeh! “But ya hafta admit it proved useful when we ran into that dragony monster thingie later? Couldn’t have done that without the extra training.”

“That’s not the point! The point is that you should listen to what we say, and.. damn it, just behave!” Tifa stomped off, waving her hands in the air and muttering something about irresponsible kids.

Yuffie grinned, waved the apple core in Tifa’s general direction, and waited until the older woman had completely disappeared from her sight. Then she put a hand down one of her innumerable secret caches and picked up the four supposedly lost Materia. “Sucker!” she crowed and added the two she’d just snatched from Tifa to the collection before pocketing them again. Man, had she perfected the art of distraction or what?

..well, perhaps not Lezard’s. He had probably planned it all from the start, the creep.

“Well.. you’re an obsessive stalker, ” Lucian replied, never being one for diplomacy, “so if anyone would know the ways to her heart it oughtta be you.”

Lezard preened at this, and it’s anybody’s guess as to whether he simply ignored the first part or took it as a compliment. “Fufufufu, ” he sounded. It was probably supposed to be some kind of laughter, but it sounded more like nails on a blackboard and sent shivers up Lucian’s spine. “You are quite right, little boy. I do know everything there is to know about the Lady Valkyrie, including ” – he winked lasciviously – “all her intimate details and of course how to bring her the utmost pleasure.”

Lucian looked vaguely ill, and his hand automatically and probably unconsciously sought the hilt of his sword.

“Dare you besmirch my lady Lenneths honor? You fiend!”

He would have rushed into battle then and there if Lezard hadn’t been prepared for just that possibility and quickly had performed some sort of charm to hold the fighter immobilized.

“Now now, boy, ” the alchemist chided. “Much as I would like to say that my Lady Love has already granted me the ultimate token of her passion, she has yet to succumb to the pull of our mutual attraction. Her loss, of course, and I feel fairly confident she will rethink her position given enough time. ”

“…” Lucian replied intelligently.

“Will you do me the favour of closing your mouth? ” Lezard looked quite displeased. “I have no mind to continue these discussions if you cannot even pretend to have the intelligence to understand what I am talking about.”

Lucian did so, but not without scowling ferociously first. One must keep up appearances at all time – after all, Lezard was evil.

Lezard sighed. “I really do need to explain everything to you, it seems. Very well, but pay attention. I made her current body, you nitwit. It is, as Mysty claimed, ‘accurate right down to the naughty bits’ – why, she did always have a way with words, the precious little thing. I spent countless hours modelling that exquisite flesh to my liking, and there is no part of her that my fingers don’t know. ” He looked down at said fingers and did a very rude and suggestive gesture, which brought a fierce blush onto Lucian’s face.

“You sound like Claire’s horrible romance novels, ” Lucian muttered. Not that he had read those, of course. They were girly. And he was a manly man, don’t let anybody tell you otherwise. Rippling muscles, a big sword, the undying love of Lenneth Valkyrie, etc.

…only he wasn’t so sure of that last part anymore, which was why he had this horribly embarrassing discussion with Lezard Valeth in the first place. Damnit.

He sighed. Better just get this over with. “I bow to your expertise in this matter, ” he said through gritted teeth. “now if your ego is properly satisfied, will you.. please ” – and this last word took considerable effort to spit out, a fact which delighted Lezard – “help me?”

Lezard appeared to consider this very seriously. He tapped a finger against his cheek thoughtfully while focusing on something not quite above Lucian’s head, before suddenly exclaiming “No!”

“Huh?”

“I said ‘No’, which means ‘I don’t think I shall’. ” Under his breath he added “and I would submit you to the vilest torture and then kill you in the most slow and painful way imaginable for even daring to ask this of me – if I thought I would get away with it. Ah, my love, you have softened my heart!”

“Bu.. but.. why not?” Lucian, having heard only the abrupt and brutal rejection of his request, was very confused by now.

“You imbecil! There really are no ends to your stupidity! Whyever would I help out a rival with achieving a goal so dear to me? Not that I think you would stand much of a chance… ” His voice trailed off, and one could just see the cogs in his brain turning while he conocted some probably horribly evil plan. He was not used to have people around while scheming, though, so his internal monologue wasn’t that quiet, and Lucian managed to pick up a few words here and there from the stream of mumbling sounds.

“..hebetudinous little… …mwaHAHAHA… inadequacy… never show his face.. fufufufu! … test the new equipment.. indeed!”

Lucian took no heed of these warning signs, though. He was a desperate – and manly! – man in love, and he would do whatever the circumstances demanded of him. And also, he had one hell of an itch on his left foot, which really took all his concentration.

“Well, ” Lezard finally said out loud, right when Lucian had decided that he would remove his boot and scratch that itch, stinky feet and their effect on the negotiations be damned.

“Your eloquence and argumentative skills have me convinced, ” the alchemist continued. There was a tiny twitch in the corner of one eye as he said that, but this probably meant nothing. “I will aid you to the.. ehehe, very best of my – and I say this in the humblest way possible – considerable abilities, but first you must agree to do exactly what I demand of you for.. the rest of the day, let’s say.”

Lucian didn’t pause for long before deciding, but he did feel a pang of nervousness and regret when Lezard suddenly grabbed his arm and teleported them both off to Odin-knew-where.

“Why do I have to.. do that?” Lucian whined. He was quite out of breath now, and not entirely displeased with the happenings after the initial discomfort, but he didn’t feel very manly given the particulars of the situation.

“Do you really think that the Lady would allow you to be on top?” Lezard grunted. “Circumstances might differ slightly since she is supplied with different parts, but I am sure that even you can improvise given this basic tutorial. Now do be quiet and let me.. ahh! finish with this. Your sniveling voice isn’t exactly doing wonders for the mood here. ”

“…”

“And close your mouth.”

“…”

“No, actually, ” Lezard decided after a spontaneous reevaluation of the situation. “You most definitely must keep it open. There is another thing I would like to submit you to.. ahem, teach you.”

“…mmmphhhh!! mmmpph!”

“Theeeeere’s a good boy.”

“…”

“Mmmm?”

“…thanks.”

“What? Did I say that?” Lezard chortled. “No, my dear boy, the task of getting her attention in the first place I will leave entirely up to you. If you manage to convince her to join you in bed, however, I am certain she will.. ehm.. approve of your newly aquired.. ahem.. skills. You did take notes, I hope.”

“…” Lucian’s fingers twitched as he was yet again trying to automatically and subconciously grab the hilt of his sword. Which sword he was attempting to reach will be left unspecified.

“I repeatedly asked of you to keep your mouth closed unless you had something important to say…” Lezard trailed off to let Lucian think he would get away with it this time, but then commenced with a – quite literally – under-the-belt attack. “Ah! I see! You were of course aiming for a repeat performance of..”

“No, no!” Lucian’s face turned white and so deep was his anguish that a single, crystalline tear trickled down his porcelain cheek. “I mean.. err.. there’s no way that would prove useful with her, so I don’t think I need to practice any further.” Under his breath he added something that sounded suspiciously like “choking.. choking bad”.

“One never knows, ” said Lezard mysteriously, and raised an eyebrow. “But have it your way.”

It was a matter of seconds before he was fully dressed again, looking as immaculate as ever. “Ah, well, ” he said briskly. “Playtime is over. If you’ll excuse me…”

“Wait!”

“What now?”

“Aren’t you gonna.. set me free?”

“Ah. Right.” Lezard patted his pockets but quickly realized that what he was looking for wasn’t there. “I am dreadfully sorry, ah, Lucian was it? I seem to have misplaced the key.”

“WHAT? Oww.” The constricting chains were apparently stronger than Lucian’s arms, and furthermore, he wasn’t quite prepared to break the latter to escape from the former.

“Ah, but do not worry, ” Lezard replied with a satisfied smirk. “It seems a search party has been established – apparently your absence has been noted – and it should arrive here shortly. Well, I’d best be going.”

The last thing Lezard saw before teleporting back home to his tower with one of his best maniacal laughters so far was that, well, Lucian’s tower wasn’t towering anymore.

Chu-Chu is running around chasing some sort of beetle whose scales are glittering purplish green in the afternoon sunlight. Occasionally he pokes it with a little stick and immediately recoils when it clicks its antennae threateningly in his direction.

There is some kind of ruckus going on outside (a flash of red hair and a mocking laughter) but she pays it no mind. It isn’t her place to care about something like that; her tasks lie elsewhere.

Enter Saionji with a feral look in his eyes. He slams the door behind him and all of the tiny glass windows tremble with the force of it. Saionji is clenching his fists so hard his knuckles are white. His jaw is tense, and he’s shaking with fury as he is wont to do whenever he is slighted. Anthy pays this no mind either. It isn’t her place to care about something like that, not unless he tells her to (and vaguely, she hopes he won’t).

He grabs her arm now, the sudden movement causing her to drop her watering can. She’s not upset over it, she can continue her watering tomorrow, or the day after that.

Instead she tilts her head a little to the left, a mild smile appearing on her lips. “Saionji-sama, ” she says softly, placatingly, and it seems to work even though she really has said nothing at all. He just nods and relaxes his grip, doesn’t notice the marks he left on her arm but wouldn’t be concerned even if he had. And it’s not her place to care about something like that, even if he hurts her (there are worse pains, far worse pains).

“Come, ” he says, and of course she follows.

His room is tidy, sparkly clean, everything in its proper place and the faint smell of roses clings to the bedspreads. He embraces her desperately, and she acquiesces, melts into his arms and out of her clothes and onto his bed. He can do whatever he wishes to her, and more; she’ll do whatever he asks of her but nothing else. It isn’t her place to like or dislike his touches, nor will she care to correct him if he mistakes her obedience for love, but she makes all the right noises since that is what he wants.

“You’ll stay with me, always,” he murmurs, and only waits for her to answer “To the ends of the world, Saionji-sama” before he drifts off to sleep. When his breathing slows down and his muscles relax, she eases out of his arms, out of his dorm. She will be back beside Saionji before dawn breaks, but there is something she must do.

The night wind is cold against her bare legs and the chilly wind makes her eyes tear, but the observatory is waiting and she hurries along. At the end of her path she surrenders willingly to her true prince; here, at least, there are no pretenses.

It shouldn’t be her place to love so desperately but she does, she has to, even though her heart is breaking with the effort, even if she’s breaking him with it. And it is wrong wrong wrong but it is the way it has to be now that she’s taken them both down this path (the morning star leading her astray)

When they’re done she stays in his arms and listens to him as he spins his plans. Tomorrow there will be a new challenger; the stage has been set and a new role cast. It isn’t her place to care and she doesn’t, not yet, but she can’t help but wonder if maybe this time there will be a revolution.

And though she doesn’t care she still feels a spark of pity for Saionji when she returns to lie next to him; he doesn’t know it yet and won’t until this afternoon when she will have posted a rejected recycled letter for everyone to see, but his time is up now and he’s out of her life.

“I don’t see why not, ” Tifa shrugged, and proceeded to push the younger girl to her ample bosom. Yuffie enthusiastically followed up by gently squeezing Tifa’s buttocks. Ah, the bliss! Ah, the happy endings! Ah, the…

…lack of oxygen?

“Can’t breathe!” wailed Yuffie. Or, she tried to. Seeing as she was firmly lodged between the barmaid’s breasts, what came out was a very muffled “camnpf’t… brrffthe..!”.

“Suffocating!” she tried again, but still Tifa couldn’t quite understand what Yuffie was trying to say.

Things could’ve ended very badly here since Tifa was too distracted by the happiness she felt by holding the young girl in her arms to notice that anything was amiss.

Luckily, at that moment Barret and Cloud happened to show up.

“WOW!” shouted Barret. “Yuri!”

Cloud simply stared.

Tifa was so surprised she immediately dropped her death-grip on Yuffie and instead flopped down on the ground. Yuffie fell on top of her in a very compromising position, which caused the males to start panting as heavily as the poor oxygen-deprived ninja.

“Are you.. gay?” Cloud asked after a while when his eyes had stopped bulging out and the blood had returned to his brain. “Isn’t that.. kinda.. wrong?”

“Yeah, ” said Barret. “Not complainin’, but you shud let us men join in too.”

“Like you should talk, ” Tifa snorted. “Why, last night I saw you with Mukki!”

At this, both the men flushed. “Don’t be judgmental!” cried Cloud, while at the same time Barret wailed “I was lonely!”

Yuffie looked at Barret. Then at Cloud. Then at Barret again. Barret and Cloud were also eying each other, deep betrayal and anguish sketched on their faces.

“He said he loved me, ” started Barret.

“He said he loved me!” Cloud replied, a frown on his face. “He bought a new pair of bikini briefs just for the occasion,” he continued triumphantly.

“What, the green ones? I picked them for him, ” Barret sniggered .

“This is gross!” cried Yuffie, seeking comfort in Tifa’s loving embrace (and also, in a very stealthy way, sneaking a hand down the older woman’s panties. Not that Tifa complained.)

“SHUT UP!” both men snarled.

Cloud was crying now. “My heart is broken, ” he sniffed. “I shall never love again!”

Barret was giving him the once-over. “Yeah, yeah, whutevah.” There was a very calculating look in his eyes now, and then he shrugged as if coming to a decision. “Let’s comfort each other. My place.”

Cloud shrugged too. It seemed like the right thing to do. “Okay”.

And so the two men skipped away merrily, holding hands and all.

“Well, ” said Tifa breathlessly (after all, Yuffie was doing very naughty unmentionable things to her right now). “That was odd.”

And then she wisely shut up so as not to distract Yuffie.

But then again, she liked to think of herself as pretty damn unpredictable, so anything could be in character for her, right? It probably was just her paranoia getting the best of her anyway.

Her palms were all clammy now, and she shifted the little box from her right hand to her left, and then back again because the right one felt cold without it.

Bless her ninja skills and utter sneakyness, or someone would’ve noticed her hanging around doing nothing hours ago. Wouldn’t that be embarrassing; Cloud and Vincent discussing her latest weird antics over a cuppa coffee. “Stupid brat moping around staring through the window every fifteen minutes and still doing nothing; she’s gotta be up to something again, hide the materia!” Or worse, they could even guess the real reason, ugh, nah, can’t have that.

She surreptitiously made another sweep over the area. Nobody nearby, and the Sense materia said the same. Still, that Vincent was pretty damn sneaky too – especially for being yaknow, half made of metal and all – and she wouldn’t be all that surprised to find out he’d been hiding behind a chimney all the time. She could picture that now; stupid guy covering his mouth behind that weird cape fastener of his, chuckling at the way she thought she was unseen and safe.

She blinked.

Vincent chuckling? Oh man, gotta store that mental image for a rainy day.

Anyway, that thought might’ve been just what she needed to get her brain out of that dead end, because now her feet had started moving towards the door on their own accord and she thought that well, it’s now or never.

A glance towards the dusty window again and she saw something moving. It was nearly enough to send her screeching back to her hideout behind those crates again, but dammit she was better than this.

Her lower lip was already bit to shreds, so trying to moisten her lips brought a smarting pain – and almost tears into her eyes.

Now or never, yeah. She took a deep breath and opened the door; too late to hesitate now darling.

Tifa was busy scrubbing the tables, a not too unsual sight this time of the day – but she usually wasn’t quite this rough. Her mouth was moving slightly as if she were silently praying.

Hah, cursing more likely, and Yuffie could bet a mastered Leviathan she knew what or rather who had upset Tifa again. (her heart sank, but too late to leave now she’d been spotted, ignore that damn Cloud now)

“Yuffie?” Tifa started, looking up from her work but not pausing.

“Yeah, well… ” Yuffie murmured and then the words stuck on her parched tongue; her voice was too rough with something she daren’t put a name to and it was safer to be silent.

They stared at each other for a while, and then Yuffie flushed and threw the little box (“Mideel chocolate chocobos”, 80% cacao, red silk bowties around their necks, sappysappyembarrassing) on the table Tifa was cleaning before turning tail and fleeing from the bar, the “Happy Valentine’s Day” left unsaid.

She did miss having friends outside the family sphere, but they would never understand. She wouldn’t even be able to share stories and pictures of her beautiful children, and she loved them too much to leave them out of her life like that.

Oh, they grew so quickly now, but they’d always need their mommy. One day, they’d be as brilliant and powerful as their father, and she hoped they too would find someone as accomplished as Akio to bring them to their full potential. Just as Akio had been there for her – and as he had for the father of her children.

But until then, she’d be there to change their oil, polish their bright pink hoods and change their tires whenever necessary. After all, that’s what mothers do.