Cold Front

Hey, rhaps here.
Lion and I have decided to write a fic together, alternating chapters and with them, points of view. I write Irvine, she writes Squall, and I go first. Enjoy. ^_^

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1. Silence and Motion

I want to go home.

It's been a fraction of a week since time compression, since I visited all the things I wish the others could and some I'm glad they can't. Three days of rest that I've spent fidgeting, pacing from bed to windowsill and Quad to Library, and it's not only because I can't get used to sitting still.

Everyone else is breathing, at least. Selphie and Zell have been spending every waking second together, plus sleepover parties, probably because no one else can keep up with their motormouths. Playing video games, something with a gun, they said, you'd kick our asses. I'm not an idiot. I know it was an invitation. They both hate first person shooters, but lately, so do I.

Contract's fulfilled. Timber's free, and Rinoa's been shipped home already. Got a shaky smile and peck from her, and she was off in an armored car for the long trip down the H.B., bumper sticker inviting all to 'live the night life in Deling' in cursive neon script. I probably won't see her until she enrolls next year. Maybe she has shit to patch up with pops first, hell if I know, but she'll need to get her tuition someplace, and I can only think of one man she could convince to cough it up.

Caught Quistis curled up with about eleven pillows in the corner of the library yesterday. In her element, nose in a book, eyes skimming a mile a minute, lips pursed tight to keep herself from mouthing the words like she used to. It took her ages to notice me, and if I hadn't crouched down across from her, she probably never would have. I half expected her to jump and titter nervously at herself like she had a hundred times in that ageless castle, but she just tipped her head up and smiled an easy smile, gave me a wave, and asked how I was feeling.

An open question that I could have answered with more of my own, but I just shrugged and told her what I was supposed to: feels good to sleep in, nothing to do, lay back and listen to the birds in the hall gardens. I didn't tell that I haven't slept more than a wink. When she turned the next page, I turned and left.

Maybe I'm waiting for them to ask me. I'm a good storyteller, I think, and the stories of their childhoods would be the easiest to tell. Maybe they don't want to know.

But, although my memory's great compared to theirs, I can't see it all as clear as day. I can't just reach into my head and retrieve everything. No one can. That is, I couldn't before, but skirting back through time compression brought everything back in a succession so clear I thought I was dead.

Everything that happened when I was with them, and everything afterwards, and everything I brought with me and forgot to give back. So much they didn't see, so much I hold alone.

Bluegreen fields like a giant copper quarter-gil oxidizing under the hazy mudpuddle of the sky. Wind that comes from everywhere at once and whips your hair around your head so it takes an hour for Pop to get the tangles out, pointing out all the while that it's time to get it cut, tie it back at least, you look like a damn girl already.

Running from the clouds that make mountains in the east, heart in my throat, arms splattered by the first drops, hoping I won't get home before it starts and once I do, wishing I could sit by the window to watch.

That old place was made of windows. Flat in every direction, a lonesome cottage standing as alone as I was but braving every gust and strike. It creaked louder than the thunder, but it never fell.

I missed my friends. I reminded myself that when I got to school in a couple years, I'd be able make more. Slim pickings had me deciding it would be better not to have any at all. Can't-replace-old-yeller type of crap. When I got lonely, I got laid, and when that didn't work I dug out the Monterosa Draft I'd smuggled in, had a buddy fake an injury for some infirmary ice, sprawled out in my dorm with him, and shot the shit about said experiences getting laid. I had buddies, pals, even a couple confidants, but I didn't have friends.

I've finally gotten back the ones I'd lost, and I can't even talk to them. This Garden's just another giant fucking field and no matter how many times I cross it, no matter how many times I come across a familiar smile, I won't really be able to find them.

Not until I go back.

And I mean, I've been to the orphanage with the others, walked through it, but there was barely anything left. An empty shell, wrecked by waves and storms and probably a few thousand monsters trying to find a nest, use it to raise even more ungodly bloodlusting children. Nothing there but an old magazine that Selphie snatched up like it was printed in gold, and that had nothing to do with us.

Pop died when I was fourteen, but I bet his house is still there. It survived the sixty years since he built it and barely needed repairs, his pride and joy, his wooden rock. My stuff -- the stuff too juvenile to pack at the end of summer vacation, too insignificant to bother going back for, will be there too. Stuff that was never really mine to begin with, and means the world to me now that I can't get it back.

But maybe I can.

Squall's the only person aside from me that doesn't seem able to enjoy this. Cid took back Headmaster duties temporarily to give him the vacation he deserves more than any of us, but he's been on the move, just like me.

This morning, I came to the Training Centre, and now I can't leave.

He looks lost, too. Plowing through monsters that could be made of butter and his gunblade made of fire, downgraded all the way back from that gorgeous shimmery blue to what, I'm guessing, he trained with, became SeeD with. My first thought was that he did it to bring back some of the challenge, but I've had all day to keep rolling it around in my head.

It's what he had before all the earthshattering shit we just finished with started. It's what he had when his other half was still around to meet him with more steel instead of leafy green flesh or gnashing rows of teeth.

I don't understand everything they had, but whatever it was, it's gone. I miss Seifer least of all, maybe becahe'she's not back here to remind me of what memories I have of him, but most likely because he's become a walking asshole.

No one knows where he is. Some students reported spotting him and his friends when we passed Balamb Port, but aside from that, we're clueless. Rinoa prompted Squall on it (I get the notion she's even more interested in his whereabouts than Squall is), and all Squall said was that if he wanted to come back, he would. They'd deal with it if and when the time came.

His famous passivity, but watching his back in a more literal way than I should be, it looks to me like he's being anything but passive. He wants blood, of any colour, and the more he draws it, the hungrier he gets, which tells me it isn't at all what he wanted in the first place.

So, I'll let him have his time. He'll get over this, and I'll keep my mouth shut -- we haven't exchanged a word aside from the occasional 'you okay?' and 'thanks' since I showed up here.

I've always been good with observation. If the loner sits in the corner long enough, he'll learn to know those he's watching better than they know themselves. I told myself at first that I was just picking up on any interests I might have in common with whoever I wanted to invite into my bed, but by now I've admitted that I was really searching for the people I knew a long time ago.

I'm watching and searching. Squall's fighting and searching. Although we're not looking for the exact same thing, I think we might be able to find it in the same place. And if we don't find it, maybe the trip will be enough to get us to give up and move on.

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