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rionaleonhart) wrote2013-04-20 05:22 pm
rionaleonhart) wrote2013-04-20 05:22 pm
Fanfiction: With These Signs Upon Our Souls, Chapter Two (FFVIII/FFXIII)
ENTIRELY UNANTICIPATED PLOT DEVELOPMENTS.
Title: With These Signs Upon Our Souls, Chapter Two
Fandom: Final Fantasy VIII/Final Fantasy XIII
Rating: PG-13
Wordcount: 2,000 (this chapter; 3,800 cumulative)
Summary: The exam brief is simple enough: protect the fal'Cie from the Timber resistance. Squad B are about to get the mission as wrong as humanly possible.
Chapter One
Shiva vanishes in a shimmer of ice, and Squall is himself again, blinking blood out of his eyes. The instant he has his bearings, he’s back on the offensive. The manipulators have regenerated yet again, but by this point he’s got a good idea of where to concentrate his attacks, at least.
They need to work fast. Getting into drawn-out fights is usually a bad idea anyway – he doesn’t even know whether fal’Cie can tire – but that isn’t the only reason; Garden will be remotely videotaping them for evaluation purposes later. Squall doesn’t know whether someone will be checking the live feed during the exam itself, but it seems likely. They could be stopped at any moment.
Rationally, he knows that being stopped is probably the best outcome. They’re already flagging, even with the protection of the GFs. Seifer’s the worst off; he’s not watching their target’s moves, which means he can’t dodge them and Zell has to keep throwing Cures his way just to keep him on his feet. Squall isn’t even certain that they’re making progress; it seems Anima can regenerate destroyed parts within a couple of minutes. Zell is getting off hits on the main body while Squall and Seifer keep the manipulators occupied, but they can’t be sure that it’s not repairing that damage as well. Are they really going to be able to destroy this thing, just the three of them?
There’s still a part of him, though, whispering that maybe it’s possible. Even if he doesn’t really know what destroying it would mean to him.
The double doors creak open behind him, but Squall is too preoccupied with the manipulators to see who’s entered. If he’s about to be arrested, he’s about to be arrested. For now, he’s fighting.
“Are you guys Squad B? Name’s Selphie; I’m a messenger, from Squad A. You know there’s someone sleeping on the floor back there?”
There’s something vaguely familiar about the voice, and now Squall does glance over his shoulder. It’s a young woman in cadet uniform; it takes him a moment to pinpoint her as the girl who asked him for a tour of the Garden this morning.
She seems to recognise him as well and breaks into a bright smile. “Hey, you’re the guy who showed me around!”
“You showed her around?” Zell asks, looking startled. “That doesn’t sound like you.”
What does Zell know about him? Squall pushes any response down and focuses on the fal’Cie, watching for the next opportunity to strike.
“Thanks! I don’t get so lost any more. Are you—” And then she seems to take in the scene before her: the whole of Squad B, fighting the fal’Cie they were called in to protect. “Oh, hey, that’s not right. You’ll get, like, super marked down for that.”
The doors crash open, and Quistis’s voice rings through the room. “Squad B! What in Etro’s name do you think you’re doing?”
And then everything goes dark.
-
a woman with strange markings on her face, and a castle, and a clock, its hands spinning and spinning and spinning.
-
He comes to lying on cold stone and slowly drags himself upright, wincing, holding a hand to his forehead. When he tries to step forward his legs falter, and he stumbles against a pillar and has to brace himself there until he feels in control.
They’re in the entrance hall, for some reason, not the fal’Cie chamber. The others are scattered around the room, some recovering, some still unconscious. When he edges one of the doors to the inner chamber open and looks in, he sees Anima, still there, still living. Of course. How were three people ever going to destroy a fal’Cie?
Squall lets the door fall closed and limps back into the entrance hall. It makes no sense, but there’s a part of him that feels almost elated. They may not have destroyed it, but they took on a fal’Cie and they survived.
His hip itches on the left side. He scratches it, and he catches sight of a flash of something dark against his skin, in the narrow gap between his cadet uniform trousers and the hem of his shirt, and that’s when he realises that of course he didn’t survive it. He may still technically be breathing, but the fal’Cie killed him in there.
He pulls up the side of his shirt a little, just to be sure. The mark of a l’Cie stands out, black and unmistakable. He lets his shirt fall to cover it and looks up to see Quistis staring at him, her hand over her mouth, looking horrified.
It’s all right if Quistis knows, he supposes. He’d prefer it if nobody knew he was a l’Cie, but at least she probably has the discretion not to blurt it out immediately, unlike, say, Zell.
But then Selphie bobs to her feet, calling out, “Everyone okay?”, and Squall tenses as he sees the same mark on the back of her knee. He’s not going to be able to hide it now, not if he wasn’t the only one it took. And what about Quistis, Zell, Seifer? Are they l’Cie as well?
Quistis, following Squall’s gaze to Selphie’s mark, seems to have the same thought and starts to look over herself, quickly. She pulls down her right sleeve to check her shoulder and her entire body slumps. It’s only for a moment, though, before she straightens up and draws Selphie aside to speak to her.
It’s a relief to Squall, who was beginning to think that he might have to tell Selphie about her brand himself; he’s never been good at delivering bad news. From Selphie’s expression, though, she seems to be taking it remarkably well. Quistis looks slightly bemused.
From Selphie, Quistis moves on to speak quietly to Zell. Squall watches for just long enough to be sure that Zell is a l’Cie – he takes off his right gauntlet; the mark is underneath – before turning away; he knows Zell will take it badly. To occupy himself while Zell comes to terms with the situation, Squall casts a Scan spell on Seifer, who hasn’t yet regained consciousness, making sure that he’s not too seriously injured. The Scan informs him that Seifer is a l’Cie as well. Squall closes his eyes and takes a deep breath and tries not to think.
The l’Cie resistance member is next to Seifer, holding his hand. Should he tell her? What is he supposed to do?
His eyes snap open when a dull thud echoes around the room; Zell has slammed his fist into the wall. Zell breathes hard for a long moment, doubled over, his hands braced on his knees, and then he straightens up and gestures in Squall’s direction; Squall can’t hear what he’s asking Quistis, but he thinks he can probably guess. Quistis glances at Squall, hesitating, then nods.
So that’s it; everyone is going to know. Zell looks over at Squall. Squall looks away.
They all stay there for a while, just sitting or standing on the stone floor, absorbing what happened. Well, apart from Selphie, who gets bored after a minute or two and goes to practise her fighting stance in a corner.
“Squall,” Zell says into the near-silence, staring at the symbol on the back of his hand, “I’ve gotta tell you I’m kind of pissed off with you right now. Like, I’m not going to punch you in the jaw, but I think you need to know I kind of really want to.”
“I told you not to get involved,” Squall points out, and Zell actually does punch him. He’s not wearing his gloves, of course, but it still hurts more than a little. Squall grunts in pain and brings a hand up to the side of his face.
“Zell,” Quistis says, sharply.
Zell lets his fists drop, his expression changing in a second from rage to horror. “Oh, man, sorry. You okay? I just – ” He gestures, helplessly. “You’re just so stupid sometimes.”
“He’s not wrong,” Quistis says, sounding more amused now. “I might have hit you if you’d said the same to me. Are you all right, Squall?”
Squall stares at them both, still holding his hand to his face. It’s going to bruise, he can tell already, but not too badly. “Whatever.”
What’s so stupid about what he said? It’s only the truth. He told Zell not to get involved. Zell didn’t listen.
God, all these people – Quistis, Zell, Selphie – are l’Cie because of him. Why couldn’t they have just stayed out of his battle? It shouldn’t have become anyone else’s problem.
He tries to bury the thought. At least he’s fairly certain that Seifer would have gone after the fal’Cie whether Squall had attacked it or not. And there’s nothing they could have done for the resistance member, really.
Although maybe if they had moved a little faster, got there a little earlier...
No point thinking about it.
The resistance member hasn’t moved; she’s still here, stooping over Seifer, who is beginning to stir.
“You sure you’re okay?” Zell asks Squall, looking anxious, and then he seems to notice the resistance member as well. “Oh, hey, how’re you doing?” She looks up. He displays the branded back of his hand to her with a grimace. “Looks like we’re all in the same boat now, right? So I guess we should introduce ourselves. I’m Zell.”
All in the same boat. It’s not an expression Squall likes, but he can’t deny that, one way or another, none of the six of them is going to be living much longer.
“...Rinoa,” the resistance member says, after a moment. She looks back at Seifer. “You’re all from Garden, right? Do any of you have any Cure spells? I don’t have a GF, so I can’t—”
But a green glow is building in the fingertips of the hand she has resting on Seifer’s chest – it began when she said ‘Cure spells’ – and now she makes a startled noise as green light spirals out from her hand to engulf him. As it dissipates, Seifer coughs, twice, harsh and grating, and blinks his eyes open.
“...of course,” Rinoa half-whispers, staring at her hand. “l’Cie. They can use real magic.”
“Like a Sorceress,” Seifer says, dragging himself into a sitting position, his legs stretched out in front of him, his eyes fixed on hers. A pained smirk plays on his lips. “We’ll get through this,” he says, in a tone Squall has never heard him use before; his voice is light, but his eyes don’t waver from Rinoa’s. “You just need a knight to help you complete your Focus.”
It’s not something Squall would have expected himself to notice, but it’s the first time he’s ever been in the same room as Seifer and felt invisible. He’s not sure how he feels about that.
Rinoa punches Seifer on the shoulder. “I could kill you right now! I told you not to fight it! Why didn’t you listen?”
Seifer shrugs. “We got out, right? See, you shouldn’t have doubted me.”
“That’s not the point!” Rinoa exclaims, and then she hesitates, glancing back at Zell. She leans over to whisper something to Seifer, and Seifer stares at her for a moment before checking himself all over. When he pulls up the leg of his trousers, there it is, just above his right ankle: the l’Cie brand.
And that’s it. He knew about Seifer already, of course, but actually seeing the brand brings the situation into sharper relief, somehow. Six of them. Six l’Cie. Most of them l’Cie because of his own stupid mistake.
Squall wonders whether they all have the same Focus.
Squall wonders what kind of Focus needs six people to carry it out.
Chapter Three
Title: With These Signs Upon Our Souls, Chapter Two
Fandom: Final Fantasy VIII/Final Fantasy XIII
Rating: PG-13
Wordcount: 2,000 (this chapter; 3,800 cumulative)
Summary: The exam brief is simple enough: protect the fal'Cie from the Timber resistance. Squad B are about to get the mission as wrong as humanly possible.
Chapter One
Shiva vanishes in a shimmer of ice, and Squall is himself again, blinking blood out of his eyes. The instant he has his bearings, he’s back on the offensive. The manipulators have regenerated yet again, but by this point he’s got a good idea of where to concentrate his attacks, at least.
They need to work fast. Getting into drawn-out fights is usually a bad idea anyway – he doesn’t even know whether fal’Cie can tire – but that isn’t the only reason; Garden will be remotely videotaping them for evaluation purposes later. Squall doesn’t know whether someone will be checking the live feed during the exam itself, but it seems likely. They could be stopped at any moment.
Rationally, he knows that being stopped is probably the best outcome. They’re already flagging, even with the protection of the GFs. Seifer’s the worst off; he’s not watching their target’s moves, which means he can’t dodge them and Zell has to keep throwing Cures his way just to keep him on his feet. Squall isn’t even certain that they’re making progress; it seems Anima can regenerate destroyed parts within a couple of minutes. Zell is getting off hits on the main body while Squall and Seifer keep the manipulators occupied, but they can’t be sure that it’s not repairing that damage as well. Are they really going to be able to destroy this thing, just the three of them?
There’s still a part of him, though, whispering that maybe it’s possible. Even if he doesn’t really know what destroying it would mean to him.
The double doors creak open behind him, but Squall is too preoccupied with the manipulators to see who’s entered. If he’s about to be arrested, he’s about to be arrested. For now, he’s fighting.
“Are you guys Squad B? Name’s Selphie; I’m a messenger, from Squad A. You know there’s someone sleeping on the floor back there?”
There’s something vaguely familiar about the voice, and now Squall does glance over his shoulder. It’s a young woman in cadet uniform; it takes him a moment to pinpoint her as the girl who asked him for a tour of the Garden this morning.
She seems to recognise him as well and breaks into a bright smile. “Hey, you’re the guy who showed me around!”
“You showed her around?” Zell asks, looking startled. “That doesn’t sound like you.”
What does Zell know about him? Squall pushes any response down and focuses on the fal’Cie, watching for the next opportunity to strike.
“Thanks! I don’t get so lost any more. Are you—” And then she seems to take in the scene before her: the whole of Squad B, fighting the fal’Cie they were called in to protect. “Oh, hey, that’s not right. You’ll get, like, super marked down for that.”
The doors crash open, and Quistis’s voice rings through the room. “Squad B! What in Etro’s name do you think you’re doing?”
And then everything goes dark.
a woman with strange markings on her face, and a castle, and a clock, its hands spinning and spinning and spinning.
He comes to lying on cold stone and slowly drags himself upright, wincing, holding a hand to his forehead. When he tries to step forward his legs falter, and he stumbles against a pillar and has to brace himself there until he feels in control.
They’re in the entrance hall, for some reason, not the fal’Cie chamber. The others are scattered around the room, some recovering, some still unconscious. When he edges one of the doors to the inner chamber open and looks in, he sees Anima, still there, still living. Of course. How were three people ever going to destroy a fal’Cie?
Squall lets the door fall closed and limps back into the entrance hall. It makes no sense, but there’s a part of him that feels almost elated. They may not have destroyed it, but they took on a fal’Cie and they survived.
His hip itches on the left side. He scratches it, and he catches sight of a flash of something dark against his skin, in the narrow gap between his cadet uniform trousers and the hem of his shirt, and that’s when he realises that of course he didn’t survive it. He may still technically be breathing, but the fal’Cie killed him in there.
He pulls up the side of his shirt a little, just to be sure. The mark of a l’Cie stands out, black and unmistakable. He lets his shirt fall to cover it and looks up to see Quistis staring at him, her hand over her mouth, looking horrified.
It’s all right if Quistis knows, he supposes. He’d prefer it if nobody knew he was a l’Cie, but at least she probably has the discretion not to blurt it out immediately, unlike, say, Zell.
But then Selphie bobs to her feet, calling out, “Everyone okay?”, and Squall tenses as he sees the same mark on the back of her knee. He’s not going to be able to hide it now, not if he wasn’t the only one it took. And what about Quistis, Zell, Seifer? Are they l’Cie as well?
Quistis, following Squall’s gaze to Selphie’s mark, seems to have the same thought and starts to look over herself, quickly. She pulls down her right sleeve to check her shoulder and her entire body slumps. It’s only for a moment, though, before she straightens up and draws Selphie aside to speak to her.
It’s a relief to Squall, who was beginning to think that he might have to tell Selphie about her brand himself; he’s never been good at delivering bad news. From Selphie’s expression, though, she seems to be taking it remarkably well. Quistis looks slightly bemused.
From Selphie, Quistis moves on to speak quietly to Zell. Squall watches for just long enough to be sure that Zell is a l’Cie – he takes off his right gauntlet; the mark is underneath – before turning away; he knows Zell will take it badly. To occupy himself while Zell comes to terms with the situation, Squall casts a Scan spell on Seifer, who hasn’t yet regained consciousness, making sure that he’s not too seriously injured. The Scan informs him that Seifer is a l’Cie as well. Squall closes his eyes and takes a deep breath and tries not to think.
The l’Cie resistance member is next to Seifer, holding his hand. Should he tell her? What is he supposed to do?
His eyes snap open when a dull thud echoes around the room; Zell has slammed his fist into the wall. Zell breathes hard for a long moment, doubled over, his hands braced on his knees, and then he straightens up and gestures in Squall’s direction; Squall can’t hear what he’s asking Quistis, but he thinks he can probably guess. Quistis glances at Squall, hesitating, then nods.
So that’s it; everyone is going to know. Zell looks over at Squall. Squall looks away.
They all stay there for a while, just sitting or standing on the stone floor, absorbing what happened. Well, apart from Selphie, who gets bored after a minute or two and goes to practise her fighting stance in a corner.
“Squall,” Zell says into the near-silence, staring at the symbol on the back of his hand, “I’ve gotta tell you I’m kind of pissed off with you right now. Like, I’m not going to punch you in the jaw, but I think you need to know I kind of really want to.”
“I told you not to get involved,” Squall points out, and Zell actually does punch him. He’s not wearing his gloves, of course, but it still hurts more than a little. Squall grunts in pain and brings a hand up to the side of his face.
“Zell,” Quistis says, sharply.
Zell lets his fists drop, his expression changing in a second from rage to horror. “Oh, man, sorry. You okay? I just – ” He gestures, helplessly. “You’re just so stupid sometimes.”
“He’s not wrong,” Quistis says, sounding more amused now. “I might have hit you if you’d said the same to me. Are you all right, Squall?”
Squall stares at them both, still holding his hand to his face. It’s going to bruise, he can tell already, but not too badly. “Whatever.”
What’s so stupid about what he said? It’s only the truth. He told Zell not to get involved. Zell didn’t listen.
God, all these people – Quistis, Zell, Selphie – are l’Cie because of him. Why couldn’t they have just stayed out of his battle? It shouldn’t have become anyone else’s problem.
He tries to bury the thought. At least he’s fairly certain that Seifer would have gone after the fal’Cie whether Squall had attacked it or not. And there’s nothing they could have done for the resistance member, really.
Although maybe if they had moved a little faster, got there a little earlier...
No point thinking about it.
The resistance member hasn’t moved; she’s still here, stooping over Seifer, who is beginning to stir.
“You sure you’re okay?” Zell asks Squall, looking anxious, and then he seems to notice the resistance member as well. “Oh, hey, how’re you doing?” She looks up. He displays the branded back of his hand to her with a grimace. “Looks like we’re all in the same boat now, right? So I guess we should introduce ourselves. I’m Zell.”
All in the same boat. It’s not an expression Squall likes, but he can’t deny that, one way or another, none of the six of them is going to be living much longer.
“...Rinoa,” the resistance member says, after a moment. She looks back at Seifer. “You’re all from Garden, right? Do any of you have any Cure spells? I don’t have a GF, so I can’t—”
But a green glow is building in the fingertips of the hand she has resting on Seifer’s chest – it began when she said ‘Cure spells’ – and now she makes a startled noise as green light spirals out from her hand to engulf him. As it dissipates, Seifer coughs, twice, harsh and grating, and blinks his eyes open.
“...of course,” Rinoa half-whispers, staring at her hand. “l’Cie. They can use real magic.”
“Like a Sorceress,” Seifer says, dragging himself into a sitting position, his legs stretched out in front of him, his eyes fixed on hers. A pained smirk plays on his lips. “We’ll get through this,” he says, in a tone Squall has never heard him use before; his voice is light, but his eyes don’t waver from Rinoa’s. “You just need a knight to help you complete your Focus.”
It’s not something Squall would have expected himself to notice, but it’s the first time he’s ever been in the same room as Seifer and felt invisible. He’s not sure how he feels about that.
Rinoa punches Seifer on the shoulder. “I could kill you right now! I told you not to fight it! Why didn’t you listen?”
Seifer shrugs. “We got out, right? See, you shouldn’t have doubted me.”
“That’s not the point!” Rinoa exclaims, and then she hesitates, glancing back at Zell. She leans over to whisper something to Seifer, and Seifer stares at her for a moment before checking himself all over. When he pulls up the leg of his trousers, there it is, just above his right ankle: the l’Cie brand.
And that’s it. He knew about Seifer already, of course, but actually seeing the brand brings the situation into sharper relief, somehow. Six of them. Six l’Cie. Most of them l’Cie because of his own stupid mistake.
Squall wonders whether they all have the same Focus.
Squall wonders what kind of Focus needs six people to carry it out.
Chapter Three
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I HAVE SO MANY WONDERINGS. Will there be two types of fal'Cie? Is someone pulling a Vanille by having become a l'Cie earlier? Is Seifer not going to run off with Edeamecia? What about Irvine? And Ellone? ALL THESE, AND MORE!
Also, I think my brain is leaning too far to the XIII side of things, because for some reason, the appearance of GF really, really surprised me. But whatever. This is still totally awesome. Yay!
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Reconciling the VIII world with the XIII one is a bit tricky, but I think I've worked out what I'm doing. Maybe. We'll see.
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