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Mind Games	By : danihouse Category: Final Fantasy VIII > Yaoi - Male/Male Views: 940 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own Final Fantasy or any of the characters represented in the story, and I make no profit from it.

Chapter List
- 1-Mind Games
- 2-2
- 3-3
- 4-4
- 5-5
- 6-6
- 7-7
- 8-8
- 9-9
- 10-10
- 11-11
- 12-12
- 13-13
- 14-14
- 15-15
- 16-16
- 17-17
- 18-18
- 19-19.1
- 20-19.2
- 21-20
- 22-21
- 23-22
- 12
- 13
- 14
The room went deadly quiet; no one seemed to be able to think of anything to say. For a veritable eternity of a minute, everyone was silent, staring at Dallia as though no one wanted to be the first to tell her she was mad. She looked completely untroubled by the consternation she had caused with that simple declaration - maybe she was a bit off in the head; who would ever think that building a Garden in Esthar was a good idea, anyway? And who would expect anyone else to let them do it? Though something about her easy manner and her small, calm smile made Zell think that even if her proposal met with a flat refusal from every quarter, she still planned to do whatever she pleased. He watched and waited nervously, keeping an eye particularly on the Trabian headmaster; he looked like he was about to blow.
“What a ridiculous idea,” the lady next to him, who had gone rather white and was giving a tight, tense smile, said in a faltering voice, as if she half-suspected that Dallia had been joking. “An Estharian Garden? Why?”
“Why not?” Dallia replied, raspberry lips curled in a perpetual grin. She paused, apparently waiting for someone to supply her an answer, and at length looked all round the table, as though challenging someone to provide a reason.
“Esthar doesn’t need a Garden, for one,” Irvine said at last with a faint undertone of disdain to his voice, as though he disliked stating the obvious.
“No? But the Gardens are, by their definition, facilities where youths are trained to deal with the threat of sorceresses,” she said matter-of-factly, looking daringly down at the redhead, who stared placidly back. “And Esthar seems to be where they’re always cropping up - it seems to me to be the perfect place to train soldiers for just that purpose.”
“Esthar already has squads in place to deal with any kind of sorceress-related event - and their own programs to train them. In that regard, they’re far superior to any of the Gardens; they’ve been handling sorceresses for far longer,” Irvine explained, sitting back in his chair and looking a good deal calmer than anyone else at the table. Zell was impressed in spite of himself; there had always been a part of him that wondered at Irvine’s getting appointed Headmaster of Galbadia Garden, but it was clear he knew his stuff, even if his image gave rather a different impression. “Furthermore,” Irvine went on pragmatically, “while Garden’s avowed purpose is, yes, to provide a solution to the threat of sorceresses, the Gardens - all three of them - are undeniably better utilized as mercenary services, the way they have been for eighteen years. Esthar is already without competition the largest military power in the world. To establish such an openly military organization there will send entirely the wrong message to the rest of the world, most of whom are still very afraid of Esthar’s power.”
“Someone has done his homework,” Dallia acquiesced, tilting her head with a hint of approval in her face, “but I have another opinion... if you’d like to hear it?”
“As if anyone’d say no,” Seifer murmured, as if to himself, startling Zell, who’d been engrossed in the interaction taking place down the table. He gave Seifer a sharp kick under the table, but the other man didn’t even look round - didn’t seem to notice at all, in fact; he was staring rather intently, not at Dallia, who held the attention of everyone else in the room, but at Edea, whose expression was dark and pensive. Everyone in the room looked distinctly unhappy at the moment - except the hostess herself, naturally - but Edea looked downright angry; and she certainly had right to be, Zell thought to himself. Aside from the fact that there was no logical reason to build another Garden at all, regardless of who might carry out the actual administration, it seemed hugely insulting to Edea and Cid for Dallia to have even suggested it. What was she thinking?
“Esthar does indeed have a very strong influence right now - militarily and technologically,” she explained on, still smiling but more seriously now. “It’s only been a very short time since the city, and its people, have been responsive to the idea of opening up to the rest of the world, and the rest of the world is likewise very slow to trust.”
Dallia had been standing the whole time, and now she pushed her chair back and began to walk slowly around the table, her face alight with enthusiasm as she spoke. “I think, ladies and gentlemen,” she said, her tone soft but eager, “that a Garden would be the perfect thing to show the people of the world that Esthar is willing to move on - to put aside its secluded past and work with other countries, not against them. That we don’t think ourselves above others, that we’re willing to conform, to adapt to the future.”
She had walked full circle around the table, and now stood at the head again, looking round at the other guests to see their reactions. No one spoke for a few tense moments; Zell couldn’t decide if it was because they thought she was batshit insane, or because they couldn’t come up with anything to counter her arguments - which were, admittedly, not all that bad. After it was clear that no one was going to give her an answer, Dallia went on, “Esthar is my home, and I want to see it prosper. A Garden would bring in a new generation of youths to the city, and at the same time promote the idea that the city is open to change, not adamant about going its own way. It would give Esthar a connection to the rest of the world. What do you think of that?”
Zell personally didn’t think it sounded too bad, but he certainly wasn’t going to be the one to say so. After a lengthy silence, Irvine was again the first one to speak up. “None of that changes the fact that there’s no need for another Garden, no matter where you want to put it,” he said in a quiet but dismissive tone. Dallia turned to look at him, her gaze full of challenge, but before she could reply to that, they were interrupted by the Trabian headmaster, who stood abruptly from his seat between them.
“Pardon me,” he said brusquely, not particularly looking like he cared if anyone did; his face was pale, though his cheeks were flushed with anger. Zell slowly rose to his feet almost at the same time Seifer did the same, both of them ready to move in an instant, but no one else at the table took notice of them; all eyes were on Dallia.
“Mr. Fillmore,” she said complacently, but he ignored her.
“I can’t sit here and listen to any more of this,” he said, stepping away from the table and straightening the front of his suit. “I’ll be taking my leave now.”
He turned and strode briskly away, and his aide scrambled out of her chair to follow him. The redheaded SeeD followed them after a moment, flashing a short, apologetic curtsey to the table before rushing off, but Selphie remained seated, leaning across the empty space toward Irvine for a terse whispered conference. Zell watched them avidly, but their expressions gave nothing away - was there something more going on here that he didn’t know about? At length, Selphie also stood and followed her colleagues out, leaving behind a rather stern-looking Irvine, who appeared to be silently contemplating recent events. The table was utterly silent; Dallia, still smiling, though looking a bit put out, seemed to be collecting her thoughts as she looked round at her remaining guests.
The group of White SeeDs were the next to rise; an older boy, who seemed to be the leader of the group, said very shortly, “I believe it’s time for us to leave as well.” The four of them filed silently out of the room, sparing not a glance Dallia’s way. Irvine watched them go with some interest, but Edea, Zell noted, hadn’t looked up once throughout the entire event - she appeared to be staring down at her lap, but her gaze was focused at a distant point, her expression grave. Cid, beside her, stood and pulled her to her feet, his hand on her back.
“Well,” Dallia said with a half-laugh, giving a little what-can-you-do sort of shrug, “I guess that’s the end of my little party.”
“Please excuse us,” Cid said coolly, leading his wife away. He shot a glance backward at Zell and Seifer; Zell frowned, unsure of whether or not he should follow for appearance’s sake, in the end deciding against it - they hadn’t come with the couple, so it wasn’t really necessary to leave with them. He looked over at Seifer for confirmation that this was okay, only to realize that Seifer wasn’t paying attention at all; he was lost in thought of his own, much like Edea had been. Zell was furious - if Dallia hadn’t been watching, he’d have punched Seifer right upside his stupid head. He settled with a sharp elbow to the kidney, which snapped the gunblader back into reality, just as the lady who’d come with Irvine rose, ushering her two SeeDs to their feet as well.
“Come, girls,” she said sharply, before turning to Irvine, and looking surprised to see that he had not leapt to his feet as well. “Headmaster?”
He stood slowly, still looking as thoughtful as Zell had ever seen him. “Yes,” he said, giving his companion a dismissive wave, “go ahead. I’ll be there in just a few moments.”
She frowned deeply, opening her mouth as if to argue, but thought better of it, and left quietly, the two young SeeDs in tow. Irvine, Zell, and Seifer were all that was left of the party, and Dallia had wandered away from the table, smiling disappointedly and sighing to herself from time to time. She appeared, just as Zell had imagined, not put off her idea at all, but merely regrouping - coming up with a new strategy now her initial pitch had failed... and spectacularly at that, he had to think.
“Broke up that party pretty quick, don’t you think?” Seifer muttered to him, giving him a pointed stare, but not looking half as disturbed by the entire situation as Zell would have pegged him, given the uber-pensive state he’d been in just moments ago.
“I tell you what,” Zell replied, watching Irvine out of the corner of his eye as the cowboy spoke with Dallia in quiet tones, “if she keeps this up, we might have a real mission on our hands - I never seen someone make so many enemies so fast. Except maybe you.”
“Hm,” was all Seifer said in response; a decidedly less spirited answer than Zell had been expecting. What was up with Seifer? Zell was almost on the verge of asking straight-out when Seifer spoke again, leaning toward him to say in a low voice, “is it just me, or does Kinneas know something?”
“Do you think so?” Zell murmured back, but truthfully he had been having the same thought, especially as he watched Irvine and Dallia not too far away, conversing in low tones; Irvine’s back was to them, so he couldn’t see his expression, but the lady was no longer smiling, her posture stiff and tense. Whatever Irvine was saying, she didn’t like. Zell mentally debated going over there to see just what was going on - it would pretty much screw their cover, but it might be worth it to find out if there was something else going on here that he and Seifer weren’t aware of. Before he could come to a decision, however, it became unnecessary; Irvine walked away, looking smug, and Dallia came back toward them, wearing a smile that Zell had decided must be her version of a poker face - whether she was actually affected by the afternoon’s events he couldn’t say, but you’d never be able to tell by looking at her.
“I’d call that a fiasco, wouldn’t you?” she mused with an air of express nonchalance. Zell didn’t know what to say, but Seifer gave her a very sharp look, to which she responded with an equally challenging stare, as though daring him to speak what was on his mind. He didn’t, and after a moment she looked away.
“I think I’d like to go home,” Dallia announced next, giving a sigh as though incomparably wearied by the party and its aftermath, although she appeared as cheery as ever, Zell thought. Turning to him, she added, “and given the unpleasant atmosphere I’ve just created here, I think I’d prefer accompaniment... if you don’t mind?”
“Uh... no, of course not...” Zell muttered, bemused - that last was clearly directed only at him. There was a tense, prolonged silence, finally broken when Seifer turned away to leave.
“Fine,” he said, his tone almost petulant. “I’ll see you back at the hotel, Dincht.”
“Okay,” Zell stammered, and Seifer stalked away before he could think of anything more to say. When he glanced over at Dallia, he was surprised to find her looking somewhat satisfied - her expression almost triumphant, as if there had been some kind of private battle going on that she had won. Seifer didn’t like Dallia, that had been obvious from the beginning, but until now it hadn’t appeared that she’d noticed, or cared at all if she had. Nothing, in fact, really seemed to faze her - and Zell had a sneaking suspicion that she was this time only pretending to be disconcerted, and the attempt was belated and half-assed at best. Dallia and Seifer, Dallia and Irvine... what was there that Zell wasn’t seeing?
Dallia’s smile twitched up at the corners as she caught him staring, and she beckoned him after her as she spun on one kitten heel and made for the door. “Perhaps there’s something you’d like to ask me?” she queried in a good-humoured tone, slipping a pair of gilded sunglasses on as Zell held the door open for her and she stepped outside.
“Er...” he stammered, stepping quickly to catch up with her as she strode purposefully to the black car that was waiting out back for her. “I... I guess not...”
She smirked, giving him a long look over the top of her sunglasses, before stepping daintily down into the backseat of the car. Feeling puzzled, Zell walked round to the other side and got in as well, and wordlessly they drove off.
“Do you, uh...” he began hesitantly after thinking for a minute about the question, “do you... know Irvine very well?”
She didn’t answer for a rather long moment; her sunglasses still obscuring half her face, Zell couldn’t read her expression. “He is the Headmaster of Galbadia Garden. I am the First Lady of Galbadia.” She paused for a short moment. “Interim, but still,” she added with a little smirk. She glanced toward Zell, who wasn’t sure he was really satisfied with that answer, and went on, “we’ve met several times at state events. We are acquainted.”
Zell chewed the corner of his lip and frowned. “That ain’t really the answer I was lookin’ for...”
Dallia gave a twittering laugh. “You allude, I presume, to the scene you witnessed inside?” she asked, though her tone indicated that it wasn’t really a question. Zell shrugged, and she continued in a tone laced with finality, “it was a personal matter, and that’s as far as it concerns you. Does that satisfy your curiosity?”
Zell refrained from answering, and Dallia nodded as if he had made a wise choice. They rode together in silence for a few more minutes before she spoke again. “Your partner dislikes me very much,” she remarked.
“Well...” Zell paused for a second to work out his phrasing in his head, and eventually replied, “I mean... don’t take it personal or anything. He don’t much like anyone.”
“No?”
“No, for sure,” he said, chuckling a little. “Seifer’s a bit screwed up, case you didn’t hear.”
“Yes, indeed...” Dallia said with an air of such definitiveness that Zell couldn’t think of anything more to add, and the rest of the ride passed in silence.

“So what’s the deal?” he finally ventured to ask a while later, the first noise to break the quiet in the hotel room since he and Seifer had arrived back some hours earlier. He’d been working on the question in his head the whole afternoon but hadn’t voiced it, as Seifer had been in a notably foul mood when they finally got back from the luncheon, but the curiosity was biting inside him and there was no point in waiting for the other man to lighten up; he might as well sit around and wait for Seifer to put on tights and dance the ballet. Seifer looked up from the novel he’d been pretending to read and didn’t appear to be too pissed off, which was a good sign; but neither did he answer right away, instead seeming to think about it for a minute.
“What deal?” he said at length, his expression blank.
“You and Dallia. What’s the deal?”
“There’s no deal,” Seifer said coolly, and promptly went back to his book. Zell, laying on his bed, suddenly sat up, closing his laptop and moving to the edge of the bed with a deep frown on his face.
“What do you mean, no deal? There’s obviously a deal. She looks at you like you’re her pet puppy dog or somethin’.”
“What?” Seifer said sharply, standing up; his book tumbled to the floor. Zell stifled a grin; clearly this was a sore subject.
“I’m just saying. You’re acting friggin’ weird and you know it,” he went on, shrugging very nonchalantly, but secretly enjoying the darkening expression on Seifer’s face. “I mean, hell, if I wanted to suffer fuckin’ mood swings, I woulda brought Rin along...”
Seifer stared at him and he stared back for a moment. “Are you trying to piss me off?”
“Yeah.”
“You’re doing a good job.”
“I aim to,” Zell said a bit proudly. “So. The deal?”
“There’s no deal,” Seifer repeated, snatching up his book from the floor and sitting heavily down on the couch again. “I don’t like her. I don’t like anyone. You might have noticed that.”
He went back to pretending to read, and Zell watched him for a moment or two, biting his lip. “Your book’s upside down there.”
Seifer flipped it around. “Look,” Zell said, jumping up from the bed and making exuberant hand motions, “something’s going on here and I wanna know what it is. It’s like there’s some huge private joke that I’m not in on-”
“Well you’re not the only fucking one,” Seifer said tersely, abandoning his novel again. “I don’t know what she’s on about. She’s fucking toying with us, that’s what’s going on."
“But why?”
“Fuck do I know?” he gave a frustrated sigh. “This whole mission is ridiculous. Whoever thought putting me and you together in a hotel room for a month was obviously addled beyond repair. I’m tempted to say fuck Squall, fuck Garden, and piss off from this joke of a job before I fucking hurt someone.”
“Hm,” was all Zell said in return, and then, “well that was a lovely speech.”
“Fuck off,” Seifer snarled, and he stomped away. Zell sat down on the bed as the door slammed behind the other man. He probably shouldn’t have provoked Seifer; he’d be insufferably bad-tempered for a few days, no doubt. Or this was just another mood swing, and he’d be back to normal in the morning - one never really could tell with Seifer anymore. He certainly wasn’t himself lately.
Well, Zell thought to himself, laying back on the bed and picking up the remote, at least he’s out of the room tonight I can watch some telly...
- 12
- 13
- 14
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Mind Games