Adult-FanFiction.org : Final Fantasy

Mind Games	By : danihouse Category: Final Fantasy VIII > Yaoi - Male/Male Views: 942 -:- 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
- 19
- 20
- 21
Seifer was waiting just where Zell had left him - his first real piece of good luck today. His expression must have been not reassuring, because the first thing Seifer said was, “that bad, huh?”

“They’re up to something ridiculous,” Zell said, remembering Seera’s plan and cringing a little - they had to be desperate to think it would work. But it was probably better not to take chances.

“Dallia’s just there,” Seifer replied, nodding in the lady’s direction. “I’ve been watching. No one’s approached.”

“It’s not Dallia they’re after, it’s Rinoa,” Zell said.

“Rinoa?”

“Yeah. So, what I’m thinking we should do is you take the east side of the room and I’ll take the west, and circle around-”

“Wait a minute,” Seifer interrupted, holding up a hand as he cut Zell off mid-sentence. “Why?”

“Well, they’re trying to kidnap Rinoa,” Zell said slowly, a little thrown by the question. How had he lost Seifer already? He hadn’t even finished detailing his plan. The other man gave him a look like he was being stupider than usual.

“I mean, why is that our problem?” Seifer said shortly.

“Seifer!” Zell huffed, giving him the sharpest look he could muster. Seifer only shrugged.

“Well, it’s not. Rinoa can take care of herself,” he replied defensively. Zell refused to temper his glare, and Seifer, to his credit, did start to look chagrined. “Anyway, that’s really not our job...”

“She’s my friend,” Zell said. “And also, she’s your boss’ girlfriend. And also, just shut up and do what I tell you,” he added, and continued to stare at Seifer in a rather unfriendly way until the gunblader sighed, and grumbled something under his breath that might have been an acquiescence. He had a point, kind of - Rinoa wasn’t really their problem, and she probably could handle herself - but they sure weren’t going to win any points with the General and his wife by letting his daughter get assaulted by would-be kidnappers. Besides, even though Seera’s plan was close to the stupidest thing Zell had ever heard, he didn’t want to just trust to fate that everything would turn out alright. He knew better than that.

“Look, you take that way, and I’ll go this way. We’ll circle around and meet on the other side, and hopefully one of us spots her,” Zell said, tactfully ignoring Seifer’s roll of the eyes. “Don’t make a scene. If you see Rinoa, get her out of sight.”

“This is stupid,” Seifer said, as if his expression and his melodramatic fed-up gestures weren’t enough to communicate what he was thinking.

“You can be rude to her if you want,” Zell said.

“Oh, well, there’s a silver lining,” Seifer murmured back. Zell didn’t deign to reply, but merely gestured to the other man to get moving, and then turned in the other direction to get on the move himself. But he didn’t even get a step before Seifer’s hand on his wrist pulled him back. “Wait,” Seifer said lowly.

“Um, we don’t really have time for that,” Zell said, frowning. He pulled his hand away, and Seifer released his grip, but the expression he was looking down at Zell with was suddenly grave.

“Listen,” he said. “About... what I said earlier, this afternoon...”

Zell watched him for a moment or two while he fought with whatever it was he was trying to say, trying not to get frustrated - but really, why did Seifer have to pick right now to suddenly want to spill his heart? It wasn’t as if Zell didn’t want to hear him out - everything else aside, he was curious to see how Seifer was going to try and explain his behavior without admitting the fact that he was an idiot - but now was hardly the place or time for that conversation. But he was clearly making an effort to do something, and Zell weighed that against the very real possibility that if he shut Seifer down right now, it might be for good; the ex-knight wasn’t exactly known for his honest and heartfelt confessions, and he wasn’t likely to offer Zell an apology twice... if that was in fact what he was doing; as he went on, it was rather difficult to tell.

“I kind of, uh, take it back,” Seifer said in a tone that was not exactly level. He appeared to be engaged in some kind of private war with his expression to look cool, which he was failing at. Zell wanted to laugh, but didn’t dare. “I didn’t really mean it and, uh... I shouldn’t have said it,” he finished flatly. Zell waited for more, but if there was anything else, Seifer didn’t seem to be willing to say it just now.

“That’s funny,” Zell said, playing nonchalant. “Usually when people apologize, they start with ‘I’m sorry’ and work their way backwards from there-”

“Fine, you know what? Laugh all you want,” Seifer hissed, his disposition taking a sudden turn for the worse. Zell was a bit startled; he’d only been joking, but evidently Seifer wasn’t in the mood to humor him. “I’m trying to do something right. You just go and think it’s hilarious.”

“What I think it is, is wasting time,” Zell replied. “I don’t care about what you said. I accept your apology. Now just go,” he said, giving the other man a pointed look. He turned to go himself, but before he could move, Seifer grabbed him again by the arm, this time much less gently.

“Zell,” he said sharply, stepping in close and crowding Zell against the pillar. His expression was dark, and Zell had an impulse to push him away, but he was averse to causing a scene. Probably better to let Seifer get whatever he was trying to say out now, instead of letting it stew for the next few hours or however long it would be before they had another private moment. Not that this one was exactly private, but at Seifer’s sudden display of violence, most of the crowd had put some distance between them, so they were comparatively secluded for the moment.

“Look, you can hate me if you want, that’s fine, I’ve made my peace with that,” Seifer growled, and Zell hardly had time to be surprised by that before he went on, “but you can let me finish talking. You at least can understand what’s going on here.”

“Why in the world would you think I hate you?” Zell interrupted.

Puzzlement flashed across Seifer’s features for a brief moment, not obscuring the anger that was still etched there - but it was enough to make clear to Zell what was happening here. What had Seifer been thinking this whole time? He had evidently formed some very dark and unpleasant theories about Zell’s intentions. Hell, he thought Zell hated him - but then, as Zell gave it some thought, what had he done to make Seifer think otherwise? Yeah, they had slept together, but it wasn’t like there was any romance in it. Or even friendliness. Really, overall, the entire night had been more like a brawl - like the countless fights they’d had before, just with a happier ending.

“Don’t you?” Seifer said in response to Zell’s own question, and his tone, which was hard and cold, only betrayed him a little with apprehension. It was only at that moment that it occurred to Zell that Seifer did, really did, like him. He was so baffled by the realization for a second or two that he forgot he was supposed to be answering a question.

“No, of course not,” he answered, giving the other man a look that he hoped conveyed how stupid he thought Seifer was. Imagine getting so worked up over something so dumb. Even still, the relief that visibly passed over him at Zell’s declaration was ridiculously endearing. He has really got a thing for me, Zell thought privately. Of course, it was one of the things he’d been conjecturing about all night, but it still hadn’t seemed quite like a real thing until just now, seeing the confirmation of his theory in Seifer’s expression. And there was something curiously charming about watching Seifer try to think of a way to ask his next question without sounding like a teenage girl. Zell tried to forget his impatience and the fact that they had somewhere rather urgent to be as he waited for Seifer to work up the nerve to ask it - after all, if he was going to ask it, he would only do it once, and Zell wasn’t going to miss it.

“So, then, you, um,” Seifer said, still trying very hard to look cool. Zell kept a straight face, resisting the nearly overwhelming urge to laugh. When it came right down to it, Seifer was just a boy at heart - Zell wasn’t going to say it wasn’t cute, but it was about time for Seifer to man up and just speak what was on his mind.

“I, um?” Zell prompted.

“You actually, uh, like me?”

“Yeah, I actually do,” Zell said with a grin, quirking an eyebrow up at the gunblader, who appeared, for lack of a better word, dumbfounded. Zell slapped him lightly on the cheek. “Now, go,” he said, pointing Seifer in the right direction before going off himself in the opposite direction. He ducked into the crowd that formed a wall against the dance floor, and when he glanced back over his shoulder, he was pleased to see that Seifer had managed to melt into the crowd as well. Well, at least something had managed to get him moving.

Still, Zell couldn’t help but smirk to himself as he made his way around the perimeter of the room, poring over the crush of people for a glimpse of Rinoa. The whole exchange was so silly that he had to smile. He made a mental note to remember to tease the fuck out of Seifer when this godawful mission was finally over and they were back at Garden. In the meantime, however, he couldn’t exactly dwell on it as he’d like to - he had more important things to worry about.

Stupid Seera. Why did she have to go and ruin what could have been a perfectly enjoyable last night in Galbadia with some absurd kidnapping scheme? He grumbled under his breath for a few moments as he searched before he realized that, his own personal grudge aside, it was rather a valid question. Her and her friends were evidently a part of some kind of sorceress resistance group - not a huge surprise; there were still a lot of them around, and Rinoa was frequently being targeted. But this stunt of Seera’s reeked of desperation, which made Zell wonder what they thought they were going to accomplish by holding Rinoa hostage - if they even got that far, because Seifer had been absolutely right when he said that his ex-girlfriend could handle herself. She was more powerful than Zell even liked to think about most of the time. True, most of that power was kept in check by the several trinkets of Dr. Odine’s that she wore at all times, but if there was one thing Rinoa was not, it was in need of protection. That did beg the question of why Zell felt the need to jump to her rescue anyway; his answer, when he thought about it, was that he was completely offended by Seera thinking she could get away with something so ludicrous right under his nose.

Well, at least this whole month spent in Deling City wouldn’t be a waste, if they saw some action tonight. On a professional level, at least - on a personal level, Zell found he was decently pleased with how things had turned out. So what if most of those four weeks had been spent at war with Seifer? Things had ended pretty well, hadn’t they? He had gotten Seifer to break down and admit not just that he wanted him, but that he liked him. Considering that a week ago he’d been ready to rip off whichever limb Seifer dared to touch him with, it was an improvement. Hell, four or five weeks ago, he’d have happily thrown Seifer onto Squall and Quistis’ mercy if he could have gotten away with it without fear of retribution, and he probably wouldn’t have thought twice about if it Seifer got booted out of Garden, either.

Funny how things could change so quickly. He’d spent some fifteen years hating Seifer’s guts, and in less than a month had almost completely changed his mind. Being in Seifer’s company day and night for four weeks had nearly driven him insane, yes, but it also gave him a chance to see the things that the other man probably didn’t want people to see. All the good things about him he kept shut up inside. Zell even kind of understood where he was coming from; after all, he probably thought it was simply easier to parade all his bad qualities and have people just dismiss him as a jerk, rather than put in all the work of showcasing the good in him with no guarantee that it would change anyone’s opinion. His logic was kind of twisted, but Zell could see how he’d come to that sort of mindset. But his opinion had been changed, of all people. Maybe that would be worth something to Seifer, and maybe not.

Still, it was not the time or place to contemplate it, Zell reminded himself. He was supposed to be searching for Rinoa - but that was turning out to be a futile endeavor, and he just couldn’t seem to get this affair with Seifer off his mind. He never used to overthink things this much. All his relationships in the past had been so straightforward and simple - well, there it was. “Straightforward” and “simple” were probably the last two words he would ever use to describe Seifer. Substitute, perhaps, “stubborn” and “scheming”. After some thought, he decided he’d better add “proud” and “manipulative” as well--

His completely off-topic train of thought was halted by the touch of a hand on his shoulder. He jumped around, half-expecting it to be Seifer again, despite the fact that the other man should still be on the other side of the room. He was more surprised to find Rinoa standing just behind him, and her expression was taken aback as he turned on her. “Zell, my god, are you okay?” she asked with a good deal of concern. His expression must have been something else, to judge by the look on her face.

“Rinoa,” he said, with some relief. How convenient of her to walk up just as he was in urgent need of finding her. “Can you come with me for a minute? Don’t ask why; just try not to look alarmed.”

“Alright,” she said, smiling a little. She was clearly confused but was playing along, which was all to the good as Zell steered her lightly by the arm toward the front of the room. What was less to the good was the fact that she had appeared just at the very moment he was searching for her, which seemed like too much of a coincidence to be in his favor. He was starting to get that gnawing bad feeling in his gut again.

“Zell, what’s going on?” she asked, giving him a look of deep worry as they nestled into a small alcove between two frondy potted plants. “Your friend said you were looking for me.”

“I was,” he replied, trying to think. If Rinoa was here, then Dallia was somewhere out in the room unwatched. He looked up to see Seifer coming toward them from the opposite direction. “Dammit,” he muttered to himself.

“You’re hurting my arm,” Rinoa said, pulling away until Zell released his grip. She rubbed her wrist with a slight hint of resentment to her otherwise innocent expression. “Is something wrong here?”

“Who told you I was looking for you?” he asked.

“Your friend,” she said, turning and pointing into the crowd. She paused, and then turned back, frowning. “Well... she was just over there a moment ago. She said-”

“And where’s Dallia?”

“She went to the ladies’,” Rinoa said, looking round again as Seifer approached them, his expression impressively neutral. She gave him a rather tepid look, and then returned her attention to Zell to add, “She spilled something on her gown. Now do you two want to tell me what’s going on?”

“I’m an idiot, that’s what’s going on,” Zell said, resisting the urge to hit himself. So Dallia was their target after all. As for her being a sorceress - well, either Seera and her friends were misguided, or he himself was, and now that the idea was in his head, he wasn’t feeling all that confident in his own discernment. Why wouldn’t she be a sorceress? It would make sense out of a lot of things that had happened over the past month. Not to mention her weird attachment to Seifer--

Zell looked up at the other man, suddenly feeling extremely uneasy. If, indeed, Dallia was a sorceress, what was going to happen when Seifer found out? If he wasn’t aware already - but that seemed unlikely, what with his rather extreme dislike of anything related to the topic. He wouldn’t even look at Rinoa, and Zell didn’t know the last time he’d actually spoken to Matron before that surprise meeting of theirs earlier this month. His aversion to sorceresses and their ilk was ingrained, and in fact was probably part of the reason he didn’t like Dallia at all, even if he didn’t realize it. His reaction to finding out that the woman he’d been working so closely with for the last four weeks was actually secretly a sorceress was probably going to be unpleasant. Briefly, Zell entertained the idea of pawning the other man off on some stupid errand to get him out of the way while he himself dealt with the Dallia situation, but somehow Seifer’s expression indicated that he was through taking orders from Zell today.

“I don’t want to say ‘I told you so’, Dincht,” he began, his tone giving away his amusement even if his face didn’t. Zell cut him off bad-temperedly.

“Then don’t say it. Rinoa, you’d probably better stay here for a bit,” he said, turning to her and giving a shrug, for lack of a better gesture to describe how utterly at a loss he was. She was looking between the two of them with growing suspicion, but he didn’t give her a chance to start asking questions before he headed toward the exit, with Seifer following closely behind. As they made their way downstairs in the direction of the restrooms, he explained what he’d overheard of Seera’s plan, omitting the part that involved Dallia being a sorceress - there was no proof yet, after all, and it would only upset Seifer to bring it up. By the time he was finished, the other man was scowling.

“That’s the stupidest kidnapping plan I’ve ever heard of,” Seifer said, sounding half-irritated but mostly fed up. “The only thing stupider is that Dallia actually fell for that.”

“She fell for it on purpose,” Zell said in response. “She wanted to be caught in their trap. Actually, I’m thinking that all the ridiculous stunts she’s been pulling have been designed to lure out her attackers. But why it took them a month to get their shit together is beyond me.”

“How the fuck are we supposed to protect her if she doesn’t tell us anything?” Seifer asked. The question evidently wan’t aimed at anyone in particular, because he didn’t seem to mind when Zell didn’t answer; he had an idea that the last thing that Dallia needed was their protection. As if in confirmation of that thought, there suddenly came a loud rumbling sound from the direction of the ladies’ room, followed closely by a mild shaking from the floor beneath their feet and a wave of static that filled the air around them. He looked up at Seifer, whose highly irritated expression reflected his own. “Did that sound like a thunder spell to you?” he asked casually, lifting one eyebrow in inquiry. The gesture, however, failed to convey the appropriate disdain in conjunction with the fact that his hair was all standing on end, which just made him look silly.

“Son of a bitch,” Zell said, adding a sigh just for dramatic effect. Seifer took off down the corridor, and Zell followed, wondering if there were any way for the situation to possibly get worse. He was fairly sure that was Dallia in action - it wasn’t likely her would-be kidnappers had access to illegal magics. If that wasn’t confirmation that she was a sorceress, then Zell didn’t know what was... and there would be no hiding the fact from Seifer, even if Zell had wanted to, which he was still debating in his head. Oh well, it was too late to worry about it now. The two men paused as they approached the door to the ladies’ room, through the bottom of which black smoke was seeping. Then Seifer barreled through the doorway, with Zell close behind.

Within seconds, the martial artist had taken in the scene. Dallia was on the far side of the room, standing in one of the sinks with her back against the vanity mirror, which was cracked from end to end. She looked somewhat peeved, but appeared unharmed, though her costume was a write-off. She spotted the two of them immediately as they came through the door, and her expression lit up. “Oh, boys, you’re finally here!” she exclaimed, as though they were late to a cocktail party, rather than to her rescue from a fairly dangerous situation. “Would you mind awfully detaining these cretins for me?”

Her three attackers turned at the same instant, and Zell sized them up. The man and the woman from before were there, as well as another young woman that Zell hadn’t seen before. She and her male companion were both armed with small handguns, and the older woman was wielding something that resembled a taser. Zell stifled a groan of frustration. He’d been shot before, but it definitely was on the list of things he didn’t want to experience again.

A movement on the right side of the room revealed that a fourth assailant was present - it took Zell a moment of scrutiny to realize that it was Seera. She was laying in the wreckage of one of the toilet stalls, whose walls had clearly been blown down by Dallia’s spell, and she looked rather the worse for wear; her hair was frazzled and burned black on the ends, and her eyes weren’t focused as she scrabbled at the rubble around her, trying to climb out. Zell guessed she’d taken the brunt of the thunder magic, and so he discounted her as an immediate threat, instead concentrating on the three others, who upon hearing Dallia’s imperious order, were now rushing he and Seifer.

He didn’t bother to look to Seifer for confirmation that they were on the same page; they both leapt forward into the fight, the gunblader taking the young woman on the far right, and Zell aiming for the guy in the middle. The one with the taser had hesitated, and then went back for Dallia, whose expression was maddeningly excited.Like this is some kind of fucking game, Zell thought with irritation, as he went for the guy with both fists. What he wouldn’t give for some hastes or a good protect spell. But no, this had to be an undercover mission - what a joke!

He went for the guy fast, but even still, he heard two shots fired before he closed the distance - one of which grazed his ribcage as he raised his arm to strike. The wuss went down with two hits to the face, and Zell was almost disappointed - the least these clowns could do after causing so much trouble was give him a good fight after all. Seifer had even less trouble dispatching his partner, although his expression suggested he would have appreciated having someone to wail on. Zell moved to take down the third assailant, but it was unnecessary; Dallia had bashed the woman over the head with a gilded tissue box, and she appeared to be out cold. She was now climbing down from the counter, holding the remains of her dress very gingerly around her, and looking fairly pleased with herself.

“That was exciting!” she announced, which earned her a dirty look from both Zell and Seifer, though she didn’t take notice of either. Zell looked around at the mess and sighed. The restroom was destroyed; Dallia’s little thunder spell had wreaked havoc on the marble fixtures and the intricate mosaic walls. He lifted his arm to take a look at the wound on his side, but it was hardly a scratch, although it was oozing blood in an unpleasant sort of way. Whether or not the guy had actually been aiming at him, or even which of the two kidnappers had fired both of the shots, he had no idea, and didn’t particularly care. He and Seifer were in good shape, and Dallia looked positively giddy - hell, this was just another adventure to her.

“What the hell were you thinking?” he asked her, biting back a sigh.

“What?” she replied, and she even had the balls to give him an innocent little shrug. “All’s well that ends well, don’t they say?”

Zell gritted his teeth, but he refrained from making a remark that would undoubtedly not go down well with Dallia. Seifer, he noticed, was being very quiet, but what the reason for that was, Zell couldn’t say. At the best of times, it wasn’t easy to read Seifer, and at the moment his expression was inscrutable.

Well, what did they do now? Zell looked around at the four unconscious kidnappers - no, make that three; Seera was still conscious, though she looked seriously dazed as she continued to make an effort to get to her feet. Possibly she didn’t realize the fight was over, not that there was much of a fight to begin with, because she was clutching a device that was similar to the taser-like thing the other woman had, and was trying to raise it in front of her to defend herself. Zell, who was closest, took a few steps toward her and slapped it out of her hands.

“Your girlfriend there is causing a lot of trouble,” Seifer said, the sneer evident in his tone.

“She’s not my girlfriend,” Zell snapped back, and you fucking well know it, he added silently. Seifer wisely said nothing more. He was clearly in a foul mood, but so was Zell, and he wasn’t feeling like putting up with the other man’s snarkiness just now. Dallia, on the other hand, was grinning in a way that Zell really didn’t like, and as he shot a glance her way, she gave him a very inquisitive look that had him wondering just how much she did know about he and Seifer. That devious gleam in her eye suggested that his unspoken comment had not gone unnoticed.

“Seera, give it up,” he said, watching with a sense of pity as the bemused girl made a sloppy lunge toward the weapon laying near her feet. Zell kicked it away.

“Zell, what are you doing?” she said in a weak, hoarse voice. “You know what she is. You of all people-”

“Give it up,” he repeated firmly. “Your plan was stupid and it failed. I don’t want to have to hurt you.”

“Sorceresses can’t be allowed to roam free,” she said, finally staggering to her feet. Zell snorted.

“‘Roam free’? It’s not like she’s out there burning down villages and eating babies, for fuck’s sake. She’s throwing parties. Where’s the harm?”

“Sorceresses cannot be allowed to stand in positions of power...” Seera went on, clutching at her head as she wobbled from side to side. Zell took pity on her and felled her with one punch to the gut, and then rolled her over to a clean patch of floor next to her companions. All these stupid resistance groups spouted the same nonsense.

“That anti-sorceress spiel is such bullshit,” he huffed.

“Bravo, gentlemen!” Dallia chirped, clapping her hands with gusto as she came up between Zell and Seifer. “I’m very impressed! You took them out so quickly!”

“It was stupid of you to let them lure you down here,” Zell told her sharply. If she took offense at this impertinence, she didn’t show it. Instead, she beamed up at the pair of them, hooking one arm through Zell’s elbow and the other through Seifer’s on her other side.

“But you two came running to my rescue! Just like knights in shining armor!”

She flashed a winning smile up at Zell, who felt his stomach lurch at the phrasing she had used, and its connotations. Seifer’s reaction was less temperate; he yanked his arm out of Dallia’s grasp, and Zell, in the interest of damage limitation, grabbed the gunblader by his shirtfront and steered him toward the door before he could say whatever his extremely angry expression suggested he was about to say. “Seifer, why don’t you go find General Caraway?” Zell said, but it wasn’t really a question. He hoped Seifer would have the sense to take himself away from Dallia when he was in such a mood, as they both knew very well how she affected him.

“Let me go,” the other man snarled, slapping Zell’s hands away. Zell simply shoved him through the door and shut it behind him, and to his relief, Seifer didn’t attempt to fight him. Well, there was one small crisis averted, he supposed.

“You seem in sort of a bad mood, Mr. Dincht,” Dallia observed when he returned to her side.

“Yeah, no kidding,” he said sourly. And why not? They’d been lied to and dicked around with for the whole month, besides trying to deal with a client who did whatever she wanted and damn the consequences. Now he was going to have a very unhappy Seifer to contend with, as well, and he didn’t even want to think about how he was going to write up this mission report. He turned back to Dallia, who was doing her best butter-wouldn’t-melt routine, complete with fluttering eyelashes and a sweet, glittery smile. “How long have you been a sorceress?” he asked.

“Oh, all my life,” she answered, waving a hand as though the question were ridiculous. “I mean, as long as I can remember. But it’s a hard secret to keep.”

“So your husband knows?” Zell followed up, but he was pretty sure he knew the answer to that question even before she said it.

“Of course he does. But, I mean...” She paused, and then gave him a skeptical look. “Are you saying you didn’t know?”

“Your lovely thunder spell tipped me off a bit,” he replied coolly.

“Oh, dear,” Dallia said, and she sat down on the edge of the counter, looking suddenly stricken. “That’s not... that is, I thought Seifer had figured me out ages ago. I mean, all those things I said... he must think I was intentionally trying to be cruel.”

She did look genuinely troubled over it, and some of Zell’s anger deflated at this. Neither he nor Seifer had had the tiniest suspicion that Dallia was anything other than what she appeared to be, but it certainly explained why Seifer disliked her so much from the start, even before she had given them any reason to, which she had amply done since. If there was anyone likely to recognize a sorceress, it would be Seifer - or would it? Come to think of it, Zell had to wonder if Rinoa knew - certainly she would be one to see Dallia for what she really was. For that matter, did Squall know? Had he sent them into this mission knowing it was a set-up?

“Who else knows about you? Squall?” he asked next.

“Heavens, no! Fury is the only one. Although plenty of people have their suspicions, no one has ever been able to prove anything,” she added with just a touch of bitterness.

“But these guys found out,” he mentioned, indicating the four bodies laying at their feet.

“Well, these anti-sorceress groups have been at me for years. But like I said, they’ve never proven anything,” was her answer to that, and she looked down at her kidnappers with disdain.

“But you were trying to lure them out,” Zell went on. “All these parties, and that ridiculous Garden scheme, and then dragging Seifer into it...”

She gave a heavy sigh, and suddenly she looked very tired to Zell. “Yes, I was trying to lure them out,” she explained, her tone low and no longer exuberant, as before. “I had no idea it would take so much. From what I gathered, their plans have been going awry all month, and this nonsense tonight was their last desperate attempt to get me before I leave the city. It’s really rather anti-climactic, isn’t it?”

Zell didn’t deign to answer that. Instead, he said, “you shouldn’t have pulled that stunt with the magic... people are going to know now, if they suspected before.”

“I think I’m ready for people to know,” Dallia said, and surprisingly, she looked in earnest. “I’ve been dancing around with fools like these my whole life. Maybe it’s better to just get it out in the open and they can declare war on me and that’ll be the end of it.”

“That’s an admirable stance to take,” Zell said, which made Dallia smile. She came down from on the counter, and gave him a friendly pat on the arm.

“I’m flattered you think so,” was her response. “Come on... we’ll let the authorities handle the clean-up down here. I should like to find my husband... and you should probably find your partner.”

Zell didn’t answer to that charge, either. He was feeling eager to find Seifer, mostly because the other man was so unpredictable that Zell couldn’t guess what he might be doing with his newfound knowledge of Dallia’s heritage. He was angry, certainly, and Zell was plenty familiar with that, but when it came to things like sorceresses and the war, he’d only ever gotten a very little out of Seifer about it, so he couldn’t even hazard a guess at how the gunblader might be taking this new development. He hoped the other man had done as he’d told him and fetched Caraway and the authorities for them. Dallia’s would-be captors were all down for the count, but they could use some reinforcements nonetheless.

He wasn’t disappointed. When he and Dallia emerged into the corridor, the first thing they saw was the General rushing toward them, in his outrageous orange costume, natch; and he was followed closely by several members of the security staff, who were doing things like barging through all the closed doors down the hallway and declaring the area “secured”. Zell couldn’t help but wonder if part of Dallia’s plan had been to hire the most incompetent security team she could find.

Zell handed her over to her husband, but he didn’t stay to chat; the security staff could handle things from here. He had something slightly more important to attend to; namely, finding Seifer before he did something untoward. Of course, he was also himself feeling worried - Seifer’s psyche was a minefield at the best of times, and Zell didn’t want to discount the possibility that coming face-to-face with a sorceress, again, might have really thrown him. He avoided both Rinoa and Matron like the plague. He, and everyone around him, steered well clear of any topics that might lead into territories dangerous - how dangerous, really, was it for Seifer? The worries gnawed at Zell more and more as he ascended the grand staircase that led back to the ballroom, so he could search for Seifer.

He didn’t have to look far. The party was over, the arrival of the Galbadian police breaking things up quite nicely, but there were still a lot of people lingering around the place, probably waiting for Dallia’s reappearance or something they could use as fodder for the gossips. It took him less than a moment to spot Seifer; the other man was standing near the west exit, lurking just out of sight of the crowds in the shadow of a decorative column. He locked eyes with Zell the instant he entered the ballroom, and the martial artist made his way straight over, pasting an innocuous smile on his face. Seifer didn’t look any different than usual, but there was no harm in being wary.

“Hey,” he said, for lack of anything better. “There you are.”

Seifer gave him a probing look, with one eyebrow arched. “Yeah, here I am.”

“I was afraid you might have... took off, or something,” Zell admitted.

“That wouldn’t be very professional,” Seifer remarked.

“Yes, and of course you are a model of professionalism.”

Seifer gave him another long look; this one had a trace of humor to it. For a minute, neither of them spoke, Seifer observing the crowd, and Zell pretending to do the same while really he was just running his thoughts in circles. They had a lot to discuss, and if he was honest with himself, the events that had happened here tonight weren’t even his priority. With that sudden thought, he decided to go for a change of subject; maybe that would cheer Seifer up a little.

“So, I seem to recall that I haven’t heard you actually say ‘I’m sorry’ yet...” he began, leaning very casually against the wall. Seifer glanced sideways down at him, and there was enough of incredulity in the look to show that he knew full well what Zell was talking about.

“The way I recall it, you accepted my apology anyway,” Seifer said coolly.

“There’s also the matter of a question I asked and you haven’t yet answered,” Zell pointed out.

“I had a message from Squall just a minute ago,” Seifer said next, as casually as if he hadn’t just completely changed the subject without even a minor effort at a segue. Zell might have thought he did it on purpose just to avoid answering the question, but Seifer did seem genuinely distracted. He probably had a lot to think about, and Zell wasn’t helping by pestering him. Then again, since when did he care if he got on Seifer’s bad side? That seriously off-topic remark, however, did demand an explanation.

“I’m afraid you lost me,” Zell said.

“He’s sending the Ragnarok out to pick us up. It should be here in about...” Seifer glanced down at his wristwatch, and then back up. “Two hours. We’re to debrief with Caraway first and then head back.”

“What’s the rush?” Zell said, slightly confused by this turn of events. Among other things, he had been kind of looking forward to that train ride. “We’re going back tomorrow.”

“I guess he can’t wait that long,” was all Seifer said, but he didn’t look particularly peeved about the fact, the way he usually did whenever Squall made any kind of decision that involved him. He looked merely thoughtful, and Zell was again struck by how unlike himself he was acting. He didn’t seem angry; he wasn’t trying to argue or bait Zell, and he had completely ignored the one attempt Zell had made at goading him. Zell realized, with sudden surprise, that he actually wanted to know what was going on in Seifer’s head. Oh, shit, I care about him, Zell thought with a small shock. He had known for some time that he was taking a liking to the gunblader, but to suddenly come face to face with the feelings was a whole new world of weirdness.

That was the real trouble with becoming involved with Seifer: his blasted unpredictability. If it weren’t for moments like these - the rare instances where Seifer wasn’t actively being mean, or sarcastic, or provoking, or cold, and was actually just being himself - Zell would never have ventured down the rocky road of liking the bastard in the first place. If he had never gone on this mission with Seifer, he could be at home still happily hating the other man’s guts, and consequently being blissfully unaware of what he really was missing - the chance to know the sides of Seifer that he seriously doubted anyone else did. His sense of humor, which was good if you discounted the fact that he thought it was funny to piss Zell off. His brains - who would have thought that Seifer was an expert in historical literature? But even those were just surface layers. The real interesting parts of Seifer only started to show when you put your claws out and dug in a bit.

“So do you think Leonhart will do all the yelling, or will he enlist Quistis and Xu to do some of the work for him?” Seifer remarked snippily.

Zell shrugged. “Maybe if we’re lucky, he’ll fire us over the phone and save us the hassle of a debriefing.”

Seifer cracked a grin at that. “Well, I guess there’s a silver lining,” he said, still watching across the room as Dallia and her husband finally ascended from the basement, surrounded by a cloud of security personnel. “Anything that makes Squall’s day worse is worth the effort.”

Zell didn’t think he’d say that if he really thought they were in danger of losing their jobs, so he didn’t reply. Instead, he took a moment to study the other man’s demeanor as he very calmly observed the scene that was taking place at the far end of the ballroom. The paparazzi had converged, swarmlike, on the star couple, and Zell could see Dallia’s emphatic gestures as she detailed the thrilling event that had passed not ten minutes ago downstairs. She didn’t, interestingly enough, try to drag either of them into the spotlight, but she did catch Zell’s eye just for a moment, and he would swear he saw her wink at him. Or perhaps the indication had been meant for Seifer; his expression was dark and uneasy, which was about par for the course as far as interactions went between the two of them.

He grabbed Seifer’s arm gently, and when the other man glanced over at him, he nodded in the direction of the exit. “Maybe we should slip out while we have the chance,” he suggested quietly. “We can probably beat the press to Caraway’s place if we’re lucky, and that won’t be the case if we stick around here.”

Seifer nodded his agreement, and they managed to sneak out with relative ease through the side exit which, what with the excitement going on in other areas of the building, was thankfully unguarded. Since they weren’t that far from the mansion at all, Zell proposed that they walk, instead of risking the bus or trying to hail a cab, and Seifer didn’t object. He hadn’t, in fact, said anything since they left the party, and as they made their way leisurely through the dark streets, Zell wondered if he should break the ice. Actually, he really wanted to ask if Seifer was okay, what with everything that had happened, but somehow he felt that wouldn’t go over too well with the other man. But again, what did he really care if he pissed Seifer off? That was just a natural part of their relationship.

“Seifer,” he finally said some while later, as they were coming round the corner to Caraway’s property. Seifer looked over at him with an expression that was maddeningly impassive. Of all the times for Seifer to have a chronic case of poker face, why now, when Zell actually wanted to get something out of him? Well, there was no point in chickening out now. “Are you okay?”

“That’s a pretty loaded question, isn’t it?” was Seifer’s reply. His tone was as neutral as his face, which only fueled Zell’s frustration, and when he responded to this curt inquiry, it was with less of concern and more of irritation.

“No, it’s not,” Zell said sharply. This was evidently not what Seifer was expecting, because he stopped walking, turning to face Zell with a look of equal parts curiosity and skepticism. Zell stared unabashedly back for a moment or two, hoping his own expression conveyed just how fed up he was with all this running around. If Seifer could just answer a damn question honestly. “It’s just a question. I’m not asking for your fucking life’s story. A yes or a no is all I’m looking for.”

For a long couple of moments, there was no reply, and they stood in the dark street in silence, save for the sounds of traffic drifting over from the next street. “Well then, the short answer is, yes, I’m fine,” Seifer finally answered, and if Zell’s eyes weren’t playing tricks on him, the gunblader was actually smiling now. It’s official, Zell thought with a mental sigh, I don’t understand a fucking thing about this guy.

“And the long answer?” he prompted, after a few seconds when Seifer began walking again, and he trailed a few steps behind.

“I’ll tell you some other time.”

“I’ll hold you to that,” Zell said, and this time, Seifer was definitely grinning. They continued on down the street, and neither of them spoke on the subject again; but Zell didn’t mind particularly. He as good as had Seifer’s word that he’d get the full story when the other man was ready to tell it, and that, he supposed, was good enough for now.
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Mind Games