vatheon | Are those...?

Entry tags:

Are those...?

Characters: Squall Leonhart and Selphie Tilmitt
Location: Squall's apartment
Time: Afternoon
Style: Whichever
Status: Closed

Vatheon had pretty nice places to live, if nothing else. Even Squall had to admit that this was a rather comfortable. Aside from the whole "taken from your homeworld" thing.

He had decided to stay in that day, as there was some kind of curse going around and he wanted no part of that. No going out, no SFC.

Instead, he was seated on a couch, staring very intently at the coffee table. Or more accurately, what was on the coffee table. A chocobo chick hopped onto the table, turning its head to one side and leaning forward to get a better look.

"Carbuncle, Cerberus..." he muttered to himself, then frowned. "...where's Doomtrain?"

Oh, there it was.

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Selphie went down onto her knees on the floor to be more at level with the little bird, and she held out a hand for the chocobo.

"It's adorable! What's her name?"

Still, she turned to Squall with a concerned look on her face. "No one wanted it? But... how? Where did it come from? My chocobos have only just laid their eggs."

"Tempest," he answered idly. Yes, he named her after the car. It was the only thing he could think of at the time. Said Tempest rubbed her head against Selphie's hand before losing interest and going back to peering at the drawer. "That redheaded kid said his laid eggs and they hatched."

"Tempest! Aww! She's so cute for a tempest!" Unlike Squall, who kind of really suited his name. She was happy to pet the little bird, and nodded knowingly.

"Lea, I guess. I'm worried though. His are some of the first kind of be born here, and he seems to hatch so many of them... And if they don't all have home then that's horrible!"

But something caught the corner of her eye - the chocobo was quite intent with the drawer now, and Selphie was sure that was the corner of a Triple Triad card sticking out the top. She just reaches out for it, trying to wriggle it out.

Lea had said that he was going to keep and take care of any that didn't find homes, though Squall wondered just how much he could handle. Sure, he seemed to know a lot about chocobo care, but there was only so much you could do.

"A lot of people seemed interested, so he probably found places for most of them," he replied. He was about to offer Selphie something to drink when he noticed her doing...something. Wait. That's the drawer. "Selphie, what are you doing?"

Yes, so by this stage Selphie was on her hands and knees, tugging this little piece of paper from the drawer. It might be nothing, but it might be what she suspected it was! Tempest was flapping with excitement to see that what she'd been looking for was finally being set free from the drawer.

Aha! Selphie was still kneeling on the floor when she twisted round and held the card high up above her with no small degree of triumph.

"TRIPLE TRIAD!"

...Oh dear God. Squall's only consolation was that the card was a common one that he had multiple copies of, so if it was damaged by Selphie's tugging, it was no problem. Triple Triad, the premier trading card game in the world Squall and Selphie came from, was one of Squall's hobbies (yes, he has hobbies) and one that he didn't like letting other people know about.

"Selphie..." he said as Tempest squeaked in joy. "...put that down."

It was all he could manage at a time like this. Even if there was nobody else around to see the card she was holding very triumphantly in her hand, he still didn't want her waving it around.

But soon she was up on her feet, waving around for Tempest and Squall to see. Not that they didn't know it was there anyway. She couldn't help but join Tempest in a little hopping dance.

"Squall! Why do you even have this one? It isn't even good!"

It was a bit bent from pulling it out, but otherwise still fine. She took her hand down and smiled fondly at the object, feeling that tug to home.

"Unless... ....unless you have MORE?!"

Selphie had inadvertently given him an out, and Squall decided that he'd say that it was just a gift from one of Garden's students for his promotion to Commander.

"I have a lot more than that!" he growled, but then was overcome with horror. That was not what he meant to say!

Dammit, Vatheon.

"Ha! Ha ha ha!"

Selphie burst into loud and happy laughter and she jumped over to Squall, waving the card in front of his face.

"You've got the curse too, haven't you?"

But it's not unkind laughter, she's just so so amused by this. "So where's the rest, Mr Triad?"

Squall actually didn't know he had the curse, as he was trying to avoid talking to as many people as possible, and this was the first time he had blurted out something. Now that it was out, however, there was no point in trying to hide his cards anymore.

"Here," he said, opening the drawer. Normally very organized, the cards were a bit of a mess as he had to quickly dump them in there when Selphie came knocking on his door. His entire collection, which was by even the most devoted collectors' standards, was quite big and he was surprised to see them at the Nostalgia Nook, so naturally, he snatched them up.

Once the drawer was opened, he moved aside for Selphie to see, but he would be watching her.

Very carefully.

Though, truth be told, it probably would take Squall a while to figure out he had any kind of speaking curse - he spoke very little to very little people anyway.

Yay! Selphie was beyond excited, and she held the card carefully now between two fingertips as she bounced over to the drawer.

"Oh my -"

Wow, she was really wide eyed, bending down to take a proper look, "Squall! Do you have... ALL of them?" Surely he had a complete collection in there!

Even though he was frustrated with this curse and a bit wary now that Selphie knew he collected Triple Triad cards, Squall couldn't help but feel a bit of pride in how impressed she was with his collection.

"No, but I have most of them." There were some very hard to find cards, mostly the ones of people, that he didn't have. "And they're coming out with new ones all the time, so I don't think I'll ever have all of them."

Okay, so this was clearly something precious to Squall, and Selphie wasn't going to disrespect any of his things. Not that she would anyway, but she could tell the cards were important - so she didn't touch.

"Wow... Where did you get them from? Home, or your stocking?"

"They're all from home," Squall answered. All of them were bought with his own gil or hard won from other people. He hadn't even put up a stocking for the holiday, because he's Squall Leonhart, naturally. He'd often go out on his own to challenge card players, and it was a wonder, really, that none of the others ever noticed this. "I...play a lot."

"Wow! You're so lucky to have them there..." Not that Selphie could think of anything in particular she'd like to have with her here from home. She had her nunchaku at least.

"I wish I had some too, cause then we could play!"

She tilted her head at that comment, trying to think of a time when he ever had played. He kept to himself so often and wondered around a lot on his own, so she guessed he could have. "Really? You've never played me!"

"Of course, if I did, then you would have already known I play," he said. After all, he couldn't exactly keep it a secret if he played matches with Selphie and everyone else on the team. "If you find some cards, I'll play you."

It wasn't like there was anyone else to play.

"Why'd ya have to keep it a secret? Pretty much everyone ever played in Garden." She herself had won a couple of pretty decent cards from playing in the various Gardens she'd been to.

"Really? You will?" She peered down into the drawer again. "Get 'em out! Show me your favourites!"

There was just something embarrassing about admitting you were a Triple Triad fanatic, even if it was something a lot of people did. Fortunately, Squall was spared having to answer Selphie's question when she turned her attention to seeing the cards he liked. Reaching into the drawer, he shifted the cards around, pulling out a few of the ones he liked. Many of them were ones of Guardian Forces like Shiva, Quetzalcoatl, Ifrit, others he liked just for the design on the cards, and even one of Zell that he had won from his mother.

That unassuming woman played a mean game of cards.

That excitement didn't go away, and Selphie was practically bouncing as she watched him go through his card. It felt like home, in card game format and, essentially, that's what it was. And then there was the Zell card.

Selphie almost automatically reached a hand out for it, her expression this time far more thoughtful, "I like the Zell card." Wow. It had been over a year now since she'd seen Zell, or anyone else. That hit hard.

Normally, Squall wouldn't be very keen on letting people touch his cards, but he was more than willing to make an exception this time, handing Zell's card out to her so she could hold it. It had a similar effect on him when he first saw it. Squall never thought that he'd ever miss loud, bouncy, occasionally whiny Zell this much, but funny how those things turn out, huh?

"I have one of Quistis too," he said, gently sliding some other cards in the drawer aside to pull out her card.

"Huh..." She just stared at the card a while, thinking about it, about home, and wondering what Zell was up to. Selphie was grateful to take a look at the Quistis card too.

"Oh.. Hey Quisty, hey Zell. Nice to see you guys!" But something croaked a little in her throat. She swallowed hard before pointedly smiling at Squall, "Cool!"

Ouch. That was kind of hard to watch, as it made Squall only more painfully aware of how much he did miss everyone else at home. Quistis' bossiness, Zell's enthusiasm, even Rinoa's strange quirks and Irvine's womanizing ways. He missed them all.

"Let's talk about something else," he suggested.

Ah, good idea commander. She looked at the cards a moment or two longer and gave them each a lingering smile, "I'm gonna give you guys back over to your owner now." And she handed them back to Squall, pleased at least to have her memory refreshed on how her friends looked.

"Alright! So whatcha wanna talk about?"

Squall was asked questions all the time. Commander, what are your orders? Commander, is it okay to let the students visit their families in town? Commander, the cafeteria is out of hot dogs again, is there something that can be done about this? And he could easily answer all of those questions.

But what to talk about? Selphie's got him there.

"I don't know," he answered. "You think of something."

Hmm... She was to think of something, eh? Selphie gave a sly look at Squall as she looked around for a place to sit. Of course, she made herself at home and dumped herself down someplace.

"How about... Vatheon? What do you think of the people here?"

Maybe he'd confess a little something. Selphie didn't know what she wanted him to say, but she had to start somewhere.

"They're different, that's for sure," Squall said. Of course they were different, they came from other worlds. But Vatheon had its own share of just plain strange people, like Train, the guy with the cat problem. "They're not bad, just weird."

"I know. It was so weird when I got here - everyone seems from such totally different worlds - I guess, cause they are!"

She smiled as she grabbed a cushion and cuddled herself up on his sofa, "But that's good that you don't think it's bad. Have you made any new friends?"

"A couple," Squall replied. And that much he was willing to admit. If he said he had no friends, he was afraid of what Selphie might try to do. He also wasn't sure which of the people he met could be counted as friends and which of them were just people he knew the names of.

"Really? Who? Who?!" Selphie wriggles into a perked up position on the sofa, watching the little chocobo chirping around the room. How exciting it would be if they shared the same friends! Or if he could introduce her to some new ones!

"Well, there's the cat guy," Squall said, then paused for a second. Whoops, that wasn't his name. It was just that Squall usually called him 'the cat guy' in his head. "...his name is Train. And a redhead girl named Kairi."

Selphie couldn't help but giggle at Squall giving his new friends little pet names, as it were. "Huh... I've never met them before. But once I met this guy who said that he was pretty sure I was supposed to know him, and Kairi. But... I don't get it."

He wouldn't call them nicknames. Just...something that makes them easier to remember.

"Don't get what? That you're supposed to remember some guy?"

Selphie shifted a little uncomfortably on the sofa, and she started to fidget with the cushion she was holding. "But - I'd met a bunch of them... I was supposed to friends with them... when I was kid. Like best friends. But I don't even remember.."

C'mon Squall, you know she hates to forget stuff.

Oh, that was insensitive of him. Squall knows what not being able to remember friends feels like, but he can't possibly understand how it feels like when Selphie feels it. He had gotten along fine, and if he were to be brutally honest, probably could if he went on friendless forever, but the same doesn't apply to everyone.

"Sorry."

Selphie could feel something rising in her throat and she was quick to swallow it down, "It's okay!~"

Squall couldn't help but wonder if it really was okay. Even if it was, maybe he should try to do something to cheer her up a little?

...ha. He's Squall Leonhart. He's phenomenally bad at that kind of thing. But still, he was going to try. With both hands, he gently scooped up little Tempest and held her out to Selphie. The chocobo chick peeped, flapped her wings, then spun around in a circle in an attempt to amuse her.

Selphiw wasn't sure at first what exactly Squall was planning on doing with the little bird, but when he held her out, she sat up straighter and smiled. She leaned forward towards Tempest and held out a hand, giggling, "Tee hee! You're one cute chocobo, lady!"

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