Heat

Squall was going mad with inaction.

His body stayed quite still while his mind raced for miles over the rolling terrain of Balamb, beyond the city and to the forests and green pastures. Lush grass-covered plains and the patchwork fields of farmers slid beneath his free-flying mind as he searched for and found boot-churned and blood-stained earth.

A high-pitched scream tore and shred his mind but he sought out the monster from which it issued. The creature, the Scylla whipped about it with its claw-tipped tentacles, ripping at the body of a SeeD that lay in a convulsing heap on the ground.

Squall was puzzled by the monster’s form. It was a great deal larger than the Scylla he had seen before. The skin of the thing was still red and striated, like ropes of muscle wrapped around and around a tall, amorphous shape. It was much bigger, though; to Squall it looked like three normal-sized Scylla had joined together to make one giant, long and thin creature. The surface of the monster was also changed some—there were thick, horizontal gashes ripped into the flesh all over the body. And the arms…so many arms. Three Scylla joined together made three hundred writhing, red tentacles.

Squall pulled back, his mind shuddering away from this disgusting, wet and dripping thing, but he could not free himself. Dizzily he remained at the monster’s side and stared around at the humans surrounding it, feeling a powerful hunger as he looked at each of the SeeDs. Their veins contained some glowing elixir that shone from within the soggy layers of flesh which were, to the Scylla, no more important than the grass or the clouds.

There seemed to Squall to be three uniformed SeeDs standing around him and there were many more lying on the ground. One of the soldiers glowed more brightly than any of the others, with more strength and energy to be had. The Scylla turned from its meager meal fading away on the ground and toward this shining morsel. Hunger was a burning heat in every throbbing pit and sac of the Scylla’s body.

Squall saw what the Scylla did not about this appetizing meal—blond hair, honey-pale skin, pink lips curled in a sneer and a scar across the forehead which, though the wound was more than two years old, was red with adrenaline-flushed blood. Seifer wielded his gunblade with an easy confidence, striking out at the creature and meeting again and again the reaching, ravenous tentacles and their bone-hard claws. It was a duel, strange and deadly, though there was no skill or grace in the monster’s movements. The Scylla reached out again and again at what it saw as an irresistible source of food standing right in front of it. Each time it stretched toward the human, it was rebuffed by the flat metal blade and it was too famished and too attracted to Seifer’s glowing strength to give up and try for another target.

Squall saw more; he saw Seifer’s sweat and the blood on his hands and wrists from cuts where the Scylla had occasionally landed a blow. Squall saw the way Seifer’s chest heaved with each painful breath he sucked in through exertion-tight lungs.

The other two SeeDs were not much help to Seifer. One of them held a rifle trained on the monster, but his aim was shaky and his arm kept dipping. Squall saw the source of the soldier’s weakness in the bloody mess just below his collarbone where the Scylla had penetrated his chest. The boy—he looked no more than eighteen—kept coughing up blood, and Squall thought that the Scylla must have punctured one of his lungs.

The second SeeD was slightly more helpful, holding a rifle in one hand and a massive handgun in the other. He pulled the triggers repeatedly, sending shot after shot flying at the body of the Scylla, but it did not even bother to turn from Seifer. The beast met each bullet with a claw as it whipped its tentacles out to catch and deflect it.

For a moment the monster turned away from its prospective meal. It had no face, no eyes, no features to give a clue as to which side was the front of the monster, but linked as he was to the Scylla, Squall could sense it directing its attention around at the other two SeeDs.

While turned toward the leaking human with the one rifle, the Scylla was caught by surprise. Seifer pushed past a writhing mass of tentacles and sliced a long chunk of hard red flesh from the monster’s body. It screamed that horrible, high scream. The scream had always been a mystery to Squall, as the creature had no mouth—where did it come from? Now, so close to the monster, sharing space with it, Squall could see: the scream that tore the air came from the claws tipping each tentacle. Myriad crusty pores covered each claw, and these holes had dual function. Not only did they suck the blood and life energy out of the creature’s victims, but they also issued that high, ripping scream which often paralyzed its weaker prey with fear.

Seifer was not disabled by fear in any way. An audible roar rolled from his mouth and, with visible effort, he gathered his remaining strength and redoubled his onslaught. The other SeeDs seemed inspired and motivated by either action, and the wounded one took aim and fired while the other began picking his targets from the mass of slimy, waving red limbs. Each hit he made blasted a claw from the long tentacles of the Scylla, and the creature’s blood spurted in a wide fanning arc.

Seifer let out an involuntary cry as the monster’s thin red blood splashed across his arm. The liquid steamed and Squall realized that it was boiling hot. Seifer’s skin blistered immediately under the blood but he did not spare the time it took to wipe it off. He just roared again, a shout of pain and anger, and leapt close to the monster.

The Scylla shrieked triumphantly and skimmed weightlessly across the air to Seifer. Its wounded limbs hung bleeding and useless, but it lifted all its able tentacles toward the glowing feast before it and made as if to close them about Seifer in a deadly embrace. Just then one of the other two SeeDs landed a blow on the main body of the Scylla. The scream and the pain were intense, and Squall felt both.

That shock of intensity immediately disconnected Squall from the Scylla. He did not travel over the land as he had before, instead he crashed back into his head like the snap of a rubber band. One moment he was in the fields outside Balamb with Seifer and the next moment he was back in his office, seated at his expensive, marble-topped desk.

Squall jumped to his feet and ran into the bathroom. He only just made it to the toilet where he was sincerely and violently ill. When he reached the point where the only thing left to vomit up were his toes and he was racked with dry heaves, he flushed the toilet and collapsed against the wall.

The cold marble floor felt good through his pants against his blazing skin. He put the heel of his hand against his forehead and he had to jerk it away from the heat. For a crazy moment he thought it must be from the Scylla, that his body was still feeling the monster’s boiling hot blood coursing through his veins. For a moment he could still feel the tearing pain of having his limbs severed, and when he looked down at his hands he expected to see the scaly black bone and the oozing craters of the Scylla’s claws.

“Hyne, what a nightmare.”

Though the images were still clear in his head, the hard edge of pain that accompanied them faded somewhat. He remained on the bathroom floor a moment longer while he processed the dream.

The Scylla’s screaming still echoed in his ears, and Squall childishly clamped his hands over them. He had a child’s desire to stay here on the floor, curled into a corner and hiding behind the tub. He had to be at his desk, though, for when Zell and Quistis called with mission updates.

Squall got up and walked back into his office. He was completely alone in the spacious room, and he was anxious and bitter about it. He kept looking at his wrist watch, counting the minutes and seconds. Four minutes and 35 seconds since Seifer’s call was cut off. Ten minutes and 29 seconds since Seifer’s voice went suddenly dead. Seventeen minutes and 48 seconds since Seifer’s signal was lost, and so on.

Squall pulled over one of the multiple flat screen monitors that rose on flexible arms from the surface of his gigantic desk. The table was a monstrosity the size of a car, and if Squall had any talents at multi-tasking, he could probably rule the world from that desk. Just now he found it ridiculous and ostentatious, and he nearly pulled the monitor off of its base as he swiveled it to face him.

The topographical map of the area was still displayed, and there was a blinking red arrow where Seifer’s last communication had originated. The map was a wide overhead view and did not give much detail unless the user selected a sector for enlargement. From this broad, featureless view, the red arrow seemed to lay on a vast pool of green set beside an even larger section of blue. Purple dots denoted villages while black ones represented cities. Seifer’s little red arrow was lost in a sea of green that showed endless acres of pasture lands and farms with no towns or cities nearby.

Staring at that blinking symbol, on and off, on and off, on and off was maddening. It’s what he had been doing when he drifted off into that nightmare, so it was really no shock that his dreams had been so disturbed. He still couldn’t shake the feeling of being inside that monster’s primitive mind. If he closed his eyes, he could feel its hunger and see the way Seifer had shone. He could see where the blood splashed across Seifer’s left hand and where the blisters raised across the knuckles. It was a terrible nightmare, born of fear and frustration.

Frustration from being here, in his office! He should be out there, in the fields as wide and green as they were in his dream. He should be out there with his gunblade and Shiva, fighting at Seifer’s side, covering his back. He should be with Seifer, seeing for himself that the blond was okay, that it had just been his communicator that had been damaged. He shouldn’t be here, worrying and wondering, sick to his stomach and having nightmares. God, he had been awake for two days running, arguing with Zhabedy and Kencie, healing from serious wounds, and what he needed right now was a good fight.

Instead he was here, alone, because he was the Headmaster. Quistis had been spiteful when reminding him where his duty lay. He had headed for the cabinet where he kept his gunblade the moment Seifer’s line went dead, and Quistis had just as quickly asked him what he thought he was doing.

“With power comes responsibility, Headmaster,” Quistis said. “You’re far too important to risk on small field missions.”

Squall had seethed. “As Headmaster,” he said, “I get to make those decisions for myself, thank you, Lieutenant Commander Trepe.”

Quistis never lost her cold smile. “I’m afraid, Headmaster, that the protocol is quite clear on this matter. Your duty is to Balamb Garden, and to the greater majority. You cannot be allowed to lose your life in a mission to save only a small number of SeeDs.”

Squall replied from behind clenched teeth. “And is that small number so very unimportant to you, Quistis?”

Quistis’s face softened a little, but her tone was still icy. “Not to me, Headmaster, of course not. But I’m afraid that in the wide view of things, they have to be unimportant to you.”

Squall let his hands curl into fists, but he did not take one step toward Quistis. Still, she flinched and looked away.

“We’ll remain in constant contact with you, Headmaster,” she said in a more normal tone of voice before turning her eyes back to Squall’s face.

“Look, this is wrong,” Squall said. He had left the cabinet door open and he could see the light reflecting off of the metal of his gunblade inside the bureau. “I don’t care how many of them there are, they’re mine. I am their commander, and I am responsible for their well-being. Fuck the rules. I’m going.” He yanked the cabinet doors open and reached for his weapon. Before he could get his fingers around the grip a gloved hand took his wrist and pulled him away from the cabinet.

“She’s right, Squall,” said Zell. He closed the cabinet doors. “You’re the Headmaster and the leader of SeeD. You can’t go running off like this. You have to leave it to Quistis and me, and Captain Caret. We’ll get a team and go out there, but you can’t. If you look at this impartially, it just isn’t important enough to warrant your personal attention.”

Squall stepped away from Zell and narrowed his eyes. “I think I can judge for myself what kind of situation is worthy of my attention.”

“You’re not neutral in this!” cried Quistis, and Squall turned to her. He caught something in her eye that he didn’t like, and he recoiled.

“We’re wasting time,” announced Captain Caret as he keyed off his wrist communicator. “I’ve already formed up a team, we’re meeting in the garage. Now. We’ve got to go now.”

Quistis turned and walked out of the office without a word, and Caret followed her. Zell hesitated, looking back at Squall for a moment and squeezing his arm briefly. Then, he, too, left.

And now Squall was sitting alone in his office while everyone else sprang into action and flew to the rescue of his lover. This immobility, this stale idleness was suffocating. Squall was not used to being left behind.

He occupied himself with staring at the vid-phone screen to his left that hooked into all communications made on Garden’s bandwidth. He had his hands pressed flat on the surface of his desk to keep them from their nervous twitching. His gaze kept slipping back to that blinking red arrow, on and off, on and off. Hyne, he was going to be sick all over again.

“Commander Leonhart!”

Captain Caret’s face appeared on screen of the vid-phone. Squall gripped the monitor in both hands and yanked it over. The metal of its adjustable arm squeaked in protest.

“Yes, Captain Caret.”

“We’ve reached the site! It’s bad, there are a lot of casualties.”

“And the Scylla? Have they killed it? Are they still fighting?”

“No sir, it’s gone.”

Squall frowned and peered over Caret’s shoulder to get a glimpse of the scene. All he could see, though, was pixilated grass and sky.

“Gone?”

“Yes sir. I believe they drove it off, sir.”

All right, fine, but how is Seifer?

“And the casualties you mentioned, Captain. How many?”

“They’re all injured, sir. The medics are going to work on them now, but I’d say that at least a few of them are dead, sir.”

Squall’s eyebrows shot up. “Very bluntly put, Captain.”

“I’m sorry, sir. But it’s terrible, sir. Everyone is hurt.”

And Seifer? What about Seifer? How could he ask about Seifer without making it seem like he was singling him out?

“Names, Caret. Give me names.”

Caret turned away from the screen and then faced Squall again.

“I’m sorry, sir. Lieutenant Commander Trepe is calling me. I’ll make contact again when we reach the Garden, sir. Over and out.” With a curt nod, Caret turned off his wrist communicator and the vid-phone screen went black.

“Dammit!” Squall shouted, pounding his fists on the table. He took a deep breath and then let it go in a quiet moan. “Seifer,” he whispered to the blank screen. “Seifer.”

That familiar old desperation stirred in the pit of his stomach. Squall put his fingers to his temples and pressed hard. A headache was growing there, and the pressure felt good.

Squall’s nails dug into his skin, and it hurt, but that was good, too. The pain anchored him. Sometimes it seemed like Squall was floating above the world, watching but disconnected from everything. The pain kept him there, made it real…made him real.

How many injured? All of them, Caret had said. Squall felt guilty; he had to remind himself of Seifer’s teammates. As Headmaster, every SeeD and cadet was his responsibility. Every wound on every soldier was his. Squall was supposed to be able to protect all of his SeeDs, he should have been like an umbrella sheltering them all from the storm, but he was about as useful in the rain as a newspaper held over their heads. He wasn’t strong and resistant to danger. Instead, he absorbed every hurt and then let it trickle down to those in his care.

How many SeeDs had died since he became Headmaster? How many hurt, how many crippled, how many ruined for life? Squall was a fool. He laid a coward’s curse on Cid for choosing him to become new Headmaster when the old man left to live in Centra with his wife. Quistis had the right to resent Squall—she should have been Headmaster, not him. She was strong and intelligent, and far better suited to the task than he.

Squall was a fool.

The infirmary was filled with his mistakes. Private Bal, Sergeant Rawl, both killed because of his ineptitude. And now Seifer, and his team… “All injured…” All injured. And Caret was sure that there were deaths, too. How many more young soldiers had Squall killed, now? Had he finally received the ultimate punishment for his incompetence? Had his lover died out there, impaled on the arms of a Scylla?

And here he sat, safe in his opulently decorated office, alone and helpless. He should have been out there, taking care of his SeeDs, and of Seifer. “A mission not worth the risk of his life.” What a joke. Squall was so useless—Garden would be better off if he was to be picked off by a monster in some unimportant little mission. Then, everything would be over; the misery, the indecision, the lying. It was the coward’s way.

“Seifer,” Squall whispered. He thought about his lover, about his embrace. He closed his eyes and felt Seifer’s callused palms on him—on his thighs and stomach, and on his neck and face. Seifer said he liked to touch Squall, to feel his pale skin and soft hair. When they made love, Seifer would run his hands over every inch of the trembling Squall.

---

(flashback…)

The July summer sun shone on two men who sat in shallow ocean water up to their chests. The ocean waves that made perfect curls farther out became easy rolling swells as they approached the beach. The sea lapped gently at their necks and shoulders, trying with cool fingers to overcome the bodies of the lovers and sweep them out into its vast arms.

They kissed, long and slow, their lips moving ravenously about as if they would devour one another. Their movements were languid, their fingers entwined in each other’s hair. Squall tilted his head back as Seifer worked his lips from Squall’s swollen mouth to his cheeks and down his pale throat. A soft moan rose up inside Squall and he gave it voice as he spread his hands over Seifer’s well-muscled chest. While Squall’s skin was white and fair, Seifer’s was warm and tan, and the sun seemed to set it aglow. Squall put his lips on the golden expanse of Seifer’s collarbone and slipped his tongue out to taste the salty sweat on his skin.

Seifer’s hands moved over Squall’s back and down. The blond grabbed his ass and chuckled throatily. Squall arched back and let Seifer lift him to his knees. Seifer brought him forward and eased him down onto his lap. Squall inhaled sharply and slowly took Seifer inside himself.

Seifer sighed deeply. “Hyne, you feel so good, Leonhart. You’re so tight, mm,” he said against Squall’s neck. “So hot.”

Squall wrapped his legs around Seifer and leaned back, eliciting a gasp from the blond. Squall smiled at that and closed his eyes. He put his head back so he could feel the sun on his face. The backs of his eyelids went red with it.

They moved with an easy rhythm as natural as the waves. The cool water around Squall and the heat of Seifer against him made a pleasant contrast. He opened his eyes and looked at the water—he was dazzled by the sunlight playing on the surface. His toes dug into the sand and his fingers were hooked into Seifer’s shoulders. He clung to his blond lover as if the ocean were threatening to sweep him away.

Sensation, strong like the ebb and flow of the sea, made Squall dizzy. Seifer was skilled, and his movements were purposeful and directed at making Squall gasp. It was hard for the pale brunet to breathe past that knot of pleasure strumming in his hips and through his every sexual nerve. He was hard with it, tight with it, panting with it.

A large wave rolled in then and it overcame them. Suddenly they were both underwater, and still fucking. Squall held his breath, and his lungs were going to burst and so was he. As the water passed them by and they emerged again, Squall squirmed against Seifer, trying to deflect the intensity of what he felt. The blond only grabbed Squall’s slender waist and held him in place, smirking up at him as he lifted his hips again and again—drove into Squall again and again.

Squall cried out, then, and yielded completely. He surrendered to the rhythm of the ocean and rose up and fell down in helpless sexual distraction. Seifer and he moved together, one body made of two. Seifer was inside of him, hot and rigid, and hitting that spot, that perfect little spot…Squall moaned and Seifer answered by biting the pale boy’s lower lip and sucking it red.

Seifer’s hand found Squall’s cock and stroked it under the cool water, and it grew in response, but Squall pushed his fingers away from their fondling. It wasn’t necessary, not needed or wanted. Squall took both Seifer’s hands and put them to his mouth, and kissed them. Seifer’s large hands were on Squall’s slim body, moving down his neck and onto his chest and over the muscled ripples of his stomach and sides.

Then, pulled on by the current, stroked by the waves, filled with each other, the two lovers crested and came together in a moment of flawless symmetry and uncanny perfection. Seifer’s moans drove Squall on, and that knot inside of him frayed and tore, letting the explosive orgasm shimmer through his whole body from bones to blush. Seifer’s hands grabbed spasmodically at Squall’s flesh, leaving red marks that would surely bruise later amongst the map of scars on his chest.

Then they were still, and they slid away from each other for a moment before drawing together again, this time only skin to skin. Seifer withdrew from the heat of Squall’s ass and gasped at the coolness of the water on his cock. Squall chuckled and got off of Seifer’s lap to kneel in the sand, and once again Seifer was taller than he. Seifer lowered his lips to meet Squall’s.

The force of their lovemaking was spent, and the waves were the only thing rocking their bodies. They kissed, long and lazy like the tide. Squall licked the salt from Seifer’s neck and flicked his tongue into his ear.

They left the water and went to lie on the beach. They had a blanket spread out on the sand, and they both collapsed onto it. Squall was light-headed from the wine they had drank earlier. He stretched languidly and then lay back beside Seifer. He could feel the water evaporating off his skin in the mid-summer heat, and it made a tingling sensation. The sun felt good on him, but not as good as Seifer’s lips.

Squall looked over at the pile of clothes they had left in the sand. Squall’s blue jeans were tangled together with Seifer’s green cargo-style pants. Their shirts and underwear were closer to the shoreline because that’s where they had left the clothing as they stripped while running into the ocean. They were both completely naked; neither of them had bothered with bathing suits.

Seifer was all golden in the July sun, and Squall could not help but stare. From the aristocratic lines of his face in profile to the hard outline of his chest and stomach, down to his still cock and long legs, Seifer was beautiful. He looked over at Squall, and lifted one eyebrow. His lips were pink and pulled into a smirk, and his eyes were the blue of the tropical ocean. He stretched, arching his back and pushing his hips into the air. Then he dropped back down to the blanket and threw his head back, leaving his throat bare. It was the sexiest thing Squall had ever seen.

“You staring at me, Leonhart?” Seifer’s voice broke the silence.

Squall opened his mouth to reply, but then he just smiled and turned his face away.

“Mm,” Seifer said, like he had something in his mouth that tasted good.

Squall felt Seifer’s hands on his breast, then the wet touch of his tongue. Squall turned to face Seifer. Seifer got up and moved on top of Squall, straddling his hips. He lowered his face to Squall’s throat and began moving his lips over the sensitive skin there. His mouth touched Squall’s chin, then his jaw line. His tongue curled into the small hollow behind the ear lobe, then worked a line of kisses down his neck. Seifer ran one finger along Squall’s collarbone and then down his breastbone. He nibbled lightly at one of his nipples, then licked a circle around it.

Seifer moved his hands down Squall’s sides, then ran them over the flesh of his pelvis. Squall jumped slightly when Seifer put his lips to the sensitive skin of his inner thigh. He parted Squall’s legs and kissed the flesh there. Squall put his hands on Seifer’s cheeks and eased him up his body. The blond put his face against the pale brunet’s stomach. Squall wrapped his arms around Seifer’s head and sighed at the feel of lips on his skin and the soft silk of Seifer’s hair against his arms.

Squall tilted his head back and looked upside down at the pair of black Chocobos they had ridden out to the beach. Both birds wore a harness around the middle designed to carry large blades. Seifer and Squall had both come out to the beach with the intention of a romantic rendezvous, yet neither of them had been able to leave the Garden without bringing their gunblades along.

“You brought your blade,” said Squall.

Seifer got off of Squall, lay on his belly and propped himself up on his elbows. His hands played with the sand just beyond the edge of the blanket. “So did you.”

Squall shrugged and rolled onto his side facing Seifer. “It’s the soldier’s habit—always ready for battle, always prepared to be sent anywhere and told to fight.”

Seifer nodded and a smile played about his lips. “We’re such good and loyal SeeDs.”

Squall smiled, too. “Well, I guess it’s in our blood. That blade is like a part of me. I could never go anywhere without it.”

“‘With honor bound to soul and sword.’”

Squall frowned. “What was that?”

Seifer laughed softly. “It’s a quote from a poem. You know, one of those epic war poems from the Hyurai War. It’s one I memorized when I was, like, sixteen. It’s all about this man, this knight, and he’s the quintessential knight. He’s the King’s Champion, and he’s strong, and powerful and all of that. Of course, in the end, he dies heroically on the battle field after slaying an army of his enemies single-handed.”

“Hm,” Squall said. “You and your knights.” He stared at Seifer for a long moment, at his yellow-tipped eyelashes, and the long lines of his face. “How does it go?”

Seifer sighed and flipped onto his back. “Hyne, I don’t think I know it anymore. It’s a really long poem. I think I remember a few lines, though.”

Squall said nothing, and Seifer recited:

“A knight, and that knight given to service,
his lord will he serve; he gives his
arms and those parts which do prove
needful for war.

“With honor bound to soul and sword,
Shield in blood enameléd,
in likeness comes he to a wolf in winter lean.
And in such guise, and with such strength,
As iron brings he the world to kneel before his king.”

When Seifer stopped speaking, the only sound was the waves stealing up on the sand, and sighing as they returned to the sea.

“Anyway,” Seifer said, breaking the silence after a quiet moment. “That’s all I remember.”

Squall nodded and closed his eyes. He heard the soft sounds of Seifer shifting beside him, and then he felt his lover’s touch. Seifer seemed to be touching him everywhere at once—his fingers were everywhere. Squall arched his back and moved up against Seifer’s hands.

Seifer’s mouth on Squall’s hip was as hot as the summer sun on the sand. Squall thought of how beautiful Seifer was, how attractive. His well-developed torso and long legs were hard with strength concealed beneath the smooth skin. He opened his eyes to look at the shadows that etched the muscles in his abdomen and chest, and those in his thighs, and the hard knots of bone in his pelvis that jutted out at his hips and led down into the groin muscles.

Seifer stood. Squall looked up at him, shielding his eyes from the glare of the sun. The blond stretched and then headed for the shoreline. Squall lifted his head to watch Seifer’s progress. The blond looked back at Squall once before wading into the water. He gasped as his sun-warmed skin made contact with the cool blue waters of the tropical Esthar Sea. Then, he walked out until the foam of the diminished waves swirled about his knees. His back was to Squall, and the pale boy still on the beach blanket took in an appreciative view of Seifer’s ass.

Dropping his head back to the blanket, Squall sighed. His body still seemed to feel the ghost of Seifer’s touch, and Squall put a hand to his chest where he could still feel his lover’s lips. He thought he must be burnt there—not from the sun, but from the heat of Seifer’s mouth.

The warmth, the light, the great fire of the sun in the sky—these things were Seifer. Everything hot, and bright, and burning—red smoke and flame—was Seifer, setting Squall’s blood to boil. An unchecked blaze, the blinding reflection of the sun off of the burnished steel of a blade—Seifer was heat, and Squall loved to play with fire.

Squall had long since dried off from their dip in the water, and the hot July sun stood a sheen of sweat on his forehead and upper lip. A cool sigh of air blew by and he turned his face into it. The air coming off of the water was sweet. He heard Seifer splashing in the waves but he did not look.

The area of the shore of Western Esthar where they were was right on the Equator a few miles south of Fisherman’s Horizon. The sun really did feel closer to the Earth here, as if it hovered only hundreds of feet in the atmosphere like a giant lamp with a high wattage bulb. Squall tented his arm over his face and the small amount of shade he afforded himself felt blissful.

Squall’s thoughts were sometimes like the shifting ocean breeze, moving East and West, rolling in with the waves or out with the tide. Even with Seifer so nearby, his mind betrayed him and he thought then of cool things, and darkness.

And Rinoa.

If Seifer was fire, then Rinoa was ice. If Seifer was light in the sky, then she was a dark pool. His blaze was her shade, his heat was her chill wind. Rinoa was the cool shadow and silk wrapped around Squall, soothing his feverish brow with a kiss. As surely as Seifer was the sun, she was the moon and its blue glow, blotting out the stars around her with her light.

Suddenly cool in the shade, Squall looked up to see what was blocking the sunlight. Seifer stood over him, the light behind him casting him as a dark silhouette. Squall could not see his expression, but he could hear it in Seifer’s voice.

“You’re thinking about her, aren’t you?”

Squall closed his eyes—coward—and turned away.

“I know you’re thinking of her.”

Squall sighed heavily. What an asshole. You can’t make anyone happy, can you?

“I’m sorry,” he whispered too softly to be heard.

Seifer said nothing as he sat down beside Squall. He reached over the brunet’s head to get to the bottle of wine that was nestled in the sand. It was still half full. Seifer uncorked it and drank from the bottle.

Squall watched the blond drink wine without ever looking his way. Suddenly, Squall was seized with suffocating panic. With complete disregard he overcame the wall Seifer had put up around himself, his need trumping the other’s desire to exact punishment.

He reached out and grabbed Seifer’s hands, and he put them on either side of his face. Seifer could always read Squall’s mind. Knowing, always knowing, what Squall needed and wanted, Seifer lay against the pale brunet. He moved his hands back into Squall’s hair and lifted his head up with an unbreakable grip. He crushed his lips against Squall’s, pushed his tongue into his mouth and worked the kiss like he would devour Squall if he could.

Squall wanted it, cried for it. Seifer lowered Squall’s head to the blanket without breaking the kiss and he took Squall’s hands off of his face. Without protest, Squall let Seifer pin his arms to the ground and let the stronger of the two of them take control. Squall gave and gave, whimpering, utterly accepting and wanting his own defeat. Seifer took and took, and Squall gave in. He couldn’t breathe past the intensity of the kiss, he couldn’t move under Seifer’s body, couldn’t move his arms or legs—he was completely helpless and he’d never been so hard.

Seifer pulled back and the two of them lay together, their bodies heaving against one another with each gasp for breath. Squall, still pinned under Seifer, whispered, “Don’t let it end.”

Seifer said, “It won’t.”

Squall gasped and said, “Don’t let me go.”

Seifer kissed Squall gently on the lips and said, “I won’t.”

And the ocean sighed and sparkled in the sun.

(end flashback…)

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They had made love on the beach all day and then they stayed there until it grew dark and cool in the evening. Then they lay under the moon and slept together on the blanket under the stars.

The peace of that day beckoned to Squall from July on the beach to September in his office. Nothing had existed then, beyond the beach. Only Squall and Seifer were real, and all of the troubles back at Garden were a dream. That day they had truly been in love, and the world was in love with them. Their revelry was brief and it had to end, but the feeling of the summer sun and the warmth of Seifer’s mouth was always with Squall, perfect in his memory.

The ocean…cool and clear, crystal blue. Lying on the beach with Seifer, riding on the back of a Chocobo running on the beach…the image of the ocean water stayed in Squall’s mind.

Squall’s communicator rang. He hit the Respond button before it had time to finish its first beep.

“Leonhart, here.”

“Sir, it’s Caret. We’re in the Infirmary.”

Squall’s gut clenched. How could he ask about Seifer without raising suspicion?

Squall needn’t have worried; Caret was not long for the phone.

“Commander, sir, it’s pretty bad. I’m helping Grayne with Curagas. I have to go.”

“How bad is bad, Caret?”

“Sir, I have to—” Caret cut off before he could say “go.”

Okay, then. If Squall wanted to find anything out, he would have to go down to the Infirmary. He got up from his desk and was out the door of his office before he registered the decision to leave.

“Seifer,” he whispered as he called up the private elevator. “You’d better damn well be okay.”

Or else there would be hell to pay.

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