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 Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2007 5:32 pm
Who: Kitsyn and Zell Dincht
What: A conversation with a concerned friend.
Where: The paintball course.
When: Paintball time, Friday June 22nd.
Why: Kitsyn seems to have a painful secret and her friends want to help.
Kitsyn puffed at a random dandelion that had previously still had all its seeds intact, watching them drift off on the slight breeze. If this spot wasn't up on the mountain it would have been hot, but as things stood it was comfortable. She was bored, and while she was waiting for Zell to show up, there wasn't going to be any paintball today; Shoom had elected to stay with Bryna today, who had elected to go look for "Nii-chan", and Valefor had gotten depressed the night before over her not-quite-breakup with Aear. Ifrit had elected to get her drunk, got drunk right along with her, and they were up until the wee hours of the morning lamenting impossible loves. When she'd left they were still sleeping it off.
She wasn't entirely sure what she planned to do today after Zell got here. Swimming kept cropping up in her list of ideas but she wasn't sure she felt like swimming today. Honestly, all the love drama going on around the Place had her dwelling on things she'd been avoiding thinking about, and she just needed to get out for a while.
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Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2007 6:15 pm
Zell Dincht bounded over the field towards the shed with his usual cheerfulness. Only one especially in tune with the SeeD would notice the thoughtful look in his blue eyes. AearHwesta had made a special visit with him the other day and though the sailor had seemed sad and thoughtful in his own right he had spoken with Zell about a mutual friend of theirs, asking for him to keep an eye out for her. Zell caught on that their friend was not the only thing bothering the sailor, but he kept his mouth shut tight. Aear would tell him when and if he felt he should.
Still Zell worried. But he tried not to show it. At least Lily was mostly happy now. And she was supposed to bring a friend of hers to train with them. Atae. That would be fun.
He spotted the lone female ahead, blowing dandelions into the breeze. Alone? "Yo! Kitsyn!!!" Zell waved eagerly as he trotted faster to meet her. "Where're Ifrit & Shoom? I was really ready to help you thwap them today!"
Blue eyes watched the femme with an almost hidden thoughtfulness. Yes... seemed Aear was right to be worried about her. Something was not right.
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Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2007 6:22 pm
Kitsyn smiled up at Zell, Yay! Someone's HERE now! written all over face. "Hey Zell! Ah... Bryna went looking for Ed, and Shoom went with her. And Ifrit... ah... Valefor was feeling down last night and they got drunk for old time's sake or something. I stopped listening when they stopped making sense. Ifrit at least was still asleep when I left... SO! I have no idea what but I guess we get to do something else today."
She stretched her forelegs out before sitting up. "I thought about bringing Atae out today to meet you but she seemed... frazzled? I think maybe I oughta talk to someone over there about doing something to block all the emotional upheaval going around the house lately, she won't admit it but it's driving her up the wall, I can tell."
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Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2007 6:54 pm
"Ed? You mean Edward, the kitsu with the metal parts? Hyne... the whole family's worried sick about him. He was staying with us, ya know? Just before I showed up. They think of him as family. And Lily's plumb beside herself over it. And Atae? Lily only just told me recently she was s'possed to bring her over sometime for training. Though I hear from Hemi she needs training I can't help her with. But Rune... She claims to have had a psychic GF back in the day as a White SeeD so maybe she or one of the 'paths can help. And Hemi was saying something about shields... mental shields?" Zell rubbed at his tattoo lightly with a paw & laughed. "Have to admit I don't know much about that but I know we'll help."
He watched her carefully. "I hope they find Ed. Good kid. Saw him and Lily together, once. Just before the chaos really struck. Lily told me alot, while training. I'd like to train with him sometime. Might do us both some good. And "frit & Aear's 'Valefor-luv' drunk? Hyne!"
Then he broke his playfully innocent demeanor for a brief moment looking decidedly serious. "And what about you? How're you holding up, Kitsyn?"
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Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2007 7:08 pm
Kitsyn laughed slightly. "Ah, yeah. Atae's been friends with Lily and Ed for a while now... and Bryna apparently snuck out of HQ one of the nights I left her there and ran into Ed on her own. Ifrit and Valefor both like him. I like him. Heck, even ENDLESS likes him, for all the tension there was and probably still would be between the two of them..." She shook her head. "He's an impetuous young adult and he's smart but he doesn't always think things through before he does 'em. He'll come back... eventually. I just don't know how he's going to act around everyone."
She snorted a bit at Zell's "shock" at Ifrit and Valefor drinking together. "Apparently Ifrit and Valefor were friends even before they became Aeons in their past life... I don't know how much you've heard about that particular world from Rikku Audio, but they were originally human..." She shrugged. "It's complicated, to say the least."
His question made her feel slightly leery for some reason. "Ah... well enough? It's kinda hard to think straight sometimes with all the things going on... Endless is elated and depressed about what happened with Lily at the same time because of Ed, Atae's probably going to end up biting someone if we don't do something to shield her empathy soon, Bryna's turning into a teen and having a particularly hard time with the hormonal changes because she's half-Nobody and doesn't understand feelings when she gets them, Valefor's like an emotional yo-yo lately, Ifrit's worried sick about her, Shoom's up to his usual insanity but everyone's wound up so tight they're reacting worse than usual, most of the permakits are causing trouble... Naneth and Iris are a bit worried about Endless, but they're still generally sane, as is Soot, though Soot worries about everyone all the time. Oy... I think that's everyone." She made a face. "I'd go insane if I lived at your place and things like this were happening with everyone. I'm having a hard enough time keeping my head on straight as it is."
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Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2007 7:16 pm
Zell chuckled in a friendly way. "Yeah... You left out Seer & the trio of doom, just from what Aear told me. And you didn't answer my question..." Blue eyes sparkled with laughter as he waved a gloved paw at her in a playfully admonishing gesture. "I asked about you. How are you doing, Kitsyn?"
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Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2007 7:30 pm
"Not the trio, actually... ah... they're part of the perma-kits... there's five around, if you include Soot... I did leave Seer out, didn't I?" She made a playful sort of frown which quickly turned into a very serious grimace as he reiterated his question and made sure she couldn't squirm out of saying something about herself.
She looked at him for a long moment, gaze not quite hard, but definitely not her usual friendly look. Then she let out a long sigh that seemed to roll along the air for a few yards before it finally disolved. "I'm... ah..." She turned her gaze searchingly to the trees as if hoping for a very particular someone to appear. "Lonesome for someone...?" She wasn't entirely sure she wanted to talk about this... but she knew she didn't want to lie to a friend when asked a direct question. Steering around a subject was one thing... flat out lying to someone she trusted? That was definitely something else.
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Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2007 8:03 pm
He only nodded with a teasing grin that yes, she had left Seer out. Kitsyn was clearly upset...
Blue eyes softened, themselves becoming thoughtful. He nodded, blue flame-marked ears flapping softly against his head at the motion. That was something like what he had expected from what he had gleaned from what AearHwesta had told him of that brief moment with the scarf. The sailor was pretty good about catching things like that, and Zell was more perceptive than most gave him credit for. Better that way. Otherwise others are always expecting it of you.
He sat down, tails swishing thoughtfully across the grass of their playing field, paw rubbing at his tattoo. "Look... you don't have to but... maybe it will help if you talk about this someone. It's not healthy to go things like this alone." He gave a short laugh at his choice of words: alone when she was lonesome. Still his eyes were bright and sincere, waiting. "We're friends, Kitsyn. I've got your back."
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Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2007 8:42 pm
Talk about her someone. Talk about Caim? What do you say about Caim? Caim and Angelus, for that matter. Oy. Caim was from a Before, not from here. Only it wasn't her before. Or was it? She'd always felt like she was made up of multiple souls... but she'd wondered often if they were actually different people, because they all felt the same... To talk about Caim required talking about a much larger secret.
"Umm... Well, before I can really tell you about him... there's something I need to explain. You know in your world how when you were fighting that evil sorceress that was possessing the others? I forget what her name is... Well, y'know how time was all fragmented and stuff and several times were sort of happening at once? This ought to be easier to understand after coming here and seeing other yous around... I think there's lots of dimensions, and maybe people all exist in all these dimensions, only they're all different in little ways because the worlds are different. They've made tv shows about it and stuff... but I think it's really true."
She paused for a moment to put words together before continuing. "Except... this world is different. There aren't different versions of people here, except maybe the ones that are born here... people from the other dimensions actually get funneled here and reborn in different forms, multiple times, even." She frowned and then just plowed on. "See... I have a Before, too. Except... I had several of them, because I remember bits and pieces of too many things from too many worlds not to have been there. There aren't multiple mes here, aside from Haisyn... and somehow I'm actually even her at the same time in a way. I'm like... a jigsaw puzzle of all the mes put together. But I'm also just me. ...It's confusing as hell. I'd ask if you're still with me on this... but I think I lost myself in there somewhere." Eheh...
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Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2007 9:10 pm
Needless to say, the fistfighter was glad he was already sitting down. And that he understood about time compression from having very nearly gone through it. And that he had other Zells at home and saw other Relms & Seifers & Runes & Rikkus in his family. And that Trelweny spoke sometimes of other worlds and dimensions and whatnot though he thought that was in a different way. But then Rune and Trel did say that it was possible the White SeeD came from a different reality than he remembered, and maybe that was another reason none of them remembered her from the orphanage though she remembered them.
Blue eyes kind of stared at her with wide-eyed wonder trying to take it all in. Okay. Wierd. But... somehow not wierd. "O-kaaay. I can't say I'm following but... " Zell scratched at the back of his neck, a perplexed look on his face. "I'm not entirely lost either. Mostly. Kinda. But then what you're talking about is stuff that isn't ever exactly clear, is it?
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Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2007 9:45 pm
Kitsyn made a sound that was partly snort and partly chuckle and flopped down on the ground. "I don't really guess it can be very clear."
The pause after that was almost too long before she spoke again. "...Well, maybe this part will be clearer..." She sat up straight while still resting on her belly on the ground. "His name is Caim. To explain his personality in terms I know you'll recognize... Squall, in a really bad mood, multiplied a few times, plus an unhealthy dose of homicidal rage. But I guess watching your parents die in front of you and then having to grow up in the middle of a war with the people responsible would do that..." She smiled crookedly at him. "I can't really say too much about his past to you... it wouldn't be fair. But that's basic for understanding him at all... because otherwise he comes off... badly. Suffice to say that wasn't anywhere near the worst of his life."
"He's a Pact-Partner... he uh... basically joined his soul with a red dragon in the middle of a life or death situation and they wound up destroying the people that killed his parents, but it was at a price... he wound up dying later in life trying to make up that price. I met him somewhere in there... or the part of me that belonged there did. Only I don't remember anything about who me was then, or who I might have been to him... but I must have been close to him to feel like I do. Of course I'd probably be drawn to him now anyway because I hate to see people in pain..."
A sheepish grin and a long pause later and she continued. "Anyway... well... I can sort of... sense if people from other Befores are on the way here if I know who I'm looking for... and I know he's supposed to show up, but the... signal has been erratic..." She frowned and shrugged. "So I'm sitting around waiting for someone who might never show up, and I don't have any idea who I was to him, but I wasn't the same me then, and he probably won't know who I am, either. It's sort of like waiting in line to jump off a cliff without a parachute. Only... I'd rather fall than never find out if I can fly."
She stood up, moved over next to Zell, put an arm over his shoulder... and gave him a noogie. "DO NOT tell anyone about my Before situation or my... sensing, ok? I can't let that get around, because I'm sure it will cause trouble for me with people I'd rather not meet. And tell Aear and Trel and whoever else knows about my slip the other day about Caim if you have to, but... and now I'm begging, Zell, ok? Don't any of you tell Caim about me if you run into him. Please. If I've got a shot at what I want... I don't want it to be because of something he may not remember or him expecting me to be someone I'm not anymore. I have to... I have to do it myself, y'know? Or it won't mean anything."
She let him go and flopped over again. "Also... Caim's mute. Or he should be. It was his Pact-price to lose his voice. Not the price of his revenge... that was a lot worse. He wears armor over a grey-blue shirt and has dark hair and blue eyes... and when you see him it's like looking at a walking storm cloud more often than not. He's the broody sort."
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Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2007 11:02 pm
He just stared. Listening. Trying to comprehend the load Kitsyn was dropping in his lap. No one ever trusted him like this. Zell, the clown of Balamb Garden. It was heavy... & very heady.
He soaked everything up though. What he couldn't get now maybe he could figure out a little better later. That had sometimes been the case at Garden. With everything except the actual fighting.
He was thinking deeply about everything when Kitsyn caught him offguard with the noogie, perfectly disrupting his broken brain's "duuuur" state.
"Gah!!! Off the hair! Off the hair!! Okay!! I won't tell! 'cept maybe to let Aear know you're off on some guy so he's not freaking out on me, kay?"
Squirming he got away from her, Frowning as he fixed his hair. "Mute, huh? Well at least he'd have a reason not to talk. Unlike Squall. Who of course talks a lot more here. Which is wierd..." Although not at wierd as him and Rinoa not being together. At least to Zell. He glanced at Kitsyn, worriedly. "So he's a quiet, broody, homicidal Stormy Squall who's bound to a dragon & is in a really bad mood beyond which I can't possibly imagine and this is who you want?" He shakes his head. "Dude. Totally don't understand that, but if he's who you want... I'm not gonna be the guy to mess it up for ya."
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Posted: Thu Jun 21, 2007 11:19 pm
Kitsyn blushed and looked away. "He's not... always like that. He actually changed a lot in the years between the war and when he died. He just... doesn't show that side to most people. That's why I say he's like Squall... hard time trusting anyone, hard time caring about anyone and admitting even to himself. He had everyone taken away from him at one point or another that didn't betray him... I can't even imagine how it must feel to live with that. And he never killed just for the sake of killing. It was always in a battle, he was always fighting for something he believed in... whether he was right or wrong about it might be debatable. He was a... king's son, I think. He had honor, even if it was a bit twisted where his enemies were concerned. The people that followed him did so freely and respected him. But he enjoyed the fighting too much, and wanted the revenge too badly, and even his childhood friend and his sister couldn't calm the rage. After the war... I think he regretted all the death. I think he wanted to change, but a few years before he died he was betrayed by one of the few people he'd considered a friend from back during the war. When he died... he was actually trying to free the dragon, and a lot of people unfairly bound to slavery and slow deaths... but the only way he could find to do that was reverting to his old ways." She turned and punched him on the shoulder playfully. "So he's not all bad. He just never really was given a chance to be all good, either."
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Posted: Fri Jun 22, 2007 12:06 am
"Yeah... sure..." Zell muttered under his breath, watching his friend as she went on about the guy. Caim. Whatever. He wasn't disbelieving, just a little... overwhelmed. He listened... understanding about doing things in war you might regret... about wanting to make amends after. There were things he & his friends did while fighting the sorceress that he wished he could take back. But at least they had had each other. This Caim, whoever he was, seemed to have been pretty much alone.
"ow! hey!" He said, rubbing at his shoulder and mock pouting at Kitsyn. "Okay. Fine. So maybe he's not all bad. If I meet him, I'll take him with grain of pepper or whatever that is Ma used to always say."
A crooked grin curved his maw. "Hey... thanks for telling me, Kitsyn." Hugs.
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Posted: Fri Jun 22, 2007 12:17 am
Kitsyn laughed. "Salt. Grain of salt. Pepper would just make you sneeze." She mock flailed for a moment at the hug and then hugged him back. "Bah... I guess I needed to talk about it... I feel like I blabbed too much..." She "squished" Zell for a second, basically a brief bear-hug. "Besides... you got my back, right? Maybe I'll be able to get your back sometime. What friends are for, right?"
She let go of the hug and pranced a few paces away, looking glumly at the empty paintball course. "Well... Now I've bared my soul... what are we supposed to do? The only other thing I can think of is to go swimming and I don't really feel like swimming today." She made a face.
In all honesty she felt kind of giddy right now. And she realized she really did sound like a lovesick fool, talking about Caim on and on like that. But she also didn't want to leave Zell with the wrong impression. Though... Caim could probably use several grains of salt, sometimes. She hoped he could find the peace here he never seemed to have Before, so maybe they could get rid of the salt someday...
If he ever showed up...
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