Chapter Text
It had been a long ass day.
Keeping in mind that Squall’s speech was one of the first events of the morning and that the opening ceremonies of Remembrance Day were the most well-attended events of the year, it was hours before they even got out of the stadium and even longer before they were finally off-duty in any way that was real. Quistis never came back, so Selphie, Zell, and Irvine were left to represent Garden in the world arena.
Which meant no dipping out early to chase down the love of his life, grab him by the shoulders, and shake him until his brain buzzed in the same constant and all-consuming way Zell’s had been since Squall very publicly announced he had a big gay fantasy life with his best friend all planned out and that he would much rather be doing that than leading children to war, thanks.
Basically.
He might have worded it differently.
So they sat through speeches and songs and one very bizarre performance art piece that involved stuttered poetry from the Esthar’s poet laureate and a three-part dance troop portraying the ascension of Adel’s tomb into space. (One of the dancers was representing a space ship, which was a point of contentious debate between Selphie and Irvine that lasted nearly the entirety of the performance.) Then, they left the stadium and went to the grand opening of Esthar’s new world cuisine restaurant, where part of the profits would go to refugee organizations to continue post-war reconstruction efforts around the world. Their spinach, sausage, and ricotta ravioli with ingredients sourced from Dollet was absolutely divine but Zell was mostly impressed by the fact that no matter how much money he offered the waitstaff, they wouldn’t give him the recipe. After that, they took a VIP ambassador’s tour of the newly opened university, whose mechanical engineering program would be accepting international applicants next year for the first time in decades. And then it was pictures and handshakes and pictures and fundraising pledges and more pictures until Zell felt like his smile was plastic and stuck on his face forever. And then finally - finally - the sun started to dip lower on the horizon and they made a break for it before anyone else offered their kindest regards and ‘would you be interested in’s and ’could we get a statement about your Commander’s decision to step down?’s.
As soon as he got back to the palace, he ducked into his room to check on his tattoo. Carefully, he peeled away the plastic covering and felt a swell of excitement once again. It was already starting to scab up in spots, but god damn she’d look pretty once she healed. He smoothed a neat coat of ointment across the skin to keep it hydrated and prevent scarring before changing out of his uniform and into something a little cozier. Jeans and a jacket with longer sleeves were a must; Esthar’s weather was relatively mild this time of year but damn if the nights didn’t have a bite.
Then it was off to find Squall. And he had no idea where to start.
He could call, but Zell would have bet an entire year’s salary on Squall’s phone being off. His anxiety always manifested in a way that made being technologically available to everyone all the time feel like a chain around his neck. Sometimes Zell was genuinely surprised that Squall hadn’t faked his death and moved somewhere remote where he was safe from the evils of e-mails.
He was pondering what deserted island Squall might coop up on when he ran face first into a wall that definitely wasn’t there before. And he knew that for sure, because just as quickly as it had appeared, it was disappearing again and a man was stepping out.
A grey suede leather duster coat hung from his shoulders with a black sweater and dress pants beneath. The pair of thick framed glasses resting on his nose were rivaled in their distracting cartoonishness only by the bushy mustache stretching above his lip. His long hair was tied up neatly in a bun at the nape of his neck, with just a few artful wisps falling loose to frame his face beneath the brim of a herringbone newsboy hat.
This man - entirely too dignified to stop and help someone he just knocked onto the ground - turned and walked in the other direction.
“Hey!” Zell shouted, scrambling to his feet. “ Watch where you’re going, man!”
Instead of stopping, the man walked faster. And as he hobbled away, Zell noticed a sight limp in his left leg, like the muscles were cramping up.
What the hell?
“Laguna?”
Somehow he made it outside before Zell caught up, and he didn’t stop walking even as Zell tried to get his attention. It was as if he thought if he just kept ignoring him, Zell would eventually go away. Which was both annoying and also insane considering Zell’s nosiness was matched only by Selphie’s. Finally, his temper got the better of him and he wrenched Laguna’s arm around and flipped him in a smooth motion until he landed flat on his back on the ground, staring up at Zell with an affronted expression.
“Ow!”
“What the hell are you doing, Laguna?”
“No, common mistake!” His voice was different, taking on the sort of affectation you’d hear in some old-school film noir. “I get that a lot, but I’m someone else.”
“Uh huh. Sure you are.” Zell said, crossing his arms. “What are you wearing?”
“This is perfectly normal clothing for who I am, which is not who you think. Now if you would please mind your business and go away - “
“And what’s that voice you’re doing?”
“I’m not - !” Laguna whipped the glasses off his face and sat up. “Can you stop talking so loud? I’m undercover here.”
“You’re…???” It was Laguna, clearly, plain as day. Surely no one actually fell for this disguise? “I’m sorry, what?”
With a flair, Laguna settled the frames back on his nose and offered Zell his hand. “Archer Paige Lagos, pleasure to meet you.”
……..You have got to be kidding.
Archie P. Lagos was a pen name Laguna had started using after the war to give himself some freedom to write what needed to be written without the bias and weight of his government office attached. Over the years, Archie had developed a broad catalogue of award-winning pieces - everything from a thoughtful analysis of the importance of a Sorceress in peacetime (the spread of Rinoa’s popular White Witch moniker had been his doing) to scathing exposés on companies still clinging to old views and xenophobic values. He even had an exclusive one on one all-access interview with none other than the President of Esthar, which Zell had read and thought was both incredibly well done and also hilarious if you imagined Laguna interviewing himself in the mirror.
Archie was Esthar’s most infamous reporter, both for his sterling reputation and for his mysterious reclusively. But Zell didn’t think he was an actual real-life persona that Laguna dressed up as in his free time. For being a world leader, he clearly had way too much time on his hands.
Zell helped Laguna to his feet and fixed him with a judgmental look. “Is this a midlife crisis or what?”
“First of all,” Laguna scoffed. “I don’t do midlife crises.”
Uhh. Zell explicitly remembered the two week period that Laguna bought a vintage bicycle and said he was training for a triathlon and the time he almost cut his hair and got bangs, but sure, okay, no midlife crisis here.
“Second,” Laguna continued, brushing his clothing off indignantly. “I am off to do some important recon before phase two of our mission.”
Recon. Okay. Obviously the President would have a much harder time getting first-hand information from on-the-ground sources. But this seemed… dangerous? Stupid? Poorly planned? He couldn’t be sure.
“You’re going by yourself? What about Kiros?”
Laguna snorted. “Are you kidding me? With his bone structure? He’s way too handsome, people would recognize him from a mile away. He can’t disguise like I can.”
Zell’s mouth pulled into a thin line.
“Uh huh.”
“Look, you can come with me if you really want to,” Laguna said, checking his watch, “but I have an appointment I can’t be late to - and you’ve gotta play it cool and follow my lead.”
Having been inside Laguna’s head on more than one occasion, the idea of letting him be in charge wasn’t Zell’s favorite, if he was being honest. Particularly the part where Ward had lost use of his vocal cords or when they all jumped off a cliff and nearly broke every bone on their bodies or that time they had to fight a ruby dragon on the set of a film because Laguna couldn’t tell the difference between a real live monster and a two person low-budget costume.
On the other hand, he had successfully led a revolution and overthrew one of the most powerful sorceresses of their time and ended decades of tyrannical rule.
So really, who was to say how it would go.
The deciding factor was mostly that Zell didn’t feel super good about the idea of letting President and Beloved Public Figure Laguna Loire™️ traipse around Esthar alone at night in what was possibly the worst disguise Zell had ever seen.
The moment he agreed to Laguna’s terms, he was being pulled back into the palace and pushed into the same secret passage Laguna had just emerged from, and inside he found a long narrow hallway filled with the guts of the Presidential Palace’s technological wonders. Wires and flashing lights lined the walls, with panels and openings to access specific tech every few feet. It must have been a maintenance shaft that Laguna used for his own personal secrecy. On one side of the hall, there was a small closet that Laguna opened and rustled around in before reappearing with a heap of clothing, a bottle of gel, and a bit of makeup.
His work was quick; foundation and concealer to hide the black ink curling across Zell’s temples. Gel to tame his hair until it slicked back neatly. Zell’s own jacket was confiscated and replaced with a black turtlenecked sweater and a gold chain accent. (He tried very hard to not feel weird about stripping in a small closet with the President. He was not successful.) The sweater was a little too tight and a little too long, but he tucked it into his pants and pushed the sleeves up which made it look more intentional and not like he was wearing someone else’s clothes. Next, Laguna gave him a pair of thin golden wire-framed glasses with large circular lenses, because apparently glasses were essential to any proper disguise. Luckily they weren’t prescription so he didn’t have to spend the whole night feeling disoriented.
When he was finally dressed, Laguna stepped back and gave him a critical looking over, like he was laying the finishing touches on his magnum opus. Then, he nodded approvingly. “It’ll do.”
When Zell caught his reflection in the glass as they left the Palace, he barely recognized himself. It was like if Quistis had a younger brother who’d decided to join the Dollet mafia because his career as a jazz musician didn’t pan out. When he said this out loud, Laguna scoffed and assured him that it was a very chic look, but Zell wasn’t convinced.
Their route led them down a lift, off the skyway, and into the proper streets of the East quarter. And the farther they got from the well-lit and tourist-safe translucent paths that he was used to, the more Zell got a look at a truer part of Esthar. Rows of buildings with colored glass and sleek metal reminded him they were still in a city he recognized, but it felt older, less polished, more lived-in. This was residential, the people who labored in Esthar’s farms and factories, a middle class that lived and worked beneath the luxuries of the skyway. Under Laguna’s leadership, the middle class was thriving and poverty was nearly non-existent, but every city had places where vices thrived. And that seemed to be exactly where they were going.
The most interesting part was that Laguna didn’t consult a map even once. He knew these streets like he walked them all the time, moving through shortcuts in alleyways and crossing streets before the walk sign turned. Zell really hadn’t had a conspiracy theory about Laguna having a secret double life before, but he definitely did now.
Their destination was a bar nestled between an abandoned pawn shop and a building that looked like it once was a grocery store and had since been turned into an art studio of some kind. A mural of a giant bird in greens and blues had been painted across the building’s facade. Its eyes were dark and many, lining it’s strange bony face in chaotic rows. A sharp angular beak seemed to be jutting outward from the building in a trick of shadow and light that made it look three dimensional. There was a group standing around outside of the studio, cigarettes burning a glow in the hazy darkness. They watched Zell and Laguna’s approach with the same kind of scrutiny you’d get from coworkers that had just been talking badly about you. It made Zell itch.
Inside the bar, the music was loud and electronic, surely one of Esthar’s many famous EDM exports. A thick cloud of cotton candy smoke blew from the bartender’s mouth as he poured a drink that looked like liquid gold. Laguna rapped his knuckles on the bar top. One, three, two. The bartender nodded and passed him a newspaper.
“The usual spot.”
“Thanks.”
He fished around in his pocket for a pen and leaned on the bar for a moment, scanning the front page story. What he was actually looking for Zell couldn’t tell, but after a quick read Laguna circled a few words. Body. Violet. Sanctuary. Satisfied, he folded the paper and pushed through the crowd.
Toward the back of the room, a burly guard stood stoic with an earpiece and a mean frown in front of a velvet-curtained doorway. He took the paper from Laguna and read the words to whoever was on the other end of the ear piece. From behind the door, a loud shrieking laugh erupted. The guard stepped aside. They’d passed whatever test it had been.
Zell felt like he was having one of those dreams where it was opening night of the school play and he didn’t remember any of his lines. Which was extra dumb because he’d never been in a school play because he was too busy training to be a child soldier.
“Archie!” A booming voice called over the noise. In the corner of the VIP room - a room that somehow felt damp as they passed through the curtain - was a balding man with a barrel chest and thighs as thick as tree trunks. “Punctual as ever.”
There was a private bar here, and two dancers dressed in barely-there patches of yellow feathers ground their hips against each other on a small stage in something that looked like a passionate anthropomorphized rendition of a chocobo mating ritual. Their hands dragged over skin and feathers greedily and every once in a while they’d share a wet and filthy kiss.
“Good to see ya, pal,” Laguna said, back to using that detective noir accent and somehow completely ignoring the dancers. “Hadn’t heard from you in a while. Started to wonder.”
“You know how it is. Had to find some new toys.” His dark eyes raked over the dancers as one of them got down on hands and knees and arched their back seductively. The other climbed on top and threw their arms out wide like wings. “You know my old pals got a contract in Deling? Galbadian Ballet. No idea how they got recruited but I was downright distraught when I got the news. These two though? Phenomenistic.”
There was a very tiny frown that pulled Laguna’s lips downward. And then just as quickly, it was gone. “That’s life, right? Open doors, closed doors. Opportunity is not a lengthy visitor.”
“Ha! Damn true.” The man clapped his hands and the dancers stopped at once, disappearing through a stage door. Then, he turned his eyes back to the business at hand and jerked his thumb in Zell’s direction. “And who’s the muscle? Ya ain’t never brought a buddy to one of our little get-togethers before.”
“Oh, him?” With an air of disinterest, like this was all very common-place and boring to discuss, Laguna waved his hand at Zell dismissively. “Marshall Delldune, my new cartographer.”
Zell turned his head very slowly and stared at Laguna.
Where does he keep getting these names?!
“Your what?”
“You know. The guy who writes my interviews down as I do them.”
“I don’t think that’s right,” the man said with a slight frown. “I thought they was called a….. dictate-r?”
“Dictator?” Laguna bristled. “We live in a democracy, sir.”
“No, no, like, uhhhhhh… shit, what’s it called? Amanuensis.”
“I don’t think this man’s a nuisance at all, he’s really quite useful - “
“Typist!” Zell exclaimed in exasperation, and it came out way louder than he meant it to. “I am a typist!”
Laguna nodded helpfully. “That’s what I said.”
“If you’s a typist, where’s your thingy?” The man did a vague gesture with his hand.
Laguna’s eyes bugged. “Um?? It’s very impolite to ask a man about his thingy - “
“He meant my typewriter, Mr. Lagos. For the typing.”
“Of course I knew that!” Laguna continued with the same righteous indignation. “And of course the answer to that is very simple and it is that it is in his mind.”
If this conversation before had been an on-fire car speeding down an icy highway, it was now as if gravity shrugged, gave up, and let the car sort of just float up into the air on its own like a balloon.
The man squinted.
“In his mind.”
“Yes sir.”
“So… it’s just thoughts. There’s no typing. It’s just he’s thinkin’ thoughts.”
“No,” Zell tried, scrambling to salvage this stupid-ass lie. “I do type. It’s just… in… the air. So I can remember it better. For when I go home and. Type it up for real. Like muscle memory. For my brain. Which is kind of like a muscle when you think about it. Ha. I have a photographic memory but. For. Sounds.”
A long silence followed and helplessly, stupidly, desperately, Zell mimed out a little typing gesture. ‘This is hands down the worst undercover mission I have ever been a part of and it has only been like 10 minutes’, the paper would have said. Surely it would have been an extremely successful article and he would make enough money to leave all this silly mercenary business behind and open a place of his own that didn’t smell like sweat and where the food probably wouldn’t give you salmonella.
The leather of the booth squeaked as the man leaned back. One long leg crossed over the other and he looked toward the ceiling in deep contemplation. A thick stripe of ink curled around his neck like barbed wire.
Ugh. Neck tattoos were so tacky.
“Huh,” he finally said. “Like the method of loci. Intriguin’.”
Once again, Laguna nodded like this was all very normal. “Exactly what I thought. Now let’s talk.”
And apparently that was just…. fine? No big deal? Like, they were all just gonna roll past that entire train wreck and get on with it? Sure, fine, Zell threw logic out the window and embraced the chaos.
The table felt sticky, and as he sat down the cushion of the booth had more give than he expected and he had to catch himself before he fell too hard against the back. It was not graceful. Laguna - in either some strange show of solidarity or a complete lack of situational awareness - did exactly the same thing with complete confidence of expression. Then, the two of them looked at Zell expectantly.
“Uhh….” He said, bringing his hands up in his typing gesture. “Right. Yeah. Could you state your name please?”
“Bone.”
Zell blinked.
“Is that a first name or a last name?”
“Just Bone.”
Stifling a long suffering sigh that would have put Squall to shame, he air-typed it out: B O N E.
“Okay. How would you like to be identified in this write-up?”
“He/him.”
“Okay, no, that’s not - “ Zell clenched his teeth and counted to five. “I meant, what do you do for a living, Mr. Bone?”
Three of his teeth glinted metallic in the dim bar light as Bone grinned. “That is unrelevant to the story at hand.”
“We don’t have all day, Marshall. Let’s cut to the chase.” There was a conspiratorial glint in his eyes as Laguna leaned his elbows on the gross table and fixed Bone with his most charming smile. “We both know you’ve got friends in interesting places. I’ve been told by my sources that one of those friends had a bit of an unusual evening yesterday.”
“First thing’s first.”
With a flick of his fingers, Bone called for another drink. A scantily clad waiter in a light-up visor brought a bottle of vodka out from behind the bar and leaned a little further forward than was probably necessary as they poured it into Bone’s glass. Zell felt his eyes getting wider as the liquid filled all the way to the top without so much as a single drop of a mixer. Bone took a sip and seemed satisfied. Then, the waiter poured two shots and slid them in front of Zell.
“I don’t do business with anybody I ain’t drank with before,” Bone said cooly.
It was obviously another test. Bone wanted something. Obedience maybe? Willingness to meet demands? Laguna probably wouldn’t have taken him somewhere he was going to get poisoned.
…Probably.
But obediently, he shot back the first, then the second. It was strong, the kind of vodka that burned like hell and tasted like it wasn’t made for human consumption. Beyond the tastebud scorching alcohol, there was a faint aftertaste of vanilla.
He kept his face cool and blank, but in that moment Zell decided he hated vodka.
Seemingly satisfied, Bone relaxed.
“Got a buddy in lift repair. Good union man. Hardworking. On his way home last night, he was taking a shortcut through the alleyways ‘round the back of the shopping mall. Night before the opening ceremony, too many tourists cloggin’ up the main streets. You know how it is. So my guy turns the corner behind the old potion shop - y’know the one that’s been closed on account o’ that electrical fire last summer? Well, he was…” He paused and raised his thick brows. “You getting all this?”
Oops. Zell nodded, air-typing diligently.
“Right. So he was walking past and he hears some noises, y’know? People talkin’, something banging around. He thinks to himself, ‘I grew up in the bad part of Dollet, I know what people are doin’ in back alleys at night.’ Right? So he starts turnin’ around and goin’ the other way thinkin’ it ain’t none of his business. But then, something peculiar happens.”
“Peculiar?” Laguna prompted. Another shot was placed in front of Zell. He swallowed a gag and pretended not to notice it.
“One of ‘em’s got this silver box, right? Real shiny. And they pull out this weird little orb. Even shinier. But that’s not the peculiar part.” Bone took a long drink of his pint of vodka and Zell could almost feel the burn in his own throat.“The peculiar part is that it looked like they were kinda fightin’ with it. Like, it was moving around like it had some life of its own.”
That must have been the suppressor. So they were already in the city. But…it was moving around? What did that mean? Like there was something inside it?
With a thoughtful hum, Laguna stroked his fake mustache. From the corner of his eye, Zell knew he was watching him. He kept his face carefully expressionless and downed the next shot.
Hyne help him.
“Did he overhear anything they were saying?”
“Man, I dunno,” Bone griped. “Sounded like some cult shit, you know I don’t fuck with that.”
They’d never thought about how the suppressor worked, had they? It had only mattered what it did, not how it did it. There was a boiling feeling in his stomach. Rolling and uncomfortable. Alcohol and anxiety. He focused on the wall behind Bone’s big head. Peeling old posters layered one over another. Names and dates and little hearts and expletives scribbled in marker. An advertisement for some Galbadian beer he’d never heard of.
It was a theory. Just a tiny little theory that rooted into his brain and spread like wildfire.
Could the magic powering the suppressor be the very magic he’d lost?
Which would mean that the thing that was inside of it was -
“Well, thank you very much for your time. We’ll be in touch.” Laguna stood and smoothed out his shirt. Then, he settled his hat back onto his head.
“And my payment?”
“You know how it works. If the lead’s good, you’ll see it by tomorrow. If it isn’t, you’ll be shit out of luck.”
Bone guffawed, loud and wet. “That’s what I like about you, Lagos. No bullshit. You’s a straight shooter.”
Dizziness hit Zell hard as they said their goodbyes. When they got outside and the roar of the bar was softened, Laguna huffed and started pacing.
“Well, shit.”
“You could have warned me your friend was gonna try to make me puke.”
“First time I met him, I had a two day hangover.” Laguna said sympathetically. “It’s usually worth it for the intel. Too bad that was a bust.”
Zell leaned against a wall and took some breaths. The metal cooled his fevered skin. “I mean, we figured they’d be here by now, right? Confirmation is a good thing.”
It was only logical that they’d be making moves under crowd cover. All according to plan. Knowing now for sure they were out there though, where he could brush shoulders with them at any moment…
It felt bad, man.
“Yeah, but. We can’t print any of that. They have to think they have the element of surprise. So I’ve got nothing for tomorrow.”
A group of boisterous women in shoes they could barely walk in shuffled toward the bar. Shrieking voices argued fervently about whether or not the president or his aide were better dressed at the opening ceremony. Zell waited for them to pass before he started talking again.
“You were actually looking for material? I thought we were just doing recon.”
“Bit of both.”
Laguna didn’t elaborate beyond that. Instead, he shoved his hands in his pockets and started walking, mumbling to himself about deadlines.
They took a different path than they came, heading instead toward the shipping district. The Lunar Shipping Company’s campus spanned 1.2 million square feet over 39 acres of land with about 10 buildings it called home. It was mostly warehouse and industrial space, but it also housed many of the company’s upper level employees alongside a dining hall, retail options, and a state of the art education center for students interested in pursuing careers in Esthar’s most booming STEM industries. With a city as large as theirs, the Lunar Shipping Company was a response to some early urban replanning concerns after the destruction caused by the Sorceress Wars and the need for fast and convenient deliveries city-wide. It was a technological marvel on top of being one of the largest and strongest union employers in the city. Laguna had been a big supporter of its development after the war, and it had paid off hugely in boosting the economy.
As they turned off the main road and onto the path down toward campus housing, Zell noticed the limp in Laguna’s left leg was back.
“So…. What now?”
“Got another lead to follow up on.”
It wasn’t like Laguna to be vague. If anything, like Zell, he had a tendency to talk too much.
“Another ‘friend’ of yours?”
“Sorta.”
Hmm…
“What’s the big deal? I’m sure there’ll be something from an event tomorrow to write about. What about that auction for the Timber Fund?”
“No,” Laguna shook his head with a little too much fervor. “I need to have something to print tomorrow morning. It has to be big.”
The limping got worse.
“Why?”
“Because I have a deadline. Journalism 101, never miss a deadline!” Clearly he was trying to be very brave and casual about it, but the wobble in his gait looked a lot like he’d stepped on a really big piece of glass and didn’t want anyone to know.
Zell frowned.
“Why don’t you just cover Squall’s speech?”
Suddenly, as if a bullet hit, Laguna’s knee bent and the limp turned into a full on leg cramp.
“AhhhhhhhHHHHH,” Laguna whined, hobbling rapidly toward a nearby bench. He plopped down hard and went to work digging at the muscle with his fingers. “Can we talk about something else?”
So it was about Squall’s speech. Suddenly, Zell understood.
“You want a story bigger than Squall’s sexuality.”
There was no confirmation or denial, just a clenched jaw and an uncomfortable expression on his face. He was definitely hiding something.
“Okay.“ Zell crossed his arms. “Is it because you’re weirded out about it?”
Part of him felt bad for asking. Laguna had never been bigoted about things like that. But he needed to know for sure. And with a huff, Laguna glared.
“Of course not.”
“So what is it then?” He gave Laguna a third degree stare that would have made Quistis proud. And despite being a combat veteran and a tenured world leader, Laguna cracked under the pressure.
“Look, I don’t expect you to understand, but…” He sighed and sunk down on the bench. “I owe him. I’ve got some things I need to make up for. I figured, if I can take some pressure off your personal life, maybe it would help.”
“Things to make up for like what?”
“Just…” Helplessly, Laguna shrugged. “Lost time, I guess.”
What does that mean?
Zell sat down next to him, casting his gaze to the fluffy clouds floating lazily across the night sky. “How did you know it was me?”
“You mean aside from the fact that you went so red we could have seen you from space?” Laguna laughed. “It’s the way he looks at you. I knew the second you got off the ship. You got in that car and didn’t look back and he watched you go like a lost puppy. It’s crazy, but I recognized it. It’s the exact same way his mom looked when - “
He stopped abruptly.
Went white as a ghost.
Didn’t blink.
Didn’t breathe.
Slowly, he closed his mouth. Swallowed. But the damage had been done. Something had been said that couldn’t be taken back.
A shaky breath got caught in Zell’s lungs. “His mom?”
Squall and Laguna’s relationship was something of a mystery. Laguna would call every once in a while just to check in, which maybe might have been normal if he wasn’t the President of the richest and most powerful nation in the world and surely had a million other things to do. He sent Squall a card for almost every holiday - including ones Zell was almost positive he made up - which Squall always seemed baffled by, but he kept them all nonetheless.
All of it made a sad kind of sense if all these years Laguna had been looking out for an old friend’s kid.
“Please forget I said that,” Laguna said, voice thin. “Please, I didn’t mean - “
“You knew Squall’s mom? How?” He grabbed Laguna by the shoulders. Desperation choked him. His stomach churned like the world was spinning backwards. Squall told him once that he thought about his parents constantly. Who they were. What they were like. It kept him up at night, wondering and waiting and never knowing where they went and why they didn’t want him. He agonized over whether or not they were still alive, or if they’d ever thought about him. If they’d ever wanted to meet him. If he’d passed them on the street one day and didn’t even know it.
As solitary as he liked to pretend to be, Squall ached to belong. And now, here was an answer. Finally, after years of grief, Laguna knew who Squall’s mom was.
“Yeah. I knew her.”
“What was her name? What was she like? Did she - ? Was his dad - ? When? I need - I just, holy shit - you have to tell him. He has to know.”
Laguna pressed his palms against his temples and squeezed his eyes shut.
“I can’t!”
“Are you serious?! What, it’s not your secret to tell or some bullshit like that? Is she still alive?”
“No,” Laguna said softly.
“Okay, then what gives?!” Zell couldn’t control the volume of his voice. “What’s the big deal?!”
“He’s gonna freak out. I can’t, it’s just too much to - “
“Laguna, it’s his parents. He deserves to know. He’s not gonna freak out. I mean, it’s not like you’re telling him you’re his dad.”
Nothing happened after that. Zell had expected a scoff, a laugh, anything. But nothing happened. Laguna just stared at him. Completely still. Big blue eyes glassy with emotion.
And then it clicked into place.
Oh fuck.
The more Zell thought about it, the more it all started to unravel. Any time Squall visited, Laguna put him up in the nicest suite in the palace. He’d not only gone to Squall’s wedding and got the happy couple an incredibly thoughtful wedding gift, but he had also cried the entire ceremony and held Ellone’s hand so tight she winced. There were so many times he looked like he wanted to say something important, only to change his mind at the last second and crack some terrible joke. And Kiros would sigh and shake his head and frown in frustration and disappointment.
“That is what you’re saying,” Zell whispered. “Isn’t it?”
The resemblance was there. Wasn’t it? It was there. In the ghosts of Laguna’s dreams. Squall wasn’t much of a spitting image of Laguna, but he looked just like Raine. The shape of her eyes, the fullness of her bottom lip and the softness of her smile. Her nose. The color of her hair and the smooth paleness of her skin. He had Laguna’s high cheekbones and narrow, angular jaw. They shared the same thin arch to their eyebrows.
Raine was Squall’s mother. She was dead. Laguna was Squall’s father. And they had been in the same room hundreds of times without Squall ever knowing the truth.
“I wasn’t keeping it a secret on purpose. I just didn’t know.” Laguna sighed, and he suddenly looked a decade older. “I didn’t know Raine was pregnant when I left to save Ellone from Adel. I didn’t know I would never see her again. I didn’t know I had a son sitting in an orphanage with Raine’s maiden name. Elle only told me right before we actually met. And then it was the end of the world, and then it wasn’t, and then he got married and divorced and the timing just never felt right. I mean, how do you tell someone ‘hey kid, I’m your dad, sorry about all those years I missed.’”
Lost time. Of course. The cards, the presents, the phone calls. Laguna wanted so badly to be in Squall’s life, to make up for all the pain and the loneliness that had been Squall’s closest companions for so many years.
Squall didn’t have the same formative learning that Zell had. Where Ma lovingly taught Zell how to drive, Squall learned in a cold and unfeeling classroom. He didn’t know how to properly tie a tie until Zell showed him at a winter formal when they were 14, and Zell was 99% sure Squall hadn’t even known Zell’s name at that point. Cid and Edea were the closest things he’d ever had to parental figures, but Cid sucked and Edea had always kept Squall at arm’s length like she was afraid of screwing up who he would become. Afraid of changing the fate of the man that fell out of time and warned her of the future. So Squall grew serious. The walls he’d built around himself grew higher. And he had to painstakingly teach himself so much of what Zell had learned so easily from his mom.
SeeD didn’t teach much in the way of how to be a person. Their focus was on how to be a soldier. Squall had talked a lot about feeling like he was always one step behind everyone else. How it felt for so long like everyone else had a hammer when he had a stick.
What would it have been like, if Laguna and Raine had been around? Who would Squall be, if he had been given the chance to be a happy kid who got to sit around the dinner table with his family and talk about his day?
A deep longing hit Zell like a truck.
All he wanted was to sit around a dinner table and ask Squall about his day.
“You have to tell him.”
“Mr. Lagos?” A woman’s voice called. She waved at them from across the street. Her curly red hair was tucked neatly in a loose silk scarf. As she approached, Zell got a better look at her face. And there - in a pair of white slacks and a smart blouse, sporting the same kind of thick framed glasses as Laguna - was Ellone.
“Mr. Delldune,” Laguna said with pride, jumping at the opportunity to change the subject. “This is my publisher!”
Ellone smiled and reached out her hand politely to Zell, as if they’d never met. “Gully McCleod of the Esthar International Post. Pleased to meet you.”
What is with this family?
“So great to meet you,” Zell deadpanned, eyeballing her wig.
Ellone hid a laugh behind her gloved hand before passing Laguna the camera that was hanging from a strap around her shoulder.
“It’s not very juicy, but I got a few we could use.”
The camera beeped as Laguna shuffled through the digital photos with a critical eye. There were several shots of a man in a navy jacket talking on the phone, taken from what appeared to be a building across the way. The next few photos featured the same man opening a briefcase on his desk. It was filled with money.
“Bribes?” Laguna guessed.
Ellone nodded. “He’s called a Galbadian general fifteen times over the last two days. Looks like someone is trying to buy a visa.”
“Who is that?” Zell hated feeling out of the loop.
“CFO of the Lunar Shipping Company. We’ve suspected he’s embezzling for a while and we’ve been trying to investigate very quietly, but it looks like he’s onto us. Probably looking to get out of the country before the truth comes out.”
“Makes sense. No extradition laws in Galbadia.”
“Exactly,” Ellone nodded. “Now that we know he’s a flight risk, we can at least keep him grounded until the investigation is complete.”
“Great work.” Laguna passed the camera back to her. Then, he sighed and rubbed his eyes. “But it’s another thing we can’t print.”
“I’m sorry,” Ellone said, laying a sympathetic hand on his shoulder. “We’ll keep looking.”
“No, it’s alright.” Laguna stood and started walking. “Let’s go home. I’m sure I’ll figure something out.”
He stayed ahead of them as they made their way back toward the outer skyway, shoulders hunched and staring at the ground. Ellone took Zell’s arm as they walked.
“I wanted to apologize for what I was complicit in. It wasn’t right, and I violated your trust. I never should have done it.”
“Thanks.” Zell swallowed hard. “But I don’t blame you. I know how he can be.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen him look so torn up about anything as he did when he asked for my help.” They boarded the lift and her small hand squeezed his. “I know that doesn’t make it better, but I hope you can see the love behind it.”
“I want something I can do with my hands that isn’t violence. And I want to lay in bed with the man that I love and watch all the movies he’s been telling me to watch for the last three years.”
“Yeah. I can.”
The lift took them up and around through the tubes until they made it back to the palace. Which was just fucking gorgeous at night. A special installation had been built in the courtyard for the ceremonies: a woman carved from white marble reaching upward toward the sky. Her dress was chiseled so beautifully that the stone looked like a sheet fabric flowing gracefully at her ankles. The marble was blemished with veins of amethyst that spread like bruises across the woman’s wrists, shoulders, ankles, and face. Silken flowers floated delicately in the air around her, each one glinting with an ethereal purple light that must have been magicked. There was a plaque near her feet that read: “We Remember. We Remain.”
Laguna stared at it for a long time.
Then, something came to him.
“Bruises!! I’ve got it!”
After a brief glance at their surroundings, he grabbed Ellone and nearly dragged her to a spot a few feet back from the statue. He angled her shoulders and pointed toward the palace.
“Camera this way!”
It was apparently Zell’s turn to get into position. Laguna yanked him in front of the camera and patted his shoulders so Zell knew to stay put. The fake mustache was ripped off and Laguna dropped his hat and loosened his hair from Archie’s trademark bun. The suede coat hit the ground and the glasses were tossed on top of the pile. In a matter of seconds, Esthar’s most infamous journalist was gone and the President had returned.
He took a breath. Adjusted his footing. Gave his shoulders a little shimmy.
“Okay. Hit me.”
Zell balked. “Hello??”
“Come on.” Laguna patted his own cheek. “Right here. Hard as you can.”
“That’s insane. I would break your jaw.”
“Great! Broken bones make for better press!” He squeezed his eyes shut again. “I’m ready.”
“I’m not going to hit you!”
“Listen. Nothing makes a headline like a late night attack on the President right in front of the new memorial,“ Laguna argued with a glint of mania in his eyes. “We can get a few good photos and that’ll be the front page story. Easy.”
Ellone chewed her lip. “I don’t think I like this idea.”
“Neither do I,” Zell snapped. “I didn’t block out any time to go to jail this week.”
“It’s not even a big deal.” Laguna did a little bounce step like a boxer. “Just punch me in the face.”
And like. It had been a long ass day. And Zell’s patience was wearing thin. He stabbed at Laguna’s chest with his finger. “No. I have been doing dumb shit with you all night out of the goodness of my heart - “
“You’re clearly not willing to fully commit to the role, because Marshall would totally hit me, it’s part of his backstory that - “
“ - doesn’t have a backstory! You made him up, how would I know that - “
“ - could keep arguing about it or we could be done with it already.” Laguna shoved him. “Come on.”
“Dude, I swear to god. Don’t do that.”
Laguna pushed him again, and for a moment he very seriously considered taking Laguna up on his offer. But Zell was a good person, goddamnit. He was not going to be baited into something so goddamn dumb.
“Stop it.”
“Fine. I’ll go first.”
Laguna lurched forward with his fist raised, as if Zell wasn’t a professional martial artist who could see that move coming from a mile away. Zell side-stepped and knocked his heel into the back of Laguna’s bad knee, sending him sprawling. But instead of staying down, Laguna rolled and grabbed Zell by the legs, pulling him down with him. In a tangle of limbs, they wrestled for control of the situation - Laguna doing his best to keep Zell down and Zell doing his best not to break Laguna’s nose. At a total loss of what to do, Ellone raised her camera and took some photos. It flashed several times before stopping very abruptly.
And then both of them were being lifted off each other by a pair of hugely strong hands.
“What the hell are we doing?” Squall barked as Ward hauled them to their feet and braced their shoulders to keep them apart.
“He started it!” Zell accused. And yeah, maybe he did sound like a bratty little kid, sue him.
Kiros raised an elegant brow. “That doesn’t surprise me.”
“I don’t care who started it, I want to know why.”
They both tried talking at once. Squall scrubbed a hand over his face.
“One at a time.”
“I asked him to punch me for a story,” Laguna said very matter-of-factly. “I don’t know why this is an issue.”
The computer of Squall’s brain blue-screened. “That’s insane.”
Sweet, sweet validation. Zell threw his hands up. “Thank you!” That’s what I said!”
“I would punch you in the face,” Kiros said kindly.
Laguna nodded. “See? That’s the kind of enthusiasm I’m looking for.”
“I got a few good shots!” Ellone said helpfully.
And as Laguna rushed to take a look, babbling excitedly about his headline, Squall gave Zell a once-over.
“….What’s this outfit?”
“Please don’t ask. Pretend this is normal.”
Squall smiled. Soft and sweet, amused and relieved.
They were standing very close.
The warm spice of Squall’s cologne put his heart in a vice.
“So.”
“Mhm.”
Squall coughed.
Zell scratched his elbow. Sniffed. Waited.
Just because he’d missed him didn’t mean he had to let Squall off easy.
“I’ve been looking for you,” Squall tried again.
“Yeah? Any luck?”
There was a brief pause during which it looked like Squall was fighting for his life to stifle an eye roll.
“Can we go somewhere and talk?”
Damn if his eyes weren’t the clearest blue Zell had ever seen. Like lifting the burden of leadership had burned away the cloudiness of self-doubt. The dark waves of his hair fell soft against the leather of his jacket. His dress shirt dipped low and the silver chain of his necklace dragged against his collarbones. Zell was drawn to the lion’s head pendant resting flat against his broad chest, and when he reached out to touch it, Squall’s breath stuttered quietly.
Zell still heard it though.
He loves me.
Heat settled in him like a heavy stone.
Gravity pulled him closer.
Just a step. But it was enough.
He told the entire world that he loves me.
Squall bit his lip, and Zell watched the drag of teeth on delicate flesh.
“Sure.” His fingers brushed bare skin as he let the pendant slip from his grasp. “Let’s talk.”