This is my first fan-fic guys, so bear with me, this is gonna be quite a long chapter.
Written by Lionheart83 (Chris). This fic is copyrighted.
Any comments, please email me at chrisg_83@ecreators.net
Hope you enjoy this!!

End Game:- Chapter I (Still Waters)

	It had been a year since the Final Battle with Ultimecia. The world was back to 
normal, everything was at peace. At Balamb Garden, nothing unusual was taking place. 
The only change was that all the Gardens were now mobile bases, able to cover large 
leagues, dispatching SeeDs to all areas of the world efficiently. The four mobile Gardens, 
Balamb, Galbadia, the newly repaired Trabia and newly built Esthar were stationed in the 
four quadrants of the globe. But as fate would have it, the world had been quiet for too 
long……

	“Yeargh!” a piercing scream emitted from the infirmary in Balamb Garden.
	“Oh, it’s not THAT painful,” said Dr Kadowaki, as she finished sewing up a deep 
cut. “Maybe next time, you’ll be more careful in the Training Centre.”
	“It wasn’t my fault, I didn’t know that Ochus could do that.” whined Zell.
He had been fighting Ochus in the Training Centre when one of them swiped his leg with 
its razor sharp leaves. The result, was a deep cut in his left calf, which needed five 
stitches.
	“You’re lucky Seifer didn’t see you like this, otherwise he’d be calling you a 
chicken wuss.” replied the doctor, while washing up the instruments used in the sink.
	“Well, he’s still being closely monitored by the Garden faculty, so I guess he 
wouldn’t be around that much.” said Zell, wincing as he got off the bed. “I guess I’d 
better be going now, Squall’s expecting me.”
	“Not so fast, on your way out, I want you to help me clean up the bloodstains you 
left behind.” said Dr Kadowaki, handing a towel to him.
	“But…”
	“No buts, you made this mess, so you clean it up, run along now, I’ve got other 
things to attend to.” replied Dr Kadowaki, while making a shoo-ing  motion with her 
hand.
	“Fine,” he sighed, then limped out the door, towel in hand.

	A lone figure sits upright on a huge chair with ornate carvings, his eyes looking 
straight ahead, but there was a glassy look to them, like they were somewhat distant. He 
seems to be looking, searching for something, or someone with his mind…

	Elsewhere, at the orphanage, Edea was busy teaching Rinoa the advanced arts of 
sorcery. Being a former sorceress, it was her task to teach the new sorceress in mastering 
her newfound powers, lest another Ultimecia emerge. However, even she was impressed 
at how fast Rinoa had progressed during the past year. In one year, she had already 
mastered levitation, transmutation, translocation, and language of the beasts and all the 
basic spells. She was now in the process of teaching Rinoa how to Create when Cid ran 
across the field to her.
	“Edea darling, I need your help! The kids are getting out of hand again.” Cid 
wheezed. Ever since Cid passed on command of Balamb Garden to Squall, he had 
reunited with Edea and together, both of them started the orphanage again.
	“My dear Cid, how can some adorable kids get out of hand?” she smiled, knowing 
that he just wanted to spend some time with her alone. She was inclined to turn him 
down, but one look at his panting form and her heart softened.
	“Oh alright, I’ll come and help you. Rinoa, keep practicing.” she said, turning to 
look at Rinoa standing in the field, in deep concentration.
	As she turned away, Rinoa opened her eyes and asked, “Ah, Edea, is it like that?” 
And just as she turned back to Rinoa, a bright white light appeared hovering above 
Rinoa’s open hand. The light grew larger and slowly coalesced into a ball. The ball was 
no longer white, but pink, and something could be seen swirling in it. Then the ball began 
to mould itself into a shape, slowly at first, but getting faster. As it moulded into it’s final 
shape, the gel-like substance coating the shape burst into tiny droplets, and in the place of 
the ball of light, there was a single rose, a single pink rose. The rose gently floated down 
onto Rinoa’s hand and she turned towards Edea, looking contented but very tired. Edea’s 
eyes widened, but she quickly regained her composure.
	“Very good Rinoa,” she said, trying to hide her amazement. “But you’ll have to 
practice more so that you can create bigger and more complex objects. We’ll end here for 
today, see you tomorrow Rinoa.”
	“Bye Edea.” replied Rinoa, as she stared at the rose on her hand. She had never 
created anything before, and was still amazed that she could do it. She never heard Edea 
saying, “She’s so gifted, no wonder she was chosen.” All Rinoa was thinking of, was 
how Squall was doing back at Balamb Garden.

	The lone figure’s eyes open wider, as if surprised by what he saw. Then slowly, a 
smirk crosses his face, his eyes ever so distant. 
	“Ah, so this is the one. Very promising, very promising indeed.” he says, as he 
relaxes his shoulders and hunches forward, as if all the searching had made him tired.

	Squall Leonheart, the newly appointed Commander of Balamb Garden was 
having a hard time negotiating with the ambassador from Fisherman’s Horizon. Marin, a 
short, bald, pudgy man, who thought that his task was the most important thing in the 
world, had demanded that Squall dispatch six SeeDs to FH to help curb the rising piracy 
in its nearby waters, but the price he offered was far below the actual price for each of the 
six SeeDs. Finally, having had enough of his pompous attitude, Squall cut off Marin’s 
negotiations with a wave of his arm.
	“Enough!” he thundered, “My final offer is 20000 Gil for each SeeD, no more, no 
less!” Considering that fact that his other hand was gripping tightly to his gunblade, the 
Lionheart, Marin’s eyes widened and he immediately got the point.
	“It shall be as you say Commander.” Martin replied, suddenly having lost all of 
his previous pompous attitude. “We shall be awaiting the SeeDs.” He then scurried out of 
the office.

	Squall slumped back down onto his chair, his hand to his forehead, and sighed. 
Just then, the door to the office opened and Zell entered the room.
	“Hiya Squall, wassup?” he asked, while munching on a hot dog.
	“Nothing much, I just sort of threatened the FH ambassador to close our 
negotiations.” he sighed.
	“Wow! Cool!” Then Zell caught sight of the look Squall gave him, “Erm, I mean, 
that’s bad. Why’d you do that?”
	“I don’t even know, he just seemed so irritating at that time.” Squall replied, 
sinking further into his chair.
	“You’ll get over it,” Zell said, “Anyway, why’d you call me here?”
	“I did?” Squall said absentmindedly, “Oh yeah, I need you to lead some SeeDs to 
Trabia Garden, it’s only just been rebuilt and needs help in getting back on its feet.”
	“Awright! Can I ask Selphie and Irvine along too?” Zell replied excitedly.
	“Sure, if they’re not doing anything.” Squall mumbled, “Take along the whole 
damn school if you want to.” he muttered under his breath.
	“What?”
	“Oh, nothing,” Squall replied, covering up his comment nicely. “On second 
thought, why don’t we both go find them now? I need to get out of here before I 
explode.” he said, looking around.
	“Fine with me.”

	The hunched figure suddenly stands up from his seat, and hastily hobbles out of 
his dark, musky room.

	Irvine Kinneas was having a lovely time in the Quad, lying back on a grassy 
slope, taking in the fresh air, admiring the butterflies and other beautiful creatures that 
were in the Quad. This other beautiful creature being Selphie Tilmitt. He was having a 
wonderful time with her, watching her prance around as she danced on the grass barefoot, 
feeling the cool grass between her toes. As she danced, the butterflies seemed to start to 
circle her, and accompany her dance, flitting in one direction one moment, and suddenly 
changing direction the next. They almost seemed to be dancing with her, guiding her like 
a gentleman at a grand ball. From the looks of it, she was definitely enjoying herself, as 
was Irvine. He just lay there, took a deep breath and exhaled. “It just doesn’t get any 
better than this.” he said, as he closed his eyes and felt the sun on his skin.
	Selphie, on the other hand, was ‘flirting’ with the butterflies, swirling around, 
feeling just so happy and overjoyed that the day was so fine. Her cute smile and cheeky 
look definitely showed that. After a few more rounds with her other ‘suitors’, she came 
back to Irvine, finding him dozing off on the grassy slope. Just then, an idea came into 
her head and a mischievous look came onto her face. 
She left briefly and came back with a feathery stalk of long thin grass, and began 
to tickle Irvine’s nose. He barely noticed her tickling at first, but as it got more and more 
irritating, Irvine couldn’t take it anymore. His nose twitched violently, and suddenly, he 
gave a loud sneeze, right into Selphie’s face. Her shocked look greeted Irvine as he 
opened his eyes dreamily. He took one look at her and started to laugh a hearty laugh. 
Selphie went from a shocked look to one of pure vengeance and said, “Ooh, I’ll get you 
for that!”
She then started ticking Irvine everywhere, under the ribs, the arms, everywhere. 
Irvine tried to fight back, but he was too far into his laughing to do anything. Finally, he 
held up his hands, “Ok ok, I surrender.”
“Finally got you Irvine Kinneas.” Selphie said, while catching her breath.
Suddenly, his face brightened up and he said, “Now it’s my turn.” Then without batting 
an eyelid, he lunged at Selphie and managed to reduce her to a heap of laughter. Her 
laughter was different from that of Irvine’s, it sounded more like silvery laughter, not 
unlike how pixies would sound. Very soon, they were both tickling each other, not caring 
what passers-by thought. After a few minutes of this ‘foreplay’, both of them fell back 
onto the grass, exhausted by one another’s efforts of tickling. As they took a breather and 
felt the warm sun gaze upon them, they hardly heard someone walking up towards them.

	“Ahem, I hope we’re not interrupting.” They heard from somewhere behind them.
Both of them looked up right into the faces of Squall and Zell. Squall had that perpetual 
smirk on his face, while Zell had a rather cheeky and mischievous grin on his. Both of 
them got up and hastily stood up, straightening their clothes at the same time. 
	“Squall! And Zell! We didn’t notice you guys!” Irvine said, rather red-faced.
	“Obviously not,” grinned Zell, with a cheeky grin that spoke volumes.
	“Squall! Zellie! Were you two looking for us?” Selphie asked, in her usual cheery 
manner.
	“Oh no, we were just looking for mushrooms and found you two,” Squall replied 
flatly, “Of course we were looking for you two!!”
	“Hey, chill man. How were we to know?” Irvine said, backing away slightly at 
the tone of Squall’s voice.
	“Sorry, I’ve just been having a bad day.”
	“He just threatened the FH ambassador!” Zell interjected excitedly.
	“Could you say that a bit louder? I don’t think the rest of the Garden heard you 
yet!” Squall said exasperated.
Before anyone else could say anything, Squall held up his hand.
	“Look, the reason why I’m here with Zell is to; one, get away from the stressful 
office work, and two, ask you two if you’d like to go to Trabia Garden for a week or so.”
	“Trabia Garden? Of course! Then I can get to see my old friends, see the sights 
and just look around!” Selphie screamed excitedly.
	“So you’ll go?” Zell asked. “We have to go there to help the school get back on 
its feet.”
	“Of course we’ll go! I’ll go anywhere just to be with Selphie.” Irvine said, 
looking at Selphie with all the love he had.
	“What a thing to say in front of them.” Selphie whispered, her hands going up to 
her rapidly reddening cheeks.
	“Then it’s settled, you guys will leave with the others first thing tomorrow 
morning.” Squall said in a commanding tone.
The others gave him a mock salute, “Yes Commander!” they echoed in unison.
Squall sighed and covered his face with his hand, disbelief written all over his face. 
	“Why me? Why me?” he exclaimed to no one in particular.

END	Written by Chris a.k.a. Lionheart83