Orphanage Days

[Kaiser]

Hey guys. Here’s something I did a lot of work on a while back (not finished yet) that I for some reason deliberately withheld from y’all. I think I wanted to wait until I finished, or I had some weird idea in my head of how y’all would get to see “Scenes” exclusively while this other fanfic archive I frequent got this and NOT “Scenes.” BUT…

1. I haven’t worked on this in a long time and need to get kickstarted.

2. They eventually got to see “Scenes” over there. So…

Okay, here’s the basic premise. It’s an FF8 fic (what a surprise!). It’s a prequel. Set at the orphanage. Everybody’s running around as little kids. Even though it’s got chapter numbers, the segments are less connected than that implies. There more like mini-episodes of a TV series. There’s some humor, but some sadness too, and the ending (when it eventually comes) is going to be rather unhappy. Tragedy? Maybe. That’s up to y’all, my readers and critics, I s’pose.

Anyway, enough dallying. I’ll be posting them here one chapter at a time. Feedback is very much desired (why would I post it if I didn’t want people to react to it?) I hope you enjoy.

[Kaiser]

CHAPTER ONE.

“NO-UH!” a young girl’s voice loudly protested. “You’re doing it wrong!”

Her playmate, a young boy, stared at her blankly and silently, stung by the accusation of doing something wrong. He looked down at the black zig-zag stripe running horizontally across his yellow shirt, and tugged at the forelock of his hair, as he always did when he was embarrassed or anxious. Which, when not within range of his older sister’s protection, was a nearly perpetual state.

“That’s not how you make a sandcastle!” the girl continued berating. “You do it like this!” She demonstrated her technique, the “right way” by standing up and digging at the sand moistened by the sea by high tide earlier in the day. She trotted back, running as fast as she could with a heavy bucket of wet sand in her hands. She set the bucket down, flipped it over, and had a flawless, well-formed proto-sandcastle.

“See? You put a window here!” she continued, poking at the castle with her finger, making a round window. “And you put the door here!” she concluded, scraping out a square door with a plastic shovel. “That’s the right way! Your way is wrong!”

He looked up briefly at his own sandcastle, which looked much the same, except he had used a small twig to gouge out his windows on the sides opposite his “door” which he had drawn in with a crooked attempt at a curved U-shaped line with the same twig. Her window was above the door, overlooking it.

“That’s where the princess lives,” she exclaimed, pointing to the window. “So she can see her knight coming. That’s why you have to put the window in the front!”

Suddenly, the bossy young girl heard the sound of young children making simulated explosion noises with their mouths, gradually growing louder as a boy and girl their age ran towards them.

“Bang!” shouted the boy, pointing his index finger like a pistol at the girl he was chasing.

“Missed Me! Missed Me!” she sang back, mockingly. “Now you have to kiss me!”

“Eww, yuck, no way! Bang! Got you!” he countered.

They both ran full tilt, eventually tripping over and trampling both sandcastles. The bossy girl screamed angrily.

“You wrecked my castle!” she whined. “I’m telling Matwyn!” She stood up and started walking proudly towards the house that overlooked the beach, a good 50 yards away. The boy in the yellow shirt just sat there.

“Quisty is a tattle-tale!” the other girl taunted in a sing-song voice. “Quisty is a tattle-tale!”

“You’re going to be in big trouble!” Quisty shouted back, still walking towards the house, slowly, inviting a chase.

“I got you,” the boy said.

“Nuh-uh!” the girl countered. “You missed me. Now it’s my turn to chase you! Bang!”

“You missed!” the boy replied.

“No, I got you!” she argued. “Look! Here’s my finger, and the bullet goes like this.” With her other hand, she traced out the imaginary line that illustrated the path of the imaginary bullet, until she poked her male playmate in the solar plexus. Of course, she didn’t know it was called the solar plexus. None of them did. To her, it was just the body, and she just shot him there.

“Nuh-uh!” the boy protested.

“Yes-huh!” the girl reiterated.

“Nuh-uh!”

“Yes-huh!”

“Nuh-uh!”

“Yes-huh!”

“Hey,” the boy said, changing the subject, and speaking to the boy in the yellow shirt. “You want to play war, too?”

“No,” he softly whispered, not looking up at either of them.

“Do you know how to play war?” the girl asked. The boy shook his head.

“It’s fun!” the other boy insisted. “First, we chase Sefie and shoot her. Then she chases us and shoots us. When you get shot, you’re “it” and have to chase. Wanna play?”

The boy in the yellow shirt didn’t answer audibly.

“Are you sad?” the girl asked. The boy in yellow shook his head negatively.

Meanwhile, the other boy began to smile impishly, and stood up. He started to sneak up on his playmate.

Sefie put her arm around the boy in the yellow shirt. He began to squirm and tried to get out of the embrace.

“This is what Matwyn does to Cid when he’s sad,” she explained, “and then he’s happy.”

Grinning from ear to ear, the other boy crept up behind the girl, holding his finger up to his mouth to signal to the boy in the yellow shirt to be quiet. He shaped his other hand into an imaginary pistol, and pointed it at the nape of Sefie’s neck, and shouted in her ear as loudly as he could.

“BANG!” he yelled triumphantly. “You’re it!”

“Nuh-uh!” she squealed in protest. “You cheated! You cheated! Cheater, Cheater, Pumpkin-Eater!”

“There’s no cheating in war!” he defended. Then he ran off, knowing that she would now chase him to get him back. Sure enough, she was quickly on her feet and chasing after him, shooting imaginary bullets at him.

“Irvy, I’m going to get you! Bang!”

The boy in the yellow shirt watched them for a little while, but quickly lost interest. Of greater import to him was finding his big sister. He looked around, but could see her nowhere on the beach. So he stood up and began to walk towards the house as fast as his tiny legs would permit him.

[Weiila]

Aww, they’re so cute Great job, Kaiser, and I especially like the “This is what Matwyn does to Cid when he’s sad”, that was so sweet

[Frameskip]

Heh, very cute Kaiser. Can’t wait for you to post the whole thing.

[LunarCry]

Awww, I love it! Kaiser, your FFVIII fics rock ^^

[Kaiser]

CHAPTER TWO

Quisty burst into the back door of the large stone house, intent on finding Matron. She found her, standing over the little boy with the overall shorts and the light blue shirt, the boy who was sick all the time.

“Matwyn!” she squealed. “Irvy and Sefie messed up my sandcastle on purpose!” She rubbed her eyes for effect.

“We’ll talk about that in a minute, Quistis,” The Matron replied. “Right now I need to give Zell his medicine.”

“Matwyn,” Quisty asked, “why is Zell sick all the time? Is something wrong with him?”

On the bed, Zell heard the question, and more importantly, felt the tone of the question, and started to cry, turning his head away from the little voice so nobody but Matron would know he was crying.

“No, Zell is just like you, and Irvine, and Selphie, and Squall, and Seifer, and everybody else,” Matron answered. “He just gets sick a little more than the rest of you.”

“Oh,” Quistis answered, her head and voice dropping, still young enough to trust everything adults told her at face value.

“Now go wash up and tell the others it?s almost lunch time, okay?” Matron instructed Quisty.

“Okay!” she smiled. She liked being Matron’s special helper whenever she could. She was good at telling people to do things and how to do things. Quistis ran off to the bathroom to wash her hands.

Matron turned her attention back to the sickly boy on the bed.

“Now, Zell, it’s time for your medicine,” she coaxed.

“I don?t want it!” he shrieked. "It tastes bad! It tastes like poopies!?

Unbeknownst to Matron, Zell spoke from personal experience. Just the day before, he had tripped outside on the beach, and he had landed near a mound of droppings from the Orphanage’s pet dog, Roger. It smelled bad, and he began to squirm to get away from it. Unfortunately, Seifer had been with him. Seifer, who always picked on him. Seifer, who liked to make fun of him. Seifer, who was in excellent physical health and was a very big boy. Seifer, who pushed Zell’s face into the dog poo and made him cry. Seifer, who always found a way to make Zell cry.

“Zell likes poo! Zell likes poo!” Seifer began to chant and sing, as he skipped off, naturally to tell all the others. Now they were all calling him Zell the poo-eater. Zell had cried, ran inside, and quickly washed his face and brushed his teeth and threw the toothbrush away when he found it smelled like poo. He told Matron he lost it, and she gave him a new one. That was all she knew had happened. Zell didn’t tell her about anything. The last thing he wanted was for her to know and start calling him “Zell the Poo-Eater” just like everyone else did.

[Cless_Alvein]

Very beautifully written, Kaiser. The only qualm I have with it is that in the first chapter, you use a lot of “big words” to describe a scene involving only children. Seems a little out of place

[Kei]

Poor Zell

This is so kyoooot. I likes! Want more… MORE! giggles

[Nebagram]

Yep, this rocks Can’t wait to see where this is heading… I absolutely loved “Scenes…” so I’ve got high expectations from this one (don’t mean to put any pressure on, like )

[Kaiser]

Originally posted by Cless Alvein
Very beautifully written, Kaiser. The only qualm I have with it is that in the first chapter, you use a lot of “big words” to describe a scene involving only children. Seems a little out of place

That’s a good point (and actually one of the quirks/deficiencies of my writing style; I tend to lean towards using a longer, more verbose, more obscure synonym than most writers or readers would consider using).

Although I guess my defense would be that this story may be written about small children, but isn’t written for small children.

Though it probably wouldn’t hurt me to use simpler, less esoteric words more often.

[Kaiser]

CHAPTER THREE

All the children sat down at the table for dinner. Zell had to sit on the end of the long table, at Edea’s left arm, because the other children had always maneuvered to sit as far away from him as possible. Someone had to end up stuck next to him, and it was the boy in the yellow shirt, Squall, because he had protested the least. He quietly sat down between Zell and his big sister Ellone, who sat between Squall and Seifer. Quisty insisted on sitting at Edea’s right hand, with Irvy between her and Sefie, This was the way the children always sat. Edea arranged them this way so that she could encourage Zell and keep a close eye on him if he needed special attention. Squall was kept happy by being next to his big sister, Ellone served as the strategic buffer zone between the Seifer and the other boys. Sefie and Quisty had to be kept separate from each other because they would either be getting along that day – and thus be a distraction from each other’s eating and learning table manners – or they were very angry with each other – and thus still be a distraction from each other’s eating and learning table manners. Irvy had to be kept between them and away from Seifer, because Seifer had a tendency to recruit him into ganging up on Zell and/or Squall. Quisty constantly was trying to emulate Edea, and so Edea kept Quisty at her right side to encourage this positive role modeling, but also to rein her in when she got out of hand. After all, emulating Matron meant telling everyone else what to do (which, Edea noted, seemed to be Quisty’s favorite part of “playing Matron”). Quisty could also be relied upon to alert Edea if Irvy and Sefie were horsing around too much, and this potential for tattling kept them in line, at least at the dining table. It was a very delicate political balance, but it was borne of Edea’s intimate knowledge of her young charges, and a period of trial and error at the beginning. And it was nearly perfect. Of course, if and when someone came around to adopt one of these children, the house of cards would collapse.

While chewing, Irvy got his telltale smirk on his face. It was the smirk he always had when he was thinking about doing something that would get her attention. He began tapping Sefie on the arm, doing his 5-year-old best to be stealthy about it. Sefie quickly turned her head.

Grinning, Irvy turned his head to hers and proudly displayed his tongue, coated in the sickly green colored film of several peas that had been mashed against the insides of his mouth.

“EWWWW!” Sefie squealed! “That’s gross!” But she laughed anyway. On the other side of the table, Seifer smiled.

“Matwyn! Irvy’s chewing with his mouth open!” came Quisty’s inevitable response.

“Irvy,” Edea calmly spoke, “You’re supposed to keep your mouth closed when chewing. What you’re doing is rude.”

“You’re bad!” Quisty scolded.

“Irvy,” Edea continued, “If you don’t behave, everyone will get to have Ice Cream for dessert except you. Understand?”

Irvy closed his mouth and hung his head. He bobbed it up slightly, and let it fall back down, constituting a nod.

“And Quisty,” Edea continued, “Nobody here is bad. You are all good children.”

“But he’s not supposed to–”

“No,” Edea interrupted, “But you’re not supposed to tell other people how to behave. That’s my responsibility. You just worry about yourself, and let Irvy worry about Irvy.”

“Who worries about you, Matwyn?” Quisty asked.

Edea could only smile. She had run this orphanage for years, and many waves of kids had come and gone, but only in this crop of children, and only in Quisty, had she encountered a five year old who would think to ask that question.

“I worry about me,” she said, sighing, “And so does Cid. Now please finish your peas, Quisty.”

“Okay,” she replied, satisfied, and resumed eating.