Warnings: OOC-ly angsty Zell, mentions of self-harming, violating rules by putting lyrics here (which don’t, by the way, belong to me).

Disclaimer: Final Fantasy VIII, the characters and places etc belong to Squaresoft. Blood & Tears by Sentenced belongs to the band mentioned. I only have the angst. And the doc whose name isn't even mentioned. Oh, joy.

To Dry the Tears...

What is it that we're struggling for?
I don't quite see it anymore.
Life kicks us in the teeth
yet something makes us crawl back for more.

Light at the end of a tunnel? Oh, please, what a cliché. But that, cliché or not, was exactly what Zell Dincht was experiencing. How odd... he thought that thing like that existed only in lousy angst movies and novels, not that he’d know for sure. Not until now, at least. Slowly, his eyes fluttered open, revealing his surroundings. White. Plain, dull white.

Heaven? Nah...

A hospital? Most likely. He hated hospitals, his adoptive father had died in one, probably just the same where he was at the moment. He looked around in the room. Who had decided that hospitals had to be white? Well, the curtains – and the horrible clothes he was wearing – were light blue. The guys who had decorated the room, obviously, had had no imagination.

He felt sleepy, which was kind of funny because he had just woken up. Why in seven hells was he in a hospital, anyway? That hadn’t been a part of his plans. He glanced down to his arms that were bandaged from the elbow to the wrist, and it all came back in a flood.

Oh yes, his life just plain sucked.

Blood and tears upon the altar of our lives we shed.
Blood and tears until the sweet release we share in death.
Hours like days, weeks like years
Decades of tears
yet somehow..

“I’m glad to see you awake.”

Zell turned to look to his right, seeing a doctor standing in the doorway with a smile on his lips. Zell frowned. He hated doctors, too, they were all just a bunch of lying bastards. He turned back to face the wall – he wasn’t in a mood to deal with anyone. He just wanted to...

“How are you feeling?”

...die.

The doctor sat onto a chair next to the bed, holding back a sigh. “Your friends are here to see you. Can I let them in?”

We'll lose the things we've fighted for
Each rise is followed by a fall
We'll lose the ones we love, the ones we most adore
Yet go on... we go on

Friends, he said. Zell had to laugh bitterly at that. No one had time for him anymore, not after the War. They were all so damn happy with their happy little lives, hell, it made him want to throw up. No, he wasn’t bitter. He was extremely happy for these... ‘friends’, hoping they were so damn happy they’d choke on it.

Even his mother had started to spend less and less time with him, and that was probably what hurt him the most. He had always thought that no matter what, he could always go to his mother. Well, not anymore, she was spending her time with her new boyfriend, who was just the worst of all. They had gotten into a fight, he and this Daniel, who claimed that he ‘didn’t want to take his father’s place in the family’. As if anyone could even try.

So, Zell had left his mother’s house with a promise that he wouldn’t come back until the man would be the hell out of their life; he was going to take his mother away from him, and then he had no one.

No one.

Was he being selfish by wanting his mother all to himself? Maybe.

“Zell?”

No, he wasn’t going to turn around, to look at the people in the room. Hell, he didn’t even care who there were in the room. They’d better leave him alone, just like they had done before; they didn’t suddenly have to act like they cared.

Or then he just didn’t want them to see him cry.

“Zell, please say something...”

He didn’t care how he had ended up in the hospital, or who had found him. The most important thing was that he was there, alive. It ruined his life. “You just couldn’t let me have my happiness, huh?” he asked quietly after swallowing another flow of tears.

“Zell, what do you—”

“You all have yours, so I think it’s only fair that I’d have mine. I can be wrong, though.”

They kept asking him what he meant – Selphie, Quistis, Rinoa, maybe Squall and Irvine were in the room too, he didn’t care – but he didn’t speak anymore. He had said everything he had wanted to say, so there. Now get out.

“Maybe we should leave him alone,” said Squall’s quiet voice. Yes, and now put that plan into action, thank you very much.

After a short while he heard the door opening, and then footsteps, and soon it was quiet again. He was alone. Why? Because he was too stubborn to accept help from the people he had once considered his friends.

No, he still did; they were still his friends... right? He wanted to take back the thoughts that he didn’t care, that he didn’t need anyone... but it was too late now. There was no one to listen to him, to care about him. He had to make it by himself.

What is it that we're waiting for?
Looking forward to, preparing for?
Life kicks us in the teeth
Yet something makes us crawl back for more

Someone sat next to the bed, onto the chair where the doctor had been sitting just a few minutes ago. Why he hadn’t heard that there was someone in the room with him, he didn’t know. A long time passed in silence, but the person with him obviously wasn’t going to leave any time soon.

“I hate my life,” he suddenly began, surprising himself. He realized that he didn’t care who was with him in the room – one of the girls, Squall, Irvine, the doc, his mother, whoever – he just wanted to get it all off his chest. “None of my friends has time for me anymore, they hardly even greet me in the hallways. Sure, they’re busy and all running the Garden, but I think it’s a little overdone, I mean, you should always have time for friends, right?” he sighed. It seemed that this was going to be a rant. “My mother has a new boyfriend who hates me, my exams at Garden are going straight to hell because I don’t have the motivation to study anymore, the instructors hate me and they took Quez away from me...” He waited for a comment of some sort, but got none. This made him wonder, but he decided to continue, anyway, “My girlfriend left me, and I had my martial arts skill mocked, and hell, that’s probably the only thing I’ve ever been proud about! Then I lost my gloves, broke my punching bag and because of that my hands are smashed,” he laughed humourlessly. “Gotta love my life, eh?”

There was silent in the room for a while, until the person with him finally spoke up. “Hmm. I felt just about the same after the War ended and I returned to B-Garden.”

Zell was more than a little surprised to find out that it was Seifer Almasy – of all the people! – in the room with him, the idea hadn’t even crossed his mind. Why would Seifer come to see him? All they had ever done was get into fights... But he supposed that he wasn’t going to complain, as long as the conversation didn’t turn into a fight.

Seifer continued, “Fujin and Raijin moved to another city together, so I’m alone. Not that I couldn’t deal with that, I’ve been alone for the most of my life, but to have your only friends abandon you...” He kept a short pause. “Can’t say I don’t understand them, though. Anyway, the point is that everywhere I go, I’ll get the cold shoulder, if not a gun pointed at me. People talk behind my back or insult me right in my face, whichever is the most pleasing option for them. I’m not welcome anywhere, I was let back into Garden because Headmaster Cid pitied me, I have to go through the same classes and exams for the fourth time and if I don’t pass this time, it’s so long. I’m not allowed to Junction, and Hyperion was taken away from me. Fair huh?”

Zell was amazed at the almost gentle tone Seifer was using; he had never seen the man anything but pissed or acting the Arrogant and Almighty Seifer Almasy. He was going to open his mouth, but Seifer continued again, with an even quieter tone:

“I’m afraid to go to sleep, because if I fall asleep, I’ll only dream of Her and the things I did during the War.”

Zell wasn’t sure which was more shocking, the fact that Seifer admitted that he was scared of something, or that they were actually having the conversation. He turned onto his other side to face Seifer, only to notice that the man had turned to look away, staring somewhere into nothing.

“But I... I never do anything to actually end it. It’s... pathetic.”

Zell sat up on the bed, letting his bandaged arms fall into his lap. “So... what do you do?”

A faint smile stretched Seifer’s lips. “Grit my teeth and bear it.”

Bear it? Zell frowned. “But it’s... so wrong.”

“Yeah, I know,” Seifer shrugged. “But what can you do? Life’s never fair.”

“I have noticed,” Zell mumbled.

“But does killing yourself really solve everything?” Seifer turned to meet Zell’s eyes for the first time during their conversation. “If you kill yourself, you’re not the only person whose life you end. There’s always someone who dies with you, someone who’s left here to suffer. I think,” he turned to look away again, “that it’s selfish.”

Blood and tears upon the altar of our lives we shed.
Blood and tears until the sweet release we share in death.
Hours like days, weeks like years
Decades of tears
Yet somehow everything seems so worthwhile
for a moment

Zell leaned against the wall behind him, drying his tears with the sleeve of the ugly hospital gown. Was it selfish of him to want to end his pain and leave others to suffer the injustice of the world? “Hmm,” he chuckled. “Maybe you’re right.”

“Of course I am,” Seifer said and stood up. “Well, it was nice to chat, Chicken, but now I’m off to do something very creative, like...”

“Can’t think of anything?” Zell grinned.

Seifer mirrored the grin on Zell’s lips and went to the door. “Shut up, you wuss.”

“Do you still have to call me names?”

“Why of course, what other source of amusement could I possibly find, especially when everyone’s watching with interest when I screw up and get kicked out?” Zell merely shrugged as a response. “Can’t think of anything?” Seifer mocked and opened the door. “If you get a sudden need to angst, I can be found in the library.”

“Sure,” Zell said, smiling for the first time in a very long time. “Thanks, Seifer.”

“That’s what friends are for.”

“We’re not exactly friends.”

“Who gets caught up in details?” Seifer asked, grinning over his shoulder at the bedridden martial artist. “Have fun, Chicken.”

Zell shook his head and lay back down on the bed, closing his eyes. No matter how much it seemed like he couldn’t keep up with the world, some things never changed.