Final Fantasy - All Series Fan Fiction ❯ Lost and Found ❯ And the trail moves on... ( Chapter 3 )

On the train ride to Fishermen's Horizon, Quistis kept wondering why would someone be following Seifer. The only logical explanation she could come up with was someone held a grudge against him for all those terrible things he did as the Sorceress's Knight. `I just hope I can find more clues at FH.' She thought. The train ride was fairly short, so she was there in a matter of 30 minutes. The abrupt ride didn't allow her to think deeply on the situation.

FH had changed quite a bit since Quistis was last there. The Esthar engineers and technicians who resided there love to build and fix things, so this came as no surprise to the intelligent blond (no it's not an oxymoron). Quistis took a couple of good looks at the `new' buildings as she shouldered her rucksack and made her way to the nearest hotel. The word new wasn't exactly the right way to describe the buildings around her. Even if they were built yesterday, the structures would still look quite shabby because all they ever used for material here were leftover scrap-metal. Still, the floating town had it's own peaceful charm that would seem appealing to anyone.

The mayor of this town had much to do with that. He believed that violence was unnecessary, and conflicts should be resolved thru discussion, which was the reason why Quistis couldn't picture Seifer being here. The only reason why anyone like him would stop at this place would be to pass over the bridge to Esthar. But if you wanted to get to Esthar, stopping here wasn't really necessary either, because the train just continues on without you having to get off. So why did Seifer specifically ask for train tickets to just FH?

As she pondered all this, Quistis wasn't paying attention enough to notice that she was about to run over a goofy, string bean of a kid with a fishing pole slung over his shoulder. The kid kneeled down to tie his shoe just in time for Quistis to trip over him, landing flat on her face.

"Ouch! That hurt lady! Watch where you're going!" he yelled. "Man, can't even tie your own shoes without being tipped on by a four-eyed girl."

"One, young man," Quistis replied as she straightened her glasses. "I'm not a girl. And two, you shouldn't be trying to tie your shoes in the middle of a walkway."

"Whatever lady." The boy said just before he glanced at his now snapped pole. "Wha…you broke my pole lady! That was my only fishing pole!"

Quistis heaved a sigh. Although the kid was a being rather rude about it, she still felt kind of bad for breaking his pole. Before the kid could wail some more, she offered to buy him a new pole.

"Listen, I'm sorry I broke your pole, so I'll buy you a new one."

"No way lady! You can't just buy a pole like this. My master hand made it for me. He said that if I break one more pole, I'll just have to fish with my hands!"

Quistis thought for a moment. "Well how about you take me to your master, and I'll explain to him that it was my fault."

The kid looked like he was thinking about it. "Ok, lady."

"All right." She replied. "How about we shake hands to seal the deal? Oh, and by the way, my name is Quistis."

"Whatever, lady." he shrugged before extending his hand. "You can call me Tommy, but my master prefers to call me brat. C'mon, I'll take you to him."

Quistis just giggled. She had to say that name suited the kid pretty well. Even if he is a brat, she still found herself liking him. Had they met when she was still an instructor, Quistis would still have been lecturing him on the values of being aware on one's surroundings at all times to prevent more tripping adults. She could tell that the boy meant no harm, so she was now willing to let it go.

Tommy (brat) took what remained of his broken pole and took off towards the old side of FH. After they took a lift up to what looked like a water tower, Quistis was starting to get a strange feeling of de'ja'vu.

"This looks like where the Garden crashed when it became mobile." she thought out loud. Tommy overheard her.

"Garden? Since when do gardens get up and crash into things?" Tommy asked. He was looking at Quistis like she had gone off her rocker. "I remember my ma having a garden, but all it did was sprout tomatoes."

Quistis giggled again. "Not that kind of garden, silly. See, The Garden is what we referred to our home as. We didn't know it, but The Garden was really a ship, and when we activated it, we lost control and crashed here. I think was about a year and a half ago."

Tommy's expression lit up. "Oh, yea! I remember that. The mayor was awfully upset when that happened. My master told me that his favorite fishing spot almost got crunched by that thing. That was you?"

Actually Quistis wasn't really there. She was stuck inside the BGH251F2 with Irvine and Selphie at the time. But to prevent any more weird looks from Tommy, she simply stated, "Yes."

Once the pair reached the top of the water tower, they ran around the side only to go down a very long ladder. When they reached the bottom, they crossed a catwalk that led to a broken crane hanging over the water. And on the tip of that crane was an old man sitting under an umbrella with a fishing pole in hand. The man looked quite serine, that is, until the brat started jumping up and down and yelling, "Master Fisherman! Master Fisherman! I need to talk to you!"

Master Fisherman winced at the boys screeching for attention. 'That boys big mouth will scare away all the fish within a 10 mile radius!' he thought. "Pipe down, brat! I'm not deaf! And how many times have I told you not to come down here? Knowing you, you'd fall off and I'd have to fish you out! Go back up the tower, and I'll talk to you there!"

Tommy turned toward Quistis. "Isn't he the greatest?" he said with a big grin on his face. "Charming." She replied. He ran back to the ladder and climbed up it as Quistis followed him.

Back at the top, the pair waited as the Master Fisherman took his time securing his pole, then making his way off the crane and up the ladder.

"All right boy," he started when he finally reached the top. "what is it that you could possibly want now? I've already given you your lessons for today." Then he finally noticed Quistis standing there. "Who's your pretty friend?"

"That's what I needed to see ya for. This lady here made me break my pole. I was just minding my own business when she ran over me like I wasn't there." He stated, pointing a finger at Quistis. She was rather taken aback for the boy's way of explaining the situation.

"Is that so?" started the old man, not missing Quistis' surprised expression. "What did she do, put a gun to your empty head and told you to snap the pole over your knee? I bet you weren't paying attention like always. Besides, it's just plain rude to start blaming people without properly introducing them." He turned towards Quistis with an apologetic expression. "I'm terribly sorry ma'me. He's a horrible brat at times. And your name is…"

"Quistis Trepe." She replied shaking his hand. "It really was my fault though. I didn't see him tying his shoe and I accidentally tripped over him. I guess we're both guilty of not paying attention."

"Really?" asked the master "I guess you expect me to make you another pole then, eh brat?" he asked brat, err, Tommy. "That's the 5th one this month. If you don't start taking care of your things properly, then you'll be doing nothing but trying to repair them and wasting a lot of resources in the process. Ochu tentacles are not easy to come by you know."

"You use Ochu tentacles to make fishing poles?" Quistis asked.

"Why yes." Replied the fisherman. "I only use the best materials for fishing. That's one of the reasons why I'm the Master Fisherman. By the way, you can call me `Boss'. That's what everyone calls me."

"Well Boss, I don't have any more Ochu tentacles, but would Malboro tentacles work?" she suggested

"Malboro!" he yelled "Did you say you have Malboro tentacles? What I wouldn't give to have a pole made with a Malboro tentacle! It's almost impossible to get Malboro tentacles with out getting killed in the process."

"Right here." She said as she pulled one out of her bag. "I always have some in stock just in case I end up destroying my whip."

"Where did you say you were from?" asked the fisherman eyeing the whip on her belt suspiciously.

"Balamb Garden." She responded.

"Oh, yes. You look like you would come from there. I've met an interesting young man from there once. Happened when your Garden nearly crashed into my favorite fishing spot while I was fightin' with a big one. What's your business at FH?"

"I'm looking for someone that passed through here a year ago. He's about 6 foot 5, heavy build, blond hair. Goes by the name of Seifer Almasy." She stated.

"Seifer?" The old mans face lit up in recognition of the name. "He wouldn't have happened to be traveling with a dark man and a pale woman would've he?"

"Why yes! You didn't see him did you?"

"Boy," he said turning to the brat, "go down to my fishing spot and take my old pole, then get yourself home now." He barked

"Gee, thanks master! I told ya he's the greatest." Tommy yelped as he skipped away.

"Now then," the fisherman said, once the boy was out of sight. "What exactly do you want with him? Your not working for those ex-Galbadian goons, are you?"

"What? No, I'm working on behalf of certain government officials. All they want to know is if Seifer is a threat to them any more. That's all. Has some one else came looking for him as well?"

"Well, that's a long story. I can see your intentions are not harmful to Seifer. Follow me and we'll talk about it."

Quistis followed `Boss' back into town to a little pub along the railroad tracks. The barkeep greeted Boss in a warm manner, which gave Quistis the impression that he was a well-respected member of the community. Boss asked the barkeep if she wouldn't let anyone near the back booths. She just responded with a nod and a wink and muttered to herself that the old man "still had it". When they sat down, Boss started the conversation.

"I know you SeeD's don't ask too many questions when it comes to your missions, but how much did your superiors tell you about Seifer?"

"Well," she began "I've known Seifer since childhood. We and a few other friends were in the same orphanage together. After that, we were enrolled at The Garden, and I became one of his instructors."

"You as his instructor? You don't look at all older than Seifer."

"Well that's true. I'm only 5 months older than he is, but at the Garden I became a SeeD at age 15 and an instructor at 17."

"So you know him pretty well I take it?"

"As well as he would let me."

"All right. Well any way, I met Seifer a year ago when he and his friends sought me out as a Master Fisherman. Guess some friends of my must have referred me to him. He was looking to learn how to be a commercial fisherman. I can tell by the look on your face that you don't believe that a volatile young man like Seifer would ever want to become a professional fisherman. Well it's true. He was just looking for a new way of life. I assume you know about his involvement with Sorceress Edea, and that's why. So anyway, I took him and his friends under my wing and began instructing them. His two friends didn't last very long though. They lacked the patience and stamina for being fishermen. I think the straw that broke the camels back was when those two goofballs tried to bring up a really powerful swordfish in their nets and the darn thing pulled them right off the boat and into the water." Boss chuckled at the memory. "Seifer just laughed at them when they came up looking like drowned rats. The amazing thing was that he, by himself, grabbed the net before it could get away and just pulled that thing up like it was nothing. That was a 400 lb fish too."

"Wow." Was all that Quistis could say.

"You darn right. I tell ya, in all my years here at FH, I've never seen anyone who could do that. Usually it takes a team of men to bring in a fish like that, but for Seifer, he could do that all day. That boy was defiantly skilled. I asked him if he's ever done fishing before, but all he's ever done was some pole fishing, which didn't suit a guy like him."

Quistis gave a soft chuckle. "No that wouldn't be suited for him. Seifer has always one to love a good fight. Which is why I can't see someone like him being in a place like this for more than a day without getting kicked out. I know of the mayor's policy for non-violence, and it didn't seem that Seifer could go more than a week at the Garden without picking a fight with Squall."

"Hmm…" Boss started stroking his chin again. "What exactly was he like before he left your Garden?"

"Well for one thing, Seifer was kicked out. He was always trying to be in the center of attention. The way he did that was being a bully and a big shot. When he was in class, Seifer would always try to get into a verbal fight with me so that I would kick him out of class. He was a very unruly and undisciplined cadet."

"Or, perhaps he was just in the wrong environment." Boss suggested.

"What makes you say that?"

"For the amount of time that Seifer has been here, I've been watching him very closely. I do that with anyone I would instruct so I know what style I need to teach him or her the best way that they'll learn. I could tell that Seifer is the kind of person who needs his freedom. If you try to order him or make him feel like he's not in control of his own decisions, then he will try to fight you until you know that or your just too exhausted to care. Seifer is actually a very disciplined person but only to his own means. When he has his heart set on something, he will push himself to the very limit to achieve it. It sounds like your Garden was too much of a controlled environment for him. I bet he had a very strict schedule didn't he?"

"Well of course. You would have to in order to fit in everything you must learn in a certain amount of time. Seifer had to become a SeeD by the age of 19 or he would be kicked out."

"Did you ever stop to think that maybe he didn't want to be a SeeD? Did he really have a choice when he was enrolled into the school."

Quistis was taken by surprise. "No…I guess not."

"There you go. When I became Seifers master, all I did was tell him the basics of how to fish and just let him go with it. He made a lot, and I mean a lot, of mistakes in the beginning, but after I let him play and get the feel for net fishing, he had it down pretty fast. If I just let him do it his own way, he'll get it eventually. He's a very bright young man, which can lead to arrogance unfortunately. But he didn't seem like that when he was here. I don't know, but I think Seifers recent experiences might have changed him for the better from what you've told me."

"But what about Seifers craving for fighting? He always fought with anyone who'd give him the time of day."

"I don't know. Maybe he was just lonely. See, humans need to interact with other humans. He might've had problems making friends when he was little, so fighting with them was the only other way he could get people to pay any attention to him. His two friends was evidence of that. Even though they are his friends, he still did his best to fight with them everyday. Perhaps fighting with you on a day-to-day basis was maybe a sign of affection for him. Who knows, maybe his parents beat him as a child and said that it was because they loved him."

"I never really thought about it that way. I guess he was just misunderstood. Anyway, exactly how long was Seifer here?"

"I think about 6 months. He was also learning how to sail from a friend of mine who's a boatman. I also taught him a little about engineering, though he didn't seem too interested in that. His two friends were more inclined to working with machinery than Seifer was. See, most people here at FH used to be engineers from Esthar. During the previous Sorceress War, we all migrated here to build our own dreams the way we wanted them. In a sense, FH was a perfect haven for those three. That is, until those Galbadian scum caught up to him."

"Exactly who were these people and what did they want with Seifer?"

"They were ex-soldiers for the Galbadia army who worked under Sorceress Edea. They came here terrorizing people and saying that they knew that Seifer was hiding here. They threatened the mayor that if they didn't have Seifer's head by morning, they were going to start killing until they did. The mayor asked me that convince Seifer that this was his fault and he should hand himself over immediately, but I wasn't about to do that. In the middle of the night, I arranged for Seifer and his friends to escape by sailboat. Fortunately, President Loire got word, and sent some troops to arrest those men, but they were gone before the troops arrived."

"Do you know where Seifer is now?"

"Not a darn clue. My guess is some fishing village in a very remote area of the world."

"Well," said Quistis as she got up "thank you for that immense amount of information. Here." Quistis laid the malboro tentacle on the table. "I'm sure your information will help me find him faster." Quistis was about to leave, but Boss stopped her.

"Miss Trepe, if you care at all for Seifer, then please don't go looking for him. All he wants is to be left alone, and if you find him, you'll bring nothing but trouble. I know I didn't know him as long as you have, but that young man was like a son to me, and I would never do anything to hurt him. You seem like a caring person so please promise me that you'll leave him be."

The look on the old mans face was so very sincere that Quistis would hardly believe they were referring to the same person. She didn't want to hurt the old mans feelings, but duty came first.

"I' sorry, but I can't do that." She stated

"Then at least keep his best interest in mind when you do find him."

"I promise."