Final Fantasy - All Series Fan Fiction ❯ When Darkness Falls ❯ Chapter 14 ( Chapter 14 )

The two arrived at the sandwich shop in a matter of ten minutes. When inside they received stares and whispers from the other customers about their dirty appearance and awful smell, before they even reached the order counter. Most of the people looked at Terra's dirty, torn clothing, while the rest were looking at Zell's bloody exterior, wondering what had happened to him.

The woman behind the register kept back a smile seeing the two teens approaching and nearly laughed out the policy greeting. "May I take you..." She sucked her lips in to keep her laugh inside. "..order?"

Zell could clearly see the humor displayed on the woman's potato-face, and he wanted to leave right then and there to avoid the discomfort; however, Terra seemed fine with it so he tried to act as casually as she was. "Uumm..." The green haired girl placed a finger to her chin. "I can't decide." Turning to Zell she asked. "We're splitting it, so which do you want?"

'Geez, don't attract attention to me.' Zell had little inner panic attacks from the people starring at them, so he quickly blurted out an answer to get them out of there as quickly as he could. "Tuna."

Terra turns back to the woman. "Tuna it is then." Placing the money down on the counter the woman prepared her order and stuck the money in the register. "The total comes to Four dollars, fifty." Taking out fifty cents she handed it to Terra.

"Thank you." The girl said, pocketing the change. Once the sandwich was handed to them the woman asked with a knowing smile. "Will there be anything else?"

"No, that's it. Thank you." Terra said.

The two of them left the shop, with Zell moving as quickly as his legs would take him so that he wouldn't have to endure another ounce of humiliation from the customers inside.

"Here you go." She said once outside. She held a half out to Zell, who just looked at her in amazement. Terra shook it lightly in her hand indicating for him to take it.

"Doesn't it embarrass you to do that with everyone staring?" He asked and in response; Terra just shook her head.

"Should it?" She asked biting into her half of the sandwich.

Zell shrugged. To him, it was the epitome of embarrassment being stared at and judged. But, he could suppose that when you've been on the streets as long as she has it really doesn't bother one forever. "It matters to me..." he stated, mostly to himself. "I don't like people watching me try to act normal when I'm not... Not anymore anyway."

Sticking his half back into the bag, Terra shrugged. "I don't see it that way. So they have a place to live, so what. We do, too. It's just that we share it with a lot more people." Avoiding a pothole in the sidewalk, Terra walked backwards then around to Zell's right side. "Those people..." She continued speaking. "Are just laughing because they're uncomfortable seeing the truth. That's all. It isn't at you personally."

"It isn't?" Zell asked as though he were questioning himself for truth to the statement. Terra shook her head then raised the bag jingling it in front of Zell's face. "It's fresh."

Smiling, he let it register that she was right. He used to laugh at people in his current state, too! Even though he knew, deep down, it wasn't funny. It hurt to see, and he felt bad about it. But, he was sure to leave toys for tots donations and old clothes in donations boxes, well, they were out of season sometimes, but he still left it.

"Thanks, Terra." The hungry blond took the bag retrieving his half of the tuna sandwich. Unwrapping the paper, he hastily dug in.

"There you go." She pushed his shoulder with her free hand. The two of them walked back to the shelter, eating and talking as they went. The conversation consisted about anything that came to mind in life and about each other.

Soon night had fallen on the town. Zell heard the large door swing open. Cracking his eyes he saw the guy from earlier walking in with a flashlight; he went over to Clyde's bed and kicked his exposed foot with his own rousing him awake. Zell couldn't make out their faces too good in the dark. Clyde blinked sucking in some air before a smile lit his face. The dark haired guy with the flashlight held out a hand helping the once sleeping castaway to his feet, and then the two left with their arms around each other.

'...Wonder where they're going?' He questioned. Popping his head up, Zell looked over Terra'sshoulder to ses her turned away face to be sure she was asleep. Luckily her eyes are closed and she was sleeping heavily. 'I've gotta find out what they're up to.' Standing, Zell brushed his clothes downward to fix the sweat stuck lifted fabric, then he hurried out of the building.

Clyde and his dark haired friend were walking casually, so they weren't very far away for him to not see them from behind. 'Gotta keep up. Maybe I can watch them and figure out how this whole stealing thing works, then I can pay Terra back for lunch.' The sneaky blond wandered hastily through the small crowd of people seeing that the two castaways picked up their pace. He doesn't wanna lose them.

"Hey, Zack, where's Reno?" Clyde asked, while casually glancing at person after person that they were passing.

"The van, said he'd meet us there." Zack replied with a slight shrug, and there it was! Zell watched as Zack, as Clyde addressed him, made a simple hand gesture to everyone else. But, to the trained-eye he had slipped his hand into a woman's rather large pocketbook, taking the wallet from inside.

'Amazing!' The spy blinked. He really couldn't believe his eyes at how quickly that had happened! 'Maybe I could...?' He raised his arms up over his head pretending to yawn, then he brought them down quickly slapping a man in the face that had walked up beside him. "Ooops, I'm sorry." Zell said casually enough, his left hand shot out for jeans pocket but he was caught red-handed when his hand got stuck.

Seeing this the man looked down at Zell angrily. "You little thief!" The man called out, but no one seemed to care. Removing the intruder's hand from his pocket, the man shoved Zell with his free hand causing him to stumble backwards a bit but not to the ground. As he walked away the man shouted over his shoulder. "You're just lucky I don't call a cop."

Zell looked on confused by the man's actions, but he was happy that he didn't get in trouble yet again. Brushing of the assault, Dincht continued up the street after Clyde and Zack.

"Psh." A low voice scrutinized out of nowhere.

Up on the roof of a store, Squall sat perched looking down at the little blond's desperate attempts at stealing. Night after night he watched the teen, fascinated at how hopeless someone could be at one simple thing. Jumping down from the building, and frightening a few of the passersby below from his sudden action, the night stalker walked through the crowd of people to where the man Zell had just tried to rob was walking.

The man never saw Squall pass him or make a u-turn and come back by. He especially had not felt the hand gently slip into his pocket taking out a nice sized wallet. "Ahaha." Squall laughed at his triumph, shoving the wallet into his own jacket pocket. Now to find the littlest pick-pocket before he retired.

Making sure he was clear of viewers, Squall walked between two buildings and disappeared into the darkness. Zell kept his head lowered as he thought. 'Making gestures doesn't work so good for me.. maybe I could just try the whole bump into thing again - or do like thieves on t.v and just run by and snatch it?' Shaking his head he figured that wouldn't work out so great. His shoulder came into contact with another person, who said almost in a whisper.

"Excuse me."

"It's alright." Zell replied. The short blond walked a distance before he realized. "Oh shit, holly shit." There was a wallet in his hand! "I can't believe I did it!"

He beamed throwing his hands into the air. He felt like celebrating or ringing in the New Year... actually... He felt like hiding. This being the first time he'd ever gotten away with this and didn't receive a beating afterwards. He can party in privacy later, so dashing off behind a building he clutched the sweet victory in his hands opening it to count out the money.

"Thirty five, forty three, fifty o-..."

"Is that my wallet?" A quiet voice sounded next to him so suddenly Zell dropped the wallet and froze. Busted. The teen bent over picking it up, and he remained beside him as the speaker opened it exploring what was inside.

Zell could feel a sudden panic flushing over him and words began to spill from his mouth. "Listen, I'm sorry about taking your wallet and I know you probably have a family to feed and everything, but..."

"Looks like everything's in order, good thing you found it, eh?" The man said with a smile that didn't look friendly, more or less mischievous than anything. Zell didn't understand though, he was still holding the man's money in his hand, didn't he notice?

"I uh..." He started to say.

"My names Squall." The young man said simply.

Zell blinked, why did this guy look so familiar to him? Has he seen him before? Coming to his senses he replied in a stammer. "Z-Zell, ni-nice to meet you."

Squall nodded then started walking away. "Thank you, for finding my wallet, Zell." He said over his shoulder.

Zell just stood watching Squall's departure, half amazed and half frightened. But he couldn't place why his stomach knotted up seeing him, whoever he was. Or why he had so obviously given him all the money in his wallet, he just knew that he was thankful.

Rounding the corner to leave, a sharp, thin piece of metal appeared in his face. Looking along the arm of the weapon wielder, Zell saw a fiery redhead standing off at the side of the brickwall. He had distinctive scars slashed under each eye laying horizontally, a long slender body standing at maybe 5'9" and a pair of sunglasses pulled up into his hair.

"Your money," The redhead's husky voice started to say. "Or your life, kid."

Slumping his shoulders downward Zell sighed out, lowly. "Perfect."