fandomhighdorms | The Salle, Monday Morning

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The Salle, Monday Morning

It was a Monday.

It had been a normal weekend.

Arthur, ergo, was in the salle, practicing his staffwork for once. He did have a battle with Mat due tomorrow ~~which was going to be pushed towards next week due to a sudden case of the fox, SPOILERS~~ and it wouldn't do to show up in anything but perfect fighting shape.

He made for a few impressive sweeps through the air as he practiced, showing off for his (Merlin-y) audience as usual.

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Zack felt like perhaps he ought to still be in bed. In bed, and perhaps never getting out of bed again, because that would be absolutely productive, right? And that was why he was in the Salle today.

It made sense, by Zack-logic, if you squinted sideways at it.

He was... kinda moving slowly today, swinging his sword and going through the motions of something not unlike practise, but his head was completely not there, and so it took him all of five minutes before he just gave up entirely.

Nope. Not happening.

There really wasn't much to say that hadn't been said last night, but still. Zack looked like he needed another hug. Like an RDA thing.

So there was Zack, getting hugged again, hard. No words.

Dinah totally must have had a sixth sense for boys-in-need-of-hugs, because wow, Zack totally needed one just then, too.

And when that hug was through, he smiled at her a little. That had helped.

"Thanks," he said. "I think I needed that."

"Welcome." See, now there was a superpower to have! "Any time, you know."

"I don't think I'll ever turn down a hug," Zack replied, giving her a little nod. "Same goes right back, okay? If you ever need hugs?"

He was pretty good at them. And not just because he had biceps like tree trunks.

"Count on it." Dinah smiled wider at him. "And cookies!"

"Hugs and cookies," he agreed, trying on a little grin for size. "They're both important."

Yes, there was sloppy, and then there was 'upset knight trying to do himself in', and Arthur did know the difference, thanks. On a generic level, anyway. Not that Zack was trying to do himself in, but-- "Zack," he called, pausing his staffwork accordingly. "Slacking off?"

We never said it'd be a particularly sensitive noticing.

"I'm trying," Zack replied, barely glancing up as he lowered his sword, the end of the blade resting on the floor. "I'm trying."

Congratulations, Arthur. You've stumbled across Zack's 'impatient and defeated' mode. Which was... actually a weird combination, for Zack.

"For all the good trying does."

Arthur took a moment to secure his staff at the back of the salle before doing anything else. He'd seen knights break before, too, but Zack was in several ways a new entity. Nevermind.

"Yes," he said, and with no sarcasm in his voice, "I can see that."

My, but the floor was fascinating right now.

"What was that, that you said? I mean, when you had me running around, remember? And..." He shrugged. "We were talking about Angeal. And you mentioned something about how sometimes, it wasn't so easy to stick by what felt right."

It wasn't that Zack hadn't been paying attention in between bouts of relentless optimism. It was that normally, he was far better at looking as though he really was a relentless optimist.

Yes, that was the question of the month, wasn't it?

"There are any number of things that can complicate matters," he settled on, diplomatically. "The trick lies in... finding a way to do the right thing that involves them."

Zack nodded a little at that. Slowly. Thoughtfully. Tiredly.

"We found Angeal, the other day."

The expression on Arthur's face gave way to more concern. "He lives?"

"He..." Zack shrugged, lifting his sword and putting it on his back with none of the usual showing off. "Yeah. He's alive. We had a deserter a few months ago. He ran away to... I don't know. At least take the deserter's side into consideration. They were friends growing up."

Arthur really wished he couldn't sympathise right now.

Unfortunately, he really, really could. So he nodded, slowly. "I can understand that," he said. "Did he say anything else...?"

"Not much," Zack admitted, frowning more deeply. He shut his eyes and grit his teeth a little and tried his damnedest to get Angeal's mom out of his mind's eye. Dead on the floor. "The only time he really said anything was after I found him in his mom's house. Kinda... Standing..."

Over her body, Zack. You can say it.

"And. She wasn't. I mean. He."

This was hard.

"He was just looking at her body. She was fine not long before that. I'd been talking to her..."

"...You think he killed her?"

Arthur was never in a million years going to admit that hit anywhere close to home at all, no.

Zack was now forgetting that words existed at all. Words? Hard. Hard words.

Shrugging his shoulders seemed easier.

And nodding. Good old nodding.

"His friend killed both of his parents. Said that they'd betrayed him from the start. So..."

"So Angeal followed his example?"

Squishy feeling in the back of his throat, and no unbidden memories of seeing his father's dead visage in Shilo's father's tomb, thank you. He sucked in a breath. "You need to put down the sword and sit down."

Practicalities were always Arthur's strong point.

"Right. Sit down. No sword." Zack made certain that his sword was nice and secure on his back, and then he... Kinda looked around. And then shrugged. There was a bench over there, he'd just make his way over, and then plop his little tush down on it, and see? He was good at following direction. SOLDIER skills at their finest, and all.

He bit his lip, and then leaned back a little, until the back of his head made a light thump against the wall.

"I wish I knew what was going on anymore."

He did know. It was just easier to convince himself that somehow, he had it all wrong.

Arthur's feet walked up to the bench, good and sure and steady ("You and me both," he wanted to say, but it wasn't the time or the place, and considering that Zack was one of his people, thoroughly misplaced) and sank down next to him with a quick exhale of air that was so measuredly idle it took him some effort to modulate it that way.

He looked towards the salle. Silent, for a minute.

This was a mess.

"This friend of Angeal's," he started at last, "Has he joined him?" It seemed like a good enough point (what was going on) to start.

Zack gave his head a little shake, his eyes still up somewhere toward the ceiling.

"No," he said, after a few moments. "Genesis gave him the invite, I think. But Angeal... I don't know if he chose a side, so much. It was more like he chose neither side. He walked away."

Nice luxury.

Arthur just nodded. Chewed on his lip.

"No more training over the next few days," he said, after a moment. "You need some rest." Practicalities, again. "Who's your superior now?"

"That'd be Sephiroth, I guess," Zack replied, pursing his lips for a moment in thought. "I don't think there are any other 1st Class SOLDIERs left. And there's just a handful of 2nds. They'll probably start recruiting 3rds soon, to make up for the ones who went missing."

They weren't missing. They were wearing some other man's face.

Zack sighed and shut his eyes.

"This sucks."

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