Scenes from a parallel universe; FF8: Part 3
by KaiserVonAlmasy

[Balamb Garden’s cafeteria. As usual, it’s packed during lunch hour. Every table is loaded with as many people as can be seated, save one. Selphie sits alone, brooding, over her lunch. Nobody ever sits at her table. Nobody dares even ask her “is anyone sitting here?” or “if you’re not using this chair can we take it?” She prefers it that way.]

Selphie: Foolish vacuous cattle mindlessly devouring the slop their master dispenses to them in order to fatten them up for the proliferation of his own selfish designs. Only I have the second sight that sees all for what it truly is. I am cursed with my vision of the truth. But I shall not conform to the assembly line and leech myself for the betterment of the selfish human masters. I refuse to devour this “hot dog” which they dispense. I will remain unpolluted by their meaningless trinkets and instruments of conformity and control!

[Enter Seifer, opposite side of the cafeteria.]

Seifer: [ASIDE] Gosh, where did Selphie go? I have been trying to catch up to her ever since homeroom let out, but I lost track of her when she slipped into the crowd entering the cafeteria. This page of poetry must have a great deal of personal significance for her, and she is likely upset over losing it. I would bet she wants to find it...if gambling were not a sin, that is.

[Seifer scans the cafeteria with his eyes and sees the one table with only one person sitting at it. He immediately recognizes Selphie. She stands out in a crowd, after all. Seifer walks over to her.]

[Selphie glares at him coldly.]

Seifer: Hi.

Selphie: Die.

[Seifer hesitates for a brief moment, caught off guard momentarily by this reply. But he recovers and continues.]

Seifer: I’m not sure how to go about this, but...

Selphie: Then don’t. Go away.

Seifer: I’ve been trying to catch up with you, but you haven’t made that easy. It’s as if you’re making a conscious effort to avoid me.

Selphie: I am.

Seifer: You dropped this yesterday, when we bumped into each other. After you walked away I noticed this lying on the ground.

[Seifer hands her the page of poetry, which previously had been stored, neatly folded, in his shirt pocket.]

Seifer: I thought I should pick it up, because if someone else did they might pass it around or share it with their friends.

Selphie: [very sarcastic] Which you would never do, because you are selfless and noble and pure of mind.

Seifer: Also, I don’t really have any friends. People think I’m too weird and brainy, and so they avoid me.

Selphie: Liar! You are only pretending to be an outcast to impress me. It’s an insult. I hate you. Go away.

[She snatches the paper.]

Selphie: So, thief, what did you intend to do with this fragment of my soul before your fool mortal conscience enslaved you and dragged you on your abdomen to my domain to return it in shame?

Seifer: Thief?

Selphie: You stole it. I am a Kindred, I would never drop anything, we don’t make careless mistakes such as that. Therefore, you must have deliberately stolen it.

Seifer: It must have fallen out of your notebook. I honestly didn’t notice it was there until after you left. I’m sorry for carrying it around with me for a day and not returning it to you immediately, but I had no idea where you were going, and I was already late to class. So I decided to give it back the next time I saw you, but today you walked away again right away. So I had to follow you here. I hope that’s okay.

[Selphie sneers menacingly at Seifer.]

Seifer: I thought I should return it as soon as possible, because it seems like very deep and very personal stuff.

Selphie: [VERY angry] YOU READ IT?

Seifer: [defensive] Only once!

Selphie: How dare you gaze upon a shred of my ravaged soul? Foul wretch!

Seifer: I’m sorry. I know it was wrong of me to read without permission, but. I couldn’t help myself. I really wanted to see what was on your mind. I think you’re fascinating. I wanted to know more about you. I want to know more about you.

Selphie: Shut Up! Liar! You have no such interest!

Seifer: I thought it was really good. I wish I could write like that, but all my poems sound dry and empty and uninspired.

Selphie: That’s because you are one of the mindless automatons! You don’t feel any real emotion! You don’t know any real suffering! Not like me!

[She pauses. Her voice gets softer, and loses the edge it has had until now.]

Selphie: You don’t...really think these are any good, do you?

Seifer: I liked them. I’m not very knowledgeable about poetic forms and theory, but they evoked a feeling in me, and I liked feeling it. I felt a real sense of isolation and foreknowledge of one’s own fate, and being resigned to accepting it. I feel that way a lot. This garden...it’s like a prison term, to me. And all I can do is ride it out, and wait for graduation day, and then I can move on to the next phase of my life. Once that happens, everything that happened here won’t be very important anymore. I’ll be able to put all the uncomfortable moments behind me. Your poems reminded me of that.

Selphie: Really?

Seifer: It’s like they say what I just said, only in fewer words, and with more emotional strength behind them.

[Selphie, in spite of the imposing coat of pale makeup, blushes. And smiles. NOBODY her age has ever been this genuinely nice to her.]

[They each lean in towards each other a little.]

[They lean in towards each other a little more.]

[Suddenly Selphie backs away.]

Selphie: [upset] I…I know what you’re doing! You are trying to sabotage my artistic vision! You’re trying to disprove everything I know to be true! Stop it! Liar! I won’t tolerate your mockery!

[She gets up and leaves, trying her best to look angry and offended, but still emitting an aura of confusion and nervousness.]

[And she left the page of poetry on the table.]

[Exit Selphie.]

[Seifer sighs.]

Seifer: Why are you so afraid to open yourself up, Selphie? Are you afraid of rejection? Or have you internalized all the talk of others about you being different and inadequate and given up hope on ever being able to connect with someone else?

[Seifer picks up the page of poetry and tucks it into his shirt pocket again.]

Seifer: I can’t make you trust me. But I can do my best to show you that when you’re ready to put your faith in someone, I’ll be worth the risk. After all, you’re worth the wait.

[Enter the two jocks. They laugh constantly, they punch each other, they get in other people’s faces, they engage in all the typical activities of the lower primates save for actually throwing their own poo.]

Biggs: Ha! Almasy struck out with the loner chick!

Wedge: What a dork! He can’t even pick up that lonely, desperate chick! Ha!

[Seifer ignores them.]

[Exit Jocks.]

[Enter Irvine.]

Irvine: Ha! What did you do to her to make her so angry?

Seifer: She isn’t really angry. That’s just a persona she’s projecting to the world. She’s really just confused and nervous because she’s just so used to everybody treating her like an outcast instead of a regular human being.

Irvine: You’re wasting your time, you know. She hates everybody. Still, thanks for trying. I needed the laugh.

Seifer: Do you laugh at my attempt?

Irvine: Yes.

Seifer: Is that because you truly think it’s amusing, or are you just trying to relieve the tension you feel seeing someone in a position similar to you trying something you yourself long to try but never dare to, and take comfort in seeing my failure because it simply reinforces your own learned helplessness?

Irvine: Huh? You’re starting to sound like her.

Seifer: Let me put it this way. You’re basically a snitch, right? That’s what everyone labels you as?

Irvine: Shut up. Don’t call me that.

Seifer: But that’s not what you really are. You don’t really mean to alienate everyone from you. You’re actually a very nice person who just wants to be accepted by everybody else, but you’ve always felt rejected. You keep trying, but it comes out wrong, because your frustration increases every time somebody calls you a nerd, or a snitch, or a dork, or whatever. You actually admire and respect Squall more than you resent him. Your problem is not that he does what he does, but that you feel you can’t do what he does. This makes you feel inadequate, so you lash out, even at the people you most want to befriend.

Irvine: How do you know all this?

Seifer: I’m very philosophical. And spiritually attuned.

Irvine: [hopeful] Can you tell me how to get them to like me?

Seifer: No, for two reasons. First, I don’t have any friends either. I myself don’t have the answer to that question. For me to tell you how to make the people at Garden like you would be like the blind leading the blind. Second, this is the sort of problem we must all find the answers for on our own, because while the life experience of all human beings is basically the same, each of us varies slightly, and so our experiences are all unique. Simply put, I can’t answer that question because I am not you, and I don’t know what it’s like to be you. The only thing I can say is not to give up. Everybody finds these answers eventually. Some of us find the answers earlier than others. Some of us won’t find the answers we’re looking for until long after we’re out of this place. It’s the nature of the universe. We can’t make the rules, we can only learn them and learn to play by them as best we can.

[Pause.]

Seifer: Although not snitching on people all the time would probably be a good start. Most people don’t like that.

[Fade Out.]

SCENE 16: And Now, Because Scene 15 Was Much Too Philosophical…A Little Balance.

[At Laguna’s house. Kiros and Ward-Head, on the couch, dressed as before, watching TV. Ward-Head has the remote control.]

Ward-Head: [laughter] Uh, Hey Kiros! Seifer’s a dork. [laughter]

Kiros: Yeah. [laughter]

[Ward-Head laughs.]

[Kiros laughs.]

[Ward-Head laughs some more.]

[Now Kiros laughs some more.]

Ward-Head: [laughter] Selphie’s a poet. [laughter] Uh, do you think she has a “mechanical pencil” Kiros? [laughter]

[Both Kiros and Ward-Head laugh very loudly and beyond all control, seemingly at a very inside joke.]

Kiros: Hey Ward-Head. I have a mechanical pencil.

[Kiros continues to laugh. Ward-Head looks puzzled.

Ward-Head: Uh, Kiros... [laughter] ...I bet you do have a “mechanical pencil.” [loud laughter]

Kiros: Yeah. [laughter]

Ward-Hard: [laughter] So, uh, do you use your “mechanical pencil” when you’re with other girls, Kiros? [very loud laughter]

[Now Kiros gets it. He’s angry.]

Kiros: Shut up bunghole! I’ll kick your ass!

[They begin to tussle violently on the couch.]

[Fade Out.]

SCENE 17: I Have A Cunning Plan...

[Still in the Garden Cafeteria. Quistis, Zell, and Rinoa seated at their table.]

Quistis: Oh, my, gawd, did you guys see that? [high pitched tittering laughter] That Seifer is such a loser! He struck out sooo bad just now.

Zell: Of course, if he keeps failing so badly, he’ll end up with you at the dance.

Quistis: Like, do NOT remind me of that? Oh, my, gawd, that bet was sooo totally stupid.

Rinoa: It’s never smart to set yourself up to be even more indebted to the system. But Selphie doesn’t seem to want to go with anybody, so you might still luck out.

[Rinoa’s face quickly becomes bloated. Her eyes widen and she begins banging frantically on the table with her wrists.]

Rinoa: [mumbles something incoherently]

Zell: [concerned] What’s going on?

Quistis: Oh, it’s, like, her allergy. She’s like, allergic to something in the Perrier Water. Her pills are in her purse.

Zell: Oh.

Quistis: Like, hurry! She has trouble breathing!

[Rinoa pounds on the table some more and points to her purse with her other hand. Zell grabs her purse and begins fumbling around in it, looking for her allergy medicine.]

Quistis: I guess I shouldn’t, like, keep buying her Perrier Water. But, like, you know, she shouldn’t just drink anything. I mean, hello! Image!

[Zell finds the medicine, puts it to Rinoa’s mouth – now compressed to a small opening on account of the swelling in her cheeks and neck – and presses the button, and the anti-allergy medicine forces its way into Rinoa’s system with a rush.]

Zell: You okay?

[Rinoa’s swelling gradually goes down.]

Rinoa: You’re a lifesaver, Zell.

Zell: [blushes] Eh, yeah, I guess.

Quistis: Anyway, like, back to me. If Selphie doesn’t go with anybody, that means than she won’t go with Squall, then...then I would, like, still win the bet. But, there’s like, totally too much on the line. Oh, my, gawd! Can you just imagine what it would be like if I had to be seen at the dance with Seifer? I mean, hello! My life would be like sooo over. I, like, cannot take that chance you guys. You guys have to help me. I know he is like such a total dweeb, but if you guys could, like, give Seifer some help, and like, some tips, we could fix him up with Captain Gloom!

Zell: That wouldn’t be fair, would it?

Quistis: Like, so what?

Rinoa: Well, nobody actually specifically said we couldn’t when the bet was made.

Quistis: Right! So, like, you can do it. Will you? You guys could, like, work together.

[Quistis winks subtly at Zell.]

Zell: [enthusiastic] Yeah, let’s do it! Good idea, Quis.

Quistis: Thank you. Like, I know. I am sooo smart. But not in a nerdy way! You know, like, in a cool way?

Rinoa: Actually, I really should talk to her anyway. I’m afraid she’s allowed the corrupt capitalist society to dictate its corrupt sense of worth to her, and since she of course can’t live up to it – nobody can – she just assumes she can’t belong. Damn bourgeois.

[Exit Zell and Rinoa. Fade Out.]

SCENE 18: Help! I Need Somebody (Not Just Anybody).

[Nida and Xu are still in the library. Nida has finally grabbed the book on top without accidentally making embarrassing intimate contact with Xu’s hand and has begun to read. Xu has her head buried in another book. Since it’s a library, they’re whispering.]

Xu: I can’t find anything in here on how to do the equations.

Nida: I can’t find anything in here, either.

[Awkward pause, both too shy to look up from their book.]

[Silence.]

Xu: This project is hard.

Nida: Yeah.

[Long silence.]

Nida: It’s really difficult.

Xu: Yeah.

[Another long silence.]

[Enter Ellone. She makes a direct line for Nida and Xu. She’s also whispering.]

Ellone: Hi.

Xu: Hi.

Nida: Hi.

[Ellone sits down at the table, with an expectant look on her face.]

[Silence.]

Xu: Um, do you know anything about organic chemistry?

Ellone: I know a little.

[Silence.]

Nida: Do you think you could…give us a little help?

Ellone: Most of what I know about organic chemistry I got from Learn Organic Chemistry The Easy Way. It’s a great book.

Xu: Thanks.

[Silence.]

Nida: Do you have it with you? Could we...look at it?

[Ellone reaches into her backpack and, of course, pulls out a copy of Learn Organic Chemistry The Easy Way. She holds it out. Nida and Xu both grab for it, and accidentally touch hands. Again.]

Xu: Sorry!

Nida: Sorry!

[Ellone sets the book on the table, gets up, and leaves. In the background, Xu and Nida both reach for the new book simultaneously, again, and touch, again, and apologize, again. Ellone watches them, and smiles.]

[Enter Irvine. He’s also whispering.]

Irvine: Shame on you!

Ellone: What?

Irvine: You’re helping them cheat.

Ellone: What makes you say that?

Irvine: Loaning them that book. You’re not helping them learn anything. You’re just giving them the answers and telling them where to look. That’s wrong.

Ellone: Why is it wrong?

Irvine: Because it’s cheating. You’re not part of their group. They should do it on their own. Without you and your books.

Ellone: But won’t they have to find the answers in a book? A book written by someone else? Wouldn’t that be getting help from someone else, as well?

Irvine: No.

Ellone: Why?

Irvine: Because...uh...because...that’s different. That’s research.

Ellone: But what is research but taking other people’s answers and using them yourself?

Irvine: Research is an important skill for finding information.

Ellone: Yes, it is. But so is asking other people for help, is it not?

Irvine: ...I guess so.

[Irvine hesitates.]

Irvine: But nobody ever helps me. I have to do these things by myself. So should they.

Ellone: But you’re very smart, right?

Irvine: Yeah.

Ellone: And you are already acing the organic chemistry class, right?

Irvine: Yeah.

Ellone: So do you really need someone to help you with organic chemistry?

Irvine: No. But...

Ellone: But there are some things you do need help with, right?

Irvine: Yeah.

Ellone: And do you ask people for help with that?

Irvine: No. But nobody would ever help me. Everybody dislikes me.

Ellone: Everybody?

Irvine: Well, everybody I’ve talked to.

Ellone: And have you talked to everybody? Have you asked everybody? Have you asked anybody?

[Silence.]

Irvine: Well, no.

Ellone: So, can you really be sure that everybody hates you and nobody would help you?

[Irvine begins to ponder this idea.]

[Fade Out.]

SCENE 19: Two Guys, A Girl, and a Shakespeare Play [No Pizza Place, Unfortunately]

[Squall has digested (in a literary sense) The Taming of the Shrew and now is once again brimming with confidence in his advanced player skills. Waving the book demonstratively, he brags to Fujin and Raijin.]

Squall: I think I be trippin’ for saying this, but, maybe I ain’t gonna need my beats to win this bet. Yo, check this! P-Dawg be doing the same thing I be trying to do, yo!

Raijin: P-Dawg?

Fujin: Who?

Squall: Petruchio. P-Dawg. He be this player in this play, right? And he trying to get his mack on with this honey that don’t want to go with no dudes. But by the end, he gets that hook-up. That be me, dawgs! I be trying to get my mack on with Selphie, but she be a crazy foo with her vampire goth thang, and not wanting to hook up with nobody. It’s the same song, foo! I just gotsta do what P-Dawg do!

[The Voice of Head Matron Edea breaks over the loudspeaker, only it sounds different from before. Approximately 75% more demonic and multi-toned.]

Edea: Squall Leonhart, please report to The Headmaster’s Office Immediately. Squall Leonhart, please report to The Headmaster’s Office Immediately. And bring your soul, so that we can devour it.

Squall: What? My soul? She trippin’!

Fujin: Huh?

Squall: Didn’t you hear that? Some wack ass thing about eating my soul?

Raijin: I thought that was fairly standard talk for authority figures?

Squall: [laughs] Oh I HEARD that!

[Exit Squall.]

Raijin: Actually, she did sound kinda weird. Don’t you think so?

[Fujin looks to her left, then to her right. Nobody but Raijin is in earshot.]

Fujin: Normal human voices just don’t sound like that. I think she might be possessed again.

Raijin: You think so?

[Two random students walk by, together. Fujin notices them out of the corner of her eye.]

Fujin: Probably.

[Exit students.]

Raijin: Maybe we shouldn’t have let him go in there alone. I mean, if Edea is in the control of demonic forces.

Fujin: Eh, better him than us.

[Fade Out.]

SCENE 20: Clash of the Rhetoric

[Selphie is on the south side of the quad, leaning against a cold, dull, gray mass of rock. It’s not actually a tombstone, but it’s the best she can manage at school.]

Selphie: Why does he have to tease me like this? What dark and perverse joy does he derive from pretending to like my poetry? I know he’s not really a fan. Nobody is. None of these foolish mortals can ever possibly have the mental acumen to understand my complex emotions.

[Enter Zell and Rinoa.]

Zell: Hi. Selphie, isn’t it?

[Selphie, still looking the other way, sneers.]

Selphie: Go away. I am not in the mood for any of your infantile gamesmanship.

Rinoa: [Aside to Zell.] Just leave this to me. [Exit Zell. Rinoa turns back to Selphie] Could I talk to you for a minute? Sister to Sister?

Selphie: You’re not my sister.

Rinoa: We are all sisters. You, me, everyone in our social class.

[Suddenly, Selphie angrily stomps down with her boot very close to Rinoa’s leg.]

Rinoa: What are you doing?

[Selphie, demonstrating unexpected flexibility for someone who claims to be undead, lifts the sole of her boot far up off the ground, near Rinoa’s eye level, revealing the squished remains of a baby Malboro, one of the most lethally poisonous creatures known to this world.]

Rinoa: Oh my God...

[Selphie lowers her foot.]

Selphie: [mildly irritated] You’re welcome.

Rinoa: I didn’t even notice that thing! Thank you SO much, Selphie, you just saved my life!

Selphie: Hmmph. Very well. Since you are suitably grateful... 60 seconds, no more.

[Rinoa smiles.]

Rinoa: That Seifer guy really seems to like you.

Selphie: You don’t know anything. He is obviously perpetuating a fraud only to make fun of me. Nobody ever understands my kind, and hence we are ridiculed and made outcast. He doesn’t really like me.

Rinoa: Ah, you see, that’s what THEY want you to think.

Selphie: They?

Rinoa: The power-elite that profit from the insecurity and fear they foster in the populace via their advertising campaigns for their products that nobody needs. They want you to feel insecure and different and lonely so that you’ll be more likely to think “gee, maybe if I buy this product, people will start liking me just like in the commercial.” The problem is, those people in the commercial aren’t real.

Selphie: They are worthless posers.

Rinoa: No, they’re not even real people, they’re just computer graphics. They’re the representation of a warped ideal, an unattainable standard of what it means to be attractively feminine, or masculine. The whole point is to get you to think that you don’t belong and that only through their brand-name indoctrination that you can belong, and that you are a worthless outsider unless you belong.

Selphie: I am an outsider. But I’m proud of it. I am not like any of you mortals. I am outside your society. I am one of the ancient Kindred. But I can’t expect someone like you to understand what it is like to be one of us...

Rinoa: No, no! You’re exactly like us! They WANT you to think you’re different and alone. They want everybody to think that, because if everybody feels alone and isolate, they will never unite and rise up and overthrow the corrupt bourgeois! The truth is we’re all sisters and brothers. We are all facing the same struggle, and the sooner we all realize it and come together and unite against our mutual oppressors...

Selphie: What’s your point?

Rinoa: My point is that right now, you’re playing by the power-elite’s rules. And I know you’re smarter than that. Also, I think that Seifer genuinely likes you. “They” would say to not give him a chance, because you do not conform to their ideal and hence nobody could possibly like you. But you’re too smart to be suckered by their gamesmanship, right?

Selphie: What’s your ulterior motive, Rinoa?

Rinoa: I don’t have an ulterior motive. I’m just trying to do my part.

Selphie: Why suddenly now, and not before? Doesn’t this have something to do with your... [snide tone] sister... Quistis?

Rinoa: She didn’t put me up to this at all.

Selphie: Oh really? Her little bet has nothing to do with this, I’m sure.

[Rinoa can’t reply.]

Selphie: Listen well, mortal. I am nobody’s pawn, and I will not be moved around and sacrificed at anyone else’s whim. Not hers. Not Seifer’s. Not this “Bourgeois” you speak of. And not yours.

Rinoa: Exactly. You shouldn’t be used or exploited by anybody. That’s what I’m trying to help you avoid! They’re taking advantage of people like you. You don’t conform to their status quo, so they try to cast you as a scapegoat group and keep all of us divided and fighting amongst ourselves instead of contributing to the great struggle against them!

Selphie: If only your high ideals were your real motivation.

[Exit Selphie.]

[Re-Enter Zell.]

Zell: How did it go?

Rinoa: It went awful. They’ve really gotten to her. Undermined her ability to trust her class allies. I couldn’t make a dent.

Zell: Oh.

Rinoa: She thought Quistis put me up to it, and because of that she wouldn’t listen to anything I said. Which is a shame, because I really think she needs to hear what I had to say.

Zell: Yeah...um...

Rinoa: Yes?

[Zell tries to look Rinoa in the eyes, but can’t quite summon the nerve.]

Zell: ...I thought what you said sounded really smart. I never thought about things like that before.

[Pause.]

Zell: Could I join your revolution? I mean, these Bourgeois sound like real bastards.

Rinoa: They are.

[Silence.]

Rinoa: Is there anything else you wanted to ask me?

Zell: Actually...

[Rinoa looks Zell in the eye, and steps closer.]

Zell: Actually...Yeah. I just thought it’d be cool if I could, like, help out.

Rinoa: Oh. Sure! Yes. Thanks.

Zell: You’re welcome. [Aside to audience] ARRRRGH! What happened to me? I just couldn’t...I just didn’t have the guts...this never happens to me on the field! Why now?

[Fade Out.]

Part 4