A/N Yes, yes, I know. I've left this fic alone for almost a year now. I'm terribly ashamed of myself, believe me. But, thanks to college and it's atmosphere of procrastination, I am back! Mwahahaha!

So let me explain how this works again. This story has three endings. One of them, the Romantic Ending, is already up. Each ending picks up right after Ch. 11, and none of them has anything to do with the other two. So ignore the Romantic Ending for this one, and enjoy!

DISCLAIMER: All characters appearing in this chapter are owned by SquareSoft, not me. If I owned them, then Seymour would have a different name, preferably one not shared by a character from Little Shop of Horrors.

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"Lulu, chill. We didn't forget anything, alright?"

The black mage had been fidgeting since they boarded the ferry. She was currently staring into space with her brow furrowed, which she had been doing throughout dinner. At the sound of Rikku's voice, her eyes refocused and she returned her attention to the table.

"What?" she asked, still a bit out of it.

"I said, chill," Rikku repeated around a mouthful of chocolate mousse. The dessert was actually Lulu's; Rikku had snitched it over five minutes ago, and Lulu still had not noticed. "We didn't forget anything. We didn't have anything to forget, thanks to Auron. The only stuff we have to our names is our clothes and the soaps from the hotel. And we've got those, unless somebody forgot their pants back at the hotel."

Seymour arched one eyebrow at Rikku. "Why are you looking at me when you say this?"

"I'm not looking at you."

"Yes, you are."

"Are not."

"You are."

"Not."

"Are."

"Not!"

"Are!"

Rikku poked Seymour. "What, you think I like looking at you?"

"Please stop touching me."

"I'm not touching you."

"Are."

"Not."

"Are!"

"Not!"

Lulu groaned and massaged her temples with her fingertips. "I'm going to bed. If you must continue squabbling, please do so away from my room." She rose, her skirts rustling, and glided off.

"Well!" Rikku said brightly. "Looks like it's just us." She grinned and poked Seymour again. "Poke."

He twitched. "Stop that."

"Poke."

He jumped; she'd gotten him in the side that time, and it tickled. "I am warning you. Stop that."

Rikku raised her finger and slowly pressed it into Seymour's breastbone. "Poooooooooke."

Seymour grabbed her hand so as to remove the offending finger from his person. Rikku's breath momentarily quickened. He glanced down and saw that her eyes were wide and wistful. He arched an eyebrow. "What sort of face is that?"

"Huh? What're you talking about?" Rikku averted her gaze. "What face?"

"The face you made just now. You looked as though you were having an opium hallucination." He noticed that he still held her hand and released it. "And now you are blushing."

"I am not!" Rikku argued, but her blush deepened.

Seymour sighed. "You are bizarre." He pushed his chair back from the table and stood, brushing imaginary crumbs from his pants.

"You're leaving?" Rikku asked.

"Yes."

"Where are you going?"

"My room. Where else would I go?"

"To do what?"

He gave her a strange look. "Why are you asking so many questions?"

"I'm curious," she replied. "Haven't you noticed that by now? Answer the question."

"I am going to ponder my existence and write out my last confession," Seymour said.

"What are you going to write in it?"

What had gotten into her? It was as if she was trying to detain him. "I do not know," Seymour said. "That is where the pondering of my existence comes in. Now, if you will kindly let me have some peace in my last night of life—that is, in my last night of living death," he corrected himself, "I shall be on my way."

"Alright," Rikku said. "See ya later, I guess."

There was that face again: that odd wistful gaze. Rikku's eyes were so wide that Seymour could almost feel her stare burning into his back. He wondered again why she was acting so oddly—or rather, why she was acting oddly in a different way than she generally did. However, his mind wasted no time pondering Rikku's behavior. There were much more important matters at hand: foremost, his survival.

Seymour entered his room and locked the door behind him. He was going to be sent the minute he touched the sand on Besaid. Jumping overboard and swimming for it was not going to work. He needed a plan, and he needed it fast. Seymour had two traditional courses of action when faced with difficulty: force and guile. The first was not an option, what with Calhoun. That left the second.

He sat on the bed and rested his chin in one of his large hands. He needed a way to make Rikku leave Calhoun's controller unattended; or, better yet, remove the device for him. Now, what possible methods could he employ? There was always the easy course of sneaking into Rikku's room and taking the controller once she was asleep, but he decided to hold this plan in reserve in case he failed to think of something better. He immediately ruled out simplistic trickery. Rikku acted like a child, but she was crafty. He needed something deeper. Something believable. But what?

After an hour of fruitless brainstorming, Seymour was interrupted by a knock at the door. "Seymour? Are you up?"

Rikku. Seymour remained silent. Perhaps she would think he had fallen asleep.

"Duck if you don't have clothes on!"

Before Seymour had the chance to be confused by this command, there was the sound of a key turning in the lock. The door opened enough for a green-eyed glance into the room, then swung open in earnest to reveal Rikku.

"How did you get in?" Seymour demanded.

Rikku jingled the key ring. "I had a key. Duh."

"I know that," Seymour said impatiently. "I meant, why do you have a key?"

"Lulu gave one to me," she said. "She's got one, too."

This was news to Seymour. "Do you mean that everybody has a key to my room except for me?"

Rikku shrugged. "Looks that way. Are you… doing any important pondering at the moment?"

Seymour's first inclination was to say, "Yes. Leave my sight this instant, and perhaps I will be courteous enough to obliterate you quickly once I have regained my powers." But then he saw how very uncomfortable Rikku looked. In spite of himself, he felt concerned. Rikku had been something of a friend the past few days. Apparently enough of an attachment had formed that he cared about her wellbeing.

So, instead of sending her away, Seymour replied, "I am not in the midst of a breakthrough, unfortunately. Why are you here?"

"Well… if you're not busy…" She fiddled with the bands of her gloves. "Do you want to take a walk around the deck?"

What? Seymour blinked. "I suppose. Why?"

"There's, um, something I wanna talk to you about."

Seymour followed Rikku out of the room. The girl was acting awkward without a doubt. She fidgeted as much as Lulu had. She was unsteady when she spoke. She avoided eye contact; Seymour found this to be disconcerting, since he was used to Rikku staring him impertinently in the face. What could have her so discomfited?

They walked in silence along the railing. Seymour expected Rikku to say something; hadn't she said she wanted to talk to him about something? But minutes went by, and she remained silent. He used the silence to continue plotting. What if he—no, there was not enough time. Perhaps—no, someone would most certainly notice. Damn. He had plotter's block.

As he scowled in frustration, he felt a strange sensation on his right side. It was a strange mix of goose bumps, pins and needles, and the uneasy feeling a person gets when he thinks he is being watched. Seymour realized he had felt something similar earlier that night and glanced surreptitiously at Rikku. Sure enough, she was gazing at him wistfully again. He unconsciously shifted a few inches away from her. There was something about that wide-eyed look that he found extremely creepy.

"Seymour…?"

He did the polite thing and turned towards her, though now he had to look directly at what he had dubbed The Gaze. "Yes?"

"I… um…" Rikku looked at the deck. Seymour was thankful, as it meant he was no longer the target of The Gaze. "It's… well, over the past few days, we've had a lot of fun. At least, I think we had fun. Did you have fun?"

"It was… interesting." Seymour considered it. "Yes. Yes, I did."

"Really?" Rikku smiled at him, and The Gaze reappeared. "Oh, I'm so happy to hear you say that! And… well… I…" She bit her lower lip. "I think I've really started to like you."

"Thank you," Seymour said, wishing she would stop staring at him. Had she blinked at all during their conversation thus far? "You are not as intolerable as I expected."

"Thanks," Rikku said, blushing a little. "But that's not exactly what I meant. I meant that I like you."

Seymour nodded. "Yes, I understand."

"No. I mean, really like you."

"Okay…" Why did she feel the need to keep repeating this? He had understood the first time. He wasn't a simpleton, after all.

"Seymour!" Rikku stomped her foot, The Gaze giving way to her normal expression for a moment. "I love you!"

Seymour thanked Yevon that he was not chewing or drinking anything at the moment, or else he would have choked. He gaped at her for a moment. Perhaps he hadn't heard her correctly. "Excuse me?"

"I love you." Rikku resumed The Gaze and wrapped her arms around herself. "I thought I'd just gotten inverse Stockholm syndrome or something, but then I realized… I'm in love with you."

"In… love… with… me?" Seymour politely choked out through his tightly-clenched jaw.

Rikku nodded, The Gaze now more intense than ever. Seymour was now quite certain that she had not blinked at all. He'd been keeping track. Rikku shyly moved towards him and put her hands on his chest. "I am," she whispered. She clutched at the fabric of his shirt. "I don't want to lose you! I love you so much!"

The wheels in his brain, which had screeched to a momentary halt due to the shock of Rikku's confession, began turning again. She didn't want to lose him, hmm? Seymour almost laughed aloud with glee. He couldn't believe his luck! Rikku loved him. Love made people do stupid, stupid things. Tidus and Yuna were proof enough of that. Rikku would be no exception. She would free him to keep him safe. All Seymour had to do was play along. Now, how did one act sensitive?

"Rikku..." he murmured, his mind dredging up images of every romantic hero he could think of. Childhood exposure to Jyscal's soap operas would finally pay off. "I don't quite know what to say. I dreamed, but I never dared to hope that you would feel as I do…"

She looked up at him. "You feel the same way?" Her eyes were positively glistening. "Really?"

Seymour nodded in what he hoped was a solemn, brooding fashion. "I do. I swear it on my life." He was proud of himself for the cleverness of that last bit: he didn't have a life.

"Oh, Seymour!" Rikku squealed. "This is wonderful!"

Seymour frowned. "But what will your friends say?"

"They'll understand! I'm sure of it!" Rikku cried with great passion. "They have to understand the power of true love!"

"I am not so certain." Seymour steeled himself and looked soulfully (or at least that's what he was going for) into Rikku's dilated eyes. "They will need convincing."

"Then I'll convince them!" Rikku said fiercely. "We'll convince them! Nothing can stand in the way of our love!" The Gaze was now so intense that Seymour half expected something to combust behind him. She reached up and caressed Seymour's face. "We've only just found each other," she said in a choked voice. "I don't want anything to get in the way of our happiness."

Seymour suppressed a shudder. He had never been so disturbed. A hundred sticky situations, a thousand double entendres, a million Calhoun shocks—he would have taken all of that and more over this… this… He didn't even know what to call it. It was as though Rikku had become possessed by all that was wrong with romance. But he had to string her along. It was the only way to avoid permanent death.

"Nothing will stand in our way," he assured her, suppressing a gag reflex as he did so. He shook his head wearily. "I apologize, but I am very tired. I must rest and think about all of this."

"Oh, of course!" Rikku latched herself to Seymour's arm and attempted to snuggle. "I'll walk you back to your room."

Seymour's eyes widened in alarm. What if Rikku tried to stay the night with him? It was wrong. So very, very wrong. And statutory. And she was Yuna's cousin. The very notion of adult situations with Rikku made him nauseous. He made a conscious effort not to stiffen as they walked down the deck.

When they arrived at his doorway, Rikku put her arms around his neck. "Seymour, in case we don't have much time left to spend together on this earth—"

Dear Yevon, NO!

Seymour disentangled himself and dodged Rikku's puckered lips. "No, Rikku," he told her, trying desperately to think of a good reason why he wouldn't let her anywhere near him. "Never say that. Continue to hope. We will have time, and I want everything to be perfect."

Damn it, he had contradicted himself. A few minutes ago, he had been the doubtful one. He hoped her passion-addled mind didn't notice the discrepancy.

"Oh, Seymour!" she swooned. "You're such a Prince Charming! Alright, then. We will wait." She blew him a kiss. "Goodnight, my love!"

"Goodnight."

Seymour locked himself into his room as fast as he possibly could. He headed straight for the minibar. He didn't care what Lulu had threatened to do to anyone who took the minibar beverages; he needed a drink. He rummaged for the strongest thing he could find—unfortunately, none of Sir Auron's rand of sake was present—and drained it in one go. His head reeled rewardingly. This business of a lovesick Rikku was the worst thing yet. Disgusting. Frightening. Absolutely creepy. What was the matter with her? She was Rikku! Such ideas where supposed to make her wrinkle her nose and say "Ew!" The had come out of nowhere. She was not supposed to be clingy and swooning!

He undressed and pulled on his sleeveless robes. Well, he thought as he folded his clothes and put them neatly into a pile. It would all be over soon. He just needed her to remove Calhoun, which had to be tomorrow morning at latest. Then he would finally be free of her and this new torment. He fell back onto the bed and shut off the light, vowing to annihilate something large and heavily populated to reward himself.

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A/N And so ends the first installment of the Anti-Romance Ending. Its conclusion (which should be much more entertaining)is in the works. I apologize in advance to any romantics who may be offended by the lack of warm fuzziness contained in this ending.