“You misunderstand,” Nida corrected, looking back over his shoulder at Seifer. “I don’t care what you think of me. But I know what you used to think of me, and I know there is no changing Seifer Almasy’s mind once he’s made it up. Which means I don’t have to impress you with my composure for my age. I don’t have to be ‘adult enough’ in your eyes or seem surprisingly put together for a trained child soldier or anything else. Which in turn means I can just say what I’m thinking rather than whatever will get me the best results. Around you I don’t have to play SeeD.” There, happy? Wait, scratch that, Nida doesn’t care. And yet... and yet that fumbling at his wristdevice again.  Because he did care. Fuck him but he always cared about what people thought. He just knew, or thought he knew, that Seifer had already made up his mind. So wasting energy on proving that he wasn’t going to hurt Seifer, that he wanted to help, was just that. A waste.  “Besides,” he said with a dismissive sort of tone as if this was the only reason he had for acting. “If Leonhart hadn’t disappeared a few days ago, he would have expected me to play nice.”