(Disclaimer: I don't own these characters, or the universe they inhabit. I'm just taking them for a spin.)

"Huh?" Something's missing... "Why are there no chairs in here?"

Selphie's question was a reasonable one; meeting rooms did normally come equipped with chairs. The table was there alright, in truth it would be a struggle to move it, but the chairs normally placed around it had vanished. A puzzled Quistis followed Selphie into the room; "That's strange... There were chairs last time I came in here." Selphie looked back toward Quistis, asking; "How long ago was that?" It would have been after we got back to Balamb, around the time we were assessing the geological impact of the missile strike, so... "About four days ago", she replied. Passing through the doorway, Squall had also noted the lack of chairs. Rather than waste time pondering the mystery of where they'd disappeared to, he offered up a simple, terse solution; "Let's just stand."

The rest of the ensemble shuffled into the chairless meeting room and fanned out around the large table in the centre. The call had gone out over the intercom five minutes previously, with Nida instructing them all to meet the Commander on the third floor atrium. Squall hadn't said anything so far as to the reason why he'd called them all together, they'd just waited for everyone to arrive by the third floor elevator, and when they were all present Squall had directed them into the meeting room. With everyone inside, Squall took the spot nearest the door. Working clockwise around the conference table, he was joined by Rinoa, Selphie, Irvine, Zell and Quistis. He closed the door behind him and turned around to face the group. He cleared his throat and the atmosphere in the room tensed slightly as Squall went into official mode.

Looking around the room, he quickly assessed the initial mood of his friends. Not detecting anything of immediate concern, he began; "I need to update you on our current situation." It was going to be one of those meetings. Most of them had been expecting it to come sooner or later. They'd had a few well-earned days of rest since completing their epic adventure, but deep down they all instinctively understood it wasn't going to last. "You know that on Wednesday we moved the garden from the harbour back onto its foundations and powered down the primary turbines." A few nods of recognition indicated that they were following so far. "Quistis instructed the maintenance crew to assess the state of things down there." He looked over at his colleague; "You probably have the most recent info on this, so I'll let you take it from here." With a slight movement of the hand, he ceded the spotlight to her.

After a quick glance at her clipboard, Quistis began relaying what she'd learned earlier that morning to the assembled group; "Yesterday the maintenance crew began a complete inspection of all the plant in the MD level. A few Funguars had made themselves at home, but they've been removed and it's all clear down there now." Quistis' eyes scanned from left to right behind her oval-shaped spectacles as she read the differing levels of interest on her friends faces. They weren't exactly hanging on her every word, but nobody looked excruciatingly bored either. "We've also drained the oil sump. You'll be pleased to know that whatever those huge grey things were you encountered last time, they were the only ones down there. There's no risk of running into any more of them as long as we keep the plant in good condition."

Squall frowned, recalling his last trip down to the MD levels and the creatures Quistis alluded to. "Oilboyles" he interjected, his tone flat and matter-of-fact. Quistis looked over at him quizzically, prompting Squall to clarify; "The grey things." She hadn't seen the creatures first hand. After their escape from the D-District Prison, Quistis been part of the missile base infiltration team alongside Selphie and Irvine. It was Squall, Zell and Rinoa who'd battled their way down to the bottom of the Garden's subterranean structure in an effort to try and find something… anything… that would protect them from the shower of incoming guided missiles. They'd encountered and defeated the freakish, tentacled grey monsters along the way.

Rinoa shuddered slightly as she remembered being attacked by the grotesque, slimy creatures. "I'm glad to hear it's clear down there" she said, pausing to swallow. "I don't want to see another one of those things as long as I live. They creep me out." Zell had also been reliving the encounter in his mind, adding; "Dangerous too… Nasty fuckers." Quistis tried to get the meeting back on track; "We think they must have gotten in via one of the old pipes from the surrounding substrate, but they've all been sealed up now. As long as the MD levels are inspected regularly, say… once a month… we shouldn't have that problem again." She looked down at her clipboard, trying to pick up from where she'd left off.

"Anyway… as for the condition of the plant itself… while the engineers in FH did a good job patching us up, some of the work they did was a temporary fix to get us up and running, instead of a full and complete repair. The initial advice I'm getting from the crew is that we'll need to ground the garden for a while in order to overhaul it properly." Losing the Garden's ability to move, at least on a temporary basis, was an important point they needed to understand. Quistis paused for a second to let that information sink in.

Ever mechanically minded, Zell's thoughts had strayed from the Oilboyle encounter to the machinery he'd seen down in the MD levels. He couldn't in all honesty say he understood how it worked, but it had left an impression on him. He reflected on how fortunate they'd been to actually get it working; "It ain't a surprise that we gotta overhaul the Garden. We didn't know this thing could fly until the missiles came straight at us... and the gear down there hadn't been looked at in decades. We were real lucky that whoever sealed the lower levels mothballed everything before they abandoned it."

Quistis nodded at Zell's observation. They had been lucky. She continued; "Our crew also need time to get familiar with the plant down there. They had some basic guidance from the FH guys but we're a long way from having a full and complete understanding of how the garden flies. The crew intend to document everything as they go." Her report completed, she glanced at Squall, urging him to continue. Picking up where Quistis finished, Squall spelled out what that meant for the group; "The Garden needs to stay where it is for a while. There's no longer any direct threat, so I don't think we'll need to be airborne again in the near future. I'm hoping we can let the team get on with the overhaul uninterrupted... but there's always a chance we'll need to move the Garden. With that in mind, I've told them that they need to be able to have us back in a flight-ready state with no more than twenty four hours notice."

Selphie raised her hand to ask a question."What about the other gardens? Do we know what's happening with them?" He'd anticipated that question, although there wasn't a nice answer to it. Whichever way you looked at it, their situation wasn't great. He inhaled deeply, then answered; "Galbadia Garden is immobile and badly damaged at the bottom of Centra. It's being repaired, but it'll be a month at least before it's capable of moving. Even then, there's no guarantee that it'll be welcomed back into Galbadian territory with open arms… particularly if the Galbadian government knows about SeeD's agreement to help the Timber resistance. As we can't spare any of our own personnel to help their recovery effort, I've requested a team of engineers from FH be sent down to Centra to assist with speeding up the repairs. I'm still waiting for a response on that from Mayor Dobe. It's unlikely that he'll reply… and if he does, I expect he'll refuse."

Sensing Selphie's interest lay in where he was going next, he paused to think of how best to approach it. "Trabia Garden is in a bad state, we've all seen it first hand. The remaining staff at Trabia Garden are overseeing an assessment of whether or not the core of the site can be repaired, or whether we'd have to rebuild the whole Garden from scratch. The fact that Trabia Garden wasn't airborne when it was struck means there's a better chance of it being repairable... but if it's not, that's a major problem. As Quistis mentioned a minute ago, we still don't fully understand the Centran technology at the heart of the Gardens' propulsion system, so building a brand new garden that's capable of flight is beyond us right now. We should know the results of the Trabia assessment in a couple of weeks time."

Squall continued, trying to make it clear what all this meant in practical terms; "The other two Gardens being out of action means that Balamb Garden is our only operational unit. With that in mind, I've ordered all SeeDs not on active duty, all displaced students and staff to report here for reassignment unless they're repairing the other Gardens." There were two people in the room directly affected by that decision and Squall intended to leave them in no doubt of the fact. "Selphie… Irvine…" They both looked at Squall. "...that includes both of you. Your official base of operation is now Balamb Garden." They nodded in understanding towards Squall, then slyly looked at each other, both wearing a faint smile. That didn't escape Squall's attention. Okay… he thought. Something's going on there...

Irvine hadn't made any secret of his attraction to Selphie. Squall and the others were well aware of that. He was pretty certain Selphie was aware of it too. He caught himself thinking; She must know… mustn't she...? She can't have that much of a blind spot... Underneath all the pathological flirting, Irvine had at times acted like a lovesick puppy, hovering over Selphie's shoulder in Ragnarok's cockpit and following her around Balamb Garden wherever she went. The further thought occurred to Squall that if Selphie had grown tired of Irvine's near-constant affections, she'd have a pretty compelling case for harassment... one that would likely keep the Garden's HR staff busy for months. Weighing it up, at some instinctive level he didn't think their association was likely to end up as a saga of legal paperwork. Running back over the duration of their long adventure in his mind, Squall could recall a couple of moments that suggested Selphie might feel something for Irvine. Nothing conclusive, just little signs here and there, the odd sentence or remark that offered a rare glimpse into Selphie's inner psyche. For someone normally so talkative and open, her own romantic feelings were the one thing she found very difficult to discuss; and Squall definitely wasn't the type to go prying into other people's relationships. He'd been more than happy to let them work it out for themselves.

If Selphie did feel the same way about Irvine, something had held her back from letting things go any further - or at least it had looked that way for the last month or so. Over the past week however, things seemed to be subtly changing. The clearest sign that something might have developed between them came at the spontaneous party the Garden had thrown after the defeat of Ultimecia, where a slightly tipsy Selphie had worn Irvine's cowboy hat for most of the evening and had gotten visibly annoyed whenever his flirtatious tendencies were focused on anyone but her. Squall wondered if things had moved on in the five days since that celebration while they were returning from Fisherman's Horizon to Balamb. If that was the case, well, despite his inherent preference to stay out of it, he'd have to get confirmation one way or the other. His decision-making capabilities as squad leader relied on knowing a certain amount about the individuals under his command, including how they got on with each other… or not. If the two of them were in a romantic relationship, that could influence things considerably.

As it happened, there was something else Squall had meant to speak to Irvine about in private when they were done here… if they were ever done here… He made a mental note to also bring up the subject of Selphie as carefully as he could after this meeting had finished. Nevertheless, that would have to wait. There was still a lot to discuss. Returning to the topic at hand, Squall continued; "We're expecting an extra fifty people to make their way here, but the guest quarters on campus can only cope with about twenty maximum. I'm planning to put the people we can't fit on campus in the Balamb Hotel. I've already spoken to the manager and secured a block booking for most of their rooms. Irvine… it'll be a few days until people start arriving, so you get a choice of one of the guest rooms in the Garden or a hotel room in town." Irvine smiled, then replied; "Here's good." Squall nodded; "OK. Go and see the quartermaster at some point today and ask him to allocate a room for you."

Irvine's digs dealt with for the time being, he addressed the group once again; "I also need to tell you about the situation in Galbadia. At the moment, we don't really know who's in charge of the country. With Deling dead, there's a vacuum left by the departure of both Edea and Seifer. The few contacts we have left in Deling City tell us that the army and the civil service are struggling to get the upper hand… and the army aren't as strong or as popular as they used to be. The fact they allowed the country to be usurped, first by a sorceress, then by Seifer, has weakened them and decreased their public support significantly. Observers on the ground tell us that there's a noticeable increase in the number of deserters. Even so, it's still too early to think that we're about to see the end of the military dictatorship there."

Squall's fingers tensed slightly as he drew closer to the primary reason he'd called everyone together; "In Timber… things aren't so chaotic, but the volatile situation in Galbadia proper has the occupying forces nervous and tetchy. And that matters because the three of us…" Squall's finger drew an invisible triangle in the air between Zell, Selphie and himself. "...are still under contract with the Forest Owls." That fact had been gnawing away at both Zell and Selphie in the back of their respective minds and, until now, they'd not had a chance to discuss it. Gesturing towards Rinoa, Squall added; "We talked about this last night… We both want to go back to Timber and complete the mission."

Rinoa looked at Squall to her right, then back at the rest of the group, intending to lay out her reasons; "I can't just forget about the Owls… about Timber… Life under Galbadian occupation there is intolerable. Everyone knows someone who's lost someone at the hands of the G-Army. I went to Timber and joined the Owls to try and help free the country. I can't just abandon it. The hope of independence is all some people have to cling to... it's the only thing that stops them giving up completely. I can't sit here, safe and comfortable on the other side of the ocean, knowing that the people I promised to try and help are still suffering." It was clear to everyone in the room how deeply she felt, and a few of them nodded gently in acknowledgement of Rinoa's resolve. Her explanation concluded, she looked at Squall, leaving a gap in the discussion for him to clarify his motivations, if he wanted to.

Squall was going to find this hard to talk about openly, but he pressed on, feeling he owed his friends in the room at least some kind of insight into his thinking; "Obviously…" he started, "...I'm not gonna let Rinoa walk back into danger alone." He was pretty sure that they'd all worked that out at least. He looked at his feet awkwardly, and cautiously continued; "... and… I don't want that contract hanging over my head for the rest of my life either… gnawing away at me that I'd gone back on my word… like I had the chance to do something that might make the world a better place and I just walked away from it." He looked up from his shoes as Rinoa softly squeezed his left arm, and alternated his gaze between his fellow SeeDs; "All that training we went through, all the battles we fought just to make sure that the world continued to exist… I dunno… I guess I don't want things to just carry on being as shit as they always were before we went through all that stuff. Somehow, it feels like it's not good enough."

Looks of surprise abounded as the others in the room didn't really know what to make of Squall's comments. He wasn't in the habit of philosophising, and on the rare occasions he'd been pressed on this kind of thing in the past, Squall had expressed something approaching a detached, cynical nihilism; scoffing for example at the notion that their enemies could or should be considered evil. If the view he'd expressed just now was sincerely held by their Commander… and it very much sounded like it was… then he'd acquired a markedly different perspective on his role as a SeeD in relation to the world around him over the course of their recent adventures.

Squall looked at Zell, then at Selphie. "If you guys don't want to come with us, you need say so now... before we go any further." Selphie's face scrunched into a frown as she barked her answer firmly back at Squall; "SeeDs don't quit!" Pumped up by Selphie's enthusiasm, Zell mashed his gloved fist into his palm, following with; "Damn right! We have to go back and finish what we started." Squall nodded, before turning his attention to his two remaining colleagues in the room. "Quistis… Irvine…" He paused for a second, thinking how best to approach this. "I have no right to order you to be part of this operation..." He took another deep breath. "... so I'm not going to." They both looked a little perplexed at that. Doesn't he want us on the team? Quistis found herself thinking, feeling more than a little hurt at the possibility. Squall was finding this difficult, but he ploughed on, finishing his pitch; "But… I am going to ask you to come with us… because... I think we'll need your help." He awkwardly shifted his weight from one foot to the other and rested his hand on his hip, concluding; "It's your choice."

Quistis was the first to reply, and she did so with conviction, her voice cracking slightly as strong emotions churned beneath the surface; "Of course I'll help Squall. I'm just as mixed up in this as the three of you. It was my fault that Seifer took off in a rage and ended up wrecking the original operation in Timber. It was me that everyone saw on TV trying to talk him out of what he was doing. I have to try and put that right." Squall frowned at the mention of Seifer, and sought to reassure his colleague; "That wasn't your fault and you shouldn't blame yourself for that. Seifer is the one who has to answer for his actions... not you." A hot bolt of anger shot through Squall's mind …and if I ever catch up with him, fucking hell is he gonna answer for them. Squall shook himself mentally. Not gonna waste another second thinking about that arrogant dickhead… Refocusing, he turned his attention towards Irvine, who'd been waiting his turn to speak. "There's no way I'm gonna let you guys walk into enemy territory without yours truly" Irvine said in a determined tone. "I'm coming too... don't even think about leavin' me behind."

"You're both in?" Squall asked. They nodded. The sweet relief spread through Squall's body as a wave of hot endorphins. He wasn't prepared to say it out loud, but he didn't want to attempt this without them. In recent days Squall had reflected on the fact that the gang of six, working together, had grown into a tight-knit team. Breaking that team up now would make their task in Timber much, much harder. He also didn't want to prejudice their decision - if they were going to come to Timber, it had to be their choice, not because they felt any sense of duty towards him or the office of Commander that weighed heavy on his teenage shoulders. Everyone in the room had given more than he'd ever ask on that particular score. Inwardly thrilled at Irvine and Quistis' decision to come to Timber, and with a fraction of a smile on his face, Squall simply replied; "Good."

Zell leant back against the wall behind him and let out a long sigh. "Liberating a whole country… man, that's a hell of a job." Squall looked over a Zell, rolling his head back to the point where it rested lightly on the door behind him; "I've been over and over it in my mind. Galbadia is the weakest it's been for twenty years, definitely the weakest it's been since Timber was invaded. I've checked every military map we have, looked at every intel report on Timber from the last two years. My gut feeling is that it should be possible to free the country from Galbadian rule, and I have a rough idea of how we could do it… but I can't pin down some of the details until we get back there. Any strategy we decide to run with, we're going to have to be on the ground in Timber for months, building up a network of trusted operators. An effective, united resistance… and we need to do that under the noses of the occupying forces, hiding in plain sight. It's not going to happen overnight."

Mulling over Squall's assessment of their task, a question popped into Selphie's head; "Does that mean we're gonna find Zone and Watts and get the Owls back together?" Squall nodded in confirmation; "Yeah, it does. The last time I saw them, they were on the White SeeD Ship." Their paths had unexpectedly crossed when Squall was searching for Ellone. "How long ago was that?" Quistis asked. Squall's eyes rolled towards the ceiling as he tried to piece together the timeline before giving his estimate; "About three weeks ago." Quistis bit her bottom lip and tilted her head slightly at the amount of time that had passed, then expressed her concern; "They might have moved on by now, could make it tricky to find them." Squall had to concede that Quistis had a point there. He ran through the possibilities, voicing his thoughts; "If they have moved on, the crew might have some idea where they were heading. Or they might still be on board. Either way, we need to track down that ship."

Squall shook himself mentally again. We're getting ahead of ourselves... he thought. There's more pressing problems to be fixed first. He focused on Quistis, continuing his explanation; "Before we try and track them down, we need to figure a few things out." To his left, Rinoa shuffled slightly in discomfort at the suggestion that they wouldn't necessarily begin the search for her comrades straight away. "Like what?" she asked. Squall turned to face Rinoa, then answered; "Like fact that Quistis appeared on TV across the whole country while President Deling was being attacked. People won't forget that in a hurry. We're gonna have a hard time if she gets recognised every five minutes while we're walking around the city."

Quistis felt a little sheepish at Squall's observation, but she had to agree that it might cause difficulties. Confirming Squall's logic, she replied; "That's true. I remember at least one guy came up to me and said he saw me on TV the last time we were there..." she replied, recalling the incident on footbridge over the railway lines. A second later her SeeD training kicked in. Chastising herself after deciding the problem was actually pretty trivial, she followed up; "... but I don't think me being recognised in the street is the biggest problem we're likely to face. Dark sunglasses and a different hairstyle should be enough to solve that one."

Selphie punched the air as she yelled; "Yaaaayy! Makeover!" Rinoa looked at Selphie and clasped her hands in open-mouthed excitement for a couple of seconds while Squall mashed his hand into his forehead in frustration. Oh god no… A slightly terrified Quistis wondered exactly what kind of bizarre transformation Selphie had in mind; By the time she's done I'll have purple hair down to my knees and a hideous frock made out of an old tarpaulin or something. Trying his hardest to ignore Selphie's comment and the look of rising panic in Quistis' eyes, Squall faced Quistis and tried to continue; "You're right, there are bigger problems. Top of the list is that we need to come up with a believable reason for being in Timber for an extended period of time, so we don't look suspicious." Zell thought he understood what Squall was getting at. Seeking confirmation, he looked at Squall and asked; "You're saying we need a cover story?"

Squall nodded. "Yeah... so we don't look like a team of SeeDs there to cause trouble. You've gotta remember none of us are from Timber, so we need to have a convincing explanation for why six foreigners are travelling all over the country with lots of equipment in tow. And that applies in the capital, in the countryside, in the forests... wherever we have to go." After a short pause, Squall let loose a sigh, conceding; "I've thought about this problem a lot, but I can't come up with anything that works." He looked around the room hopefully at his colleagues and asked; "Do you guys have any ideas?"

Zell blurted out the first thing that came to mind. "Err... truck drivers?" Squall pondered Zell's suggestion for a second. I can see why he'd say that, but… "That's exactly the kind of thing that'd be pulled over and searched at every checkpoint. Even if all our paperwork checks out, how many foreign teenage truck drivers do you think the G-Army come across on a daily basis? They'd smell a rat straight away. I'm not sure that's the way to go." Not being particularly attached or invested in his off-the-cuff suggestion, Zell simply shrugged, accepting that Squall's assessment was probably accurate. Back to the drawing board.

Irvine recalled one of their previous escapades where they'd had to hoodwink the Galbadians. "How about infiltrating the G-Army?" he asked, looking at Squall. "Pretend to be new recruits or something? That's how Selphie got us into the desert missile base." Squall frowned with scepticism, replying "... and they sussed you out after, what, an hour?" He shook his head. "I don't think we can just sweet-talk our way in... and besides, we're going to be there for months. It's a little too close to the enemy for my liking. Even if the resistance has people inside the G-Army, it's gotta be for intel only. Anything more is almost certain to get an inside man killed. I don't think we can infiltrate the occupying forces without jeopardising the whole operation."

Quistis was the next to voice an idea. "A film crew?" Rinoa caught on to Quistis' line of thought. "You mean like filming on location, that kind of thing?" Quistis shuffled her feet slightly, then answered; "Exactly. Pretend we're shooting a movie in the Roshfall Forest, or a nature documentary. It doesn't really matter." Squall looked at Rinoa and asked; "How heavily censored is that kind of thing in Timber?" She furrowed her brow in thought; "I'm not sure about censorship, but I'm pretty certain you'll need to apply for a load of permits before you'd be allowed to shoot." Her observation rang true. The overbearing hand of the Galbadian bureaucracy was legendary. Squall continued where Rinoa had left off "...which would let the authorities know exactly where we were and tie us to a predetermined itinerary... and that's no good. We need to be able to move around freely."

Across the table, Selphie sprung to attention like she'd been hit by a bolt of lighting. She had an idea; a good one, she thought. Unable to contain her excitement, her suggestion sliced through the air as a hyperactive squeal "Oh my god! I can't believe I didn't think of this before! We could pretend to be a band!" As the final word left her lips, Squall's stomach turned to ice.