Acquisition

by The Jack of Spades

FF6. The melting of the Ice Princess.

It was a test of willpower, of guts, of generalship and all that it stood for, Kefka had told her. He'd been a bit cheeky in doing so, but that had always been his style.

General Celes Chere stood at the forefront of a legion of ten thousand Imperial troopers and several hundred Magitek Knights. Her eyes, two heartless orbs of ice blue, surveyed the small hamlet of Maranda that lay before her, splayed out like an innocent animal awaiting dissection.

There would be no anesthetic, however. There would be nothing to put the innocent civilians to sleep while their village got raped and plundered and its government got crushed.

Celes herself was mounted in Magitek armor. At the tender age of fourteen, merely four years ago, she had been proclaimed by Gestahl himself to be a magical prodigy. By the Emperor himself! Not even Kefka had that kind of honor. Then again, for one reason or another, his infusion had gone terribly wrong...

Celes was proud of herself, very proud. She had won the respects of her peers and had begun her training for generalship not too long after Gestahl's public acclamation. After nearly four years she'd won the title, standing tall and straight next to the esteemed likes of Leo Christophe and Kefka Palazzo. She had achieved something that many had only dreamed of doing.

Since this was Celes' first mission, she was eager not to let anybody down, including herself. Her captain stood to her right; her lieutenant was on her left. If all went well, the smiles on their faces now would last for the rest of the day.

Maranda was a peaceful little town far west of the Imperial capital of Vector. It was the westernmost city on the southern continent; all the main ports of the landmass were located near the southern and eastern shores. It was isolated, for all intents and purposes. The town's militia was merely a ragtag little band of a hundred or so farmers, merchants, and the occasional noble, all of whom had only paltry training with weapons when compared to the battalion that now faced them. The government was democratic, with the town mayor serving his or her people for a ten-year term before the position was up for reelection. Quite unlike Tzen, which had once been a small kingdom with close ties to the empire of Figaro. Tzen had been Kefka's first assignment as general years ago.

Tzen, the ports of Albrook, Almot, and Arcan, Toloose and Cremarl...the list of cities went on and on. The Empire had conquered all of them, under the orders of Leo or Kefka or both. Maranda was the last target left, aside from some small pockets of farmland here and there that didn't pledge allegiance to any emperor, king, or town mayor.

Today, Celes would force Maranda pledge allegiance to the Empire.

It was a green, florid city. Not as flashy as Jidoor, Maranda was a quiet beauty of a town. Many of the homes were covered in ivy and trees were planted at most street corners. The vegetation was not constricted to arranged floral displays and planned gardens, but instead allowed to spring up wherever nature had planted it. There were several open-air markets and heavy activity in the Town Square. Many of the timber-and-stone houses had extensive backyards, marked off by shoddy little picket fences.

Nice place, Celes thought. A smile crept across her lips. Yes, it would be a pretty addition to the Empire, along with the unspoken but understood bonus that most of the southern continent would be under Vector's far-reaching shadow.

Celes turned to her captain. His dark eyes met with hers, under the brim of a heavy helm.

"We attack as follows," she began. "The infantry will front for us and the Magitek Knights will cover them. I don't want this place to be leveled, just conquered." She paused there temporarily, hoping that her words had gotten through to the man. Then she turned to her lieutenant. "You will go through the city and scrounge up some new recruits for the Imperial Army. You, Captain, will head for the mayor's home and lay siege to the place until he agrees to step down from his position. Once you've captured him, send for me and I'll take it from there."

"Don't forget the treaty," Celes' lieutenant spoke up. Prim and stoic in the eyes of his fellows, he was inwardly peeved at being placed under a female general. He allowed none of this to show, however. He reached down inside his Magitek armor and produced a small, thin, lightweight box, adorned with the Seal of Vector. He opened it and removed its contents: a fairly thick scroll of parchment, long as Celes' forearm.

The lieutenant continued, "His Eminence has commanded that he acquire ownership of this city in writing as well as in deed. The mayor must sign this." He handed the scroll to Celes, who placed it in her lap for now.

"This should prove to be the easiest mission I've ever been sent on," the captain declared smugly. "Maranda is nothing compared to what Tzen and Arcan were like."

"Don't be so sure," Celes rebuked him absently. Her eyes trailed back to the scene before her and grew vaguely distant. "There are no guarantees in war. Besides, I've heard that Mayor Ginn is a particularly stubborn man."

"Perhaps we should send for diplomats," the lieutenant suggested wryly.

Celes shook her head. "No, Lieutenant. There will be no need for diplomats. I will be doing the talking."

"And Mayor Ginn will be doing the listening," the captain added, smirking.

"And the conceding," Celes finished. "Captain. Signal the charge."

A few stray citizens near Maranda's outskirts had spotted the Imperial troopers poised at the city gates. They formed a crowd that broke out into a buzz of murmurs. Some citizens opted not to stick around and make a spectacle. Those were the fleeing men, women, and children who headed for the safety of their homes.

"Raise the flag," the captain ordered a small soldier by his side. The man complied in the blink of an eye, raising a blood-red banner as high as he could and waving it back and forth.

There was a chorus of whirring noises, as the Magitek armors were revved up. Machinery squeaked and gears ground behind Celes. The infantry fell into position.

"Move out!" Celes issued the command and pointed forward. Her Magitek armor took one awkward step forward, followed by another and another. The lieutenant and captain followed, flanked and trailed by foot soldiers armed to the teeth.

The combined commotion was deafening.

The shrieks and cries of villagers pierced the air. Before Maranda's militia could even hit the streets, the city had suffered a few casualties due in part to persistent resistors. A vendor was hurling produce at the passing army; he ended up with a smashed cart and hundreds of gil in wasted inventory as a result. He barely escaped with his life.

When the militia finally met up with the Imperial troopers, there was quite a clash. A midday sun brought life and blinding gleams to a myriad of sharpened weapons, swords, axe heads, and the pointed tips of heavy halberds. Indeed, Maranda's forces were outnumbered one hundred to one at least, but they fought viciously. Celes deployed a handful of Magitek Knights to annihilate them quickly before more Imperial lives were lost.

There was a high whine and the whizzing sound of a screaming laser as its beam flew towards its target. A blast of Esper-powered flame hit a cluster of bloodied militia troops, reducing them to mere smears of corpses. Laser after laser was fired and more and more men were fried.

It was awful. The sound of chaos and panic in the city formed a demented sort of symphony to accompany the city takeover. In the chill of her Magitek armor, Celes Chere shuddered, unseen. The sight of all that carnage disturbed her, arousing feelings she never thought she had.

Remorse. Pity. Compassion. These people, harmless and innocent, only trying to protect their sovereignty. She should be protecting them, her conscience chided, not destroying them.

She couldn't spare any more time dwelling on those thoughts. She steered her Magitek armor through the cobblestone streets of Maranda, followed by a cluster of soldiers, and began impressing young men and boys into the Imperial Army.

Bullying was really more like it.

Her lieutenant had smashed his way to the northeastern section of town. There he had come upon a small and somewhat isolated residence, built a little ways north of the rest of the village. Curious, he piloted his machine as close as he could to the building and dismounted. Scimitar in hand, he busted through the door. Several soldiers on foot rushed to back him up.

"I'm a lieutenant of the Imperial Army! I demand to see all the residents of this building at once!"

There was a cry and the sound of something shattering in the back of the dwelling; an elderly woman emerged, plodding hurriedly to the front of her home, hands raised protectively before herself. There were footsteps from above, as two more people clattered noisily down a flight of wooden steps. There was a young girl before the lieutenant now, as well as a young man, perhaps no older than General Celes.

The lieutenant walked up to the boy, who was shorter than he was. He looked down on him with harsh hazel eyes. "You would make a rather fine addition to His Eminence's Army." He looked him up and down now. "Tell me, are you any hand with a sword?"

The girl by the youth's side moved to clutch his shoulders tightly, as if that gesture could keep him away from Vector's greedy clutches. She stared back at the lieutenant with defiant eyes.

"Can't we talk this over? What right does the Emperor have to force our boys into his army? From the looks of things outside it seems like he already has enough," the old woman, obviously the youth's mother, snapped at the lieutenant.

"Madam, this town is being placed under martial law. Your mayor will be surrendering his position very shortly, I can assure you. When this place is fully assimilated into the Empire, more soldiers will return to recruit troops. We can't build the world's most powerful army without a large infantry," the lieutenant regarded her coldly. "Now boy, answer me. What good are you with a weapon?"

The boy, sandy-haired and blue-eyed, swallowed before choking out, "I suppose I can handle one..."

"You've never trained with a sword? You've had no formal training at all?"

The youth shook his head, then quickly backed up his gesture with a shaky "no sir." The lieutenant drew up taller.

"Very well. I suppose in the long run it will make little difference. Come with me. I'll take you back to Vector, where you'll get all the training you need." He stepped back to make way for the dozen or so armed troops behind him. If the youth wouldn't come on his own, then he would come by force.

The boy shot a pained look at the girl besides him. Pretty she was, gentle-eyed, with long hair that fell down to a point right at her waist. He couldn't bear to leave her behind. Would he ever see her again if he left now?

But what choice did he have?

"I'm sorry Lola," he mumbled feebly. He wasn't one for words. He stroked her cheek before shrugging off her iron grip on his shoulders.

"No! Devin!"

"Don't worry, miss. He will be well taken care of," the lieutenant assured the girl. His expression was rather impassive however, so his words were of little consolation. Helplessly, Lola and the elderly lady watched as the young man was forcibly taken by the Empire's soldiers.

Back at the front, General Celes and her fellow Magitek Knights had managed to wipe out the Marandan militia and anyone else who opposed their presence in the city. Some of the young, fiery troops wanted to ignite some of the buildings, but Celes put a damper on their twisted hopes.

After the militia and its hierarchy were no more, the Imperial Captain had little trouble in capturing the Mayor of Maranda and his subordinates. Shortly thereafter, a trooper clad in the brown leather of the Imperial Infantry was sent out to deliver the message to General Celes.

"General, we've captured the mayor. The captain requests your presence inside."

"Very well. I'll be in shortly." Celes worked the controls of her Magitek armor, shutting down its main operating system before climbing out and landing catlike on her feet, scroll in hand. The distance from the armor to the ground was impressive, but she shook off the shock of her descent and made her way towards the mayor's residence. As she strode through the streets of the newly acquired Maranda, several insulted, downtrodden pairs of eyes watched her from behind windowpanes.

Welcome to the Empire, Celes thought.

Out of the blue, one particular pair of eyes caught her attention and held it fast for quite an extended length of time. Celes couldn't make out their color, but they were bright and shining and must have belonged to a very young owner. Celes squinted at them until they disappeared, back into a dark dwelling.

Again a stab of guilt. Look what she had done. For all she knew that child could be an orphan now, thanks to her commands, her orders, the destruction at her hands.

Her hands. She looked down at them suddenly, as if she feared that they would be covered in blood.

What am I thinking, she scolded herself. Orders are orders. I am a general of the Empire. I have to carry out my duty. This is my test of will. I can't fail.

Despite a few scattered shouts and thuds of operating Magitek armor, Maranda was oddly quiet. Yes indeed, its adoption into the Empire had gone rather smoothly. Celes couldn't wait to hear the totals of all the new recruits.

It was the only thing she could look forward to now. Perhaps it would make her feel less guilty. Or perhaps not.

Her steps suddenly became weighted by her emotion. All this destruction, all those bodies that surrounded her... She had caused this. She wondered momentarily if Leo or Kefka had felt this way about their first assignments.

Well, maybe not Kefka, but Leo might have had similar pangs of regret. Celes was familiar with that general's big heart. Surely he had been affected by the massive casualties that he had caused long ago, when he was younger.

The massive building that housed the newly captured mayor came into view shortly. Its stature lurked somewhere between mass and class, being larger than any other house in the area. Yet it too was laced with ivy and had a yard to call its own. Various flowers drooped from flower boxes and were spread across the front lawn. Pretty. Celes strode up the wide stone path that led to the home's porch and entered without a sound.

Inside was a strange mixture of darkness and light. Sunshine streamed in through the windows in wide golden swaths, chasing the shadows to the most remote corners of the room. Initially there was no sign of the captain or the mayor. Celes grew tense. Instinctively she reached for her sword at her hip, yet she did not unsheathe it. She could tell that the house was safely within Imperial hands, yet a part of her didn't even trust her own senses.

The young general picked her way across a great main room, obviously a waiting room or parlor for the mayor's guests. Dim, fuzzy shapes of furniture stood silently in the dusky fusion of light and dark. Just ahead of Celes and coming down the hallway was a lone figure. Her muscles tensed; the sinews of her hands twitched. Friend or foe?

It was friend.

"General Celes, the mayor is right this way." It was her captain. Relieved, the young woman relaxed her left arm and followed him down the corridor. She was being led to the back of the dwelling, to a large office. Inside there was a great round rug on the floor and a heavy desk at the back near the window. A half-dozen or so armed troopers were poised around the desk, their positions reminding Celes of wildcats waiting in ambush. There was a phonograph in the corner and a vase and some flowers on a table opposite that. The place was decorated sparsely, cluttered mainly with the inner workings of most provincial cities: desks for the mayor's staff, boxes of filing papers, etc. Celes ran a careless eye over the continents of the large room before spotting Mayor Ginn himself, sitting on a great leather chair behind his desk. Chin at his chest, he sat there motionlessly.

"Allow me to present Noel Ginn, Mayor of Maranda," the captain spoke to Celes.

Mayor Ginn's face rose to meet the hard features of the young woman before him. He couldn't believe his eyes! At most she had to have been only twenty years old, maybe even younger. A mere teenager, leading the Imperial forces! Whatever was Emperor Gestahl thinking? She would be no match for his stubborn disposition. More than anything else, she would be young and naive and easy to twist to his liking. He'd have no trouble parleying with her.

Celes Chere stepped closer to the mayor, studying him indiscreetly. Shock and surprise lingered in his dark eyes after being so easily captured by the Empire's troops, but there were no signs of fear. He wasn't afraid of her. In fact, he was contemptuous of her, of all things. Celes decided that she would have to impress him with every virtue in her arsenal if she wanted him to acquiesce smoothly.

"Mayor Ginn, I am General Celes Chere of the Imperial Army of Vector. It is in the name of Emperor Gestahl himself that I claim this city for his royal Empire. You are to publicly resign from your post and surrender control of the city government to us. A viceroy will be appointed to take over the city shortly after my return home." She unbound the scroll in her hands and stretched it out on the mayor's desk. There was a short pause before she asked, "Is there a town hall or meeting place of any sort in this village?"

The captain's eyes glided towards Ginn, expecting an affirmative reply.

"Oh, there is, but I don't intend on going there any time soon. Nor do I plan on signing that so easily, General Chere." The mayor held Celes' stare with supreme confidence. "Furthermore, I find it rather insulting that His Eminence in Vector found it appropriate to send a mere child here to bark his orders. I refuse to step down, I refuse to hand over this city's sovereignty, and I refuse to make way for any viceroy you decide to send in here." His eyes were like fire now.

Celes blinked. She didn't know what to say. It wasn't supposed to end like this! He was supposed to give in! He was supposed to surrender! She was right when she had told her captain that this might not turn out to be easy.

Sensing Celes' distress, her captain came to her aid. "You're a fool, mayor," he snarled. "Your townspeople are locked away in their homes and most of the young men of your city now belong to Vector. And your militia has been completely wiped out. Being old and stubborn won't make this any easier for you."

"Oh, you are very, very wrong about the militia," the mayor said, his words like oil gliding off his tongue. He smiled, a very vague, mysterious, and lethal gesture. "They're all around you now."

The troops surrounding the mayor's desk exchanged puzzled glances. The captain shot Celes a warning look. Before she could respond, half a dozen militiamen burst forth from a closet off to the side of the room, catching the troopers off guard. The captain drew his sword to help fend them off, while Celes made a surprise move of her own. Like lightning she drew her own weapon and positioned it beneath the mayor's very round chin.

"Fool," she hissed. She then turned her attention to the soldiers and her captain and took on the role of lifesaver. Concentrating, summoning the power she'd been infused with, she extended her arm slowly and watched as a flash of magical power flared outward. "Get down!" she warned.

The captain and the soldiers turned and found Celes preparing a spell; accordingly they dropped to the floor. A sharp, icy wind passed over them. Celes concentrated, increasing the power of the wind and pressing her allies' attackers against the opposite wall of the office where they writhed in pain, unable to move away. Below her, some of the troops stirred, but they dared not get to their feet. There was magic at work here.

The mayor was dumbfounded. As the seconds turned into moments, however, it soon became clear to him: this was no ordinary young woman. She had magic powers. That was why Gestahl had chosen her. Her abilities would be key in winning over the town's resistance.

A sorceress... He kept his wary eyes on her, unable to move with her sword at his throat.

Celes narrowed her eyes and continued assaulting the militiamen with the power of her spell. The chill turned into a deep freeze. The men were being frozen to death. The temperature of the room sunk like a stone.

She kept this up for as long as her strength would allow. When she found herself growing weary, she broke the spell. Like birds from a branch, the assaulting militiamen fell from their places on the wall, reduced now to corpses that landed on the floor with heavy thuds. The sounds invoked images of a great mountain breaking apart, its frozen form crumbling from time and pressure, its pieces falling to a valley thousands of feet below.

When the icy winds had stopped, the temperature of the room began to climb once more. The sun was out and it was midday; the interior of the building would not stay cool for long. Celes turned her attention back to the mayor.

"I've tried being diplomatic and courteous, but seeing as how that had little effect on you, I'm going to start doing things my way." Her eyes burned into mayor's, freezing him the way she had done to his men seconds ago. "If you do not step down of your own will, you step down forcibly." She twisted her sword in her grasp, sliding the edge of the blade against the man's throat as a reminder. "What do you say?"

Meanwhile, the captain and his troops rose to their feet. Some were injured in the surprise attack, but all of them were able to stand. No one had been seriously hurt. Now, along with the mayor's eyes, an additional seven pairs were locked on Celes.

Mayor Ginn procrastinated a bit. There had to be some way out of this, some way in which he wouldn't have to sacrifice his position. He didn't want Maranda to take the course of so many hundreds of other cities on the Southern Continent. The Empire was going too far this time. He had taken pride in how his town had managed to thrive for years, undetected by Vector. Damn this day. Damn the moment the sun came up to mark the final hours of his village's independence.

"I... I can see there's no clear way out of this," he spoke at long last, his words slow and measured. "I do have one choice that I'm willing to make. I'm not going down dishonorably. I've been elected by the people. I will not concede and I will not defer. If you want my city, you'll have to get rid of me yourself."

"Oh, that can be arranged," the captain leered, his eyes gliding towards Celes knowingly.

But it was Celes' turn to hesitate now. Unlike the captain or his troops, Celes saw what was at stake here. The mayor had mentioned it himself: honor. Honor was the price on the line. The mayor had worded things so that Celes would indeed have to kill him in cold blood in order to complete the Empire's takeover of the village. He in turn would die an honorable death at the hands of a savage, heartless magic user to whom the concept of honor was as foreign as that of compassion.

But all was not lost yet. If Celes could make him think that he would be dying a coward's death by not fighting back, she would have the last laugh...for now. She chose her words very carefully.

"On the contrary, Mayor Ginn, you will be going down dishonorably. You've already done your honor great harm by throwing away the lives of your militia and your people while you hid away in here, away from all the fighting. Now you'll be suffering the same fate as those whom you've sacrificed. You are a coward."

"You are the slaughterers. You are the true cowards---" The mayor's words were cut off as Celes inched the sword deeper against the soft flesh of his neck.

"Then I guess we're even, aren't we?" She smiled coldly at him, although inside she was raging. How dare he upstage her!

"Just do it, General. Put this old bastard out of his misery," her captain goaded her, impatient for blood. "Do it for Vector."

For Vector... Celes did not allow another thought to pass through her mind. In one swift, fluid motion, she drew her sword blade across the mayor's neck. A spurt of hot blood shot out and caught her on the chest. The mayor's head fell back drunkenly, the tear at his throat widening more and more. The amount of blood was incredible, oozing down his neck and onto his clothes.

Silence. Celes could feel the blood on her chest slide down further and further. What had she done? Mechanically she drew away from the dead man, sword still in her hand, her eyes cloudy.

"Get her a handkerchief of some kind; don't just stand there like an idiot," the captain spat at one of the soldiers. The young man complied immediately, searching the drawers of the room for something Celes could use to mop up the blood. He found some embroidered handkerchiefs in one of the mayor's desk drawers and handed one to Celes, who took it automatically. She cleaned up the blood as far as it managed to slide down, even dipping into her military uniform unabashedly in front of an entirely male audience. Some of them averted staring at her politely.

"You did well, General. The Emperor will be pleased."

Celes turned to face her captain, who was regarding her with a proud smile. On a normal occasion she might have smiled serenely and felt her ego swell a bit, but it had already been trampled by what she had just committed.

Murder.

And things weren't over yet. She would have to publicly announce her deed to the townspeople when she gathered them in the town hall, wherever it was. The mayor had never exactly mentioned its location, and on purpose too. He had no intentions of handing his city over. He actually didn't either; Celes had taken it from him. Then, in one final act of utmost heartlessness, she slit his throat when she could have let him go. When she could have run him out of town instead. Maybe even with his family, if he had one.

But the captain had trapped her as well with his words. "Do it for Vector."

Damn it.

"Thank you, Captain," Celes said in reflex. "We still have things to do here, however. I want the entire village, with the exception of those impressed as Imperial soldiers, to head for the town hall. Are there any aides to the mayor left? Secretaries, that sort of thing?"

"We've managed to detain two of them in the rooms further down the hall, to your right," the captain pointed in the aforementioned direction. "The last remaining authority of the city is in their hands now."

"Then they will be the ones to sign the treaty. When it's all over, I will station some of the troops here to ensure that the city remains in our hands until the viceroy arrives." Celes turned her back on the dead mayor and flung his bloodied handkerchief over her shoulder. It pained her to touch it. It was once his, and she had soiled it just like she'd done to his city.

Damn it.

* * *

It took the Empire's forces about a half-hour to assemble the entire village and force them into the meeting place. And even then, Celes wasn't entirely sure if everyone was within its four walls. She was willing to bet that some Marandans had escaped beyond the city limits and were heading for the isolated farmsteads miles away. They were sure to find protection there too, but not for long. Gestahl surely had his sights set on occupying those independent lands and would more than likely make his move very soon, now that Maranda had fallen.

It had only taken about an hour and a half.

The town hall of Maranda was a very large place; even Celes herself could not come up with an accurate estimation of its dimensions. Both sidewalls were lined with a row of small, even square windows and the interior was choked with endless aisles of long wooden benches. At the head of the room was a long, solid-looking table and a pulpit. Behind those were rows of chairs, most likely for the city's senate. Celes entered the hall when she felt certain that no more citizens would be arriving. She walked up the main aisle in the center of the room, her long legs devouring the distance as though it were nothing.

Seated on the chairs of the city senate was a horde of Imperial troopers. The captain, the lieutenant, and a handful of others had taken their places at the long table. The captain's hands were folded calmly on its surface, his eyes gazing over the rows of heads that stretched on before him. The lieutenant picked at his fingernails, refusing to acknowledge the crowd as if they were animals that weren't worthy of a direct look.

Behind the pulpit and to the left of the senate's seats were two formidable-looking men dressed in their finest, apparently nobles, the assistants to the mayor. The rightmost one looked a bit nervous, but the one on the left looked grim and determined. Did they both know what became of Mayor Ginn? It was more than likely. Celes was getting a good look at their individual responses to the city's crisis.

She arrived at the head of the congregation and made her way up the wide pair of steps that led to the raised section of the building where the city officials would sit. Her eyes met with her captain's momentarily; she had caught a glimmer of happiness in them. That emotion was directed at her, for her, because of her. Yet she could not reflect it; the feelings wouldn't be genuine.

She headed for the two men off to the side, under the watch of a cluster of troops seated in the back. She raised her voice and began her speech, not just to them, but to all the townspeople.

"Citizens of Maranda, and the remainder of its former government... Your resistance has been shattered. Your mayor is no more and your militia has been wiped out completely. The Empire is now in charge of this town." She paced the floor as she spoke, her eyes sifting through the crowd at all the faces. Some were shocked, some were weeping, and some weren't even looking up at her. Fear. She sensed an enormous amount of fear.

Despite the protest of her nagging heart, she continued on. "Aides to the mayor, because your town leader would not comply, your fate is now on the bargaining table. You have two choices: to concede willingly and give up your sovereignty with dignity, or to resist. If you choose to resist, for every minute that goes by, one of your own people will be killed until you give in." She turned to face the two men. "You can make this short and painless. I am giving you that opportunity. What do you say now, last survivors of the Marandan government?" She crossed her arms before her chest and awaited their responses.

At Celes' option of killing off one citizen per moment given the assistants' refusal, a faint murmuring broke out somewhere at the back of the gathering. This hum spread forward to become a roar of calamity, so loud that a disconcerted Celes whipped around to face them.

"Quiet, damn it," the captain thundered, slamming his fist once, twice on the table. The murmuring died down, but did not cease.

The lieutenant spoke up. "Silence, backwater filth. Your noise won't change anything. Only the decisions of your lawmakers can do that." Cold, condescending, and hateful. The people's words faded into stillness.

Inwardly, Celes shuddered at the reaction. To be sure, her captain was a gruff man, but her lieutenant was far worse. He was icier than she herself was. Still, she was satisfied with the populace's compliance; she whirled around to face the mayor's assistants again.

The two men were whispering amongst each other heatedly. Hands were waving, heads were shaking, and eyes were wide with pleas to listen or furious rebuttals. Celes watched this disinterestedly. She wanted results, not bickering.

"I would like a response, gentleman." She prodded at them with her words. Off to her right, her captain's lowered voice drifted towards her ears.

"This could take all afternoon..."

Celes tapped her foot against the wooden floor. Against the backdrop of awed silence, the sound was ear splitting. At long last, the assistant on the right turned and spoke to her.

"What could you possibly gain by killing off our citizens? The Empire is out for conquest, is it not? If everyone is slaughtered, there will be no one left to conquer! Doesn't all this chaos and killing bother you at all?"

Celes broke in, "I've been told before that I'm heartless. Don't try reaching out to what I don't have, please." A lie, a blatant lie. Still, she couldn't afford to have her expression mirror that truth, so he kept her features still.

The man's lip trembled. "I would concede, if it were entirely up to me, I assure you---!"

"But it's not entirely up to him," the man on the left spoke up, eyes trained on Celes. "For gods' sakes, you've already invaded all the other cities on this continent! What do you gain by taking over us 'backwater filth'?"

"You've already impressed so many young men into the Imperial Army," the man on the right added.

Celes sighed in frustration.

"Put 'em on ice, General," the captain growled, eying the assistants with contempt. "I'm sick of their gassing." Celes ignored the man, forming a comeback of her own.

"The Empire stands to gain more from the occupation of this city than just extra soldiers for its army. His Eminence has been planning to spread the rule of Vector to the northern continents, and that he cannot do if the loyalty of the cities on this continent is in question. Once you give in, ships will sail to the north and a new invasion will begin. But that can't happen until this city is in our hands. And the way I see it, you have no other options. Make it easy on yourselves, gentlemen. The lives of your people depend on your swiftness in conceding." Her eyes blazed with a cool fire. Put them on ice, she thought. Well, she might just get around to doing that if things turn out badly, rather than harm the innocents, even if she came up with that threat herself.

The man on the right sighed and hung his head. The one on the left was still resisting, but Celes could feel a growing weakness in him that told her that his concession would come at any moment now. All she had to do was be patient...and hope her captain didn't blurt out anything hasty.

The waiting was the killer. Behind Celes, a few citizens shifted in their seats. An infant wailed, only to be hushed by a desperate mother. Whispers traveled back and forth.

The captain drummed his fingers anxiously on the table, chin in hand.

The lieutenant laced his fingers together on the tabletop and remained quiet and unruffled. He decided at last to gaze upon the backwater folk on the benches, his disgust for them glaringly apparent. He couldn't care less if their lives were spared or not. All he wanted was to be on his way back to Vector. Hopefully during his next mission, he'd be placed under one of the veteran male generals.

The stillness became oppressive. Finally the two assistants to the mayor came to an agreement, although it was a rather unwilling one. "General, we concede. We step down. You've done enough murdering for today and we don't wish to see it continue," the man on the left said. "The city is yours."

Celes gave the men a curt nod in acceptance. There it went again: mentioning murder. Associating the bloodshed of the innocent with her actions. She wanted to speak, to voice her acceptance of their surrender, but her throat was tight and dry. She felt like what the mayor had said she was: a coward. In perfect silence she approached her captain and retrieved the parchment, now stained with several drops of the mayor's own blood. She unwound its scroll and presented it to the two aides as she had done to Mayor Ginn.

"This is to be signed at once. You will not concede with speech alone. It's the Emperor's wish that you do so in writing as well."

There was little resistance. Celes breathed a sigh of relief as both men produced pens and scribbled their names across the document's stained surface. Before adding his own signature, the man who had stood on the left gave Celes a very black look. But it was a quick gesture, so she had little time to react. Or reflect. When all was done, Celes scanned the parchment with her eyes, then handed it back to her captain.

Mission completed.

"Thank gods!" The captain rose from the table, giving it a firm pound with his free fist. "Lieutenant, let's get the men out of here." He proceeded to round up the Imperial soldiers.

Celes took off on her own. After she exited the building, she headed straight for a cluster of soldiers waiting outside. They were detaining a rather large group of young males, soon to be addedto Vector's army. She shielded her eyes from the blinding sun as she approached. It beat down on her with maddening cheerfulness, a sort of smile in the face of fear. Somewhere off to the west, dark clouds were gathering. They pushed the sunlight farther and farther east, casting everything beneath them into shadow.

Celes placed a hand on one of the soldiers a bit too heavily; he nearly jumped under her touch. He spun around to face her.

"We will take these men back to Vector for training," she told him. "You all will stay in town and await the viceroy. It will be a good week or so until he gets here, so be patient. I'm leaving the city in your hands."

"Yes, ma'am." The soldier saluted her tersely.

"And another thing." Celes leaned closer towards him. Her eyes became grave. "You are soldiers of the Imperial Army. The last thing I will tolerate is an abuse of your privilege. If I chance to hear that you're taking advantage of any of the citizens here---and you know of what ways I speak---I'll see to it that you get what's coming to you. And it won't be pretty. So mind yourselves while I'm gone." She had thought of the women particularly when she spoke this. She had spotted a few young mothers in the crowd back in the town hall and the thought of them being raped was abominable to her. She was a woman herself, after all.

As she turned away from them to help round up the remaining troops, she was struck with a queer thought: she had sounded just like General Leo. She had heard him speak of such things back in Vector.

Well, she assumed, I guess that's good. Leo was the very personification of honor. Perhaps that could make up for all of today's carnage.

When the troops had been assembled and those stationed in the city had taken their posts and the citizens were back inside their homes, Celes made to leave. She, the captain, and her lieutenant made their way through the wide streets of Maranda to the eastern end where the Magitek armor had been left. Along the way, Celes passed a very familiar house.

She couldn't put a finger on why it was so familiar. She studied it in silence as she came closer towards it. It was then that it hit her.

The door to the house opened slowly with a small creak, and out poked two faces: a mother and her daughter. The girl had to have been only five years old at most, but her eyes... Her eyes were those that Celes had seen in the window on her way to the mayor's residence. Those very same eyes, bright and shining and brimming to the full with innocence---one look at them and she softened more than she ever wanted. Of course, it wasn't the kind of knee-buckling softness that reduced a person to a pile of mush. It was the kind that made one's heart stop for a moment in contemplation. Those little eyes represented everything about this city that had died today.

And Celes was the murderer of that essence. She had led the attack.

She wondered for a moment if her officers felt similar pangs of regret. She paused mid-step and looked deeply into the child's eyes, just wondering. Her mother retreated from the doorway as soon as she saw Celes, then pulled her daughter away as well. The door closed abruptly and the spell over Celes was broken.

"General Celes!"

Her captain was calling for her. She resumed her pace, quicker this time to catch up with her officers. Never again did she want to look upon that little girl or her haunting eyes. Ever. It reminded her too much of the terrible guilt she bore.

She reached her Magitek armor and climbed in without a hitch, the strong muscles of her legs propelling her all the way up its monstrous height and into the cockpit. The clouds from the west had moved in quickly, covering the entire sky until no sunshine could break through. A misty rain began to fall.

Celes fired up the machine she sat in and led the charge out of the city. Once she returned home, she supposed she'd be greeted with praise from the Emperor and Leo, and a leering smile of half-acceptance from Kefka if she was lucky. Then the viceroy would be selected from the Emperor's top officials and be dispatched to the freshly conquered Maranda, arriving within a few weeks. It was all so predictable, yet the thought of that routine was of some comfort to the young general.

Because there were few other areas to seek comfort from. She had murdered in cold blood today. Even if she had been under the Emperor's somewhat distant care, even if he had lavished praise upon praise on her shoulders, it still didn't feel right. It wasn't justified.

The rain made her Magitek armor slick and soaked her clothes and hair. It was still fine, still just a spray, but it would probably grow worse as she got closer to Vector. The air grew colder.

Some Ice Princess. Some heartless general. Today had been the birth of her growing conscience, and her past actions would ensure that it would have plenty of guilt and sadness to feast upon. Celes couldn't think of the Emperor, of Vector, in the same light now. She'd be hailed as a hero when she returned, but that would be of no consolation. She foresaw the phoniness of it all. She was just being used. She was a tool of the Empire, a puppet, a coward who wouldn't dare disobey orders from on high, no matter how unfair they were. Mayor Ginn had been right.

Could she glance back at Maranda now that she was departing? Or would that make things worse for her? She decided against it at the last moment.

She had done her duty; that was all that mattered now. The acquisition of Maranda was complete.