A/N: Well, this is the first part of the side story for Fire, Dreams, and Twilight, as promised. To those of you who have read that story, hope you enjoy it. To those who haven't, I highly recommend you do so; it might make this one easier to understand.

Warning: Told from a couple of OCs POV. I just thought it would be interesting to give the readers a different perspective on our favorite gunman. Yes this story does have a purpose; it's not all just filler to take up time and space.

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Chapter 1

Mid July - Year 1

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"Lucia, what did you think you were doing taking in an outsider like that?"

She rolled her eyes at his condescending tone. "Honestly Meire, you don't have to be so over protective. I couldn't just leave him out in the rain!"

She turned away from the man in the door, going back to the dishes she had been washing before his intrusion. She could not hold back a huff of annoyance; she was thirty nine years old and well beyond the point where she couldn't make her own decisions. Did he have to keep treating her like a child?

"It's not raining now, is it?" He shot back, taking a bold step into the kitchen, his voice softening a decibel. "Look, sis, I know you've been lonely since Kashet died—"

She stiffened, her hands frozen in mid wipe, the ceramic plate still suspended in the air. "This has nothing to do with him." It was hard to keep her voice steady as she thought of him, thought of the void that had been left in her life once her husband died. All she had left of him was Cloud, her dear little Cloud.

Meire flinched at the ice in her tone and he realized his mistake. Kashet had died only the year before, stricken down with a disease that was native to the Nibelheim Area that was almost always fatal to those who had not been immunized. Slowly and calmly he watched as his older sister placed the plate back in the sink, turning around to look her brother square in the eye, "I don't know what your problem with Vincent is, nor do I care. But never assume such things of me. I took him in because Cloud asked me too; I let him stay because he has no where else to go. There is no other reason. You of all people should know me better."

Meire felt properly ashamed because of his words; he should have known better than to open his mouth like that, to say such things to her. He snapped his eyes shut, his teeth grinding together painfully, "I didn't mean it like that, Lu—I'm just worried. I don't trust outsiders."

"I know…I'm not asking you to trust him," She deflated, losing the edge in her stance as she accepted her brother's apology. He just had a habit of being an over protective worrywart, which was rather amusing since she was the older one. "Just…please try and make things a little easier for him. Gaea knows he won't get any sympathy from the other villagers."

"Fine. But don't expect me to automatically warm up to him." With those words he turned and fled his sister's home. He couldn't handle looking at her any more, both his anger at her decision to his embarrassment over his own reaction needed to be dealt with before anything else could happen. He needed to find Malachie, his friend was always there when he needed a sympathetic ear.

--

"So, it really is true?"

Meire nodded solemnly, taking another long swig of his drink. It hadn't taken much to convince his friend to accompany him to the Dragon's Nest, a small tavern that was a popular after-work hangout for the village men. It wasn't the best looking place, nor the most reputable; but it sold good beer and was easily accessible, located between the Inn and the Item Shop. Seeing as it was early in the afternoon the establishment was pretty much empty, the real rush didn't come until well after nightfall, when the on-duty Hunters returned from some of the longer patrols.

Meire sighed and set the tankard down on the counter with a loud clank, waving for the bartender to refill it before returning his attention to the man sitting on the stool beside him. "Yeah, Valentine has been staying with my sister since he arrived here." He gratefully took another drink of the now filled glass, watching as a puzzled expression flickered across his friend's face. Strange, he should have been satisfied with the answer, after all it had been Malachie who had informed him of the rumor that Valentine was indeed staying in the Strife household. The outsider was a mystery to most of the townsfolk, he seemed to prefer to be out of the villager's sights whenever possible. The one group that he had any regular contact with were the Hunters, and even then it was only because he had just recently joined their ranks.

"What's wrong, Eron?" He almost stumbled over the unfamiliar name, hardly anyone ever called Malachie by his first name, it just wasn't done.

"Nothing," Malachie said, leaning over to tug the drink out of Meire's hands, "I think you've had more than enough of this, you don't want to go home to Alissa dead drunk do you?"

He gave half-hearted protest as the other man drained the rest of the drink, but didn't really make an issue out of it. Malachie had a point, Alissa would skin him alive if he dared drink too much. As it was he could already feel a faint buzz from the two full tankards he had. Much to his chagrin he couldn't hold his liquor at all, which was such a shame considering how much he enjoyed the stuff.

"What I'd like to know is why are you so worried about him being there. I mean, sure he is a little…intimidating…but I haven't seen him do anything to warrant your distrust."

Meire put his elbows on the bar and shook his head in his hands. "He's an outsider. After the last one…"

"Last one?"

"Kashet." He growled out the name, his mind going back to his sister's husband and the nostalgia, pain, and anger the memory brought back. He ignored the nostalgia, burying it beneath the other stronger emotions. "Nibelheim is not a place for outsiders. They don't understand the mountains, they have no defense against the sicknesses caused by the mountains and the monsters that live in there. I don't want Lucia to get attached to another one that will end up leaving her alone again. She should have settled down with a nice villager, not some wannabe ranger from Gongaga."

"It sounds like you are angry with Kashet, not Valentine." Malachie pointed out, somewhat stunned by the intensity of Meire's revelation. How long had the blonde man been holding all of that inside? Meire and Kashet had been close, especially after the sandy-haired man married his sister. He paused, going back over the thought in his mind, why hadn't he noticed it before? Meire was the kind of person who—once you got past his barriers—would give you everything he had. He didn't have many close friends, but those he did have he cherished above all else. Losing one—especially one as close as Kashet—would had hurt him far more than he had cared to admit.

"Kashet, Valentine, all them outsiders are all the same." Slowly he folded his arms on the counter, closing his eyes as he let his head rest on the wooden bar top. "They just don't belong here. They always end up hurting someone."

It made sense now that Malachie thought about it. Lucia's grief over losing her husband had activated 'Protective Brother' mode, and coupled with Meire's own feelings of loss had led his friend to protect himself and his sister the best he could. It was a rather simple, yet effective solution; avoid the problem.

All of the villagers had grown up with the mountains; they knew to avoid some of the more dangerous passes, they knew what plants in the areas were safe to eat and which ones were poisonous. The high mako level in the mountains also gave the native people a higher tolerance for the stuff, reducing the possibly for a fatal case of Mako Poisoning. Native-borns were also immunized at a young age against the local viruses that ran rampant in the region. All in all, the chances of someone from the world outside the village limits surviving for any long period of time was very low.

Malachie was tempted to confront his friend on his suspicions, but decided against it. "So…What are you going to do now?"

"There's nothing I can do." Meire grumbled into the counter, trying to force back the foggy sensation that alcohol always brought on. "I promised sis that I wouldn't make things hard for him."

Malachie looked at him incredulously, what had possessed the blonde the do that? But before he even opened his mouth to ask the question Meire continued, "I said some things, and she took it the wrong way. Let's leave it at that."

He shrugged, shoving the curiosity to the back of his mind and placing it under lock and key. No matter how low a tolerance Meire had to the tongue-loosening attribute of alcohol, two drinks only did so much. He decided to dismiss the topic, trying to think up a solution to his friend's predicament. He knew the other man wouldn't be satisfied to just sit back and let things developed the way they would. "Why don't you watch him? Technically, you're not breaking your promise, and you'd be able to keep an eye on him."

Meire lifted his head and leveled a stare at Malachie. "Problem…The only people he ever interacts with are the Hunters."

"But you forget—I am a Hunter."

"Right…"

--

"Malachie, Valentine, you two take the northern patrol today."

It was one thing to say that he would do it, another to actually do so. Faced with the prospect of having to spend more than a few passing minutes in the sharpshooter's presence caused him to reconsider his words. Just being under the cursory glance of those crimson eyes frightened him more than he'd ever imagined. There was just something—something beyond the feline-like pupils—that sent an inexplicable feeling of terror down his spine.

But he couldn't let down Meire, as soon as he'd sobered up he had immediately thrown himself to the task of observing the unsocial outsider. Malachie could even see that his friend was regretting his decision to not be part of the Hunters. Meire was, to put it simply, not a fighter. He made his living working at the inn as a cook. Of course, such a job clearly cut into his "Valentine watching time" and so even more of the observations had been hoisted off onto Malachie. At first he had been content to watch from afar, but now Howard wanted him to actually work with the frightening man—was the Head out of his mind?

He glanced nervously at the man he was being assigned to, thinking back to what he(and the more plausible rumors) knew. No one in the entire town really knew where the foreboding outsider had come from; just that he had shown up the day after the old mansion at the edge of town had caught on fire and burned down. Few people claimed that they had seen Cloud—Meire's nephew—lead the man away from the building moments before it burned, but there weren't enough witnesses to actually validate the claims.

However, almost the entire town did see what happened the next morning. The mysterious outsider had summoned a dragon and had completely leveled the building. He himself had not seen it—he had been out hunting when the event happened, but his wife had filled him in when he returned home that evening. He had figured that such a powerful person would have no reason to stay in such a backwater village, and as such had been rather surprised when the man had shown up at the Hunter's weekly gathering, requesting a job.

He had been accepted rather quickly once he had given a demonstration of his skills with the gun he always carried around. There were no others in the village who were as skilled in long distance weaponry—most of the village men tended to use swords or spears like him. Valentine's accuracy with his chosen weapon actually proved an asset to the small organization; the hunters were a group of volunteers from the village that protected the small settlement from the many monsters that roamed the plains to south and the mountains to the north. He was immediately assigned to the northern patrol, a development that eased every other hunter's minds. They avoided taking the northern patrol when they could because to the north lay the mountains, and in the mountains lived the dragons. The only way to deal with the monsters safely and efficiently was with long range attacks due to their wicked teeth, claws, and their fiery breath attack. Patrols were made up of two people, the rest of the hunters rotated their turns with the marksman.

Today was Malachie's turn.

His mouth went dry and he scolded himself for being so scared, he'd taken the northern route before and hadn't been so afraid, so why now? Another glance at his partner's half-hidden face was enough to answer his question—he was afraid of being alone with the sharpshooter. He couldn't help the feeling; Valentine was rather intimidating, his red eyes and wicked looking gauntlet tended to discourage any from going out of their way to get to know him. But he had no choice. "Yes Howard." he said meekly to the leader of the hunters, his grip on his trusted spear tightening.

Valentine's eyebrow rose at Malachie's reluctance to be paired with him, but just shrugged it off. He was more or less used to it by now. He inclined his head toward Howard, letting the burly man know that he had heard and acknowledged the command. Howard seemed slightly annoyed at not getting a verbal reply but didn't say anything about it, he had long since gotten used to Valentine's anti-social attitude.

He continued to give out orders to the rest of the group but Malachie wasn't paying attention. It took every ounce of will power to keep himself from quaking, he would much rather be with the southern and eastern patrols, even the numerous packs of Nibel Wolves would be better than staying with Valentine.

"Don't be afraid…" An airy voice wafted into his ears, "I'm not going to eat you."

Malachie did jump at that, whirling around and bringing his spear into a defensive posture. He was mildly distressed to realize that the group had dispersed already, leaving him alone with the demonic man. Valentine snorted, crossing his arms across his chest. "Jumpy." He commented before setting down along the main road, heading in the opposite direction of the rest of the group.

Malachie watched him draw further away, before making a half hearted attempt to follow. Valentine must have heard his feet dragging against the gravel road because he glanced over his shoulder, "You don't have to come."

"Y-yes I do--" Malachie may not like the fact, but it was true. He had sworn an oath when he joined the Hunters, promised that he would protect the village no matter what the risk. Not to mention he had promised his friend that he would help him. Even if he had to face all the dragons in the entire Nibel Mountain range in order to fulfill his obligations, he would. He had a lot of pride in his personal honor; he would not allow his cowardice to tarnish it. "The Oath—"

"The others didn't," Valentine shrugged, "But suit yourself."

Malachie was taken aback, he couldn't believe it. He wanted to call the marksman a liar, but his words had sung true. Had his fellows really turned their back on their duty? Had Valentine really been handling the Northern Route and all its dangers by himself? He felt new resolve blossoming within him, repressing his fear, and tucking it away in the back of his mind; he would not go back on his oath, even if it meant spending half of the day with Valentine. He picked up the pace and soon caught up with the sharpshooter, no one would ever call Eron Malachie a forsworn.

--

"It's been pretty uneventful, huh?"

Vincent gave a sidelong look at the man with him and shrugged in response. While he tried to look unconcerned, he couldn't help but agree with Malachie, usually he would have encountered quite a few weaker monsters by now. He hadn't ever seen the mountain pass this empty in his entire experience with the region. His hand twitched, wanting to curl around his gun, all of his instincts had him on edge, both his Turk training and his intuition were yelling at him, telling him that something wasn't right.

"It's creepy," Malachie commented, most likely trying to fill up the awkward silence with his words, "Usually we'd at least see a swarm of Kyuvilduns."

Vincent nodded his agreement; the giant bug-like monsters were rather common on this side of the town. Luckily, they were rather weak, so that they didn't pose much of a threat to the residents.

"It's like…something scared them away…" Malachie laughed nervously. "But what would the odds of that be?"

Vincent tilted his head, narrowing his eyes as if trying to see something from afar. "Hold that thought…"

"Hey, wait!" Malachie's hand tightened around his spear-shaft and he hurried after the retreating back of his partner. "We aren't supposed to go that far!"

He glanced over his shoulder, pulling his weapon out of its holster. "Then stay behind; I saw something."

Malachie didn't even bother taking Vincent's suggestion, only catching up when the red-cloaked man stopped to lean over something. As he approached he realized what the gunman was looking at. "Is that a Zuu?"

The large blue bird-like monster was crumpled on the ground, its long neck bent at an odd angle and a faint red mist was rising from the edges of the flying monster. Vincent sighed and nudged it with his foot, the movement causing the rest of its body to evaporate, "It's dead now." He eyed the large claw marks in the dirt beside the corpse. "I think I know what killed it too."

"What? The only thing that leaves those kinds of tracks is a dragon and they don't come…anywhere…near…town." His words were becoming even more hesitant as he glanced between the mark and the corpse, "Please tell me I'm wrong."

"It depends on what you are thinking." Vincent checked over his gun, flipping off the safety. "But if you insist on deluding yourself, be my guest."

"Oh boy…" Malachie moaned, "A dragon…a Gaea-be-damned dragon…"

"Stay here." There was no room for argument in his tone as the sharpshooter took off.

"You can't face a dragon by yourself!" No matter what Malachie thought about the marksman he wasn't willing to just leave Vincent to the mercy of a dragon. It would weigh on his conscience for the rest of his life, forever reminding him that he had abandoned his ally to certain death.

"You'll just get in the way." The glare and conviction in those demonic red eyes stopped him in his tracks, much as if he had been petrified by the Stone Stare of a Gagighandi. Vincent took the opportunity to continue through the pass at a rapid pace, by the time Malachie had regained feeling in his legs he was gone.

--

He held his gun ready as he crept through the rocky landscape. Over the ridge he could hear a heavy breathing, a rattling breath that he easily recognized from his travels in the area beforehand. He pulled himself up behind a conveniently placed boulder and peered around it, his eyes widening a fraction as he took in the gigantic form at the foot of the decline.

It was a massive reptilian monster, its long sinewy neck swinging back and forth as a forked tongue tasted the air. Blue scaled hide glinted in the afternoon sun, a long spiked tail dusting the path behind it as it shifted agitatedly. Vincent hissed softly to himself, how did a blue dragon get here? They were only found on the Northern Continent, in the caves above the Great Glacier. Blue Dragons were almost twice as powerful as Nibelheim's natives, the Green Dragons.

He shook his head and lifted his gun, it didn't matter how it got here. It had already ventured too close to the town to safely let it be. He pulled the trigger without another hesitation, and in the same motion readied his weapon for another shot.

The beast cried out, its pain filled scream reverberating on the rocks. The blue scaled head wove every which way in an attempt to locate its attacker, the red-bloodied mess that had once been an ice-blue eye glistened morbidly against jeweled scales.

Vincent leapt from his hiding spot just as sickly blue flames slammed against the stone, the magically induced fire completely engulfing the dark grey boulder. He rolled down the hill, setting loose rocks and dirt raining down on the monster below him, springing to his feet the moment he reached the base. He quickly dodged to the side as the dragon's tail smashed down right where he had just been standing, and the force of it's passing flung a shower of rocks and stones into the air.

He fumbled with his gun and shot off three more shots, but they weren't near as effective as his preliminary attack, merely bouncing off the dragon's jewel-like scales. The gunman cursed softly, if it were a Green Dragon those bullets would've hit their mark; Green Dragon's didn't have scales, only leathery hide. He needed armor piercing ammunition to do any significant damage to this beast.

Growing tired of the game of cat and mouse, the Blue Dragon whipped its wings around, picking up a great gale. Rocks were flung everywhere, pelting the ex-Turk with debris and sediment. His cloak whipped around in the mini-storm, flying in front of his face and blinding him momentarily. Seeing its prey distracted, the Dragon's head reared back, locking onto the gunman's red and black form with its one good eye.

--

Malachie scrambled over the rocky surface, lugging the large bulk of his spear with some difficulty. He heard the savage roar of a dragon ahead and he feared the worst, few were the men that could defeat a dragon on their own. There was a ridge coming up and he felt a weird feeling in his gut telling him that the monster was just beyond that hill, a pressure that seemed to build around him the further he walked, a foreboding sensation that settled in the pit of his stomach.

Another cry went up, but this one chilled him to the bone. It was of a different tone and pitch than the first—the one that the hunter had recognized as a dragon-kin—and held no resemblance to anything he had ever heard in the mountains or the surrounding woods. He shook off the paralyzing fear; he had to make sure Valentine was all right.

He crested the ridge, his heart freezing mid-beat as he took in the gruesome scene. The dragon—a Blue Dragon!—lay curled up to the side, the leathery wings ripped to shreds as if by a wicked set of claws. Deep gashes littered its flank, loose scales having been torn away from the beast's side and scattered across the mountain slope. Its sides rose and fell in labored breaths, and Malachie could see the life fleeing from the listless husk. There was no sign of the second monster, the one that had obviously felled the dragon, but he could see his partner sprawled out a few meters from the fallen monster. "Valentine!"

He scrambled down the slope, abandoning his lance as too unwieldy to carry down the ridge. He made it to the bottom of the decline, coming up beside the downed man in an attempt to asses the damage the monsters had done to him. Luckily, there were only a few superficial bruises and scratches, but that didn't explain why he was unconscious. There were no signs of any head trauma, nor was blood loss a realistic possibility due to the minor scale of the wounds. At first he wondered if the man had even engaged the dragon, but those thoughts vanished when he saw the empty bullet shells—the metallic silver color easily showing up among the dirty charcoal-grey of the rocks—and the bloodied mess that had once been the dragon's eyes.

"Valentine, get up!"

The man stirred, a soft groan escaping his partially parted lips as he opened his eyes. "I thought I told you to go back to town?"

"And leave you out here?" He snorted, "You would've been killed by that dragon if it weren't for the other monster."

"Other monster…?" Vincent echoed vaguely, staggering to his feet and ignoring his offered hand. Malachie shook his head at the sharpshooter's refusal of his help before poking around as the dragon proceeded to take its final rattling breath. Vincent made his way over as the corpse disappeared into red mist, leaving an item behind. The gunman picked it up, turning it over in his hand. "A Dragon Armlet…"

"Keep it. You're the only one on the squad without some type of armor." Malachie bent over and plucked something off the ground. "All of these scales will more than satisfy the hunters anyway, do you know how much Blue scales sell for?"

Vincent shook his head, frankly he didn't care. He slipped the ring of metal onto his right arm. The six empty materia slots were glaringly empty, much like the way he felt at the moment. A heavy sensation settled about his heart, gnawing at his insides as he slowly began to piece together what had happened after he took out the dragon's other eye; he couldn't help but feel sick to his stomach at the conclusion he came to.

'Gaea, please no…'

--

"Eron, I heard you got paired with Valentine today."

"It's nice to see you too, Janae." Malachie kissed his wife gently as he wandered into the house. "And to answer your question, yes I did."

She pulled away from his grip and bustled back into the kitchen. "So how was he? Was he as scary as Zahar was saying?"

"I will admit, he was more than a little bit intimidating," Malachie set his pack down on the table and leaned his spear against the wall. "And he did manage to wound the dragon before it knocked him out."

"Ah…" She said as she set a plate on the table in front of him, "Sorry, it's cold, but you got home later than usual." She sat down in the seat directly across from him at the small table, putting one elbow on the table and propping her head up. "Did anything interesting happen?"

"How about I show you?" The mousy brown-haired man pulled out both a blue crystalline object and a long pitch-black one from the pack and set it on the wooden table. Janae's breath caught in her throat as she was drawn into the beauty of the glittering scale. "Is that…?"

"A Blue Dragon scale," He confirmed, "But, just look at this other one."

He drew her attention to the long object sitting next to the scale. It was about a quarter as long as his forearm and it curved and tapered off into a wicked sharp point. It was jagged on the opposite end of the point, as if it were broken off of something.

"What is it?"

"It's a horn, 'Nae, I found it in the same valley that we found the dragon in. I'm thinking of giving it to Meire, he likes to collect these kinds of things." He also had to talk to him, but he didn't want to involve Janae in Meire's business.

She shrugged, settling down to her own dinner, not quite seeing her husband's fascination with the nondescript object. "He's your friend, you'd know best."

A/N: Comments?