"Patrol of the outlying territory complete, sir! Further orders?"
There was no real response to the question: rather, a small, exasperated sigh.
"Further orders?"
A small pile of papers fell upon the desk. They outlined reports of potential sphere locations around the world. Moments before, they were under perusal: now, however, a rather singular source of irritation had intervened.
"Further orders?"
"Yaibal. . . aren't you off duty?"
"I'm never off duty, Meyvn Nooj! Further orders?"
The older man sighed, greatly wearied. He'd been up late that night, studying the results of a Spira-wide search by the newly formed Youth League, one bent on digging up the past of Spira – one that Yevon had, for better or worse, gone to great lengths to hide from the general populace. That was, after all, the purpose behind the Youth League, and their most noble function. And so, Nooj would not allow those reports to sit idle, and had personally been sifting through all fifty-three of them. Many he had already dismissed as either mistaken or erroneous, based on his personal knowledge. Others he was uncertain about, and he shuffled these off to the side, to be inspected by other, more knowledgeable sources. Only six had managed to make it past either of these categories, bearing in his mind unequivocal proof that there was something of great historic importance contained in the report.
He had been eying these reports again when Yaibal, a very new recruit – only five days in the service – came dashing into his office. This was not the first time that night, either: on no less than three occasions had Yaibal barged into the command tent within the last two hours, bringing the grand total for the day up to eleven visits. Inwardly, Nooj cursed himself for putting the majority of the League out on this massive search for artefacts, as very minor Leaguers like Yaibal were inclined to seek out the highest echelons of power in the Youth League, looking for new orders when their old ones were complete.
Which meant Yaibal came straight to Nooj. Over. And over. And over. The first six times, Nooj worked hard to suppress his sighs of vexation, calmly reminding himself that Yaibal was new, and the League would mould him into proper form soon enough. Once he hit his seventh visit, however, Nooj did little to hide his contempt.
Not that Yaibal noticed. He approached each visit with rising confidence, stiffly alert and ready for a new assignment. It did not matter that Nooj continually appointed him with relatively small tasks, from standing guard to cooking dinner for the stationed troops. His tenth visit had, in fact, been a cleansing mission to the latrines. Yet Yaibal had done it all without complaint, and indeed, his eyes still sparkled with burning passion for his job.
Nooj usually liked passion in his troops. Now, though, it annoyed him terribly, and he grunted his discontent.
"Further orders?"
The words nearly threw Nooj into a conniption fit, and the compulsion to bodily toss Yaibal from his office was extremely tempting. But no: this situation could be handled with more finesse, and he knew it. Nooj was far from being a stupid man, and he figured that, with a little manoeuvring, he could get Yaibal out of his hair until the information gathering operation was concluded.
So his mind began to work as he sat there, calmly watching Yaibal, whom he knew would not leave until Nooj had given him a new set of orders. Yaibal would not even question Nooj's silence, opting instead to repeat his obnoxious request/demand for further orders every few minutes. Nooj could plan the entire night away, if he so wished.
As it was, it took only three repetitions for an idea to percolate in his brain.
"Yaibal, what I say to you next is of the utmost gravity. It is not to leave this room. Even under pain of interrogation, you must reveal nothing. Understood? If not, please leave now, and I will find somebody else to do the job."
Even military precision – adopted through five days of observation and reading too many novels though it may have been – could not mask Yaibal's sudden excitement. He even broke his rigid salute and waved his hands wildly. "N-n-no sir! I can do it! Give me a chance, sir-"
Nooj pressed a finger to his lips, exhaling a brief "shhh" that silenced Yaibal and put him back into salute. "Alright. Keep it quiet, as well, as I want this all to be low profile. Intelligence matters. You understand."
Yaibal did. He was trembling with anticipation, a highly visible act that Nooj cocked an eyebrow at.
He looks like he needs to pee. Jeez. Clearing his throat, Nooj began. "I've received reports from my, ahem, forward spies," – no such thing actually existed – "that New Yevon has been mobilizing their forces around our territory. Now, we have no enmity with them at current, but that could quickly change. Our paths are bound to clash in the future, as I'm sure you know."
Yaibal nodded quickly. He looked a little pale at the fictitious news.
"I need somebody to keep an eye on our holdings. And I mean all of our holdings. And beyond somewhat, as I'd like to watch New Yevon, to make sure they keep their grubby paws in Bevelle."
Yaibal looked ready to pass out. He knew his part was coming. Nooj twitched involuntarily while watching him.
"I. . . want you to be this. . . Yaibal?"
It was too late. The Private had fainted dead away, a look of beaming triumph on his eyes. He crumpled onto the floor with a loud slam.
Nooj glanced over the curving side of his desk at Yaibal, blinking. "Driven apoplectic with the desire for duty. Hum." Now afforded a few moments of relative peace, Nooj left Yaibal on the floor, a gently breathing heap, and managed to read his reports for a good twenty minutes before Yaibal came to and sprang up.
"Ready and willing, sir! I won't fail! No sir! What are my mission parameters, sir? Sir! Sir!" Yaibal was ranting with joy, a fact that disconcerted Nooj more than ever.
"Alright, alright, calm down now. . . here's the plan. For the next three weeks, I want you to travel from the Djose Highroad to. . . hm. . . Guadosalam. Back and forth. Patrol everywhere, and keep an eye out for New Yevon troops. Leave no crack untouched. And I mean none. In fact – " he added, removing his glasses to inject a sense of importance into his words, "– implement a Code 92." Nooj settled the tips of his fingers together in front of his nose, watching Yaibal carefully.
Yaibal's face flickered with confusion. "A. . . Code 92, sir?"
Instead of replying, Nooj began to glare at his soldier. His gaze was one of incredible accusation. How dare you not know what a Code 92 is?
Yaibal snapped it up and improvised. "Oh yes! The old, uh, 92! Sir! Understood!"
Nooj nodded. There was no such thing as a Code 92. He was merely stringing the poor sap along. "Very good. I want you to report back in three weeks. Chances are good you should be able to travel that length of road at least twice. No transportation, either: they'll be. . . expecting that." Nooj dragged his last sentence out, indicating a grand conspiracy that involved his hapless sentry. The fact of the matter was, in Nooj's mind, that would be cheating: Yaibal might get bored of flying back and forth on a hover and simply wander back to base. Dedicated, yes: prone to memory lapses out of boredom, yes. If given reason to be paranoid, Yaibal would be alert the entire three weeks, and far from bored.
There was nothing for him to find along that long stretch anyway. Nobody would bother Yaibal, dressed as he was in the standards of the Youth League – which, in many cases, mirrored that of bandits – and, amazingly enough, Yaibal could aptly defend himself from Fiends. Nooj suspected the enthusiastic fop would be searching under rocks and scouting out an enemy that wasn't actually there at the top of trees for the whole time. With any luck, by the time Yaibal returned, several of Nooj's junior officers would have come back from their investigations, and could deal with the nuisance. And, even if not, it gave Nooj a three-week reprieve.
Nooj mentally shook his head. Annoying after only five days of service. I know I said that everybody is allowed in, but, maybe a screening process wouldn't be so bad. . .
Yaibal straightened. His chest puffed out with pride. "I won't fail you, sir. I'll find out what those Yevon dogs are up to! You won't regret giving me this assignment, sir, no sir!"
Nooj rapped his fingers upon the table. "Indeed, I'm sure you won't. You set out first thing in the morning – and make it early, so nobody notices your absence. I don't even so much as want to glimpse on your face: otherwise, I'll deem your espionage skills below par. Understood?"
Yaibal leapt about frantically. "No sir! I mean, yes sir! You won't see me, no sir, not once, sir!" As if to elucidate on the point, he promptly dropped below the level of the desk, all but hidden from view – except for the peak of his cap, which instantly gave the Private away.
Nooj decided to ignore it. "Very. . . effective. Right, you need your sleep. Set out before daybreak. Remember, I don't want to see you for three weeks after you set foot outside of this tent."
Yaibal rose with what Nooj swore to be a loud 'sproing', saluted, thanked his superior – nay, he heaped his praise on – and fled when Nooj waved his hand dismissively. The Meyvn could hear Yaibal's hoots of glee receding into the distance as he made a path to his tent.
Nooj sighed. His eyes were burning. And, yet, a huge weight had been lifted – he would not see Yaibal for three weeks. And that, ladies and gentleman, was something to drink to. Rising steadily from his roughly padded command chair, he poured himself a nice, long shot of rum, and toasted his own accomplishments. "To my victory. . . over a tread-head." He drank, long and hard, savouring the burning sensation as it ran down his throat.
---
The next day, Nooj, watching from the high precipice at the upper level of the command tent, noticed a stealthy Yaibal sneak out of his tent, a pack slung over his shoulder. The young man – obviously over-cautious, yet not looking in any of the right directions – darted back and forth amongst the tents, trying to hide his presence yet remaining directly in Nooj's line of sight.
Nooj sighed heavily, clutching the banister before him. "He's hopeless." The Meyvn retreated back to bed for a good three-hour sleep moments after watching Yaibal trip noisily over a set of pots, vectoring the Private straight into a small pen of sleeping chickens. Yaibal made good his escape, covered in feathers, his passage into the outside world heralded by the panicked shrieks of seven surprised hens.
There was no real response to the question: rather, a small, exasperated sigh.
"Further orders?"
A small pile of papers fell upon the desk. They outlined reports of potential sphere locations around the world. Moments before, they were under perusal: now, however, a rather singular source of irritation had intervened.
"Further orders?"
"Yaibal. . . aren't you off duty?"
"I'm never off duty, Meyvn Nooj! Further orders?"
The older man sighed, greatly wearied. He'd been up late that night, studying the results of a Spira-wide search by the newly formed Youth League, one bent on digging up the past of Spira – one that Yevon had, for better or worse, gone to great lengths to hide from the general populace. That was, after all, the purpose behind the Youth League, and their most noble function. And so, Nooj would not allow those reports to sit idle, and had personally been sifting through all fifty-three of them. Many he had already dismissed as either mistaken or erroneous, based on his personal knowledge. Others he was uncertain about, and he shuffled these off to the side, to be inspected by other, more knowledgeable sources. Only six had managed to make it past either of these categories, bearing in his mind unequivocal proof that there was something of great historic importance contained in the report.
He had been eying these reports again when Yaibal, a very new recruit – only five days in the service – came dashing into his office. This was not the first time that night, either: on no less than three occasions had Yaibal barged into the command tent within the last two hours, bringing the grand total for the day up to eleven visits. Inwardly, Nooj cursed himself for putting the majority of the League out on this massive search for artefacts, as very minor Leaguers like Yaibal were inclined to seek out the highest echelons of power in the Youth League, looking for new orders when their old ones were complete.
Which meant Yaibal came straight to Nooj. Over. And over. And over. The first six times, Nooj worked hard to suppress his sighs of vexation, calmly reminding himself that Yaibal was new, and the League would mould him into proper form soon enough. Once he hit his seventh visit, however, Nooj did little to hide his contempt.
Not that Yaibal noticed. He approached each visit with rising confidence, stiffly alert and ready for a new assignment. It did not matter that Nooj continually appointed him with relatively small tasks, from standing guard to cooking dinner for the stationed troops. His tenth visit had, in fact, been a cleansing mission to the latrines. Yet Yaibal had done it all without complaint, and indeed, his eyes still sparkled with burning passion for his job.
Nooj usually liked passion in his troops. Now, though, it annoyed him terribly, and he grunted his discontent.
"Further orders?"
The words nearly threw Nooj into a conniption fit, and the compulsion to bodily toss Yaibal from his office was extremely tempting. But no: this situation could be handled with more finesse, and he knew it. Nooj was far from being a stupid man, and he figured that, with a little manoeuvring, he could get Yaibal out of his hair until the information gathering operation was concluded.
So his mind began to work as he sat there, calmly watching Yaibal, whom he knew would not leave until Nooj had given him a new set of orders. Yaibal would not even question Nooj's silence, opting instead to repeat his obnoxious request/demand for further orders every few minutes. Nooj could plan the entire night away, if he so wished.
As it was, it took only three repetitions for an idea to percolate in his brain.
"Yaibal, what I say to you next is of the utmost gravity. It is not to leave this room. Even under pain of interrogation, you must reveal nothing. Understood? If not, please leave now, and I will find somebody else to do the job."
Even military precision – adopted through five days of observation and reading too many novels though it may have been – could not mask Yaibal's sudden excitement. He even broke his rigid salute and waved his hands wildly. "N-n-no sir! I can do it! Give me a chance, sir-"
Nooj pressed a finger to his lips, exhaling a brief "shhh" that silenced Yaibal and put him back into salute. "Alright. Keep it quiet, as well, as I want this all to be low profile. Intelligence matters. You understand."
Yaibal did. He was trembling with anticipation, a highly visible act that Nooj cocked an eyebrow at.
He looks like he needs to pee. Jeez. Clearing his throat, Nooj began. "I've received reports from my, ahem, forward spies," – no such thing actually existed – "that New Yevon has been mobilizing their forces around our territory. Now, we have no enmity with them at current, but that could quickly change. Our paths are bound to clash in the future, as I'm sure you know."
Yaibal nodded quickly. He looked a little pale at the fictitious news.
"I need somebody to keep an eye on our holdings. And I mean all of our holdings. And beyond somewhat, as I'd like to watch New Yevon, to make sure they keep their grubby paws in Bevelle."
Yaibal looked ready to pass out. He knew his part was coming. Nooj twitched involuntarily while watching him.
"I. . . want you to be this. . . Yaibal?"
It was too late. The Private had fainted dead away, a look of beaming triumph on his eyes. He crumpled onto the floor with a loud slam.
Nooj glanced over the curving side of his desk at Yaibal, blinking. "Driven apoplectic with the desire for duty. Hum." Now afforded a few moments of relative peace, Nooj left Yaibal on the floor, a gently breathing heap, and managed to read his reports for a good twenty minutes before Yaibal came to and sprang up.
"Ready and willing, sir! I won't fail! No sir! What are my mission parameters, sir? Sir! Sir!" Yaibal was ranting with joy, a fact that disconcerted Nooj more than ever.
"Alright, alright, calm down now. . . here's the plan. For the next three weeks, I want you to travel from the Djose Highroad to. . . hm. . . Guadosalam. Back and forth. Patrol everywhere, and keep an eye out for New Yevon troops. Leave no crack untouched. And I mean none. In fact – " he added, removing his glasses to inject a sense of importance into his words, "– implement a Code 92." Nooj settled the tips of his fingers together in front of his nose, watching Yaibal carefully.
Yaibal's face flickered with confusion. "A. . . Code 92, sir?"
Instead of replying, Nooj began to glare at his soldier. His gaze was one of incredible accusation. How dare you not know what a Code 92 is?
Yaibal snapped it up and improvised. "Oh yes! The old, uh, 92! Sir! Understood!"
Nooj nodded. There was no such thing as a Code 92. He was merely stringing the poor sap along. "Very good. I want you to report back in three weeks. Chances are good you should be able to travel that length of road at least twice. No transportation, either: they'll be. . . expecting that." Nooj dragged his last sentence out, indicating a grand conspiracy that involved his hapless sentry. The fact of the matter was, in Nooj's mind, that would be cheating: Yaibal might get bored of flying back and forth on a hover and simply wander back to base. Dedicated, yes: prone to memory lapses out of boredom, yes. If given reason to be paranoid, Yaibal would be alert the entire three weeks, and far from bored.
There was nothing for him to find along that long stretch anyway. Nobody would bother Yaibal, dressed as he was in the standards of the Youth League – which, in many cases, mirrored that of bandits – and, amazingly enough, Yaibal could aptly defend himself from Fiends. Nooj suspected the enthusiastic fop would be searching under rocks and scouting out an enemy that wasn't actually there at the top of trees for the whole time. With any luck, by the time Yaibal returned, several of Nooj's junior officers would have come back from their investigations, and could deal with the nuisance. And, even if not, it gave Nooj a three-week reprieve.
Nooj mentally shook his head. Annoying after only five days of service. I know I said that everybody is allowed in, but, maybe a screening process wouldn't be so bad. . .
Yaibal straightened. His chest puffed out with pride. "I won't fail you, sir. I'll find out what those Yevon dogs are up to! You won't regret giving me this assignment, sir, no sir!"
Nooj rapped his fingers upon the table. "Indeed, I'm sure you won't. You set out first thing in the morning – and make it early, so nobody notices your absence. I don't even so much as want to glimpse on your face: otherwise, I'll deem your espionage skills below par. Understood?"
Yaibal leapt about frantically. "No sir! I mean, yes sir! You won't see me, no sir, not once, sir!" As if to elucidate on the point, he promptly dropped below the level of the desk, all but hidden from view – except for the peak of his cap, which instantly gave the Private away.
Nooj decided to ignore it. "Very. . . effective. Right, you need your sleep. Set out before daybreak. Remember, I don't want to see you for three weeks after you set foot outside of this tent."
Yaibal rose with what Nooj swore to be a loud 'sproing', saluted, thanked his superior – nay, he heaped his praise on – and fled when Nooj waved his hand dismissively. The Meyvn could hear Yaibal's hoots of glee receding into the distance as he made a path to his tent.
Nooj sighed. His eyes were burning. And, yet, a huge weight had been lifted – he would not see Yaibal for three weeks. And that, ladies and gentleman, was something to drink to. Rising steadily from his roughly padded command chair, he poured himself a nice, long shot of rum, and toasted his own accomplishments. "To my victory. . . over a tread-head." He drank, long and hard, savouring the burning sensation as it ran down his throat.
---
The next day, Nooj, watching from the high precipice at the upper level of the command tent, noticed a stealthy Yaibal sneak out of his tent, a pack slung over his shoulder. The young man – obviously over-cautious, yet not looking in any of the right directions – darted back and forth amongst the tents, trying to hide his presence yet remaining directly in Nooj's line of sight.
Nooj sighed heavily, clutching the banister before him. "He's hopeless." The Meyvn retreated back to bed for a good three-hour sleep moments after watching Yaibal trip noisily over a set of pots, vectoring the Private straight into a small pen of sleeping chickens. Yaibal made good his escape, covered in feathers, his passage into the outside world heralded by the panicked shrieks of seven surprised hens.