Author's Note:
This chapter is a pretty important one for the story because it's the one I need some reader feedback for (if you're feeling generous, of course). In this chapter we are introduced to three potential new characters, and my question is whether we should aggressively follow these new characters or return to the pre-existing ones in order to further explore their stories in greater detail. Either way they'll be involved, but the question is are they interesting enough to take screen-time away from the classic line-up?
We're also introduced to one of my favourite bits of FF VIII lore, that of Adel's signal. The notion of a Sorceress being so powerful that she can blot out the radio signals of an entire planet while essentially in a medically induced coma really speaks to the quite reasonable fear of them that people have.
It also emphasizes the importance of an organisation like SeeD as a bunch of normies working to keep these Goddess-like beings in check. I mean Edea was a sweet old lady who ended up taking over a superpower and igniting a World War in the course of about a month, and Ultimecia had the power to compress the entire space-time continuum down into a single point and create a bubble of livable space in the middle of it.
You can see why people get nervous around them, you know?
Time Compression -3 years, 4 months, 14 days:
The winking lights of the Presidential Palace could be seen from anywhere in the city, but Halborn liked them best from right here. He was stationed up on the roof of the Cielmata Observatory, one of nearly two dozen installations all across the city that turned their eyes towards the heavens.
The constant glow of the city made these observatories practically useless for observing the stars or other celestial phenomena, but that didn't matter a jot. What they were looking at was close by enough that they wouldn't lose sight of it… The trooper winked with his right eye and watched his overlay convert to thermal viewing. He cast an eye over the districts below, watching as the thermal blooms gave an otherworldly mien to the already bizarre technicolor anthill.
Esther hummed with the light of a billion people going about their business in blissful prosperity, and Halborn watched it with a contented smile hidden behind his helmet. An image of unmarked transport trucks rolling through empty streets bubbled up and ruined it for him, and the smile was washed away.
He tried to focus on the sky above him, but he heard doors being kicked in and little girls crying in confusion…
"Evening, Captain."
An anonymous soldier in regulation power armour effortlessly scrambled up the sheer glass of the observatory's lower floors. Halborn's HUD identified the trooper as Eleseff Bala, a relatively new addition to his unit. She was… enthusiastic.
"Bala."
He responded stiffly, still a little shaken. He and a lot of the older troopers had 'moments' like this, but it wouldn't do to let the new girl know about them. They had all informally agreed that stuff about… the past should stay with the Old Guard. They didn't need to poison the minds of the next generation. Halborn took his responsibilities to the young seriously…
"I take it that the perimeter is clear?"
Bala saluted happily, her axe affixed to her back for optimum climbing traction.
"Yes, Sir! All faces of the building are secure."
"Same as they were 20 minutes ago…" Halborn thought tiredly.
Lots of younger recruits were like this, full of beans but quick to get bored with the very workaday conditions of their job. There wasn't much adventure in the New Esther, and the police rarely responded to anything more calamitous than the odd Black Friday shopper's quarrel…
"Thank you, Bala. Why don't you take a minute before you inevitably make another pass…"
It should have been impossible for an armoured beetle-face to convey disappointment, but somehow the young trooper seemed to positively radiate it as she took her place in the small security office they were sharing. He recovered some of his smile at her boredom and tried to remember if he had ever been that energetic. As she fidgeted in her armour while he got comfortable he determined that he could not have.
After a minute or so, it seemed the younger officer could no longer contain herself.
"Sir... why do we have to guard this place, anyway? Surely there are targets that are worth more than some old telescope?"
Halborn was glad (not for the first time) that nobody could see you roll your eyes in power armour.
"The Observatories are to be observed and maintained at all times, Bala. The Tomb of the Sorceress needs to be monitored constantly to detect any changes in its condition or orbit. You know that already."
Bala seemed unconvinced by his answer, and Halborn reasoned that he might have felt the same thing if their positions were reversed.
"But isn't that what the Lunar Base is for? Adel's being monitored by everyone there 24 hours a day. Surely these telescopes aren't any use compared to them?"
Halborn mentally weighed the pros and cons of getting into this particular debate before answering. On the one hand he hated talking about anything to do with the Sorceress, but on the other hand this did seem like the sort of thing she should be aware of… He had to admit that he found it deeply uncomfortable whenever someone younger than him used her real name…
When he was that age it was known that you never dared to speak the Sorceress' name out loud.
Eventually the desire to educate won out, and Halborn switched on the portable TV he used to watch his soaps on slow nights.
"You ever have a TV like this? They probably don't make 'em anymore."
Bala looked at the old TV set as if it had been unearthed from the ancient Centran ruins instead of Halborn's satchel. Instead of connecting it up to the cable socket in the wall, he popped out a metal antenna array with a button on the side. The TV beeped angrily and the screen flickered to life, showing a scrolling mass of random numbers and letters.
"You know what that is, Bala?"
She nodded her armoured head and Halborn continued, scanning the junk data for the bits he knew were coming up.
"See, that's the signal coming down from the Sorceress' Tomb up there in space. It's so damn strong that there isn't a single place on the planet you can use a radio or a TV transmitter without having to drown this stuff out."
He traced lines of junk data with his finger and beckoned her closer.
"Come in close and have a look, you might miss it otherwise…"
Bala knelt down on one knee and brought her face up to the screen, with a hiss he heard her helmet open and she placed it gingerly under one arm. Halborn noticed with something approaching dismay that she looked even younger than he thought she was…
"Any second now… See, most people assume that all the static is a by-product of the Tomb's functions. A sort of dampening field to ensure that the Sorceress stays mentally… uh… switched off. Brain-dead, so to speak…"
He saw some of the tell-tale signs that the other Old Guard boys knew to look for, it wouldn't be long now…
"Only… That ain't strictly true. See, the signal isn't a function of the Tomb, or Lunar Base, or of anything else we might happen to have up… There!"
He darted an armoured finger to a line of code that crept up from the bottom of the screen. Bala squinted to follow it, stared for a second and then nearly leapt clean out of her skin. She rocketed away from the television and hit the opposite wall in a crash of limbs, her helmet rolled away into the corner. Halborn didn't even flinch.
"Yeah, it has that effect on people…"
He looked at the girl's eyes, which were wide with panic and confusion.
"You're a mean old man, Halborn…" he thought to himself as he walked over to pick up the discarded helmet, he dusted it off with one hand and held it out to her.
"Here, put your helmet back on, kid."
She was still staring in horror at the little TV screen which continued to dribble out code, seemingly unaware of its own transgressions.
utwFG3912FFENTjgffwjxobyrq99ctneaxcjjwrn321mbFedkbBkySSawnjvbogajwnrvu3hj1F2i34offvka35obccskwk45+&fjwwrobjcvgidgidlwoer44392945idwowermrea0c96m4FSWRSqmmwekfodksr9391839f9vkc_IWILLNEVERLETYOUFORGETABOUTME_#fj492sjv842kakxjctotowkqoskckvoitoktyo5m3cvo05k6guvwmqpoyib3i49bszxcoblpwo10293jcmdkiern483njac8j59mwkncjr9khobdirhrgvxzbhyxvbhtscvfhnuj654d23r45y6dvt4rdazxerkmsqiwck0rmwivjirjwmqw392912k391kcdikvmitoqkd93n58vn52k34umfk3ij5n6k4vkr4j42jndnvjrkalkfmv4o24j3ksdnrjti234jgmti608mdmfr43e21ejskvntsdnvkscvrkyobd494mgi5kfkndivntsmdv95j6jnnfksnejsjdgnrtk3
Time Compression +10 years, 2 months, 8 days:
The afternoon was gloriously sunny as Squall rotated his elbow to release the tension from his wrist. Around him lay the panting, exhausted bodies of 40 students. To a chorus of groans and stifled sobs he withdrew a handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed his brow in a workmanlike fashion. He silently gave the blade and handle a very quick dust-down before securing it to his hip-harness. When he spoke, it was without heavy breathing or any outward sign of exertion (something he knew would have an emasculating effect on the newly-chastened students).
"Now, have we learned anything important today, class?"
Some of the groans got momentarily louder as the more vocal of the students debated whether to answer the inhuman monster that had just kicked seven bells out of the lot of them. After a moment, the more lucid students murmured the mantra he had been beating into them for the past half-hour.
"While Instructor Trepe may have many positive qualities as both a teacher and a person, it behooves us to defer to the wisdom of Instructor Leonhart in matters pertaining to the Gunblade…"
They spoke in halting unison, ever-so-slightly out of sync with one another. If Squall were a man of less self-restraint, he would have openly giggled at their sullen delivery. He regretted not making a recording of that moment of supreme triumph to show Quistis later.
He allowed himself a thin smile before casting his eye over the recovering student body.
"Very good! However, it did take you three attempts, so I would recommend writing it down somewhere. Now! Most of you have won the prize of being judged bloody useless with a Gunblade, so you win an afternoon with your beloved Commanding Officer Mr Foxfort."
This elicited a further groan of dismay from the students and a raucous belly-laugh from their CO, who clapped his meaty hands together in anticipation of further trauma. Squall scanned the bruised crowd for the ones he had mentally picked out during the 'fight'.
"However, you, you and you are to stay right here."
Three very sore looking students pulled themselves up to a standing position and gingerly fell into line in front of him. He took a moment to appraise them in a non-combat setting.
The girl on the left was a good head-and-a-half taller than Squall and had the muscle-mass to go along with it, she looked Trabian if Squall was any judge… Wherever she was from, she clearly had some sort of background in soldiering. Maybe one of the Mountaineer Regiments? No, too young… He put the thought to the back of his mind for now.
The boy in the middle was dejectedly trying to pull his hair back into whatever ridiculous 'style' he had placed it in before being ground into the dirt. He gave every impression of being a melodramatic pretty boy with delusions of grandeur, but Squall was best friends with Irvine Kinneas so who was he to judge?
The other boy was so scrawny Squall marvelled at his ability to stand still without being carried off by an errant breeze… Nevertheless, he had held and swung that Gunblade like a pro at times, more consistently than anyone else on the field at least… Now if he could just get the kid to stop staring at him…
He stood in front of them and made a point of striding up and down once or twice to look them over.
"Right… First-things-first: You're here because out of the whole class the three of you seem to be the only ones who can follow instructions. I like that."
He stood in front of the girl, who stared straight ahead in a textbook at-ease position. Squall noticed with growing consternation that 'straight ahead' translated to 'somewhere above her Instructor's head' in this case.
"You. What's your name?"
The student didn't move an inch as she answered.
"Bascombe, Tula. Sir!"
Squall visibly rolled his eyes at all the faux-military posturing, but pressed on regardless.
"Do you know why I picked you out?"
That broke her out of formation instantly, and she looked at him with barely disguised shock. Squall recognised a textbook "Nobody said there would be questions!" look.
"Uhh… no, Sir. I don't believe I do… Was I… better than the other candidates?"
Squall eyebrows knitted in sympathy.
"No Bascombe, you were terrible. Demonstrably worse than most of your colleagues."
He strode over to the unopened Gunblade cases and grabbed one of the B-Patterns that he had stashed away for this unlikely eventuality. Her mouth was still a rictus of shock and dismay when he returned.
"However, I noticed that you're heavily favouring your right hand, and this is a two-handed weapon. You're throwing off your own aim when you move. I want you to try this one out."
He popped the clasps on the case and pulled out a one-handed Automatic-Pattern Gunblade, swapping the heavy two-hander for the nimbler automatic.
"You ever fence, Bascombe?"
"N… no, Sir." She stammered, holding the blade as if it would go off in her hands.
"I had a colleague who took fencing lessons in secret for over six years. Said it was the secret to success with this weapon. He was good too, see this?"
Squall pointed to the scar on his nose for effect. Bascombe seemed to get a light in her eyes, her soldierly bearing demolished by the comparison to an actual SeeD!
"Don't get too excited, he was deeply unpleasant… and don't think I'm just saying that because he tried to murder me four or five times…"
Squall watched the girl's heavy shoulders slump and set to work teaching her the basic positions. He sent her off to one of the training dummies as he turned to the next recruit.
"Alright, what about you then… Name?"
The aspiring hair-model smiled toothily and gave a mocking version of Bascombe's salute.
"Jat Kolem, Boss. Say, can I get one of those nifty automatics too? Don't seem no fair at all that Tula gets all the fun toys."
"Ugh… He evens sounds like Kinneas." Squall thought to himself as he shot the boy a look of dry condescension.
"No. You're not fast or strong enough. You want the two-hander for the precision. Head over there, work on your foot-patterns and show me what you can do when we put the trigger in play."
He reached into a pouch on his belt and retrieved six large bullets, dumping them unceremoniously into Jat's open hand. With a handwave he dismissed the boy and turned to his final charge.
The boy was as silent as he had been this whole time, holding the Gunblade over his shoulder in the way that Squall himself liked to do sometimes.
"Zan Thosfort, at your service Commander Leonhart."
Squall had to bite back the urge to wince. As unlikely as it was, he did occasionally get recognised...
He didn't care for it.
"Alright, alright… None of that 'Commander' stuff, ok? Instructor will do for now…"
Zan nodded thoughtfully, clearly attempting to attribute some deeper meaning into a very simple request.
"Understood, Instructor."
The boy's voice was calm to the point of clipped, and Squall tried not to think about how familiar the tone was.
"Right, well… You've studied the Gunblade at some point I see, but if I'm not wrong this is your first time actually holding one, yes?"
The boy nodded curtly. If he was surprised by Squall's insight, he didn't show it.
"Right, well I'm just going to make a couple of slight adjustments to your stances. Whatever book you're reading it was written with someone taller and thicker than you in mind."
He went through some minor adjustments and sent the boy over to a training dummy. He noticed the lumbering CO making his way over with a field radio in one hand.
"Call for you, Instructor. Routed through G."
Squall acknowledged him with a nod and took the boxy radio in hand. He tapped the chunky button on the side twice and it crackled to life. A slightly distorted voice he recognised as his Chief Adjutant Xu came through.
"Commander, we have a priority dispatch. You're requested to rendezvous with one of our clients at G and await further instructions."
Rendezvous at G? Galbadia Garden is strictly off-limits to anyone who isn't involved in the conf-...
Oh.
"Copy Xu, please inform my wife that this request would legally qualify as nepotism and thus will be handled by one of the personnel already on site."
Xu's response was almost instantaneous.
"Our client has advised that accusations of nepotism are unfounded, as the terms of your contract stipulate that you are to make yourselves permanently available to her, and I quote: 'Until Timber gains its independence'. She notes that Timber is still a governed territory of the Galbadian Republic, Sir."
Squall took a moment to huff.
"Xu, am I getting predictable?"
If Xu laughed, she did so with the channel closed.
"I can have an Albatross in the air within 8 minutes, Sir."
Squall creased his brow with irritation.
"At today's gas prices, Xu? I have a rental car, thank you. Tell her I'll be there in an hour or so. I'll be bringing some Auxes with me, so have the personnel officer find somewhere to stuff them for me, will you?"
"Understood, Sir. Central Out."
The radio shut itself off and he handed it back to the CO who was lighting up a new cheroot with a look of true contentment on his face.
"Bowing out, Sir?"
Squall nodded and patted his sides to ensure he had all of his things in order.
"Afraid so, Foxfort. I'm taking those three with me as well, make sure their families are informed."
"Right-o, Sir. See you in a day or so?"
"I expect so, but if not I'll make sure they're returned to you in due course."
He shook the CO's hand and walked back to his three recruits. He noted with interest that Tula's training dummy was hacked into several discrete sections, Zan's was the recipient of several surgically precise slash-wounds, and Jat's was blown clean in half.
"They'll do for a start…" He thought to himself.