Chapter Four

Cowboys and Idiots

"So, Squally," asked Irvine pleasantly. "Just what are we going to do now?"

Squall scowled at him as best he could in his current position, but the manoeuvre failed abysmally.

They sat, back to back and handcuffed, on the side of the main road to Timber while some of the local law enforcement officers – five of them, to be exact – closely examined the burned and charred remains of the vehicle they had used to travel from the scene of the massacre.

They were having a considerable lack of success – there wasn't much left of the vehicle.

"Irvine," said Squall as levelly as he could manage, "The next time you want to test out a magical stone that we don't know how to use, could you wait until we aren't in a moving vehicle and being chased by three other cars?"

"I'll do my best Squall, but I'm not guaranteeing anything."

Squall set his teeth and took a deep breath. Quistis. Next time he needed to go so far undercover he could only choose one travelling companion for two months, he would choose Quistis. Instead she was probably sitting quite comfortably in his office in the Garden, taking his calls and doing his paperwork while he was chained to Irvine – Irvine, of all people – sitting without dignity in the mud at the side of the road.

It had all started, as most things do, with something very small. They had been driving along the road to Timber – decided because they needed to change their vehicle and Timber had the most extensive rail network, as well as being closest – and something had made a highway patrol pull them over. That something may have been that the vehicle was covered in blast marks, or that Squall had been driving a little erratically because of the state of the hardware on the truck, but whatever it was didn't really matter now.

What mattered was that Squall had talked them out of the situation – the highway patrolmen were walking back to their car – when Irvine had made some smart arsed comment. Now what that was didn't matter either; the patrolmen heard it, came back to the truck and asked to see some credentials.

So Squall did the only thing he could have at that point – he put his foot all the way down on the accelerator and sped away from the stunned highway patrolmen. He couldn't wait around while the patrolmen decided to take them in (which they would have done, as it was technically a stolen vehicle) so in his eyes at least, running was the only viable option.

And so ensued a high speed chase. The patrolmen called for backup, and two more cars joined the pursuit. Squall had commented in the heat of the moment that they wouldn't be able to lose them in the vehicle they were driving, which had given Irvine the brainwave of using the small, green, magical stone they had retrieved from the black market dealing they had just fled from.

"Trust me, Squall!" he had exclaimed before leaning out of the window slightly. "I know what I'm doing!"

And the rest followed, as far as Squall could determine, the most logical course of events that could have occurred in such a situation. That Irvine wouldn't be able to use the stone wasn't an option, as that wouldn't have been the worst thing that could have happened. No, the stone shone in Irvine's hand, so brightly Squall couldn't see the road. The next thing he felt was an intense, blistering heat build up in the driving compartment and so Squall, again, did the only thing he could have in the situation.

He jumped out of the speeding truck.

Moments later, the truck exploded in a fiery miasma and flipping onto its roof, scraped to a noisy stop on its remaining momentum. Squall, too dazed from the blast and the fall from the vehicle, had been unable to stop the descending highway patrolmen from binding his hands and then tying him to Irvine, who he had almost been unhappy to find had also bailed out of the truck.

And the worst thing about it all? Squall could live with being imprisoned; he could get out of it eventually. He could also live with being stuck with Irvine for another indeterminate amount of time; he could just ignore him. No, the entire purpose for their being out here, the reason they had risked their lives and stumbled on what looked like some kind of black market conspiracy – the small green stone – had been in the truck when it had exploded. Irvine claimed it had been too hot to hold and had let go of it before jumping out.

And so Squall, in one of the few moments when he could accurately sum up his mood in five words or less, was royally pissed off.

He glared at an approaching highway patrolman, looking very pleased with himself.

"Well, you boys seem to be in a little spot of trouble now, don't you?" he asked cheerfully.

"Hey, we're - ugh!" shouted Irvine as Squall violently elbowed him in the kidney. The less they said to these low level officers, the better in the long run.

"Don't want to talk to me? Well, that's okay. I'd rather you didn't anyhow. Don't like mixing with miscreants."

Squall glared again in reply and the officer got the idea. He gestured to one of his colleagues and together they picked up the two prisoners.

Walking side by side and still chained to Irvine, Squall had a momentary epiphany. He had risked his life and the lives of the people he loved to save this world, and here he was, surrounded by low level grunts, being arrested for someone else's gross stupidity. It just wasn't fair. Not only had he failed in his mission, but he was suffering the greatest indignity he could think of as a result.

"Well," said Irvine, sounding just as dejected as Squall. "I guess it could be worse."

Something inside Squall snapped. He launched himself at Irvine as best he could manage – his hands were tied behind his back, and his right arm tied to Irvine's left – and they tumbled to the ground, Squall doing his best to inflict lots of pain upon his partner in crime.

"How could it be worse?" he shouted as the highwaymen tried to split them up, failing as they were tied together. "How?"

"We could be dead, Squall! Dead!"

Suddenly the fight went out of him. He just lay limp on the floor and let the officers pick him up, immediately after which they untied the two men in case of a repeat performance.

"What the hell is the matter with you, Squall?" asked Irvine, looking very angry. Squall didn't dignify him with an answer. They reached one of the cars and were unceremoniously dumped into the back seat. One of the officers clambered into the front, pulling away from the crash scene leaving his colleagues going over the wreckage.

As they were pulling away, Squall happened to be looking at the destroyed truck. Out of the corner of his eye he saw one of the officers produce a small, green object from the debris. They had pulled away before he could confirm what it was, though.

Three long, so unbearably long, hours later, Squall sat in a prison cell next to the one Irvine occupied. They had been searched, processed and questioned. Having said nothing, Squall was returned to his cell and now they awaited further questioning at an undetermined future time.

After he was absolutely sure no-one could overhear their conversation, Squall turned to Irvine through the steel bars of his captivity. "It's still in one piece. I saw them take it out of the wreckage."

"Wow, that's great," retorted Irvine.

"Look Irvine, don't start."

"I'm not starting," said Irvine, standing up. "I was just impressed at your ability to have completely useless information…" He started shaking and jumping up and down on the spot while Squall looked on in morbid fascination. "…While I…"

A set of keys dropped into his handcuffed palm.

"…Have far more useful material possessions," he grinned.

"How did you…? No, don't answer that question."

"Why, scared you'll be impressed further?"

"No, I can guess when you got them; I just don't want to know where you kept them while they searched you."

Irvine shrugged and started jiggling the keys around in his palm.

Squall sat in silent contemplation. If they had found the stone then it stood to reason they would have brought it back to the station with them for study or at least evidence against them. This was bad insofar that it implicated them in being involved in the black market dealing, but good that they could grab it when they inevitably escaped.

The catch on Irvine's handcuffs gave a sharp clink and he held up his unbound hands for Squall to see.

The door to the corridor outside their cell block clanged open.

Squall's mind raced into overdrive. He lunged to the bars and whispered tensely to Irvine, "Give me fifteen minutes and then break out of the cell. I'll meet you in the storage room."

Squall trusted Irvine's memory stretched to when they had visited Timber's police headquarters five months ago.

The door was thrown open just as Irvine sat down on his bench with his hands clasped behind his back.

It was the same highwayman as before, the same smug look on his face.

"You," he said pointing at Irvine. "Come with me."

"Wait," said Squall. The highwayman glanced at him. "I'm ready to talk."

"Well alright then, you can come with me instead."

He led Squall down the cramped corridor and to the small, windowless room and sat him down at the chair he had previously sat in. Handcuffed to the floor via a metal bar, Squall could only gaze intently at his interrogator. He sat opposite him across the bare table.

"So."

"So," repeated Squall.

"You want to tell me what you were doing driving a stolen vehicle, that's owned by a top military organization, by the way, and with what intent?"

"I don't want to, but I seem to have forced myself into a position where I have to explain."

"That's right. So you either talk to me and I'll help you out, or I'll have to go and get my superior. And let me tell you, he's not in the best of moods this afternoon." He leaned forward conspiratorially. "Marital problems, I reckon."

Squall stared stonily back at this sore excuse for an interrogation. "Why don't you do that?"

The highwayman took a second to realise what had just been said, and then the smugness dropped out of his face. "You'll be sorry, kid."

"We'll see," replied Squall.

The patrolman shuffled out of the room, leaving Squall alone.

A set of keys dropped into his handcuffed palm.

He huffed as he fidgeted with the loop of metal in his hands. Trust Irvine to take advantage of the exact same situation as him, and get exactly the same result. Now there were two highwaymen somewhere in the station or back on patrol sans a pair of handcuff keys, the two who had split up the fight between the two prisoners.

His handcuffs snapped open, much to his chagrin, about the same time after Irvine had started trying keys out. He would have to write this one off as a draw.

He picked up his chair and took it to behind the door just as it swung open, concealing him from the rest of the room. Two men walked in and then stopped, surprised by the lack of a prisoner sitting at the table.

Squall threw the door shut and swung the chair down onto the smug highwayman's head, and he crumbled to the ground unconscious. The older, more respectable looking of the two turned to face the now free Squall with fear in his eyes.

"I don't want to hurt you," said Squall. "But if you don't help me out I'll have no other choice."

The police superior nodded slowly.

Squall walked ahead of the superior, his hands clasped behind his back. The plan was to make it look like the officer was escorting him elsewhere in the station and damned if it wasn't working.

They approached their destination. "Open it," instructed Squall, motioning towards the door with his head. The officer unlocked the door to the storage room and walked inside.

Squall heard a small metallic snap and then the officer stopped dead in his tracks. He walked into the room to see a shadowy looking Irvine perched on a crate just behind the door, in much the same position Squall had ambushed his captors from. He was also pointing a gun at the officer's head.

"It's okay," said Squall. "I'll take care of it." The officer got one more fearful look before Squall brought his fist down into the back of his head. He collapsed to the floor, motionless.

"It's not okay actually," said Irvine. "I've checked this place out and other than this," he said as he passed Squall's gunblade to him, "There's not much that isn't locked away in safes or those big fancy display cabinets."

Squall sighed in resignation. He hadn't expected it to be easy, but he was getting tired of all of these delays. "Do you at least know where it is?"

"Uh huh, follow me."

Irvine led his superior through the dark, mazelike room of storage crates and safety boxes built into the wall. After half a minute they reached a wall of boxes with windows built into them. In one, Squall saw the stone shining cheerfully through.

"Dammit," whispered Squall. He approached the wall, intent on breaking the box open.

"No!" said Irvine. "If you try and force it open the alarm goes off. You need a key and a thumbprint, as well as the right code to open this puppy."

"How do you know all that?"

"Some of us were paying attention when we visited here last time," retorted Irvine.

Touché, thought Squall. "Alright, well we have our thumbprint, let's check him for keys."

A search of the officer yielded no results.

Squall sat against a crate thoughtfully. They couldn't stay here any longer, but they couldn't leave the stone either. If they couldn't take it with them then they had to destroy it before they went. But, they couldn't get into the box in order to do so. Suddenly he glanced at Irvine.

"See if you can get it to break."

"What?"

"You got it to do something before, and we can't leave it here with the police. We have to get out of here so if we can't take it with us you'll have to see if you can break it."

"How am I supposed to do that?" whispered Irvine incredulously.

"I don't know, try it out."

Irvine sighed, and even though the request was so ridiculous he knew Squall wasn't joking. "Fine," he muttered dejectedly. "But for the record, this is a stupid idea."

He walked to the safety box with the stone in, and looked sheepishly at the ceiling. "Break," he muttered.

"Come on, you can do better than that," said Squall.

Irvine glared at him. "Break," he said again. Nothing happened.

"Come on, you stupid stone, break!" It sat in the box, apparently content to stay that way. "Break!" said Irvine intently.

He turned to Squall. "See? I told you it -"

Suddenly a bright light shone from inside the box, and Squall heard an odd noise. If he had to try and classify it, it would be the sound that stone would make if it was tearing. Then, the box and its immediate neighbours cracked open as they petrified and crumbled to dust before the two astonished men's eyes.

Squall put his hand into the mound of dust and produced the stone, which had remained unharmed from its second magical strike. "Stupid idea?" he asked Irvine, but he wasn't paying attention. Instead, he carefully picked up a fragment of stone from the pile of dust.

"Look, it has writing on it. It must have been a bit of paper in with the stone."

"What does it say?"

"It's just a couple of numbers. I don't know what they mean."

"I do," said Squall. "They're lines of longitude and latitude. I'm a bit rusty but they should be just outside Deling City."

"Great, Galbadians acting up again. You'd think they have a problem with the rest of the world."

"We don't know that yet. We should go and check it out, though."

"Yeah, yeah. We should. We need to get out of here first."

"Just a second." Squall bent to retrieve the file the officer he'd kidnapped had been carrying. "It might help to know what they know."

"Yeah. And it just so happens…" Irvine trailed off, pointing to the wall just above his head. An air vent hung open. Squall smiled grimly.

"Let's go."