CHAPTER IX: Always a Bloody Owl (I)

It was her emerald green eyes staring back at me when I finally awoke in the flesh. Selphie was there, poising herself over me like a fretful mother, her face a conglomeration of emotions that were both undistinguishable and unfamiliar to me. I stood up and the sensation of pins and needles ran down my body in one fleeting ripple, unsettling my bones and sickening my stomach. Zell was still here too, and he had that usual glaze of stupor on his face. Something held him deep in speculation, and I knew without a doubt he was wondering the cause of our rolling blackouts. But that look on his face— it made him appear as though whatever he was thinking about had long ago spoiled and was stewing in a broth of expired rationalizations. Do I really consider him dumb? Of course not; he's just Zell.

Eventually he spoke up, only to have us discover we all had the same 'vision:' the three soldiers in the acreage; the Galbadian Hotel; the passionate pianist; and the gallant soldier named Laguna who appeared "handsome," "strong," and ardent, according to Selphie. Actually, her description of him made me contemplate whether or not I had the same dream as her at all—I dreamt he was a moron.

We exited the train, promising not to speak about our phenomenon until we completed our mission. I reassured Selphie that I would relay the occurrence to Headmaster Cid upon our return if nothing else; she was adamant about it for whatever reason, tugging on the collar of my coat until I finally assented to its significance. Honestly though, I didn't think it was significant at all. It made the whole situation, our first mission as SeeD, too weird and unexplainable. If we let it cloud our priorities now, we'll appear unprofessional and déclassé as mercenaries of Balamb Garden.

What was it about this town that emanated repression? Nothing about Timber felt animate or alive, not even the people. The architecture of the nearby buildings were erect but dismal, their walls decaying with untended cracks and stale paint that had been chipped away from years of disregard. Everything radiated conformity and neglect: the tedium of disheveled citizens as they ambled by, their faces wilted and wrinkled by the weight of poverty and disease; the condition of the crossways on which they walked, burnished by the dribble of unclaimed bags of trash that made the streets slick with grease; and the unkempt man in front of us, his voice damaged and baritone under a slur of raspy jargon. "The forests of Timber sure have changed," He muttered, his attention ostensibly seized by the illustrations of a map he gripped with trembling and calloused hands.

"But the owls are still around," I replied.

He looked up at me, as if these words weren't intended for him. He nodded, folding the crinkled map and placing it in the crevice of his armpit. And then: "Follow me," he had demanded, pulling the brim of his hat down so that his eyes were thoroughly concealed.

We were led across a series of train tracks until finally arriving at a detached locomotive. Allegedly, it was their hideout. I wasn't sure how you could manage a big yellow diesel train for a 'hideout,' but apparently they did. Inside the cabin, the man explained his initial uneasiness when he had met us at the station—namely, the reason behind his trembling hands. He had a partner –named Watts—who was missing, presumed to have been captured and killed by those they were resisting: the Galbadian Republic. But that wasn't the case. He wasn't dead. He was just careless. A few minutes after we arrived, and just a few moments before we had finished our introductions, Watts had arrived, asserting that he had forgotten their latest location and had been lost for, as he put it, 'the whole damn day.' Mind you, their 'latest location' has remained unchanged for the past two months. I didn't care the reason; I just didn't want to waste time.

"As I was saying, I'm Squall, the squad leader. This is Selphie, and Zell," I repeated, quicker and less emphatic than before. They introduced themselves as well: Zone and Watts. I didn't pay much mind to Watts though; he was a kid, probably around his early teenage years and closer to thirteen than sixteen. He looked at me. I looked away. I couldn't help it. There was no way I was going to take a twelve year old who hadn't even gone through puberty seriously. Zone was much older though, mid thirties I'd say— scruffy beard and brawny forearms that peeked out from the frayed sleeves of his tattered shirt attested to his age.

Zone crossed his arms, removing his cap and placing it aside. "We're one of the many resistance factions within Timber seeking independence from Galbadia. Since their occupation here, Timber ain't even a shell of what it once was. Everything's gone'ta shit, including my health," He managed to choke his words out quickly, overcome by a coughing spell. He recovered, wiping his forearm across his mouth. "But our resistance, 'The Forest Owls,' will be forever known in the pages a' Timber's independence! Now that you're here, and with the impeccable strategy we three've devised, Timber's at the forefront of a complete revolution!"

'A complete revolution?' It's never that easy. I found myself inadvertently allowing my thoughts to supersede his string of self-encouraging dialogue, so I digressed: "The three of you?"

'Yes," He answered, "Our princess is sleeping though."

"It's the princesses' nap time, sir," Watts chimed, flashing an unwarranted smile in my direction.

"Ugh, man…" Zone said, scratching his head and crossing his arms. "Hey Squall, sorry, but could you go get the princess? She's in the last room, up those stairs. She's been waiting a long time for SeeD and I think it would be appropriate for you to do the honors of waking her."

His face irritated me, or maybe it was his gumption at requesting something so wasteful from us. We were here to fight, to aid his group in a fight for independence from Galbadia; not run menial tasks.

"…Were we hired to run errands?" I asked, a slight growl creeping in the undertone of my voice. He didn't answer, but the shock of my question had scraped a look of awe across his face from one cauliflower ear to the other. "Well?" I asked again.

"A-Are ya angry!?" It was clear he didn't mean to offend us. But we were SeeD… Special forces. Not gophers.

"This is the last time for this kind of thing," I'd replied— I didn't like being anyone's errand boy. Making my way down the narrow corridor of the train, I thought about this mission—or rather, why Cid would send us to a group like this. They clearly couldn't even afford a decent hideout. SeeD didn't come cheap; Cid must have practically given the three of us to them. And for what? To give us a taste and warm us up for 'real' SeeD missions? I didn't want to think about it. It was too annoying to contemplate on.

All in all, I felt an even greater gush of disheartenment as I turned the corner, entering through the ruffle of a pink door curtain, confronted by a wide array of pink décor. It looked as if a bomb had gone off—a bomb full of pink paint and Victorian designs. Pink wooden chairs, pink drapes, pink rugs against pink carpet, and there lied before me, on top of pink sheets, a creature that appeared so delicate and so light that I could just whip her off the bed and onto the floor with one swift yank of the sheets. I didn't have time for this.

Although I wouldn't have ever done it, my impulse to wake her must have been pretty strong, because she sat up suddenly, but slowly, wiping her eyes of newly-waken tears. I didn't recognize her at first, and then it hit me, half as suddenly as it hit her.

"Hey… You're…!" She paused, her once sleepy face filled with utter excitement. "You know!" She exclaimed, "From the party! We danced together!" She climbed to the edge of her bed. I noticed a pair of white embroidered angel wings on that back of her blue rib-knit duster sweater that draped off the corner of the bed as she crawled forward. "So… does that mean… You're a SeeD!?"

I nodded. "I'm Squall, the squad leader. There are two others with me."

She started to talk, found she couldn't, and sprung from the gaudy pink recesses of her bed sheets. She ran into me, wrapping her arms tightly around my neck. I suppressed the urge to sigh, deep behind my lips.

"Take it easy."

"It's just that, I'm so happy! I've been sending requests to Garden forever, but nothing changed…" She reached across her body, grasping at her own arm. "I'm so glad I spoke to Cid directly!"

I thought back to that night she had asked me to dance, and the way she walked off suddenly, without explanation. Someone other than me may have considered it rude; but, at the time, I think I considered it a blessing. It made answering Selphie's peeping questions much more bearable to ignore later on.

"So, you were looking for the Headmaster at the party?" I was beginning to understand her a little more. Up until she laughed, waving her hand in front of her, as if to swat off my assumption from her presence like you would a fly.

"You know Seifer?" She asked.

His name alone made me swell with inner malice. But for a moment, I think I might have felt a whimper of pity for him. And so I answered her, but with an unintentional tone of apathy: "…Yeah." She didn't catch it.

"Well, he's the one who introduced me Cid," She replied, "Cid is such a nice man. I really didn't think SeeD would come out to help a measly little group like us; but, after explaining our situation to him, Cid gave the go right away! And now, now that you guys are here, we'll be able to carry out all kinds of plans!"

I have this habit of drowning people out when they start talking about the future as if they know what's going to happen. Which is what she was doing: assuming SeeD would solve all her problems and deliver Timber to their independence just by our presence and aid to her little faction. It was a childish notion, and to put it bluntly, pretty immature.

"Let's go back to the others," I insisted.

She shuffled in place, peering first into her mirror before stretching her spandex shorts down away from her butt and fluffing her breasts. "Um," She paused, "Squall, is 'he' here?"

Who is she talking about? Cid? Seifer?

As if she had read my mind: "Seifer," She said.

"….. No, he's not a SeeD." However, he is an asshole. I kept that last bit to myself.

"Oh…" Her voice lost its spark, like the smoldering of dying embers after a sweep of rain washes over it. She shifted in place before stepping forward. "By the way, I'm Rinoa. Very pleased to meet you, Squall," Her tone lifted, "SeeD members dance quite well, don't they?" She teased, peering up at me like a puppy that's just finished chewing up your last pair of good shoes.

"Approach your target inconspicuously at a dance party... There may be missions requiring this sort of subterfuge. It's expected of SeeD to learn various skills. Whether or not to display your skill involves situational awareness and your mission's intentions." That was lie. Well, sort of. SeeD candidates are required to take several elective courses prior to candidacy. It was just that, ballroom dancing wasn't one of the electives I had chosen, or even remotely considered for that matter. Ballroom dancing was just… whatever.

"Oh…" She exclaimed, "So you didn't really want to dance with me? That's too bad. I guess I wasn't good enough looking for you…" Her voice drifted, as if wanting me to coax it back with words of sentiment and care. Fishing for compliments? Yeah… not biting.

She cocked her eyebrow and placed her hand against her hip. She knew she was pretty; she didn't need my reinforcement. After all, she had Seifer's attention. Everyone knows that a guy like him goes by looks. To girls, he was like a 'trophy boyfriend,' I guess. An "I'm-gorgeous-enough-for-Seifer" trophy.

As we made our way back to the others, Zone's voice came within range, and I wondered, just for a moment, if he had lost his voice from disease or just talking too much—probably the latter. Bits and pieces of the conversation bounced down the hallway towards Rinoa and me until they fell together in one strand of semi-intelligible dialogue.

"So, why do you call yourselves the ''Forest Owls'?" Zell asked. "Sounds pretty sissy to me."

"We're fighting an entire government and their military. We can't just up and fight 'em; they'd crush us and Timber would end up worse than it already is. So, we have learned to be patient observers, like the owl. We watch carefully from the crevices of safety: gathering intelligence; attacking in short spurts when the time is right; and laying low, forever aware of our surroundings, like the turn of the owl's neck, so that nothing can surprise us."

We, Rinoa and I, appeared in the rusted doorframe of the cabin. I was in front of her, but Zone seemed to stare right through me to Rinoa, with a gaze concentrated enough to burn a hole through my sternum.

"But Rinoa," He continued, "Rinoa is our chickadee: small, passionate, and beautiful, armed with a'lotta fight and one hell of an indomitable spirit!" His words caused an earnest, reluctant smile to spread across her lips, as she, shuffling down the couple steps in front of us, eagerly introduced herself to Zell and Selphie.

Strategy. Let's talk strategy. That's all I wanted. There was no need for formalities or introductions. After all, when we've done our jobs here as SeeDs, their names won't be matter, or their faces. They'll just be one more blurred memory of a job well done that'll eventually get erased under a myriad of future missions.

Zone pulled us into the next room, excited to divulge their faction's carefully strategized plan.

"It all started when we gotta hold of top-secret info from Galbadia," He paused, acknowledging the fact that Watts had obtained the information all on his own, despite his age. He continued, "There's a V.I.P. from Galbadia coming to Timber. And when I say V.I.P., I'm talking about Vinzer Deling: our archenemy, the scumbag president of Galbadia." I watched as Zone swelled with anger, his forearms rippled with veins like a roadmap of torpid rivers, careening up his neck and across his temple, framing his left eye. Rinoa intervened.

"President Deling is taking a private train from the Galbadian capital," She picked up, "Our plan is to—"

"…Blow it to smithereens with a rocket launcher!?" Selphie asked, dancing in place. They weren't sure how to answer her, so she continued: "Rebuild the tracks so that the train runs into a bottomless pit!? Place a cute puppy in their path so that they have to stop!? –And then, we grab the president and tickle-torture him until he surrenders his role as a dictator and lets Timber go?! Or how about—"

"Whoa little missy! Not quite!" Zone rebutted nervously at Selphie's erratic inquiry.

"So get to the point! Just tell us what to do!" Zell yelled, taking an aggressive stance from the corner of the room where, to my surprise, he had been listening quietly up until now.

"Plain and simple guys," Rinoa started, clapping her hands together, "We'll position ourselves next to the presidential cabin along one of the parallel tracks that runs from here, to here." She moved over to a table where two model trains and a blueprint of the train yard laid spread across the table. "We'll have about five minutes to switch the presidential cabin with our life-size replicate model. Don't worry how right now, we've got the technological side of things handled, we just need able bodies to make the switch…" Her voice drifted, unsure if we would be capable of train walking. We were.

She read our faces. "Ok, good," She continued, "Our ultimate goal is to seize the president in his car and attach it to our base, which is what you're standing in now. Like I said, we have a dummy car hooked behind us, so what that means, is that we'll have to switch our 'dummy cabin' with the presidential cabin. Since we can't uncouple the cars directly, we'll have to tamper with the control system that manages the coupling. To disable it, we have to enter a series of codes which Zone, our technician, has prepared ahead of time. I'll be coming with you guys, and I will be the one relaying the codes to Squall. Now, Squall," Her tone deepened in either an attempt to rejuvenate our attention or portray a sense of gravity. Maybe both. "You'll slide down on the side of the train using a cable and enter the codes into the system. You only have a few minutes to do this, so I hope you have quick and steady hands. After we've made the switch, that's it. As long as we handle the codes, Zone and Watts will control how we move along the tracks and where we'll station after we've connected the president's cabin to us," She concluded, setting the model trains aside. She cocked her eyebrow and a grin skipped across her face, "Pretty good, huh?"

Selphie took a step forward, reaching for the presidential cabin replica from the table, fumbling it in her hands, "All the train models you have look nice except for the president's car which looks kinda shabby. Why is that?"

"Yeah, Rinoa made that one; that's why. We bought everything else at the gift store." Watts answered.

"Oh…" Zell realized, shrugging, "I thought some kid made it. The paint job sucks, too." He was right. It looked as if Rinoa had painted it blindfolded.

"Oh, shut up! I made it look like that on purpose," She replied hastily, swiping the model train from Selphie's hands and placing it underneath a pile of magazines; a pile of magazines that, I might add, sported bare-breasted women in lacey underwear on the covers.

"The paint job represents my hatred towards Deling," she contended, crossing her arms.

"Hatred, eh?" Zell replied, "You must really, really, REALLY hate Deling."

"It's one of the ugliest things I've ever seen in my life! You must super-ooper-duper hate him," Selphie added.

"Are you guys finished!?" Rinoa asked, "Can we get on with it now?" Her cheeks flared up in red, clearly embarrassed in her god-awful art skills, "Talk to Watts when you're ready, I'll meet you on top."

Zone doubled over, his eyes bulging and covered in streaks of blood vessels, almost as if they were about to pop from their sockets. He knelt down, looking up to us, "Stomach ulcers: I always gett'em when I'm stressed," He added, his eyes swelling up with tears, "This mission, if you fail, you'll put months of hard work to waste. AND you'll let down our princess," He lurched forward, "And if ya do that, kid, I'mma have to kick all your asses!" He stood up, wiping blood from his mouth, "I expect nothing less from SeeD than perfection… So get goin', and make sure nothing happens to Rinoa. She's like a daughter to me. And I mean NOTHING, or the last Garden you'll ever see is the one I bury you in," He growled, turning to walk away. He stopped halfway out the door, his body bladed in an attempt to fit his broad shoulders through the narrow of the frame, peering over his shoulder, his voice stern with presage:

"Oh, good luck, too. God's speed, soldiers."


Note from the Author:

College started for me, so the writing may down die a little, but I will update every ten days regardless of my circumstances (roughly every weekend, or at the very worst, every other weekend, until the story is complete).