Chapter 10: "Super-Secret Mission!"

"Ooohh~ ahhhh~."

Logos shifted under his blankets, a headache instantly pounding in his skull as erotic music blasted in his ears. It took him only a moment to register what was happening.

"What are you watching!?" The gunner lifted himself, the light from the screen intensifying his headache as soon as he saw it, and the two twins, one with a serious blush and the other with a devious smile, met his eyes.

"A porno!" Taji smiled toothily, one finger poised over the power button of the screen and the other hand clutched around a sphere. His smile nearly caved in when a foot made contact with his face, disconnecting his hands from both objects. "Gah!"

"Get out!" Logos clutched one side of his head in pain, before retracting his foot back under the covers to escape the cold air of the basement, "Now!"

Daji stood up, smoothed out his pants, before bowing his head, "Taji was the one that did it not me!"

Taji, still sitting with his legs crossed on the floor, seemed content enough staying where he was. "Tattletale!" he hissed, just as Daji made his nervous escape with a slamming of Logos's door. Logos flinched, his eye twitching and headache mounting, before reaching over his head and pulling something off his wall. Taji turned his head away from the closed the door just in time to see a barrel of a gun pointed at his face. With a squeak, he hopped up to his feet to dash away. Reaching the door, he swiftly opened it again as his brother's footsteps retreated down the hall, before SLAM! He was gone too.

The door slamming twice came down on his own skull like a knife and Logos clawed at his brain from the pain inside it. He looked bleary eyed around his room before clicking the screen off, shutting the sounds down with a click-whir. The silence encasing him after all that racket was instantly soothing to the current thumping in his cranium.

"Out of all the movies…" Logos rubbed his face slowly, dragging and distorting his features around. With one eye flicking opened, he noticed his chest where he kept his spheres was in disarray, half pulled out from underneath his bed. Standing up, a curse in his throat, he bent down to the pile of cases and round spheres and started tossing them in so he could close it and shove it back where it belonged.

"We did it! We made him mad!" Was shouted somewhere down the hall and the gunner could do nothing but roll his eyes when he heard a voice answer back, "Well, is he following you?"

In light of his headache, he decided to avoid their scheming and to sleep off the rest of his hangover. When he awoke again sometime later, his headache was only marginally better and two pieces of paper laid on his card table again. He rose from his sheets, gripping his head tightly, before making his way slowly to the table.

The same thick handwriting, Ormi's, was in the crumbled first paper.

Twins told me about this morning. I'm taking the Goons out on mission so that you won't shoot anyone today. Really important mission and secret too so don't bother looking for us. You could of come too but you snooze you lose, buddy. Maybe next time you can come with us :3

-Ormi

Logos sighed from the fact that whatever details went into the 'secret mission' was left out conveniently. The gunner had no clue how long they'd be gone or when they'd be back. He picked up the second one, the scrawl on it was probably going to give him more information than the first. The Dr. Goon always put in his wise words after Ormi's bumbling to tie up loose ends.

The secret mission is none of your business, gunslinger. :P -Rouk

"THOSE SONS OF-!" Logos crunched both notes in his hand before slamming it down onto the table.

"Hey which one of youse grabbed those things?" Ormi shouted behind his shoulder as he led the entire pack of goons to the Moonflow to catch a shoopuf ride over the water. Nago made an affirming sound and waved excitedly.

"It's called the H.E.A.R.T." Taji corrected with pride and annoyance both laced in his voice, "I didn't make it from scratch to be called a thing."

"What are you talking about?" Rouk looked over at him, his eyes narrowed behind his dark mask, "You didn't build that from scratch. You stole that Commsphere that the Shinra kid made and altered it!"

"Pupt, pupt, pupt," Daji shook his index finger before shrugging in unison with his brother, speaking in tune as they swayed toward the center between them.

"Small details."

"Whatever it is, hand it tah me," Ormi held out his palm and flexed his thick digits quickly at the Mr. Goon. Nago shuffled through his coat and pushed the circular sky-blue device into Ormi's hand before lowering his arms and asking.

"What are you going to do? And why'd you want me to get all of them? We didn't leave any at all for Logos…"

"It's not what I'm gonna do with them, it's what Logos is gonna do with them from the oscillo-finder." Ormi smiled again and unhooked the back. After staring at it for a while, he went 'ah' and pulled out a small wire, and with a 'chingk!' sound, the screen flashed before buzzing off. Pocketing the wire, Ormi held up the device and shook it as he spoke, "Don't make that face twins, I'll put that back in when we's need it. Now for the other one's-" He gave them the same treatment, handing the non-working pieces back to the goon.

"What are you doing?" Taji squirmed, hating to watch the half-dismantling of his wonderful creations, "There better be a good reason, Tubs."

"Maybe not," Ormi shrugged before smiling at the 'dying' teenager who dramatically gripped his chest and turned away, like it literally wounded him critically to watch his 'toys' being messed with.

"What are all those wires for?" Nago asked Daji, who was hovering over his shoulder.

"Well, that would be what connects the receivers to the oscillo-finder back home and helps the oscillo-finder detect the location of the H.E.A.R.T device." Daji sniffed, "Is that why you're taking them out Ormi? So Logos won't track us?"

Ormi yanked the wire of the last one free and handed it to Nago before he heard the question, "Huh? Oh yeah sure, kinda."

"I'm surprised you knew what to pull," Rouk looked at the messed up wires, one missing in each, and the jumble of parts and minuscule chips and gears inside the last H.E.A.R.T whose back had yet to be replaced. The Dr. Goon shook his head, "I can't make out what's what."

"Why take them with us at all though?" Nago looked up from the last H.E.A.R.T in his hand, feeling the rest rustle against the pouch at his hip, "We coulda just left them and Logos couldn't find us."

Ormi clipped the backing on with a snap, and explained, "If he wanted tah find us, he could, but he's probably too stubborn tah chase after us with all the messing around with him we've been doing lately. And Taji and Daji making him mad this morning-"

"We sure did!" They said in unison, their palms meeting together and a leg popping up in the air behind them. "Mission accomplished!"

"Well, with how mad he was he'll just think I took youse guys out again, which is true I guess." Ormi held the wires firmly between his fingers before pocketing them with the first ones. "We's just going out a little longer and farther away than usual."

"But what about the H.E.A.R.T?" Nago flicked a forefinger toward the object in question, "What's the point in messing them up at all?"

"Youse guys will just have to see," Ormi smiled wide, his gap exposed as his lips parted.

The twins looked at each other before back at their 'temporary boss', tilting their heads toward the space between them until the top of their skulls bonked against each other, "Huh?"

The sound of swishing water hardly distracted them as the wayward group stared at their 'temporary boss'. Ormi, with hands on his hips, was humming contentedly and staring out over the water. The shoopuf huffed as it was allowed another break from its slow calm journey back and forth between the banks of the Moonflow. The Hypello working the pad waved his blue hands at them, his body swaying a bit, "All aboard, yesh?"

"Oh!" Mara's sweet voice piped, startled a bit, before turning to the Hypello, "Yes, could we all ride together?"

"Yesh," The Hypello looked around just for extra measure in case of other customers that might protest before blinking his, assuming of course he was indeed a male and not a female since Mara couldn't tell, large amphibious eyes, "All aboard?"

The twins boarded first by flipping in their goonishly manner onto the half lethargic creature. The shoopuf snorted, but made no other sign about having noticed it at all. Rouk watched the other goons board, Anomi flipping like her other Al Bhed companions, before looking at the temporary boss, "Ormi."

"Whut?" Ormi lifted a thick brow, a silly smile still plastered on his broad face.

"When you said 'what Logos will do', I assume it goes well for us when it plays out," The doctor straightened himself up, folding his arms over his chest, "I'd rather not have to hit him more than once a week."

Ormi put a hand on the Goon's shoulder as he passed and said, "It'll be alright."

"Oh?" Rouk stepped onto the animal after Ormi, the creature huffing as it adjusted to the added weight, then with a great puff of air as Ormi stepped on. Though an animal this size wasn't hindered by the weight, it did make a sound close to displeasure and seemingly sighed.

"Another question," Rouk lifted is black covered forefinger, settling himself stiff-jointly onto the back seat of the carriage of the shoopuf, "Who thought this one up? You or Erie?"

"Who do youse think?"

"I'm not sure," Rouk narrowed his eyes, "I'd almost always say Erie, but right now…I can't be certain."

Ormi beamed even more, obviously proud, "Why's that?"

Rouk sighed roughly, and lifted a corner of his thin lips. "Forget it, sometimes I just have this ridiculous thought that maybe you're harder to understand than even Logos. But it doesn't matter, I don't get paid enough to think so much."

Ormi laughed, his voice booming and startling the other goons who had been staring intently at the scenic water around them, before lowering it to a chuckle, "Right?"

"Hey, Ormi," Nago's nuetral voice drawled, his masked face pointed out to the water before turning his head slightly to peer over his shoulder, "What's going to happen when we reach the shore?"

Ormi, sitting rather comfortably in the back of the carriage with Rouk, let out a content sigh and put his hands intertwined on his belly, "I guess I should be telling youse guys the plan now, huh?"

"Clearly." Rouk's gravely voiced bit out.

The goons gathered closer around the back, hunching their heads in a semi-circle around him, and waiting as if waiting they were children waiting for a story. Ormi, after peering with glittering excited eyes at those around him, smiled his gappy grin again and began, "I had Mara and Anomi look around a little."

"Yeah," Anomi confirmed as the others turned their attentions to them momentarily, "You wanted us to use our old connections to find out about what those Yevon creeps were doing."

The Leblanc Syndicate had a very good connections all over Spira, mostly in dark alleyways and small rundown businesses, but that's where all the good juicy bits found itself anyways. The Syndicate's info network rivaled anyone's in Spira, including the large organizations like New Yevon and the Youth League. It was partially because of how mixed their groups was, former Yevonites and Al Bhed in droves and anyone in between, who made the network form by looking to old colleagues and friends alike. However, where friends and companions could not be found, Leblanc had made sure they still had at least one dainty finger of influence in that area by means of a little light intimidation. Their reputation still held in several areas, despite the loss of the leader, and Anomi and Mara had no trouble uncovering dirt, even on something as secret as an in-the-works rebel uprising.

"We might have found out something we weren't supposed to." Mara added, her talented hands wringing together nervously, "So, is this what it's all about?"

"Sort of," Ormi waggled his hand, scrunching up his face a little, "Youse guys are gonna split into two teams. Some of youse are going to head up the road and make your ways to the Youth League, I'll tell you what I want youse to do in a minute, but the rest of youse are coming with me to Luca."

"Luca?" Rouk asked, "Why there?"

"I'll tell ya," Ormi rolled his eyes, "But first, Twins, youse guys brought your tools that I asked of ya, right?"

"Duh," Taji answered, rolling his shoulders with a heavy pack weighing it down. His brother carried a similar load. Ormi, after gathering everyone that morning and eating breakfast with them, announced that they were all going on a trip. As trusting and unquestioning as the goons typically were, it wasn't looked at oddly when Ormi started to tell them what to pack in addition to the usual travelling provisions. To the twins, he asked for parts, lots of them, enough to make a small engine perhaps. Then he asked for a lot of fiend parts, like marbles, which wasn't in short supply with the elementals floating around in the basement.

Ormi nodded, pleased, as the two packs were set on the floor of the carriage with a clang, the contents then revealed to him. "Well, there's not a lot of time, so now we gotta get to work."

He clapped his hands and started ushering the goons around to make room, and then began giving instructions.

Leblanc picked at the food on her tray, not finding much interest in it that morning.

"Are you alright?"

The familiar deep voice startled Leblanc into actually jolting upright and dropping her fork onto her metal tray with an unseemly loud clatter that turned heads towards her spot in the mess tent.

"I'm sorry," Nooj snorted a little, so faint in fact that Leblanc and anyone else listening wouldn't have been quite sure they heard it at all, before asking Leblanc, "Did I scare you?"

"No, love, I'm alright," Leblanc put a hand to her fluttering heart, a smile drifting to her lips easily.

"That's good to know," Nooj offered a brief smile, and Lady Luck knows how Leblanc lived for those moments, before it was gone and the Meyvn suddenly looked very grave faced. Leblanc lifted her head in attention as Nooj said, "I'm going to need you now."

"Those rouges from New Yevon showed themselves finally?" Leblanc stood straight from her seat, ready to leave at Nooj's command. She was answered with an affirmative nod.

"Exactly that," Nooj's voice lowered, and he led the way out as Leblanc fell into step beside him. "We want to hit them hard first off, to end this as fast as possible. Djose has warned us that its a small troop. I'm planning on taking you, Commander Lucil, Elma and perhaps a few others to see to it immediately."

With pride from being one of the few chosen, Leblanc smacked her hip out of habit with her palm, "Leave it to me, love!"

Unknown to them, at that exact moment down at the entrance of the Mushroom Rock ravine, four shadows bumped into each other when the first one stopped. The sun was momentarily blocked out, causing bluish darkness to cover everything.

"Ow! Move it!"

"Stupid, you bumped into me!" A dopey voice shot back, "You move it."

"Please get along you two!" A frantic light voice chided with a shaking end on her words.

A dull monotone voice murmured, "Shut up, the Yevon guys are coming, hide."

Soldiers, rag tag to say the least, and unsurprisingly since they had no permission whatsoever from the actual party they served to conduct this attack, marched into the opening. Right on the time expected.

"Oh, yeah," the second voice victoriously cooed, "Easy as pie."

"Hey, what does that even mean?" The third voice piped, "I mean, pie is kinda hard to make. It's not easy at all!"

"Shut up!" The first voice snapped, "They're going to hear us!"

The fourth voice and the first one in the line moaned quietly and in a dreary tone, "Oh, for the love of-"

"You're louder than me!" The second voice raised his tone to a shout at the first voice.

One of the soldiers stopped, "Huh?"

"Eep!" The third voice squeaked just as the sun broke through the clouds and light, in a swift moving wave, reclaimed the land once more just as the peon of the Yevonite rebel group looked over the sizable boulder he heard the disturbance erupt from.

"Taji you idiot!" Daji wrapped his gloved hands around his brother's throat, "Your loud mouth got us in trouble again!"

"Wh-ell it was yo-ur big mouth tha'd started it!" Taji yelled through gasping breaths.

"Hi there!" Mara waved friendly-like, though nervous just the same, at the soldier rubbing the side of face under his helmet, "Lovely day, isn't it?"

Getting to business, he positioned the end of the gun on them, gathering more attention from his comrades who came to join him. He barked, "Who are you?"

The goons looked to each of each other's covered faces. There insignias were plain to see, wasn't it obvious?

"Come on, tell me you've heard of us," Daji turned, his hands slipping from around his brother's neck. He began vaguely gesturing to his attire.

"I'll ask one more time, who are you? And who do you work for?" The soldier's finger grew taunt on his weapon's trigger and he spaced his feet apart, "I give you to the count of five before I eradicate you from the face of this earth!"

"Oooh," Taji nearly whistled, before tilting his head and grumbling from the side of his mouth. "He talks like Logos,"

Daji lowered his head into his shoulders, agreeing with his brother, "Tell me about it. But, Logos is kinda scarier, right?"

"One!"

"Shouldn't we do something?" Mara looked to Erie who was shaking her head in disbelief, a palm slapped into her face. Why was she made the leader of this operation? Thanks a lot, Ormi.

"Two!"

Erie, though usually dull on missions, got defensive and annoyed as they remained pinned at gunpoint in their spot. Her voice rose a pitch, exclaiming, "How do you not know who we work for?!" Erie spat out, before yelling, rising to her feet "In fact, how dare you!?"

"Yeah, everyone should know about them!" The twins, picking up the battle cry, raised their voices in unison as well.

The gunman looked a little disturbed but his finger tightened again, his teeth gritted in irritation. It was obvious he was surprised they took that tone with him and his comrades, who could riddle them holes in a matter of seconds.

"Three!" He continued to count.

"Hey Taji! He's almost there!" Daji pointed at the bearded guard's face and laughed, suddenly mocking.

"Unless he doesn't know how to count and messes up," Taji nudged his brother with his elbow.

The rebel soldier's face grew red and he barked out quickly, "Four! Five!"

"Hiyah!" Erie kicked up with her heel under the rifle point, forcing it skyward as the man's finger pressed into the trigger. BANG!

"Twins now!" Erie commanded, her leg hooking into the soldier's legs just as the shot's first echo sounded in the ravine.

"FOR THE LEBLANC SYNDICATE!" They high-fived each other before turning to the slightly raised lump of dust. Digging together they found, at the exact moment, two handles on either side of a block of steel and they gripped and pulled back on them simultaneously. A long cord attached to each of the handles was revealed with a yank and it instantly revved up an engine with a loud crack of an explosion and a humming of a machine.

The machine coughed black smoke, its vibrating dusting itself and shaking the remaining filth covering it from its compact surface. Glowing symbols shaking on the outside, runes, were flickering and then becoming more intense in their brightness as the machine started to fully warm up. Shadows started to dance in the ravine's above from the shifting clouds, but the surrounding rocks were bathed in multi-colored light as the machine armed itself to eye-searing brilliance.

"Sweet!" Taji smiled and turned to clap his brother on the shoulder, to find him missing, "Daji?"

"Taji!" A rebel had his arm around his throat, squeezing hard and Taji could hear his brother choking and sputtering for air.

"Let him go!" Taji growled and flew forward, a wrench picked off the ground and pulled tightly into his fist, "Now!" A second rebel slammed Taji aside and into the boulder they had hidden behind with the use of his rifle butt. Taji felt the air push out from his lungs in a wheeze as the butt of the gun was shoved even mercilessly deeper into this solar plexus. Taji kicked out, futilely, before he lift his clawed fist and waved back and forth for the soldier's face.

The gun was pulled away before the entire side was re positioned and lodged against Taji's throat, pinning his waving hands against the length of it as well. He gasped, fingers twitching around the bar that held his claws in his hands. "Daji!" He called out to his brother, feet digging into red clay and not gaining any purchase. A yank sent him upward, his chin thrust against the gun's barrel.

"Firaga!" Taji felt heat surround him, but more importantly, around his assailant. He was dropped to the ground as the rebel screamed, his clothes catching alight. Erie turned her hands away again and launched another spell at the next challenger. Mara, hands arching and swaying beautifully, expertly engulfed the soldier attacking Taji's precious twin in water. As the twin was released, she then quickly changed her chants to that of a lightning spell, for some effective results.

"Sweet air!" Daji gasped, practically eating up the exhaust filled air in gratitude for having it again as the machine began to spit up sparks. He gasped, and accepted the hug that his brother gave him as he hurled himself into his younger brother's arms.

"Yo, idiots! When's that thingy of yours supposed to work?" Erie shouted over her shoulder with a rough voice and raised her hands in the air before pushing her palms outwards, fire flying from the middle of her hands from a spell. "We can't keep this up forever you know!?"

Mara lifted her hands and chanted, her one layer steel fan poised over her head. She opened her eyes and kicked her leg forward, her fan stabbing the air in front of her and moving it aside, "Waterga!"

There was a spoosh and a couple more cries from the rebels being bombarded with spells.

A defender jumped forward, his flamethrower clutched to his side.

"Taji! Daji!" Erie hopped back from the flame just as it incinerated the spot she was standing, her mask getting caught and singed away while her face burned with heat. "When will that stupid machine-" She balled up her fist as the defender redirected his aim. She threw her entire weight forward and crashed her knuckles into the defender's nose, "WORK!"

"Now!" Taji and Daji, seeing the gauges at maximum power, crashed their palms into the duo black buttons on the side of the belching machine.

There was a giant boom, and Taji and Daji immediately fled, Daji grabbing Mara and Taji grabbing Erie, as they hightailed it towards Djose Temple at breakneck speeds.

"Get them!" A rebel leader shouted and pointed after their tracks just as the machine sung with a high ring, "What the-?"

It glowed to the point where it seared the corneas to even look at it, before the machine in it's entirety exploded into the faces of the rebels, blinding them and binding them to their spots.

Ice cracked against their bodies, and the soldiers not in the direct proximity of the explosion, struggled against their icy imprisonments. The other heads were limp as the blast itself knocked them unconscious.

"Mission-" Taji and Daji leapt into the air, flipping over Mara's and Erie's heads, before their hands crashed in the middle of their flying arc, "Complete!"

"Argh!" The rebel leader watched them fly down the path and disappear around the bend, kicking up dust as they ran away in their goofy costumes.

Hacky scratched his head, the creaking ice still giving up the chilly steam even at high noon, "I don't get it. These are some high powered spells and there isn't a mage in sight to maintain it."

Leblanc smiled, looking at the remnants of a machine with a very familiar symbol spray painted messily on its side.

"Well, now that this has been dealt wtih-" Nooj limped closer, also looking down at the simmering machine, and obviously amused with the turn of unexpected events. His smile was redirected to Leblanc and he continued, "Perhaps you should get word to your goons that it would probably be in their best interest not to meddle with the Yevonites for their own sakes."

Leblanc opened her mouth, but a rough voice caught her attention first and she jerked her head to the side to glare.

"Great," Ruckus sat up from leaning over the machina belching smoke, grenades jingling at his belt as he rubbed his blackened hands together to rid them of dust. "Just great…"

"I'll tell them that you said thank you," Leblanc lifted her chin, not liking his tone.

"Why is it any of their business?" Ruckus twitched, suddenly feeling eyes on him and turned to peer out toward the entrance, only to shake himself and look back, swearing he saw pink and green but deciding against it. "I don't see why they need to get their noses into it."

Nia, nearby enough to overhear, scoffed and shouldered her weapon, "Lay off, Ruckus. They're just worried about Love-Love."

"They need to either join us or get out of our way," Ruckus shot back.

"No need to be ungrateful," Nooj said, his tone mediating, "I think we should consider ourselves lucky we don't have to deal with them personally. Now we can focus on more pressing matters than brute fighting."

"Hmph, as you say," Ruckus crossed his sturdy arms and looked to the side. Leblanc wanted to march forward and yank his ear off for his impudence. Nooj called for everyone to move out, and they all turned on their heels to follow the order through.

"Don't bother," Elma put a red leather bound hand on Leblanc's shoulder, seeing the stiffening it had done a moment before, as Ruckus took off back to camp. "He's not worth your time."

"This is correct," Commander Lucil, hands folded before her, said wisely, "Some are more interested in fighting. The only way to teach them otherwise is to show them that glory is really in peace, not battles won."

"Nicely said," Nooj smiled, his head dipping a little, before stabbing his cane back a little to help turn himself around.

Leblanc watched Nooj for as long as she dared before slowly turning with the rest of the Youth Leaguer's returning back to their posts guarding the headquarters while the others, instructed by Yaibal, moved about capturing the rebels encased in ice.