"That Day of Infamy"
Chapter Nine
"Counterrecoil"
(Day 4.)
With a labored, deep breath, Ellone stepped back, one hand still holding the gun, the other searching for something to hold onto. She found the threshold to her bedroom door and held on, breathing heavily.
"Why..." she panted, "show me this? What kind of... help do you think I can give you?"
"You can help me change it."
Ellone's eyes welled up. She quickly swallowed it down.
"You can't change the past." She said, "Not even with my power."
"But you were there." Lea said, "You know what happened. You saw it."
"I hadn't met you then."
"Exactly." Lea snapped her fingers, "You can only connect with people you've seen. That's on record. So where have you seen me before?"
"I go to Winhill all the time. I spend half the year there. I could've seen you at any time."
"But it wasn't that you saw me – I knew you were there the entire time. That's the point. You weren't just connected, you were actually there."
"You're mistaking my consciousness with my body." Ellone said, "I can't help you."
"But you have to!" Lea leapt to her feet, prompting Ellone to raise the gun and to make her stand still, "There's nobody else!" her voice was pleading, "It's all my fault and I didn't even want this! I can't take it back, please, I have to take it back, I need to take it all back!"
As Lea's eyes welled up with tears, Ellone's voice came out as a dangerous snarl.
"I don't care." She said, "I've spent my entire life being tossed around by Sorceresses. What makes you think I would help you, even if I could?"
"Because he was my brother," Lea sobbed, "and I didn't mean to... I didn't! I didn't!"
Ellone, careful to keep her gun trained on the weeping girl, groped around on the kitchen counter that stood between the living room and the kitchen. When she found the comm-link, she clumsily inserted it into her ear.
Lea sobbed and cried, her face buried in her hands, and Ellone's finger hesitated on the button. She considered the line. There the Sorceress was, begging for her help, wanting just to undo her original sin.
But you can't. You can't change the past.
She clicked on the button. It bleeped once. Twice. Three times. Four times. Five and-
"Elle?" Seifer's voice.
"She's here!" Ellone said, almost shouting, "The Sorceress is here, in my house!"
"Say what!?"
Lea's eyes darted up, bloodshot and suddenly incredibly alarmed.
"The new Sorceress is right in front of me! In my living room!"
"Please..." Lea said, "Don't do this..."
"Did you hear me, Seifer?"
"Do you still have that gun?"
"Ellone, please..."
"In my hand!"
"Then the fuck are you calling me for? Pull the trigger, now! I'll get Timber Guard on it while you put two in her!"
Ellone obeyed, broke the promise and pulled the trigger. The gunshot boomed and Lea jerked downwards, screaming. The kickback sprained her wrist and the bullet missed Lea by inches and shattered the window behind the girl. Ellone cursed. She took aim, more carefully this time... but also slower. Slow enough for Lea to let out a guttural growl and charge her, palm open, and smash it against her nose. Ellone heard cartilage break and the world spun as blood came spurting out of her nose.
The gun was still in her hand. Ellone reached and grabbed something soft and long – her hair. She yanked her head back, trying to bring the gun to bear. Lea raised an arm to block it.
Ellone fired. Lea screamed as her eardrum burst. Ellone fired again, the third one rushing through Lea's hair and exiting harmlessly out the broken window.
"I came to you for help!" Lea screamed, one hand creeping up from between Ellone's breasts, fingers curled like a claw, reaching for her throat, "I just wanted to make it right, I wanted-"
"No!" Ellone blinked rapidly, trying to get the tears out of her eyes, "I've spent my entire life being pushed around by Sorceresses who just needed me to do something for them! They took my family from me, one by one, and you're asking for my help now? To do what? To bring the boy back?"
"Josh, he..."
"We all face consequences. You're the one who killed him. You."
Ellone paused for a second, to let it sink in.
"I can't give his life back to you. I can't. It's beyond my ability. The only thing I can give you is-"
Lea's hand gripped her throat. Lea leaed into her, and Ellone felt the kitchen counter on her back as she was bent backwards and onto it. The gun was still in her hand, three bullets left, but the barrel was pointing anywhere but where she wanted it to.
"I just need a little help!" Lea snarled, her voice on the verge of cracking up, "Why is that so hard to give now that I'm a Sorceress? I didn't ask to be Rhea's Heir! Hyne's Descendant!? I didn't ask for any of this!"
Ellone was unable to breathe. The hand around her neck was like a claw, a vice-grip squeezing tight, pressuring her windpipe. She redoubled her effots to bring the gun barrel closer to Lea's head. She pulled the trigger. Lea screamed again, but the bullet missed her and embedded itself harmlessly into the wall.
Two shots left.
"If you won't help me, so help me Hyne..."
I can't, Ellone thought as she put her hand on Lea's wrist and tried to pry her loose, even if I wanted to. You can't change the past. It's done.
"What?" Lea hissed, "You got something to say?"
Black spots began to dance before Ellone's eyes. Lea's arm was strength itself, unbendig, and her hand was squeezing... squeezing...
The darkness was creeping up. She was feeling lighter and lighter, slipping away...
...don't you think I wanted my brother to grow up with a family? Don't you think I wanted them all to grow up with their parents? I wanted the Sorceress War to have never happened, for Adel to never have strayed into darkness... I wanted to never be her chosen heir...
Ellone's last thought before passing out was clear, but it was quickly smothered by the darkness that embraced her.
...I don't even know why she chose me, in the end.
Artemisia stood to attention in front of Grand Master Sera Lowcraft. The Grand Master clasped her hands together on her console. Artemisia swallowed hard. She only did that when the matter was dead, dead serious.
"There's no easy way to say this." Lowcraft said, "So I'll just say it. I just got a call from IA."
"Sir?"
"You are under investigation for the murder of the Dollet Duchess."
Artemisia felt like she had just been punched in the gut.
"Based on what, sir?"
"Kappa Squad's operation report and subsequent scene analysis. The slugs dug out of the body match yours."
Artemisia thought of the Gospels. And you shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free.
"Yes. I shot her. I thought she was reaching for a gun."
"You also mention in your intelligence report that she was the one responsible for the Duke's murder."
"Yes, sir."
"And is it true that," Lowcraft taped on the console, browsing through what Artemisia thought was the report, "she told you that she wanted you to kill her?"
"Yes, sir."
"And that she had legal reasons for it as well?"
Artemisia understood that she was being interrogated. She clenched her teeth and decided that still, the truth, ugly as it was, would have to triumph.
"Yes, sir." She said.
"Well, the problem with that is, Artemisia, you are the only survivor of that encounter and, in the absence of any recorded evidence, the account is awfully convenient for you. Don't get me wrong," she held up her hands, "I believe you. But IA might not."
"Will there be a court-martial, sir?"
"No. Not unless you do have the missing Ellone Loire diary."
Artemisia shook, but didn't show it. She swallowed it down, along with her pride to answer the accusation, knowing full well that the diary was in a crevice she had found in her bedroom wall, and that she had yet to touch it. Its mere presence had robbed her of sleep these last few days, and she had laid awake, the leather-bound volume in had, wondering if she should read it after all.
"No, sir." Artemisia lied, "I didn't take it."
"Good. It'd be a violation of your contract and your oath as a SeeD. That amounts to high treason, as you know."
"Yes, sir."
"Where do you think it is?"
"It was my impression, sir, that the diary was the basis for the Duchess' actions. As such, I would not be surprised if she has hidden it."
"So you don't know where it is?"
"No, sir."
"Well. Alright. You're relieved of active duty pending the investigation, so relax, and IA will be in touch. Continue telling the truth and I am sure the matter will be resolved with ease."
Artemisia swallowed hard.
"Yes, sir." She said.
"Dismissed."
Artemisia saluted Lowcraft, turned on her heels and walked out of her office. She directed her steps towards the elevator. When she got there, she pressed her palm against the scanner. The scanner seemed to be taking longer than usual tonight. It bleeped, finally, and called the elevator. A small eternity passed while the elevator ascended to the administration level. The doors hissed open and Artemisia stepped inside. The elevator descended. She checked her watch. 6:52, internal. Early for some, late for her.
Once she was on the ground level, Artemisia headed directly for the dormitory. The Garden Faculty were gone; between shifts, she assumed. She headed for her Dormitory, treading the path she had treaded thousands, if not millions of times. It seemed to take longer, and finally, unable to take it, she broke into a run. She rushed through the corridors with one goal in mind: to get to her bedroom.
She found her room and snuck in. She headed straight for her own bedroom, with no regards to anything. She entered and closed the door behind her. She leaned aginst it, breathing heavy. She went to her bed, crouched down and slid his arm in between the mattress and the frame. She pulled out the leather-bound volume, Ellone Loire Diaries, Volume Two of Two, out.
My pride as a SeeD is a small price to pay for knowledge of the future...
Artemisia mentally slapped herself and part of her wondered if this, or thoughts like this, would be what took her over the prophesized edge.
The guard kicked Ellone's door open and rushed in through the opening to find her lying on the floor, eyes closed. He walked in and knelt down, fingers reaching for her neck to find a pulse. It was there. He sighed in relief. He reached for the comm-link embedded into her ear, buzzing out words he couldn't quite hear. He picked it up and put it to his ear.
"Lieutenant General Ellone Loire, come the fuck in, if you would fucking please! Fucking Hyne, come on!"
"Who is this?" the guard asked.
"...and who the fuck are you?" the other voice responded.
"Timoti Cran. I'm a local Timber guard. You?"
"Grand Master Seifer Almasy of Ocean Garden, fuckhead."
"I am the first one on the scene to your distress call. I found Ellone Loire." He said, "She's alive, just unconscious. She should be coming to shortly. I won't move her until she does."
"Any wounds?"
Timoti scanned her body the best he could.
"Not that I can see."
"Oh thank fuck for that... alright, Tim..."
"Timoti, please."
"Alright, Timoti Please, just stay on her. While you do that, alert whatever authorities are in there that the Sorceress is on the loose, and she may be looking to get out of the city. Everybody should know what she looks like by now if you circulated the posters, so fucking get to it, yesterday, right?"
"Sure thing." Timoti said and clicked the only button of the comm-link, "Get right on that, fuckhead."
Lea ducked into an alley. She was well away from the house, having run through the streets and taken random turns, often enough and random enough to get herself nice and lost. The upside was that she was certain that nobody knew who she was and where she had come just yet. The downside was that she was sure she was on the other side of town from the train station, which was where she needed to go.
She wiped sweat from her brow. Her t-shirt was stuck to her back, wet and cold. She glanced down the street. It was the morning rush, everyone was out and about, going places, going about their lives.
It dawned on Lea in that moment that nobody there, even those that looked her in the eyes, knew what had happened. The colorful, small buildings forming what had come to be known as Timber's Old Town around her stood as they had always had, even through some of the harder times. The people, young and old, early and late, well-groomed or scruffy, they all had their paths to follow. Lea knew that she could almost see their pathways, like threads woven into the fabric of the morning rush hour, each one forming the dense cloth of life.
None of them knew. None of them cared. The world kept spinning and the hour kept ticking, with the loss that was filling her to bursting, the lack of the irreplacable that tortured every fiber of her being even in that moment, the things that were driven into her so much like wounds meant nothing, nothing at all, to anyone.
Was this how they had all felt, Lea wondered, the Sorceresses before her, when they had understood fully and completely how utterly alone they were? Not just in their lives, but in their nature. Detached and separated, sectioned off from the rest of humanity, a connection that their Knights would have provided them, had they not been mortal themselves.
Lea felt that her Knight had been sacrficed to a single wrong utterance.
She pressed her back against the wall.
What now?
Josh was gone. He was a third-page news blurb in a local newspaper. House fire. Claimed the lives of three. Her brother, mother and father. All dead for the knowledge of what she was.
And what am I that even my own kin won't help me?
She thought of Ellone's words. The same thing she had heard from her dozens of times in interviews, in that publicity stunt exposé of Quistis Trepe, in history books... you can't change the past.
Then what else is left for me?
Lea peered down the street. There were two Timber guards at the far end, just standing there with their long rifles. There was a choice, right then and there, presented to her to answer her question. She could walk up to them and confess to everything and give herself up.
Or... there can be one thing... The only thing I'm good for...
In that moment, the world came to a standstill. The thought enveloped all else and coated everything into itself, choking the world with its existence. Lea closed her eyes and swallowed. She hung her head. Yes, there was another option. There always had been. Ever since the Chicobo, ever since that night, and in the month following it, hiding out in train stations, moving from city-state to city-state, following the news as SeeD choked Esthar with an iron fist, listening to the voices swirling around in her head, giving her counsel in dreams... there had been another way.
Perhaps, she conceded, the only way.
But how could that happen when she was in Timber and SeeD was in Esthar? She had to give them cause, at least.
With a resignation resonating with newfound determination, Lea raised her hood and went back out into the street, and turned her steps towards the train station.
The only thing a Sorceress is good for, she thought, is making war.
Author's Note: Lea wasn't present when Squall utters "The only thing (the General) is good for... (is) resorting to war," but, it is a solid conclusion where he is concerned, and it is a solid conclusion where the Sorceress is concerned.