Names
Thanks again for the review Midnight Phase and I hope you got the response for the review, and if you didn't, I'm reposting it at the bottom.
Thanks also go out to TOWTWUKER for putting me on your Story Alert list.
Some more insight on Seifer and Cloud as well as B-Garden coming under enemy control. Also ever wonder if anything else could happen to a Knight.
Disclamer: I own nothing involving any of these fine copyrighted fictional people. True I may stick in the occasional OC just for kicks, but they are up for grabs if you want to use them in your fics. Well enjoy.
"Squall just ask it already." Seifer looking back to Squall in the front cabin of the truck after his repeated glances in the mirror to look back to both he and Remmey in the rear cabin of the truck. The truck being one of the ones normally used to transport sick or injured chocobo, but when you have a mid sized behemoth to move, it works just as well.
"What is it like over there?" Squall glancing back.
"It's a nice place, so long as you know what you are doing, and are able to get some friends and family." Seifer smiling thinking about: Po, Iris, Cloud, Tseng, and Jack.
"So other then being normal, what's Cloud like?" Zell now getting curious as to what Seifers family was like as he was quite throughout the flight back after he settled down on the top of the jet.
"A lot like his name sakes, trouble. But he's well worth the time it takes to fix any problem he gets into, once you know him." Seifer thinking about the tendencies his two best friends from this world shared with his son.
"Name sakes? So, he was named after two people. Who?" Irvine now getting into it as he was also curious.
"Fujin and Raijin. Fuijin (wind) and Raijin (thunder), so I got to thinking what do both the wind and thunder have in common?" Seifer leaving it open for the others to guess.
"Clouds." Irvine getting the hint Seifer left them. "Thunder from storms to attack and protect them and winds guide them on their journeys."
"Correct." Seifer as he goes back to scratching Remmey and starts to growl softly to him filling him in on the conversation as he had poked his head up at the mention of Cloud.
Squall looks curiously to the others at this, and Zell fills him in that this was the growl talk he reported about. Squall nods his head as he half watches them in the mirror, trying to pick his next opening in questioning the half weapon. Once it seemed that the growing had stopped Squall went back to questioning Seifer.
"Did you see, or hear, of anyone else that might have been taken over to Planet?" Squall looking back to Seifer in the mirror again.
"No, but then again Planet is a big place, and I never really looked after the first year." Seifer wondering as to what Squall was really after and asks, "So, who else is missing?"
"Rinoa." Squall not looking back to Seifer in the mirror.
"Squall pull the fuck over now and get out of the truck." Seifer looking worried as he goes over some nasty possibilities from that answer.
"What?" Squall confused at Seifers sudden change in mood.
"Squall you ether pull over now, or I destroy the truck to make you stop." Seifer now reaching over to grab and lightly squeeze Squalls arm in the front cabin changing his fingers into clawed digits to show he wasn't bluffing.
Squalls eyes widen at the change as he pulls over. Seifer removes his arm from the front cabin once the truck stops, changing the claws to fingers once more. Now with everyone out of the truck, Seifer pulls Squall to the side leaving a confused: Remmey, Zell, and Irvine to wonder what was going on as he starts to sniff Squall over and do a few scans.
"You got any clue as to what he's doing?" Irvine to the other two with him.
"Nope, and I don't think our new four legged friend will be able to answer us ether." Zell half jokingly looking over to a pacing Remmey to lighten the shift in moods.
"I'm looking to see if we might have another Weapon on our hands later." Seifer looking over to the others.
"What!?" Squall taking a step back in shock.
"Hold still I'm almost done." Seifer going back to checking him over. A few minuets later after some more sniffing and a few pokes, Seifer is done.
"All clear, no signs of you becoming a Weapon, or anything else." Seifer calming back down.
"Anything else?" Irvine glancing to Seifer to see if he could talk about it.
"Wrath, Demon, or Lesser Being, and yeah I can give you the basics. A Wrath is the spirit of a dead Knight who lost his Sorceress to unknown means, and is unable to confirm her status at the time of his death. They are usually harmless, unless they think you have the information they need, then they are extremely deadly. Demon is a Knight who's Sorceress was killed in battle by an enemy who violated her right in front of her contained Knight. As soon as she dies the change happens turning the Knight into a berserker capable of killing off whole armies, or villages, without any thought going through his head other then revenge. The last one isn't so much as a becoming as it is more letting go, hence the name Lesser Being. The best way to describe it is de-evolving into something that has no past or future mentality, only just a here and now survival in its simple mind." Seifer sees Squalls thoughtful look and says. "Don't worry, we know how she disappeared, where she is at now, and you have the added bonus of the D.C. with you this time we're good." Seifer giving Squall a pat on the shoulder showing he was serious about giving the help.
Squall nods his head to Seifer and asks, "Is there is anything more I may have to worry about?"
"No, for now, and what few things that may come up." Points to Irvine and Zell, "I'll tell you later." As Seifer starts to head back to the truck.
Irvine shakes his head and asks as he follows him back to the truck with the others, "Seifer, how much of what you just said did you know about before the war?"
"All of it." Seifer not looking back to him.
"Seifer," Squall grabbing his shoulder to make him stop and look at them. "All of what you know about what you told us, or all of what you know about Knights and Sorceresses?"
"A good 85 of what I know about Knights and Sorceresses I learned before the war. The rest of it I learned ether during or after it." Seifer looking at them.
"Thanks, for not using it on us." Zell looking at Seifer.
"Don't," turns around and enters the back of the truck and lets Remmy in, "I failed." As he closes the door.
The others soon follow getting into the front cabin as they continue on to B-Garden thinking about what was said, not knowing that the one who had been following them form the air strip stayed behind. Smiling in the departing groups direction the stealth cloaked bird masked woman gates back to Planet thinking, "Seifer, you didn't fail. You saved me."
Time and location: Just as the truck is coming into B-Garden parking garage, Scott Smith (one of the attendants) is running towards the truck with Angelo in a heap in his arms.
Squall seeing this quickly parks and goes over to the two and says. "Status."
"I was going to get Angelo for you when you got back, and when I went up to get him, he was growling at your office door. I opened it up only to see something at the computer, with the two SeeDs in there standing as still as dolls. Next thing I know, Angelo attacks the thing at the computer, and gets smacked back towards me. The thing that really gets me is the SeeDs, they just crumpled to the floor after that. Seeing as fighting isn't my thing, I grabbed Angelo and hit the alarms, but nothing happened. Knowing that you would be back, I ran down here trying to tell any SeeDs what I saw, but they were all in a daze. I don't know what's going on, but we need to get whatever it was up there out of there." Scott looking worried.
"Thanks." Squall and hands him a hi-potion for Angelo. Once he knows that they are good he signals the others to follow. Going into the main hall they could see every student and SeeD on the ground. Irvine goes to one of the fallen students to check for a pulse as Seifer begins to sniff around with Remmey.
"Kid has a pulse and is breathing. If I didn't know any better I would say he was sleeping." Irvine looking to Squall.
"I can't smell anything out of the ordinary, and nether can Remmey." Seifer trying to figure out what caused this.
"Intruder Alert. Three males and one monster on the main hall. All SeeDs proceed to eliminate." Came a cold voice from the intercom.
"What the?" Zell looking at the "sleeping" SeeDs as they stand and draw their weapons targeting them.
"Sound." Seifer as he starts to shoot the intercoms after splitting his gunblade into its two parts as the noise from it was giving him a small headache.
"What?" Squall as he parries a spear attack from a male SeeD.
"Whoever that was is controlling them with sound." Seifer as he doges a knife thrown from an unknown SeeD from the second floor and shoots out another speaker.
"So any ideas on how to free them." Irvine using his gun like a club to knock out a gloved female fighter.
"A few, but we need to get back to the garage to secure the guy and the mutt first." Seifer wanting to check out Scott to confirm what he was hearing as the four of them made it back to the garage, knocking out or casting stop on any SeeDs in their way.
After they made it back to the garage Seifer closed the door and punched a code in locking it out completely from the main security hub, to everyone else's surprise. Once done he went over to Scott and looked to his ears and smiled at what he saw, hearing aids in both ears. Scott needed them, thanks to the war, when an explosion happened near him causing some hearing loss. Seifer then looked to everyone and gathered them near and began to explain his plan.
"Siren, for lack of a name, is controlling everyone with sound over the intercom, and our buddy here," looks at the name tag "Scott just confirmed it. So I got to thinking what would happen if we split off into two teams. One going around back to get to him, and the other to give orders with his voice to confuse the SeeDs and distract him."
"Nice idea, but how, and how did you know about the sound?" Squall wondering how they were going use some unknown back entrance way to the command office, and how Seifer heard something that none of the others could hear.
"Simple, I still have the lockout codes for this place, along with my knowledge of all the back service entrances, from when I worked for Norg. Hence the trick I just pulled locking Siren and the SeeDs out of here. The sound was first clued off by the headache that the intercoms were giving me." Seifer looking to Squall.
"Ok, so we get to Siren, but how do we keep him out of our heads, and how dose the other team give out other orders?" Zell being as Irvine and Squall were milling over the last part.
"Simple" Seifer says in a voice matching the one from the intercom then switching back to his own and says. "When team two is going up they wear head phones with music, of some kind, blasted loud enough to block out the sound. While my team one goes to a work station outside of the system to play havoc with our guest."
Squall mills it over and says "I'm team one not two."
Seifer smiles and says, "Fine it's "your" Garden."
With that Seifer draws out a map for the SeeD's (fighting ability) and Remmey (nose and fighting ability) going over some of the doors and codes with Squall. While that is going on Irvine and Zell look for walkmans and start to set them up to play the loudest and most irritating songs they could find on a loop. Scott was watching the door, through all of this, and wondering who the new guy was and the monster as he held the still out of it Angelo.
"Everyone set?" as Squall looks over the group.
"Yeah, and here." Zell hands over a walkman to Squall and then tries to give one to Seifer who shakes his head.
"My inner ear is a little different now, so I should be good." As he hands the head phones back to Zell.
Zell scratches his head and gives Seifer a questioning look.
"I may look human on the outside, but inside that's another story." Then signals them to follow him to an old closet with a broken power outlet in it. Tapping the wall above the outlet in a few places he causes a panel pop out from power outlet. Then after typing in a few codes into the panel, and pushing it shut, the wall moves back to reveal a passage. Once everyone was in the wall went back into place. Squall nodded to Seifer and his team goes off in one direction, with Seifers going the other.
Location: at the workstation with: Seifer, Scott, and Angelo; Seifer is putting in some codes when Scott askes.
"Not to sound stupid, but just who are you? You know this place inside and out, and you said you worked for Norg, but you don't look like any of the old staff that was around." Seifer looks up and at him debating on what to tell him when Angelo starts to move a little as he wakes from his fight and begins to growl in Seifers direction.
Seifer thinking as he goes to Angelo, "So you remember me mutt?",smiling at the dog as he goes up to him and casts stop on him along with a cure 2 to help with his recovery.
"Why did you?" Scott looks to the now frozen Angelo and then at Seifer wondering if he had tricked them.
"I did that so he wouldn't attack me while I was helping the others. I smell like Remmey and considering he is a monster, you do the math." Seifer hoping that the half truth would work.
Scott seems to buy it and says, "Makes sense, but you still never gave me a name, or how you know so much about this place from working for Norg."
"My name is Strife." The computer beeps indicating that he was in, and able to use the emergency intercom. "Any requests for the SeeDs?" As Seifer looked at the monitor showing some of the security feed.
"Requests?" Scott looking confused at.
Seifer in the Sirens voice " Attention all SeeD's, jump up three times and then sit on the floor and cluck like a chicken."
Though slower to react then when the real Siren said it, they did it.
Thanks again for the review Midnight Phase, and to answer the name question Seifer used a saying: rainy days bring cloudy nights. It will have a few meanings in the story, and Clouds name came from one of them. I'll give you the long answer of it first then the short.
The meaning that he, Seifer, used to name Cloud with was the "rainy days", thunder (Raijin) and wind (Fujin) of a rain storm, "bring cloudy nights", if they didn't bring him out of his after war depression there would be no more nights with them together. Basically it comes down to Seifer naming Cloud after his two best friends who kept him alive, and honoring them by keeping their memory alive for the next generation.
Also to note: the Siren is Waya and no he doesn't know that his assistants are dead, yet, as he has his hands full with this conflict. Next chapter will finish off this conflict as well as give a little information as to some of the work that the D.C. did for Norg. Till next time and as always read and review and I will get back to you.