A/N: The beginning of the second arc, 1/3 of the way through the story, narratively speaking. Thank you for following me this far, and I hope you enjoy the story.
Standing at attention felt different to Squall now, especially so far out of uniform. He stood nearly shoulder to shoulder with Fujin. He wouldn't lie and say he didn't feel slightly silly with his hair cut like it was and wearing leathers. Mission requirements being what they are he would adapt. He glanced at Fujin, whose outfit was a little less outlandish but at least it had a kind of aesthetic match to his. The idea of "Warrior Chic" almost made him laugh, but he ruthlessly suppressed the break of decorum.
His eyes focused back on the new acting Commander of Garden's SeeD who was holding a folder with the eventually settled mission parameters they were aiming at. He could tell she was still frustrated with the lack of definition. That was par the course though for deep cover and infiltration missions. Quistis breathed evenly, she wore authority with an ease that she always had. Her blue eyes were clear and sharp like shards of stained glass.
He couldn't help but feel vindicated in his decision. She had stepped up into the role with ease. She'd had a lot of questions for him in a short private meeting just before dawn. She'd taken extensive notes and listened closely. It was a defining characteristic of her to take everything seriously. Some people called her two faced for her wildly different persona when off duty, but he knew it was dedication to being who she needed to be.
"Alright, the mission is approved, not that I had much say in it." she said, shooting Squall a look he ignored. He figured at least one more barb was going to come his way.
"Indefinite mission length, no set check in period. Operatives are encouraged to provide regular updates to Garden by whatever secure methods they can manage. Eventual objective identification of or elimination of the officers of the Red Geezard Battalion, and any similar groups." Quistis closed the folder and sighed. Setting the folder down on her desk she turned back elbow in hand the other hand touching her chin.
"I wish you both the best of luck." She looked out the window of the classroom turned office.
"Thank you Ma'am." Squall said, saluting, mirrored by Fujin.
"And good luck to you as well. I doubt you'll need it." he said smoothly dropping back to a parade rest with ease. Quistis laughed quietly and smirked to herself.
"Thank you, Squall. I'll admit, I didn't expect you to choose me as a successor." She said putting her hands behind her back.
"Who else?" Squall asked easily. Fujin looked between them to the nearly matching smiles.
"Dismissed. Your lander is leaving in an hour from Balamb. You're already packed I would hope." She said turning her back on them to face the window fully.
Squall and Fujin stepped out of the office quickly.
"READY?" She asked and Squall thought about it a moment.
"She is, I will admit I'm getting nerves now that I'm actually going." He's still carrying his smirk and apparently feeling rather honest.
"SURVIVE." Fujin quipped, casually.
"Easier with two." He shot back, and it was her turn to smirk.
Fisherman's Horizon was a strange place to start their insertion into Galbadia, but when Fujin had explained it it had made sense. He suspected she had ulterior motives for wanting to start there, but could not fault her for twisting the mission to meet her own ends. Lord knows he'd done the same more than once.
The trip via Lander was different, but actually made docking up with FH quite a bit easier. The base of the structure was an easier disembarkation point than the humorously slapdash gangway they'd often used during Balamb's mobile periods.
Crawling up onto the substructure aside Fujin and pulling their bags up behind them. Strapping them on tightly they took a moment to take stock out of the way of the four Garden faculty that had to stop at FH for other reasons.
Squall followed Fujin, she walked confidently through town, her head scarf pulled to almost her eyebrows as she walked. They headed almost entirely around the disk like main structure to a small cabin leaning against the rods of a few of the solar panels. It looked like a lean-to that had slowly morphed into a kind of cabin made of corrugated metal, monster bones, rope, tarps and seemingly whatever else the occupant could get their hands on. It wasn't pretty but Fujin seemed to almost inflate as they approached, her steps quick and light. Her heels didn't even touch the ground for the last few steps as she rang a quite literal bell hanging from the awning.
"Yeah, Yeah, I'm home, it's my day off y'..." the occupant started opening the door. It was Raijin. If he hadn't heard his voice first he would never have recognized him. Raijin had always been built like a slab of muscle. He was unquestionably the most muscular and toned of any student at Garden. Now though… It was hard to reconcile that. He was still muscular. But more in the way of a laborer. His arms were corded but his torso had rounded some, the size and definition lost to a light blanket of fat. He still wore a brief vest around his shoulders letting his chest breathe. His hair had grown longer turned to dreadlocks and bound back with a braided piece of fishing line adorned with beads. And the beard. It was a little patchy but respectable. It leant him the airs of an old man of the sea, despite his relative youth. It was hard to remember this man was younger than he was.
He stood a few steps back from Fujin. He had only a second to take in Raijin before the two of them were in each other's arms. Fujin had wrapped her arms around him without hesitation her cheek pressed into his chest as he squeezed her back. One hand was a tight fist in the middle of her back and the other rested tenderly on the side of her head.
"Oh! Oh, Sis! What're you doing here!? I thought you were gonna be in Galbadia for another month, y'know? You should have sent word I'd have something for ya!" He said tears misting up his eyes. She just squeezed harder.
"DIED." she said, her voice muffled by being buried against him and her head turned down.
"What? But you're… oh... " Raijin said slowly, his eyes walking up from the back of Fujin to Squall who stood awkwardly still, trying not to intrude.
"I can come back…" Squall said softly.
"Le~" Raijin started his browns knitting together.
"I lost. You said it was gonna happen and it happened." Fujin said softly. And it was like the air got sucked out of Raijin. Squall turned and started to walk away.
"I'll be back la~" He started to say, raising a hand.
"NO. STAY." Fujin said, pulling her head back and looking at him harshly, her face a mess of tears like he'd only seen once before.
Squall stopped in his tracks and turned around.
"Squall? I recognize that voice, y'know? You're Squall Leonhart." He said leaning back a bit to look down at Fujin.
"What's he doing here, I thought we were avoiding Garden. You said they were bagging anybody who was a former." He said reaching back behind the door jam.
"DINNER?" Fujin asked, pulling back a step, keeping her arms around him.
"It's barely lunch time, Fu." he said questioningly and even through the back of her head Squall could feel the look she gave him.
"Fine, fine, but I'm warning you, all I've got is fish and pickled vegetables…" he said chastising.
"GIL." she said shortly, visibly tugging the bigger man.
"I couldn't take your cash, especially if y'all're on the run. Garden's gotta be hella mad about their boy going punk on 'um." he said looking up at Squall with concern.
Squall awkwardly kicked a seashell that skittered pleasantly off the edge of the platform.
"Um… Funny story." Squall said without a smile.
Raijin looked down at Fujin then back up at him.
"Alright, both a' yall got some explaining to do." Raijin said more seriously.
Fujin picked what looked to be a cafe, but really seemed to be more akin to a full service restaurant. Squall couldn't really complain as he crossed his legs and perused the menu, having picked the most distant of the ramshackle tables made of what looked for all the world like welded scrap metal. Probably was, like most things in FH.
Fujin and Raijin were talking in their strange, stilted way. Fujin responded with single words while Raijin rambled through the last four or so months. It was mostly mundane minutiae of relationships with people he didn't know and fishing jargon. It was weirdly soothing to listen to someone who really didn't have an exciting life.
They got food and Squall kept bracing for the start to the actual explanations to start, but they just didn't. They ate, sat and nattered a while. Raijin had a whole conversation with the server as they paid in cash. They stood up from the place and walked in companionable silence all the way back to the little shack alike so many in FH and came inside to the very sparsely furnished space that was low tables and bundles of cloth standing in for furniture. The bed in the corner had no pillows and only the lightest of blankets.
It would have been sad had it not been stuffed with art and small things. Many made of fish bones, carved into intricate shapes. Scrimshawed shells and bones in elaborate pieces hanging from the relatively low ceiling. Much of it was amatuer, full of little mistakes and odd choices, but wholly unique.
The most striking of the art was a large piece of painted driftwood with pegs that held up a familiar and ornate Chakram, a weighted Bo staff, but most importantly a one handed gunblade. One he was extremely familiar with. Hyperion. From the first second he saw it he was startled out of the conversation that was just beginning.
He walked through the home with cautious steps and stopped in front of it.
"We kept it." The words shocked Squall and he jumped a little bit, the voice just over his shoulder. Fujin was standing staring at it as well. She'd spoken so softly but there was a weight to the words.
"It was wrapped up in the corner for so long, I thought it might get rusty. If I made something out of it, I could justify keeping it oiled, y'know?" Raijin added guiltily.
"...He'd have liked it." Squall said and all three of them lapsed into a heavy silence. It took many minutes before anybody felt like talking again, each lost in their own rememberings.
"I believe…" Raijin trailed off, breaking the silence.
"I believe you guys were gonna tell me a story." Squall's eyes turned to Fujin who was chewing on her lower lip.
"YES." she said, turning around sharply. Squall turned on his heel to face them as Fujin flopped down on a pile of cloth where Raijin sat as well his back against the wall, settling in. Squall leaned against the wall, crossing his arms and legs.
"You wanna tell it?" he asked and Fujin considered before looking up at him a moment then rubbing her fingers together thoughtfully.
"YOU." she said looking back up. He shrugged and started.
He tried to keep a neutral tone, sticking to the facts of the ambush in Sawton. He saw Fujin nod gravely as Raijin looked to her when he described her injuries and their conversation.
"So it's really that bad out there, huh…?" Raijin mused quietly as Squall gathered his thoughts.
Squall didn't comment but instead talked about Fujin's exploits in her two weeks, the exhibition match gone wild, the fight in the showers, her test and her graduation.
"...And that's where we are, She has insider knowledge of a group that's going to keep Galbadia destabilized for potentially years longer than it needs to. We, and by that I mean Garden and the Respective governments of the world, would like the fighting to be over and a winner declared." Squall finished. Raijin nodded sagely, rubbing his bearded chin with one hand thoughtfully.
"Alright. Alright, that's a hell of a story. One more question though, Fu, when you start carrying a gunblade around?" He asked, pointing to the sheath on her bag. Squall and Fujin looked at eachother. He had left out their daily training sessions. It hadn't felt relevant to Squall in his story. Fujin opened her mouth though.
"TAUGHT." she said jerking her head at Squall.
"He taught you? When'd you learn the one handed style?" Raijin asked, looking genuinely surprised.
"You can't fight someone more or less every day and not learn a thing or three. Plus, I used one once upon a time. I learned the basics of both weapons before I committed to the two handed model. Seifer did the same, in reverse of course." Squall said, waving a hand about. Raijin considered looking from Fujin to Squall and back. A frown on his face.
"I see." he finally settled on saying. He was looking Fujin in the eye who looked nervous, her restlessness increasing by the second before she grimaced and sighed.
"LITTLE..." she said, rubbing a hand past her nose and pushing back her head scarf to run her fingers through her hair and along her scalp.
"Hm…" Raijin answered looking back at Squall with an appraising look on his face, considering him differently. Squall wanted badly to ask, but knew he wouldn't get a terribly helpful answer from either of them, judging that he kept his peace, his eyes found their way back to the weapon display. His eyes tracing the familiar weapon, even though it brought up bad memories for him.
"It brought back a lot of painful memories. But… I… It's a good match, it's… comfortable… even though it hurts…" Fujin whispered. Struggling with each word and phrase. Squall felt uncomfortable listening to her talk. It felt like an invasion of her privacy but there wasn't really anywhere to go, Raijin was blocking the door.
"I'm listening, little sister." Raijin spoke softly, egging her on. Squall flinched slightly, his discomfiture deepening.
"It feels like I'm taking back some part of it." She said in one breath and then gasped as though it had hurt her to say it.
"People hate him so much, in Deling, in Esthar, in Balamb, in the East, and the West." Fujin said, her growling voice thick with emotion. Squall looked away, his eyes finding their way back to Hyperion.
"You remember, when I started using the Chakram, what Seifer said?" Fujin's voice was still very small, prompting one to even try to breathe quietly to not miss her words.
"Not really…." Raijin's admittance was soft and sheepish.
Fujin sighed and brushed her fingers through her hair pushing it back from her eyepatch. Two fingers gently rubbed the skin of her cheek where the eyepatch's bottom rested.
"It's not important, but, when I fought alone, changing to a melee weapon was just easier, my magic has always been my strongest, um, asset." she continued finding a rythme.
"So being able to actually parry and make use of the strength of the junction more directly just made sense, right? So I started using a sword, there's tons of them in Galbadia, you can get one for less than a thousand gil. Then when… Well, I started training with Squall… and, we sparred a lot, and we got to talking about weapons and balance and what makes a good weapon, and he suggested gunblades, as an option. When we tried it, it was his suggestion to try the one handed model." She lapsed into silence. Squall wished he had a drink or something to do with his hands. Both Fujin and Raijin were staring at him with strange looks on their faces. He couldn't return their glare, this whole thing was becoming painfully awkward.
"That must have dug up some things." Raijin muttered into his beard, putting his hand over his face, muffling what he said.
"...Yeah." Fujin said, sounding tired.
"I still get flashes. But… It feels… right? Good? I don't know. I like the one handed model. It's the best weapon I've wielded." She reached to her pack and pulled out the long, fine bladed weapon, unadorned as it was and with the same sort of blade curve as the larger cousins, convex rather than concave. Concave like the Hyperion's blade was, the comparison was inescapable as she held it out at arm's length.
"Could use some grip mold adjustments." Squall murmured, more to have something to say than anything. Fujin actually snorted audibly, a hand slapping to her mouth as soon as she made the completely undignified noise. Raijin's laughter only made her blush as he slapped his knee, the tension that had been building broken.
"THANKS." Fujin groused. The blade's tip lowered to rest on the floor
"Whatever." Squall said softly, only making Raijin laugh harder.
"Oh, you two are too much, y'know?" He managed to squeeze out while catching his breath and wiping a tear from his eye.
"SMOKE." Fujin added morosely.
"You started smoking again?" Raijin jumped on her comment. She looked away from him reaching back to her pack to holster her blade.
"She got a commendation for giving tabs to her teammates during her exam." Squall added innocently. Fujin glared hard at him while Raijin looked cross.
She mumbled some kind of words Squall couldn't even understand and Raijin just shook his head with his arms crossed.
"ADULT." she said sharply, raising her head back toward Raijin.
"OLDER!" she added pointing at him. Raijin for his part put on a heavy frown of disappointment.
"You're supposed to be the smart one, those things hurt you, and you know it." Squall tried really hard not to laugh but made a small noise.
"UNDERSTAND!" Fujin said hopping from a full seated position to a low crouch in one smooth motion, Raijin pointed at her.
"OH yeah! Because this is mature behavior, gettin' all at somebody who's just lookin' out for you, ya know?" Fujin flopped back down glaring at Raijin.
"Yeah, that's what I thought." And she was right back on her feet with her hackles fully raised and practically hissing.
"Huh, I guess she is a cat." Squall comments innocently. Fujin turned pink and looked absolutely furious while Raijin split into peals of laughter.
"TRAITOR!" She said rounding on Squall who simply crossed his arms and held his ground as he had been. It took several seconds until she sat back down.
"You here for Hyperion then, I guess?" Raijin said softly, the laughter fading from his voice. Squall and Fujin looked at eachother. All three of them slowly looked up at Hyperion. It rested heavy, almost accusatory on the wall. Squall was first to look away from it. Raijin lasted longer before standing to fill a small cup with water from a barrel in the corner that Squall followed him over.
Fujin stared at the weapon on the wall. She stood and walked to the wall and raised a hand, laying it on the flat of the blade. She looked over at Squall and Raijin. Raijin had put an arm around Squall's shoulders. The smaller man looked extremely uncomfortable but they stepped outside together and she reached up pulling the weapon down from its pegs. Holding it in her hands it was heavier than she remembered. Like it was made of lead not steel. But it was lighter than hers as well. She fitted her hand to the grip and held it out fully stretched. It was longer than hers. Every small movement resisted her direction. The balance was very different, several inches further toward her hand. She twisted her hand and drove a small figure eight with the tip. She could feel it, watch with her eye where the blade twisted.
"PROUD?" she asked in a bare whisper looking past it to the wall, to her Chakram, to the Bo.
She experimentally thrust with the blade, a move she was fairly comfortable with. The tip deviated wildly and she frowned. She pulled back and thrust again, again it swiveled.
"ANGRY?" she asked her voice harsh even to her own ears. She swept it and her wrist smarted as she tried to arrest the swing short like she could with her own. She lay it across her hands touching the long empty flat of the blade. He'd never marked it like Squall had. She remembered the roaring lion on his blade when they'd been students. Running her fingers over the metal she really thought about it all.
"What did you stand for Seifer, besides the idea that Seifer Almasy should be somebody." She asked bitterly. The weapon almost laughed at her, she could hear his laugh in her head and it made her furious. She swallowed that anger, the bitterness and hung Hyperion back where it belonged, on the wall. A memory of a man who was her best friend, her closest confidant, but as soon as he had a modicum of power it showed who he probably always was. A child trying to be the knight in his story book.
She walked back to her bag and ripped her gunblade from its sheath.
"MORE!" she said in a fierce hiss, and stalked outside past the two boys in the middle of a tight conversation that interrupted as she brushed past them.
"Hey! Hey, Fu where you goin?" Raijin called after her, Squall however stepped back inside after only a moment and emerged with his gunblade on his shoulder and followed her without a word.
Squall was bewildered when Raijin's thick arm landed across his shoulders. He allowed himself to be led outside into the warm humid night.
"So, you two are gonna be traveling together, huh?" Raijin asked, sipping his water from a cup that more closely resembled a tall bowl. Squall drank from a similar vessel to buy time more than anything.
"Yes. Until we accomplish our mission, or find out it's impossible." Squall responded. Raijin digested that for a moment and nodded.
"We're blood her and I, not by birth, I don't think… but… I think you understand." Raijin said, Squall nodded. He had some feelings that resembled that, for a few people, Ellone, once he remembered her. Quistis, Selphie, Zell, Irvine when he was feeling generous. A family he adopted and who had been through the end of the world with him.
"I care about her, you know? I write letters to her whenever I can, a lot of my spending money is spent sending people on wild goose chases for her so I can write. And she writes back. We're all we've had for a long time now, you know?" Raijin admitted tapping his bowl to the building softly. Squall listened, sipping occasionally.
"I see." Squall said by way of acknowledgement. Raijin took a moment to study Squall. He turned his head away to take a longer drink, sighing as he brought it away from his mouth.
"I wanted her to stay here, she walked out on me, more than two years ago. Because I was happy here with a net in my hands, and she wasn't. She wanted something to make her feel like she had a reason to be alive. Living quiet wasn't good enough for my sister." Raijin sounded just a touch bitter about the whole thing but he sighed softly, when he spoke again it was more hopeful.
"She'll have somebody now to watch out for her. I'm sure she told you what it was like out there, you know? But she didn't tell you everything." Raijin paused weighing the vessel in his hand, watching the water ripple and dance a moment before he spoke again, more quietly.
"It got dark. Really dark. The last couple times she made it home... well, here, she was a wreck. She's got magical skill like a Trabian, so the scars are all on the inside, you know?" Raijin said. Squall opened his mouth to respond but Raijin kept going.
"Keep…" Raijin started and trailed off as Fujin loudly stomped her way out the door and past them. Her eye focused ahead and her gunblade held at a low ready. Raijin's arm loosened and Squall ducked under it even as Raijin started to speak. Squall walked straight to his gunblade and swung it up to walk after her without a word. She walked out to the edge to stand staring out at the Sea. The wind and the salt spray throwing glittering light dancing in the mid afternoon air. Raijin was left standing at his home, bothered but ultimately deciding to stay back, just like he had been for two years now. This was the new way for them, afterall, it had to be. Squall though, strode right up to stand a few steps behind her.
"RAGE!" She screamed out at the water her fists white knuckle as she swept the blade so fiercely it whistled shrilly as though parting the gusts. Squall waited as she paced up and down the edge fencing ghosts with her blade her eye far away in her own mind. He doubted she knew he was even there. No, she probably did. But he judged she had something to work out. He waited, it took many long minutes and a lot of hissing and spitting and muttering from Fujin before she had calmed down enough to look at him, even if she didn't face him. Squall, for his part simply stood silent witness to her anger, a rock unmoved by the wind's fury.
"FIGHT?" she asked, raising her gunblade to a low ready.
"If it'll help." Squall's response gave her pause. She looked at him then, her face tugged into a frown that always twitched to threaten a scowl but never formed one.
"NO." she said finally lowering her gunblade again and turning to stare out at the sea again. Squall considered her back, her posture, the way her hands stayed curled into fists though they loosened now. The tension in her shoulders that had nothing to do with keeping the tip of the gunblade from dragging on the concrete. He raised his chin and paused, he realized he was resolved to open his mouth only in the instant before he heard the words come out of his mouth.
"Is this about the Hyperion?" He asked, considering the question even as he saw the wave of tension shoot through her.
"...YES." she answered looking back at him over her shoulder, just a glance really. It let him know that he had asked the right question.
"I'm guessing you don't want it." He stated she simply nodded.
"Headmaster Cid once cautioned me to let sleeping dogs lie, not sure how that is relevant, but it feels like it is." Squall shrugged helplessly and Fujin let out a little snort of amusement.
"RIGHT." Fujin took a deep breath, raising the gunblade up to hold it perpendicular to the ground and examined it casually.
"Did you get what we came here to get?" Squall asked softly, Fujin sagged slightly and then smiled.
"YES."
Evening had set in by the time they left FH, the sky was painted as they held onto the back of a train, not technically passengers, but clinging to the rear like stowaways. Technically illegal sure, but so common that it simply wasn't stopped. They hopped off at the end of the horizon bridge after the sun had finished setting.
There were the ruins of a small stopover point on the bluffs at the Galbadian end of the Horizon bridge overlooking Mandy beach. It had never been repopulated after the first war, let alone the second when the bridge served a purpose again. The buildings were structurally sound enough. In a small corner store was evidence of old camp-fires. The space picked clean and everything pushed out of the way to make open floor space. A note hung from a chain mentioning that the skylight could be opened. All around them there was a deep feeling of foreboding it clung to the whole place like the very air was charged with negativity.
Shelter from the roaring wind and oncoming storm from the ocean was the goal, they'd already rode through the storm once on the way in and were not eager to brave it again with wet clothes. So they split to different sides of the building and changed into the next day's clothes, much the same as today's before hanging up the soaked garments to dry a short distance away.
Looking at the clothes they went out into the night and quickly gathered enough for a small fire, mostly a single dry-rotted wooden chair and the fallen branches of a few hardy trees that clung to the hills. Squall reached into his pocket for his lighter and froze as Fujin snorted. Squall sighed and raised an eyebrow at her. She reached into her pocket, pulled out the empty pack of cigarettes, threw away the package after tossing him the lighter. Squall got the, luckily, still dry timber burning after a little work, while Fujin climbed a shelving unit to open the skylight enough to get a draft going. With the small fire roaring they moved the clothes to be within its warm circle. She used her high position to look around, checking the entrances and escapes, looking for anything that could account for her bad feeling that still buzzed at the base of her skull putting her teeth on edge and hair on end. It only deepened her unease when she found no accounting for it.
The two of them sat down near to the fire. Squall with his back against a shelving unit seemingly placed for the purpose. Fujin hugging her knees both of them had their weapons within arms reach. As much as this place gave her intense misgivings Squall looked completely relaxed. Not the most reliable of measures, he was a very guarded person but she took his outward relaxation for license to put the feeling up to nerves. They were, afterall, back in hostile territory.
Watching the smoke curl and twist into the skylight Squall found himself hypnotized by the performance. The sheer intricacy of the twisting particulate upon the updraft was enough to let his mind settle on unconscious things. Fujin seemed of similar mind though she watched the flames instead, her red eye reflecting the dancing plasma with terrible clarity, trusting Pandemona to awake her in an instant if hostiles appeared.
Waking up in the field is always a bit of an experience. Squall's eyes snapped open and slowly glided across the space, looking for any changes. Not finding any he took a deep breath and slowly started to move. Stretching as he went and when he made it to his feet he was limber enough to move freely.
Across the space Fujin was laying on her back on the tile stretched out and staring up at the skylight around the cold ashes that had been blown around by the drafty space. He looked at her curiously as she made a small sound of effort and her back left the cracked tile of the floor with a staccato series of pops and crackles.
He straightened his clothes and resettled his kit. Checking over his pack and lifting it to a shoulder with a small package of field rations in his hand. Fujin did similarly as they stood to head out. It was a bit of a long walk to Timber and they hadn't wanted to come in on the back of a train and gotten more questions than they really wanted to deal with. Ironically walking in from the hills would probably get them less attention.
"BAD FEELING." Fujin said as they walked. It had been crawling up her spine since they hopped off the train. She had thought it just nerves, but it had persisted. Her instincts were screaming at her, and she couldn't ignore it anymore and she wanted to address it before they even got out of sight of the ghost town.
"Sorry, that's my fault." Squall said, and for a few moments the feeling fell away.
"WHAT?" She asked, looking at him incredulously. What the hell was he doing that would be causing this awful feeling of impending doom.
"Diablos. It's one of my Guardian Forces. He produces this aura when I let him, it keeps monsters far away so it's fairly useful, if you can handle a serious case of the heebie jeebies… I do feel it too for the record." Squall said looking back at her to see her considering.
"MANY?" she asked and Squall mulled over being honest eventually deciding that he was being silly.
"Four, Diablos, Doomtrain, Shiva, and Siren." He said listing them on his fingers starting from his little finger. Fujin looked at him with a critical eye.
"Not much elemental force, but a great deal of utility. You're using two right? Pandemona, and… Strigoi was it?" Squall asked and Fujin nodded.
"WIND. ICE." Squall nodded thoughtfully. After their little conversation Fujin filed the bad feeling as being Squall and tried to put it out of mind as they walked toward Timber the veil of darkness back to exuding from Squall full force
. The high rise of the Timber Maniacs building rose above the rolling hills and they approached easily enough. The walls of the city rose slowly, only about twenty feet high but even at range they could see that they were manned. As the two of them approached they could see a crowd of people near the gates. Someone was shouting, holding up a winged icon of some kind. Squall politely asked Diablos to cease his bad vibes as they pulled closer.
"We are free brothers and sisters! Free, but for how long!? Galbadia will not stay away forever, and when they return will you be ready!? Join up! The Wings of Freedom will sail into Galbadia, we will crush them where they live, let them taste the pain of having their houses burned, their families living in fear! Join us to strike back!" There were a large number of people standing around, many of them armed. Not shocking. Timber might actually be the most heavily militarized city-state in the world. Decades under Galbadian heel had given rise to a widespread militia and resistance movement. Clashes in Timber had been the largest drain on the Galbadian military outside their campaigns.
Squall considered the recruiter sceptically, he didn't like the odds of a Timber Guerilla movement's chances against either of the Galbadias. This was just another destabilizing force looking to tip the balance. Problem was, they really only had access to East Galbadia. Unless they planned to sneak through it to the west. Squall rather doubted that they would bother. Galbad was Galbad to most folks outside the conflict.
The two walked past the preacher and his crowd of onlookers without comment. They made it up to the walls where a checkpoint had been set into the walls. A Timber guard dressed in blotchy greens and blacks stood with a winged spear he was leaning on stopped them with a hand.
"Business, tough?" He said sharply, his tone derisive. Squall's initial offense was probably not helping his case. Fujin however stepped up and pulled one of her ID cards out of her pocket.
"RETURNING." she said sharply. The guard looked at Fujin and her card but slid back to Squall constantly. He took her ID and slid the corner of a Gil note out from behind it and it slid into his pocket.
"...That covers you Miss, what about your boy here?" Squall's face fell from a frown into a scowl.
"WITH." She said casually and the guard sized her up. There was a tense moment before he stood up and jerked his head past the walls.
"Fine, stay out of trouble." He said and the two of them quickly walked into town. Squall nodded to Fujin who shrugged one shoulder. The town hadn't physically changed much, but the energy in the place was different. People walked the streets armed. The shops were more sparsely stocked, but spirits were high, people were laughing, children were in the streets. Squall found himself relaxing as they walked. They had a few things they wanted to accomplish, and stopped to buy local rations. It was really just a pass through.
Squall had information on a smuggler, and they were in town to find him and secure travel to Western Galbadia, all the way to Deling if they could manage it. It took some conversations, a few meetings in the back of shops and a deal of gil passing hands but eventually Squall and Fujin found themselves in a warehouse packing into an armored carrier filled with crates they helped load, careful to work together to not give away their strength. It wasn't too hard, there were about a dozen other workers, some who looked fairly ill suited to the job they were doing. A pair of young women, a child, three men, one adult and two younger. When it was all loaded they all squeezed into the carriers as the door was shut. It didn't take long before they were moving.
Active war or not, trade was money, when legal trade was made impossible, the sub market rises. Black market traders and underground sellers, weapons and exotics in peacetime, food and bigger weapons in wartime. Gil rolls downhill as the saying goes. The trip was fairly tense. The young women and the child hung close together, the three males as well. They were all dressed in unremarkable clothes with few belongings. None of them were armed. All six of them eyed the two SeeD with undisguised suspicion. Not only because they had chosen the space closest to the rear gate. Conversations were quiet and private. Fujin and Squall stayed out of them both watching and waiting. Fujin caught a few hours nap here and there, when she woke up Squall would nap. Both of them had their weapons loose in their sheaths.
One of the times Squall was asleep one of the women very cautiously siddled closer to speak in a soft voice.
"Um, are we going to stop soon? Flisa wants to stretch her legs?" The woman spoke very cautiously, watching Fujin's face but glancing at her hands constantly.
"UNKNOWN." Fujin responded then her brow pulled down and the woman rushed to apologize her hands shooting up, which made Fujin jump just a bit and nearly sent the woman backwards.
"Sorry! Sorry! I did not want to offend, I just hoped you could…" She started and Fujin held up a hand.
"ILLEGAL." she said hooking a thumb at herself.
"What?" the woman asked, looking puzzled. Fujin sighed, lost in the rumbling of the truck.
"ALIKE." she said pointing between herself and the woman.
"You're going to Deling, too?" Fujin nodded.
"You don't work for Samuel?" The woman's companion asked. Fujin shook her head slightly, her eye sliding to the new speaker.
"NEITHER." She added motioning to Squall. She could tell that she wasn't really being well understood but it didn't matter. Last thing she wanted was these people thinking she was some kind of enforcer when her skin was on the other side of this relationship. It had been a fair assumption. She and Squall were literally dressed like Deling street trash. She pulled down her headscarf before she sat down. She could feel eyes on her but choose to ignore them.
The woman withdrew and the conversation started up again, faster.
She fished in her webbing and pulled out a brand new pack of Deling specials. The price was outrageous, but that's the cost of black market goods. Some light intimidation had gotten her a modest discount all the same. She jostled one of the last few rolls out of the soft pack and put it in her lips. She paused then and looked at the six civilians and put the pack away. Leaving the roll in her mouth, crossing her arms and leaning back against the wall. She played with the smoke in her lips. The air in the cargo truck was a little less tense at least. A few minutes later she pulled the roll from her mouth and tucked it behind her ear with a scowl, deciding that filling the tiny space with smoke would only ratchet back up the tension, or draw the attention of the drivers.
The ride was slow, part of a convoy of five vehicles with outriders to help dissuade monsters. Stops were frequent but nobody was allowed out of the carrier, rough terrain threw them against walls and getting stuck on the unmaintained roads was not uncommon either. The slow cooling of the metal shell told Fujin it was nearing nightfall. She knew she was pretty badly cramped up from sitting like she had been. Squall hadn't complained but she'd seen him trying to stretch his legs as well.
They finally stopped many hours into the drive, after dark. They were only allowed about 20 minutes as a quick maintenance pass was done on the trucks and a head count was made. Fujin took in the other people that were being moved into Deling. Some of them were probably actual workers to unload the trucks and head home, the minority she guessed. Though she had to question where some of the people she saw got the money to make the journey and decided that thinking about that would make her day worse. One glance at Squall's tight face and scowl told her he was likely thinking along the same lines. She took her moment outside to have a smoke, her nerves slowly fraying from the lack of doing anything. They were herded back aboard the trucks, packed away. There was one more break before the train bridge crossing.
The crossing itself was a slow affair where there was a long delay as the smugglers had to negotiate each Galbadian army at opposite ends of the bridge. There was a heart stopping moment when on the west side of the bridge the rear gate unlocked and opened.
Squall and Fujin pulled back into the alcoves they were sitting in and the others cowered behind whatever they could. The red-garbed elite stood with a terminal in his hands, he looked right past most of the people hiding poorly amongst the produce. The East Galbadian Elite commander towered nearly seven feet of armor and integrated weaponry. Squall had seen images of the new exoskeletal support suits but seeing it first hand was a different experience. It was the midpoint between the cutting edge GIM52A and the old elite hardsuit. Oversized arms were still standard, the helmet was full face covering now and his voice was being piped out through a speaker somewhere in the torso. It would have been pretty scary, if he hadn't fought an Iron Giant in the past, or Estharian Terminators for that matter. The soldier's actuated lenses hovered on Squall then Fujin.
"You two. You don't look like the normal type, what's your business in Galbadia?" He barked sharply. Squall looked at Fujin who gave him a small upward nod.
"Mercenaries sir, heard there's work in Deling." Squall answered, purposefully adding a quaver to his voice. Best to let military types think they're in charge.
"Hmph. Where are you from?" he asked suspiciously looking at Fujin, Squall, lucky for him, had two galbadian parents and had the look of the local around him. Fujin however with her sharp features and off-coloration.
"She's with m~" The soldier cut off Squall with a raised hand.
"I didn't ask you shit, kid." the officer said with a raised exo-glove pointed at Squall. Fujin was watching this exchange and considering her response. Settling she spoke up.
"CENTRA." an easier answer than what little she remembered of her childhood.
"Watch your tone, kid. You're talking to the actual military! Centra, a fucking Tribal? What are you doing so far from home little girl?" He said in a mocking tone. Pointing at her with an oversized hand. Fujin almost sighed in relief, she was concerned she'd already been ID'd. It wasn't impossible but it would complicate things for sure. She ducked her head and said nothing more. This seemed to satisfy the commander as he craned his head and tapped at his slate.
"Accounted for, if the strays haven't been picking at it." He said dismissively swatting the outrider who was standing by the side of the vehicle with the manifests hard enough to almost bowl him over.
"Get out of my sight." He said as the doors closed cutting off the exchange. Squall let out a long sigh, Fujin's was more of a pop.
"You're mercenaries?" One of the men in the back said, a bit of anger in his voice.
Squall and Fujin looked at eachother a moment, Squall's eyes flicked to the direction of the voice. The corner of Fujin's mouth curled and her eye looked down at his pack. Squall rubbed the side of one of his knuckles with his thumb for a moment and Fujin spoke up.
"YES." Her voice was hard, and accusatory as she turned her body to face the back of the space.
"Jakom be quiet!" said the older man of the group.
"They kill people for money!" The younger voice hissed back.
"They may only kill monsters! Use your head!" the older man argued back increasingly quietly though his tone was more angry than ever.
"Do you kill people!?" The boy said louder. Squall and Fujin shared another moment of silent communication. She scowled and thumbed her knee, wiping away something he didn't see. Squall's hand wandered up to the sword still sheathed over his shoulder. Fujin's nostrils flared in a silent huff.
"If the coin is right." Squall said unwavering. He looked the young man dead in the eye and he saw him flinch. The accusations stopped with the unspoken threat lingering in the air. Fujin fidgeted a little. Her earlier work to lessen the tension lost to the edge of truth. Nothing to be done about it. She could think of a lie, but it was too flimsy to try she admitted to herself. Better off letting the civvs be upset or unsettled than getting singled out more than they had.
They continued on through the darkness and into the dawn, pushing through the scorching heat of the savannah like terrain at the borders of the Dingo Desert on their way up through the great plains to the capital itself, stopping only when they pulled into a large fenced lot at the edges of the city.
All of the immigrants were quickly and quietly shuffled off the trucks, following Timber workers to a side building where they were all housed together. There was a palpable aura of relief from most of them and Squall got his first glimpse of the place in three years. The city of night, smogtown, the industrial capital that fueled the Galbadian war machine. It's buildings were all fairly short and imperial inj style, borrowed from Dollet but with a brutal edge.
And the clouds. Night was sharp here, but daylight was somehow worse. The clouds hung low, collecting over the city and bringing an ashy taste to the air. The smog of industry collected over the city. A confluence of the shape of the terrain and a prevailing breeze from the nearby ocean caused the clouds to hang in a way not fully understood. Even here in the dawn it was filtered ruddy brown like a banked ember. It was said the city got unfiltered sunlight maybe three days a year. The population was heavily industrialized and there was endless work to be doing. Forging the steel of the country that formed the skeleton of all their works, refining the magic stone that fueled their expansion, splitting the fuel that lit the streets when nothing else could.
The city burned with the dawn and the sirens of motion in the street, military vehicles moved along the roads at breakneck pace, besides busses and the occasional private vehicle. Hydraulics gushed, people shouted, brakes screamed, and in the distance gunshots rang out. Trucks loaded deep with materials trundled to and fore. It only took a minute to cross the yard, but it left an impression he knew he wasn't alone in feeling. Of strength, of sprawl, and of an intimate familiarity with violence.
City of Flames, City of War, Jewel in shade, Vinzer's Legacy, Deling City.
A/N: as always thank you to those who took the time to review, they are a warmth that carries. as always please take the time to review if you can, they are the primary way I improve as a writer, tell me what you did or did not like of if you just want to say hi. I try to respond to all reviews but I am very busy right now with my work so please bear with me 30/09/20