TROUBLE IN ESTHER!

CHAPTER FIVE

ALL CHARACTERS AND PLACES STILL BELONG TO SQUARESOFT. I TRIED BREAKING IN AND STEALING THEM BUT IT WAS TOO WELL GUARDED.

Esther President Laguna Loire stood at the window to his office completely lost in thoughts about many different things. There was one thought that stood out above all. As far as he was concerned it was more important than all other issues, even the monster problems that his city was facing.

Unable to decide on his own he chose to call his two Presidential Aids in to ask their opinion on what he should do. They both had offices right next to him so they were there in no time at all.

Kiros Segal and Ward Zabacc entered the room shortly after Laguna called for them. Unsure as to what he needed from them, they stood quietly and waited for him to speak. They also wondered whether it would be something important of just one of their long time friends off the wall ideas.

"Hey guys! I need your input on what I should get for lunch. I can't decide on pizza or meatloaf."

Realizing that it was one of his brain overloads and not something important Kiros resisted the urge to walk over and smack him upside the head. Barely! Ward on the other hand stepped forward and looked as if he was about to do just that.

"…….!" Even though he could no longer speak out loud, due to Laguna getting them lost deep in enemy territory and then getting them in a fight on the top of a cliff, which had cost him his voice box, he still managed to make them know what he was thinking. Mainly with facial expressions and occasional brute force on Laguna.

"Ward says that you should be getting ready to meet with the three SeeDs since they should be here at any time." "Or did you forget already?"

"Uhhhh? No I didn't forget, Kiros, I was just…..uhm…..testing you guys! Yeah that's it."

"OK, well they should be arriving by train any minutes so lets get going and worry about lunch later." Replied Kiros before turning and following Ward out of the room.

Laguna simply stood there for a minute scratching the back of his head and thinking to himself that he really needed to get a date book to keep track of all his appointments. He then followed his friends out the door to head for the train station.

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ESTHER TRAIN STATION

"Awwww… come on Selphie!"

"Irvine, I already told you I will not go on a date with you in the middle of a mission! Now if you don't quit begging I'll make you clean the engines on the Ragnarok when we get back to Balamb Garden. I do out rank you as a SeeD after all."

Irvine took this as his queue to change the subject and turned to Quistis who was standing on the other side of the room by the doors to exit the train, "So, Quisty where are we meeting Laguna?"

"He should be waiting around here somewhere so we'll find him once we disembark." She paused for a second before continuing, "Speaking of which, the train stopped moving five minutes ago, but you two were so busy flirting that you didn't even notice."

"Now come on and help me look for the President before he thinks we missed the train." She then turned and strode out of the train and immediately began scanning the area looking for their contact. It only took a few minutes for them to locate him. In fact he was being dragged by Kiros and Ward and muttering something about missing the turn for the food court.

As soon as Selphie spotted him she began jumping up and down and yelled, "Sir Laguna, Sir Laguna we're over here! Booyaka it's so exciting to see him again isn't Irvine?"

"Yeah, but not as exciting as seeing your beautiful face, my darling." At the look on her face he immediately regretted his words. She looked as if she was about to beat the living crap out of him.

Quistis simply chose to ignore the two and walked over to where the others were standing. "Mister President, SeeD Team Leader Quistis Trepe and fellow SeeD's Selphie Tilmitt and Irvine Kinneas reporting for duty as requested by your government." She stated the SeeD greeting and then bowed to show her respect. Laguna looked at her and burst out laughing. Not sure why, she stood up straight and looked at him in a confused manner.

"Quistis you guys really don't need to be formal with me. I hate the title of Mister President anyways. Besides, thanks to Ellone you guys have all been in my head at one time or another." "Now how about we head back to the palace and I can tell you what has been happening lately."

Everyone grabbed their things and fell into step behind Laguna, Kiros and Ward. They headed for the skylift and prepared to get onto the next car when they heard a loud roaring from behind them.

Irvine pulled his shotgun 'Exeter' out from its place inside his brown trenchcoat and spun around, not exactly sure what he was dealing with since there were so many different monsters still loose from the Lunar Cry. All he could see were two enormous clawed feet several yards away. He looked up and then he looked up even further and realized he was staring at the biggest T-Rexaur he had ever seen! It was easily twice as big as the one in Balamb Garden's Training Center!

"What the Hell! How did that thing get in the city? It should have been seen long before now?" Laguna yelled before diving out of the way as the beast stepped forward and attempted to flatten them. He looked over at Kiros and Ward and saw that they had gotten out of the way to but they had just ran into two Toramas and were engaged in a fight with them.

Irvine stepped forward and cast Blind on the creature's head, hoping it might help if the T-rex couldn't see them. Then he noticed the large gray metal band around its neck. "Quistis, any idea what that thing is around its neck?" But before she could reply he was picked up and thrown backwards ten feet when the monster spun and used its tail like a bat to send him flying. He smacked into the safety wall for the elevated platform and collapsed to the ground.

Selphie saw this and ran over to him to see if he was okay. She bent down and cast Curaga on him to help wake him up and then turned and swung her 'Strange Vision' nunchakus at the T-rex. They smacked into its upper leg but didn't even phase it. She backed up and cast Ultima at it.

Quistis had been attacking from the other side but she wasn't having much luck either so she quickly cast Scan to see what weaknesses the thing might have. It didn't show any at all which was strange for a T-rexaur. What scared her the most was the fact that it had a Vitality and Strength that were off the chart. "Selphie, do you have any Meltdown spells to cast? They might help!"

"No, Irvine does, but he's still unconscious."

Laguna chose this time to run over to Quistis and mention that there were several more fierce looking monsters heading up the street. Quistis saw them and decided that it was time to beat a hasty retreat before they were overrun. "Laguna can you have Ward grab Irvine? We need to find somewhere safe to regroup and figure out what is going on."

"Yeah, the Presidential Palace is well guarded and it's not far from here so lets head there." Laguna took a second to bend down and pick up Irvine's gun. Then, checking to make sure it was loaded he told Ward to grab Irvine and to head for the palace.

Selphie fired off one last Ultima at the T-rexaur before turning and following the rest of the group as they headed down the street for the two block run to the palace. As she passed the spot where Ward and Kiros had killed the Toramas she bent down and picked up one of the strange collars that it had been wearing.

She quickly caught up with the rest of the group and within a few minutes they were at the palace entrance.

Kiros looked around as they walked inside and noticed that the guards were nowhere to be seen. "Laguna, you didn't fire the guards again did you?"

"No, I didn't!" He looked around and realized that in fact the palace appeared to be empty. "Lets head to my office and try to figure out what in the hell is going on."

The group silently made there way up to the second floor and into Laguna's office. Once inside, they laid Irvine down on the couch in the corner and walked over to the computer terminal at his desk. Kiros punched in his code and a map of the city appeared. All over it were red X's marking monster sightings and attacks.

Kiros then brought up a map of the palace to check for signals from the guards radio headsets. They were all showing up in a large storage room in the basement of the palace. He next tried contacting them to see what their situation was but got only static from the speakers.

"We have a problem. Laguna the radios are all being jammed and all the guards signals are showing up in the main storage hangar."

Quistis heard this and began to figure out what she thought was going on, "Guys, I think that the monster attacks were just a diversion to spread out your troops around the city. We need to find out who is doing this and stop them before they can cause too much damage."

Selphie remembered the collar device she had picked up and carried it over to show to Quistis. "Quisty, I think this might be part of the answer," she handed over the device before continuing "It was around the necks of all the monsters we encountered."

Laguna took a look at it and began to say something about it just as the door to the office blew off its hinges and fell to the side. Twenty men wearing Galbadian military uniforms poured into the room and surrounded the five people at the desk and two more stood over Irvines unconscious form on the couch. They all had machine guns aimed and ready. Behind them another man wearing a high ranking uniform strode forward and clapped before speaking.

" Congratulations, you little SeeD twerps are smarter than I gave you credit for. I didn't think you would figure it out that quick." He paused and looked at Laguna before continuing, "oh and I wouldn't recommend trying to attack me or my men because I have a friend of yours who wants to say hello." He turned and snapped his fingers at the guard nearest the door. The guard stepped outside and dragged in a girl with a bag over her head. The man grabbed the bag and yanked it off of the petite girls head to reveal Ellone.

Laguna burst into a fit of anger and looked like he was about to dive for the officer when Ward grabbed him by the shoulders and shook his head indicating that it would be a bad idea.

The officer simply laughed and then stated "I suggest you do what I say when I say or your friend is going to get an extra hole in her pretty little head" He looked over at Ellone before turning his attention back to the group by the desk, "Now if you would all drop your weapons on the floor and follow me."

Authors note: Sorry it took so long to get another chapter out. Hopefully people like this one. Please review and let me know. Thanks to those who have reviewed. It is nice to know that someone is actually reading this. Have a good night.

Oh yeah, I might have another chapter out this morning or at the latest tonight.