Tour de Force
by Soul Hunter
Part 9
There are some things in life that often scare the living daylights out of different people for no apparent reason at all. Some of these are clinically psychological, like the infamous mental affliction known as phobia. Others are just born of past experiences that left a streak of unpleasant memories too painful to recall and excruciating to relive. Trauma, if it can be called as such.
And then there's the fear of the unknown. The fear of the future, the apprehension of what's to come. More often this kind of fear has disabled people, rendering them helpless and unable to move on, to continue. To venture into unheard of places where it is often said that proverbial angels fear to tread. It is unfortunate, but the nature of people being scared to move to another echelon is quite prevalent. It has often resulted in broken dreams and unrealized visions. It frequently ends up with stagnant lives.
Yet some people do venture. A host of the brave and the bold do dare to advance to the next level. For what reason? Only they know for sure. Only they see the priceless prize just lurking beyond the restricting confines of the current state. Only they have the steeled will to go forth into the unknown, eyes often shut tight as they jump heedlessly and recklessly to the dark void... Hoping that at the end of the tunnel, they will find what they seek. They will have the answer.
The next level... it sounds utterly intimidating. But if people are to insist in staying clear of it, how will they receive answers to their unrelenting questions?
The next level. The subsequent step.
They plunge headlong into it, even though they are bereft of the certainty of a sure answer. Slithering into the unknown, they close their eyes, choosing to be blinded from the constraining concept of the 'safe side'. All they know is they are here... alone... together. Abandoning their fears, they head forth courageously into the brewing tempest. Dispensing all caution, disregarding all norms.
The storm rises to its peak as the mindblowing journey continues. A flurry of colors litter the parallel boundaries, mixed in a stream of intertwining white bolts each curving unto itself until all they see are telltale patches of homogenous lightwaves bordering the narrow expanse of the proverbial warp tunnel. As their collected consciousness advances, so do the blurred images of people and places standing in the lateral outbounds of the speedily moving vessel. They can see the souls, but the souls can't see them.
A phenomenon takes shape. Already staggered in the throes of the raging hurricane, they next become trapped by the force of a bizarre twister jutting down from the malevolent vortex. A storm within a storm, magnificent in form and merciless in purpose. They try to resist, maneuvering their vessel to an evading path. But the maelstrom is too powerful, as it relentlessly hurls them around like lifeless rag dolls trapped in the ravaging nexus of the furious tempest.
It continues to roar, repeatedly unleashing violent heaves and shoves while continuing to draw in the precious heat fueling its ferocity. They brace themselves against the typhoon's final attack, then looks up as the dark clouds open to the clear blue lurking just above it. An updraft blows, powerful and proud. Their containment swings and drops before ultimately rocketing up to the highest pinnacle of the storm's last knell. It then cries out its freedom amidst the caliginous tempest below which now begins to disperse. Finally releasing its claim, the storm dissapates to give way to a gentle cushion of soft winds, tenderly setting the battered vessel down to it's goal.
The next level.
She doesn't know what to think. Pushing out the last of the stale air in her lungs, Selphie breathes in a batch of refreshingly cool air provided by the airconditioning. She lies quietly, still awash with the relieving exhaustion from that journey they traveled. Feeling an urge to doze off, the Trabian lass fights the heavy sensation starting to set on her eyelids. She then looks to her side.
"What now...?"
Zell gazes at her with equally lazy eyes.
"What now? We sleep."
"Not that, silly!" she blurts out while pounding him with a pillow. "What do we do now that... well, we've crossed the line?"
"Oh that." he chuckles. "Well... I guess there's nothing left but to dance with the music. I mean, we dared to go this far... So what do you think we should do next?"
"Don't throw the question back at me, Zell. Answer it. What now?"
"Umm..." he sinks into a deep pondering. "Uh... you're not thinking that we should just go out and tell the world about us, are you?"
"No, I'm not saying that." Selphie answers. She admits to a certain enticing tendency to do what Zell just voiced out. But at the same time, the Trabian lass also begins to realize that diving headlong into her impulse and dealing with the consequences are two different segments of the same chain. All of the sudden, Selphie starts to feel jittery.
"Don't you even think about doing that, Zell."
"What? Of course I won't, Sef. You think I'm crazy?" Zell stops abruptly after that thoughtless repartee. Confusion starting to set into him, he asks himself why all of the sudden he feels this gnawing shadow of uncertainty deep inside him. Has he suddenly realized that he doesn't care for Selphie as much as he thought he did?
The martial artist stares intently at his teammate. Then concludes: that's not it. On the contrary, he had just come to a realization that he cares for her more than he ever considered possible. As he looks at Selphie, Zell recognizes the resonating cry of his desire to be the one for her.
But still, the doubt remains. What could possibly be causing this?
"Why don't we just forget about it for awhile." he consequently suggests. "If you're asking what we should do next and I'm also asking what we should do next, I suppose that means we both don't know the answer. So, can we drop this for now?"
"And what do you recommend, Mr. Dincht?" Selphie returns to her softly. "That we just continue meeting like this until we figure out what to do?"
"You have a better idea?"
"No. Not really." She answers while pulling the heavy blanket up to her neck. "What time is it?"
He glances briefly at his watch. "Quarter past eleven, almost lunchtime. You wanna grab a bite?"
"No..." Selphie echoes lazily. "I am a bit hungry but... no. Wish Rica also does room service, though."
"Yeah, right. And what do you think she'd think if she sees me here with you?"
"You can always hide under the bed." Selphie retorts, her face contorted in a playful smirk. "I think there's enough space there for even Raijin to fit in."
"You serious?" he blurts out. "You really want moi to suffer the indignity of hiding under the bed?"
"Who knows? Maybe you'll need to one of these days." Selphie answers with her persistently playful tone. Zell then squints his eyes at her.
"You're messing with me, aren't you?"
"Yeah." she chirps, sticking her tongue out to him. Just then, the low-set white lights start to flicker.
"What the hell's wrong with the lights?" Zell wonders.
"Oh, I heard yesterday that they're making some repairs to Garden's power generator. We're actually operating on auxiliary right now."
"Oh, I see. Power generator..." he mumbles, prior to his train of thought unwittingly linking Selphie's input with the discussion the two of them had with Quistis earlier. Selphie takes notice of his sudden silence.
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing." Zell quips back. "I just remembered the meeting we had this morning."
"What about it?"
"I just remembered what Quistis said about Mako element and TSL."
"And..."
Promptly assuming a serious facade, Zell lifts himself up to a sitting position before continuing. "I read in some history book about an underground war that went on between Dollet and Esthar a long time ago. That was the period when Mako element was most widely used. But not for making TSL."
Selphie just looks on at Zell to prompt him to continue.
"It's one of the highlights of that war, when weapons started to become more sophisticated. Royal scientists from the old kingdom of Dollet have allegedly discovered a way to condense Mako element into a simpler substance that, when detonated, can cause a great deal of damage even with very little amount in use. But then, they had to discontinue its use because of the problem of storage. The substance is even more volatile than natural Mako, and a lot of radiation leaks were caused by it. But even if the manufacture of the bomb stopped, the concept survived."
The martial artist pauses briefly, as if trying to recall something. "But I kinda forgot the name of that substance. What was that? I think it starts with G...."
"Gyro War?" Selphie interrupts.
"Yeah... Yeah, that's right? How'd you know that?"
"You're not the only wide reader around here, Zell."
"Cool!" Zell quips. Inadvertently visualizing the word, the SeeD starts to feel an ominous coldness in his blood due to a sudden recollection.
"Holy crap!"
"What's wrong?"
His heart racing, Zell frantically turns to Selphie with an almost panicky request.
"Sef, do you have a paper and a pen?"
"Sure..." she returns before leaning down to the drawer beneath the bedside table. Pulling out a small pad with an Aletta platinum pen fastened at the seam, Selphie quickly comes back to hand them over to Zell. Still gripped by alarm, the martial artist jots down the word 'Gyro War' on the paper, then turns it upside down.
"Shit... shit!"
"What the hell's wrong, Zell?" a now similarly alarmed Selphie asks. She gets her answer in the form of Zell brandishing the upside down pad in front of her.
"Recognize this, Sefie?"
"Ohmigosh..." Selphie snaps. "That's the mark we saw on those crates under the VY-1's cargo bay back in the terrorist base!"
"That's right. Those dumbasses were making Gyro War bombs! And I'll bet a year's pay that there's one already loaded in the VY-1 when we took it back to Esthar. Get dressed, Sefie! We have to warn the others!"
"Say that again, Quistis?"
"I said, Zell told me to tell you that a bomb might be planted in the VY-1 bomber they recovered yesterday." Quistis' voice crackles back from Squall's SeeD communicator. "Where are you?"
"I'm with Irvine and Rinoa. We had just come back from lunch." Squall returns to his deputy. "Are you sure, Quistis? We need to get back to the summit in ten minutes, and we can't waste our time in some wild goose chase."
"Zell sounded pretty sure, Squall." Quistis retorts. "Anyway, I recommend that you check it out. It may be a long shot, but we just can't ignore a potential threat like this."
"Okay. By the way, where's Zell?"
"He just left with Selphie, said they're gonna check on something. This one's your baby, Squall."
"Copy that. We're on our way." Squall then turns his attention to his two comrades. "Rinoa, Irvine, we have to go to the underground hangar on the double."
Ten minutes later, three SeeDs are seen dismounting from a hovercar near a structure called Tears Point, somewhere south of the Great Plains of Esthar. Checking the ammunition load of his gunblade, Squall turns to Rinoa with a nod.
"He's junctioned. Don't worry about encountering any monster from this point." the sorceress assuages her knight.
Not long after, the three youthful warriors, accompanied by a squad of Esthar military's explosives detachment, are already traversing a long corridor leading to the main access tunnel to the underground hangar. Irvine surveys the surroundings, then turns on the pocket phone Kiros Seagull had earlier provided him with.
"This place looks like a maze, Kiros. What are we looking for here?"
"The hangar is divided into four sections. The one that you need to locate is situated in sector RF1, the Hazardous Payload sector. Hurry up. If that bomb is exactly as Zell described it, you may not have much time left."
"What do you mean, Kiros?" Irvine quizzically snaps back. Unfortunately, the depth of the underground facility coupled with the surrounding electronics begins to interfere with the microwave signal. "Kiros? Kiros?!? Are you still there?... ... Damn, lost the signal."
"Nevermind that. Where do we go from here?" Squall intermits.
"Hangar Sector RF1."
"There!" Rinoa suddenly exclaims upon making out the illuminated marking on one of the heavy doors. "RF1. That's what we're looking for, right?"
As they walk into the vast room, Rinoa gasps upon seeing a score of immobile bodies of the on-duty technicians littering the cold hangar floor. Strutting closer to one, Squall checks its vitals, shaking his head in the process.
"They're still alive, but barely."
The explosives squad commander, Major Therren Foole examines the victim's eyes. "Oh man. This is radiation poisoning! That means the bomb is already leaking radiation out! Everyone, get out of the room now and lock me inside!"
"But why?" Rinoa shoots back. "If the bomb is leaking radiation, you're gonna need our help to disarm it."
"You don't understand. This is the Hazardous Payloads sector. It probably has a sensor system designed to detect traces of leaking radiation. And if it does, the safety system will trigger a containment procedure that will isolate this place from the rest of the facility. You guys won't be able to get out!"
"He's right, Rinoa." Irvine agrees with the Major. "We're only going to get in his way. Let's get out of here."
Just then, floating radioactive traces begin to reach the first of a series of sensors attached to the main doorway's frame. Consequently, a loud alarm starts blaring to the surprise of the group.
"GET OUT, NOW!!!"
But it was too late, as heavy, two-yard thick metal slabs that weigh over 20 tons each start dropping along the four walls of the hangar. At the same time, the ceiling becomes covered with metal slabs of the same dimension, completely encasing the chamber in an impenetrable shell and trapping everyone inside.
"Oh Shit!!!" Major Foole yells out. "I told you to get out! There's no way for you guys to escape now."
Trying to hide his fear, Squall turns a headstrong facade to the Estharian squad leader. "Never mind that. We have a job to do, so let's just do it and make sure that bomb never goes off." He then turns to an evidently frightened Rinoa. She looks pale, very pale.
Squall then realizes that the pasty hue of Rinoa's face is not caused by fear.
"I feel... sick..." she starts, subsequently collapsing to the floor. Rinoa was then followed by Irvine, prior to the explosive squad members falling down the embankment one by one. Gripped by horrid alarm, Squall tries to run to Rinoa's aid. But the hot sensation likewise has begun to afflict the SeeD commander. Struggling hard to stay conscious, he manages to reach for his SeeD communicator before ultimately succumbing to the toxic influx.
- end of part 9 -