Dr. Odine sat in his study in the Esthar laboratory, staring intently at the readouts on the lucite panel before him. Indeed, his experiments on sorceress related powers were coming along very well. All he had to do was make sure the true Sorceress Ultimecia didn't find out about his studies. He had detected a change in the paramagical power readouts weeks ago, which seemed to indicate that the Sorceress had found a new host. He had hoped that it wasn't true, that perhaps it had more to do with his latest experimental subject's powers. But in the end he knew that there was another sorceress, and Ultimecia had found her. His fears had been confirmed with the news about Cid Kramer's wife being overtaken.
"Vell," he whispered to himself, rubbing his tired eyes, "zere is nothing for it. Nothing yet." But someday, he knew, there would be a way to defeat the true Sorceress. And he was sure he'd be the one to discover the way. Or at least to help discover it.
Garden. It was a thought that kept coming back to him. Cid and Edea Kramer's Garden. SeeD.
"SeeD must be born," he said out loud. He was discovering new ways to use paramagic every day, and this would be his way of watering Garden.
The true Sorceress was a glaring mistake of natural forces. He'd heard of sorceresses in the past who were harmless, or even helpful, but very, very few. Most had been victims to their own power, accidentally turning it in on themselves and destroying themselves. Some had been descended from Hyne, some had had the power forced on them by a stronger sorceress. But most had been entirely self serving entities, and warped, twisted power machines.
Dr. Odine's train of thought was broken by a sound that made his heart beat against his ribcage suddenly. A hard, jagged breath, almost a growl, close behind him. He looked up slowly at the lucite monitor of readouts, and saw the distorted reflection of a disheveled man behind him. Before he could turn around, he felt the barrel of a gun against the back of his neck. The *click* of the trigger being cocked felt like a vertebrae in his neck cracking. He took a deep breath.
"Mr. Loire," he said coolly, "vat are you doing here?"
"Turn around so I can see you," Laguna said harshly.
He turned around to face him and was shocked by what he saw.
When Dr. Odine was young, before his mother had passed away, she used to read to him. He recalled one of his favorite plays she had read to him which, she had told him, had many lessons in it. He remembered his mother reading in their native tongue, the words "tempt not a desperate man," and her voice solemnly explaining to him what that meant. He supposed he'd never fully understood it till this moment.
He expected Laguna to hit him, with his fist or his gun, or to drag him out of the chair, and he prepared himself for it. Instead, Laguna shakily wiped his eyes and forehead on his long sleeve, and asked a question.
"How could you do it?" he asked.
"You cannot shame me, Mr. Loire," Dr. Odine said. "I know zat I am doing ze right thing."
"You're doing experiments on Elle," Laguna said, as if he couldn't believe it. "Was she here the whole time, the last time I was here?" he asked.
Dr. Odine recognized that the man in front of him, pointing a gun at his head, was totally undone, and absolutely ready to pull the trigger.
"Ellone is perfectly safe," he said quickly, trying to control the fear that was rising in him. If he showed his fear, then Laguna might mistake it for guilt. "And zere is a good reason for all of zis, and a good reason vy you should not kill me."
Laguna shook his head slowly and almost absently. "I didn't ask you for a reason," he said in a low whisper.
"Do you know," he said, trying to buy himself some time, "vat vill happen to you if you murder me?"
Laguna stared at him for a second as if he didn't understand what Dr. Odine was getting at. Then he laughed, which made Dr. Odine's insides feel as if they were melting. "I'm a fugitive from so many people right now, Dr.," he said, "one more group isn't gonna hurt me. Besides, I have nothing to lose and you know it." His voice began to rise in anger and, Dr. Odine thought, panic. "You made sure of that when you took Ellone away from me." His hands were shaking and Dr. Odine knew that he could pull the trigger on accident.
"Ellone is a special child, and..."
"Oh yeah?" Laguna said, cutting him off, "I thought she was a stupid brat? Now what would you want with a stupid brat, doc?!" He pushed the gun into Dr. Odine's face. "To hell with this," he said, "why am I wasting my time with you?"
"Ellone can lead ze vay to defeating ze true Sorceress," Odine said quickly, trying to distract him with a grand statement. "She, she alone holds ze key to the future. She is a time traveler."
Laguna blinked the tears out of his eyes, but didn't say anything, and more importantly, Odine thought, didn't pull the trigger.
"She sees things on her dream travels. I have reason to believe zat zis is true time travel, and not merely psychic intuition, for she speaks vith others from zat time, zat are alive in zat time. She sees a vorld taken over by ze true Sorceress, ze sorceress Ultimecia. She sees ze coming of a vorld in which time is compressed, and all existence is denied save zat of Sorceress Ultimecia; she says zere are people zere zat she knows and loves, in danger. Mr. Loire, she sees your son in zat time."
*BANG!* The echo of the bullet that had ricocheted off the wall to the side made Dr. Odine's ears ring. When his heart started beating again, he saw that Laguna had dropped the gun to the floor.
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Kiros paced outside the door on the roof of the Esthar Laboratory. There had been a guard up there, but he was fast asleep and locked inside the building. He had to admit, the paramagic that Dr. Odine had taught them a few years ago did come in handy. He had let Ward use the Sleep spell on the guard, simply because Laguna was in no state to cast, and because he himself usually drew magic from others, while his two comrades cast it. It felt more natural to him to be receptive, at any rate. Ward didn't like to take the time to draw magic, and Laguna sometimes jumped the gun and got the timing wrong.
However, he did find that drawing magic continually for long periods of time was exhausting, moreso than casting it. He had always meant to ask Dr. Odine why that was. But as of now, he entertained the idea that he might never get to ask Dr. Odine anything, depending on what the doctor said to Laguna.
Laguna had asked to go in alone, after assuring them that he knew exactly what he was doing, concerning Dr. Odine. Ward had been hesitant to let him go alone, as out of control as he seemed to be. But as far as Kiros was concerned, the Dr. had kidnapped a little girl, Laguna's only living relative (for he did consider Ellone to be Laguna's family, since he had practically raised her.) He didn't care what came of his experiments, either. It was just as wrong for him to take Ellone and use her, as it was for the sorceress to do the same thing. Ward had seen the reason in this, and in the need for him to guard the front door, and finally relented.
Besides, Kiros thought, Laguna might be right on the edge, but even so, he was no fool. He would know exactly what he had to do.
Kiros stopped pacing and looked out over the city of Esthar. Esthar City proper was a lively and interesting city, but it was bordered by a wasteland. On the outskirts of Esthar City was an expanse of murky, rusty sand. It wasn't beautiful, like a normal desert. Instead it looked like a junkyard of dirt and rocks. He thought about what it would be like to walk across that rusty sand for days on end, with nothing in sight but miles more of it. It depressed him, and he was just about to think how much better he liked Esthar City as compared to its outskirts, when Esthar City was gone.
He turned around quickly and dizzily as the sand spread out on front of him. The air was heavy with magic, so heavy and thick with it that he couldn't breathe. He reached for his katal and found both of them at once, before realizing that the first thing he should have done was try to draw a protective magic, such as Shell, from whatever magic being or monster was around him, and cast it on himself.
As an afterthought, he reached out mentally and looked for something to draw from, and instead, felt the cold veil of Silence swallow him.
Kiros had had Silence cast on him a few times before. The first time it had happened had been right after he, Laguna and Ward had learned about paramagic. They had spent an entire day casting magic on each other, so they could understand what it felt like. He'd let Laguna cast Silence on him that time, and what had made him nervous was that he couldn't use magic to counteract it, and he couldn't ask Laguna to undo it. Ward had commented that Kiros was quiet enough and didn't need such a spell on him - this was before Ward had, in a form, had Silence cast on him for the rest of his life.
They'd experimented with it in Dr. Odine's laboratory, and when the Dr. had found out that they were using magic recklessly on each other, he'd scolded them all for it, telling them it was not a new toy, but a delicate power not to be wasted. In the end though, it had been very helpful for all three of them to get a feel for what they would soon be doing on the battlefield, even if Laguna had learned the hard way that it was dangerous to cast Confuse on a man as large and powerful as Ward.
And from those early experiments, Kiros had learned what Silence felt like. But he wasn't prepared for power of this magnitude, and he knew right away that it had been cast on him by a sorceress.
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"Uncle Laguna, please don't cry," Ellone said.
He picked her up and hugged her.
"Don't you think I'm too big to be carried?" she asked, but put her arms around his neck anyway.
"Yeah, you got big," he managed to say. "I just missed you." He put her back down. "I'm kinda afraid that if I let you go someone will steal you again."
She took both his hands in hers, and Laguna was a little unnerved by the maturity that was now in her eyes. "Uncle Laguna," she said earnestly, "I was the one who decided to go with Dr. Odine. I know I can help him learn things about the true Sorceress. When I lived at the orphanage, everything was really nice, Uncle Laguna," she said. "I missed you all the time, but I made friends too. I thought about you and Aunt Raine every day, but I had people to keep me company, you know, all those kids. I sort of helped take care of them."
Laguna took a deep breath and nodded, but didn't know what to say. Ellone had gone from being a baby to being a well spoken, responsible girl. It wasn't right. He'd missed the years in between. He let her continue.
"I had to leave because the sorceress found out I was there. All the kids I was with are scattered because, I guess because they have to go to school to learn how to kill the true Sorceress. At first Cid didn't want me to leave, but then it only made sense for me to go. All the other kids are going to Garden. But since the true Sorceress is after me most of all, I have to hide from her. I have to learn different things than they do, to protect myself."
Laguna couldn't believe he was hearing a nine year old girl relate a story of personal loss in such an accepting tone, merely because she had a responsibility to the other children in her life. It was wrong. This couldn't be Ellone, telling him about the sacrifices she had to make for the world and for the safety of her friends.
"But I'm happy now though, Uncle Laguna," she said suddenly. "Because I can stay with you now."
Laguna was physically startled by what she had said. It hadn't occurred to him until she mentioned it that she might not stay with him. "That's right," he said, trying not to sound too emotional. But, he wasn't sure exactly what she meant. Was she telling him that she would stay with him? Or that she would stay at the Esthar Laboratory, having experiments done on her like a willing lab animal, and he would visit her once in a while? No. Under no circumstances. He wouldn't allow it, even if it was what she wanted. It wasn't a life for a child.
"The sorceress is after us both now," she said. "We have to stay together."
Laguna breathed a sigh of relief.
"But we have to help Dr. Odine find things out about the true Sorceress. I really don't wanna stay in the laboratory though, so maybe we can all go somewhere else and besides, it's not going to be too safe here for long. Dr. Odine is nice to me, even though he's stupid sometimes and he annoys me. Then I just stare at him until he gets scared." She giggled before continuing. "Uncle Laguna," she said suddenly, "were you gonna kill Dr. Odine?" She looked into his eyes as if to tell him that she would know if he was lying.
Laguna met her gaze evenly. "If he hurt you, I was," he told her. "And it's not 'gonna,' it's 'going to.' Don't start talking like me again," he added with a smile.
