The Ragnarok blasted its way through the sky, the speed of the dragon ship reducing all scenery to an indistinct blur. Not that Seifer had much of an interest in looking out the window anyway.
He couldn't keep his mind off his inevitable return to Garden. If the two SeeDs sent to retrieve him served as any kind of indication, Seifer would meet with a chilly reception at best.
Bored, Seifer stood up and stretched, as much as his handcuffs would allow him. One of the two guards immediately sprang to attention.
"What are you doing? Sit down at once!" he exclaimed, drawing out his sidearm.
"Oh, relax," Seifer said, a languid smile crossing his face. "I know Leonhart likes his dogs energetic, but he isn't around now. Even if he's never figured it out, it is permissible to remove the stick from your ass on occasion."
Surprisingly, the guard didn't seem to find this funny. He stood ramrod still, with his weapon pointing at Seifer. By this point, the exchange aroused the interest of the other guard, positioned behind Seifer. He drew his baton and pointed it at Seifer's chest.
"Do what he says, Almasy. We're under orders to bring you in alive, but my little brother died during your assault on Balamb Garden. He was seven years old, and I'd like to beat about seven years off your lifespan."
"Which one was your brother? Was he dumb and ugly, just like you? Did he bleed much? I killed so many puking brats that day it's hard to remember." Seifer didn't seriously expect this response to elicit a reaction, but decided it might prove worth a try.
"Sit down and shut up," said the first guard, the one holding the gun. Seifer cocked his head quizzically and dropped his hands to one of his hips, as if reaching for a concealed weapon.
Both guards reacted at the same time, the one with the baton lunging directly at Seifer, trying to tackle him. Seifer, in turn, dove forward at the guard with the gun. Distracted by the motion of his companion, this guard hesitated to fire, and that millisecond gave Seifer the advantage he needed. Running low, he slammed his shoulder into the first guard's stomach. Using that energy to his advantage, he used both hands to throw the guard into the other SeeD. Without hesitating, Seifer grabbed the discarded pistol and shot both guards in the head twice. He thought for a moment about rearranging the bodies, but decided to leave them in their current state - a grisly tableau serving as testament to the poor quality of the current generation of SeeDs.
Squall's going to love this, he thought.
Moving quickly, Seifer found the security camera overlooking the passenger compartment. Standing on one of the chairs, he pulled one of the wires connecting the unit to the wall, breaking the circuit and putting the camera out of commission. After checking the guard's corpse for an extra clip of ammunition, he continued to move through the ship. In one of the rooms near the engine, he found a high-energy plasma torch, one small enough to tuck into the pocket of his trench coat.
Seifer didn't know his way around the ship, but eventually found his way into the cockpit, where the pilot chatted idly with ground control at Garden. Seifer crept up behind her and threw his handcuffed hands over her head. He pulled back with all his weight and listened for the sound of her throat crumpling. She didn't have time to scream, and he killed her in complete silence, setting the cockpit radio to a non-existent channel, so that the Ragnarok broadcast nothing but static. That completed, he used the torch to break the chain on his handcuffs. The cuffs themselves chafed his wrists, but he could stand the pain until he found a more appropriate moment to break them.
He cracked open the emergency panel on the back wall, removing the last item he needed to complete his hastily devised escape. He tapped a few coordinates on the Ragnarok's navigation system, flipped a switch to override the autopilot, and pressed the panic button.
All this done, he hurried to the cargo compartment and donned the hoversuit he'd found in the cockpit. The suits functioned best as an aerial assault device - Seifer employed them to great effect during his attack on Balamb Garden - but could also function as parachutes. Judging from the battle marks on the suit, SeeD captured this unit during that assault, an irony that Seifer truly enjoyed.
He slammed a button on the wall and the cargo door gaped wide before him. Without hesitation, Seifer threw himself into space, delighted when the hoversuit began slowing his descent. As he drifted towards the ground, he looked up at the Ragnarok, the ship speeding towards an inescapable collision with a mountain. Eventually, some enterprising member of SeeD, seeking, no doubt, to curry favor with Squall, would sift through the wreckage and inventory it. At that point, he would discover that the body of a certain prisoner-in-transit had disappeared. Until that discovery, Seifer had a considerable window of opportunity to go to ground.
Watching the Ragnarok streak towards its doom, he smiled.
"And so," he said, quoting one of his beloved storybooks, "having lured the dragon to its death, the Knight makes good his escape."
As if on cue, the ship impacted at that point, like fireworks commemorating Seifer's escape.
"Hey… Wake up!" Seifer felt someone jostle him sharply, and he looked around, rapidly trying to assess the situation.
"Sorry guys," he said to the two sour-faced guards as they led him away from the passenger section of the Ragnarok. "I was having the most wonderful dream."
Seifer strode down the gangplank of the Ragnarok, head held high, a contemptuous smirk on his face. He entered his former home, proud, defiant, and flanked by two armed guards. His coat flared around him as he moved between the ship and the building. The few students near the door stared openly as he entered, and Seifer knew word of his return would reach every person in Garden by curfew.
The guards herded Seifer past the onlookers and onto the elevator. One of them fed his access card into the slot, allowing the elevator to travel to the third floor, which housed all of the administrative offices.
When the glass elevator stopped, Seifer assumed the glass doors would slide open on the side of Cid's office, the site of countless lectures. When the doors opened on the other side, it served as a stark reminder: the circumstances of his return dwarfed any disciplinary infraction.
They exited the elevator, and the guards led him down the hallway, past the offices of the various Instructors. To one side, Seifer noticed a cleaning crew ransacking an office, removing the personal effects of its former occupant. He wanted to discover which Instructor vacated their post, but the guards pushed him onward before he had the chance.
They paused in front of one of the doors, and one of the guards pressed the buzzer. Almost immediately, they heard the answering buzz, and the door slid open. The two guards escorted him inside. Squall stood up from behind his desk.
"Remove his restraints and leave," he said, without even waiting for the guards to stop moving.
One of the guards started to protest. "Commander…" Squall silenced the younger man with a cold look.
When the guards turned to Seifer, he moved his hands with a quick flourish. He held them up, letting the handcuffs dangle from one of his fingers. As they stared blankly at him, astounded, he casually tossed the handcuffs to the nearest guard. The two young SeeDs seethed, feeling humiliated in front of their commander. By way of answer, Seifer merely smiled innocently, watching them leave the room.
"Sit," Squall ordered, his face as inscrutable as ever.
"Sure thing, 'Commander,'" Seifer replied, taking a seat and massaging his wrists. "By the way, I suppose congratulations are in order. It's a pretty nice deal you've got going here."
Seifer took a moment to glance around the room. The office, he noted, had Squall's trademark design sensibilities. No posters adorned the walls, no potted plants in the corner, no aquariums teeming with fish. Squall simply adopted the room as his own, effecting minimal change. He'd chosen black as the only color in the room, with the occasional spot of white, as on the hands on the clock, or chrome, like the arms of the chairs.
"Cid's calling for a Tribunal," Squall said, after staring at Seifer for a moment.
"I figured he would," Seifer answered. "He's always had it in for me."
"This isn't a normal situation, Seifer. Desertion we can handle - it's in the rule book. But waging an all-out war against us? That's new."
"I know. And I'm…" The sound of the buzzer interrupted Seifer. Squall pressed the button to open the door, clearly displeased at the interruption. He sat behind his desk and stared at the messenger with cold eyes. She held a piece of paper out to him and then stood at rigid attention, waiting for Squall to finish with it. Hastily, he produced a pen and signed it, saying nothing as she took it back out of the room.
"Petrosian," Squall said after the door had closed, knowing the question on Seifer's mind.
"What about him? Don't tell he's been nominated for Instructor of the Year or something stupid like that."
"No. He'll be retired by curfew tonight."
"What? Why? I mean, he was a vicious bastard, but his survival classes were always full."
"He was giving one of his 'lessons' in the Quad and Zell happened upon it. Zell instructed him to stop, and attacked Zell instead. Zell defended himself, but Petrosian took a beating. We discussed the issue while you were in transit and opted to retire him."
"What about Zell?" Seifer asked. "What are they going to do to him?"
"Cid decided that Zell defended himself."
"What do you believe? Remember how Petrosian used to treat Zell when we were younger? I've never seen anyone run that many laps around Garden. There was that one day, after lunch, when Petrosian made Zell run laps until he vomited up his hot dogs. And we all had to stand there and watch."
"Cid took that into account and put Zell on probation. He's two ranks lower for the next six weeks."
"Okay. So why are you telling me all this? I doubt you brought me here for a casual chat."
"I'm telling you this," Squall said, slowly and deliberately, "because I want you to understand the gravity of your situation. Cid's cleaning house. And as it stands, you're next in line."
"I know. Like I was going to say earlier, I'm prepared to face whatever justice the Tribunal metes out. That's why I came back willingly."
"Willingly?" Squall asked.
"Sure," Seifer shot back. "Don't you remember our simulations? I got near-perfect scores on my Improvised Escape exams."
A faint smile of recognition moved across Squall's face.
"I liked the sim where Quistis had to plant the bomb and you were supposed to stop her."
"I know you were going to mention that one!" Seifer exclaimed. "Why does everyone remember that?"
"Because the fact that a girl that small could kick your ass so thoroughly and leave you tied to the very bomb you were supposed to defuse is nothing if not memorable. And it didn't help that Zell took pictures and posted them all over Garden."
"Incidentally," Seifer said, quickly changing the subject, "your errand boys did a pretty poor job. I counted nine times I could have escaped without killing either of them, and another eleven if I killed one or both."
"If you want to stay alive, don't advertise that fact. Stay in the detention facility until the Tribunal and act penitent."
"What's to stop me from escaping again?" Seifer said, grinning.
"The absolute certainty" Squall said, unsmiling, "that if you do, Cid will assign me to bring you back, using whatever means necessary. Which I will do. This time, though, he won't care if I bring you back in handcuffs or in a body bag."
