It was a little girl, with her blond hair in pigtails, wearing a pair of blue denim dungarees over a white T-shirt. A red bandanna was tied around her neck.
The dog bounded over to the girl and jumped up at her, putting its paws on her shoulders and licking her. She giggled and pushed the dog away before turning to Squall and peering at him with big green eyes. "Are you here to rescue me?"
Quistis walked over, making sure to put away her whip first. "Yes, just come with us, okay?"
"Mommy said never to go with strangers."
"Where is mommy?"
"I dunno. She hasn't come back yet."
Oh no. Her mother's missing. Thought Squall. I was hoping not to have to deal with this kind of thing.
"Quistis?" He said.
"Yes, Squall?"
"Do you have Diablos junctioned?"
"Yes."
"Good, switch on Enc-none and take the girl and head back to the Ragnarok. Zell and I will continue to search this area till you get back. Enc-none won't get rid of the monsters, but it'll at least repel them until you get back to us."
"Right." Quistis turned to the little girl. "What's your name, honey?"
"Jenny."
"Ok, Jenny. You and Puppy have to come with me. Squall and Zell are going to find your mommy and bring her to our ship." She extended her hand.
Jenny regarded Quistis suspiciously for a second and then smiled and took the offered hand.
"'Kay."
When Quistis came back, an elnoyle had descended upon Squall and Zell, and was attempting to kill Zell with its sweeping claws and massive, darting stinger. Zell, obviously having the time of his life, was bobbing and weaving and practically dancing around the flying monster. Squall, in the meantime, was biding his time and firing off shots from his gunblade to keep the elnoyle off balance. Finally Zell decided to put the beast out of its misery. Stopping and crouching slightly, he brought his hands back, as a piercing yellow glow enveloped them. He leaped high into the air, his entire body now glowing with concentrated energy. There was a brief pause, as everything seemed to stop in time. Then Zell, with seemingly impossible speed, flew forward fists outstretched "METEOR BARRET!" He yelled. The blond fighter shot through the body of the elnoyle and landed the other side. The monster let out a hideous roar of pain and fell to the ground, a gaping hole through its chest.
Zell, in his victory dance, punched the air a few times before bowing slightly.
Quistis ran over. "Is everyone okay? Sorry I didn't make it back sooner."
Squall wasn't listening. This is far worse than I expected. I've never seen monsters act quite like this. Dragons that attack ships, monsters that actually seem to actively search out humans and kill them. This is insane. We found one girl, but the monster attacks are becoming ever more frequent. How long can we remain here before we're forced to pull out?
Squall was roughly shoved into cover by Zell. "Hyne!" Zell hissed. "Would you keep your head out of the clouds for one minute, Squall?" Quistis was on the other side of where Squall was lying. "Look, Squall. Over there, by that church."
Squall looked. By where some stained glass from a broken window lay, stood a man in a white trenchcoat. He was leaning on a powerful looking gunblade like it was a cane. His shoe brushed some of the glass aside, and he was alert, apparently looking for something. On either side of him stood a tall, dark-skinned man, and a girl with grey hair and an eyepatch.
Seifer! And Raijin and Fujin! What are they doing here? If they're responsible for this...
Squall's hand tightened around his gunblade and his muscles tensed, ready to leap the rubble and behead Seifer in one blow. Just then, he felt a hand rest on his shoulder. Quistis whispered into his ear. "Don't let that anger get the better of you. Let's wait and see what he does."
"Hey." Whispered Zell. "What's he saying?"
"I don't know." Replied Squall. "I can't hear."
Raijin turned to Seifer, who was still critically scanning the ground in front of him. "Yo, Seifer! We ain't found any clues over by the item shop." The youth's usually loud voice was lowered, like he was trying not to attract attention.
"ANNOYED." Fujin's harsh, rasping voice was also low.
"Hmph." Seifer brought up the Hyperion up and rested it casually on his shoulder. "I'm beginning to get fed up now. All we've done is kill monsters so far and there hasn't been any clue as to what caused the monsters to attack Winhill. I'm beginning to think that this job we got from that Loire clown is a dud."
"GO HOME?"
"Nah. To be honest, I'm not that bothered about the money for this job anymore. I'm curious myself now. I wanna find out what's going on in this place. It's always so quiet here. C'mon."
The trio headed off towards the fields in the direction of the mansion in the town centre.
"Hey Quistis, could you catch any of that exchange?" Zell asked.
"No. But, I wonder if they do have something to do with this disaster."
"We should follow them." Squall rose and began to tread cautiously over in the direction in which Seifer's posse had gone.
"Wait, Squall." Quistis went to catch up with him. "We can't ignore the mission at hand. We need to keep searching. Anyway Seifer, if he does indeed have anything to do with this, will probably turn up again. Then we can stop him, okay?"
Squall sheathed the Lionheart. "Whatever."
Just then, Squall's communicator rang. It was Selphie speaking when he answered.
"Squall, the Ragnarok's scanners have just picked a group of Galbadian army aircraft landed nearby in the hills. They don't appear to have spotted us yet. Orders?"
Galbadia? What are they doing here? Could it be that they're responsible? After all such an influx of monsters into a town, even Winhill, seems unnatural. But still, why would they attack parts of their own country?
"Right, leave the girl in the ship and switch the cloak and reflect shield defence programs on. It might be better if one of you stays behind to look after her. Proceed to where you saw the planes and try to gain some reconnaissance of their organisation, numbers, equipment, morale, etc. Do not engage. If you find anything, wait until you get back to the Ragnarok before you radio it in. Understand?"
"Understood, Squall. Bye!"
