V
"There is absolute fealty and absolute folly. The world is mine. Accept. Give in."
--Adel
"Welcome to Chocobo Forest," the odd little boy said, running a finger along a chocobo track on the ground. "You'll scare the chocobos away if you all come in."
Seifer turned to everyone else and shrugged, stepping towards the boy. Laguna, Edea and Rinoa nodded and stepped outside the forest to wait.
"We need chocobos," Seifer said. "How do we get them?"
The boy stood up. "First of all, I'm Chocoboy. Howd'ya do. Let's see... if you want to catch a chocobo, you'll need two whistles, the ChocoSonar and the ChocoZi--"
"Can I get one without going through all that?" Seifer asked.
"Sure, if you want me to catch them for you. It'll cost you, though."
"Good. I'll take four."
"Four?"
"Yeah, four," Seifer repeated. "That a problem?"
"Not really," Chocoboy said. "Ookay... let's see."
Stetching out both hands, Chocoboy started a low warble that sounded like "Here, choco choco choco... heeeeeeere choco choco choco... I SAID COME HERE CHOCOBO! Pleeeeeeeease?" Jumping up and begining what looked like some sort of odd, crazed dance, he began calling the chocobos again. Within no time four of the huge, yellow birds had appeared.
"Heh, heh, heh! How's that for you?" he asked. "That'll be four thousand eight hundred gil, please. Nah, since I'm so nice, I'll only charge you for three... three thousand six hundred, please."
Seifer dug out the gil, handing it to the boy, who grinnied.
"Thanks. Oh, and just as a special present, I'd like to give you a chicobo. It's my special way of saying thanks."
"A what...?"
"A chicobo. You know, a baby chocobo?"
Seifer shook his head. "What am I supposed to do with a small chocobo?"
"I dunno," Chocoboy said. "That's your problem."
"No, thanks," Seifer said. "I don't need any sma--"
"Come on!" Chocoboy insisted. "Name him!"
"I don't want a small choco--"
"Name him!"
I am going to kill this kid, Sifer decided. As soon as I get out of this place, I am going to mail him a grenade or something. "What the hell am I supposed to name him?" he asked.
"You're asking me? Then I'll name him Boko. And thanks for the business!"
The boy sat down again, inspecting the chocobo track. Seifer stared at the chicken-sized bird that was suddenly butting up against his pant leg, and moved over to the chocobos. For some odd reason, they were already saddled. Climbing up onto one's back with a bit of difficulty, he grabbed the reins and steered it out of the forest. Boko followed along automatically.
"Four chocobos and one... chicobo," Seifer said. "I vote we roast the little one and eat him."
"He's cute!" Rinoa said, bending down to pet Boko. "I wonder what Squall will say when he sees him?"
Damn over-optimistic... I think I understand a bit of what Squall's had to deal with. Seifer grimaced at the thought of spending much more time with Squall's "team." Their sad conviction that everything was completely fine was wearing on his nerves, let alone his sanity. "Can we just go, please?" he asked, a bit impatient.
Rinoa swung up into the saddle of one of the birds, offering Edea a hand up on the third one as Laguna clambered into the fourth. "I haven't ridden chocobos since I was little," she said. "Let's go!"
The Ragnarok set down in the Esthar Airstation, the main commercial airpath in the city. The Airstation was abandoned at the moment for an "indefinite amount of time," probably until another country became advanced enough to have an airstation of their own.
Following Kiros along the odd, translucent streets, Quistis and Nida wondered what (if anything) Odine would have to contribute to their search for answers. Of course, that was assuming they could get any sense out of Odine at all.
Sitting down on the lift to Odine's workshop, Quistis was reminded of the time she had come into Odine's lab for a much different reason: the mission breifing for the Lunatic Pandora scheme. It hadn't worked out very well.
Come to think of it, none of our missions end up very well. Like the one at Timber that Selphie told me all about. And the one at Galbadia--did one single thing go right there? And then the Esthar mission... well, we did kill Ultimecia, but...
"Umm, we're here," Nida said, shaking her shoulder. "You awake?"
"Yes," Quistis said, blinking. "Sorry."
"No prob," Nida said, with one of his odd, half-amused looks on his face. Quistis wondered how long he had been trying to get her attention this time. Stepping off of the lift, Quistis headed for the door.
Odine was in his workshop as usual, huge red-and-white clown ruff bobbing as the little man scurried about. His scribe was scribbling notes on a clipboard, trying to do this and listen as Odine babbled about something at the same time. Moving over to the large window, he peered inside and began snapping more stuff at the scribe.
"Uhm, Doctor Odine, sir?" Nida asked timidly. Kiros walked in, grabbed Odine by the shoulder, and spun him around.
"Vat?" Odine demanded. "Vat do you vant?"
"You have visitors," Kiors said. Peering around Kiros, Odine jumped up, clapping his hands together.
"Good! Excellent! Vonderful! It iz them. Well? Vat do you have for Odine this time?"
"Questions," Quistis said. "About the Crystal Pillar, among other things--"
"Ze Crystal Pillar! Yes, I have seen ze Crystal Pillar. Scribe! Call up ze pictures!"
"Yes, Doctor Odine," the scribe said, turning towards the control panel. A three-dimensional hologram sprung up in the center of the room. It showed a single, black spire raising out of some sort of desert/wasteland.
"You see here," Odine said, "ze Crystal Pillar has acted as ze catalyst for the energy pulled out of ze Demi draw point. All of ze energy has crystallized! Do you know what happens when energy crystallizes?"
Quistis shook her head.
"Of course you don't. No one does except me, Odine! See, the Crystal Pillar was created on ze moon, and it calls monsters from ze moon, but only when it is over certain spots, and when it is full of energy. Tears Point iz ze one we found first, but Centra vas destroyed by a Lunar Cry. And both were done with only the Crystal Pillar charged, but now ze pillar is much bigger and with more energy!"
"So Dyne wants to create another Lunar Cry?" Nida asked, paling.
"Of course not!" Odine stamped his foot. "See, there is great power needed to create ze Lunar Cry. But zis power could be used for something else entirely!"
"What?"
Odie turned away and started mumbling. Quistis looked at Kiros, who shrugged. "Doctor," he said. "What is it?"
Odine turned around. "Odine does not know. There iz nothing on record that vould tell me."
"What?" Nida asked. "So we came all the way out here to figure out that Dyne has a lot of power? We knew that already!"
"You vant to go outside?" Odine asked angrily. "Hmm? Vell?"
Nida turned away. "Maybe we should get back to the Ragnarok," he said. "We have two days, we could go investigating ourselves."
"Sure, why not?" Kiros asked. "And then we'll come back here and check in again."
Quistis sighed. "Be sure to notify us if--"
"You are going to ze Crystal Pillar?" Odine demanded. "Then I am coming as vell!"
"What?" Nida asked, looking at Quistis.
"Uh... all right," Quistis said. "Sure. See if you can make any sense out of this."
"Do I get a choice in this at all?" Nida asked, glancing at the odd little scientist. Either no one heard him or everyone ignored him, a feeling Nida was well aquainted with. Sighing, he headed back to the ship.
The jacketed men worked effeciently, far too efficiently for Squall's tases. The boats they constructed were made in a most unusual fashion: large quantities of coral were dragged up and treated with repeated Demi spells until the desired mass was attained, then they were thrown into an Ultima draw point that seemed to have popped up from nowhere until they became oddly soft and pliable. They were shaped like clay into long, narrow hulls for skimmers, and a larger hull was being constructed offshore with eight of the small three-hulled ships forming a sort of mobile shipyard.
Three skimmers were supporting divers with some sort of treated sabre who went to get the coral, and as the hulls of the skimmers filled with coral they brought them back to the armored man who was operating the pulley system of raising the coral to the deck. A pile of small peices was being built up and depleted as the workers ran out of Demi spells and needed to refine more. Squall had pocketed a few of the peices, just in case he would need them. He had also thought about stealing a few Ultima spells, but decided against it as Dyne might suspect.
Glancing across the ocean, Squall could see the faint outlines of the skimmer fleet Dyne had sent out to gather magical supplies, and the two larger building-ships going to the Islands Closest to Hell and Heaven.
"Marvelous, isn't it?" Dyne asked, coming up behind Squall. "Through the jackets, Naja makes them so efficient. I was able to raise this army in under a year with his help.
...great, Squall thought. "And the buildings?"
Dyne smiled. "You seem curious enough today. Don't tell me you don't know about the Centra Shelters?"
Squall shook his head.
"Your own Garden is one. Long ago, when the Centra civilization was destroyed by the Lunar Cry, a few escaped in what we now know as mobile Centra Shelters. There are still a few found around, and all the Gardens are ones. We managed to find two of them, and we can use them as mobile bases. Now they're being sent with two skimmers each to establish bases on the Islands Closest to Hell and Heaven. Once that's done, you'll be taking over here in preparation for a three-pronged attack on Esthar."
Esthar? "Esthar?" Isn't that a bit ambitious? Is the army really that powerful?
"You, Naja and I will be remaining here, of course, but we will oversee the invasion. The force based here will enter first, through the duckblind crossing the water on the Abadon Plains inlet. We'll take the submersible underneath and then destroy the duckblind from the vulnerable inner side. Naja will direct his forces from the Island Closest to Heaven through the Millefeuille Archipelago, breeching the duckblind north of the Lunar Gate as soon as your troops engage the Estharan Army. With their forces divided thus, the Estharans will have very few people availible when my troops come through the Nortes Mountain duckblind north of the city."
Squall nodded slowly. This cannot be good, he thought. "Esthar has one of the largest militaries in the world--" he started.
"Pah! We have enough men for this. We will gain more with each prisoner we take. Regardless of how skilled a fighter they were, once they don the jacket each fighter has Naja's own skill. It will work."
Duly noted. Now the question is, can I possibly stop this?
"When will the invasion begin," Squall asked, voice carefully neutral.
Dyne looked at the sky. "Ten days, as soon as we receive word from the Island bases. As soon as we defeat Esthar and subjugate the population, we'll set our sights on Galbadia."
With the entire population of Esthar as shock troops. Galbadia wouldn't stand a chance. "Why?" he asked.
Dyne smiled. "Admit it, Leonhart. You don't really want to be cooperating with me. You're doing this because you have no choice."
Squall took a step back. "What?" Does he know...?
Dyne sighed, and a flash of something that looked almost like fear shone in his eyes for a split second. It was gone so fast, however, that Squall couldn't be sure he saw it. But-- it hadn't exactly been the first time--there was something odd going on. Half the time Dyne actually seemed to be afraid of him...
"It would be much better if you cooperated with me out of choice instead of coersion," Dyne said. "What can I offer you to make you want to?"
Nothing, Squall thought.
Dyne turned to him, a sly smile gracing his face. "What about the girl, Rinoa? I have some very persuasive people in my employ, I could convince her to join us easily.
"Rinoa--" No... he can't take Rinoa. She wouldn't let him.
Like I didn't let myself?
"If I could convince her to obey me without the suit, would you cooperate? I could buy her allegiance, perhaps with promises for or threats against Timber?"
No. If you did, I could never do this. She'd be the enemy of... of everything I have ever... I'd... I don't know what I'd do...
"No," he said. "Not Rinoa."
Dyne laughed. "You don't remember?" Taking a step forward, Dyne placed a gloved hand under Squall's chin. " 'Rinoa... even if you become the world's enemy, I'll... I'll be your knight.' Sound familiar?"
It did. Too familiar. Squall had thought it in Edea's house, during the private converstion he and Rinoa had had. It was after Riona had been worrying about SeeD coming to kill her if she became posessed.
Why did I even think that? he wondered. Does Dyne know everything I've ever thought? No, dammit, no! I can't let him manipulate me like this!
Stepping back away from Dyne, he turned towards the boatbuilders. "You once said you didn't believe in evil," Dyne continued mercilessly. "That it was just different standpoints. If you believe this, then you must believe everyone's views are valid. What then is so unappealing about mine?"
Because you force it on others, Squall thought. Because... because...
"Look around. Most of these people were criminals. Crooks. Lowlifes with a slim chance of surviving their next year, let alone leading any sort of rewarding life. Now look at them: they have a mission, a purpose, a sense of self-worth. For the first time, they are working for something other than the next scrap of bread, the next innocent victim. You can't tell me this is a bad thing, can you?"
Stop it. You can't mess with my head. I know what my values are.
Don't I?
"Look at the history of the world. People like your Ellone have been exploited for generations. You saw it, when she was used as some sort of tool to compress time. If we unite all the countries under one rule, there will be no one to fight. No more wars. And when there is only one sorceress or sorcerer in the world, there can be no power struggles. Don't you think this is a noble purpose?"
No. It doesn't work like that. Elone agreed to use her powers, so we could defeat Ultimecia. Ultimecia! That's it. His plan can't work, because we know that sometime in the future Ultimecia will be born, and this entire bloody war will start again anyway--
"Wrong," Dyne said, reveiling that he had been listening in to Squall's thoughts. "You never believed in fate, Leonhart. Do you now? Do you think that the future can't be changed? It hasn't happened yet. Nothing is written in stone."
Stop...
Dyne laughed and turned away. "Think about what I've said, Leonhart. Think very... very... hard." Still laughing, he left.