XVI


It seemed like hours had passed, but Lialla was sure that not even one could have elapsed. Leaning against the wall of the infirmary office, she tried to dry her hands with the cloth she had found. She had been able to scrub in the back room, but she could swear that the stink of blood and poison still clung to her skin. She felt drained--both physically and emotionally. The fight and the argument with Nida had taken more out of her than she had realized.

Glancing behind her, she noticed Nida was still working on something--probably casting the SeeD's broken leg. Glancing around, she slipped out the infirmary doors and into the hall, hoping to make a discreet exit.

She knew something was wrong from the moment she stepped into the halls. Two of the Roses should have been waiting for her--instead, the halls seemed completely deserted. Hand moving to her sidearm, she glanced around the halls.

"Janya!" she called softly, accompanying it with a piercing bird whistle. An answering whistle came from off to her left, and she jogged down to the entrance to the Quad where Janya and a pair of other girls were standing. "What's going on?" she demanded.

"Nothing," Janya said. "A few SeeDs tried to get out once, but we fired a few warning shots and they retreated. Everyone is down the hall in the ballroom. I don't trust it at all--it's been pretty quiet."

"Where are Chanse and the others?"

Janya shrugged. "I haven't seen them. There were some strange noises earlier--sounded like someone came down off the elevator--but I had to guard this place, so I couldn't check. If they were attacked, I would assume that they withdrew to outside."

Lialla glanced behind her. "We're withdrawing," she said. "Come on."

Janya nodded, and the four turned and jogged for the exit. Bursting out of the Garden and into the cool air, they slowed. Crusted snow crunched under their feet, but it was the only sound in the cold night. The sky was completely open--nothing shone in the darkness but the moon and the stars. Coupled with the expanse of unbroken snow spreading across the Balamb-Alcauld Plains, it should have been a sight of breathtaking beauty.

"Lialla?" one of the girls asked softly. Lialla glanced at her.

"Yeah?"

"It's... about Nemo." The girl took a breath. "Are we just going to leave him there?"

Lialla grimaced. "Once the soul is gone, the body is just an empty shell," she replied. "Let them burn it or bury it, I don't care which."

"They'll be glad to hear that," said a voice, clear as a clarion in the still night. All four Roses turned, drawing their weapons to point them at the stranger approaching them from the side. Somehow, she had managed to escape their detection.

Lialla was the first to speak. "Who the hell are you?" she demanded.

The woman crossed her arms, looking straight at Lialla. "I should be asking you that," she replied. "You're the ones on my island."

Lialla and the other three exchanged a glance.

"My name is Denalek ValHalla," the stranger said. "I run this place. I hear you girls have been creating quite a stir."

Lialla grimaced. "ValHalla," she said. "The infamous Guro dupe."

"I've always known who I served," ValHalla countered. "Anyway, they wouldn't like you calling them that. They're called the Tribunal now--and you had better remember it, if you want to survive."

"Since when did the Guro-Shumi control SeeD?" Lialla asked.

"One of their own was the founding Garden Master," ValHalla explained. "Now that he's dead, they decided to adopt SeeD as their own. I would suggest not messing too much with us, but...."

"Word travels fast, huh?" Lialla asked.

"You have your friend Nida to thank for that," ValHalla responded. "He hit the call button on the intercom. I could hear almost everything you said."

Lialla glowered. "Then you know your Commander is out of commission for a bit," she said.

"Incidentally, that's what I came out here to talk to you about."

Lialla nodded sharply. "I hope he dies," she snarled.

"No doubt you do. But I'd like to tell you something. An appeal to your humanity... if you have any."

"You're barking up the wrong tree," Lialla snapped. "Whatever it is, I already don't care."

"I think you do." ValHalla glanced across the four Roses, making an disarming gesture. "You can put your guns away. Or don't you think you can take on one woman by the side of the road?"

"Don't relax," Lialla said, still keeping her gun trained on ValHalla. "She forced everyone else to withdraw. She has some trick up her sleeve."

ValHalla raised both hands. "I have nothing except a few words," she said.

"Then spit them out."

ValHalla nodded, digging her hands back into her pockets. "I'm not sure how to start this," she said, "but I guess I can start here: while you were talking with Nida, I remember the issue of timing came up. Nida wasn't very happy that you were doing this over Christmas. Frankly, I can see his point."

"If this is going to be a lecture on ethics, you can shoot yourself," Lialla said. "We all know the stories of what you did for the Gu--the Tribunal--during the Sorceress Wars. If you were really that ruthless at our age, you don't have any right to speak."

"I've faced judgment for what I did. I'm willing to at any time, in any court. What I want to say is that I hope you won't turn out like I did. ...consider it the sentiment of a guilt-ridden heart."

Lialla sneered.

"I'm going to tell you something," ValHalla said, continuing through Lialla's obvious distaste. "It's about Garden... or rather, it's about Garden's future. I'd like you to know that tonight or tomorrow--perhaps even as we speak--an inspector from the Tribunal is coming. His job is simple: to assess whether Garden is capable of running itself. If he finds it not to be so, we're either going to taken over or terminated. What do you think he'll say when he sees our Commander lying in the infirmary, almost dead? What do you think he'll say about tonight? It won't be pretty, I can say that. What do you think will happen? You'll have destroyed Garden."

"So?" Lialla spat on the ground. "I hate Garden. I hate your reputation, your popularity, I hate your goddamn holier-than-thou stance on everything. What do I care if it falls?"

ValHalla nodded. "I expected that answer from you. Which makes what I'm about to ask even harder."

"Make it quick."

ValHalla sighed. "We get so few people around Garden that are prime Commander material," she said. "Even so, the Commander has become a vital part of our operations here. What will the inspector say about the lack of a Commander--or, potentially even worse, a Commander we scratched up from the dregs of our student pool? I can't let Commander Leonhart's... incapacity hinder us, but there's quite simply no one else in Garden with the kind of... experience in the position that he's had."

"Get to the damn point, dupe."

"My point is that we need a secondary Commander for the Inspection, and you owe us big-time. I'd like you to fill the position. Hyne knows you're Commander enough."

Lialla could only stare. Finally, she slowly shook her head. "You're mad," she said.

"Am I?" ValHalla glanced at her quizzically. "That's what they used to tell me in the War. I don't think it was madness--just an unusual kind of sanity. I have my reasons for asking, and my reasons for assuming you'll comply."

"I really doubt anything you say will change my mind."

"Within everyone there exists at least one deep emotional well. I figure you have to have some kind of compassion in there somewhere."

Lialla had almost said Not anymore when she caught herself.

"At least listen, so that I can feel I was given a fair hearing."

"Make. It. Quick." Every word Lialla spit out was tinged with venom.

ValHalla tucked one hand behind her back, gesturing vaguely with the other. "I heard you say in your conversation with Nida," she started, "that we were all mercenaries. Therefore, I think you must know what this means. You know how we have the best and the greatest scum of the earth, how we're a ragtag bunch but that we can stick together. I've only been here a matter of days, and I've already seen that attitude in these SeeDs. You'll also know that we can't be ordered around for just anything--we might hire ourselves out, but there's an independence that goes with that. We're not part of a standard army... we're not grunts, we're individuals, and we know that. That's why we're mercenaries. Do you understand?"

Lialla nodded. "Yeah," she said roughly. "I understand."

"Then you can understand what it would do to these people to be shut down," ValHalla said. "What can they do? Mercenary work is a disreputable profession. We might find jobs with other companies, but most--like you--hate us. We might find normal jobs, but we'd always be the ex-mercs. Always and unconditionally the black sheep. Most likely, we'd be pressed into standard armies. Can you imagine that? It's the worst fate a merc can dream up. There are hundreds of people in that building--" ValHalla gestured to the Garden, "--and they're all hanging on a favorable review from the inspector. The Guro don't care--they don't understand. They're too far removed. We're nothing but a profitable venture to them. But you... I can't see you willingly sentencing all those people to that kind of a hell."

Lialla lowered her gun. "I can see your point," she said, "but I'm not convinced. You talk a lot, but I still can't see why--apart from my poor bleeding heart--I should help you."

ValHalla sighed a deep sigh. "What else is there to say?" she asked. "...except for the obvious?"

"Obvious?" Lialla asked.

"The obvious." ValHalla tilted her head backwards, staring up into the sky. "That it's Christmas Eve, and that this should be a time of giving, of sharing joy and hope. That we've all had enough sorrow and misery and fighting and despair to last us our whole lives, but that we know we'll always have to back into the rough old world. That this time should be a release from all that, and that we should not now have to fear an uncertain tomorrow. Thousands of years ago, when the first Christmas came into being, it was said that all humanity took a tacit vow. On this pair of days, for once in the year there would be peace. No hatred, no fear. Only peace, and happiness, and joy."

For a moment, ValHalla stared up into the starry expanse. Finally, she looked down at Lialla again.

"Humanity's composed of fools. I was one of them. The presidents and dictators of every nation have been them. Men and women and elders and even children have been them. Peace? Peace means nothing. It's a platitude. ...at least, that's what I used to think. Until one year... I spent the last year of the Sorceress War in Esthar, and I met up with some of the most remarkable people. I had the fortune to spend Christmas with them, and they tried to make me understand. I didn't then, but... now? I realize that I've remembered their lesson time and time again through my life.
"Now? Maybe it's just a coincidence. But it's Christmas, and here I am, talking to you all. ...Desert Rose, right?"

Lialla nodded stiffly.

"I thought so. Because, see, the people I spent that Christmas with were Desert Roses. This was long before you came into the profession, of course, but... it is a striking coincidence, don't you agree? I never thought that I would be giving out a speech like the one they used on me, trying to sway others as they tried to reform me. But life plays the most spectacular games, sometimes."

There was silence for a long time. Slowly, ValHalla took a step forward.

"So?" she asked. "Will you help me? ...if not for some sense of compassion, then for the spirit of Christmas at least?"

More silence. The silence was intense.

A hare bounded across the hard snow, leaving no trail behind him. The light from the stars glinted off Garden, glinted off the snow, glinted off ValHalla's eyes and buttons. The wind above them sang softly, never deigning to come below and chill them. In those moments, there was utter....

...peace.

Lialla sheathed her gun. ValHalla looked at her expectantly, and Lialla could see hope in her eyes.

"I'll help," she said.