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Chapter Seven
Midnight Raid
"Sir we have an unknown enemy force inside the palace! They came in dressed as Esther Soldiers. Our Front Gate team thought they were the next shift coming in to work. They took the front gate within minutes and are quickly moving this way." Laguna stared at the guard in shock until Squall grabbed his shoulder and spun him around.
"Laguna! Snap out of it. Is there a way out of here besides the main gate?" Laguna looked thoughtful for a second before nodding at Squall.
"Yeah, the delivery entrance goes out the back. It's not very far from here." He turned to the guard standing in the door and pointed at him. "You come with us. We may need the help." He then turned to Squall only to find him gone from sight. He was about to yell out when Squall reappeared from his room carrying an unsheathed gunblade. He strode over to Laguna and pointed towards Ellone's room.
"Go get Ellone up and dressed as quietly as possible. I'm going to check the hallway outside and see if the coast is clear. Once I do that we get out of here and head for the Ragnarok. You'll be safe there." Squall then turned towards the guard who was still standing near the entrance and motioned for him to stay with Laguna and Ellone. The guard nodded his understanding and moved away from the door to stand next to Laguna.
Certain that the guard understood his duty, Squall moved up to the entrance and carefully stuck his head out to check the hall. Seeing nothing unusual, he moved out the door and began to creep down the hallway.
'Diablos, Bahamut! I want you guys alert and ready for any sneak attacks.'
'Already on it. To bad my encounter-none ability doesn't work very well on humans.'
'Silence! Concentrate on the mission Diablos!'
'Sheesh! Sorrrry master Bahamut!'
Squall, doing his best to ignore the two, moved to the end of the hallway and paused to listen for noise. Hearing none he slid around the corner and moved towards the entrance to the warehouse hallway.
As he approached, he began to hear noises coming from the other side of the door. Slowing to a stop in front of it Squall dropped down on one knee and carefully cracked the door open. Peering through the crack he could make out two forms huddling against the far wall.
Squall, noting that they hadn't spotted him yet, touched his hand to his forehead and mentally chanted the necessary words to the spell he wanted.
As the magic rose up in him he stood up and slipped through the door. He cast outwards with his hand and flung two sleep spells at the enemies in front of him. The pair were unconscious before they hit the ground.
Squall glanced around to make sure he was alone before sneaking over to the crumpled forms. Giving them a quick check, he noticed that they too were dressed as Esther Soldiers. 'Let's see what we have here.' Squall thought to himself as he checked for any useful items they might have.
Finding nothing of interest on them, Squall was just starting to stand up and return to Laguna's apartment when a glint of reflected light caught his eye. Turning back he noticed that one of the guards had a necklace on. It must have slipped out of his uniform when he fell down. Squall quickly reached down and snapped the chain.
Standing up he inspected the talisman that hung on the chain. It had the crude image of a coiled snake on it but that wasn't what caught his attention as much as what was on the other side! On its reverse was a picture of a beautiful woman.
The exact same image as he had seen on the talisman worn by Rinoa's kidnappers! But what were they doing here? Was it just a coincidence or something more?
Pushing those thoughts aside, Squall slipped the item into his pocket and began making his way back towards the Presidential suite. He made it back without any further problems and within minutes he was standing in Laguna's living room.
Ellone, sitting on the couch with a frightened look on her face was the first to notice him and she immediately jumped up and ran over to him.
"Squall, thank goodness your safe! You were gone for quite a while and we were beginning to worry." She whispered before glancing over at Laguna, who had just finished loading his machine gun. He walked over to them, followed by the guard.
"I ran into a few more of those imposter soldiers and had to get rid of them before I could come back."
The guard, having been quiet this whole time, stepped forward and spoke. "Sorry to interrupt but is everyone ready?"
Squall nodded at him then turned his attention back to Laguna and Ellone. "I'll take point followed by Ellone. Laguna, you and the guard are to follow and cover our back." After receiving nods from everyone he continued, "Once we get outside of the palace we snag a car and get to the Ragnarok as quickly as possible."
Everyone, following Squall, made there way out of the apartment and begin the trip towards the warehouse delivery area. They made good time and didn't run into any more soldiers. As they walked Squall motioned Ellone up next to him and then handed her the talisman he had collected earlier. "This is the same as the one I saw in the Dreamscape. I found it on the soldiers I knocked out. Ever seen it before?"
Ellone examined it before giving a shrug in Squall's direction. "No, I can't say I have. You should ask Laguna. He's done a lot of traveling in his time. He might have seen or heard of it before."
"Yeah, well I'll have to ask him later. I don't want to break up our formation." Squall replied as Ellone handed the necklace back to him. "You better drop back a little. We're coming up on the area where I ran into the guards earlier."
"Ok, be careful." She replied as she slowed down in order to let Squall gain some ground ahead of everyone else. Sneaking a glance over her shoulder she saw Laguna come around the corner behind her. He saw her and attempted one of his goofy smiles but it did little to help her feel any better. The only thing really helping her was the fact that Laguna and Squall had both been through a lot worse than this before and survived.
Then she noticed something strange. The guard who had been following them hadn't come around the corner yet! She quickly pointed at the corner and Laguna turned to look. Within a second he noticed the same thing and hissed at Squall who stopped and turned to see who had made the noise. Laguna motioned at him to wait while he checked around the corner for the guard.
Squall nodded and stepped up to Ellone, "Stay behind me and wait. Laguna can check to see what happened." Seeing the look on her face he added, "Don't worry. Laguna knows what he doing."
'Hmmmpphh! Never thought I'd hear you say those words about Laguna!' 'Whatever Bahamut!' 'What happened to the guard? I think something is wrong here. It's starting to smell like a trap. If you think about it why haven't any alarms gone off or any other guards arrived?' 'I don't know. Diablos I want you to junction to Laguna for a little while just to be safe.''As you wish.' Squall immediately felt Diablo's presence disappear and move to Laguna.
Ellone waited with Squall and thought about his words. She could only hope that he was right about Laguna's safety.
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|************************************************************| Laguna had just started back down the hallway towards the Apartment area when he felt a presence rush into his mind. 'Hello! Squall sent me to keep an eye on you. Find anything yet?' 'Gee, what a vote of confidence! No I haven't yet.'Laguna continued along the hallway until he came to the last corner before his apartment entrance. Dropping into a crouch he slid forward and peered around the corner. Standing not five feet away stood two guards, including the one who had been following them. Laguna stayed silent hoping to hear what was going on. Unfortunately he was unable to hear anything other than whispers. And he couldn't risk moving any closer or they might spot him. Debating on whether to attack them or to retreat back to the others he noticed that both guards were wearing talismans just like the one Squall had picked up. Seeing this he decided that it would be best to fall back before more enemies showed up. He had to warn Squall and Ellone that they were being herder into a trap! He backed up slowly and was just about to turn back down the hallway when he heard a very recognizable sounding CLICK. He heard it at the same time as he felt the barrel of a gun placed against his head. "Hand you gun back with two fingers and stand up very slowly!" Weighing his chances he realized he didn't have any that sounded very healthy. So he did as the guard ordered and slowly stood up. Then he remembered something that he could do. 'Diablos? Do you have anyway to get a hold of Bahamut and warn him? Maybe they can get here in time to help.' Laguna asked mentally with a renewed hope that there might be a way out of this after all. 'Hold on.' 'OK' 'No, they won't be able to help us!' Cursed Diablos!'Why not?' Laguna asked as he felt a fresh wave of dread wash over him. 'Because the enemy has them surrounded!' 'DAMN!'|******************************************************************| "Squall, how long should we wait? Maybe we should go look for him." "No, he had a ways to go. In the meantime we're pretty exposed out here. Let's head for the Delivery entrance. If he hasn't caught up with us by then I'll find you some place to hide and go find him. Come on, let's go." Squall replied to Ellone before pulling her down the hallway towards the doors. Once they arrived at the door he slid the door open and they stepped through into the warehouse. It looked almost exactly the same as last time. The lights were off and the only visible light came from the door on the other side of the room. Squall grabbed Ellone by the hand and half pulled, half dragged her across. They were halfway across when Squall realized his mistake. There was one big difference that he should have picked up on. The two guards he knocked out were gone! Squall immediately slid to a stop and pushed Ellone behind him. Holding his gunblade at a ready position he glanced around to see if he could spot a trap. At exactly the same time as he heard the laughter coming from above him, Squall felt himself blinded from the massive lights flipping on and destroying his night vision. As his eyes adjusted the light he heard Ellone gasp. Looking around he realized that they were completely surrounded by pendant wearing soldiers. 'DAMN!' |****************************************************************| Elsewhere……. Light… Dark… Light… Dark… She felt dizzy. The constant shifting of the light above her had been going on since she regained consciousness. How long had that been? A minute? An hour? A day? She had no clue. All she could tell was that she couldn't move. Her drugged mind couldn't comprehend why. She found it hard to even blink. Occasionally she heard noises above. She thought they were voices but she wasn't sure. She tried to think what her name was but even that was impossible. She did the only thing she could do. She screamed! To be Continued…. Authors Note: I love cliffhangers. Sorry for the length of time between updates. I was on vacation away from a computer. By the way thanks to the following for their reviews. Angelprinczess29, Wolfie, Jenileerose, Blackadder, Gigashadow And special thanks to team-senshi for their ideas and constructive criticism. It helped a lot.
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