General Mallis sat at the head of the conference table, his one eye staring at the communications panel. All of Garden waited on Dr. Kadowaki's call, and Squall and the General needed an update on the Headmaster's condition before planning their next move.
Squall's team had gathered in the room as well, to await the same announcement. No one had the energy to discuss the incident in a voice above a whisper. Quistis crossed the room over to where Seifer and Zell stood huddled together, talking.
"Hi, boys," she whispered. They both nodded at her and continued looking at whatever else in the room they'd started examining before she'd arrived.
She turned and saw Squall, all his muscles tense, jaw clenched, forehead pressed against the wall of the conference room.
"I think Squall's losing it," she heard Zell whisper in her ear.
"No," Quistis smiled. "He's pulling it together. He's just catching his breath so he can be ready for the next step. He'll be fine."
"You know, Zell," Seifer smirked, gently elbowing his lover in the ribs, "if I didn't know better, I'd think our little Quisty has a crush."
Quistis adopted an innocent schoolgirl's expression. "Old habits?" she asked, by way of fashioning an excuse. Seeing the melodramatic scowls painted on the faces of Seifer and Zell, she quickly changed tactics, muttering, "I'm working on it."
"Everyone," said the General, cool voice cutting through the room, "Dr. Kadowaki is contacting us."
Everyone rushed to the conference table. When they'd all assembled, he pushed the blinking button before him with an almost careless élan.
"Dr. Kadowaki," he said, "what news?"
"Cid's going to be fine," she answered, her voice wavering under the strain, "but he'll probably need to stay here for a matter of weeks, given his health of late, his heart condition, the amount he's been smoking, that sort of thing."
"Understood." Squall nodded. "But he will survive the injury?"
"Rest assured, Squall," she replied, and he imagined her removing her glasses and rubbing the bridge of her nose. "The wound looked much worse than it actually was. I just want to give his heart a few days to rest and you can come in and inspect things for yourself."
"Hey, um, Doc?" Irvine called out, from the other side of the room, approaching the panel, and leaning on Squall while he talked. "I have sort of a prickly question here..."
"I had one of the techs examine the bullet while I worked on Cid. If this is what you're asking, Irvine, it's one of our bullets."
Irvine leaned up against the wall now and pulled his hat down over his face. As he contemplated the latest turn of events, a muffled, "Hoo boy," emerged from under his hat.
"Any other questions?" asked Dr. Kadowaki. "This whole affair has taken a lot out of me, and I could use a little rest myself, if you don't mind."
"By all means, doctor," said Mallis. "You've been most helpful."
The light on the intercom winked off, leaving them in stark contemplation of their situation. Mallis appeared to settle in for a nap, closing his good eye and the lid over where the other eye once rested in its socket, and folding his hands over his chest. From that moment on, the General appeared to take no notice of the conversation in the room. Irvine spoke first.
"So the shooter was wearing our uniform, holding one of our guns, loaded with our ammunition. Is it safe to assume he's one of our people?"
"He is," Xu answered, pressing a few buttons on her handlink. "His name's McMurdo. Quistis has been going over his profile, so I'll defer to her."
Quistis stood up, smoothed her uniform, and pressed a few of the buttons on the panel before her. The screens on the wall displayed pictures of the cadet in question, and for a moment, Quistis wondered how the fifteen year-old boy felt, held in total containment down in the Dark, deprived of light and sound, in contact only with his intravenous tube, through which he received meals, and the enormous metal chair to which they'd confined him
As the barrage of routinely measured statistics came up on the screen, Quistis pointed to those she found most relevant. "McMurdo is a middle-of-the-pack cadet who has never excelled at anything and has never triggered any flags in our system. Everything we've ever seen out of him screams "team player," and there's nothing at all that indicates that he's capable of mastering the independent thought necessary to plan and carry out and assassination attempt. All the psych profiles peg him as a total beta wolf."
"So we find the alpha," Squall said.
Without warning, General Mallis's eyes flew open. A wild grin had crossed his face, but he had the gleam of a hunter in his eye.
"Llyriance..." he hissed, jumping to his feat. "Think about it," he continued, without waiting for a reaction from the group, "you're a third-rate SeeD cadet who will never amount to anything, when lo, along comes the representative of an enormous military republic. For one small act of treason, it's fortune and glory, or whatever else Llyriance promised him. How very elegant."
By this point, Mallis had reached the door to the conference room.
"Sir?" Squall called out. "Is that what you really believe happened?"
Mallis paused at the door and turned, his grin even wider than before. "We won't know until we have better intelligence, Squall. So invite Llyriance over for a little chat, won't you, and we'll ask him." And the General exited the room, his laughter audible in the hallway.
Everyone looked to Squall, who stared at the floor, fingers tented together. He looked up gazed around the room. "Cover of darkness. Selphie, it's your show."
She nodded, face grave. "Xu, we'll need the high-end covert items."
"Should I start prepping the ship again?" asked Nida.
"No, replied Selphie, mind whirling. "It's too high-profile. We'll travel by boat and then by van once we hit land. Anyway, everyone's free for three hours while I draw up the mission profile. Reassemble in the briefing room."
* *
Quistis strode into the briefing room to find Selphie still tapping away at the console, her face illuminated in the eerie green glow of the monitor. It projected a rotating image of Llyriance's three-story estate, along with a series of color-coded lines, denoting points of infiltration. A smile of grim pride on her face, Selphie stepped back and pressed a button, watching the simulation run. She let the program repeat three times before she cancelled its progress.
"Booyaka," she whispered to herself, satisfaction in her voice.
Quistis walked over to the rest of the group, examining the open containers of equipment.
"Have you ever seen such a thing of beauty?" Irvine asked, holding out an air taser for Quistis's inspection. "The obligatory long shot, followed by a standard conversion into a stun gun. In both modes, it consistently delivers more than 50, 000 volts, more than enough to fell any human. Llyriance's guards are going to get quite the introduction to the business end of this little gem."
"Not so fast, cowboy," Selphie called out, walking over to the center table and calling up the mission profile. "We're pulling out all the stops to make this a stealth mission. So if that means no shooting anyone with the shiny new taser, then you'll just have to cope with that.
"Anyway," she continued, "not everyone's coming along, but I wanted to keep us all on the same page for this mission, since things have been so out of control lately." She took a quick look around the room, making sure she had everyone's attention before she plunged ahead into the mission description.
"The basic idea is that we're going to use two boats to sail to the Galbadian continent, approach Llyriance's estate in two vans – Nida will be driving one, with one of the SeeDs under his command in the other. He'll stay in the van and provide mission support while Irvine, Seifer, Zell, and I, do the rest. We'll hit Llyriance's house, knock out the power, and kidnap him, bringing him back to the van and returning him to Garden before sunrise. Security should be light, but we're taking no chances, hence the tasers. We're also bringing heavy tranquilizers so Llyriance can't fight us once we find him.
"Now, let me give out assignments to the people who are staying behind.
"Quistis, go do what you need to do to work in the Dark. I know it'll be grueling, and we don't know how long you'll be down there, so go make your preparations.
"Xu, double-duty: just rest and work. I hate to put so much responsibility on you, but you know you're the lifeblood of this place."
Slowly, Selphie crossed over to Squall. She slowly wrapped her arms around him. "Go to Rinoa. Go spend some time alone. Go sleep. But take care of yourself. We need you, Squall. Just... try to find some time to regain your strength, okay?"
Squall nodded his comprehension and pressed his hand on the back of Selphie's head.
"Selphie?" called out Nida. "The ships are ready to depart whenever we arrive at the harbor."
Selphie stepped away from Squall and called out to the group, "Okay, team, time to move out. Your gear will be waiting onboard the ships." So saying, she caught Irvine's hand and started her purposeful stride toward Garden's parking garage. Quistis ran her hand through her hair and thought of her office.
* *
Quistis let out an enormous sigh and transferred her attention from the forms in front of her to the leather satchel hanging by the door, a reminder of Cid's monstrous treachery. No matter how much she wished to destroy the thing, she knew it would prove a key piece of evidence in bringing the Headmaster to justice.
Distracted by the bag for long enough, she grabbed it, crossed to her wall safe, and threw the satchel inside, slamming the door shut with great satisfaction. She spun the wheel, turned the lever, and murmured a few words under her breath. The air in front of the safe shimmered blue for a moment, promising her that its contents would stay safe for the present. A buzz at the door caught her attention, and she reached over to admit the visitor.
The door slid open to allow Tia to enter the room – once Quistis's most gifted junior cadet, now a full cadet for all of a week. She beamed with pride in her new uniform as she entered Quistis's office.
"Tia, I appreciate your coming so late."
"Not at all, Instructor Trepe, thank you for the invitation" Tia replied.
Quistis gestured to a seat. "Please, come in. Sit down."
The girl smiled slightly, red hair falling around her shoulders as she descended the three stairs into the office. She and Tia took their proper places on opposite sides of the desk, the redhead with her small hands clasped.
"Before you start, Instructor...?"
"Please," Quistis interrupted, "call me Quistis, "and don't sit at attention. It's 1:00 A.M. What would you like to say?"
"Did you get a chance to read the report on the mission I ran into the Grandidi Forest?"
Quistis sighed heavily. "I confess I have not. Recent events, before and since, the Headmaster's assault have kept me from doing anything but performing my most basic duties. I've even had to hand off most of my classes onto other SeeDs so I could contend with missions and... outside projects. But, I'd be glad to check now."
Quistis donned her glasses and accessed the Garden Network, navigating through the menus to the repository storing Tia's mission. She entered her security code and read the report, then turned to Tia, removing her glasses again. Before Quistis could even open her mouth, the younger girl started speaking.
"Now, I realize that as a pure capture mission, it failed. But I urge you to look at it from a broader perspective. Before we knew nothing about this creature, aside from a few sketchy reports in a magazine. Now we have detailed facts brought back by a veteran SeeD field team..."
"Led," Quistis grinned, leaning forward, "by a thirteen year-old cadet."
"Junior cadet, actually," Tia rebutted, "I hadn't yet been promoted. At any rate. We tracked the creature to its lair, engaged it in combat, and wrote up extensive post-battle reports. In short, we formed the basis for further study of this being."
"So what are you getting at?"
Tia glanced away for a moment, worried. She took a deep breath before turning back. "I just feel so awful about failing this mission. I mean, I know you took this to Commander Leonhart as a personal favor to me, and I don't want to get you in trouble for it, and I don't want it to go down as a failure on my record..."
"Tia, please," Quistis cut in, cutting her off, her voice gentle, "you're fine. You're not in trouble. First, you need to know that live capture missions on an unknown creature are the hardest kind of mission you can take on. They almost never occur, so they're almost impossible to prepare for, plus, even once you're ready, how do you know what to pack, since you don't know what to use against the creature?
"Second, SeeD doesn't traditionally run these sorts of missions. We don't really have the facilities for dissecting monsters. If you'd bagged this thing, we would have just brought him here, sold him to the labs in Esthar – giving you a personal cut of that sale – waited until they'd released their reports, and then let one of our spies in the Presidential Palace pass the information along to us.
"Third, and perhaps most important, your first mission doesn't have to be about success. It's just about going out into the field and learning about working in a team. It doesn't have to be a quest to increase the body of scientific knowledge or to prove your worth. Commander Leonhart and I didn't expect you necessarily to succeed or to fail. We knew that you'd learn from it, and that's why we signed off on the mission
"But, really, it's getting late. We must turn to the real reason you're here."
Once more, Tia folded her hands primly in her lap.
"Yes, Inst... Sorry, Quistis. What can I do for you?"
Quistis tilted her head back and regarded the ceiling for a moment, before bringing her eyes back down to the younger girl. "First of all, the conversation, after this point, is absolutely confidential. If you repeat any part of the conversation to any unauthorized person, you will be subject to emergency punishment proceedings, outside of those contained in the normal SeeD judiciary process. Understood?"
Tia nodded, puzzled by this warning.
"Good," Quistis continued. "Now, as you may expect, there's a lot going on with the attempt on the Headmaster's life. To be perfectly honest, those of us on the First Team had our hands full before this happened, so, as you can imagine that this latest development has left us a little swamped.
"Now, the good news is that we have the shooter in custody. We haven't released that little tidbit to the general populous."
"Really?" Tia interrupted. "Where is he?"
"The Dark," Quistis replied. "Are you familiar with it?"
"I've heard the name, but... not really."
"Well, you know that there are levels that exist down below the Garden proper. The MD level, which houses the machinery that runs this Garden. Below that, the level we used for Seifer's Tribunal – it used to be the chamber for Garden Master NORG. The Dark is on one of the lower levels as well. We use it when we need to interrogate someone particularly vital to the success of a mission. You can see why the shooter falls into this category. And this is why I need your help."
Tia's eyes narrowed as the tried to judge Quistis's statement. "I'm not sure I follow."
"Well, I have to be the interrogator. I'm the entirety of SeeD's psychological operations department. There was another student, but things went... awry. Anyhow, I have no way of telling how long I'll be down there questioning our would-be assassin. Could be less than a day, could be weeks. Either way, I won't be able to leave the Dark until I'm finished. That means I'll need someone to cover my classes. I already have people to cover my cadet classes. I need you to teach my junior cadets."
"But I was a junior cadet just a week ago!"
"Good," Quistis responded, smiling "then it should all be fresh in your mind. Are you up to it?"
"Well, of course!" Tia exclaimed, shock and glee and fleeting bits of horror mixing on her face.
"Excellent," Quistis reached for the bracelet at her wrist, from which dangled the gold-and-silver emblem of a SeeD Instructor. She removed it and handed it over to the redhead, saying, "You have command."
Instantly adopting the ritual solemnity the moment demanded, Tia clasped the bracelet onto her own small wrist, replying with, "I have command."
"Thank you, Tia. If you need any help, just get in contact with one of the members of the First Team, and explain the situation."
Tia rose, and headed for the door. At the top of the stairs, she paused and turned to Quistis, "I hope you get the answers out of this guy. For all of us."
Quistis nodded in reply. "I'll do my best. And I promise that when all of this is over, you can run another mission into the forest, and I'll be the first to sign up to help you capture that thing."
Tia smiled at Quistis, turned sharply, and left the office.
Quistis, weary from the last few hours of preparations, left her desk and reached into one of the small closets of her office, producing a compact sleeping bag. She spread it out on the floor, wasting no time in falling asleep on it.
In what seemed like moments, the phone on her belt rang. Her eyes flew open as she grabbed at the device, answering it, "Yes?"
"Quistis?" came Squall's voice. "Meet us at the front gate."
* *
The sunrise rushed in through the main gate of Balamb Garden as Quistis arrived, finding her friends waiting. Selphie, Zell, and Irvine still wore their black stealth suits from the mission, while Squall and Xu appeared to have changed their clothes in the intervening hours.
"Llyriance is being taken to the Dark," Squall said, not turning to face her. "We're preparing him for interrogation." He turned to face the rising sun, as though his simple admission might answer any questions on her mind. Still, she knew he'd keep his own counsel, so she didn't pursue it any further.
"Okay, Squall," Zell blurted out, "since no one else seems curious, I'll do the asking: what the hell are we doing here, and where the hell is Seifer? I mean, I know he made it back from Galbadia okay, so where is he?"
Squall smiled one of his secret smiles, and then pointed into the distance, where three figures walked the road leading to Balamb Garden. "Interrogating Llyriance is going to be an intense job, and things won't be any simpler for us from there on out. I want Quistis fighting at full strength, so I'm getting someone else to interrogate the shooter, which is where Seifer has gone."
The words slammed into Quistis with deadly force.
"What?" she exclaimed. "I can interrogate McMurdo without any problems and be back on my feet in no time."
Squall, instead of addressing the entire group, now focused on Quistis. She felt her entire world melt away, and could feel nothing but the two of them. In the past, she'd found this power of Squall's romantic, but now, coupled with the storm in his eyes, she had to fight the urge to back away.
"Not up for debate."
A flurry of emotions ran through Quistis. She felt hurt and betrayed, but at the same time knew Squall had no intension of slighting her with his decision. He made his call from a strategic standpoint and knew that Quistis, of all his comrades, would understand and support him in that philosophy.
"Understood," she said.
"Look!" yelled Zell. "It's our mystery guests." Then, yelling into the distance, "Hey, Seifer! Who you got with you?"
Seifer yelled back, answering, "It's a reunion. Hope you have your party hats."
The large muscular man to the left of Seifer leapt in the air and crowed. "Totally! The posse is back together again, ya know?"
The thin, silver-haired woman with an eye patch looked over at her friend and hissed, "DOLT."
Squall stepped forward, prompting the rest of his group to follow him. They neared the posse and halted, while Squall produced two documents.
"Raijin and Fujin, former SeeD cadets. You deserted Balamb Garden. But we need you. These papers reinstate you as cadets eligible to take the next field exam." Squall took the next few steps forward and handed them the documents. Without waiting for them to look over the papers, he turned and walked toward back toward Garden, the whole entourage following him.
The entire group assembled in the lobby. "Everyone," Squall said, "You're dismissed. Raijin, report to Xu and she'll set you up with the duty roster, and answer any questions. Fujin, Quistis, the elevator with me please."
Squall, Quistis, and Fujin filed onto the main elevator. As soon as the doors slid shut, Squall turned to Fujin and nodded, his voice solemn. "I'm sure you've guessed why we've brought you back."
Fujin nodded at Squall, and then looked at Quistis, her counterpart in psychological operations.
"INTERROGATION."