Chapter 5: The Best.
The whole copyright type thing summed up in an equasion: Squaresoft me.
Erm, okay. I'm about to introduce a character who you will probably hate. Give them a chance okay? I will explain why the character is like that in later chapters, and also the character will become better I promise! I hope this chapter isn't a let down...
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The girl had woken up alone, and she had changed too. She was afraid at first, but a note from herself in her pocket reassured her. All she needed to do was to find this 'Leonhart' girl, apparently the daughter of Squall, and apparently her friend. Not that she was worried about being alone, she was the best. She hopped over the rooftops of the castle, looking down, feeling her excitement shared by the GF that was bound within her.
A girl. Two girls. One tall and speaking incessantly her wide mouth smiling, the other small and quiet, her gaze constantly alert.
Which one was the sorceress? The taller girl had great physical presence owing to her height and great green eyes. But the small one had some feeling of being more powerful than she looked that almost radiated from her if you knew how to see it properly, and as she looked up, the features of her face showed plainly her lineage.
Ellone sensed something.
"We're being watched." She said.
"Huh? How do you know?" Asked Sylvie.
"I don't know how I know, but I can feel it."
"Maybe it's a sorceress thing?"
('Good point, I wonder if I can sense better if I concentrate.')
Ellone shut her eyes and breathed deeply, allowing her mind to blank. She sensed something. Sylvie next to her giving off warmth and concern. She roved further. There! The mind was so sharp that the young sorceress recoiled from it. Not hostile, just hard and hot and bright like a poker. She felt the direction of those stormy grey eyes.
The girl on the roof watched in amazement as slowly the small SeeD turned around, her eyes closed, and pointed her head directly at her.
Ellone opened her eyes and saw.
"There you are! Why are you spying on us?"
The girl didn't answer, she just jumped down from her hiding place and looked long and hard at the pair in front of her.
"Who are you?" Asked Sylvie.
The stranger said nothing. She was a little taller than Ellone, and not so bony in build. She had very hard grey eyes and a pale face, which were a contrast to her mane of red hair and vivid red lips. She was obviously from Esthar, dressed in a tight silver bodysuit and tooled up with so many guns that she could have occupied Irvine Kinneas for days.
"My name," She stated, "Is Maxina Best. Because I am the best. Maxina means 'best' therefore I am the best Best."
"Wow, you're the best of the best of the best then!" Said Sylvie lightly.
"Precisely." She smiled, "You are Sylvie Kinneas and Ellone Raine Leonhart. I have heard from a reliable source, myself, that you are as good as SeeDs can get and that I am your friend, or will be."
('This must be the 'loud Estharian' Sylvie wrote about.')
"I'm pleased to meet you Maxina Best."
"What a polite little sorceress. You may call me Max, or Best, the choice is your own."
"I think 'Best' suits you quite well."
"It does rather. Though please remember that I am the best, you may be a close second, but I have never lost at anything. No sorceress, SeeD or monster can ever defeat me."
"Wow, you're really confident!" Said Sylvie, she sounded cheerful, but Ellone recognised her expression, she didn't seem to like Best much, "You've never lost at anything? Doesn't life get boring?"
"Some things are a challenge, but I do not give up until I am the master."
('This girl is going to either drive me insane or end up being a really good friend.')
"Well Best, we're going that way." Ellone pointed, "Are you coming with us?"
"Why that way?"
"Seems as good a direction as any."
"Very well, you have come from that direction, and I have come from the roof, your decision is logical enough." Maxina began to walk alongside them.
"So, Best, you're not a SeeD then?"
"No, though my organisation is similar to Garden, EMO, the Esthar Mercenary Organisation. It doesn't exist in my time, but that is because I have yet to set it up."
"You're going to set up a whole mercenary organisation? But, you can't be much older than..."
"In my own time I am fifteen. Here I am eighteen."
"Talk about a prodigy."
"I did tell you that I am the best."
"What about fighting? Do you use Para-magic?"
"Of course, my GF is Fenrir. You will find that I am far more than a match for any opponent, including you, Miss Leonhart."
Ellone scowled and stayed silent.
"She prefers to be called Ellone, her friends call her 'Ella,' though I'm unsure if she likes that or just tolerates it."
"You appear to be a lady of few words Ellone. Is it that you do not like to speak or that you have nothing interesting to say?"
"Few things that people say are ever really worth saying, and even less things are worth saying more than once."
"....And if people don't understand you the first time you speak to them?"
"They're not worth talking to."
"I see. Are you always like this or have I caught you on a bad day?"
"Monsters!" Ellone drew her gunblade and was immediately in a battle stance. Sylvie extended her spear and stood ready, and Best drew two pistols with a little flair and locked out her arms. "Creeps! Think we can take them?"
"Please, give me a real challenge!" Best jumped forward, guns blazing. The first creep was blown away within seconds, falling to the ground like a black rag. "Let's see you handle the other one miss Leonhart."
The young SeeD was now burning to prove herself. She struck the creature so hard with her gunblade that there was little left of it to fall down. She failed to notice the look of concern that crossed Maxina's face.
"You are very strong." Said the Estharite quietly. "...But you cannot be stronger than me. I am-"
"-The best. We know already! Will you please shut up!" The outbust seemed unusual for Sylvie, and the frown was strange seen on her childlike mouth and light brow. "Yes, you're good maybe, but that doesn't mean you're nessesarily better than everybody else!"
"I will entitle you to your own opinions Miss Kinneas, though I do not agree. I am intregued that we are destined to become good friends, you do not seem to be the sort of person I make friends with."
('That's because Sylvie probably made friends with you, not the other way around.')
Ellone gave Sylvie a quietly sympathetic glance. ('I can't see tham being friends either.')
"Come on. Keep walking, we don't have time for this." Said Ellone, "I don't want to be stuck here longer than I have to be."
"Yeah, okay."
"Hmm." The Two taller girls unlocked their eyes and followed Ellone.
"So Ellone, are you to be our leader?"
"No, I don't see why three mature people need to have a leader. Somebody just needed to remind you of what's important here."
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Pain. Loneliness. He was not hurt, but something ached inside him. Something, somebody was missing. But he couldn't remember what he had lost that was so important. All he knew was that he would give anything to have whatever it was back with him. What was it? An image skittered on the edge of his memory, faceless. He knew it was beautiful, he ardently desired to see it, touch it. But yet it evaded him.
He walked on like a robot, barely aware of what was going on, cutting down any foes that barred his path.
"I...Will....find..."
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ellone sat down on a chunk of rubble.
"We're resting here." She said, "we've been walking for ages and still nothing."
"Just old ruins, miles of them."
"....What are we supposed to be looking for anyway?"
Ellone looked up.
"I...Don't know. I have this feeling, like I've lost something important....I wish I knew what it was."
There was a long silence. Sylvie looked at her feet, Best checked her artillery piece by piece. But it was suddenly broken by a shout.
"HEY! PEOPLE! ALRIGHT!"
The three young women looked up to see a young man thundering towards them.
"WOOT! I'm the luckiest guy alive! I finally find company and it's three hot babes!"
('Oh no. It's not. Please Hyne don't let it be a grown up Genji Dincht.')
The young man slicked back his blonde hair with a hand.
"Well hello." He said, "Are you ladies lonely at all?" He looked at them in turn, "Heh, you're all...pretty well armed aren't you?"
('Oh but it is.')
"Yes, we're evil sirens who prey on passing travellers."Said Sylvie, "We have been waiting for you Genji Dincht." the SeeD somehow managed to keep a straight face as she stood up and loomed over him. Sylvie, like so many tall people, had the ability to loom ominously, which she could apparently turn on and off at leisure.
"Aaaaaggghhhhhh....Please! Don't kill me!"
Slyvie now lost the ability to keep a straight face and had a very long and incapacitating fit of giggles.
"She's just kidding you Genji." Said Ellone.
"But...How do you know my name?"
"Please note that I am nothing to do with them and have never met you before. My name is Maxina Best." the redhead shook Genji's hand.
"So who are you two then?"
"...And he still doesn't have a clue!" Sylvie carried on laughing. Ellone shook her head and looked at the floor.
"What!? ....Geez, one of you is the ice queen and the other one is off her head!" Something clicked. "Oh my- You're Sylvie Kinneas! ....so you must be...."
"Yep! That's Ellone Leonhart."
"No freakin' way!"
"I know! Isn't she cute!?"
"Yeah! She's like, the uber cute!"
"I'm stood four feet away. Do you mind?"
"Yeah, we keep telling her she's pretty and she'll make Best feel jealous. I'm presuming you're also the best looking, right Best?" teased Sylvie.
"Are you making fun of me?"
"No, she's making fun of both of us. She's the best at that."
"What?! She cannot be the best! I am the best!"
('Result! Oh, that was too cruel.')
"I will not be beaten by a lanky, clumsy green eyed monster!"
"Ooh, looks like I'm not the only 'green eyed monster' around here. C'mon! Ellone insults better than you!"
"Gaaaahh! I will not tolerate this! I have to be the best!"
"Fine, Best, you be whatever you want. So Genji, you seen anything interesting?"
"Nope, this place is boring. Super boring."
"And we're the first people you've bumped into?"
"Yeah. Why are we all older here?"
"Probably something to do with this being compressed time. Past, present and future all exist at once or something."
Genji's eyebrows moved as he tried to understand the concept.
"Oh man, now my head hurts. I'll leave the thinking to you guys okay?" said the youth. Best smiled, probably pleased that Genji was suitably inferior to her when it came to thinking. Although there may have been another reason. Genji had become a well muscled young man with a rather handsome, if somewhat boyish face, perhaps she found him attractive.
"Do you think there are others around here? More of our friends?"
"I woke with a letter in my pocket that I had written to myself. It said there should be six of us." Said Best.
"Six? But that's the same number as were in..."
"...Squall Leonhart's group when they defeated Ultimicia. The same thing occured to me."
"Well. My first thoughts are to get a move on. But perhaps we should rest longer." Said Ellone, "Besides, if we wait, maybe they'll find us. These ruins can't go on forever right?"
Sylvie suddenly laughed.
"You know who you sound like when you take charge like that?"
"Don't tell me, Squall Leonhart is it?" ('It's always Squall Leonhart. Like father like daughter, and all that rubbish.')
"No. That's the funny thing. You sound just like Instructor Trepe!"
"...Whatever. Just rest. We walk again in twenty minutes."
"Aye aye capp'n Quistis!" Called Sylvie with a mock salute.
Ellone found a more secluded spot behind a wall where she could sit and be alone for a while.
('What's going on? Why didn't I write more in my note? Why do I keep having to be leader, can't those guys cope alone? ...No, that's not the problem, they can all cope alone, they just can't cope together. Sylvie pretends she likes people, but really she knows she's different, she's much smarter than the rest of us, but she's afraid to show it. Best is loud, but she keeps having to remind herself that she's good, it's as if she doesn't believe it, she's terrified of failure. At least Genji's straightforward. He's impulsive and he has a big mouth, but at least he doesn't seem to have any dark hidden depths like the rest of us.....Damn, I really am turning into Quistis Trepe aren't I? Analysing everybody for no reason.')
The small Leonhart sighed and stared at a patch of moss that was crawling with woodlice. She dozed for a moment, but opened her eyes suddenly when she felt a presence. ('This sorceress thing is annoying, how am I supposed to think if I get disturbed all the time? ...Well, I'll check it out.')
She roved carefully with her mind, counting off conciousnesses as she passed them. ('Best, Genji, Sylvie.....hello, who's this?') The being wasn't far off, but it was difficult to read what sort of a person it was. It gave off a feeling very different to the one Ellone had felt from Best.
The girl climbed up the wall and sat atop it like a strangely beautiful gargoyle.
"Hey!" She shouted on seeing a person. The figure stopped and looked up at Ellone. It was a woman.
"Hello!" She replied. "I mean you no harm!"
('I know that voice. Where have I heard it before?') Ellone watched the familiar voice approach. ('That's odd, I don't recognise her at all. Is it another person I know but older?') She scrambled down and stood with her hand hovering by her gunblade.
"I said I mean you no harm! I'm a SeeD, a SeeD from Balamb Garden!" The woman saluted smartly.
('Wait, I know you, you're- no, this isn't right. It doesn't make sense. How can she be here? It's...')
[World's most annoying chapter ending! To be continued!]