AN: the title's just me bein superstitious an all - don't worry I'll get over Selphie soon, I promise - tee hee!
Rating: R (I tried to keep it lower, but it just wasn't destined to happen - unlike other things [which are responsible for the rating])
Disclaimer: SG characters are (c) MGM (thankie to Morrigan for that :p). FF8 characters are (c) Squaresoft, original characters are mine – ask nicely and I might let you play with them, s'long's you don't break them...
Warnings: SxS - Yaoi (guyxguy) later - if u don't like, don't read. Character death. Maybe angst (I do like to torture my characters sometimes :p), language (prob nothin u aint heard b4, but still...)
~Chapter TwelveA: Go Fetch~
Zell wasn't surprised when Selphie, eventually, arrived at a dead run. In fact, he'd been more surprised to find she wasn't already there, until Irvine explained about the observation room and that she was probably caught in a dilemma over risking missing anything, and meeting aliens first hand. Not for the first time since he'd arrived at the excavation site, Zell wished Squall - or even Seifer - were there. Much as he hated to admit it - in Seifer's case - they always knew what to do in a situation, and it always seemed to go right for them. It was a case of everything they touched turning to gil, and everything he touched turning to dust.
Irvine looked like he had everything under control, bar the fact that neither of the two groups spoke a common language. Just because he had a tendency to blurt out the first thoughts to arrive in his mind when he was under pressure, Zell thought, didn't mean he wasn't observant. He'd seen the silent question between Irvine and another SeeD, and even without knowing the SeeD, had figured out that they had to be a linguistics specialist. Not many had an ear for languages, but fortunately with most of the world speaking Galbadian there was little need for translators. Even the Shumi could mostly speak Galbadian. So if a linguist didn't recognise the language, it was unlikely anyone else, even a sorceress, would. Except, maybe there was a spell or something a sorceress could cast to translate whatever the aliens were saying.
It felt odd calling the three people in front of the artefact aliens. They looked exactly like anyone else Zell had ever seen, although they looked kinda old for soldiers. But then again, SeeDs were mercenaries and as such had a lower life expectancy than regular army soldiers, so maybe the three were army.
Zell suddenly caught some of what Irvine was saying to Selphie, and realised the Galbadian had come to the same conclusion as he had. That a sorceress might be able to help. Selphie, to her annoyance, was being sent in the Ragnarok to fetch Edea from the orphanage. Zell wondered, as he watched Selphie stomp off, why Edea hadn't been asked to join them when the thing was discovered. He turned back around at Irvine's sudden laughter.
***
Daniel shrugged. "I don't think they're going to let us get anywhere near anyone who might have the education to know more than the main language." Jack rolled his eyes.
"I'll list the facts. No one here seems to be wearing the same 'uniform'. In fact, the only one wearing anything resembling a uniform is one of the three who seem to be in charge. There is a wide variety of weaponry, most of it swords, knives, stuff like that. They don't look like an army, so what else could they be...?" He asked sarcastically. Daniel frowned.
"You think they're mercenaries?" Sam asked. Jack nodded.
"Bingo. And what does every mercenary require?" Daniel nodded his realisation.
"At least a rudimentary knowledge of most languages." He sighed. "I'll try, but given their reaction I'd say that if there were g'ould on this planet, it was a long time ago." Jack shrugged.
"I'd say the girl over there, in the blue halter top, probably has the language skills." Daniel looked at Sam who shrugged.
"OK." He muttered. "Guess I can't make more of a fool of myself than I have before."
AN: I know Daniel shouldn't be prejudiced about who knows what language, after all, if you don't know any of the dialects, it's pretty likely that you won't know which the main one is to start with.
