Summary: Last chapter was simple. Everyone was trying to find each other and there were more than a few surprises in store for everyone.  Someone has been watching them but they don't know who it is? Are they friend or foe? They'll find out soon enough.

Chapter 3 – Friend or Foe?

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Squall spun around in shock. He looked up and standing there, was the person he had seen earlier. Squall drew his gunblade out of its sheath, as the man front flipped off the cliff. It was a good 20 foot drop but he landed softly on his knee. He slowly stood up and looked at Squall.  His eyes narrowed as they landed on Squall's gunblade.

The first thing that surprised him was the man's height. He was smaller than Squall, being barely over five and a half feet tall. The next thing that surprised Squall was his hair. It was golden-blonde and was very spiky, slightly more on the left side. He had bright aqua-marine eyes which glowed faintly. Just by looking into his eyes, Squall knew this man was dangerous. He wore a navy sleeveless top and navy, slightly baggy pants. To Squall, he looked like a mercenary. And there was one thing about him that made Squall slightly nervous. It was the large sword on the man's back. How it stayed there, he had no idea. There wasn't a sheath to carry it in. The sword looked over four feet long, and at least a foot wide. It shone bright white and had a long handle, with metal coming out to the side and curving slightly. He knew this was because the sword was to be handled with two hands, it looked quite heavy. And for some reason, it looked very familiar.

Squall's eyes widened slightly as the man took the sword off his back and brought it in front of him. The edge of the blade fell to the floor, cutting a slit in the ground. Squall's eyes widened even more when the man brought his sword up, balancing it in his right hand, his left in front of his chest protectively. He brought his right foot back and bent his knees slightly, in a fighting position.

Squall suddenly realised that this guy wanted a fight. He was going to refuse, but he didn't want his friends to get hurt. Squall brought his gunblade in front of him and also got into his fighting stance.

Rinoa, who, along with everyone else, had been silent during this, stepped forward and looked back and forth from the two swordsmen.

She hesitated, and then quietly said, "Be careful Squall. This guy's very powerful." Angelo stepped up next to her and growled at the sword wielder, who looked at her then returned his focus to Squall.

Squall looked at her and nodded. He then turned back to his opponent. They each stood still, both waiting for the other to make the first move. They advanced together, both blades coming round in an arch and clashing together with a loud ring. Sparks flew as they both thrust at each other, again and again, neither one gaining an advantage.

Squall realised that if they continued like this, they would both tire out and the fight would end in a stalemate. He began to move faster and putting more strength into his attacks. He slowly began to gain the advantage. His foe would sometimes miss the chance to defend, but would dodge Squall's gunblade none the less. He was very fast. Even with his GF junctions, Squall couldn't hit him.

Squall attacked his foe, who didn't defend. Instead he jumped back out of Squall's range, but not before earning a small cut on his arm. Squall was about to rush forward and attack again, when he realised his foe didn't advance. Squall thought he had given up, but quickly found out he was mistaken. The mercenary decided that using only one hand, he would be beaten. So he grabbed onto the handle with both hands and balanced the sword.

He then lunged forward, catching Squall totally off guard. Squall managed to get his gunblade up to defend, only to have it knocked right out of his hands. His foe had increased the strength in his attack, dramatically. He must have been toying with him. Squall was sure that, if his gunblade wasn't made out of indestructible metal, it would have split in half. Before he could move, his foe slashed him three times, the first got him on his right arm, the second at his waist and the third cut him just above his left knee. His foe stopped as Squall fell to the ground.

He looked at Squall, who was starting to sit up, then at Rinoa. He raised a hand and a faint light glowed at his palm. Squall noticed that the mercenary had something around his wrist. It looked like armour, but it had small slots, that held several green orbs, including a red one. His sword had the slots as well, some spheres were green and 2 were pink. One of the green spheres on his sword glowed brightly as did the glow at his hand. Squall suddenly realised that he was casting magic, and he was aiming for Rinoa! Angelo barked loudly at Rinoa, as if she was trying to warn her.

The glow at his hand turned yellow, and then bolts of lightning shot out towards Rinoa. Rinoa was too shocked to move, so Squall had to think fast. He concentrated and put his hand up and cast a spell on her. The lightning was stopped in its tracks and shot back towards its caster, thanks to the Reflect spell Squall had cast.

The mercenary stood calmly as the lightning bolts came at him. He raised his arm so that his armour was struck. The bolts disappeared as it was absorbed. He shut his eyes, as the energy ran through him. Squall and the others stood, or sat in Squall's case, in shock, as the cut on his arm healed.

The mercenary looked back down at Squall and smiled. He put his sword on his back and raised his hand. A glow appeared again as a different green sphere on the armour grew brighter. Squall shut his eyes ready to take the hit.

It didn't come.

Instead he felt his strength return to him, and his wounds heal. Squall slowly stood up and stared at the mercenary, totally bewildered.

"I'm sorry if I hurt you," the mercenary said, speaking for the first time since the start of the fight, "But it was necessary. I needed to see if you were a threat to the town up ahead."

"But sir?" Selphie started asking, "How do you know that we're not a threat just by fighting one of us?"

"Well, from my experience," he answered, "Usually the people I have fought didn't protect their comrades if they were in danger. That's how I knew that you're not a threat."

"Nice way to introduce yourself!" Squall said angrily, "I hope no one else around here is like you."

The man chuckled.

"What's so funny?" Squall asked, getting slightly annoyed.

"You don't know much about people round here, do you?"

Squall scowled at him. It was bad enough getting beat by him. Now he was saying that he's stupid.

"Where are you from anyway?" the man asked, curiously. He had never seen the clothes that some of these kids were wearing. Or their weapons.  Squall's gunblade, he thought, was particularly interesting.

"That's none of your god damn business" Squall answered curtly. Rinoa and the others instantly knew that he had said that a bit too rudely. The man's face had a scowl that scared Rinoa slightly. Squall had made a mistake by getting him angry.

The man raised his arm and a sphere on his armour started glowing. Without warning, a large green fog erupted around him and he shot it towards Squall. Squall was sent flying back, landing a good ten feet away. He tried to sit up, wincing in pain. Some of his leather was singed and his shirt had a burn mark on it. That guy had used magic. A powerful magic, at that.

"Listen kid," the mercenary growled, "You're either going to tell me who you are, or I'm going to force you to."

"First off, don't call me kid." Squall growled back, getting up again, "And second, tell us who you are first."

"My name's Cloud Strife," Cloud said, folding his arms, "I'm a former member of the resistance group, AVALANCHE."

"AVALANCHE? Never heard of them before." Zell asked.

Cloud looked at Zell with confused eyes. He was positive everyone knew of AVALANCHE. How couldn't they. It was thanks to AVALANCHE that the planet is still here.

"You've never heard of us?" He asked

"No, we haven't," Irvine said, "We're from a military academy called Garden. We're all SeeD's."

Cloud looked even more confused than ever.

"Did you lot bang your heads on the way here? There's is no such thing as Garden."

"Yes there is. We grew up there." Selphie said.

"I'm sorry, but there isn't."

"Oh, yeah?" Squall finally said, looking quite angry," How the hell would you know?"

"Because I've been to every town, city and continent on this planet, kid." Cloud said calmly.

"Stop calling me kid!" Squall shouted.

Cloud chuckled and looked away, "I'm older than you aren't I?

Squall just got even angrier, but knew how to respond.

"At least I'm taller."

This really got under Cloud's skin. He looked Squall dead in the eye, and glared. He looked absolutely furious.

"Listen, kid." He said, in a remarkably calm voice. "Better men than you have judged me by my size, and believe me, they've regretted it."

The stood in silence for a moment, before Quistis spoke.

"Cloud, could you tell us where we are?"

"Yes. This area is the Grassland Plains. The town a couple of miles north is Kalm."

Selphie and Irvine looked at each other, confused.  Being the pilots of the Ragnarok, they had both been around the world and had never heard of such a place.  Neither, apparently, had any of the others.

Squall was silent, deep in thought. If they stayed here, they would never find out what had happened to them.  But he didn't trust Cloud.  Maybe the others did, he didn't know, and wasn't about to ask them. Then there was the fact that they needed shelter, he was sure Kalm had inns. He made his decision.

"Can you take us there?" he asked

Cloud looked at Squall then at the rest of the group. He was sure he could trust these 'SeeD's' or whatever they were called. But something inside him told him that he needed to keep an eye on this Squall. He was obviously their leader, and if he didn't trust him and his friends, the rest would probably turn on them as well. But he was willing to get them a place at the inn. They looked exhausted.

"Sure. Looks like you need a place to stay anyway. I'll get you a few rooms at the inn when we get there. C'mon, let's go." He walked off heading towards Kalm with Squall and the others close behind.

A/N: Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. I'm so, so, so sorry that this chapter took so long to come out, I've been really busy lately. Well, the mysterious character was Cloud, mmm. Next chapter, we'll be meeting up with the rest of the group. But on the way to Kalm, there'll be a 'pleasant' surprise for Cloud, Squall and his friends.