Disclaimer: Once again...as much as I'd like to own some of the characters from the SO series...it entirely belongs to SquareEnix.

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Chapter 1: How it all Began

It all started when I first learned about my true heritage, about 7 years or so when I thought I lost everything I had. I was prepared for the worst, but it seems fate was on my side. I was given another chance to find out about myself, and that was what motivated me to find out more about my parent's life prior to their moving to Federation Station #17.

Was I an Expellian as my mother?

Where did she adopt me from?

Who were my real parents?

Why did they abandon me?

Who exactly am I?

At first those were the questions that haunt my dreams and nightmares, I tried to seek out these answers as much as I could, as much as the child that I was then could, but I couldn't find out anything more then what I already knew.

My more intense researches didn't start until I started to dig deep into my mother's life on Federation Station #5, Moonbase, the period in which she was working for a professor name Robert Leingod. There actually wasn't much information as to what they were researching about in that facility but for some reason, I had an inkling feeling that I would find an answer to my questions if I am able to learn more about those researches. Being one of the best programmer on the team and my knowledge on computers really came in handy when I tried to access the federation's classified data. By those possibly-illegal means, I managed to learn about most of the experiments that go on in that facility during my mother's employment...except for one. It was the forbidden experiment that Professor Leingod and his crew conducted, something that the only higher ranked federation members knew about, and I was itching to be able to learn more about it.

Unfortunately my little digging spree didn't go unnoticed by the captain and his partner Mirage and although they never asked me straight out, I could tell by some of the suspicious glances that Cliff sends me. They probably respect my privacy about the matter and decided to wait until I was ready to tell them all about it, I was grateful for that and I could've possibly keep these little secrets to myself forever, if not for the incident with the Federation ship 'Invisible'. After that incident, they were forced to question me about my mysterious powers and my little sessions spent going through secret federation data. Looking on the bright side, at least I was able to pinpoint my next research to be focused the data in Leingod Research Lab. That's when I learned about the origin of my power...our powers, his and mine, how I know that we were made for each other...that I wasn't alone.

Surprise as I was to learn about this newfound 'power', I was more surprise at what happened few months later, when Cliff decided to give me his position as captain of the ship. He told me that that he decided that it was time for him to let the new blood step in and after he noticed how much leadership potential I had in me in the time of crisis, he couldn't pick a more better person that he could trust to do a good job as he did. What happens after this announcement however, wasn't a surprise at all, it had always been a factor that a female leader's abilities were often looked down at by some close minded people, and I never expected that everyone would go along with this little change.

Sometimes later when I heard that the Leingods were going to take a vacation in Hyda IV, I immediately seized this opportunity to have the chance of finally meeting the famous Professor Leingod in person and of course...his son. There were so many questions that I wanted to ask them, but I never got the chance to. Thanks to those wretched Vendeens, my meeting with him was further more delayed. I decided to send Cliff and Mirage to retrieve him for me, to be truthful I wanted to go myself, but I knew that it wasn't possible, I still had some trouble with another mission, and I know that I could trust Cliff and Mirage to bring him back safely.

But Guess what? Just when I heard that Cliff had successfully found him on Vanguard III, Who could've shown up but the Vendeeni? Hurray for them, they couldn't have turned up at a better time, and I thought the Aldians were the most discombobulating...did they ever prove me wrong.

Elicoor II was where Marietta picked up the Eagle's distress signal, according to our information database, it was considered to be an undeveloped planet... I wished hopefully that Cliff, despite his brash plans and actions, would know better then to emergency land somewhere that won't draw too much attention and that Mirage would be able to keep them out of trouble. Judging from the Diplo's current position, it would probably take us awhile before we could reach the Elicoor system, even with our gravatic warp engine. After what has happened at Hyda IV and Vanguard III It would be wise not to alert the other organizations about Fayt's whereabouts, just in case that the Vendeeni where tracking him through us.

"Captain, we got a message from the Eagle. It's Mirage, would you like me to put her on screen?" Marietta asked, calling me back from my thoughts, I nodded curtly for her to go ahead.

"This is Eagle calling Diplo, do you read me?" I heard Mirage said as the screen turned on, the picture was a little frizzy, but I was still able to make out her face.

"We read you, this is Maria speaking, what's the current status report?"

"Captain, thank god, for a moment there, I thought that the communicator might not work. We were attacked along the way to the meeting point, we're currently on a planet in the Elicoor system."

"We learned as much, we're on our way to pick you up. What about Cliff and the Leingod boy? Are they with you at the moment?"

"We lost control and accidentally landed in a populated area, the local habitants came down to investigate out ship and well..."

"Go on." I said, sitting down in my seat, bracing myself for the worst that could happen.

"Cliff suggested that he and Fayt go out to negotiate with the habitants, he told me to contact you and sneak out at night, unfortunately he and Fayt were captured by the natives...I haven't heard from them since. I would go and rescue them, but Cliff instructed me not to. Would you like me to go?"

My heart almost skipped a beat when I heard the news, anything could be happening to Fayt at that moment! What the hell was that Klaus Ian thinking? It took me awhile to calm down and thinking straight, before I gave Mirage a suitable reply.

"No, don't. I don't know what he's thinking, but maybe he has a plan up his sleeves."

'Oh yes he'd better have, or I swear I'll strangle him myself should anything happen to Fayt'

Giving me a nod, the female Klausian logged off and I let out a sigh, silently hoping that nothing would happen to Fayt Leingod before we get there, but who knows...with a guide like Cliff by his side, it was unlikely that trouble wouldn't come knocking on his doors.

And that was one of the reason why, that as soon as The Diplo entered Elicoor's orbit (which took way longer then I expected), that I got on one of our smaller shuttles and quickly headed followed the signal from Mirage and Cliff's communicator and landed on Elicoor II, carefully concealing the small spacecraft, before I used the ship's transporter to travel towards my destination.

Satisfied that I was transported to the right place, I smiled inwardly before I made my presence known...

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A/N: I think that about sums this chapter up...I'll edit the last part as soon as I go back and reply to that point again. This chapter is mainly focused to wrap up everything at the beginning of the game from Maria's POV so that I could get into more Maria/Fayt action.

I'd also like to thank everyone who reviewed me; I nearly doubled over in joy when I receive my review alert -mails at school. :D

Event: I can't wait to read your fic! Thanks for being my first reviewer! glomps and yuppers...I think Maria is a bit ooc myself, but she's just that cold to a Sophia and a few more people in general (you can see from how she acts in this chapter). Her views on Sophia are how I imagined she felt from some of the gestures she made towards her (I swear to god that in one of the scenes, she really looks sickened by Sophia's words/action), and the reason I think Maria to be somewhat of a cold person from time to time was based on one of the Diplo's crew member said about her and how she acted in the flashback sequence. I figure that facing a traumatic thing as she did could probably do that to her personality.

taekmkm: As I've said...I haven't finished the game entirely yet, but my cousin has, and he got the Maria ending, which inspire me to write this fic along with giving me ideas for some other ones. I myself am looking forward to getting either the Albel ending or the Nel ending (although I have an inkling feeling that I might get solo) I also agree! SquareEnix should've given us more to learn about her character.

Tala1: LOL I just noticed that my fic was the first non-Albel one. XD It doesn't mean that I'm not planning on writing an Albel fic though! To tell you the truth, my favorite characters are Albel and Maria. I've written this fic because I was inspired by the Maria ending of the game, and because of that same ending, my brain was jumpstarted into composing an AU Albel/Maria fic (now dubbed "MaBel" in my head) which is waiting to be updated right now on my comp...I just need to double check a few things before I post.

Jonathan Priest: OMG you reviewed my fic! I never got a chance to E-mail you back and thank you for giving me your blessing on my Suikoden fic, and I'd also like to say that I'm dying to read the next chapter of yours! wishes you update soon

clears throat Back to the SO3 Topic...if not the fact that she has decent magic skills, I wouldn't have looked at her twice, both her face and her voice annoys me...almost as much as Farleene's. finds Albel's over quoting of maggots and fools funny though

I also agree with you that SquareEnix has the greatest taste in choosing pairings, they were probably high on something when they decided that Fayt and Sophia make a good pairing...thank god that they let us get alternate endings in the game. I have to say though that between Sophia and Rena, I'd choose Rena anyday, I adore Rena. thinks she and Dias make a better couple then the default one

You caught me; grammar-wise verb tenses are my weak point and bad thing is that it's the only thing that MSWord couldn't help me fix. So I have to try and ask my cousin to beta-read for me from time to time, and even that isn't helping me much.

Once again thank you all for your reviews and once again c/c is welcomed, as I really need them to help me improve my writing skills, so every comment counts!