FINAL FANTASY: POINT OF INTERSECTION
BOOK 1: THE APPROACHING STORM

CHAPTER 12


In the periphery of her vision, just on the edge of sight, Marticia glimpsed the flaming husk of what once had been the Dollet communications tower. The focus of her gaze, however, was rooted out the window on the port side of the bridge where she stood, her gunblade clasped in sweaty fingers. As the ship banked away from the ruins of the tower, the devastated city itself slid inevitably into view. Marticia told herself that Squall and the others must have exaggerated, that the death and destruction couldn't possibly be as bad as they had made it out to be.

She was wrong.

When the dead city finally came into sight below her, Marticia had to grab the nearby bulkhead to steady herself as the world suddenly seemed to tilt out from under her. Blood pounded in her temples as she squeezed her eyes tightly shut to block out the abomination lying blackened and lifeless just a few thousand feet beneath her. Once, it had been a bustling, thriving metropolis, an affluent port city benefiting from trade with both Galbadia and Balamb, but now only death walked its empty, silent streets.

Marticia slowly opened her eyes again, willing the unthinkable, horrific images away, but grim reality stubbornly refused to yield. Even from up here, the carnage was more than evident. Shattered glass lay everywhere like sparkling shards of crystal, and the broken windows and storefronts from whence they had come gaped open like mouths whose teeth had been brutally smashed apart. Rows of modest brick buildings, many now blackened and scorched, stood mutely like concrete gravestones over the masses of bodies that choked the cobblestone streets, and here and there a few fires burned and sent puffs of billowing smoke wafting up into the afternoon sky.

Doors had been torn down and trampled upon, and from what Marticia could see, many of the dead must have been frantically scrambling over each other to try and escape whatever had slaughtered them during the night. Drying blood was everywhere, pooled in the streets and sidewalks, spattered across and beneath the mangled bodies, and smeared across the walls and streetlamps and signs. Vultures circled over the city streets, some coming down to gorge themselves on the bloated corpses lying untended in the roads.

Marticia's stomach did a queasy turn, and suddenly she couldn't stand it any longer. Whirling away from the terrible sight of her ravaged hometown, she choked and ran to the turbolift.

Slamming the release button, she slumped against the back wall as the lift descended into the ship's midsection. The mechanical humming of the vessel was somehow reassuring, a stable and unchanging drone that helped to counter the sudden, unsteady hammering of her heart against her ribs.

The lift deposited her into the ship's midsection, and from there she made her way unsteadily to the forward observation deck. Stumbling about halfway down the center aisle between the double rows of cushioned seats, Marticia brushed past one of the chairs on the port side and gazed numbly out the plate glass window as the smoldering remains of her hometown passed by underneath her like a stream of faded memories slipping away beyond any hope of recall.

Faces sprang up within Marticia's mind, friends and family she would never see again in this living world. Her mother, with her ebony tresses and dark, often worried eyes, had never fully accepted Marticia's training to be a SeeD, fraught with danger as such a career often was. The young woman thought sadly of her father and the sparring sessions they used to share, using wooden swords instead of real gunblades as he had taught her how and when to fight. The mischievous smile that had constantly seemed to play across her younger brother's lips would never show itself again, nor would his clear hazel eyes dance with mirth like they once did.

Marticia banged the heel of her fist against the window in frustration, her blue irises wet with unshed tears. She tried to blink them away, but a few escaped to roll unnoticed down her cheeks as she continued to gaze at the ruins sliding away so quickly beneath her, seeming to take with them into the shadows everyone she had ever loved or cared for. Her fist clenched tightly, a cold knot of anger and grief forming within her gut almost like a physical weight.

The ruins of Dollet slipped mercifully out of sight as the Ragnarok sped out over the ocean, and soon only the endless blue waters of the sea filled Marticia's vision as she continued to gaze out the portside window. Late afternoon sunlight glinted across the tops of the waves like thousands of shimmering mirrors glittering with the reflection of the slowly darkening sky, yet the young woman could not see it. In her mind she saw still the shattered remnants of a life that had been cruelly taken from her.

A mechanical hiss roused Marticia from her thoughts, and she glanced wearily up to see Squall make his way slowly onto the observation deck. At first, he didn't seem to be aware of her, apparently as absorbed in his own thoughts as she had been in hers. She straightened, however, and hurriedly wiped her cheeks to brush away any stray tears. Her cheeks flushed a little in embarrassment as the young commander at last met her gaze. That she had broken down and cried was bad enough, but to have him of all people find her here in such a vulnerable state was even worse.

"Sir, um, was… was there something you needed?" she asked hesitantly.

He shook his head. "Sorry, I didn't think anyone was here. I'll go somewhere else."

"No, wait… you don't have to go," Marticia straightened and tried to reform the hardened shell she always wore around her emotions, the mental toughness that had seen her through so many troubles over the years. The feel of her gunblade hanging from her hip calmed her somewhat. "I don't mind if you stay. After all, we never did get the chance to finish my debriefing."

"Fine. Tell me about Rinoa. What happened to her? Where is she?"

Marticia sighed wearily and sat in a nearby chair to collect her thoughts. She resisted the urge to look out the window again, willed herself to remember the tumultuous events of the previous evening. What had been planned as a surprise night raid had failed utterly. Field exams weren't supposed to be like this, she thought. Dangerous, yes, but nothing a trained SeeD or a good candidate couldn't handle. Yet last night, it had all gone so very wrong, from the moment her squad and Rinoa's had first entered that damned communications tower.

"I'll try and tell you what I can, Squall," Marticia replied softly, "but I should probably start at the beginning and go from there…"

Squall nodded, easing himself tiredly into a chair across the aisle. "Go on."

"Everything went according to plan up until we got inside the tower. The town was quiet, like it always is at night—Dollet's big, but not really a nightlife kind of place like Deling City. Anyway, we only encountered a few Galbadians on the way, no more than we had expected…"

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Marticia leaped out of the aft section of the gunship and onto the shore, her boots thudding in the sand as she jogged across the beach. She could have easily found her way from here to the tower blindfold, so well did she know her hometown, and confidently she led her two companions toward the concrete stairs that rose up to the street level of the nearby city. Lights glowed softly in some of the buildings, though many others were dark as the inhabitants had already turned in for the night at this late hour.

Six Rapier-class SeeD gunships had been dispatched to Dollet, and Marticia had made adamantly sure that she was assigned to the team. Dollet was her home, and to see it overrun by Galbadians once again filled her with disgust and outrage. She fingered her expertly crafted crimson gunblade as she ran, the sweeping curves of the deadly weapon shimmering like blood in the wan starlight.

A fitting image, she thought, considering that it would soon spill the blood of her enemies.

Stealthily flitting up the stairs, Marticia glanced guardedly both ways down the cobblestone street as it turned the corner where the steps rose up from the beach to meet it. The road was empty in both directions, and while it was not uncommon for the streets to be fairly quiet this late at night, there were almost always a few people ambling by themselves along the sidewalks, lovers strolling together or perhaps a drunk stumbling his way into some dark alley. Marticia sighed uneasily, and though she figured the emptiness was probably due to the occupation, her disquiet lingered nevertheless.

None of the Galbadian forces had as yet detected the gunships, she knew, since the vessels had been configured for silent running. With luck, she and the rest of her team would be able to secure the tower with little fighting, and from there taking the town wouldn't be much harder. Galbadian troops were notoriously inept, so Marticia expected the operation to experience little difficulty.

Her squad and the Heartilly girl's candidate squad were the only Garden forces that would attack the tower directly. Xu and the rest of the team were to provide support and backup as necessary, pinning down the Galbadian troops within the town while Marticia and Rinoa led their respective squads into the tower to capture it from their enemies.

To further ensure the mission's success, the two squads would approach the tower separately so the Galbadians would have little chance of anticipating the attack. The two squads had arrived on shore in separate gunships, one after the other, and so Rinoa and her two fellow candidates were probably halfway to the tower by now. They wouldn't enter, however, until Marticia's squad had arrived, and would instead secure the perimeter around the facility.

With luck, the Galbadians would never know what hit them.

Marticia hurried over to the cover of a nearby alley and motioned for her fellow SeeDs to follow her. Layna Irons, a fiery redhead with a temper to match, quickly joined her, the young woman's footfalls making almost no noise on the deserted cobblestone road. A year ago, she and Marticia had graduated into SeeD together, and they had often been assigned to work side by side on the same missions. Though opposite in many ways—Layna was often boisterous and never hesitated to voice her honest opinion, while Marticia strove to remain cool, calm, and in control at all times—they had formed an unlikely yet surprisingly strong friendship.

Following almost on Layna's heels was Elias Yulmir, Marticia's other squad mate. The sandy-haired youth had become a SeeD only a few months ago, and while his gunnery skills were nearly on par with those of Irvine Kinneas, Elias had developed a reputation for rushing into things without thinking first. Such behavior had gotten him into trouble before, thus his assignment with the always by-the-book Marticia as squad leader. Squall and the headmaster hoped that her disciplined approach to duty would rub off on him and that she would keep him more or less in line.

"Think we'll meet any resistance from the radicals?" Elias whispered eagerly.

Marticia shrugged. "Most likely. I don't want to go looking for them, though. Remember, this is a sneak attack, and we're to engage in as few battles as possible en route to the tower, understood?"

"Yeah, yeah, I know. So let's get moving already."

"Oh, and Elias?" Marticia added, "Don't go firing off that rifle of yours unless you have to. You know how loud that thing is, and a gunshot would give away our position to anyone nearby. Just let me and Layna handle any troops we come across until we get to the tower."

The eager young SeeD sighed. "But what if—"

"Hey, Eli, just stow it, alright?" Layna snapped tersely, every so often glancing furtively around the corner of the alley "You heard what Marty just said. Don't blow our goddamn cover just 'cause you're feeling a little trigger-happy, got it?"

"I just want to see a little action, that's all. I didn't become a SeeD to go sneaking around in the dark all the time, Layna."

Marticia glared dangerously at him, her blue eyes cold, before the other woman could reply. "You'll follow the orders I gave you, mister, or I'll report you to Xu and the commander as soon as we get back to Garden. Do I make myself clear?"

"Yes, ma'am," Elias replied glumly, muttering to himself under his breath.

"Then let's go. We don't have much time, and I don't want to keep Rinoa's squad waiting any longer than absolutely necessary."

Marticia stealthily led her two companions onward through the side streets and darkened alleys of the city. The three SeeDs said nothing, and around them all was quiet save for the distant sounds of battle just on the edge of hearing. Xu and the rest of the exam team must have engaged the main contingent of Galbadian troops on the far side of town by now, drawing the radicals' attention away from Marticia and her squad as they advanced unheard and unseen towards the darkened bulk of the communications tower just northwest of the city.

They encountered Galbadian patrols only twice, and both times Marticia and Layna quickly silenced them with blade and fist before they could sound an alarm. Elias quietly dragged the bodies out of sight, and the small group moved on without so much as a single word spoken between them. Before long, they had reached the winding path that climbed up the side of the cliff to where their destination lay. Marticia craned her neck to look at the imposing structure for a moment, then sighed grimly and started up the path, the others following in her wake.

Her unease, temporarily dispelled by the urgency of reaching the tower, filled her mind now as she thought of what had transpired so far. Everything seemed to be going as planned, but Marticia couldn't shake the sense of wrongness that gripped her, the subtle tug in her mind that insisted something was amiss. Perhaps it had to do with her GF's recent silence. Fenrir, a noble wolflike creature when summoned into the material plane, had been her guide and inner companion for as long as she could remember, but in the last few days he had gone mysteriously silent.

Half an hour later, Marticia and her squad were crouching behind some shrubbery that grew along the edge of the bluff overlooking the base of the tower, when there came a soft rustle of movement behind them. The female SeeD spun around, hand on her weapon, but let out a relieved breath when she saw it was only Rinoa and her candidate squad. The young sorceress, dressed like her companions in a standard SeeD candidate uniform and black leather boots, smiled reassuringly as she and her two companions stepped quietly out from behind a bend in the cliff face rising up overhead behind their backs.

"Sorry we startled you," Rinoa whispered, idly brushing a few strands of dark hair from her face. "Did you guys have any trouble on the way here?"

Marticia shook her head. "Nothing we couldn't handle. You?"

"The same. We bumped into a patrol or two but took them out before they could cause a ruckus."

"Is the perimeter secured?" the female SeeD asked.

Rinoa adjusted the curved blade mounted to her right wrist and nodded. "Yeah, it's all taken care of. There were guards here earlier, but we got rid of them."

"Alright, then," Marticia ordered briskly, "let's get this over with."

Within minutes the small group stood silently before the closed doors of the tower. Oddly enough, the facility looked to have been recently shut down, though Marticia couldn't quite figure out why. None of the small exterior lights emitted the customary pale glow that could normally be seen for miles in all directions, and the satellite assembly had been withdrawn into the bowels of the tower. The brooding structure loomed ominously before them, a slumbering behemoth in the night. A shiver passed through Marticia's body, and suddenly she felt very small. Her unease grew deeper.

Layna checked the lock panel next to the entry doors. "Looks like the emergency power's still on. Want me to get us inside?"

"Go ahead," Marticia nodded, "but be careful. Something doesn't feel right…"

"I will, Marty. I feel it too. Damn jitters…"

The red-haired SeeD punched in a series of digits, and moments later the doors slid open with a mechanized hiss. Marticia gripped her gunblade firmly, her index finger resting lightly on the trigger, as she inched her way toward the dark opening. Beside her, Rinoa cautiously brought up her arm and took careful aim with her blaster edge. The only illumination inside the tower came from the dim reddish glow of the emergency lights, giving what Marticia could see of the chamber a faint crimson hue amidst patches of impenetrable, murky shadows.

She and the others crept slowly inside, weapons ready, but oddly enough, Marticia could see no Galbadians. The hairs on the back of her neck rose as her fighter's instincts suddenly flared up inside her. Something was definitely wrong here, very wrong. She gripped her weapon a little tighter as she made her way toward the main lift that dominated the small entry chamber.

No sooner had she begun moving than all hell seemed to break loose.

A flurry of dark forms suddenly swarmed around them from out of the shadows, and before Marticia could bring her gunblade to bear on the mysterious creatures, she felt strong, rough hands grabbing her from several places at once. She fought like a woman gone made, writhing in her assailants' iron grip, and managed to pull the trigger of her gunblade.

The small explosion seemed to shatter her eardrums, tearing apart the stillness and the torso of one of her attackers. A quick glance nearby showed the rest of her companions in similar situations, and as she looked at her enemies she realized suddenly that they were men, Galbadians, but with uniforms that were utterly black, even their trademark domed helmets. No wonder Marticia and the rest of her companions hadn't seen them at first.

Wasting no time, she immediately grabbed her comlink from her pocket. "Xu, do you read? This is Marticia Gailey, of SeeD squad Beta Five! It's an ambush! I repeat, it's a trap! The Galbadians were waiting for us! We're inside the tower, but—"

A heavy weight suddenly smashed into the back of Marticia's skull, and she tumbled limply to the ground. Her comlink flew from her hand and was crushed with a loud snapping of metal and wiring beneath the booted foot of one of her attackers. The clash of metal on metal and explosions of gunfire filled her ears, and as she looked around she saw that her friends were sorely outnumbered. There must have been at least three dozen of those mysteriously garbed Galbadian troops, and unlike their less imposing counterparts, these men fought with skill and precision.

Marticia tried to rise, but the strength seemed to have left her muscles, and she could only watch helplessly as her friends were overcome one by one. The Galbadians didn't kill them, oddly enough, but instead sent them sprawling unconscious to the ground. In desperation, Marticia reached within herself to try and call forth Fenrir, but her GF would not respond, nor would any of the magic his power normally allowed her to wield. She felt something, like a wall in her mind or in her blood or both, keeping her from her longtime companion.

No wonder she and her friends had been overcome so easily, she thought. Without the power of the GF's, they were helpless.

The last of her companions that remained standing was Rinoa, who held her enemies at bay for the time being with a combination of her deadly blaster edge and her sorceress magic, which seemed to have been unaffected by whatever was interfering with Marticia's own GF and those of her friends. The young sorceress lanced out with forked streaks of lightning and searing gouts of orange flame. The troops fell back, repelled again and again by her magical assaults. Marticia could have sworn she saw a translucent pair of feathered wings sprouting from the other woman's back for a moment.

Suddenly Rinoa seemed to stiffen, and the aura of power around her began to fade. She rose into the air, but seemingly not of her own will, as she visibly struggled against whatever was holding her. The unseen force hurled her against the wall, and she cried out in pain as she slammed into it. She was spun around, pulled back toward the center of the room, and was thrown at the wall yet again. Once more the cycle was repeated, until after the last impact Rinoa slumped weakly to the floor as whatever had held her released its powerful grip. The wounded girl's eyes fluttered and slid closed.

Marticia reached with what little strength remained to her toward her gunblade, but froze as a chill breeze suddenly swept through the small chamber. The troops shuffled nervously, and the young woman's blood seemed to turn to ice within her veins. She lay still so as to not draw attention to herself, but let her eyes wander around the room even as her heart thudded loudly within her breast.

Her gaze settled onto a patch of darkness in a far corner, and it was from there that the bitter cold seemed to emanate. She felt, rather than saw, a presence with those shadows where the reddish glow of the emergency lighting could not reach. As her eyes adjusted to the gloom, she was just able to discern the faint outline of a robed, hooded figure gazing coldly back at her with feral, steely eyes. Suddenly she wondered whether this man, if man it was, knew that she was feigning unconsciousness. A shiver ran up her spine, and she had to look away.

Moments later, however, she found herself gazing into that dark corner once again as the mysterious figure slowly emerged from its concealment. An eerie stillness settled about the room, a cold silence broken only by the quiet, measured footfalls of the cloaked being's booted feet and the soft swishing of its ebony robes. Pale, white hands emerged from the sleeves, one grasping a shimmering circle of beaten gold no more than a few inches in diameter.

Kneeling next to Rinoa's fallen form, the man opened the golden device and then snapped it shut around the unconscious woman's slender wrist. Taking her in his arms, he slowly made his way to the middle of the chamber where several of the black-clad troops waited, apparently the leaders of this strange contingent. Marticia strained her ears to hear what was said.

The robed man spoke first, his voice a chill, crisply accented whisper that sent a shudder through Marticia's body. "Bring the others. The rest of you will remain here."

"Yes, sir," the Galbadian commander nodded, "What are you going to do with them?"

"That does not concern you. Now do as I have said."

One of the other troops picked up Marticia's crimson gunblade. She would have slugged him if she'd had the strength. "What about their weapons?"

"They will be of no use to them, so it matters not if they keep them," the cloaked figure answered softly. "Take them to the assembly chamber with their owners."

The commander saluted, and while four other men went to pick up the rest of her companions and their weapons, Marticia felt herself slung over the Galbadian commander's shoulder like little more than a bag of potatoes and carried through a small door on the far side of the chamber. Her skull filled with blood as she hung upside down, and only her refusal to give in kept her from losing her tentative grip on consciousness. Her long ponytail of dark hair hung in front of her face, but she was able to make out the trooper behind her, carrying Elias in the same way.

It seemed like hours before they finally got to the cavernous assembly chamber. Marticia winced as she was tossed idly onto the hard concrete floor, her shoulder smacking painfully against the unyielding surface. Her gunblade landed with a clatter nearby, and she gazed at it longingly for a moment before the hooded and cloaked figure crossed her line of sight to inspect the deactivated satellite array.

Suddenly he turned to the Galbadian commander and the four troops who had accompanied him down here as they moved to exit the chamber. "Do not be in such a hurry to leave, commander. I have one final task for you and your men to perform."

"What's that?" the other man asked dubiously.

Shifting his grip on Rinoa's body, the robed figure raised his arm. "You can die."

As Marticia watched in horror, gaping pits of blackness opened up beneath the feet of the doomed men. Withered, inhuman arms reached up and tore at them with curved talons, dragging them into the pits amidst their helpless screams. And through it all, the robed figure watched impassively, his eyes glittering coldly from within the depths of his hood. Moments later, it was over. The pits were gone, and the unfortunate Galbadians with them. Marticia had no doubt that the men who had remained in the entry chamber had suffered the same fate.

Shifting his gaze, the cloaked figure slowly stretched out his hand, and a line of purplish fire shot out from his fingertips. The flames slammed into the massive bulk of the communications tower's primary and secondary power generators, scorching them beyond repair until billowing clouds of smoke wafted up from the decimated machinery. As the robed man at last brought his arm down, the violet flames flickered fitfully and went out.

Marticia shivered, hardly able to believe what she had just seen. She started to reach for her gunblade, even though she knew it would make little difference against this hellish figure, but then froze as his gaze seemed to pass over her for a moment. Her heart seemed to stop, and what little resolve she possessed crumbled away under the scrutiny of that pitiless stare. She didn't move, didn't even dare to breathe until the man had looked away.

The door to the chamber slammed shut with a loud bang that reverberated within Marticia's ears, and a clearly audible click from the other side signaled the activation of the lock mechanism. The female SeeD realized with a shudder that she and her friends were trapped down here, at the mercy of the cold-hearted killer who had brought them here.

The mysterious figure raised his arm again, and to Marticia's utter disbelief, the air in front of him suddenly seemed to ripple like water. The robed man held Rinoa's unconscious form firmly with both hands and stepped carefully and deliberately through the mysterious undulating rupture, and all Marticia could do was watch helplessly as the distortion faded behind them, the air returning to normal as though it had never been otherwise.

Finally, the wounded SeeD could keep the fatigue away no longer. Her eyelids grew heavy, and her head seemed to be an intolerable weight upon her shoulders. Tired of fighting, sick of the insanity that had happened all around her when she was helpless to stop it, she let the darkness claim her at last. Her eyes closed, and awareness fled soon after.