The silent expanse of space suddenly shattered into bright light as the sleek fighter shot out of hyperspace, its s-foils closed in the dormant cruise configuration. The Incom T-65 X-wing rolled up on its starboard s-foil, angling toward Spira's gravity well. Beyond the curve of the planet, in orbit between it and Spira's large moon, hung the Super Star Destroyer Executor.

Inside the cockpit, the pilot felt his blood run cold. Vader's personal flagship. This is not going to be an easy mission. He reached over his left shoulder and flipped a switch, feeling the gentle thrum through the fighter as the s-foils locked into their distinctive position that gave the X-wing its name. Then again, I never did put my faith in the trust of an easy mission.

He reached forward with his left hand and activated the miniature hypercomm system that had been installed on the X-wing, costing more than the X-wing itself had. "This is Arren Vale calling Rebel Command. I've entered the Spiran system and am making my approach to the planet now. I've located the Super Star Destroyer Executor in orbit around the planet. It doesn't seem to be affected by the gravitic anomalies around Spira."

As he spoke, a heavy shudder ran through his X-wing, as though caught in a tractor beam, and his speed increased slightly. Instinctively, he tugged back on the stick, but the X-wing's nose only rose slightly. He fought down the panic, clenching his hand tightly on the control stick. Spira's distorted gravity well would draw him down to its surface whether he liked it or not. He had known, going into this mission, that he would not be going home, one way or another.

Shaking off his anxiety, he continued transmitting. "I've just been taken in by the gravitational forces. I expect to be making a landing in a few minutes."

With that, he switched off the hypercomm system and brought up the X-wing's shields. Without the option of reducing his speed, Spira's atmosphere would disintegrate his snubfighter with its shields down. And he'd also get some minor defense against whatever anti-air batteries that the Empire had constructed since they'd taken over.

The world of Spira grew in his forward viewports until it blocked out the rest of the universe. He brought his nose up the best he could, angling most of the ship's shield power toward its ventral side, the side that would take the brunt of the atmosphere.

As the heat of the atmosphere started to spark fire off his forward shields, he looked out the viewport at the world below him. He could see no signs of technology from his position high in the atmosphere. The entire world looked clean and peaceful. He slowly shook his head.

Shame that the Empire had to come and ruin it.

He angled his X-wing down toward the vast plains near the northern mountains, glancing as he did so at a data readout given to him at the start of the mission. The Calm Lands. That was the name of those plains he was heading toward. He'd have to find out why they were called that once he was on-planet. After all, he would be living out the rest of his days on that planet, assuming that he even survived the rebellion he was going to provoke.

A muffled bang reached him as his X-wing rocked violently, and alert sirens began blaring in the cockpit. Swearing, he silenced them with the press of a button and looked over the diagnostics display.

"Damn. Lost acceleration control. This isn't going to be a pretty landing."

He began feeding power into the repulsorlifts and test-firing his braking thrusters, making sure they still worked properly. They did, so he angled his X-wing toward the cliff beyond the Calm Lands, trying to get as much time to bleed off speed as he possibly could.

The atmosphere was behind him now; the flames burning on his ship's shields long since gone. He fired his braking thrusters at full power, only to hear another bang and have more red appear on his diagnostics display. He spared them a glance; he had blown out his braking thrusters.

"This is going to be a very bad landing…"

---

Nooj looked up toward the sky as a second sonic boom echoed over the Calm Lands. He had made his way toward the entrance of the chocobo ranch as soon as he had heard the first one, wondering if the Empire had finally resorted to bombing the Calm Lands in an attempt to spook him out of hiding.

He raised an eyebrow at what he saw up in the sky. Or maybe someone else has been on the receiving end of the Empire's tender care?

About a thousand feet above the ground, he saw a strange craft with split wings flying haphazardly over the Calm Lands, its entire aft end in flames. The vehicle's aft end slewed to the right, and he could see that the four wings, two on each side of the craft, made the distinctive pattern of an X.

As he watched, the craft bounced skyward as it reached the edge of the cliff, another explosion blossomed off of its underside, and then it disappeared over the lip of the cliff on the western edge of the Calm Lands. Moments later, a loud crash reached his ears, indicating that the craft had 'landed.'

Turning around, he stiff-legged his way back inside and into the first alcove, where Clasko's living area was located. The former Chocobo Knight looked up as Nooj entered.

"What was that sound?" he asked. "Sounded like something crashing."

Nooj nodded slowly. "Something did crash. I'm going to take a chocobo and investigate. Okay?"

Clasko nodded and motioned toward the chocobo corrals, where the tweeting and preening of the chocobos could be heard. "Go ahead. Take any one you like."

Nodding, Nooj left his cane against the wall of the alcove and limped lightly toward the corrals.

---

Consciousness returned slowly and painfully to Arren. He found himself lying in short grass at the edge of a cliff, staring out over a vast valley. Somewhere down in that valley, something was on fire; he could see a thick black plume of smoke rising up from below.

Where was he? He painfully rolled over onto his back, and saw that he was wearing his orange flight suit. Well, it was a start. He had been flying. Had been? Where was his X-wing?

As he looked out toward the mountains on his left side, he recalled his current mission. Ah yes, that's right. He was in the Calm Lands. And that plume of smoke was probably his X-wing.

He pushed himself into a kneeling position, then tried to stand. His right leg stubbornly refused to support his weight. Flopping back onto the grass, he looked at his leg. It didn't look broken. Probably just twisted in the fall.

Laying back against a rock, he closed his eyes as those last few frantic moments in the cockpit came back to him. Seeing that he was dangerously close to scraping his keel on the edge of the cliff, he'd activated his repulsorlifts at full power to bounce him a few meters up into the air. That had succeeded, but the repulsorlift generator had exploded seconds later and he knew that he would not be able to bring the craft down survivably.

So he had done the only thing he could have. He'd yanked the boxy hypercomm system out of his communications console, yanked the ejection lever, and kept as tight a grip on that box as he possibly could.

Sitting up, he looked around for the hypercomm. He spotted it in the grass a few feet away and crawled over to it. Aside from a dented corner where it had presumably landed, and some scorching on one side where he'd ripped it from the consoles, it was unharmed. He checked the emergency antenna built into it, saw that it was unharmed, and nodded slowly.

A second later, he heard a small 'wark' sound and turned in the direction it came from. Approaching from a short distance was a large yellow bird with a man riding on its back. The man held an odd-looking gun in his hand, pointed straight at Arren. He thought about going for his blaster pistol, decided better of it, and simply raised his hands meekly.

The mounted man pulled his bird to a stop right beside Arren, the weapon not swaying from its target. "Are you with the Empire?" the man asked, simply.

Blinking slowly, Arren shook his head, then realized that this man was a local, and probably had not even seen TIE fighter pilots, much less Rebel pilots. "No. Are you?"

The man shook his head and lowered the weapon. "I am Nooj. Meyvn of the Youth League."

Arren blinked, the name slightly familiar to him. Dropping his hands, he reached into one of the pockets on his flight suit and pulled out a datapad, calling up all the information he had been given about Spira. He nodded after reading the entry about the Youth League.

"Good," Arren said. "You're one of the ones I'm supposed to contact."

Nooj looked skeptical. "'Supposed to contact?' Who are you, and who are you with? Spira has seen enough offworlders, in my opinion."

"My name is Arren Vale. I'm a pilot for the Rebel Alliance. We are the enemies of the Empire that has taken over your planet. My mission is to organize and arm a rebellion on Spira to overthrow the Empire."

Nooj's expression didn't change. "We stand no chance against them. Their armor repels all our small-arms weapons, and theirs burn through our armor as though it wasn't there."

Arren looked down at his datapad again, scrolling to his mission parameters. "There are supposed to be crashed Republic ships on this planet. They should have the weapons we need to fight the Empire."

"Even if that were true, we couldn't organize. Bevelle has been taken completely over by the Empire. The Djose temple is no more, and Besaid is under martial law. There is no way we could contact the leaders and political figures of Spira in order to organize this resistance."

Arren sighed and looked down at the ground. It was looking more and more that he wouldn't be living his life out on Spira. He'd end up dead at the hands of the Empire.

As if seeming to sense his thoughts, Nooj offered a hand down to Arren. "Come on, we need to get you into a hiding place. The Empire will be all over the Calm Lands before long."

Once again, Arren tried to stand, but slipped back toward the ground. Before he could hit it, however, Nooj's mount stooped and the man caught him by the fabric of his flight suit collar. "Are you injured?" he asked simply.

"I think I twisted my leg when I landed," Arren replied, nodding. He turned and nodded toward the hypercomm box. "I need to take that with me."

Not bothering to ask what it was, Nooj pulled Arren up behind him on his mount, then guided it over to the hypercomm and once more had the bird stoop down, allowing Nooj to scoop the box off the ground and hand it to him.

Nodding his thanks, Arren wedged the box between Nooj and himself, then grabbed onto Nooj so he wouldn't be thrown from where he sat. Once he was secure, he nodded to Nooj, who clicked his teeth at his mount and sent it racing off toward the mountains.

For a long while, neither of them spoke. Arren took the time to look at the flat plains around him, seeing off in the distance a tent that had people wandering around it, and scattered around this section of the plains, large numbers of rock formations jutting up from the ground. He was about to ask about them when Nooj spoke up first.

"So just who is it that you're supposed to be meeting with? Aside from myself, of course."

Arren didn't need to look at his datapad; he'd already committed the names to memory. "The leaders of the Youth League, New Yevon, and the Machine Faction. That would be you, Baralai, and Gippal, if our information is correct. More importantly than them, however, is that I'm supposed to deliver a holorecording to a Yuna."

Nooj's face was turned away from Arren, but the Rebel pilot sensed a tightening of his voice. "What is it that the Rebel Alliance wants with Lady Yuna?"

So this Yuna is a woman. It sounded like a woman's name, sure, but now I know it. What does the Rebellion want with her?

He shook his head. "I don't know. I was under strict orders not to view the recording."

"I see," Nooj said, after a few moments. "I wish you luck in that endeavor. Nothing enters or leaves Besaid, where she lives, without the Empire knowing about it."

"Well, there will be shortly," Arren answered.

Nooj didn't respond, instead continuing to guide the bird through a mountain pass, across a bridge, and then down a pathway into a gorge. Ahead of them, Arren saw a large hole leading directly into the ground. Nooj pulled his mount to a halt in front of it, then climbed off. Helping Arren down, he allowed the Rebel to lean against him.

"What is this place?" Arren asked.

"This is the Cavern of the Stolen Fayth," Nooj replied, not understanding that Arren had no clue what a fayth was. "There are many fiends inside. We will have to be careful, but I think it will be some time before the Empire discovers this place. It is safe for now."

Arren looked dubious at the mention of fiends, having some idea that he meant monsters, but realized that he did need a place to hide from the Empire's stormtroopers. Putting on a game smile, he motioned toward the entrance of the cavern. "Well, let's go, and discuss our plans of a rebellion."

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A/N: Yeah, this was a pretty boring chapter, but you have to introduce your Rebel somewhere. It can't be Star Wars with just the Empire and no Rebels, after all. Thanks to Nick Fall for the information about the hypercomm system, and for suffering through my endless questions. By the way; Star Wars, Final Fantasy, and all its affiliates are copyright their respective owners. The only thing that belongs to me is the character Arren Vale.

And now, shout-out time.

Raven: Sorry dude, but like I said, this chapter is kinda drab.

Rik: I'm really gonna try to finish this one. I have a lot of plot ideas and sneaky tricks up my sleeve that I'd be really disappointed if I didn't get to pull.

Master and Chief: Well, not going to use Doom3 weapons, since I've never played any Doom game, and they're not gonna find their toys on Bikanel Island. I think our Rebel friend Arren revealed where their munitions are going to come from. You did kind of inspire that idea, though. I was really scrounging for some way to arm them with blasters, and your idea helped.

Wolfy16: Hey, I've gotten up to chapter four with no signs of slowing down. That's a new record!

Morgaine of the Fairies: Worry not, you shall see more of Tidus in the next chapter. Plots will be revealed, tempers will flare, people will almost get blasted! :o