The crowd around Squall's bed shifted awkwardly for a moment, not knowing quite what to do. They were saved from figuring it out, though, by the piercing shrill of the alarm.
A voice shortly came on the intercom—the pilot, "Highly magical object coming toward the Garden at high speeds! Headmaster Cid's presence is requested immediately. All personal report to battle stations."
The effect this had on the room was galvanizing. Cid, Xu, and Zell quickly filed out of the room to go to where they were needed. Rinoa jumped off Squall, looking briefly ashamed of her outburst.
Damn, thought Squall. I'm finally about to get some answers to all of these questions and suddenly we've got Julie on our tails. Okay, I've got to figure out what's going on here.
"Quistis, could you quickly bring me up to speed on what's going on?"
Quistis looked unsure, "I don't really understand it all myself, but I'll give it my best shot. As near as I can tell… well, after Rinoa left… ah, I can't start there…"
It was one of the first times Squall had ever seen Quistis out of her usual business-like self. "Quistis, there's no time to hedge. What kind of danger are we talking about here?"
"Julie has all of Rinoa's powers."
Squall blanched, turning to look at Rinoa. She was no longer in the room.
Cid finally made it to the lookout station at the top of the Garden. When he arrived the pilot stepped aside to allow him control of the front panel.
The pilot had been right. There was someone of a high magical caliber headed straight towards the Garden. The estimated time to her being in magical range was counting down on the front panel. Cid swallowed and turned to the pilot.
"Set a course away from the sorceress. Full speed. Initiate—" the headmaster stumbled on his words. Finally he let his head sag. "Initiate evacuation procedures."
If what Rinoa said was true, then there was no way that the Garden could stand up to Julie. There was simply no force in the world that could hold its own against her.
I can't believe that! Thought Cid. There has to be a way to beat her… Cid stumbled a bit at the Garden's sudden acceleration. Today isn't the day to make that stand.
He shook his head as if clearing cobwebs and looked again at the timer until Julie would be able to hit them with her powers. Two minutes.
The Garden was in a state of very controlled chaos. Everyone was making their way to the emergency exits, running as fast as they could, yet their Seed training made the operation much more organized. They were forming lines and it was eerily silent, except for the annoying screeching of the alarm.
Squall was not making his way towards any of the exits. He was trying to find Rinoa. He hadn't seen her in four months and damn it all if he was going to just lose her in these crowds. Eventually as the Garden began to clear out, he decided that she must have already left.
Little did he know, that moment that he'd seen her in the infirmary would be the last time he would see her in a long time.
One minute, thirty seconds.
Julie began to gather together some of her magic force. Raw magical energy was difficult to harness. She'd realized when she'd tried to destroy an oil-ship that she flew over. The regular Ultima spell was easy to pull off—almost laughably easy—but it barely made a dent in the huge metal ship. She'd stopped momentarily to destroy it, and it had taken quite a while to gather the necessary energy.
I suppose I'll just have to design more powerful spells. Then I'll be able to more easily cast them. Hell, I might be able to make a draw point and have my hired help cast the powerful spells. I wonder if there are limits to this?
And so she found herself pulling up energy. It was going to take a lot of force to destroy the entire Garden in one blow. But then, if something was worth doing, it was worth doing right.
One minute.
Rinoa had barely managed to avoid cid as she climbed up to the top of the Garden lookout. He had been on his way down the elevator to evacuate. She'd just barely dove behind a nearby plant to hid herself. Finally, he was gone and she made her way up to the top. Walking over to the panel next to the headmaster's desk she entered a code. A long time ago she and the headmaster had talked about this possibility. They knew that the Garden might face missiles from Galbadia or something like that that it couldn't run from.
Rinoa had developed a shielding spell that would hold the Garden together. She had been the only one strong enough to use it, and they didn't want it stolen, so they'd hidden it in the panel by his desk. Cid had calculated by the energy in the spell that if anyone who didn't have her powers used the spell, they would probably kill themselves, or at least hurt themselves, but it would reflect an enormous amount of energy back on the source of the attack.
Even if I die… I'll save everyone from my mistake. I just hope... my baby…
Rinoa steeled herself to do what she knew she had to do, and took the final elevator to the upper platform.
Thirty seconds.
Squall, Cid, and Xu sped across the countryside in one of the cars that Balamb Garden for some reason still had. Everyone that could be was loaded up and was now getting away from the Garden as fast as possible. They knew that with Julie's powers, it was most likely that the Garden would not survive this.
Squall was left with a bad feeling, though. Of course I've got a bad feeling! The place I've called home for years is about to be destroyed! Nonetheless, he couldn't shake the feeling. He pulled out some binoculars and looked back at the Garden, scanning it up and down.
Wait? What was that at the top?
Zero seconds.