My darker half

'This isn't going so bad...' Cho controlled the vehicle as steadily as he could mange, he settled with the fact that he was able to see most of the road. He took a small sense of pride in the fact that he was getting taller and settled with his field of vision partially obstructed by the dashboard and the hood of the care. Most was better then none right?

If he only knew most of the way out of Esther he'd be set, but for now he could only take a guess and follow the skyline. If he saw water he knew he was going the wrong way, if he saw land, he was headed in the right direction.

It seemed to like was heading the right way, he had a generally good sense of direction.

! - ! - !

After a half an hour and a lot of luck he felt the paved roads of Esther shift in to the dirt and rock of the field outside of the city. 'Thank you who ever invented GPS.' Cho sighed in relief, after a few moments of curiously examining the device that had been sitting in front of him the whole ride he learned how to use the console in the car and set a course to Tears point.

He couldn't help thinking that it would have helped when he was trying to leave Esther.

Knowing he'd probably run out of gas by the time he got there Cho went as fast as he could, watching the landscape fly past him in streaks. 'Nida, why couldn't you just tell me what was going on…' Even if he did know, he couldn't guarantee that he wouldn't be doing exactly what he was doing right now...

Cho was thinking so hard, and partially because of the inability to completely see the road, that he nearly crashed in to Tears Point. When he finally noticed his nearly critical error he flinched and shouted in surprise. "Oh crap!" With out another moment's hesitation he pulled the steering wheel sharply to the side, forcing the car to veer even more sharply to the left and just barely scraping past one of the glowing pillars. 'Pay attention! What the hell am I doing?' He mentally shouted at himself, taking a deep breath to still his elevated heartbeat.

He ended up, going at a much slower rate then before, on the road leading to a large statue centering in tears point. Only the statue that once stood tall had been completely demolished by the Lunar Cry 4 years previous, like much of this whole place had been, now mostly replaced with the fallen Lunatic Pandora. Esther wouldn't bother rebuilding this place, in fact they were planning on doing just the opposite and demolish what was left of it.

The true purpose of this place was unknown to Cho, only that it had some connection to the Lunatic Paradona. It in actuality was in part what called the Lunar Cry down from the moon's surface, which is why it happened in that particular spot. The Lunatic Paradona was still there, it had been what demolished the Sorceress's statue when it had been grounded.

Now it posed no threat because most of the interior had burned through from the either intensified flames that had caused it to fall from the sky, it was almost completely hollow inside now.

Yet another thing Esther had to demolish, though they hadn't gotten around to it considering the city's repairs were the first priority. So the place was empty and free for Cho to explore….only thing that stood in his way was the fact that monsters of every type over ran this place.

'I didn't get this far by worrying about monsters!' Cho said to himself, he hadn't getting, and was getting quite skilled at evading them. The boy opened the door of the car, using the window frame to climb up to the roof. Now with an elevated field of vision he surveyed his surroundings, not seeing anything of particular interest in the east. He saw a large, scorched crater amidst the aligned pillars with dimmed colors in the west. Just barely standing on his toes he could see the beginnings of something red inside. "That's it!" Cho shouted triumphantly, that had to be it, it fit all the criteria. It was red, it was in the ground, near the spot of the Lunar cry. "It's gotta be it!"

"Hey Kid, what are you yelling for?"

Cho flinched at the sudden voice, it was enough to make him slip off the roof of the car and tumbled to the ground. He landed painfully on his back and his head struck the ground roughly. "Oww…" Cho sat up abruptly, rubbed the back of his head as he looked toward the direction of the voice. He saw three people, two much older boys and one girl. It was none other then Seifer, Fujin and Raijin, the three together as usual.

"What are you guys doing here?" Cho asked, looking over the unknown faces.

"What are you doing here, this place is dangerous ya know." Raijin took a hold of Cho's arm and pulled the boy up on to his feet. Why exactly was someone his age here anyway?

"I'm looking for something." Cho explained, pointing in the direction of the second airship.

"What could possibly be important enough for a kid like you to be in a place like this?" Seifer asked demandingly. Was this kid serious? Did he even know what this place was?

Usually Cho would have come up with something smart to say to someone like him, but his head was hurting and he didn't feel like the resulting augment it would have. "There's an Airship here, I need to get to Balamb Garden." Cho told them.

"Nobody needs to go to Balamb Garden." Seifer said firmly, there was no way he could know what was going on.

"Huh? What are you talking about?"

"It's been taken over by monsters, they had to evacuate ya know." Raijin told him.

That explained it…our at lest part of it.

'But why wouldn't Nida take me with him? It's not like I'm going inside?' Cho still didn't understand it. "I really need to get there then!" Cho said, completely sure of himself as he turned headed in to the maze of broken pillars toward what he hoped was the fallen Ragnaork.

"Hey! Wait a minute!" Seifer tried to stop him the boy but Cho didn't even look back, receding deeper and deeper into the forest of structures. This boy honestly couldn't be serious, why would he be trying to put himself unnecessarily in a situation like that? Seifer folded his arms and snorted with annoyment. "Damn kid's gonna get himself killed."

Should he just let the kid go? He obviously had a plain to get to the Garden and even if he managed to survive here, which he probably wouldn't, he would most definitely be killed there.

"Come on, let's go catch him." Seifer gave a defeated sigh, dropping his head as he trudge forward. "I'm gonna regret this."

! - ! - !

Cho charged forward, crouching down underneath a large piece of metal hanging down and stepping over another. It seemed just as soon as he took two more steps he heard the roar of nearby monster, the first one so far. 'What was that?' Cho stood up strait, looking around him in light confusion.

It would have been easier for him to avoid whatever it was if he knew which way the sound had come from. 'I'm probably over thinking this." So he ignored it, climbing forward through the remains of strange alloys and concrete that were scattered around.

It wasn't to long until he heard it again, "Huh?" The boy paused again, though still unable to determine where that sound had come from. So once again he ignored it, so he continued on... "Oh crap..." Cho was forced to stop again as he came to a dead end of an impassable wall of debris.

"Hmm..." He stopped and looked around, trying to find another path. He saw a bleak one to the right, one barely visible because of the wreckage surrounding them. Cho couldn't help thinking to himself that 'This place is like a maze...' as he pushed away some of the fallen concrete and metal blocking a slim trail. He kicked the last bit of it in, watching the scraps fall to the ground right before a Courl that stood waiting for him on the other said.

'Oh--' He thoughts were cut off abruptly as the monster opened it's mouth and roared loudly, making a surprised Cho stumble backwards to the ground, the two purple tendrils on both sides of it's face wiping around wildly. They stopped flailing and raised erect into the air as the Courl cast a Thundaga spell, drawing a pillar of golden lighting down from the cloudy sky and slowed Cho before he even realized it was happening.

"!" He bit back a cry of pain as the bolt's electricity tore through him with all it's furry, pressing him flat on the ground and leaving him with a searing pain through out every part of his body. With a hiss of pain Cho stumbled to his feet, he was barely able to take an attack like that.

The truth was he was assigned to a SeeD team focused basically on information and intelligence, something that would take advantage of his skills. He didn't get to do much fighting, and he wasn't really trained for it. That's why this would be really hard for him. His instinct drove him to reach over, feeling blindly around with his eyes fixed on the monsters. He found a metal pipe and immediately took it, which was better then nothing.

The Courl lunged at him with a snarl, attempting to bite him on any place it could reach first when Cho swung the pipe, slamming it into the side of the monster's head sending it sliding backwards to the ground. 'Hey, that was a pretty good hit.' And if he ever needed to train for weapon use, this would be his first choice.

With a roar of anger and blood streaming down into it's eyes, the Courl threw it's tendrils unto the air and cast another Thundaga spell. And just before the lighting bolt hit, Cho realized something 'Wait a minute, this is a metal pipe. This thing is a lighting rod!' With out hesitation he tossed the rod away, drawing the stream of lighting descending from the sky with it. Both of the object and the lighting crashed in to one of many glowing red pillar, with in what seemed like a blink of an the electricity flowing through and overloading it caused it explode, the force knocked Cho off his feet and filling the air with a mass of black smoke. "Aaaahhhhh!"

Before Cho could even think about what had just happened let alone move, the Courl came flying at him through the smoke and had apparently been out of the blast radius. "!" Before it could touch him a silver blade came in-between them, and the unexpectant Courl ran right in to it, completely off balance it passed right over Cho's head.

Seifer lowered his gun blade and thrust it into the ground, then with out warning it he reached down and picking the boy up by his shirt collar. "Are you trying to get you ass killed?" Seifer shouted angrily, holding the struggling Cho off the ground with the clear annoyment that he had to go through the trouble.

"I didn't ask you to save me." Cho shot back, prying himself from Seifer's hold and only getting mad because Seifer was the one yelling at him.

And Seifer was now mad at the ungratefulness. "If I hadn't you'd be dinner by now."

Cho only glared at him in return, he felt off today. Something was nagging at him and he couldn't concentrate completely, or else that monster would have never had him in that position, and he could have thought of something better to do then give Seifer a mean look.

He could just walk off. Which didn't seem like such a bad idea, but there was no way he could do it fast enough to get away from Seifer and the monster at the same time.

"Thank you." Cho muttered reluctantly.

Seifer definitely didn't expect that who had just hostilely ignored him twice, he wasn't even sure he heard it right. "Huh?"

"….." There was no way he was going to say it twice, if he did that he'd just be spiting himself.

It was clear that he had, and with a thank you given Seifer dropped the subject and the augment with an incoherent utterance. By then Fujin and Raijin trailing behind had already taken care of the Courl.

With that out of the way Cho started to towards the crater which he hoped held a second Ragnaork again, he couldn't help wince in pain and push forward with a noticeable limp. He knew he would train himself like hell when all of this was over.

And this boy still seemed to be ignoring his warnings even after nearly being mauled. "Your still going through with this?" Seifer asked, walking after him. It wasn't to hard to catch up with him.

Cho replied with a more strained tent to his voice. "I have too, I have to get back to Balamb Garden as soon as possible." He spoke more weakly then before.

"You are such a dumbass, do you have a death wish or something?"

Cho stopped and glared at him fiercely, "NO! Leave. Me. ALONE!" Cho felt something stirring inside of him stronger then before now that he'd let it out, he was starting to get depressed, and with depression came anger.

"Fine, I'm not going to babysat an ungrateful brat. And since you wanna die so badly, I'm taking that car. " Seifer turned to leave, giving a quick look back with the small wondering of how Cho had got a car here in the first place before he motioned his friends to follow. "Lets go."

Seifer froze in mid step, almost out of ear shot when he heard it. A strange, surreal sound that made him turn back around towards Cho.

Seifer folded his arms and walked back to the stalled boy who hadn't move since he'd left a second ago. "Hey kid, are you...crying?" Seifer leant down over his shoulder, trying to get a closer look at Cho's downcast face.

Cho pushed him away with more strength then Seifer thought he had. "What the hell's wrong with you?" Seifer tried again, peering over the right shoulder this time as he heard the soft sobs become louder.

"Leave me the hell alone."

"What did I do to you! Why are you getting mad at me?"

Cho abruptly lifted his head and looked up at the other boy with another intense glare, tears streaming down his cheek. "I have to get back to Balamb Garden because Nida went to a fight he probably wont come back from. He just left me here! He's all I have and I'm not going to let him die! But I can't even make it to the damn ship because of these goddamn monsters, and I'd rather die trying then to give up and let him die with out trying!" Cho shouted angrily, then furiously wiping the tears from his eyes with his arm trying to force himself to stop crying.

Seifer didn't respond right away, he had no idea it was that big of a problem, what could he say to that? Is this why he was out here, putting himself in mortal danger and running the very real risk of being killed.

He really shouldn't have cared, he usually wouldn't have, but despite his objections this time he did. Maybe it was the 4 years of boredom that he spent not doing anything at all that drove him to persist. Yeah that was it, he was bored...yeah, that sounded right. "Come on, Let's go find that...whatever the hell your out here for." Seifer gave another defeated sigh and dropped his head. He couldn't believe he was doing this.

"R-Really?"

"There are a hell of a lot stronger monsters out here, you can't even handle a weak one."

A bright smile crept across Cho's face, he couldn't stop himself from nearly jumping on Seifer as he gave him tight hug. "Thank you!"

This was...unexpected. What was with this kid, one minute he was lashing out at him, the next he was hugging him? And what was with that look on his face? He was smiling, really smiling, really, really smiling in a child like manner. "Yeah, Whatever, just get off me." Seifer placed a hand on Cho's forehead and tried to prey him away, that was a really tight grip.

It looked like it was him and the kid, Fujin and Raijin had already left back when Seifer declared they were leavening. They were long gone, and it would take too long to find them in this maze, they'd just get lost and be bate for monsters.

Finally Cho let go, turning the only way of finding that red thing he had to go on, which was east, and trusting his general sense of direction .

! - ! - !

They had been traveling for an hour before they really got anywhere in the maze like settings. Cho took the lead, Seifer defending him through out the many battles that varied from weak fangs to Marlboros. the object in question couldn't have been to much farther since the path they were on now was going completely strait.

"Ok, that was pretty cool." Cho admitted with the reluctance that came when defending one's own pride by not wanting to admit being wrong. "And you are kinda strong."

Seifer rolled his eyes and pushed Cho, causing the boy to stumble to the side and into another one of the colorful pillars that made up the place. "Your an annoying little brat, you talk so big for someone so small. When you can beat Behemoth on your own, then you can talk to me about how strong you think I am."

"We you wouldn't have had to fight it in the first place if you would have just listened to me." In typical Cho fashion, he wanted to sneak around some of the larger monsters since he was good at it and it was just easier then fighting. Seifer didn't. "Work smart not hard you idiot."

Seifer gave the boy a swift punch to the back of the head, about to chastise him for calling him an idiot when something else tore at his attention "Whoa!" Seifer felt a sudden lapse in ground while taking his next step, he almost fell over the edge of something when the rocky earth broke off into a deep hole But Cho managed to grabbed his coat and pulled him back.

"We're here." He said sarcastically, now that Seifer wasn't endanger of falling anymore Cho let go of the coat and immediately ran over to the edge of what they had just come across. It was just as he thought it would be a large hole in the ground, about 5 feet down that now made sense considering the perspective he'd been looking at it when he surveyed it from the roof of the care he stole. A ship, the Ragnaork lay on it's side propped up on it's left wing, explaining the red he saw, and the antenna protruding from the top and leaning against the sides of the hole.

Luckily the side door was facing up.

"You were talking about this ship?" Seifer knelt down to get a closer look. This was the ship he thought it was, so why was it here? Didn't Squall and his teammates have it? So what was it doing in the ground? Cho brought them all the way out here, he should be able to explain it.

"You didn't know that there are 3 of these ships? All of them were used to carry sorceress Adel's seal into space." Cho told in his matter of factly tone that he always used when explaining something or trying to make a sale. "I guess this would be number 2... well, we didn't come out this far to stand here, lets go already." Though he was still somewhat hurt he was the first to go, fearlessly jumping down in to the hole with little more perpetration then a step back. With a small sound of expelled breath, Cho landed on the red metal just above the protruding wing.

"Of course you would just jump in, like you know what the hell's down there." Seifer quickly followed, nearly landing on top of Cho when he landed with a sense of gracefulness. Taking a quick look around just to make sure nothing would just jump out at him, Seifer walked over to the door that looked as if it was embedded in the floor from this angle. "Where did it come from? And if they were used to carry Adel up there, why didn't they come back down." He asked, taking hold of the handle and pulling the door open cautiously.

"It came down with the Lunar Cry." Cho, adjusting his stance to keep balance on the slanted surface, Cho leaned forward and peered into ship, he was a little surprised to see the lights were on. And it didn't look like took too much damage from the fall on the outside, the monsters shielded most of the impact. "And I guess they were all attacked by monsters and killed the crew off of something like that." Cho was the first to jump in, finding it extremely awkward now that everything was on it's side and he landed on a wall.

"Monsters huh, great." Safer snorted sarcastically, climbing down into the hole and landing beside Cho.

With out hesitation Cho climbed over the protruding door frame that was only in his way now that it was on the ground and moved in to the next room. He aligned himself carefully on the railings and held on to the chain links of the bridge itself for balance. Seeing it was the only way forward, Seifer followed by the same means while trying his best to look around the room.

"I wonder if it still works...I really hope so, there's no way I can fix this thing..." Cho's thoughts were interrupted when Seifer elbowed him softly in the side "What?"

"Shhhhh...Look down."

He did as Seifer said and looked down, not seeing anything that would warrant for them to stop and pay attention to it. "I don't see anything."

"Damnit kid, I mean really look. That light--" Seifer indicated the one of the florescent lights positioned in the crevasse between the wall and the floor "--is shining directly on the floor...I mean wall, whatever the hell it is. The point is it's still dark." Seifer found that too strange to be nothing.

Directly below them was that dark spot Seifer was talking about, it was odd for a surface to be directly in front of a light and not be illuminated. Was it even possible?

"Your over reacting." Cho reassured him as he reached into his pocket, shifting around until he found what he was looking for and drew out the object, a coin. "Watch." He extended his hand out and dropped the coin, watching it fall towards the floor (which really was the wall) below. As soon as the coin touched it, the dark spot jumped up like a splash in water. With out warning a long spike shot out of the dark spot with amazing speed.

"Whoa!" Cho and Seifer both retreated back a step in the opposite directions as the spike sliced through the bridge with pin point precision. "Oh crap!" Cho held on tightly, shuttering from the thunderous sound that came as his side of the bridge broke apart from Seifer's and swung down ward towards the ground. The other half of the bridge was forced to bend with a horrible creaking sound, becoming hedges that could only bend so far, and Cho's decent stopped stopping just above the ground.

The blackness on the ground took the form of a dark wolf that immediately lunged at Seifer who's side of the bridge was suspended in place as if was still connected to the other half. "!" As soon as the Shadow got in to the air, it changed shape again. From it's head grew a large blade shaped almost like a wide boomerang that was easily larger then it's whole body. Seifer pushed off the bridge, just narrowly avoiding the monster, watching the Shadow tare through the metal bridge and burst through it right where Seifer had been. Seifer landed and immediately stepped back with reflexes flaring as the two halves fell to the ground in front of him. 'What is that thing?'

It was amazingly fast, changing shape changing shape in mid-air in to a shapeless mass of liquid and then sling shooting itself in the opposite direction toward Seifer. It's body seem to divide as it came on to Seifer, a rain of long, thin spikes followed. Seifer strifed backwards, shifting to the left to avoid one that grazed his neck and shoulder like a bullet, then to the right just narrowly slicing off a strand of hair, then quickly moving backwards to evade a torrent of them. His back hit the wall, just barely the last one grazing the tip of his nose and falling into the pool dark that had gathered on the floor. From the pool the wolf reformed, directly in front of him.

"Kid, what's your name?" Seifer called, not looking at him as if not to draw attention to Cho's presence.

It seemed like an odd time to ask for introductions but..."My name's Maru but everyone calls me Cho. What's yours?" He asked quietly.

"Seifer." He said plainly, drawing his gunblade. "Listen to me cause I'm only going to say this once. Get out of here now, go to the next room or something and lock the door." Seifer thrust his blade at forward at the shadow, it jumped back evasively, crouching down slightly and leaping in to the air, landing agilely on the flat side of his sword. Seifer drew back his arm, pulling his sword towards him punched the creature, knocking it backwards to the ground.

Cho complied with a small nod, climbing up pulling himself up higher, quickly fitting his fingers into the chain links and scrambling towards the top. The Shadow seemed to notice him then, and realizing being smaller and retreating he must have been the weaker. It completely ignored Seifer and ran in the opposite direction to Cho. "Where do you think your going?" Seifer wasn't going to make it that easy to get away, with his sword pressed downcast and his hand extended he cast a spell. "Flare!"

A sudden gathering of red energy built around the retreating form with an explosion that burst through the shadow's body and a red shockwave that tore through it, knocking it down to the ground in a spray of black liquid.

By then Cho made it to the top of the bridge, and again the fact that the ship was on it's side made it self apart. Before he would have been able to walk to the exit, now there was a large break he had to cross. 'I can make this...' he to a small step back and then jumped over small gap, diving through the double doors that thankfully opened automatically... He fell head first in to a much larger gap, down the floor (The wall actually) in the next room, 'Ow!' He ended up landing on his stomach, with the air knocked out of his lungs.

With a drew in deep breath, tilting his head as he looked up at the sideways lift that lead to the cockpit, there was no way he could get up there with the lift like that.

No way he could lock the door anyway, he started to wish he hadn't left so he could at lest help Seifer, and not be stranded here...But Cho wasn't completely useless, and if it came to it, he'd make a good decoy at lest. Anyway…. He didn't have much choice on where to go now. He could probably make it back in to the room where Seifer was, or go into the passenger area. And there was the door that led to a stairwell descending to the hanger, but unfortunately there was no way he could make it to the hanger since the door was even higher then the lift was, he couldn't reach it...

Unless…

Cho walked along the overturned walls, making his way over the doorway in to the passenger room, 'Wait a minute...if I remember this right...' He climbing up a row of two chairs surely mounted on the overturned floor. He was brought face to face a small divot that served as a handle to a hatch barely visible to anyone that didn't know where it was. It was a passage that led from this room down to the hanger used for servicing the lift up to the cockpit. There was no real point of going to he hanger, except that he felt safer there, and he could more easily reach Seifer if the need arose. Besides, he couldn't really do anything else but look around.

'Yeah, this is it.' Cho pulled open the dark hatch and climbed into the rather small square, each previously off light came on subsequently one after another to illuminate the path now that the hatch had been opened. The usually downward sloping was a sharp incline now, Cho had to use the seemingly thousands of wires and small handles that opened up compartments to pull himself upward. It wasn't to hard from him since he was used to going through narrow spaces and could easily lift his body weight with his arms, he only weigh about 90 pounds. "I knew it would be here..." He gradually passed the lift currently above him, easily making it to the second hatch the led to the hanger. It was much easier to travel through this one because if the ship was right side up it would have been sloping sharply downward. Now that the ship was side ways, the path was completely horizontal.

'Maybe I can get to the cockpit from here...' He reasoned to himself, crawling quickly through the ventilation sized passage. 'If I jump right, I can maybe make it--'

...It happened right as he made to the end of tunnel, as soon as Cho climbed out of the shaft something overwhelming bombarded his senses. It was an attractive, manipulating aroma that made him want to find the source, maybe if he had been thinking rationally he would have thought this as some type of attack.

'What...what is that?' With out even thinking he pushed open the hatch serving as he exit and climbed up, pulling himself out of it... only to stand up and find a shadow waiting for him. He managed to easily contained himself from flinching or shouting from the surprise, mainly because he noticed that the source of that sent was coming from it.

This had to be an some type of attack or spell he was under. Why couldn't he seem to move?

And strangely enough it didn't immediately attack him either, it watched him like a predator about to pounce on it's prey. Cho easily could tell something was different about this shadow, it was larger then the ones before. The other one came up just past his waist in size, this one easily was his size, maybe taller. The other ones were more of an extremely dark purple in color, this Shadow's fur was pure black, and the most imposing feature was the eyes. Those other ones had red pupils, this one's eyes actually glowed crimson in a hypnotic way. It was terrifying, just watching it made him freeze in fear...that's why he couldn't move, now it made a little more sense. It was those eyes that did it.

"Yo--your…not like the other ones…" Cho managed to choke out, trying desperately to move any part of his body, but he was so overwhelmed with and an unexplained fear that he couldn't even raise his voice to anything over just above a whisper. And that smell, it was driving him insane! What was it about a simple smell that caused it to be so drawing, so manipulative that it was the only thing that could rival the fear. But enough rational though pushed through all of that for him to notice a few other key factors.

The wolf slowly circled him, moving even closer with each pass, sniffing him, memorizing his scent.

Something in Cho's mind managed to click together, an idea, more like a hunch.

"Your…a GF?"

"GF?…." It's voice was deep, smooth, oddly provocative. It didn't sound like much attention was being paid.

This shadow was a dog, or at lest that's what he thought it was, and dogs were anything like Chocobos. Which if they weren't he was completely off about this, then he recognized a few things he'd noticed about the shadow. He knew enough to tell the way this shadow was walking at the moment was not the way a normal canine walked, it was using more muscles then necessary and probably didn't even know it. He also noticed that every few breaths the shadow opened it's mouth a little, that easily meant that the canine was hot and had a dry mouth. The way it's tail was barely moving and seemed undecided between staying between natural or between it's legs. Plus the fur was half matted and dripping sweat that wasn't completely clear, it was more cloudy. Now the only reason a wolf was completely black fur would have cloudily sweat is if it was sweating out something, something like pheromones.

If he didn't know any better Cho would think that this GF was in heat, it was a dog after all. "Wh-at are you going to do to me?" Cho asked, he managed to shake his head. "Ok…whatever...Just don't eat me. Come on, I taste horrible."

The wolf looked at him questioningly, then stepped forward to a dangerously close range, looking Cho in the eye before burying his face in to Cho's neck and giving him a soft lick. 'Me and my mouth, now he wants to see what I taste like.' Cho flinched, wincing as if it was painful, or in the anticipation of pain that he hoped wouldn't come.

The shadow licked him again, apparently he liked the taste, but that wasn't what he was planning to do….at lest not yet.

"Hey…you haven't eaten me yet." Cho tilted his head away from the one pressed against him. "You seem pretty smart so maybe we can talk about this first, let's be reasonable." If it was anything Cho knew how to do it was talk his way out of things, maybe if he kept talking... "There must be a lot of better tasting things around here then me. There's monster not to far from here that looks tender...Am I getting anything here?"

"I don't want to talk.." The shadow continued to sniff Cho, running his nose down the boy's chest, along his sides, and then halfway down his lower body before bringing it back up to Cho's neck. He really was memorizing the scent.

"Ok…What do you want…" The boy asked. "Anything, you name it, as long as it doesn't involve me being eaten." The fear that had immobilized him was starting to fade, Cho found it easier to move now that that the shadow wasn't looking at him with those glowing eyes.

"What I want is you." He replied coldly, pushing his head over the boy's shoulder and continued sniffing.

"No way, that's non-negotiable…But uh...I'm sure we can work something else out." Cho unfortunately thanks to a misconception thought they was still talking about eating.

The shadow didn't move an inch, he just pressed his head against the back of Cho's neck, this was starting to get confusing. "It's you or you life."

Huh? That didn't make any sense? How could...

That's when Cho finally realized what he was talking about, and he realized that scent driving him crazy couldn't be anything other then pheromones. He was right, this shadow really was in heat...Cho really wasn't sure of the concept of how this heat was effecting him when such a thing usually didn't extend to other species, but on the other hand this wasn't just a regular dog, possibly not one at all.

No wonder he was drawn to it so much.

Cho had almost said yes off of that factor alone, it was that manipulative, but he restrained himself out of fear. "Uh….Your giving me a choice, that's a step in the right direction. I was always a fan of the diplomatic approach, smart people take the diplomatic approach, I was right about you. Now Let's see if we can broaden those choices up a little, maybe add a third option?"

Maybe this boy didn't understand what was really going on here, what he was dealing with. That did add a level of amusement to this whole thing. "Alright, I'll give you a third option."

Cho smiled, he couldn't believe this was actually working. "Ok What is it?"

"The first two options combined."

Cho had to give it to him, this was one smart and very egger wolf, he wasn't working this shadow over, he was just being played with. "Ok, how about I get somebody your species." Cho offered.

The wolf just gave a small growl, making it apparent that either way the wolf was going to get what he wanted. And he wanted Cho preferably living.

Cho was running out of options, his mind inanely started racing for an excuse or a stall. "How about we get to know each other first? Where did you come from?"

The shadow gave him another growl, this time shifting forward and nudging him a little.

'Well, he has soft fur, I can say that much about him…Well, if this doesn't work, I'm screwed (literally)' "I'd be horrible in bed. You're a GF, how about we junction and then I find somebody much better. Then you can you can used my body and…you know. That way, everybody's happy." That other person was obviously Nida, and he wasn't really plan to let this whole plan be gone through with. But if it came to it and the wolf used his body, he got a strong GF, and sex with Nida, plus he got to stay alive. The down side really wasn't to bad.

First, the wolf barely if at all knew what a GF was save the word junction, from there he could generalize at lest partially what it was. But he was actually considering it. He really wanted Cho who was undeniably appealing to him, but if he did it the way he was currently planning on it would be very unconformable to Cho.

He found it much more enjoyable to himself if his mate was enjoying it to, in a way some what similar to Cho he focused more so on other senses then just the obvious, Cho's prerogative was sight, his was sound. He wanted to hear every pleasurable sound this human could make, it was just part of the desire he was feeling. Something so appealing such as that most likely wouldn't happen if they continued on this course of action of forcing.

But on the other hand, he hadn't had a mate…ever and he was at lest a few hundred years old. This heat was almost unbearable, it made him extremely attracted to certain people, it was like a growing sensitivity. And he was attracted to Cho. That didn't necessarily mean he would be to someone else no matter how much he wanted to mate.

Well since he was so attracted to Cho, he found himself willing to give him some leverage in how this happened. Either way it was going to happen, he had waited too long for it not too. He didn't want to hurt Cho, but that didn't mean he wouldn't, he just wouldn't like it. If this avoided him from hurting Cho, which he would have done if he went ahead and did what he was originally planning, he was for it.

The Shadow backed away from him with slow steps.

'Man I am such a genus!' Cho's mental congratulation to himself was abruptly cut of by the feeling he was forgetting something '…Oh man, I almost forgot about Seifer, he needs help.' Strange how Seifer entered his mind at a time like this, he should have remembered him when he first saw the shadow.

"Fine." An unwilling compromised expression spread across the wolf's face as he looked up at Cho with those glowing red eyes.

They still they haunted him, immobilizing him with fear. That fear only increased when the red seemed to surround his body like an aura even though it really wasn't, he would have asked what was happening if he could mange to get a word out of mouth.

The Shadow walked towards him casually, then suddenly leaped at him making Cho flinch, coming closer and closer until it seemed the Shadow had jumped right through him like a ghost.

He saw a rush of black being pulled over his eyes, by the time it passed the wolf was gone completely…Or so he though until he felt the Shadow, moving inside of his mind through the junction. He felt the wolf's junction becoming deeper as if he was possessing Cho.

Strangely enough The first thing that came from the wolf's new connection was the libido, it was overwhelming at first, so much that Cho had to sit down.

'I see why your so anxious…If this is going to work out your going to have to work with me a little. Alright?'

(Hn….)

'Man this is making it really hard to concentrate……' Cho mentally groaned, his body quickly became flushed, he was already starting to sweat porously and he could hardly breathe. Not to mention he had an erection so hard that it hurt. He was sweating out the same pheromones, and that scent was only adding to it. He found it amazing that the wolf was able to control himself this long, because he was a second away from giving in to the Shadow's first offer. 'Damn you, what the hell did you do to me?'

Until he Seifer came.

He pulled open the sideways door to storage in the next room, sliding down what used to be the floor turned wall and landing next to Cho in front of the open hatch. He looked over Cho as he sheeted his Gunblade, seeing besides being evidently shaken up the boy seemed alright. "I was looking all over for you." Seifer wiped away a streak of blood dripping down his forehead. "You--..."

Seifer's voice trailed off, nose flared up when he finally noticed the scent of pheromones nearly coating Cho. Seifer shook his head and blinked a few time before disregarding it as best he could.

"Are you alright?" Cho asked distractedly.

"I'm alive ain't I?" Seifer looked away, he was clearly being effected because he was getting extremely agitated.

That's when the new found GF began to stir, he apparently didn't want to wait any longer. 'No not him!' Cho protested but it seemed like even he wasn't listening to himself.

(You want him.)

'No, You want him'

(I want you.)

'You've made that clear. You're the only reason I'm feeling...this.'

(Then let me be the one to relieve you)

'...Yeah…..Hey wait a minute!' Cho shook his head frantically. "You almost had me there for a minute. The faster we get this done, the faster you can get off. Not until then, Got it?'

(We?)

'Yes We. We're junctioned aren't we, that means me and you are partners. We.' Most of what he was saying had come from Carbuncle, it seemed more of it stuck with him then he realized. And the shadow found that some how appealing, or at lest acceptable. Whatever Cho was talking about needing to get done clearly involved danger, he didn't like that idea, he wanted to protect Cho. He wanted to make the boy officially his, so it would end up being a 'you mess with him you mess with me' type of thing whether Cho liked it or not.

'Got it?'

(Fine. And don't speak to me as if I'm one of you humans. I'm only helping you because it suits me.)

'Uh, Alright then. Ready?'

(Fine.)

'Then let's go.'