Disclaimer: I don't own…well, anything really. I don't own this computer, my car even though in the last year I've put more than it's market value worth of gas into it (11 freaking miles to the f'ing gallon!), my PS2…I guess all I own is my X-box…which doesn't have any games I'd make a fanfic about other than Morrowind, possibly Fable (not likely), and if I develop a sense of humor, Psychonauts. I don't own my bed, my TV, my hair (my Kung Fu teacher conned me into shaving it off a few times…long, very ugly story), and…okay, enough of my bitching, I own Hideo, Delta, most of Kaejadra (some aspects were inspired), the direct events in this story, and nothing else (literally).
Chapter Nine: The Last Choice
Darkness surrounded his body and mind. He could see nothing, hear nothing, smell nothing but his own dried sweat, and he preferred it that way. It didn't surprise him at all when two SeeDs cuffed him and dragged him to the disciplinary room, the closest thing the Garden had to a stockade, the moment he got off the Ragnarok.
Silence, save his slow breathing, encompassed him. Being void of thought was his only salvation, the only thing he could do to be free of madness. He had been viciously interrogated an hour earlier, and he barely answered the absolutely necessary questions. He didn't care if he was expelled. He didn't care if they locked him up in a government prison.
He let the darkness and the silence penetrate him, become him. He was tired; tired of worrying, tired of struggling, of caring, of being afraid, tired of running from everyone and everything, of being left with no option but to run, he wanted it all to end. He was just so tired.
At this point, he would rather despair than cling to hope only to bring about more struggle. That's what his problem had been his whole life: he never gave up. He always moved forward, clinging to whatever hope there was. He lifted his head up to the ceiling, seeing nothing but darkness. It was so dark, his eyes might as well have been closed. He had clung to hope, and look where he ended up: a prisoner, a wanted man on every side, no way to escape, and again, he gained more than he ever had only to watch powerlessly as it left him.
'Better to have loved and lost than to have never have loved at all', they said. Bullshit, he said back. All those spoiled rotten brats ever 'lost' was their sense of reality. He wished so bad he had his GF back, both Ixion and Krakken. The thunder GF was taken from him, as well as the Black Behemoth suit, leaving him with only his silver dragon jumpsuit, while his blue matching coat was still in the Grandidi Forest. He wished he had every GF in the world overloading his mind right now, erasing his memory to the point where he didn't even remember how to take a piss. He was tired of his memories of Tetsuya, of the gangs and Esthar, of SeeD and the Garden. He would rather face his execution with a dead soul then the perpetually tormented one he now harbored. Why did all this have to happen to him? Why couldn't Delta have stayed the hell out of his life and left him a blank slate?
Half the time it seemed like the only purpose to his life was to be Hyne's little torture doll, and at other times, he was convinced that was the case.
His thoughts barely broke when the door to his room opened. He turned his head and squinted at the light that poured in. When he finally got a good look at the person standing there, he felt even worse. At this point, he would rather be locked in that room with Kaejadra than Delta.
"Are you okay?" She asked after a few seconds. He didn't move a muscle other than to take his gaze away from her. He heard the door close and found himself back in the darkness, though he knew he was not alone. "Talk to me, let me hear your voice." She pleaded.
He tried to stay silent, but making her wait became agonizing to him. "Nothing to talk about." He finally said.
"Hideo, what the hell's going on? They locked you up on sight, and they're refusing to tell anyone why! Do you know how hard it was to get them to let me in here?" With what they had been through in the last twelve hours, he couldn't blame her for being confused and worried.
"Why didn't you try and get the official report, then?" Go away. Please…just go away.
He could feel her eyes on him, even in that darkness. He knew those eyes were full of hurt. "I want to know why, in your words. They won't tell me, so you will, and I'm not leaving you until you do!" So she thought she could be as hard as him, did she?
He shifted on his spot on the bed, huddled in the corner. "They probably think I'm a spy or something."
"Why would they think that?"
"I don't know, probably because I am." If she was not going to leave him, he was going to give her hell until she did.
She sighed in frustration. "Hideo, are you going to answer my question or not?"
"It's the truth, damn it!" He yelled. "Think about it! I'm a hacker, in a military academy, what the hell would I be doing here, huh? I screwed with the wrong people, and they told me they would let me off if I did a little hacking for them!" A silence followed after that. "Is that enough for you now, or do you want me to grab a top hat 'n cane and do a dance?"
He could hear her breathing now, broken and raspy. If only he could see her face now, a face full of hurt would drive the stake even deeper into his heart.
"You were sent here…" she said, "…by who?"
He scoffed. "So that's how they let you in here, eh? You agreed to get the answers out of me, didn't you?"
He didn't need sight to see it coming. The sounds of the quickly approaching footsteps were warning enough, yet he still did nothing to stop her fist from hitting his face. The punch was hard, and his head rebounding off the wall added to it. No more than I deserve.
A pair of callused, strong, yet feminine hands grabbed his jumpsuit and pulled him out of his sitting position, and close enough to her face he could feel her warm breath. And he could smell her tears. "Answer me, you son of a bitch! I want the truth, for once! Don't I deserve that much?" She pushed him back against the wall. He heard her walk away slowly, then press her back against the wall and slide down it. "How much have you lied to me? I trusted you, with my back, with my life, with everything I had! Now…now I don't know who you are, if you're really the person I thought was my friend."
He sighed. She was right, she did deserve that much. "It wasn't the Black Behemoth that sent me, that much I can tell you." He strangely felt relieved when he told her that. "All I can say is these people are dangerous." Misleading, but it was true. "These people have no intention to harm or interfere with the Garden or SeeD," he then added towards the door, "or Manitech's deranged experiments!" He sighed, figuring he might as well continue. "Other than why I came to the Garden, everything I told you was true. I was raised on the streets, in gangs, I became a hacker, and now I'm here." He then added, with a chuckle, "I didn't even have a last name, so I used my alias."
"Why were you there in the Grandidi Forest?"
"I found out in the Headmaster's files where you were going, and I had a feeling they would find out about me soon, so I hitched a ride. With my two GFs, I was sure I could make it to Esthar on my own."
"Why did you follow us into the base?"
"Because of you." A hint of anger showed in his voice. "You don't become one of the biggest international crime syndicates ever known by being welcoming, and I had heard more than enough about what they had done in Esthar alone." He moaned. "Of course, you had to be on that mission, and screw up my plan."
He heard her get up and walk around the perimeter of the room until she found the door. "Hey," he called to her, "find out what you wanted to know?"
She stopped in the doorway. "I don't know." She said. "But in the last half hour, SeeD has gone into high alert. We've changed course to Balamb, and we're going faster than I've ever seen the Garden move. And no one is saying why."
He scoffed again. "I'll bet it's because of what we saw back there." He didn't need to explain what that was.
She still had her back to him. "Hideo, what was he?"
"He's a…a sorcerer, a male sorceress." He had to stop himself from saying 'Bastard Shepherd'. "They created him to control monsters for them." He sighed. "You should see the Headmaster, he probably knows more than me."
She was about to take a step, but stopped. "Good-bye, Hideo. It was nice knowing you, while I thought you were my friend." She then walked away, the doors shutting behind her, leaving him in his darkness once again. He had hoped to make her leave by hurting her, and she ended up hurting him more.
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Time, after that, passed by slowly. The harder he tried to not think about her, the harder it became to think about anything else. Try as he might, he couldn't find that void within his mind like before. Of course the one he had fallen for would be such a curse to him…or was love itself a curse.
From time to time, his train of thought would be interrupted by images of Kaejadra. A few times he could almost hear the sorcerer calling out to him. He thought he might be going crazy, or maybe the Bastard Shepherd really was trying to reach his mind.
Some time after he felt the Garden stop, the door to his room opened. "May I have a word with you?" A familiar voice said.
"Do I have a choice, Headmaster?" Hideo responded. "I thought I was a prisoner."
"I never liked the idea of detaining students in a military fashion." Cid answered. "May I turn the lights on?"
"Go ahead." Hideo winced a second later as the lights came on, revealing a small, plain white plaster room, with a desk on one end and his bed, barely more than a cot, on the other. The headmaster walked over to the desk, pulled out the chair and sat on it. Cid normally was cheerful, if a little tired, and sometimes stern, but this time worry plastered his face. "Sir, are you here to question me?"
The headmaster shook his head, resting his chin on his fists, elbows propped on his thighs. "No." He answered simply.
"You were trying to create sorcerers and sorceresses by fusing human and GF, weren't you?" Hideo asked.
"The Garden wasn't the first to employ the power of Guardian Forces." Cid slowly started explaining. "Most groups that used them were often feared and hunted, but in the last twenty years, as technology grew, and the need for military supremacy increased, ways of using GF as a weapon were inspected again. The problem was there aren't enough GF in this world to supply even a small army. The research for linking man with the Guardian Force matrix, with a GF as a medium, started nearly fifteen years ago. Around the time I started the Garden project, I found out how, with out significantly smaller military force, we could employ GF. As I studied GF, I found out about this research. The early days of the Garden were slow, and we barely turned a profit, so we volunteered to turn in the results of our GF usage to the researchers at Manitech for extra money. Eventually, as our profits grew beyond our expectations, we ended up providing funding for them."
"Because you wanted them to succeed?" Hideo inquired. "You wanted to turn students into your own super soldiers. Why? More power? Because you wanted the Garden to be unstoppable? What would you have done, then, with an invincible army?"
"Enough!" The Headmaster ordered. "That's not it at all." His next words were calm, solemn, even a little sad. "You have to understand: Balamb Garden's position is unique. The other Gardens became government funded, but we stayed neutral, relying on SeeD for the bulk of our financing. The more missions we did, the more we became a powerful force in this world, the more we realized how much we were needed. This world is a fragile one, with the superpowers ready to tear each other apart at a moment's notice. It needed an equalizing force, to keep each side from becoming too powerful, to keep them from starting a war that would reach every end of the known world. And we became that power."
The Headmaster hunched over more and rubbed his eyes. "But the price was high. We don't have a single SeeD who's survived more than six years. Financially and labor wise, we can keep this up, but my conscience can't. All students here are children. Many SeeDs aren't old enough to drink, and I'm constantly sending some kid or another to his or her death. On an old man like me, each death hits hard. I'm getting tired of sending them to their graves. Yet I can't simply end the SeeD program; this world still needs an independent equalizing force, besides simply eliminating dangerous sorceresses. If I can find a way to save the lives of these children, I'll do what I can."
"And somewhere along the way, you or Manitech found out the Black Behemoth was doing something similar?" Hideo asked.
"More like they found out about us. They stole the research files twelve years ago. We haven't heard anything on them since, until the attack on Deling. We had no idea they would make such progress, but we never suspected they had a sorceress. No doubt that helped them."
"So what now? What are you going to do with me?"
The aged leader sighed. "That's why I came down here."
"I suppose you were listening in on me and Delta's conversation."
Cid nodded. "Yes, and we have no further questions because of it." He straightened his back, sitting up. "To be honest, I'm not sure what to do with you, Hideo. I believed you when you said you have no intention of harming the Garden or SeeD, but considering your past connections and what you have done, I'm not sure we can take the risk."
"I'm not going to try and assure you that it's all in the past," Hideo replied, "I was planning on leaving. I have my reasons, and I'd rather not discuss them, but this is probably for the better." He hoped that would be enough.
The headmaster sighed. "Yes, it probably is." He seemed to roll over some thoughts in his head before continuing. "It seems you've done more during Operation: Grandaddy's Medicine than you intended." He pulled a few folded pictures from his pocket and handed them to Hideo. The Estharian unfolded them, finding satellite images of forested ocean coasts, and around two dozen boats leaving it. Looking at the scale, if he estimated this right, those boats were vary large. "Sir, what are these?"
"Shortly after I got the report from Squall, I contacted Esthar to let them know about the attack you discovered. It was my judgment that, since you knew about the plans, the Black Behemoth might execute them immediately before word would reach the Presidential Palace, so I told them as soon as I could. About three hours ago, I got this transmission from President Loire. It seems the Black Behemoth is on the move, but not for Esthar, as I had thought they would. They're heading straight for Balamb."
"What?" There was something not right with this. "Why would they be going for Balamb? Other than being the second largest port city on the four continents, what strategic value does it have?"
"I was stumped for a while as well, but I think they are trying to draw us into a confrontation with them."
Hideo brought his eyes from the images to the aged headmaster. If that was the case, they must have thought SeeD was the greatest threat to them. But if he had read the numbers right, there were hundreds of the most ferocious monsters locked up in that complex, and if those boats were transports…"Are we taking the bait?"
"We've already sent word ahead to Balamb, but it'll take far too long to evacuate the whole town. If we run, we'll be sacrificing the whole island."
"Sir, they have hundreds, maybe even thousands of monsters, all under their control. Even with Balamb's military backing us up, it'll be a slaughter!"
The headmaster sighed. "I already discussed this at length with Laguna. He can send a large shipment of soldiers over here, but to amass those troops and transports to take them so far away from the city would take at least twelve hours. The Black Behemoth is expected to arrive on our shores in just under six hours. Their long range missiles can't track those ships, so the only thing we can do to slow them down is to send our assault boats in Balamb after them, though with the numbers they'll be looking at, they'll only be able to slow them down." Cid looked Hideo in the eyes. "All we can do is slow them down while reinforcements arrive, and to draw the fight away from Balamb."
"So we're all going into battle." Hideo said. "Have you told the rest of the Garden?"
"No, I will make the announcement after we're done talking. What I wanted to clear up was that even with your word that you have no allegiance to the Black Behemoth, we can't afford that kind of trust, not in this situation. So I'm going to ask you to leave the island. I've talked to the Mayor of Balamb, and you'll have a reserved seat on a train before the first wave gets here."
Hideo nodded. "So I guess this is goodbye."
"It is. Whatever your intentions were, you still served SeeD, however short it was, so I'll arrange for you to get your GF back and your payment up until now before you leave."
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Kaejadra opened the hatch above him, and emerged into thick fog. He stood on the bridge deck of the transport. In front of him, over the railing and out of sight, were the monsters. One Hoard per ship. He never bothered to try and understand the basics of what made a Hoard, he just knew it was a calculation of culminated combat ability. This one, he knew through his connections with the monsters, comprised of three behemoths, two elnoyles, and five grendels.
He knew what the radar said about their position, and he didn't trust it. He never trusted technology over his own senses. He didn't trust technology at all. He was created by it, a nano-assembler void tube was his womb, the lab his bedroom, and an examination table his cradle. The monster arena was his only playground as he grew. Technology never helped him there, and it never will help him. No missiles or rockets were brought along, no antimatter cannons or plasma emitters, not even guns were allowed to be brought. Only himself, the monsters, the transport boats, and the bare minimum crew required to accomplish this.
He never trusted anything that didn't help him, and technology was one of many things that never helped him, only hurt and oppressed him. Technology didn't create the moon or it's creatures. Technology may have given him life, but his life never meant much to him. This power, his connection with the universal nexus of the GF Matrix, his connection with the monsters was his only relief. It was the only thing he ever had, the only thing that showed something other than malevolence to him, and he would embrace nothing else. Except now, it all changed. He was not alone.
He pulled on a gaze visor, the standard operations helmet of the Behemoth Syndicate and the Esthar military, and switched it to telescope view and infrared. The image he got was distorted, so reaching into his endless reservoir of power, his control magnified many times now that Eden was a part of him, he thinned out the fog, the fog that he summoned, for miles ahead of him. The visor's image clarified, and he was able to make out a beach, probably ten miles away. He estimated three hundred and fifty people stood close to the banks. Most were Balamb military, and this was probably the entire army there. Balamb was, after all, a small nation. The rest, he knew, were of the Garden. He knew there was just under fifty SeeDs currently, so there must have been several regular students who volunteered. They all amassed there, spread across a mile or so, waiting for them. Waiting for him.
He smiled as he took off the helmet. I'm sorry to disappoint, he silently mused, but I'm here for someone else.
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This is bad. Squall thought as he looked at the ocean. He could see nothing past fifty yards out, as a massive wall of fog covered it, approaching the island. It was as flat as a cliff side, half a kilometer high and miles wide. He didn't expect this. They wouldn't know where the boats would land, he couldn't coordinate different groups, and no one would know where they were on the battlefield if that fog was as thick as it looked.
He looked back to his camp. SeeD was ordered to participate in the battle, but the students were given a choice. Too many had backed down.
He had given the order that all Magic First Class users were to spread across the different groups. When they encounter the monsters, the melee fighters would surround the magic users, who would provide offense at long range and support at short range.
He had taken Rinoa to his camp. He didn't trust anyone but himself and his friends from their unforgettable adventure together to protect her, and he could easily see one of the common soldiers in their camp getting the wrong idea seeing a sorceress on the battlefield. All camps were to stick together as units, and he was not going to leave her side. She wasn't a student or a SeeD, and he didn't want her in this battle. But she had refused to leave, and he knew just how much of a help she would be.
He turned back to the ocean, to the rapidly approaching wall of fog. Off in the distance, he heard a behemoth roar.
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The first rows of ships hit the beach as the fog engulfed the inland military units. Several roars reverberated across the beach, and Squall cursed inwardly as he saw a few Balamb soldiers take steps backward. Stay focused. He told himself.
Through the thickening fog, they could hear heavy trampling approaching. "Rinoa, Irvine, and any long range weapon users," he called out behind him, "focus on larger monsters first!" After he said that, a huge shadow grew in the fog ahead of Squall. Readying his weapon, he prepared himself.
Suddenly, a huge jaw became visible. Reacting on instinct and GF intuition, Squall's left hand grabbed a tooth, while his gunblade wielding right reached between two razor-like teeth, straining every GF enforced muscle fiber in his being to keep the T-Rexuar's mouth from clamping down on him. Suddenly, the giant monster's head whipped up, throwing Squall into the air. The elite SeeD quickly got control of his flight, and landed on the monster's head, driving his gunblade through it's skull.
One down. He thought. If every monster was A-rank and above, they were in serious trouble. He suddenly heard a strangely familiar shriek in the foggy air, and soon, something blasted through the fog, and dragged him with it. Regaining his disciplined senses quickly, Squall found himself being dragged along by an elnoyle, with his stomach on the crooked abdominal section between the upper body and tail.
The gloomy SeeD hastily pushed off it's abdomen, planted his feet on the large stinger, and quickly made two deep slashes to the monster's midsection, severing it entirely. Through the fog, he could see the outline of a granaldo, and placing his feet on the upper body of the elnoyle, now starting to descend through the fog, he jumped off toward the new monster.
As he got near, he soon saw another elnoyle nearby. Landing on the shoulders of the barely larger monster, Squall quickly severed the granaldo's head, then looked to the elnoyle before they could both fall back to the ground. He instantly recognized the familiar gesture as the monster sucked in a deep breath, preparing to spew it out devastating magical energies.
He was about to use a bullet from his gunblade, but instantly disregarded the thought. He would use them only to protect Rinoa, no other reason. He reached back, and threw his gunblade like a boomerang. Before he and the granaldo he was 'riding' fell far enough away to where he couldn't see the monster, he saw his gunblade embed itself in the elnoyle's skull.
The seasoned mercenary jumped off the grandaldo, and cast float on himself, landing on the ground lightly. There, he saw a scene from hell. Half a dozen soldiers laying dead, one with nearly his entire body crushed and split open like a sack of flesh, and one still barely alive, his waist and everything below simply gone, as he struggled to hold on and live as he futilely dragged his near dead body with his arms across the blood covered ground.
And he saw there were still monsters that Rinoa and the rest of the camp were fighting. This was far from over. Running over to the dead elnoyle to retrieve his gunblade, he could only hope that his father would be able to gather his forces soon enough.
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Hideo turned his head to the east, looking at the entrance of Balamb as the first explosions of battle were heard. Shortly after, he heard the familiar whistle of an ultima spell, followed by another explosion. He told himself he didn't care, that he was leaving on the next transport. He had told himself that each time as he watched a train or a transport ship leave without him.
He continued down the street to where the road slanted down and started spiraling around the Balamb Hotel. There, he could see the docks, with hundreds of citizens pleading with the soldiers to let them onboard, or their wives or children. The train station was twice as packed. He could have left already, he could have sealed it all and been away from the battle with only a few words and some proof of identification. Yet he held back.
At long last, he was a blank slate. He had no gangs to run from, no government warrants to haunt him, no vendettas or phantoms, just death on one side and freedom on the other. There couldn't have been a clearer choice, yet he held back. For once in his life, fear no longer kept him moving: it kept him still. He feared Kaejadra, the Black Behemoth and their legion of monsters, but he also feared…he wasn't sure what it was. All his life he had been driven from one home after another, but for once, he had the choice to leave, and it was this choice, this small amount of freedom he rarely saw, that he was afraid of.
What happened to him? Had he become so accustomed to this never ending cycle that he actually believed his own hopes of something better merely to be a fantasy beyond possibility? Had this despair become so deeply rooted within him that he feared this possibility becoming reality? If it was not circumstances that brought such conflict to him, then he brought it upon himself. He truly had become hopelessly attached to pain.
"Hideo!" He was glad for the distraction, until he saw who the voice belonged to. No, not again!
Delta ran up to him, stopping several feet away from him, far enough to show she still didn't trust him. There, she just looked at him. She looked at him as if she didn't know if he were an enemy or ally, and he returned the look. For a long time, they just stared at each other, in a silent struggle as the sounds of battle echoed in the distance.
Finally, she broke the silence. "What are you doing? Don't you know what's going on?"
"Yes, and I have every reason in the world to run!" He almost yelled. This was the last thing he needed.
"And when did a few monsters scare you?"
He scoffed. "Delta, these aren't red bats or bite bugs! These aren't even grand mantises, we're looking at behemoths, elnoyles, T-Rexaurs, even red dragons! Talk all you want, you've never fought anything like that before!" The memories of Lunatic Pandora's pass over Esthar, of the hordes of monsters tearing through squadrons of soldiers at a time, was still fresh in his mind after nearly a year and a half. "We're junior SeeDs, we're nothing compared to the seniors! We'd only slow them down. What makes this so damn important to you?"
She huffed. "When Galbadia attacked Dollet, we ran, giving away our soldiers and our country. Well, this time I'm not abandoning my home!"
"Your home?" Hideo scoffed. "Delta, your home and your family are in Dollet! Are you going to throw all that away for this suicide cause?"
"Suicide cause?" She repeated, softly, as if she wasn't sure she heard that right. "Hideo, the Garden is our home! I'm not sure I ever really knew you, but I know this was your home as well! You can deny it all you want, but I know it meant something to you!"
He almost did deny it, but he knew he couldn't fool her. Or himself.
"Do you even know why you're leaving?" She asked.
"Do you even know why you're staying?" He asked, deciding to voice his thoughts. "You say you don't want to 'abandon your home'? Bullshit! You want to die out there, whether you realize it or not. You feel guilty for what your uncle did back during the siege on Dollet!" He broke the distance between them, and got his face to within inches of hers. He was short, only a couple inches taller than her, but he nevertheless looked down on her. "You talk about how you want to serve your people, about how you love your country. Well, this is not Dollet. If you die here, you wouldn't have served your people or your country! 'Abandon your home'? You just want to repent for those soldiers your uncle sacrificed! Now tell me, Delta, who's not being honest here?"
She returned his stare with a cold look. He had hit home. He could practically see her thoughts zipping around in her head. Soon, her cold stare changed. Her eyes started filling with hurt, her brows unfurled, and her lower lip started trembling.
He softened his gaze as well, and he put his hands on her shoulders. After a few seconds, he pulled her in and wrapped his arms around her. "Come with me, Delta, at least to the western continent."
She lifted her arms up, wrapping them over his shoulders. "Hideo, this place still means so much to me."
It does for me too. His mind wandered back to when he last saw Tetsuya. "Hideo, it was our home! Even if it's rat infested, it's still your home. That's something no one has any right to take away from you!" He closed his eyes tightly. "There are some things in this world that are worth risking your life for, even dying for."
"Delta," He pulled away from her enough to look her in the eye. He lifted his hand to brush her face, and he pressed his lips to hers. She didn't seem to notice as the aura of a cast spell radiated from him, and she fell asleep in his arms.
He took the payment chip he got from the Garden, nine thousand gil from a rank eleven SeeD, due to a three point promotion from his performance from the Deep Sea Research Center, and put it in her pocket. He picked her up in his arms and made his way to the outskirts of the crowd outside the train station. There, he found a guard.
"Hey, you!" He went over to the guard, and without warning, he put the unconscious girl in his arms. "Put her on the train, compliments of the Mayor." He pulled his Garden and SeeD ID from his wallet and put it in the man's hand. "Show this to the authorities, tell them to put her in my stead."
As the guard began to contemplate what the SeeD instructed, Hideo put his hand on Delta's cheek, caressing it. "If you live long enough, you'll understand that someday."
I understand now, Tetsuya. Thank you, bro.
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"Just die!" Hideo screamed as he barely dodged another slash from grendel number three. These small, agile dragons were so much easier when he had three GFs, including Bahamut, and other SeeDs helping him. Even with Shadow Run in almost constant use, he was having trouble with three on one.
He sidestepped as one leapt at him. Using the stepping, he spun around in hopes of at least cutting the beast, anywhere at all, but his translucent blue sword, Lunar Edge, was stopped by the grendel's bone-blade tail.
The GF intuition flared up, and he slipped his legs from under him as grendel number one leapt on him. His sword was too far away at that moment, so he kicked the monster away before it's claws could reach him. On his back, he wasn't quick enough to stop grendel two from leaping on him immediately after.
Hideo was able to grab a hold of one of the monster's front claws, while he barely managed to push away the other claw with his sword-baring hand. At this range, in this position, he wouldn't be able to swing hard enough to do more than barely cut the skin.
Hoisting with all his strength, he and the grendel rolled over, with the human on top. Enough was enough. He brought his feet together, his knees to his chest, and he kicked off the monster to take flight. In the air, he used the last of his few ultima spells to detonate the monstrous trio.
He landed well, but barely managed to stay standing. The four Balamb military personnel he hooked up with didn't last long, and in this fog, if you wandered twenty feet away, you were invisible.
That's why he didn't see the hand before it grabbed his leg.
"What the?" He recoiled, and saw on the ground a SeeD, caked blood on his mouth, his stomach cut open with intestines hanging out, and his legs were messy, bloody stumps just below the knees. His eyes were glazed, face as white as a sheet of paper, and he was soaked with sweat. His outstretched arm and head were shaking. His eyes didn't seem like they were able to stay on him for long.
"Please…please, help me find my legs!" He croaked. "Please…I need 'em…I promised…I'd dance with her…at the Garden Fest-" A huge red claw formed out of the fog, crushing the man's body with a sickening crunch. The huge black horns and small head of a ruby dragon followed.
Hideo recoiled, his breath quickening and sweat building. That was far from the first soul he saw taken, begging to live, here on these plains.
The dragon walked towards the Estharian slowly. Hideo's body trembled with fear and rage. That rage built within him, and he focused it into his magic, pushing the limits of what his body could handle, and channeled it through his outstretched hand into a blizzaga spell. The large blue comet-like crystal shot out, striking the monster's flank, instantly freezing the grass and soil, and turning the dragon's skin a crusted black. It roared in pain, and convulsed a couple of times.
Hideo gripped his sword and charged. His rage had abated enough for him to see the dragon rearing it's head back, ready to use it's fiery breath attack, and he activated his Shadow Run, jumping to the dragon's side, then onto it's back. He reversed his grip on the Lunar Edge, and with both hands, stabbed it into the dragon's back. He had tried to sever the spinal cord, but the vertebrae were too thick, too tough, and the blade was pushed to the side, into muscle and maybe an organ or two.
Shadow Run still in effect, he didn't hesitate at all by pulling out his twin pistols and firing at the monster's head. Each bullet ricocheted off it's thick skull. He had just used his last few shots for nothing!
Then, over the constant explosions, screams and roars of the battle around him, close and far off, all beyond sight in the white and gray fog, he heard another sound: machinery, and it was getting louder.
He grabbed his sword and jumped from the beast's backside just before a tank appeared from the fog. It ran into the ruby dragon, pushing it onto it's side, and then climbed on top of it, crushing what life was left in it.
When the stub-cannoned tank got off the monster, it's top hatch opened and a Balamb military officer appeared, holding a huge, double barreled assault rifle. One barrel was meant for rapid fire bullets, while the other was meant for anti-tank rounds. "I'm sorry, was he yours?" The man asked.
Hideo was too tired to even laugh at the joke. At this point, he was running purely on adrenaline. Where did this tank come from? Balamb doesn't have ground infantry vehicles. Being a small island, the country's military was comprised almost entirely of navel vessels and personnel. Then he saw the Dollet national symbol on the side. I guess those evacuation transports brought back more than empty boats.
Then, the sixth sense granted by the GF went crazy. Firing off the Shadow Run, Hideo managed to get ten feet away from the tank as an incredibly powerful thundaga spell hit it. A massive explosion of flares shot out, the tank catapulted twenty feet into the air to disappear into the fog, and the ground that was underneath it exploded in a shower of soil and grass. The shockwave from the spell knocked Hideo clean off his feet, and yet he was still distantly aware of the concussion from the tank hitting the ground again.
Several seconds passed before the world stopped spinning, and he managed to get back on his feet. What the hell was that? What could cast a spell so- He got his answer as a behemoth came into sight from the veils of wispy fog, walking straight at him.
Oh shit.
The behemoth scrunched up, and with the strange magical-field sight he gained from fighting Andrea and Kaejadra, he saw the beast preparing a spell. A black sphere appeared over it's head, barely visible at this distance.
He tried his best to recall what spell this was as fast as he could. He nearly panicked when he realized what it was. Meteor!
A huge, ten-foot-wide lump of rock fired out, and Hideo barely managed to jump out of it's trajectory as it hit the earth, tearing through the ground as if it were loose sand. He activated the Shadow Run for the hundredth time since he got on the Alcauld Plains, and managed to maneuver around the gigantic asteroids as they plowed through the ground, covering a large area.
As he avoided one, he found himself staring right at one too close for him to run to the sides. There was only one way to go: up. Firing off his legs for everything they were worth, he barely cleared the meteor with his legs still attached.
Then he saw his mistake as one flew directly at him. In the air, he had surrendered all control to gravity, and he had no way of avoiding it. As desperation gripped him, instinct took over, and he fired off a telekinetic burst, shattering the rock. The left over pieces still pummeled him. One piece the size of a basketball hit him clean on the head, knocking sense and orientation out of him as gravity continued it's work, making him crash to the ground.
He laid there, fighting to stay conscious. His head throbbed like a drum the size of the Garden. His vision was fogged, and sight became tinted red. Through his confusion, he managed to react on a single instinct, a thing he relied on far too much out here. "Curaga." The blue energies of his last curative spell swirled over his body and penetrated into him. Quickly his mind became clearer, and he saw the tint in his sight was from one eye having blood from the meteor hit seeping into it.
He got onto his hands and knees, breathing heavily, exhaustion starting to overpower the adrenaline. He heard the grunting of the behemoth coming closer. He looked up and saw it's purple form approaching through the fog. Damn you!
He reached into his stock, and used the last blind spell he had left. He used the rest helping a few others fight a pair of Iron Giants.
Thick, black smoke formed around the behemoth's head. It's first reaction was to paw it's head to remove whatever was obstructing it's vision. But the smoke persisted, fuming from nothing but the ether. Then the huge monster jumped up and started bouncing around, bucking like a bronco, whipping around it's eel-like tail and huge black horns.
Hideo groaned. Now he wasn't going to be able to use melee attacks on it without being pulled under and trampled. Kaejadra knows how to train his monsters.
Gritting his teeth, he used a firaga spell, hitting the monsters hard, yet barely burning through it's short, coarse fur. Hideo growled and used another one, then another, then his last one. He then resorted to Ice elemental attacks, then lightning, then used his second level magic, then his first. He then used his last thunder spell, the merely one-thousand volts hitting the beast, and it still continued.
Goddamn it, no wonder these things are feared so damn much! He ran a long circle around the still bucking monster. Then he saw the wreckage of the tank, and the huge assault rifle. Putting his sword back in it's sheath and firing off the Shadow Run, he blazed across the field and grabbed it. He took a second to look it over, and switched it to auto-fire. Setting the butt against his shoulder, he pulled back the trigger, making it spit fire at the monster. The bullets were lodging themselves in the beast's muscles, but no further. Hyne, why do they have to be so damn muscular!
Then it stopped bucking, and it looked at Hideo through black eyes. The blind spell had worn off.
Hideo looked over the rifle, and found the switch for the anti-tank rounds. He flipped the heavy switch, aimed, and fired. The recoil nearly knocked him over, but he was rewarded as a huge chunk of meat blasted off the behemoth. Finally, something that hurt this bastard! He fired again, and again, and again, blowing up huge chunks of flesh, sending blood all over. Finally, the ten round clip was exhausted, and the behemoth dropped dead.
Hideo dropped the gun, and fell to his knees. His vision was getting blurry, the constant deafening racket of monsters roaring, spells firing, and people screaming, all out of sight, was starting to sound like music, bidding him to succumb to his exhaustion.
Then he felt it. Beyond his five senses, beyond the GF, he felt him. All other sound softened into silence, and he heard clapping. He lifted his head and saw a silhouette in the fog approaching. Then, Kaejadra became fully visible.
Formerly clothed in a black hakama and haori, he now wore baggy white pants and a blue vest with heavy golden embroidery, zipped up in front.
"So here you are." He cooed. "And I was starting to think you had run like you did before."
Ixion, if ever I needed your help, it's now! He activated the Shadow Run, leaping up, pulling his sword from it's sheath and attacking all in the blink of an eye. Even faster than his attack, Kaejadra lifted his hand to meet the Lunar Edge. A force blasted from the sorcerer's hand, and the blade shattered.
Hideo fell to his knees, shock overriding his senses. He put his hand to his chest, and saw blood oozing through his fingers. This isn't happening. He prayed.
The sorcerer stood before him, laughing, mocking his weakness. He truly was weak, and only now, as his lifeblood left him, did he understand it.
Off in the distance, he heard screams, cries for help, cries of pain, cries of desperation. Cries that he could not make, now, with a shard embedded in his lung.
His head sagged, his body convulsed, and blinding pain shot through him as he coughed up blood to mix with the crimson of the hundreds of humans and monsters that covered the fields. All around him, the bodies of SeeDs, soldiers, and monsters lay lifeless, mutilated, their faces carved with submission to hopelessness.
It truly was hopeless, only a fool would dare hope, and he had been such a fool. Here, on this field, he was going to die. How could he have thought he had a chance against one powerful enough to destroy a GF? Now, he had nothing. His guns were empty, he had exhausted his magic stock, and now, his sword was shattered. How fitting that his first weapon for taking life would now claim his own.
"Hmm." The sorcerer mused. There was a shallow cut on his cheek from when he shattered the other's sword. "That was careless of me."
I'm going to die. He realized. Suddenly, all his fears ended. All the pain he bore since his birth, all the hatred and suffering he endured throughout his life no longer existed. He never knew, until now, just how afraid he always was. For the first time in his life, he was content to be where he was, dying here on this battlefield, all fear gone.
He sensed the man charging his power to deliver one last blow, one that, he knew, would incinerate his body. Fine by me.
As the last few seconds of his life, each feeling like hours, ticked away, Hideo wondered how everything lead up to this point. His life flashed before his eyes. Tetsuya's sacrifice, Liam's lessons, the hackings in Esthar, President Loire's ultimatum, his first sight of the Garden, adjusting to the technology, the SeeD tests, it all flashed through his mind.
Yet one thing eclipsed all others, one feeling that made everything else miniscule: Delta. He knew exactly how she would feel when she found out he was dead, just like when Tetsuya died.
No! He wasn't going to put her through that! He was going to see her again, even if he was going to get a beating for putting her on that train, he was going to see her again!
He lifted his head to look Kaejadra in the eyes. Sorry, asshole, but I think I'll cling to hope and suffering just a little longer! He knew what the only possibility was. His fear of dying overrode his fear of that power, and he dove back there, into that infinite tunnel. Instead of driving away from it, he flew towards the light. If this does cause a ethereal-physical reaction, or a fluctuation in magical properties, at least I'll take you out!
Then he hit it. He found his soul surrounded in light, and magical power beyond his wildest imaginations. It was as if he were teleported to the bottom of an abyss, and breathed in a lungful of water. He felt both his body and soul change, shifting across this new power. He had no control over it, he had no need to. The power flowed freely through him, he did not contain any of it.
He was lifted from the ground, light pulsing rapidly from his body. The blue crystal shard shot from his chest, nearly cutting Kaejadra in the process. Hideo's head and arms were pulled back, as if he were being lifted by the chest. Webbed waves of milky light exploded out, each firing off as rapidly as the pulses of light.
Suddenly, all the expended light retracted and flashed back into the Estharian's body. Hideo fell lightly to the ground, kneeling, face towards the ground. Streaks of snowy white flashed through his hair until that was it's full color. He rose to his feet, and looked the sorcerer in the eyes. Eyes that were once green now were black abysses, save the blue pupil in the center.
The Bastard Shepherd smiled. "I've been waiting for this!"
End of Chapter Nine.
Author's Note: Well, there you have it. The conclusion to the cliffhanger I left in the prologue. Or would it be proepilogue? Since my word check is marking it, I'm guessing that's not a word. Anyways, I'll probably post the final chapter in a few days. As you can expect, it'll involve a big-ass fight sequence. Hope you enjoy.