Bloody hell, it's taken me a long time to write this one. I kind of made a start on it when I finished Chapter 6, but somehow it got shoved down to the bottom of my list of priorities.

This chapter is quite action-oriented, but it'll be the last bit of gunfire you'll get for a while. The next chapter will be much more sedate, because I need some character detail and the plot section coming up doesn't involve goons with big guns. Anyway, off with the rambling, on with the writing. Enjoy!

Chapter Seven

Military trucks encircled the rain-washed street, soldiers and officers milling around the scene with sour expressions, often taking photos, jotting in notebooks or talking curtly to reporters. The chopping sound of a helicopter's rotors could be heard overhead, and I looked upwards and saw the black outline of a Blackhawk glide past. Flashbulbs clicked, with phosphorus-white flashes and discussions over what to snap next. It had been an hour or so since the incident, which would no doubt make its way into the newspaper that ferried about the Timber Hotel on a miniature train, but as I was the only witness, I was required to stay behind and recount my story. I suppose I could have run away, but knowing the cold-hearted nature of the Galbadian investigators, I'd be looking over my shoulder until they caught up with me. The last thing I needed right now was unwanted attention, especially considering the occurrences during my missions.

Speaking of those missions, I still had plenty on my plate, fragments of information without source or meaning. Who or what was Ultima? Why were Galbadians carrying out strange transactions wherever I went? More to the point, why were Galbadians trying to cause trouble within Garden, their country's greatest yet most formidable ally? The questions and facts whirled around my head, distracting my judgment, and it resulted in me giving short, uninterested answers and undetailed accounts to Galbadian majors and journalists.

Finally, after another half-hour of dictaphones thrust into my face, the Galbadian troops dismissed me, and I began the long trudge to the hotel. I was soaked to the skin; my boots squelched with water every time I took a step, water dripped from my sodden fringe, and my black coat clung stickily to my wringing shirt. The torrential rain had evolved into a full-blown thunderstorm, illuminating the desolate streets with tongues of lightning and filling them with cracking echoes of thunder.

I was not surprised to find the hotel dark and empty when I returned, as it was long past the owners' lights-out time. I quietly made my way up to my room, which was made more difficult by the boots which squeaked and oozed water onto the floorboards. My darkened room had very few features, namely an on-suite bathroom and a dresser, but it had enough space for me and my limited needs for another day or so. I stuffed my coat in a carrier-bag, as there was no wash-basket, and I showered and shaved in the on-suite. Unfortunately, the razor was one of the bluntest I'd ever set eyes on. Every drag of the blade yanked hairs out of their roots rather than slicing cleanly through them, and after I cut a slit in an unprotected area under my chin, the shave went to hell in a flurry of blood and white foam. I must have used half a toilet roll patching myself up afterwards.

Eventually, I changed into a fresh black t-shirt and some jeans, and put on a blue-and-white checked shirt over the top. It wasn't exactly stylish, but at least it was dry. Just before I locked myself in my room, I retrieved a truly awful pie from the fridge in the hotel's storeroom, which I ate cold as I had no facilities to cook it. After another twenty minutes' deliberation, I locked the door to my room and laid my briefcases on top of the ragged throws covering my bed. In one was the customised W2000 rifle, broken down and greased, and the other held my handgun slides. Carefully, I extracted each component from the case and wordlessly clipped them into place, screwing a silencer onto the barrel of each, creating two silenced USP pistols. I lifted my pillow up and tossed one of the guns underneath, and I returned the other one to the case and stashed it in the dresser. Having done that, I finally got into bed, keeping my clothes on because the covers weren't thick enough to provide real resistance to the bitter cold.

It was still raining brutally when I clicked the standard lamp off, so much so that I couldn't see the street outside through a wash of rainwater. The rain drummed incessantly on the window panes, trickling down the glass lazily. I lay quietly for a while, just listening to the rain and gazing into a thick night sky fogged orange in the glow of street-lamps, and thought about what had happened to my life in just a few short days. I was in this mess deeper than I ever wanted to be; the inclusion of Dangers into the fray made it something of a personal issue for me, as I'd known him since we were juniors at G-Garden. As much as I disliked him, his personal vendetta against Edea was something that mystified me—as younger students, he and I shared very little interest in Galbadia's political climate, and often talked about the latest magazines during conferences in G-Garden's auditorium.

But this new name, Ultima, was something I couldn't fit into the equation. It was an unnecessary addition, and something which appeared to have no relation to any of the other facts.

Eventually, as I had done for many of the past few nights, I drifted into a light sleep fuelled by entirely too much thinking, a bad habit of mine. Although my sleep patterns changed almost every night, and sometimes caught me completely off-guard, requiring a re-shuffle of my schedule, I often caught a few hours of sleep here and there. To be honest, it didn't happen too often—I was probably a few steps short of being a full-blown insomniac.

I woke just after dawn to the sound of a cell phone ringing, emanating from the pocket of my jeans. Instinctively, my hand grasped the USP concealed beneath my pillow, but I quickly realised nobody had a gun pointed at me, so I reached into the pocket to withdraw the phone.

"Irvine Kinneas," I stated tersely, not wanting a long conversation.

"I thought I told you to stay in the company of the Forest Owls," a voice demanded on the other end of the line. It was Cid's voice.

"Yeah, I didn't like their cooking," I replied, hauling myself out of bed. I could almost hear Cid creasing his brow in thought.

"No matter," he finally declared, "it's not that important. Our client has requested assistance again, and your name was mentioned."

This guy sure thinks a lot of me, I thought with an optimistic warping of the mouth. "What's the deal this time?"

"Turn on the TV. You'll see." I didn't actually know there was a TV in the room, but I found the grey unit nestled in the corner, remote perched on top. I turned the volume down as low as I could while still able to hear it, but the scenes on the screen told me all I needed to know. Military trucks, the same as the ones in the street the previous night, were lined around the Missile Base in Galbadia, which had only been purged of Estharian insurgents a couple of days before. Flames engulfed the checkpoint at the main entrance, probably the result of incendiary grenades. My theory was proved correct when the camera flitted over a blackened corpse, slumped over the red-and-white-striped barrier.

"What the hell happened?" I asked in awe.

"Hostage situation. Terrorists stormed the place earlier this morning, killed most of the soldiers and took the technicians hostage. Problem is, they've got access to most of Galbadia's nuclear technology in there, and as they clearly stated in their demands, they're not afraid to use them."

"Speaking of which," I said, eyes still fixed on the images of pandemonium, "what do they want? These terrorists seem to be doing this for fun nowadays."

"No, these guys are serious." Cid paused for a second before continuing. "They want the Sorceress turned over to them."

"Who, Edea?"

"Of course."

"Damn." I switched the TV off, and threw the dresser's doors open, taking out the cases with my free hand. "So what am I supposed to do about it?"

"We need you to go in there, rescue the hostages and avoid any confrontations if possible. They probably won't hesitate to launch if provoked, so use your discretion. And they've got a hostage with significant bargaining power, especially for Galbadia."

"Who?"

"I can't say, it's confidential. Strictly by the book, you hear me?"

"Yeah, I hear you," I replied, and hung up before he could reply.

Over the next few minutes, I dressed myself carefully, selecting clothing which was unlikely to make me look out of place, and I inserted the silver pistols into holsters under my coat. I could hardly believe this assignment came up when it did, as I'd only had a single night's rest—nowhere near enough to recuperate. I still had a pretty unpleasant headache, so I reached for a bottle of painkillers from the medicine cabinet. You could tell by the packaging what it was—an unremarkable white bottle with one of those ridged safety caps, which were usually almost impossible to detach from the bottle. I mouthed a small handful of the tablets, and washed them down with a gulp of rusty-tasting tapwater.

As I headed for my hotel room door to leave, the cell phone in my coat pocket emitted a low tone, signalling a call. I dug around in the deep trench of the pocket, and flipped it open with a deft flick of the wrist.

"Kinneas," I muttered. "If this isn't the most beautiful woman in the world, I'm hanging up."

"But sir!" Watts babbled enthusiastically, "we've got another assignment, and we're leaving soon. Just wanted to let you know."

"Sorry, Watts," I answered. "I'm busy today. I can't come with you."

"This is important, sir!" he insisted. Not only was his not the voice I wanted to hear, it was telling me things I didn't want to know. "Sir, haven't you been watching the news?"

"A little."

"We're going to the missile base, sir," Watts announced. "We're gonna try and sneak in somehow, cause we want to see what's happening in there." Now, as you can imagine, I was a little confused. Why would a Timber resistance faction want to investigate a terrorist activity in Galbadia—and what was in it for them? More to the point, I needed to get into the base myself, and I didn't really want them to accompany me, seeing how inept they were, but I figured I wouldn't get rid of them too easily. Resignedly, I decided to accompany them by default.

"Meet me outside the hotel in five minutes," I said curtly, then snapped the phone off.

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The journey that followed was a long and arduous trek through the dustbowl of Galbadia, walking through sand-brushed deserts and red-walled canyons. The unrelenting rain still continued, showering down from a dismal grey sky, and the sand beneath our feet was soggy and clung to my boots.

"What's the mission plan?" I asked, out of the blue. Zone, seemingly caught by surprise, threw a startled gaze toward Watts, who looked equally taken back.

"Uh… We haven't quite… worked one out yet," he managed. Almost as if he was expecting a steely stare from yours truly, he threw the hood of his blue anorak over his head. The problem with this mission was that Zone had chosen an item of clothing that made him stick out like a Shumi in the middle of a Galbadian shopping centre. Nice one.

So it was that the rest of the journey passed without any significant events—even though I had silenced weaponry, I couldn't afford to waste precious ammo on fiends roaming the plains. They weren't enough of a threat anyway. I had stuffed the USP pistols in my belt on further consideration, although I made sure to take the safety off so I wouldn't lose anything important. We reached the base after around an hour's constant walking, an hour that made me wish we'd been able to use their train—although it was quicker and more efficient, we couldn't alert the terrorists to our position, especially given the Owls' cowardly pretensions.

"Can you see anyone from here?" Zone whispered as we crouched behind a nearby canyon cliff. Almost as a reply, Watts produced a pair of binoculars with something of a flourish, and cupped his eyes to the lenses.

"Not much happening, sir," Watts observed. "I can only see fire and dead bodies." Feeling slightly impatient, I gestured for him to pass the binoculars over, as I preferred to make my own assessment than trust the judgment of others. The binoculars were the type often favoured by big-budget Galbadian blockbusters, overlaid with a red targeting display showing statistics for elevation, wind speed and direction. I tracked the base with the intersecting red crosshairs, checking for any sign of life, but there seemed to be none. Dead Galbadian soldiers were strewn around the entrance, lying in uncomfortable heaps near the weapon inspection lobby and the solid armoured barrier to the base.

"Damn," I growled. "Who the heck would want to do a thing like this?"

"That's what we want to find out," Zone replied, gesturing for me to return the binoculars to Watts, which I did. "Thing is, Galbadian security around Timber's kind of eased off a bit since the Estharian invasion of Deling City, so I suppose this is a close-to-home issue."

"I'd hate to be the poor fool who has to think up a cover story for this," I said, frowning.

It took another few minutes to reach the weapon strip section, which, as we had ascertained previously, was unoccupied. I stepped cautiously into the booth where a soldier had collapsed over a control terminal, and I retrieved the FA-MAS assault rifle he had slung under his arm, putting my arm through the looping strap. As I stepped back out onto the tarmac, Zone regarded me with a puzzled glare.

"You think we'll need those?" he asked tentatively. In response, I slapped a magazine into the underside of the rifle with a loud clack.

"Better be safe than sorry, right?" Zone nodded in affirmation, clearly having doubts about the mission. I assumed he'd had some sort of military training, but given his usual bumbling ineptitude, it wasn't a certainty. With that, we continued our journey toward the inside of the base, which was made much easier by a technical malfunction in the gate control system, and we halted again after a short time, just behind an army truck emblazoned with Galbadian army insignias.

"I'm looking in the back," I announced, and walked over to the back doors of the truck. Discovering they were still open, I threw them aside and surveyed the interior. The truck was riddled with bullet entry holes, and so I wasn't surprised to see dead soldiers in the back, clad in the usual blue uniforms and clutching the standard-issue magic swords. The driver had had it worst of all; a round had shattered through the glass of the windscreen, through his head and out the back of the headrest of the seat. I winced as I surveyed the scene.

Then, thinking of the Estharians in Deling City, my mind began formulating a plan. Seifer had taken on the guise of an Esthar soldier in order to infiltrate the Presidential Palace more successfully. It would be just as easy to do the same thing here…

Watts and Zone were bouncing around in frustration and impatience after the amount of time I had spent in the truck, but those stares soon turned to bafflement as I hurled a dead G-Soldier onto the tarmac.

"You think you can fit into this guy's uniform?" I asked, holding the deceased soldier by the collar of his uniform. "It'd be the best way to get inside the base."

"Do I have to?" the anorak-clad man protested. I looked up from the ground with a disparaging stare.

"You got a better idea?" No response to that question. "Good. So what are you waiting for?"

"Well, sir," Watts added, "Don't you think the terrorists have kept tabs on who they've taken out so far? Aren't all the G-Soldiers around here dead?"

"I dunno," I said. "Maybe we'll pretend to be reinforcements or backup. Better than going in as civvies, I'd say. Whatever we do in there, and however we go in, we haven't got time to have coffee thinking about it. So don't you think we ought to get on with it?"

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As per the usual arrangement, I found myself infiltrating the base alone again, as Zone and Watts had chosen the typically easier route inside—an exhaust vent near one of the outhouses. Still, with all the crawling I'd done back in Deling City, I wasn't sorry to be approaching the base from the back door. Unfortunately, and fitting my usual lack of good fortune, I was dressed in the most unenviable soldier's uniform—said soldier seemed to have an unfortunate tendency to wet himself in times of trouble.

In fact, evaluating my plan from a realistic point of view, I began to realise how badly thought out it was. Sure, Zone had been lucky enough to acquire his uniform from the guard who had been hit cleanly in the head, but the soldiers Watts and I had taken ours from had seen enough lead to start a pencil factory. I was hoping my contingency plan didn't involve the terrorists seeing me too much.

I made my way round the back of the central building quietly, using the wall as both support and concealment, so that any passing terrorists around the other side wouldn't have been able to see me. I had a suspicion, though, considering usual terrorist activities, that most of them would be inside the base guarding the hostages. I didn't rule out any other possibilities, however, as there could still have been some patrolling the outside or taking a cigarette, as they do. I made sure my FA-MAS was in reach, hand tightly around the trigger guard, and I used one hand to prop myself up as I leant round the corner. To my surprise, there was no-one about.

Rounding the corner and following the same pattern on the next wall, pressed flush against it, I aimed my assault rifle expertly at each possible entry or exit point. The base was silent. Or at least it was until I heard the crackle of static on my radio, signalling a call from my Timberan compatriots.

"What's happening?" I growled into the mouthpiece.

"They're keepin' 'em in the main hangar," the voice on the other end replied. "Are you inside the base?"

"Not yet," I cut him off. "Don't worry; I'm working on it."

"We're gonna hang out here for a while. Tell us when you're inside." Typical. I should have known what to expect, really. I clicked the radio off with my thumb, and stuffed it in the pocket of my uniform.

The door to the base was already open, and I quietly clicked it shut as I passed through into the base. It was a welcome respite from the showers, although there was a dismal patter of the rain on the metal of the building. Not having a keycard to rely on, I instead fished a screwdriver out of my pocket and tried to unscrew the panel, a task easier said than done, as the screwdriver in question was a flat-head one I only kept for emergencies. Eventually, after much deliberation, the panel began to detach from the wall, and I prised it away with the rectangular head of the screwdriver. I'd seen this thing on a film once, where one of the characters re-worked the wiring inside a keycard reader, or a biometric security system or something, and the door opened automatically. Thankfully, and unlike most of the other scrapes I'd had with electronics, I actually knew what I was doing – something about detaching the wire which linked the reader to the door's opening mechanism, I assumed. And with the final twist of optic wire, the door obediently shot upwards.

The Galbadian missile base was another place I'd only passed through on a previous jaunt, in the Ultimecia chapter of my life, but I at least knew enough about it to find my way through. The maze-like intersections of walkway were sprinkled with terrorists wielding FA-MAS rifles and AK-47s (or 74s, I wasn't entirely sure), and incendiary grenades hung by their pins on the greens the guards were wearing. It wasn't looking too hot.

"I'm in," I said into my radio. "You say the hostages are all in the hangar, right? The main missile storage place, yeah?"

"That's the one," Zone's voice confirmed, echoing inside a steel exhaust pipe.

"How d'ya get in there?" I asked. The line was quiet for a few seconds, not even punctuated by the gritty static I usually heard.

"Don't ask me, I don't even work here," Zone replied. How useful. Clicking my radio off again, I began to make my way toward the missile command room, careful to approach it slowly due to the army boots I was wearing, and found myself flush against another wall next to the door of the room. Unfortunately, boring as it was, an area which contained much the same sort of terrain had to be approached in the same way, meaning my actions had been recycled once again.

When I kicked the door down, however, the proverbial hell broke loose. You see, I was expecting another room full of gunned-down G-Soldiers or maybe just a few unmanned computer terminals. What I got instead was two swarthy, thick-set terrorists wearing unremarkable camouflage greens, although the cause of most consternation was the body armour and face-concealing balaclavas the pair were wearing, meaning I couldn't identify them or get a good shot off. It wouldn't stop me trying, though.

"Drop that fucking gun!" one of them screamed, tightening his grip on his AK to ensure I hadn't forgotten he was armed.

"You drop your fucking gun, asshole!" I yelled back, protruding the muzzle of the FA-MAS further in front of me as if to say, You think YOU'RE armed, bitch?

"Fucking drop it now!" This conversation was in need of termination, immediately. I ducked out through the door into the hallway, and almost instantly I heard the ringing of shots on metal, the AK fired at where my head had been just seconds before. I thought I heard the click of a magazine being released, and although I couldn't be too sure about it, it was the best chance I'd have in a while. Leaning round the corner just enough to see what was coming without exposing myself too much, I held down the trigger on the FA-MAS, resulting in a prolonged burst which I think struck one of the terrorists square in the chest. It wouldn't have killed him, but maybe it knocked him back a pace or so. Hearing the clumsy sound of footsteps on metal, I realised the terrorists were making a run out the other door in the room, and I sprinted into the room, my gun zeroed on one of the terrorists attempting to escape. He only turned around when it was too late, and as he saw me approaching he readied the AK with one hand. But my gun was already spitting rounds again, and this time, one of the rounds struck him just below the chin. Now unable to move, the remaining spray of bullets lifted him off his feet like a giant hand wrapping around him, flinging him carelessly against a computer terminal.

There was only one problem, and to use my favoured term, it was a fucking big one. The other terrorist in my absence had gained something of a headstart, and I knew once he was back with his comrades he wouldn't hesitate for a second to raise the alarm. Sure enough, the invasive wail of a klaxon kicked in through the speakers dotted around the base, accompanied by the dimming of strip-lights overhead to make way for flashing red ones mounted on the walls. Well, this mission's gone to hell, I told myself with a private sigh.

I was already prepared for the influx of movement and shouting out in the main hall, so when I heard "Freeze!" come from a walkway just above mine, my rifle was already angled upward to combat the speaker. But it wasn't necessary; just as we were both going to fire, a grate detached itself from the ceiling, directly above the new terrorist's head. He raised both hands to stop the grate from knocking him on the head, which was exactly the intention; now the terrorist was unable to reach his gun, a 12-gauge shotgun protruded out of the open vent, and a tongue of flame erupted from the muzzle. The force of the shot shoved him to the ground, and I thought I felt a shower of blood on my G-army helmet through the gaps in the grated walkway.

"Nice work," I called up to the shotgun-wielder, raising a thumbs-up. Immediately, crackles of gunfire sounded from another, more distant walkway.

"Go!" a disembodied voice yelled. "I'll cover you." So it was the most obvious of advice, but I was at least appreciative that Zone had decided to get off his chicken-shit ass and do something useful. I sprinted across the walkway, listening out for the rattling of AK fire, and as I ran, I squeezed the trigger of my FA-MAS at irregular intervals, sweeping the rifle across the air in exaggerated arcs. I didn't hear any screams of pain, so I assumed I hadn't hit anyone this time; like the terrorist gunman, I was firing blindly, just spraying ammo around to warn them that I wouldn't hesitate to fire if the need arose.

The returning fire in the distance cut off, maybe because said terrorist had thought better of his ammunition, and so I made it to the staircase without any further distraction. As I suspected, the calm didn't last long, and I found myself jerking to a halt as I saw yet another balaclava-clad thug dart out from round the corner, where the missiles were loaded. Actually, I might have encountered him before, but I wasn't all that interested in making acquaintances with him.

"Who in the hell are you!" he yelled, tightening the grip on a USAS-12 jackhammer shotgun. Fancy weapon, incredibly powerful and fast-firing, but more importantly, Galbadian. Whoever these guys were, they were probably in league with the other Galbadian weirdos I'd encountered on my travels so far – and for the same reason or a different one, they all had a beef with the Sorceress.

"Hi, I'm the postman," I replied, before pulling the trigger on the FA-MAS again, tightening my hands in anticipation of the recoil. But all that came was a dry click, signalling that the clip was empty. I cursed my stupidity; not only had I used all the 5.56 ammo firing at someone who I couldn't even see, let alone hit; like the fucking idiot I was, I hadn't got any reserves of ammo from the soldiers. The soldier sneered laughter like he'd already won the fight; being a little more forward-thinking, I discarded the rifle, which clattered to the floor.

As I swivelled around and began to make my escape, furiously thinking of a secondary plan, I heard the familiar sound of footsteps on metal, along with the over-enthusiastic clack of a fresh magazine being slapped in the underside of the USAS-12. That's my trick, you jerkass, I thought angrily. Hoping he couldn't see where I'd gone, and that he wasn't far enough up the stairs, I put one hand on the railing and vaulted myself over it, dropping down to the bottom rail so he couldn't see me.

I was hanging precariously on the edge of the railing with just one hand, keeping the other free so I could loose a weapon or something from my belt, and that familiar foot-on-metal sound grew closer by the second. I just prayed he was as stupid as the movie terrorists, and would think I'd magically vanished into thin air. For the first few seconds of creeping and stalking around the walkway, USAS-12 clutched menacingly to chin to look threatening, I thought I'd got away with it.

"Here, piggy piggy," the voice sneered, with the occasional clank of another footstep. These guys, I noted dryly, sure were good conversationalists. Then, as he turned to face the railing, frowning down into the darkness below, I stretched my free hand down to my ankle and freed the knife wedged in my sock, and placed it between my teeth. Yeah, it didn't taste so good, but it had to be done.

His head was now right over the top of the railing, leering down with a frown deep enough to grow potatoes in, but I was probably obscured too much by the darkness for him to see me. Or maybe he just needed to go to an optician, or forgot his glasses, or something. Whatever was causing his bout of myopia, it meant he couldn't see my hand, and when he turned around again, I seized the moment immediately. Yanking the knife out of my teeth, I pivoted upward and thrusted the blade into the flesh surrounding his ankle.

"Motherfucker!" he screamed, his jackhammer kicking a shot off at the nearby wall. The diversion was all I needed; using my knife hand, I powered myself up over the grating again, and planted a kick directly under his chin, which snapped his head backward with a cracking sound. If I was lucky, I'd broken his jaw; but even if I had, he still wasn't immobilised enough. As he collapsed to the grating, I grabbed his neck and pressed down hard on the carotid artery, cutting off the blood supply to his brain. Well, that was the intention, but when he looked up to me as if to say Why don't you just kill me? I assumed it was another trick I'd seen many times before but never actually put into action. For good measure, and as a response to the unspoken question, I shoved an elbow into his forehead, which finally knocked him unconscious.

"Shut up," I said, dragging the knife out of his ankle and smearing it on his camo greens.

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Explosive barrels, I told myself with a grin. How come there's always strategically-placed barrels containing highly flammable material in terrorist situations? You'd think after all the times terrorists have been incinerated by explosive barrels just asking to be shot, these Galbadian guys would attempt to avoid the clichés associated with a hostage situation. But much to my surprise – given what Cid had told me about the seriousness of this campaign – these guys were following the Terrorist's Handbook, step-by-step. It wasn't even anything different – the barrels contained nitroglycerine, as they always did. Still, it made my task a hell of a lot easier.

As all good terrorists did (and the amateur ones, at that), they kept all the hostages in a big group, huddled up and kneeling by racks of plutonium cores and decommissioned missiles. From my vantage point in the exhaust vent, I could see terrorists stalking about the place, at least four or five, all armed with the now-standard AKs or combat shotguns, and I think one of them, who kept vanishing behind a wall, had a USAS-12.

"Can you see them from where you are?" Watts' voice crackled out of the radio on my belt. Thankfully, he'd chosen to lower his voice slightly, so the echo wasn't loud enough to alert any eavesdroppers.

"Yup," I responded. "All in a group, as usual. If we can get the hostages out of the way, we should be able to take them on. Got any ideas?"

The response to that question? Damn, I think I'd already heard this excuse before, word for word. "We're… working on it." Well, that meant I was in on my own again, much to my surprise (take note: I use sarcasm very often.) The FA-MAS was long out of the question; I'd discarded it on the walkway, but in keeping with my lazy proclivities, I wasn't interested in looking around for ammunition, so it wasn't even a minor consideration. Good thing I'd prepared those USP pistols beforehand. To my disappointment, the USPs didn't have the LEM modules you sometimes found stuck under the barrel (the simplest of all military technology; put the little red dot on your target, and when you fire, that's where the bullet goes) but they were adequate. Hell, they'd save my life if I needed it saved, so that was more important.

There was one terrorist I was beginning to find annoying, not just because he had a bigger gun than I did, but mostly due to his unrelenting pacing around the hangar. I don't think he stopped pacing once the whole time I was watching him – I seriously thought he was going to wear a hole in the floor. But it occurred to me that his set pattern, which he must have followed a good hundred times, involved passing by the aforementioned barrels of nitroglycerine, putting himself in danger from any immediate attacker. If I were him, I wouldn't have strayed too close to bright orange barrels marked with the yellow-and-black danger stripe – because, you know, those stripes are there for a reason – but as I'd realised many times, these guys weren't the professionals they were made out to be.

I turned myself around in the tunnel with as little shuffling as I could muster, ensuring my legs were in front of me so I'd be able to drop out easily for an attack. I placed both feet on the hatch, ready to kick it out in a Zone-style manoeuvre, but as I was recollecting my thoughts, I heard the thunderous explosion of a shotgun. Through the gaps in the hatch, I saw one of the group of terrorists topple over backwards, his face a bloody pulp. The twelve-gauge shot had practically dissolved his face.

"Heads up!" I yelled, and shunted my feet forward. The hatch detached from the vent, and the diversion was exactly right for the terrorists, who'd been preparing to take out the hostages. Immediately, like the inefficient morons they were, they all turned toward the source of the noise. Instinctively, I rolled at the bottom of the short drop, ensuring I didn't land awkwardly on the ground, and whipped the two USPs out of my belt. I think the remaining terrorists had a bit of trouble deciding who to shoot at; me or Zone, who'd created the original diversion; but it was long enough for me to conceal myself behind a cart of 500 kg bombs, which no-one would risk shooting at (unless they felt like evaporating the entire continent for kicks.) I heard Zone's shotgun fire once again, and took this as a cue; with a USP in each hand, I dove out sideways from behind the rack, firing each trigger in a consecutive rhythm. The pacing terrorist, who was diving out of the way, unfortunately found himself darting through the explosive barrels, which, struck by the pistol rounds, exploded in a torrent of orange flame.

"I'm checking the missile launch panel, you watch the hostages!" I yelled to Zone, who, armed with a shotgun, suddenly seemed a million times less inept. The panel in question was out in the main hall, mounted on a wall, and it operated using the most up-to-date software and targeting programs for a lower margin of error. Of course, not being a computer geek, I had little idea how to operate it, but as long as the missiles hadn't already been fired, I was okay.

Something erupted behind me – gunfire, a single-shot round. A sniper. The bullet hammered into the screen of the panel, destroying the technical overlay and any chance the terrorists might have had of destroying a country. The sniper wasn't using laser-sight, so I couldn't use the red beam to triangulate his position, but in the corner of my peripheral vision I saw the familiar reflection of red light on black metal. The sniper had an MSG-90 – the very weapon I'd ruled out of being involved in the assassination I'd carried out in Timber. How he'd got hold of it could be pinned on a specialist gunsmith, but that was an inquiry I'd save till afterwards.

I made a run for the front entrance, wincing as I heard another 7.62mm round ricochet off the railing nearby, and bounded through the still-open entrance. It was pretty hard to conceal myself as I ran; not just because the base was darkened, but his MSG had a state-of-the-art thermal imaging scope, meaning the picture of me on his imaging tube was a blob of orange and green on a dark blue background. He'd have to be as blind as the other guy not to see me – then again, I thought, maybe that idea wasn't too quixotic.

When I finally ran out into the cool afternoon air, my uniform began to show dark sprinkles where the raindrops were still falling. The sniper in question had chosen a strategic position – one of the walkways which ran out of the base and around the perimeter, meaning I had only a few seconds before he showed up again. Running backward, I saw the dark shadow pop out from behind a wall, raising the scope of the rifle to his eye. But he was a few seconds too slow, and I darted behind an outpost building – although he had thermal capabilities, meaning he could see me through walls, he couldn't hit me.

An ingenious idea struck me as I saw a fallen terrorist lying prostrate on the ground, possibly taken out by the newly-renegade Zone. He had incendiary grenades, same as his comrades, and I detached his one from his uniform carefully, as one false move would result in me looking a bit like bacon that's been fried for too long. With the grenade in my left hand, a USP in my right, I leapt out round the outpost building. The sniper was prepared all right, and I saw the rifle he was clutching shift slightly with the firing of a round, and a round drilled perfectly into my left arm. The muscle screamed in pain, but I summoned all my strength to detach the pin of the grenade and fling it toward the sniper in a lazy curving arc. He wasn't as stupid as his friends; as soon as he saw the red cylinder in my right hand, he was whirling around to make his escape. But he'd ventured too far into the open. The grenade, nearing the end of its curve, was directly in my line of fire, and I raised the USP and fired off two shots in uick succession. The first shot was a piece of shit; it smashed into the wall with a spray of concrete, but the second rocketed into the grenade, detonating it in mid-air and showering the unlucky sniper in flaming fragments. Not one to lose initiative, I fired a third shot, aimed at the disabled sniper's head, just to ensure he didn't try anything inventive in his last movements.

My arm wasn't going to take any more exertions, and succumbing to the pain, I slumped to the ground, letting the pistol slip out of my hand. Somehow, against incredible odds, I'd managed to accomplish my mission – although, I had to admit, not without the help of the Forest Owls.

I almost laughed when I saw them run mockingly out of the missile base, seemingly having rounded up the hostages inside and told them to get the hell out of there. Then again, by the looks on the faces of the hostages present, it wasn't that funny.

"Fucking hell!" Zone yelled at me. "RUN!" Well, that was all the encouragement I needed, I can tell you. Although my arm was telling me not to, I scrambled to my feet and started loping away from the base. I wasn't actually looking at it when it exploded, as I was trying to concentrate on running out into the plains and ignoring the thudding in my arm, but my ears registered a crunching explosion, barrels of combustible nitroglycerine ignited by explosives the terrorists had set without anyone's knowledge. And then everything went kind of quiet, accompanied by this annoying, low-end ringing in my ears.

"Fucking hell," Zone proclaimed again, panting as we ground to a halt.

"Fucking hell," I agreed, turning to face the blossoms of orange flame billowing out from the destroyed base.

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Yeah, you can take your seatbelts off now, no more guns and explosions for now. The plot is going to undergo some chicanery in the next chapter, so expect the seemingly unrelated events which have happened so far to be tied together. It's going to start getting twisty soon…

Anything else I need to say? Oh yeah—please read and review! I still need encouragement. If you want to check up on my progress with this story, you can always visit my Livejournal (that's my homepage, for the late person.) Well, that's all. I'm off to air guitar. Till later!