June 9

Naraka's motorcade arrived in front of the Galbadia Presidential Residence shortly after 01:00, passing through the main gate and pulling directly up to the front entrance in order to permit the President quick passage into the building. Naraka himself had been roused from sleep barely half an hour earlier, as his train en route to Dollet had been diverted back to Deling City; and he was not a particularly agreeable morning person even when his mornings began on schedule, six hours later.

"Janis!" he snapped, as his chief aide met him at the doorway. "I'm going to miss an important meeting with he governor of Dollet over this, so please explain to me just what in the flaming hell is going on?"

"The details are still coming in, Mr. President," Janis said, falling into step as Naraka breezed past the security guards and into the corridor. "The incident occurred about an hour ago on the Deep Sea Research Facility, apparently without any advance warning. A single attacker, one of the SeeDs, turned on our Galbadian forces —" he checked the clipboard he held in his hand. "— and apparently his fellow SeeDs as well, killing several soldiers and eventually escaping via one of our long-range hovercraft."

"Not good enough, damn it!" Naraka snapped, pausing impatiently for the attendant to call the lift for the executive level. "Which SeeD was it, why did he suddenly turn on us, and why did no one see this coming?" The lift arrived, and he stepped inside. "Have you contacted Garden yet? What do they have to say?"

"General Tolmar is attempting to reach Headmaster Xu right now, sir," Janis said. "You have to understand, Lord-General, that we only learned about this event a relatively short time ago, so we can't be certain about a number of the specifics at this —"

"There were nine SeeDs on the DSRC, correct?" Naraka cut him off. "It shouldn't be too hard to determine which of them was responsible for this act, would it? I trust my government has not reached that degree of incompetence."

The other man paused uncomfortably for a moment as the lift doors opened and they stepped onto the building's second floor. "Yes, sir, we do have that information. According to preliminary reports from the facility, the individual responsible for the attacks was Commander Squall Leonhart."

Naraka stopped in his tracks and spun around to look the other man straight in the eye. Although he was rather short and lean in build, the General had an air about him that generated a very harsh, commanding presence, and Janis reflexively tensed. Naraka maintained the stare for a long moment, before glancing away as he assumed a thoughtful, but equally fierce attitude. "The commander of SeeD," he mused, before glancing back at Janis. "I wish to speak with General Tolmar immediately," he said, turning on his heel and heading off towards his office.

It was already well into midmorning, Balamb time, but Xu had only just managed to get away from her work long enough to take a late breakfast. Even without Squall and the others' secret mission to worry about, she had her hands full with summer classes, the newly enrolled students, preparing the next year's budget, and the dozens of other affairs that complicated her life as both the Headmaster and Garden Master of Balamb Garden.

When Lauren came into the cafeteria at a near dead sprint, she immediately winced in anticipation of whatever had gone wrong now. The other SeeD quickly spotted her, and ended any possibility of Xu having a decent meal.

"What's going on?" she asked, as Lauren came to a halt next to the table. "You look like you just saw Omega Weapon."

"Galbadia's calling," Lauren said, panting slightly. "General Tolmar herself. Says it's absolutely urgent."

Xu sighed. "What in god's name could they possibly want now?"

"They're demanding to speak with you," Lauren said, shaking her head. "They wouldn't tell me anything."

"All right," Xu said, emphasizing her resignation with another sigh. "I just hope they don't have another job for us. We are seriously close to running out of SeeDs to give them."

"I don't know about that," Lauren said as Xu rose to leave the cafeteria with her. "The way they were acting when I talked to them, I'm almost hoping it's something that simple."

Xu took the elevator up to the 3F, parting ways with Lauren and stepping into her office where the words AUDIO CHANNEL OPEN were being displayed on her vidphone. Sitting, she took a moment to steel herself for whatever it was the Galbadians had in store for her.

"This is Headmaster Xu," she said.

There was a brief pause from the other end. "Headmaster, please hold for General Tolmar," a voice replied.

Hold? she wondered. You called me! And what happened to "absolutely urgent"?

"All right," she said, forcing her voice to remain neutral.

Perhaps half a minute later, the screen finally lit up with the image of the middle-aged Galbadian General. "Headmaster," she said. "I apologize for the delay; I was speaking directly with Lord-General Naraka."

Xu nodded formally. "I see. You'll understand I'm curious about the reason for this call."

"I'll get straight to the matter," Tolmar said. "We've received a report indicating that, just over an hour ago, a member of the SeeD team we hired on the fifth of this month violently turned against us and escaped our custody. A number of our soldiers are dead. Naturally, the President is seriously concerned about the matter, and we are very interested in hearing Garden's perspective on these events."

Xu stared at the screen for a moment, totally speechless. It took several seconds for her mind to properly process the information that had been given her, and somewhat longer to devise any sort of response. "...I, ah...this is an absolute shock," she said truthfully. "I don't know what to say. It's completely unprecedented for any SeeD to act against their employer in such a way."

"So you didn't have any foreknowledge that this was going to occur?" Tolmar asked.

"I've been completely out of contact with that SeeD team since we left them at the pickup point in the mountains," Xu said. "How could I have had any knowledge?"

"Considering the number of high-level SeeDs on the team," Tolmar continued, "the President is concerned that this might have been a staged attempt to undermine the contract."

"Absolutely not." Xu shook her head vigorously, trying not to reveal how hard her heart was pounding. "All of them were instructed to cooperate fully with their employer, just as always. I can't explain what could have led any of them to do such a thing."

As she strove to fight off her initial shock at Tolmar's announcement, her mind finally began working through the event. What could have caused one of the SeeDs to suddenly turn on the Galbadians? It was even more confusing that it had only been one of them, rather than a mass mutiny, which would at least have made more sense. Perhaps the Galbadians were lying; all the SeeDs had risen up, but only one had escaped? Possible, she thought, but also far-fetched. Regardless, the SeeDs in question had departed Garden not even three days ago, with no such intentions that she knew of; something must have changed fast for them on their mission.

"This behavior is, of course, a direct violation of both the contract that was agreed upon for this deployment and your extended contract with our government," Tolmar said. "Considering it also seriously undermines the interests we hired these SeeDs to protect, it's very important that we determine just what it was that provoked this action."

"Of course," Xu said. However, she could tell enough from observing a person's behavior to know that Tolmar almost certainly knew a good deal more about the matter than Xu herself; though that much was fairly obvious in any case, considering that Xu didn't know anything. "Garden will assist you in any means possible. I'd like to know a bit more about the incident, however; I think it would be best for everyone if we were all on the same page about this."

Tolmar frowned at her for a fraction of a moment, apparently trying to read the Headmaster just as Xu was attempting to read her. "We're still collecting details ourselves; there's a limit to how much I've been told."

And you don't trust Garden any farther than you could throw it, Xu added silently. Believe me, the feeling's mutual.

"Can you at least say who it was that was responsible for this incident?" Xu asked, watching carefully for any sign of facial language from the other woman that might give her some sort of hint, regardless of the spoken answer.

Unfortunately, the General seemed to be quite good with her cards face. "I don't have that information," she said. "Again, this event occurred a very short time ago, and reports are still coming in."

This was obviously ridiculous; the identity of the SeeD would be the first thing the Galbadians ought to know. However, Xu couldn't very well call the Galbadian liaison a liar to her face and expect a positive result, so that effectively ended that line of questioning. "Well, let me assure you that the full resources of Garden will be at your disposal with regard to resolving this situation," she said aloud. "We don't tolerate renegades, and certainly not those who break with contracts to harm our clients."

"I'm certain the President will appreciate that," Tolmar said, glancing somewhere offscreen. "You'll be contacted again once we have more information."

Xu nodded, uttering a few more pleasantries and declarations of shock and resolve before the call was ended. Once it was, she activated the private line for her assistant's desk. "Trent, find Lauren and get her right away," she commanded.

"Yes, ma'am," the young man's voice replied. Xu nodded, and buried her face in her hands as she waited. She hadn't had many good days since taking over as Headmaster of Garden, but this one ranked well below all of her her worst so far; and it was only 09:13. Furthermore, although she wasn't quite sure how yet, Xu was certain that in the days or weeks to come, things were going to get much, much worse.

"She denies any foreknowledge of the event, Lord-General," Tolmar's voice said as Naraka tore through the latest report that had arrived on his desk regarding the incident. "And she has promised the full assistance of Garden in tracking down the individual responsible."

"A request we obviously can't assent to," Naraka said. "More likely she simply wishes her forces to find the renegade before we do, so they can shelter him from justice."

"General, if I may," Tolmar said. "If this was in any way a coordinated action, why would only one of the SeeDs turn against us? That leaves the other eight in our custody, and could have seriously harmed their chances of success at whatever their objective was."

"That one SeeD was the commander of Garden," Naraka reminded her. "That's an absurd individual to turn renegade, and even more absurd that none of the others would have supported him. This can only be an orchestrated incident." He finished with the report. "How much information did you give her?"

"Only the basics," Tolmar replied. "And I didn't get the impression that she knew any more than that. Lord-General, it's truly my opinion that she did not have any foreknowledge of this incident."

"Be that as it may," Naraka said dismissively, "we have a serious breach on our hands. We can't afford to trust Garden in this affair, especially not now that we must track down the leader of their SeeD force." Janis stepped into the office with another dispatch, which Naraka took immediately. "They'll have to be watched."

"Yes, Lord-General."

As Naraka began to read through the report now in his hand, his face darkened considerably. "That will be all for now, General," he said abruptly, terminating the call. "Why the hell wasn't I informed of this sooner?" he demanded of his aide.

"Mr. President, that dispatch arrived literally seconds ago," Janis said. "It's the first we've heard about it from Administrator Derrick."

"Well, what the god's name is Derrick thinking, then?" Naraka snapped. "The Sorceress has been stolen from under his nose, and he waits this long to even mention it?" He cast the dispatch down on his desk, pointing a commanding finger at Janis. "Get the Defense Commissioner and the Joint Chiefs together right away, as well as the Director of Intelligence. And ask Derrick to kindly reveal anything else he might have been holding back from us!"

"Yes, sir," Janis said, turning immediately to carry out his instructions. As he left, Naraka glanced around the circular office for something on which to vent the fury that was threatening to overcome his generally disciplined manner, and bringing with it an unusual and very unwelcome fear. The General was quite certain that, at the least, he would not be getting back to sleep anytime in the near future.