Author's Notes: Still here. Still writing. Still tormenting one of my favorite characters ever. But soon, my few and far between readers, there will be relief. Maybe.
Hyne's War: Chapter 36
The stairs were their own little vision of hell. He'd only made it to the first landing, about thirty treads down, when he grew certain that he hadn't gone nearly far enough to stabilize himself. If the pain in his breathing was any sign he had definitely cracked a rib when he was thrown against the wall. The magic had done nothing for that, nor the more nagging of his pains. But it was enough, continued to be enough, for him to all but throw himself down the stairs, the voices of his GFs distracting him more from the pain than his ends as they filled in the blanks of his knowledge.
There are rules of how our powers work, Siren was explaining as Nida grabbed a support for the stairs and used it to turn the corner to the next flight while loosing as little momentum as possible. Rules that humans only barely touch upon. You know of the limitations of summoning the... lower forms as Veringas described them. Well, in a way I exist as a lower form of her. I am a lesser part. As such I cannot act against the greater portion of my being. I am to Sylph as Ifrit is to Salamander and so on and so forth for many of our kind that you are unaware of.
So kind of like a tentacle of an ochu can't attack the ochu itself?
That earned him a disgusted sound from Siren. Oh I should hope not. Those creatures are just...
That isn't on subject, Siren, he chided her.
And you are the one that compared me to a...
Enough, Salamander reprimanded them both, his tone brooking no argument. There is much left to be achieved. Turn your mind to the task at hand, not upon the things which hinder.
And like that, the pain was gone. Not fully gone like it would be with a hero drink, but a distant and hazy kind of gone that he recognized from once before.
I didn't ask for this, he grumbled at Salamander as he flung himself down another flight.
Many things come to us that we do not ask for or desire. We must do with them as we can to make the best of our lives.
Yeah? Well, tell me that next time you have a broken rib.
That earned him a rumbling chuckle, which was almost more frustrating than the fuzzy feeling in his head. The worst part was that he wasn't even annoyed by the meddling of the GF. Mostly because he couldn't feel annoyed at the moment. Honestly, maybe it was better when the GFs were still dormant in their minds, pushing aside his memories. Better that than the unknown that the pair of powerful beings had over his mind.
You should be thankful.
Tell me that again when when this is all over.
Speaking of over...
Even as the GF spoke, Nida could feel Salamander's fiery awareness force his eyes toward the next landing below the one he had just reached. From here it seemed that there wouldn't be another flight down from there. While it didn't mean that the end was truly in sight, he was hopeful that it would well and truly be the end of stairs. Because Nida wasn't quite sure how many more of them he could take without doubling over in pain.
Fear not, all shall play out as has been foreseen.
Hardly a comforting thought.
Still, his feet hit the final landing far too soon, and Nida stole a moment to suck in a greedy breath. The very attempt to let his chest swell with air almost doubled him over from pain. No doubt about the broken ribs then. Not that there was time to deal with it right now. Instead he unsheathed Rupio, carefully adjusted his grip on the sword until he was content with it, and pushed his way through the door that announced he was on sublevel 19. For the life of him, he didn't want to ponder just what that number might mean for the return journey.
Irvine had clearly been through the hall that the door opened into. There was no other explanation for the two bodies that lay, half on top of each other, at the far end of the corridor. The pool of their mingling blood was a clear sign that Irvine had opted for the quick, hard to argue with force of the Exeter. Not that Nida could blame him. Fallen at the side of both bodies were assault rifles, a display of force they hadn't encountered before this. Most of the Zebalgans—and Nida was sure that the forces they had encountered were Zebalgans from the way they avoided shooting at Irvine and prominently wore red armbands—had been wielding tasers and other weapons meant to disable, not kill. Hell, the one time before this that they'd faced someone with a gun, it had been a shotgun loaded with beanbag rounds. There was still a pretty serious bruise from where the beanbag round had hit him in the leg. Granted it was no where near the worst of the injuries he was dealing with, but it was still a bit of an irritation.
But these two, Nida found when he stooped by the bodies to check their fallen weapons, had been carrying live ammunition. Whatever what was beyond this door, whatever they had been protecting, had been far too important to guard with anything but live rounds. Of course that had done nothing to protect them from the trained reflexes of a professional of Irvine's caliber. The only question Nida had was whether or not Irvine had given them a chance to surrender before he'd shot. More likely than not they wouldn't have attacked Irvine without prompting, not if they recognized him as the heir that their leader was looking for.
For all that he had never been the best with accuracy, Nida wasn't about to pass up the opportunity that the weapons presented. While a gun wouldn't have been enough to turn the tide against Ashura on its own, such a weapon might have made the confrontation a tough easier. He didn't even hesitate to snatch up one of the assault rifles, slinging it over his shoulder even as he reached for the other to remove the magazine. For half a second Nida wished he still had one of the duffel bags he and Irvine had brought with them for the trek. Yet most of the gear stowed in those had been meant for climbing, and had been left in the main stairwell that they'd repelled down. He wondered in passing if the gear would still be there when they returned, but as it wasn't a pressing concern, he instantly turned his mind from it and to the more pressing problem: the closed door the two bodies were sprawled before.
The door the fallen pair had been guarding was different from most of the others that they'd previously encountered. Most of the others were standard research facility things, made of metal and glass. Some had simple locks, nothing more than standard, physical key operated tumbler locks that Nida could handle with his eyes closed. A few hadn't even been locked, nothing more than partitions between areas. Several others had long ago been operated by maglocks that hadn't taken much more than rewiring or a few seconds with some of the electronics Nida had brought for dealing with that very kind of obstacle. But the one before him now, this door clearly kept him from what had once been a highly secure area. Nothing like hand or eye scanners—such things might have been more of a hindrance than a help in a research facility that likely had a bit of turnover on staff—but the lock at the side was about as complex as the hardest things that he'd been trained with. Even with the right equipment it could take several minutes to get through the door.
Several minutes that a brief glimpse through the small window in the door suggested that Nida might not have.
While he couldn't see much through the window, he could see the distinctive view of Irvine from behind. After all, it was rather hard to mistake Irvine's coat, hat, or long pony tail for anything else. Yet what really worried him was the tension in Irvine's posture. How many times had Nida seen him like that before, when they were in the middle of a training session, shoulders heaving from the strain of his exertion? Of course it only made sense now because from the limited view he had, Irvine's staff was clearly in his hands. Which meant that Irvine could only really be after one target. Unfortunately, no angle that Nida tried for really gave him the expected glimpse of Boyce.
It may not be the place where... Siren started to caution Nida, but he waved her thought aside.
I'm certain, Nida countered, swinging his newly acquired gun back and digging into one of the larger pockets in his pants. Irvine wouldn't be defaulting to his staff if he'd already used Exeter unless it was Boyce in there. For all that he says he'd take the guy dead or alive, I think he's no more capable of killing Boyce than he would be capable of killing me. Orphans and potential family...
There was no response, at least nothing but a supportive sensation from Salamander. Which was good, because honestly Nida didn't want to get anything more from either of the GFs. What he had to do now was get that door open and through it so that he could help Irvine.
At least you get to finally put your hand to something you're trained in, Siren teased.
"And what do you think I was doing with the flying?" he snapped, almost too irritated to delve into a mental conversation. The truth, though, was that it took a surprising amount of focus to have a conversation in your own mind. Far less hard to talk to the empty air. And right now he needed far more focus than a mental conversation would allow. Fighting with other presences in his mind to observe things for him was different from hacking a lock.
And speaking of hacking, Nida turned his attention to the device he'd pulled out of his pocket. Siren was right, as much as he hated to admit it. Infiltration was his training, not head on combat. It was a kind of spying where the idea was to never be known to the people you came among. Instead he'd had to live with going among strangers with his name pretty much broadcast from the corners of every room. He'd been trained as a ghost, not a rallying point. Never before had the survival of a friend—of someone who might even be considered family—rested on how well he did his job. No, that wasn't quite right. All of his training inherently supposed that there could be lives riding on his work, a large number of them. But he'd been trained to work alone whenever possible, and having the life of someone he had come to know as well as he knew Irvine was something he'd never really been prepared for.
Nor was he used to the concept that he could end up working with someone whose survival was potentially more valuable than the completion of the mission objective.
How long had it been since that day in the forest where he'd beat Zell, Quistis and Selphie solely by the virtue of being willing to give up his life for the mission?
I need silence for this, he warned the pair in his head before kneeling down by the control pad that operated the door. How Irvine had gotten through this, he'd never guess, but he was pretty sure he knew how he was going to make it through. The question was how long.
There was only a soft click to herald the lock releasing. Still, it was what Nida had been waiting for, even if the sound made him want to wince. Soft was it was, it still sounded impossibly loud to Nida, and he couldn't help but worry that it would be heard in the room. Unfortunately there was little that could be done about it if he had been heard. Better to operate as if he hadn't, and plan for if he had. Carefully he eased the door open, wedged the butt of the second assault rifle between the door and jab, and took a moment to ready himself.
He could approach the situation from a number of ways. The gun, if he could get a clear shot, might end things quickly, and had the distinct advantage of taking Boyce out before the man could use whatever power it was that had almost forced Nida to join him previously. A body would be a terrible thing to have to carry back out of here, though, and he was certain that a body would be the minimum need to force the Zebalgans to admit to their leader's demise.
Elijah's sword was another option, and one that almost felt poetic. The range would be valuable against Boyce's two-handed axe—if he had the thing at hand—and there was a certain pleasure to the thought of killing Boyce with Elijah's blade. But, if they did take Boyce by force and lead him out of here, the blade might disable him to the point where he'd be more of a pain than a body would be.
Then there were the tambo. Their effective range against a weapon like Boyce was known to carry was laughable at best, and for deflecting the weight of a double-bladed axe they could hardly be expected to suffice. Getting in for any sort of blows would be difficult at the very best, but it would make taking a captive easier.
For the first time since entering this place, Nida found himself regretting the fact that he hadn't brought one of his polearms with him. They'd be useful in a position like this. If, of course, he'd left any but his metal bo and the...
No, Siren whispered to him, voice low and gentle. This is not the time to remember such things. The little wolf needs you now. Can you not hear him?
Even as she whispered Nida could feel the GF marshaling her power, stretching her awareness out and almost pulling words through the air to his ears. That didn't mean that he didn't have to strain to pick the words out from among the other sounds in the room, especially a rather loud fan that he was certain either had to be exhaust or bringing air into the room.
"...his eyes. Except he never looked at me with so much..."
"Disgust?" Irvine offered, sounding like he was spitting the words out.
"Disrespect," Boyce countered, his voice sounding more annoyed than anything else. "He understood what it was to give respect to his elders."
"Respect is only given where it is earned. Which you could never hope to do. Kind of lost all chance at it when you decided you were meant to take over the world. So I'll give you one last chance. Surrender or die."
"No, Irvine. I shall give you one chance. Join me and submit to your fate, or continue to suffer the loss of your friends and allies until such time as you see that my will is the only one that shall be satisfied."
It seemed as good a time as any, so Nida stood, shifted the assault rifle into his hand, and pulled the door open as smoothly as he could manage. The intent was something disdain for the whole situation, though he doubted that it came off like that at all. That said, his entrance did earn him a flinch from Irvine, and a look of pure shock from Boyce as he strode into the room, leveling the gun at the would-be Zebalgan King.
"Nida," Irvine all but whispered in something like relief even as Boyce cursed, "Nomura."
"Guilty of both," he assured them as he advanced, keeping the gun trained on Boyce. How likely was it that the man knew how poor of a shot Nida was? Would Irvine remember Nida admitting such early in their training together, and know not to leave it to his ability to shoot? "I'm sad to see that you guys started without me."
"Ashura?" Irvine asked, sounding half worried.
"Dead. And not a concern. I'll explain later. But honestly, Irvine, I was expecting you to have wrapped up things by now."
He wanted to say more, wanted to hint at things that he couldn't say outright, but there was no chance that he could trust himself to do it. Boyce had worked with Garden before, not just Trabia, but Balamb as well. Careful turning of words to get a more useful message across would be too much of a risk. The last thing he wanted, after all, was for Boyce to find out just how injured he was. This wasn't something he was certain they could deal with if it came to a fight. Worse, Nida wasn't sure if he could keep control of himself if Boyce really did have some sort of power over him and chose to exert it.
"Good to hear. Sounds like we've got a pretty clear line to haul him out of here."
All Nida could do was nod in agreement, for all that he didn't agree at all. There was no way to be sure there weren't more Zebalgans in the complex, that Boyce would come quietly, or that they could stop him if he didn't.
When did you become so pessimistic, little dove? Siren asked, and Nida wasn't sure he had an answer for her. The closest thing he could offer to one might be that he was tired. But that didn't make sense, did it?
"You managed to defeat Ashura?" Boyce asked at last, looking like didn't believe it at all.
"Defeat? No. Kill would be the more accurate term. You know, it strikes me that working with a sorceress was hardly the best plan you might have had. After all, didn't you call for the heads of sorceresses early into your little war?"
"Ashura was not a..."
"If you ever trusted my words before this, believe me when I tell you that the woman was a sorceress," Irvine cut Boyce off, sounding quite annoyed. "That woman was..."
"Psychotic," Nida offered, resisting the urge to tell Irvine just what she had done to the GF in her possession. This wasn't the time for story telling.
"You can't have done that," Boyce insisted, looking quite disbelieving. "Ashura is..."
"Dead," Nida repeated, as levelly as he could manage, before stepping to Irvine's side and gesturing with the gun in his hand. "Same as you'll be if you don't cooperate. Because I'm frankly tired of all of this shit, Boyce. I'm tired of your war. I'm tired of this suggestion that your people deserve to rule over everyone. I'm tired of your myths about the power of Hyne waiting to be unlocked by Irvine. And I'm, frankly, tired of all of this bullshit hurting people. The only reason I'm even entertaining the idea of bringing you in alive is because Irvine's insisting on it. Because it would be easier to just shoot you and have done with it."
"Nida!" Irvine gasped.
"Shut up, Irvine," he snapped. "You know I'm right. This man is a menace, as much to us as he is to his own people. You saw my report on what he has ordered his own people to do. Their lives mean nothing to him. Prophecy means nothing to him. The only thing that matters, the only thing that drives him, is mastering the power he thinks is out there, waiting for him. It's about power, like it always is with a tyrant. And I'd sooner see him dead than rising to the level of Adel, or Ultimecia. It's our responsibility as SeeDs to prevent this kind of abuse."
"You can't mean to..."
"It's what I'd do in his position."
Great, just what Nida needed, Boyce's agreement. If that didn't keep Irvine from siding with him, nothing would.
"We can't just kill him," Irvine insisted, right on cue.
"We can," Nida countered, turning slightly to meet Irvine's gaze.
He comes, Siren's voice cut through the argument, and all Nida could do was jump back a step, more out of instinct than any real idea of what was going on.
The instinct is good—unsurprising considering the fact that he had actually spent time with Seifer, Veringas, and Siren training to react the moment the GF ordered him—and before his feet even touch the floor again the head of Boyce's axe is flashing past his face and slamming into the floor before him. There's all of a half a second for him to register the look of shock on Irvine's face before he hits the ground and the gun is pushed aside to unsheathe Rupio. Without so much as a thought, Nida felt Siren and Salamander sliding into place in his mind, mingling themselves with his magic to better support him. Ultimately he wasn't sure whether he should be thankful to the GFs or worried that with them awakened they could force their powers into him whether he liked it or not.
"Nida!"
He doesn't wait long enough to figure out what Irvine intended to follow that cry with. Instead he shifted his shoulders and arms just enough to test if he'd have the full range of motion he needed, then threw himself at Boyce even as the man raised his axe again.
"You can't kill me anymore than he can," Boyce insisted, a cruel smile on his face.
"Try me."
"Oh, unlike my dear grandson, you want to do so. Quite strongly from the way your eyes burn. But you are not capable of it. You cannot face me. You will not face me. The fact that you are able to raise that blade against me for even a moment is just a sign of your stubbornness, not any true chance of harming me."
The confidence with which Boyce spoke was almost sickening, and Nida threw himself forward, blade flashing. The man, old as he was, was faster than even Elijah's hints about him had implied. The axe was up in a defensive posture long before Nida could even think of trying to pierce the man's defenses. The next, anger fueled blow was much the same. This time, though, he didn't have a chance to pull back from the blow. Instead he felt one of Boyce's hands clamp tightly around his wrist, his grip so tight that Nida couldn't pull away from it.
"Stop this foolishness," Boyce hissed. "You will not fight me. You cannot fight me. Let your rage go and serve me as you were meant to."
"I'm not meant to..."
"You will not fight me. You cannot fight me. Surrender to the knowledge that is already there in the very core of your being. You were born to serve, as all of our bloodlines are. And you were born to serve me."
The words, the confidence behind them, only made Nida angry. Immediately the words of a powerful wind spell came to his lips, but even as he opened his mouth to call forth the power, he found himself unable to move. It wasn't just his mouth either. His muscles seemed to be locked into place, neither willing to push forward, nor to withdraw. He felt frozen, not unlike he would with a stop spell, except he knew that what was holding him back was a different kind of magic.
Boyce had ordered it, and Nida could do nothing but obey. Any question he might have had before as to whether he truly had some Zebalgan blood or not was finally laid to rest.
There must have been some sign in his expression, or maybe the simple fact that he was still for so long, but at last he heard a chuckle, and the axe was moving away from the block. Instead of carrying forward his arms relaxed, lowering themselves to his sides, the sword held in a too-loose grip at his hip. No matter how hard he tried to fight, he found himself to be utterly still, unable to move, unable to even scream in fury.
"What have you done to him?" Irvine demanded.
"His body recognizes its master, even if his mind does not. It keeps him from doing what he should not do."
"So this is how you lead your kind? Through mind control? You sicken me."
"Be that as it may, boy, it is what it is. And it is why I shall be victorious."
"No, you won't," Irvine insisted. Nida wished he could see the expression on his face, but the position he was in wouldn't allow it. Still, he heard the sound of wood on metal, which meant that Irvine had dropped the staff, likely to take Exeter back up.
"I would not do that, if I were you."
"You're not me."
"Nomura. Defend me."
His body was thrown into motion before the order even registered in his conscious mind. Despite trying his hardest to keep from moving, his body turned on the balls of his feet even as he pulled the sword to the ready position.
"Nida..." Irvine said, and this time Nida could see his expression. Something akin to shock and betrayal registered for half a second before resolution.
"You really think that is going to stop me?" Irvine demanded, shaking his head. "SeeDs of our level know that the mission is more important than the people in it. Stopping you matters more than getting out of this alive. So long as one of us makes it to bring your head to Squall, nothing else matters."
"I don't believe you," Boyce insisted, his voice hard as Nida found himself moving between Irvine and Boyce, stepping right into Exeter's sights. "Elijah and Xu both reported that you two were close, a product of the training together."
"Maybe you're right," Irvine admitted, his voice low as he slowly let the barrel of his gun fall. Nida wanted to shout at him, insist that he do whatever was necessary to deal with Boyce, even if it meant his own life.
"I will spare him if you unlock the secrets of the magic of Hyne for me. We are already here, as we are meant to be. All you must do is your destiny..."
It was impossible for Nida to tell whether Irvine's laughter angered Boyce or not, but the sound of it was comforting.
"You really believe that this is the place?" Irvine demanded, shaking his head. "Well, I suppose you couldn't know better. Then let me tell correct you, Boyce. I've seen hints of the place in my dreams, and I know what it feels like. You've picked the wrong place for a final confrontation. This isn't the place. You've wasted our time."
"I see... Well, be that as it may, I have you both within my power. That alone is worthwhile."
"Within your power? Really? I think we're looking at very different scenes here."
He must have been charging the spell for a while, because there was barely any difference at all between when Irvine raised his hand and when the light of the spell filled the room. The light was too bright, far too bright, and when it faded it was replaced by a darkness so deep that he couldn't see at all. A blind spell then. But what had Irvine hoped to achieve by it?
"Attack him!" Boyce shouted, and immediately Nida found himself lunging forward, sword coming up before him wildly and finding nothing but open air. On the inside Nida found himself smiling. Hyne bless Irvine for coming up with a way to render his uncontrollable body useless to Boyce.
And now it is our turn, Eagle, Salamander's voice crackled in his head. Except the roaring of the GFs flames didn't seem to fade when the creature stopped speaking. Instead the mental sounds of the fire rose in his mind, consuming all other noise. He couldn't hear himself think, much less the sounds of the room around him.
Such is the point, Salamander pointed out amid the roars of the flames. You cannot obey what your mind cannot hear. Worry not, Siren will signal me when I may free you from this.
It seemed like an eternity there, caught in a place where he couldn't see, couldn't hear. Then, as suddenly as the darkness had overcome him he felt the soothing wave of an Esuna, and the crackling in his mind faded away. The first thing that registered in his sight was Irvine standing in front of him, a sad smile on his face.
"You okay?" he asked, and Nida could easily hear the fatigue in his voice.
"I should be asking you," Nida countered, and marveled at his ability to speak. Whatever control Boyce had held over him was gone.
"I had the ability to control myself," Irvine countered, shaking his head. "You weren't kidding about the power he seems to have over Zebalgans."
"No," Nida agreed, carefully sheathing his sword. "What happened?"
"Look for yourself."
He didn't have to look far to find Boyce crumpled up on the floor, his axe fallen beside him. There were, so far as he could tell no wounds to account for his fall, which suggested that Irvine had knocked him out with a spell. Yet considering the fact that all of the Zebalgan leaders before Boyce had proven to be junctioned, and well junctioned at that, Nida was certain that a sleep spell wouldn't have done it. Wordlessly he looked towards Irvine, and the gunner just shook his head.
"It's hard to believe, but I'm telling you that it was a sleep spell. Mixed in with a fireball. He was focused on dealing with the fire, I think he might have been trying to shift his junctions to deal with it, which left him open to the sleep spell."
It seemed ridiculous, impossible, improbable at best, and yet there it was. Boyce was fallen on the floor, his mind was clear, and Irvine was standing beside him relatively unharmed. How... No, just accept it and move on.
"How do we deal with him now?" Nida found himself asking. As much confidence as he'd had when he told Boyce they just had to take his head, he was positive that Irvine wasn't going to allow it.
"We drag him out of here with us. I'll take him in my flier, because we can't risk him coming conscious in yours."
He wanted to argue with Irvine, but the look on Irvine's face brooked no arguments. Not even a pulling of rank. Whether Nida was defaulting to him because this was Irvine's family, or because Irvine was the heir, was a question, but he just nodded and took it into stride.
"Well, we've got a little problem with getting back," Nida admitted at length. "Ashura fucked me up pretty bad. I'm not looking forward to those stairs in the least. And climbing back up... Irvine, there is no promise that we've cleared this place out, and I'm in no condition to make up for it."
Irvine took it all in stride, calmly collecting his staff and replacing it in the sling on his back before pulling Exeter back out. All Nida could do was watch as Irvine checked what ammo was loaded into his gun, obviously trying to work out how much ammo he had and of what varieties and whether it would be enough to get them out of there. At last he seemed to come to some sort of conclusion, and from his expression he didn't like it in the slightest.
"Give me that."
What the 'that' was wasn't even a question. Nida untangled himself from the carrying strap of the assault rifle and held the weapon out to Irvine, who instantly put Exeter away and checked the assault rifle out. Once he was done Nida tossed the extra magazine in Irvine's direction, which the gunner caught almost without thinking.
"You're going to have to carry him."
It had gone without saying, and yet Irvine had insisted on saying it anyway. Maybe it was meant to make it clear that he was in charge now. Maybe it was supposed to remind Nida that they weren't going to be doing away with Boyce. Or maybe it was simply that Irvine had felt it needed to be said. Either way Nida resisted the urge to groan at the pain he knew he was going to have to take to do this, and started over towards Boyce's fallen form.
This was not going to be anything approaching pleasant.
It turned out that the trip back to the fliers wasn't even approaching miserable. Miserable, Nida noted in hindsight, would have been relatively pleasant. Instead he was certain that there wasn't actually a a word that fully encapsulated just how the trip out had felt. The weight of Boyce on his back only made the strain on his ribs more painful. Nor did it help that just before they were strapping Boyce into a harness to haul him up the main stairwell, he felt the tell-tale twinge in his arm that suggested maybe his ribs weren't the only things that would need special care. By the time they made the surface his back was aching, his leg almost felt like giving out, and the way Irvine carried himself made him look like he was about to collapse under the weight of both of their packs of supplies—picked up on their way back up the main stairwell—and the fatigue of controlling the firing power of Exeter for so much time.
True to Nida's prediction, the complex had been no where near empty by the time they had reached Boyce. Either some kind of alarm had gone off when they reached Boyce, or there was some kind of party that all the guards had been rushing towards. As they made it to through the corridors Irvine had cut down fighters left and right, he'd run out of ammo for the assault rifle before they crossed Ashura's room. They had reached the surface a few minutes short of Irvine being flat out of basic ammunition, meaning he might soon be forced to lay down pulse rounds.
"I'll hold this if you'll..." Irvine said, turning his attention back towards the entrance to the complex.
"I know," Nida admitted, continuing his shuffling pace towards the further flier, the one marked with the navy blue of Balamb Garden rather than the pale blue bottom and drab gray top of the Ragnarok's ships. All he had to do was get Boyce to Irvine's ship, buckle him in, stow the gear on both fliers, and then hold the door long enough for Irvine to get out of there. Since Irvine was the one taking their prisoner, it only made sense that he got out of here first. Besides, he had every intention of triggering the emergency beacon on his own flier, and bringing Fujin in to deal with the place.
"You sure you can handle it?"
His only response was to scoff, which was more than enough for Irvine apparently because he turned on heel and raised his gun, checking over his ammo yet again. It left Nida alone to shuffle towards the flier. Alone with nothing but his thoughts and an unconscious man on his back.
"Stop."
A conscious man on his back. Fuck.
Si...
"You're going to let me go. You're not going to say anything."
No voices leapt to his defense in his head. There was nothing but silence. Silence and Boyce's voice bouncing around in his head.
His muscles offered no protest as he felt Boyce's arms push against his shoulders. His ears registered the sound of Boyce's boots hitting the ground. And his body would not move to stop the bastard. Instead he stood there, stooped over, staring into open space before him. This made no sense. Hadn't Elijah said that Boyce had only been able to make him do something that he, on some level, actually wanted to achieve? Then why was he rooted in place, almost unable to blink? Did he really want Boyce to get away? Was he a traitor on some level?
"Boyce, if you don't stop right now, I swear in Hyne's name that I will shoot you where you stand."
Apparently this time all it took to shake Nida out of his revere was Irvine's voice. The tambo came out even as he turned to face Boyce, who had made his way towards Nida's flier. From the corner of his eye he could see Irvine had turned as well, Exeter leveled quite plainly at Boyce's back.
"I really don't think you're going to..."
Boyce didn't have the chance to finish before Exeter barked, and Nida watched as Boyce flinched and stumbled forward a step. The stumble turned into the old man falling to his knees, a hand going to his shoulder as he went down.
"You..."
"Follow through with what I say I'm going to do. And I won't hesitate to shoot you again."
"You could really do that to an old man?"
"If he couldn't, I'd at least be happy to shove a tambo right in the wound," Nida offered, striding towards the point where Boyce was doubled over in pain.
"You'd enjoy that a lot, wouldn't you, Nomura? I expect you get that blood thirst from your mother."
"Who knows. Who cares?"
"I won't let you have this victory," Boyce said, pushing himself to his feet.
"There is nothing you can do about it," Irvine insisted.
"There is one thing. Your victory means nothing is you don't have my body to prove it."
"We'll have your body," Nida assured him, rushing forward without the need for a gesture from Irvine.
A combination of the sharpened senses from Siren slipping back into place in his mind, the haste spell that washed over him from Irvine, and the lack of belief for what was happening conspired to make the whole world look like it was in slow motion. Even as he threw himself headlong into a run that he knew he couldn't maintain, he could see Boyce getting his balance back and starting forward. No matter what, Nida was certain that he could make it to the flier before Boyce was in and got through the start-up routines.
Except Boyce wasn't heading for the flier. As he neared it Boyce didn't grab for the cockpit hatch. Instead he ducked under the nose of the flier, still moving with as much speed as he could handle. There wasn't anywhere else to go in that direction. The platform ended abruptly several feet beyond the flier, leaving nothing but open air and the ocean below. Nothing but death awaited in that...
Fuck.
If only he was Zell or Selphie. They were almost bottomless wells of energy, and even injured as he was, they would throw themselves with wild abandon at the fleeing man. But his leg hurt, his chest screamed with each breath, and it almost felt like he was going to stumble every time he strode forward. It didn't matter. Nida didn't have it in him, and there was a desperation fueling Boyce's legs that defied logic. All Nida could do was reach out, in vein, as Boyce plummeted over the edge, disappearing from sight with not so much as a whisper. By the time he reached the edge he had already heard the splash, still he slid to a stop and looked over. The waters were rough, choppy and rippling where Boyce had gone in. No body had come up yet. Because that was what they would have to look for when there was a fall from this height with a man shot in the shoulder. There was no way he could survive the fury of the ocean as waves slammed repeatedly against the support structures that held the flight deck up. There was no chance.
"Nida!"
"He's gone!" Nida shouted back. Or tried to shout. Really, it came out as more of a whisper than anything else.
"Nida?"
"He's gone!" he shouted, putting more into it this time.
"We don't have time for this," Irvine insisted, coming up behind Nida. Had he been there, staring over the edge for longer than he'd thought? "Come on. We have to get out of here."
"He's..."
"Made his mind up. We've got to get out of here. Get into your damn flier and get back to the Rag. I'll get in touch once I've finished getting yelled at by Squall. Be prepared to redirect the Rag to Balamb, because I'm sure you'll be in for one hell of a debrief. Now go!"
Habit, or maybe just shock, found Nida obeying, his feet and hands moving despite his mind, just like when Boyce ordered him around.