"...So let's review," Rinoa was saying. "This mission will have seven stages: One, sneak on board the 'second escort'; two, proceed cautiously across the roof of the 'second escort'; three, proceed across the roof of the 'president's car'; four, uncouple the 'first escort' car; five, have the 'dummy car' and our 'base' move in after uncoupling; six, uncouple the 'second escort' car; and seven, escape with the 'president's car' and our 'base'. "We have exactly five minutes to complete the seven procedures."

The three SeeDs and three Forest Owls were standing in a small room dominated by a model railroad featuring a crude representation of the Timber-Galbadia rail line. A pair of trains were situated on parallel tracks.

Nida raised his hand. "Can we back up a bit? You guys want us to kidnap the president of Galbadia?"

"Yeah!" Zone confirmed. "It'll be crowning achievement of the Timber Resistance! Our faction, 'The Forest Owls', will be forever known in the pages of Timber's independence!" He was already beaming simply at this prospect. "Exciting, huh?"

That wasn't necessarily the word Nida would have used. "...Aren't you at all worried that this could just provoke a massive Galbadian crackdown?" he asked.

"No way!" said Zone. "They wouldn't dare, once we've got their president in custody! Galbadia will have to listen to our demands!"

Nida shrugged. "If you say so."

"Hey, what's the big deal, anyway?" asked Zell. "As SeeDs, it's our job to carry out the employer's orders! Those Galbadians won't even know what hit 'em!"

Although unsure exactly what those three sentences had to do with each other, Nida had to admit that Zell had a point. SeeDs weren't supposed to question orders, regardless of how questionable those orders happened to be.

"Anyway," said Rinoa. "To decouple the cars, we need to mess with the control system that handles the coupling. I'll have a device that can read the access codes, and I'll relay those codes to Nida, who has to enter them within five seconds."

"This stuff is waay too complicated," complained Selphie. "Heeey! How about this? Let's derail the president's car. Y'know, hit him with a big log or something. Then we watch it crash and burn! Ooh..." The thought of watching a train crash and burn obviously appealed to her. "So what do you guys think?"

None of the Forest Owls seemed particularly enthusiastic.

"...I think that would be an even worse idea," said Nida, before he could stop himself from indirectly ridiculing his employers' plan.

"What's the point of killin' him before abducting him?" asked Zell.

"...Okay, that's all," said Rinoa. "Everyone ready? Let's decide on the party!"

"Gathering information is my specialty, sir!" said Watts.

"OuuuucHHHHH..." Zone collapsed. "My stomach!"

Nida would have sighed, but to do so would have severely understated the mood he was in.

Hanging from a tether fastened to the outside of a train moving at 180 kilometers per hour did not improve his mood.

"Are you ready?" Rinoa called down to him.

"YES!" Nida shouted back up to her. "You don't really have to ask me every single time!"

"Yo, the blue guy's comin'!" Zell called.

"The code is..." Rinoa began.

"And the red!" Selphie called.

"...three!" Rinoa finished.

"What?" Nida called, then realized that the better option would be to repel back up to the top of the train. So he did so, although he thought that a guy flying past one of the windows might just be more suspicious to the guards inside than a safety cord.

"We've only got three minutes left," Rinoa warned him. "We've gotta hurry!"

"Yeah, yeah," Nida grumbled.

"Okay, you're clear!" Selphie called. Nida jumped back down and set about entering the codes anew. It occurred to him that the novelty of being a SeeD really should have lasted for at least twenty-four hours.

"S-Sir..." The Galbadian soldier paused to gulp before continuing. "Everything is in order, sir!"

The President, reading a newspaper that he had somehow acquired within the past few minutes, didn't respond.

Oh, well; I'd better get outta here before I lose another paycheck, he thought. Man, I really wanted to be able to propose to her, but now I bet I won't even get leave until the end of the year. What am I ever gonna do?

He was about to turn, leave, and bemoan the sorry state of his life even further, but he noticed something odd about the newspaper the President was reading. Hey, that's a Timber paper. Where did he get that? We haven't arrived in Timber yet.

Then the car lurched backward as it seemed to connect with another car in front of it — which didn't make sense, as the train had been coupled hours earlier in the Deling City station. Still, the jolt was enough to knock the soldier off-balance; and the President fell right out of his seat and onto the ground.

Where he remained absolutely still.

The soldier frowned. "Uh, Mr. President? ...Are you all right?"

"I'm in a bad mood right now!" said the President. "If there's nothing in particular, I order you to leave immediately!"

The soldier's frown deepened. "Uh, are you —" He stopped himself. "I mean, yessir! Absolutely, sir!"

And he hastily exited the room.

Safely outside, he permitted himself a quick sigh. Man, this has been a weird assignment so far.

"Finally," said Zone. "We've waited so long for this encounter with Vinzer."

"...'Vinzer?'" Nida asked.

"That's what we call him," said Rinoa. "He doesn't deserve the title, 'President'! ...or a last name!"

"Was that perfect, sir!?" Watts broke in. "Amazing, sir! You're the best, sir!"

"Uh...thanks," said Zell.

"Your SeeD rank went up by 1!"

Nida blinked. "...Who said that?"

Rinoa cleared her throat. "Well then." She nodded at the door leading to the President's car. "I guess it's time for the interrogation."

"Interrogation?" Nida asked. "You want information from him? I thought he was a hostage."

Rinoa looked at him as if he had been speaking in revisionist Centra.

"Leave the intelligence to me, sir!" Watts declared, backing up against the farthest wall from the door.

"OwOwOuccchhh," Zone added, running off into the conference room.

Rinoa shook her head and sighed, and for the first time Nida felt like he could relate to her. "You three!" she said, pointing to the SeeDs. "Tell me when you're ready to go. As soon as you're ready, I'll begin 'serious negotiations' with the president!"

"This should be interesting," Nida muttered. He glanced at Zell and Selphie, who nodded. "We're ready."

"Bring it on, man!" Zell added, punctuating the imperative by slamming his right fist into the palm of his left hand.

Rinoa paused for a moment, giving Zell a look that Nida couldn't quite decipher, but had seen many times before where Zell was concerned. Then the four of them went on into the President's car.

"President Deling!" she said, folding her arms as she approached the man, still seated with his back to the door. His apparent lack of concern with the new arrivals seemed to throw Rinoa off for a moment; then she continued. "As long as you...don't resist, you won't get hurt..." She trailed off, obviously expecting some sort of response.

"And if I do resist..." he replied, in a voice that rang as if he had swallowed a violin. "What would you do...? Young...lady?"

He turned to face Rinoa, who jumped back with an unintelligible exclamation.

Nida could take a fair guess as to what the problem was. He'd heard Deling speak once or twice on the news, and his voice, though hardly pleasant, was distinctly violin-free. "...Oh, crap," he said.

"Boo-hoo...Too bad..." The man stood up, swaying in a very unnatural sort of way. "I'm not the president. I'm what they call...a body double. All these rumors about the many resistance groups in Timber...you pass along a little false information and they fall for it..." He laughed, with an equally unnatural manner. "How pathetic...Seems like there are only amateurs around here."

Nida was becoming more than a little concerned by this man's behavior. Rinoa, however, looked more offended than anything. "Ama...teurs!?"

The man who wasn't Deling lurched forward at her, and Rinoa recoiled even farther. "Ahh...My butt hurts from all this sitting...Young...LADY...ahh...So what did you have in stORE for me had I resiSTED...? Why doN'T you teLL mE..."

Nida took out his weapon as the man's speech continued to degrade.

"QuiTE aMUsing thouGH...For beING such anAtEurs...! HoW daRe YOU InSUlt tHe presIDent!"

Then he lunged toward Rinoa. Zell jumped forward to intercept. The man ran straight into Zell, and promptly began trying to chew off his arm. "What the hell?" Zell demanded, thrashing about wildly as he attempted to get the man away from him. Nida quickly ran up and jabbed him with his dagger, which caused him to disengage.

"Are you okay?" he asked of Zell.

"Sure," Zell replied, still staring at the not-President. "What is your problem, man?"

"You...fEll...For...iT" he replied; then he attempted to eat Zell again. This time, his efforts were met with a sharp jab to the face and a kick in the abdomen, which sent him sprawling. This didn't do much to deter him, however; three seconds later he was back on his feet, and going after Selphie this time. This didn't work much better, as he quickly had a nunchaku slam into the side of his head. He staggered from the impact, but did not fall down unconscious like a sensible human would. "aMusINg...tHIs iS AmuSinG!"

"What is up with this guy?" Zell asked.

Nida had an idea. "...I'm not sure he's so much of a 'guy'," he replied. "And, uh...Water."

The magic attack did indeed knock the man off his feet; but as usual, he bounced right back up. Although this time, he was shaking even more violently than he had been before, and his body was beginning to glow in an assortment of very odd colors. As the others watched, he transformed into a creature several times his original size, vaguely human-looking but extremely disfigured, with limbs far out of proportion to each other and very dead-looking grey skin.

"...Woah," said Zell.

"Brrawghh!"

Watts frowned, glancing in the direction of the President's car. "That didn't sound good, did it, sir? Think they're okay in there?"

Zone looked worried. "What could make a noise like that? You think there was some extra security measure we didn't know about? What if the princess is in danger?"

"Well, there are three SeeDs with her, sir," Watts reminded him. "They're trained to handle eventualities, after all. They'll probably be fine, sir!"

"Gwahrggg!" came another cry from the President's car, this time accompanied by some kind of explosion.

The two Forest Owls stared at each other for a moment. "...I'll see if I can get some info on what's going on, sir!"

Zone felt a stomach cramp coming on. Watts ran out of the briefing room to the door leading to the President's car. When peering through the window failed to generate acceptable results, he stepped out and crept up to the outside of the President's car, planning to open the door a crack and peer in. However, as the door was automatic, it naturally slid open all the way as he approached.

"BWRAARGGHH!"

Watts ran all the way back into the briefing room, nearly crashing headlong into the door to the RAIDERS car before it could open for him.

"What?" Zone asked.

"There's this giant monster, sir!" Watts exclaimed. "And it's got this huge arm and hand and leg and it's got these teeth and...uh..." He stopped himself. "...I'm sure the SeeDs have everything under control, sir!"

Zone's stomach made a very interesting noise as he collapsed to the floor.

Ten minutes later, the three SeeDs and Rinoa had joined the two Forest Owls in the Briefing Room. The mood was not positive.

"Man, I can't believe the president was a fake!" Zone said.

"I can't believe we fell for it!" Rinoa said.

I can, Nida didn't say.

"Info, sir!" said Watts, who had just arrived. "New info!"

Before he could stop himself, Nida groaned. No one noticed anyway.

"It's big news!" continued Watts. "I found out the real reason why the president's here, sir!" He paused for breath. "The president's going to the TV Station! Security's really tight, sir!"

Rinoa frowned. "...The TV Station? Why in Timber? They can broadcast just as easily from Galbadia."

Selphie also frowned. "Heey...D'you think the Dollet communication tower has anything to do with this?"

"What's that?" Zone asked.

"It's this big tower in Dollet!" Selphie explained. "And it, like, handles communications and stuff!"

"Yeah!" Zell joined in. "It's the biggest radio transmitter in the world! But it was abandoned 17 years ago 'cause of the worldwide signal interference. But yesterday, all these Galbadian troops showed up and installed this new transmitter. Then we SeeDs went over and kicked their ass! Even though we weren't supposed to be there and Seifer was being an idiot an' disobeying orders again..."

"...," Rinoa said.

"Ohhhh...I get it..." Zone introspected. "The only TV station that can handle broadcasts over the air is in Timber. Other stations use HD cable, which only supports online broadcasting."

"So, what's that supposed to mean?" Rinoa asked.

"They're gonna send a signal using radio waves?" Nida asked. "What for?"

"If they do that, they can transmit images to regions without cable," said Zone.

"I know that...!" Rinoa said, glancing at the SeeDs. She didn't sound like she had.

"There aren't many places without —" Nida began, but Rinoa kept talking.

"What I want to know is," she said, "what is the president going to broadcast!?"

"Well, the places without cable are —" Nida began again.

"There must be something they want to say to the whole world," Rinoa mused, interrupting again. "What can it be?"

"Ooh!" Selphie had an idea. "'Everybody! Love and Peace!'" She accompanied the message by spreading her arms and swaying in what was apparently the love-and-peace dance.

"...," said everyone else.

"If I remember correctly," said Zone, "radio waves haven't been used in 17 years."

"Yeah," said Nida. "The Galbadians must have some new technology that can cut through the signal interference. I guess if they had some ultra-high frequency transmitter, but it'd need some really powerful boosters in order to..." He trailed off, as he realized that everyone else in the room was staring at him.

"...Wouldn't it be wonderful if the first broadcast could be the declaration of Timber's independence?" Rinoa asked.

"Hey!" said Zone. "That might be possible."

"Let's come up with a plan then!" said Rinoa, adding "Can you guys give us a minute?" to the SeeDs. Then she, Watts, and Zone squatted down together on the floor, whispering to each other.

"...Can we go home now?" Selphie asked, after about a minute and a half had passed.

"That'd be nice," Nida agreed. "Something tells me our deployment was supposed to last a bit longer than six hours, though."

"Hey, what about our contract?" persisted Selphie. "Shouldn't we check it?"

Nida shrugged. "Might as well." He approached the three Forest Owls. "Uh...excuse me?"

Rinoa jumped up. "Oh, good timing! We've come up with a plan!"

"They call that a strategy meeting?" muttered Zell. Nida heard him, but Rinoa didn't seem to.

"Uh..." Nida said, "can we see the deployment contract you made with Garden?"

Rinoa shrugged. "Oh, sure." She produced a folder and handed it to Nida.

"So?" asked Selphie, short moments after he'd started to read it. "What's it say?"

Nida sighed. "Um...'Balamb Garden' (hereafter referred to as 'Party A') acknowledges 'The Forest Owls' (hereafter referred to as 'Party B') as the hiring party. 'SeeD' (hereafter referred to as 'Party C') shall be dispatched upon signing of this contract. Party C shall operate under the supervision of Party B, acting at Party B's discretion until such time as the conditions detailed in Section IV are met, or such time as Party C ceases to be a viable unit (See Section V). Party A does reserve the right to recall Party C in the event of extraordinary circumstances (See Section VI), but assures party B that such action will not be taken without proper advance notification, and compensation will be offered by whatever options are available (See Section VII). Party B agrees that Party C will not be used in any way inconsistent with the Terms of Deployment (See Section II) or knowingly damage the reputation of Party A (See Section III). Failure to comply with any of the terms of this contract by either party will re —"

"Wait wait wait wait wait wait wait!" Zell exclaimed, interrupting. "The hell's all that supposed to mean?"

"I don't get it," Selphie agreed.

"Well, so far it's just basic preliminary stuff," said Nida. I've still got to check the Terms of Deployment before —"

"Basic?!" Zell interrupted. "Man, you're out of your mind!"

"Yeah, that one's pretty confusing," said Rinoa. "When I told Cid I didn't understand, he gave me a different one." She produced another contract. As Nida was still reading the first one, she handed it to Selphie. "He's such a nice man."

"What's this one say?" Zell asked.

Selphie cleared her throat. "'To the Forest Owls. This SeeD deployment contract will last until Timber achieves independence. Please make good use of each SeeD member. I wish you the best with your objective. Please understand that this contract is an exception, and no replacement of any SeeD members can be made. Balamb Garden Headmaster Cid Kramer.'"

"'Until Timber's independence!?" Zell exclaimed.

"Yeah!" Selphie complained. "That is soooo vague!"

Nida frowned. "Well, in this one it says —"

"Hey, you're paid professionals," Rinoa interrupted. "No complaining!"

Nida sighed. "She's got a point," he said. Still, he went on reading the contract. "Oh, that's how they decide when we get paid."

"Ok, let's decide on the parties!"

"Gathering information is my specialty, sir!" Watts ran away.

Zone collapsed. "OuuuucHHHHH...My stomach!"

"...Do they do this all the time?" Nida asked.

Rinoa nodded. "Pretty much, yeah. ...So! Of the four of us, the ones who'll be heading to the TV station will be..."

"Here we go again," Zell muttered.