It was late afternoon, and Nida, Quistis and Seifer were still crawling along the desert road on the vehicle's depleted power cell. The trip had been maddening; they were only going slightly faster than they could have on foot at a flat run, but they hadn't even come across another car they could hijack. And they were getting close to launch time.

"This is idiotic," said Seifer. "They're gonna destroy both Gardens and we'll still be pokin' through the desert."

"Thank you, Seifer; I'm aware of the situation." Quistis' nerves were becoming a bit frayed as well.

"We should be there within the hour, anyway," said Nida. Ahead of them, the boxy structure of the missile base could be seen on the horizon.

"Goody," said Seifer. "So, you got a plan yet for when we get in there, Instructor? 'Cause it seems like we've had enough time to set one out in triplicate by now."

Quistis glared at him. "We'll use this vehicle to get in," she said. "There's spare combat gear in the back, enough to make 3 or 4 full Galbadian uniforms. Once inside, we'll sabotage the system."

"No kidding," said Seifer. "Sabotage the system. Why didn't I think of that?"

"You're the one who wanted to come on this mission, Seifer," Quistis replied. "If you've got a problem, you can go."

"The plan isn't my problem, Instructor," Seifer retorted. "You've been grading tests for the last year." He pointed to Nida. "This guy wasn't a SeeD until yesterday."

"I have a name," said an irritated Nida.

"Yeah, whatever," said a dismissive Seifer. "Now we're gonna try to infiltrate a high-security Galbadian facility, and I'm supposed to trust your lead?"

Quistis looked at him incredulously. "You don't think you can trust me? You've failed the SeeD exam four times, Seifer; did you ever think there might be a reason?"

Seifer pantomimed getting stabbed in the heart.

"And stop calling me 'Instructor,'" Quistis said. "I'm not an instructor anymore, and whatever fantasy you have in your head, you are finished as a student at Garden. I don't owe you anything anymore."

"Yeah?" said Seifer. "Well, that's a shame, because I'll really miss all your pearls of wisdom."

Quistis shook her head, and glared at him. "Go to hell, Seifer."

"Same to you," said Seifer, glaring back.

Spears of white smoke shot up from the structure ahead of them. "...Guys," Nida said, his voice catching in his throat.

Quistis and Seifer both froze, watching in silence the trails arced toward them and passed above the top of the truck's windshield.

"...Stop the car," said Quistis. "Nida, stop the car."

Nida's reaction time was sluggish as he slammed on the brakes. As soon as they stopped, Quistis stumbled out the car door and looked up at the missiles passing overhead. They were barely visible themselves, tiny winged objects ejecting tongues of flame and followed by a widening cloud of smoke – like arrows dooming an invisible target. She felt tremendously dizzy, and thought she might throw up.

It took a second for Nida to remember how to turn off the engine and put the truck in park. When he did and stepped onto the road, his legs felt terribly weak. Seifer, too, had an expression that completely belied the attitude he had been displaying seconds earlier.

"...Do you know," Nida asked, "which Garden they were targeting first?"

Seifer shook his head. "They didn't say."

Nida glanced back up at the missiles, which were already a long way towards the far horizon. "So either Trabia or...or Balamb Garden will be..." A distant sonic boom finished the thought for him.

Quistis had regained most of her composure. "—All right," she said. "We still have time to save one Garden. And we owe it to them – we owe it to everyone – to try." She looked at Seifer. "Nothing else matters."

Seifer looked back, and nodded. "...Yeah."

"All right," said Quistis, looking back toward the missile base. "Let's get prepared."

The security guard at the missile base barely looked at them. "Car trouble?"

"Bad fuel cell," said Nida, unconsciously deepening his voice. "Gauge broke."

"Yeah, whatever. Save it for maintenance." He checked the vehicle's ID number, and a green VALID appeared on his display screen. "Alright, go ahead."

Nida drove into the parking lot. He was still getting used to navigating with the world being projected in 270-degree relief on the screen inside the Galbadian infantry helmet he now wore, and ended up dinging the truck he parked next to more than once. He hoped he would get used to this, but he did wonder if the setup was really expected to make Galbadian soldiers better in combat.

He also hoped that no one at the base would question why his uniform smelled so strongly of mothballs.

Quistis and Seifer, similarly attired, got out of the vehicle; Nida did as well after removing the keycard from the ignition slot. "Okay," he said. "I guess we just go in?"

"That seems to be the entrance," said Quistis, nodding toward the only door they had access to. They started walking.

"Got the rest of your plan yet?" Seifer asked.

"I'm working on it," Quistis said.

They came up on two doors, neither of which had any apparent knob or latch. Both had key slots, however. "...Um," said Nida. On a hunch, he took the ID card he had retrieved from the truck and swiped it through one of the slots, then the other. Nothing happened. "This could be a problem."

Seifer's helmet disguised his eye-rolling; he began pacing almost immediately, however.

Quistis looked at the keypad. "Nida, you took studies in electronics, right?"

"Yeah," said Nida. "...You want me to hack into the system using the keypad?"

"You're the most experienced among us with this sort of equipment," said Quistis. "It's why I wanted you here."

"Maybe you should have asked Zell," said Nida, remembering his inexplicable success at the Timber TV station. Still, he frowned at the keypad. "...It's pretty standard. Probably isolated from the main system, with some kind of ROM backup." He shook his head. "I don't think there's any way to hack it with what I've got here. But I might be able to bypass the scanner and fool the system into releasing the door by accessing it directly. I'll need tools from the truck, though, and —"

The door slid open, and a soldier stepped out. "Hey, you the new tech guys?" he asked.

"—Yes, that would be us," said Quistis.

"Thought you couldn't make it today," the man said. "...Well, whatever. Get your butts in here; second launch is in less than an hour."

The three SeeDs glanced at each other for a second, but quickly followed him into the missile base. "What's the situation?" Quistis asked.

"The situation is we were supposed to have an inspection on the circuit room done 10 minutes ago, but everyone's tied up," the soldier said. "Get in there and run a diagnostic."

Quistis saluted. "Yessir." Nida checked the man's rank, and then realized his own uniform didn't have any.

"...Which one's the circuit room?" he asked.

The soldier gave him a look that translated perfectly even through his helmet. "Down the hall, on the right, behind the door that says 'CIRCUIT ROOM'." Muttering something about "damn newbies," he left.

"Well, that was easier than I thought it would be," said Quistis. "Let's go."

The base was quite cavernous on the inside; they passed along a catwalk under which large, angular missile pods passed along a conveyer line and made Nida thankful he wasn't afraid of heights. It was all he could do to keep from gawking at the display of equipment, however.

A guard was standing outside the circuit room when the three SeeDs reached it. "We're here for the inspection," said Quistis.

"About time," said the guard. "Go on in."

The circuit room consisted of panels full of circuits, displays concerning circuits, and wires connected to circuits. Nida inspected one of the displays. "Looks like this is the central hub for the base's entire power grid," he said. "There are hubs for most systems elsewhere through the base, but this is the primary diagnostic center, so all the wires have to lead through here."

"So we trash this place, all the power goes out," said Seifer.

"Well, maybe," said Nida. "It looks like there are redundant buffers and capacitors staged at regular — hey, what are you doing?"

Seifer had drawn his gunblade. "Just testing something." And he swung the weapon into one of the consoles with a particularly large number of wires, pulling the trigger as he struck.

There was a terrific display of sparks, which spread through the entire room as consoles exploded and panels flew open, throwing ruined wires everywhere. Nida and Quistis covered their faces, and Nida was very glad for the armor's full-body protection. The room was plunged into total blackness for a second, before the emergency lighting came on.

"Electrical system malfunction," announced the loudspeaker. "Maintenance Team, investigate immediately."

"Was that really necessary?" Nida demanded when the display died down.

"We wanna bust this place up, right?" Seifer asked.

"I don't think the missiles are controlled from here!" said Nida. "And like I was saying, there are redundancies in the power grid! The best you did was slow them down!"

Seifer shrugged. "So we go trash something else."

"Hey!" Someone was banging on the door, which slid open a bit sluggishly a second later. On the other side was the guard, looking at the room in astonishment. "What's going on in here!?"

"Uh, we—" Nida stammered, madly combing his mind for any possible explanation that could cover this. "We were just — load-testing the breakers, when that panel — the whole system got shunted through a feedback loop! You're lucky this didn't happen during the launch!"

The guard stared at them a bit longer. "Look," said Quistis, picking up the thread. "We need to reroute the system through secondary controls. So if you'll excuse us?"

After another second, the guard nodded. "...Fine. But you're going on report over this."

"We understand." Quistis led them out into the hallway and away. "That worked out all right," she said.

Nida shrugged. "Yeah; I'm pretty sure what I said wasn't physically possible, though, so we should probably leave before the real maintenance guys get there."

They entered another section of hallway, at the end of which was a set of stairs leading upward. "That may be the control room," said Quistis; but before they got close enough to check, a soldier came out of a door to the left.

"Hey, you!" he said, pointing to the three. "...Haven't seen you around before."

"We're new," said Quistis.

"Huh." The guard shrugged. "Well, we need some help in here. I guess it doesn't really matter who...Do you think you could lend a hand?"

Quistis frowned. "What's the problem?"

"The loading system jammed halfway," said the soldier. "We've got to align the launcher manually. Come on." He disappeared back into the room.

"Why the hell are we helping them prepare the thing?" Seifer asked.

"We need to maintain our cover," said Quistis. "I expect we'll need one of their codes to access the computer."

"Or we sabotage the launcher," said Nida. The others looked at him. "...I might have an idea."

"This doesn't look like...what the hell did you say happened?" asked one of the soldiers on the maintenance crew, examining the ruined circuit room.

"They said, uh..." The guard frowned. "There was some kind of...feedback shunt...on the test...load breaker...loop."

The soldier looked at him, confused. "What the hell...?"

"Hey, what's this?" asked the other soldier, examining one panel. "Looks like someone took a saber to this thing. And then shot it."

The first soldier examined the damage. "Okay, there's no kind of shunt or loop that would cause that." He turned to the guard. "Where did those other guys get to?"

The soldier nodded, observing the now-properly aligned launcher. "Good work. All we need to do now is confirm the coordinates on the control panel, and synchronize this launcher with the main system. I better stay here and check the local software." He removed a disk from the launcher's data slot and handed it to Quistis. "The program should be ready to go. You guys get on it."

Quistis nodded, and led Nida and Seifer out. "Well?" she asked Nida.

"I disconnected the hydraulics on the launcher platform," Nida said. "When they give the launch command, it won't be able to deploy; it'll fire the missiles while still underground."

"Destroying the base," said Quistis. Nida nodded.

"Not bad," said Seifer. "So we're done?"

"There's at least 2 other launchers that we don't have access to," said Quistis.

"I might be able to redirect the targeting system with that," Nida said, nodding to the disk. "Have the missiles crash in the middle of the ocean or something."

Quistis handed him the disk, and he got to work at the control panel.

"So we just wait around while he fiddles with the computer?" asked Seifer. "How many guards have you seen on this base? I bet we could take 'em all out."

"Seifer," Quistis said exasperatedly. "Most likely the missiles are on automatic timer. It would come down to this sooner or later anyway." Seifer grunted, and began to pace. "...How's it going, Nida?"

"I'm not sure yet," he said. "The standard interface is firewalled; I'm trying to go in through the core text. I think I can use the disk to get me access to the targeting system, but its protocols are pretty limited." An error message blinked at him. "I'm gonna try randomizing the disk cyphers."

"Is that wise?" Quistis asked.

"...Maybe," Nida said, not radiating confidence. "Each directory seems to have its own code, but the privileges aren't uniform. This way, I might be able to get sys-op access to another directory and find a back door into the targeting files."

Seifer was scowling at them. "...What the hell are you people saying?"

"I'm in," Nida said, looking surprised. "...No, this is something else. ...Error ratio?"

"Hey!" Approaching them were two soldiers with Maintenance patches on their uniforms. "You the guys who were just in the Circuit Room?"

"Nope," said Seifer. "Must have us mistaken with someone else."

"The hell we do," said the other, frowning at the hilt of Seifer's gunblade. "I want to see that weapon."

"No, you don't," said Seifer.

Nida gulped, and started working faster.

"What's the problem here?" asked Quistis, stepping in.

"You sabotaged the power grid, didn't you?" asked the first soldier. "And what's your friend doing back there?" Seifer folded his arms. "...That's it. Get away from that control panel!"

Quistis and Seifer looked at each other. "Look, you really want to see my weapon?" Seifer asked. "Fine."

Seifer's gunblade and Quistis' whip lashed out simultaneously, catching the soldiers completely by surprise; they fell lifeless to the ground before anyone could have been alerted.

Except perhaps by the guard standing by the stairs to the control room, who immediately slammed the panic button.

"Attention all staff!" announced the loudspeaker. "This is an emergency! Intruders are inside the base! Eliminate them at all costs!"

"Well," said Quistis. "Nida, how's it going?"

"This whole thing's compartmentalized!" said Nida. "I think there's certain commands it's only supposed to accept from the control room!"

"Can you override?" Quistis asked urgently.

"I'm trying!" But for a moment, Nida just stared at the screen. He knew there was some way to disguise his the point of origin of his query, and he'd studied it in class just last semester. But his mind was completely blanking when he tried to remember what it was. "...I...I dunno."

"Time for a Plan B?" asked Seifer. Without waiting for an answer, he charged toward the control room door – and the soldier who looked very unhappy about having to guard it.

Nida looked at Quistis, who sighed and nodded after Seifer. By the time they reached the stairs, he had already beaten the guard and was running up into the control room. "Attention," said the loudspeaker as they ran up after him. "This is the control room. We are now entering the final phase of the missile launch. Take your designated positions and prepare for the launch. —Huh?"

They arrived in the control room to see Seifer facing off with three Galbadian soldiers, apparently the base's control staff. "No one's launching anything, you got that?" he said.

"You're the intruders?!" said the officer. "Well, bring it on! How dare you interfere with our plans!"

Seifer shrugged, and charged.

They quickly paired off, with Nida and Quistis each taking on one of the soldiers and Seifer fighting the leader. Nida took a Fire blast from the base soldier fighting him and nearly let the man's saber connect with his ribcage, but managed to convert on his block by whacking the soldier on his helmet, kicking him, then stabbing him in the leg. The soldier staggered back; Nida stabbed at the soldier's gut, but didn't connect. The soldier tried to riposte, but Nida ducked out of the way and jabbed his dagger into the man's side. The soldier fell, and Nida kicked his saber away.

Quistis had already finished off her soldier, but Seifer and the base leader were still going at it. As Nida looked up, the leader nearly unloaded his machinegun into Seifer's chest, but Seifer managed to smack it with his gunblade at the last second; the shots went wild, but did succeed in mostly destroying one of the consoles. "—Hey!" Nida called. "Careful!"

Seifer didn't seem to hear him. He punched the leader in the neck as he brought his gunblade around in a wide roundhouse swing that definitely would have finished the man off had he not ducked at the last second; instead, the weapon glanced off another console, and sent sparks flying. Nida and Quistis ran up to help, but the cramped quarters of the room made it difficult. Quistis did drive her chain whip into his leg, knocking him off-balance enough for Seifer to kick him clear. "Firaga!" he growled, and the resulting fireball put the leader out of the fight.

"Okay," said Quistis, after they took just a second to catch their breath. "One of these control panels should be the launch control mechanism. Let's split up and look."

They did. Nida found the consoles devoted to the power grid, to equipment readouts, and to communications and G-net access, but no launch controls. "...I'm not seeing it," he said.

"Neither am I," said Quistis.

"The hell do launch controls even look like?" asked Seifer.

Nida checked the console Seifer was looking at. It wasn't that one either. Then he gulped, as an idea struck him. He checked the still-sparking console with the ragged tear from Seifer's gunblade in it. "...I think it's this one," he said.

Quistis came over to look. "...Oh, my."

Seifer looked away, and didn't say anything.

"...Okay," said Nida. "We're still in the control room. There might be some way to re-task one of these other consoles to access the targeting system."

"Can you?" Quistis asked.

"—Maybe," said Nida; though if his mind had been blanking before, it was total static now. "I—I just need a minute."

Quistis hesitated for a second, then shook her head. "No, we don't have it. Even if no more soldiers come, the missiles will launch any moment — and when they do, this base will be destroyed. We have to get out of here."

"We can't just leave!" Nida exclaimed.

"Do you honestly think you can do this if we stay?" she asked him.

"I—" Nida raised his hands to his head. There had to be a way. "I don't – I just —"

"Nida," said Quistis. "...Let's go. Zell should have reached Garden by now to warn everyone. We've done all we can."

"Hey!" Seifer jumped in. "We came this far; we just gonna run? We can't just —"

"We've done all we can!" Quistis snapped. She grabbed Nida's arm and started pulling him toward the exit; he was more than a little dazed. "Let's go!"

"Where the hell are the drivers?" demanded the captain, who with his contingent of perimeter guards was standing along the intruders' supposed escape route. Beside them, the massive Iron Clad tank rested in its parking zone, for want of its operators.

"Don't know, sir!" said one of the guards. "...Sir, we could take it! I'm pretty good at operating armored equip —"

"Absolutely not!" snapped the Captain. "That's a highly advanced piece of machinery, and I'll be damned if I'm responsible for its damage!"

Just then, two figures in soldiers' uniforms came running out. "It's about time!" the captain snapped, as a third soldier came running behind them. "Let's get the Iron Clad ready to roll! These intruders won't know what hit them!"

He climbed up and opened the vehicle's main hatch, with the two drivers close behind him. "You can bet I'm reprimanding the hell out of you if the intruders get out," he said.

"Sorry," said the driver.

The captain blinked. Did they have any female tank operators on the base?

Just then, two other soldiers came running out. "Sorry we're late, sir!" called one.

"?" The captain frowned, looking between those two soldiers and the three who had previously arrived. "...Hey!" he exclaimed, pointing at the latter three. "You're the intruders!"

"Thanks for openin' the door," said Seifer. The captain tried to dive into the Iron Clad, but Quistis' whip wrapped around his legs and sent him crashing hard to the ground. Nida stabbed the guard before he knew what was going on.

"We'd better get in," said Quistis, retrieving the Captain's keycard while choking him with her knee. "This looks like our best bet for escape."

Seifer and Nida piled in; Quistis followed; she was just at the hatch, and the real tank drivers were almost upon her, when the ground started to rumble as if in a minor earthquake.

"Now what?" demanded Seifer; but this quickly became apparent. Two boxy missile launchers rose from the ground, and oriented themselves to point eastward. Quistis quickly ducked inside the Iron Clad, closing the hatch just before the missiles fired.

There were a series of deafening booms, each accompanied by a jolt as the ground heaved underneath the tank; Quistis was banged against Seifer, Nida and the walls, and without the Galbadian armor she still wore, she probably would have broken something. As it was, the blasts dazed her to the point where she couldn't remember which direction was up.

Finally, the upheaval ended with her head jammed under a console and her leg somehow entangled with the chair. And for a moment, her breathing was the only sound in the world.