Chapter 4.

Squall felt the warm air brush through his hair before checking over his speedometer to find the needle sitting quite happily on ninety, Squall switched up a gear and watched it jump to one-twenty before changing up again after reaching one-thirty and hitting one-sixty. Squall could feel the speed, every last bit of it. Pleased at the speed of the vehicle he kept it up for around a minute before gradually coming to a halt and reaching to the central console for his satellite phone. He dialled in the number for Garden and let it ring.

A pleasant voice greeted him upon pickup.

"Balamb Garden, secretary to Headmaster Cid speaking, how may I direct your call?"

"This is Commander Squall Leonhart reporting in, would it be possible for me to speak to The Headmaster" Squall replied, rather jokingly.

"Squall, couldn't you've just said you wanted to speak to Cid" the woman replied, amused.

"Just doing my job"

"I guess not, ill put you through, hold on"

With that the line started ringing again.

"This is Cid, what've you got Squall?"

"Oh, nothing, just saying that we're clear and you can move out when you're ready."

"Confirmed Squall, we'll be off soon, that all?"

"For now"

Squall pressed the end call button on his Satellite phone and placed it back in the central console then looked around for a good vantage spot to which he found a naturally forming hill in the landscape that would give him a fair view of Garden taking off, he put the car into gear, took off the handbrake and started to head towards it.

After parking the GT500 atop the hill, he got out, sat on the hood and looked to the coast, where he could see Garden and its landing zone clearly. The light shone off Garden at different angles and different intensities as the colours varied across its vast superstructure. It was with that Squall saw the receiver-struts come up from the floor and lift Garden off the ground seemingly effortlessly, he watched the anti-grav ring slowly go back down over the structure and settle at the bottom and start spinning once more, the receiver struts released themselves from the Gardens main struts and retract back into the floor. Garden hovered for a few seconds as its docking struts retracted before turning back to the ocean and heading towards it, as it reached the beach it started to lower itself down then it hit the water, the anti-grav ring disappeared and Garden sailed casually into the open water, he gave a short salute then stood up and walked back around to the drivers-side door, got in, started the engine then revered back a bit, he pulled the car through one-eighty degrees and gave it full throttle once more, heading towards Deling city.

"Zell, pull over, it's taking off"

The car came to a screaming halt and all but Quistis dived out of the car in blatant excitement, Quistis gradually got out after she had finished reading the page she was on.

The garden started rising from its hole in the ground and the docking latches separated from each other and the Garden floated for a bit, turned around and flew off into the ocean.

"Well, I guess there's a first for everything" Said Irvine

"I guess so" replied Selphie

"Boring, can we go now?" cried Zell

Quistis just stood with her hand protecting her eyes from the sunlight beating down on her, shrugged and got back in the car.

"Gunna hafta do something about her" said Selphie "Perhaps some music will get her in a cheery mood"

Irvine nodded in agreement, along with Zell, they got back in the car and Selphie pulled out a CD from one of the hampers labelled 'Ultimate School-bus Anthems Ever, The Compilation' and didn't hesitate to put it in the CD player, in hope or cheering Quistis up, who again had her nose buried in her book, that was until the van speakers buzzed into life with the classic '99 green bottles sitting on a wall'. She reached over to the CD player, pressed eject and looked back at Selphie.

"Ya know, if you wanted me to say something, you could've just asked, but I get the hint."

Selphie smiled while Zell and Irvine laughed,

"Good ol' Selph', knows exactly how to get a person to speak"

Squall was again doing his favourite speed of 160 along the mostly flat Galbadian terrain until he reached the gates of Deling city, and slowed down to enter the busy city. Deling city was as busy as it always is, flocks of people crossing the roads, the whirr of car engines, and the smell of burning gasoline in the conventional and primitive engines that the Galbadians used, it had been a little while since Squall had visited Deling City, but he immediately knew that it hadn't changed much, he headed to the car park just east of the centre of the city. Upon arriving there he called the other party.

"Zell? How long do you think you'll be?"

"I'm guessing around 20 minutes, where are you now?"

"Sitting in the car park to the east of the arch, I've got some stuff I gotta go get , if I'm not here when you get here, you know where I am, stick around, I wont be long"

"Jesus….how fast were you going…well, I guess ill see you there, we got a plan for being there?"

"Not really, just thought it'd be a good idea to come here, you might want to go see Rinoa and it isn't like there aren't enough places to go here, anyway, gotta go, cya later"

"Yeah, cya man"

Squall pressed the end call button and walked off to the shopping centre of Deling city looking to upgrade his combat knives and re-stock on various things.

His first point of reference was the item shop in the large multi-floor dome that was Deling cities shopping centre/mall. He walked in, Gunblade casually bouncing off his thigh in its sheath and Griever hanging out over his shirt, almost everybody looked at him as he entered the shop and he just ignored them as he walked over to the shelf that various types of remedies on it. He picked up half a dozen, read their labels and walked over to the checkout. The cashier scanned the items in and prompted Squall with the price, he reached around to his back pocket and pulled out a wad of notes rolled up tidily and tied up with an elastic band, he took out three of these notes and placed them on the counter, grabbed a bag, placed the items inside and turned to walk out. As he turned, he felt strange, like the wind had just picked up all of a sudden and made all the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. As he looked over he saw the curvaceous feminine form that was Rinoa Heartilly, he just stared, thoughts running quickly through his head. He started to walk towards the door, slowly, casually,

"Hello Squall" she gasped. Squall wanted to not acknowledge her, but his remaining feelings stopped him.

"Hi" He grimaced.

"What're you doing in Deling city?"

"Short vacation"

"Anybody with you?"

"Everybody, they'll err…be here soon, sure they'd want to meet up for a drink or something."

"I'd like that, but what about you, do you want to meet up for a drink"

"I'll err…get back to you on that one"

"Come on Squall, don't act like we can't be friends"

"Yeah…uhh…whatever, listen I've gotta go get some new knives, where can I find you?"

"Well, I've got the day off work, so I'll be at my fathers place, me and him get along so much better now that I'm living back here. Take my number, call me when or if you wanna head out later" she said holding out a business-card size piece of paper.

"Will do" he said as he took the piece of paper "Hey, listen, there any good weapon shops around here?"

"Try Mercado's upstairs…well, see ya later I guess"

"Yeah, maybe we can meet up at your dads place then head somewhere, see ya later Rin"

She smiled at him, and he smiled back…unwillingly, but it seemed polite at the time. He walked up to the escalator and travelled up to the second floor where he saw the large shop with all sorts of weaponry displayed in the window, from maces to samurai swords, all highlighted with their own colour of neon backlight, it struck Squall as a little over the top, but hey, it wasn't his shop.