Sarah

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5

"Irvine?!"

"Quistis! Am I glad to see you." The sharpshooter grinned my way, then frowned as he saw my expression. "Is something wrong?"

I opened my mouth to try to explain then shut it, not knowing where to begin. And I didn't really know all that had gone on myself anyway. "Nothing really. What are you here for?"

"Don't you know? I'm your contact for this mission."

"Huh?" That got my attention. "You're our contact? But you're just..." I caught myself before I shoved my foot in my mouth again, but Irvine just waved it off.

"It wouldn't have seemed so strange if I'd been the one who approached you guys, since I already knew you and all. I would have been reporting to a higher up anyway, although I hadn't been told who it was yet. It was my SeeD exam, being your guys' contact; they don't need any sharpshooters right now, so they gave me this assignment."

"So why are you meeting us here? I thought we had to make it to Galbadia garden before our contact...erm, you revealed yourself. And what's our mission anyway?"

"It was basically going to be a spying mission, but that's changed now. Where's Seifer?"

"What do you mean it's changed?" Something that had been nagging me suddenly clicked. "And why are you talking about everything in the past tense?"

Irvine flinched. "I'll tell you, I promise, but I have to know where Seifer is. He may be in danger."

A serious Irvine. I knew such an event meant something was seriously wrong. "I don't know. We had an argument and he walked out without telling me where he was going."

"Well, we've gotta find him. We need to get off this train as soon as possible."

Desperate as I was to know what was going on, I bit my tongue and nodded. Standing up, I crossed the room and went out the door, followed closely by Irvine. "You take the front area of the train, I'll take the rear. If we don't see him we'll backtrack until we meet up with one another. If we still couldn't find him on the second sweep then we'll worry."

"Gotcha. Just keep an eye out for anything suspicious." Then before I could ask what he meant he took off down the train.

Shrugging, I headed down the other end of the train. The first car held nothing, nor did the next one. The third car was a dining car, and fairly full of people eating their dinner. There were a few staring out the windows at the scenery, which reminded me of Selphie.

Passing through one of the passenger cars, I heard a feminine laugh behind me. Turning around, I could have sworn I saw the tip of a long white jacket disappear into a cabin, whose door was promptly shut and locked. Rolling my eyes, I walked back to the door and politely knocked. My only reply was another giggle and a lower voice saying something I couldn't make out.

Gritting my teeth, I called out softly, "Seifer, are you in there?"

There was cursing, more murmuring, then the doors slid open to reveal Seifer. "I'm busy," he snapped out.

Raising an eyebrow, I peeked around him. A girl our age was seated on this cabin's sofa, smoothing down a rumpled dress. She had long dark hair and her skin had an olive tone to it. It struck me that, while they were obviously not the same person, she had the same features as Rinoa. Eyes narrowing, I looked back at Seifer. "Enjoying yourself?"

"If you hadn't barged in, I would be! Now go away." With that he shut the door in my face.

Fuming, and realizing we were running out of time, I gave the door three hard knocks with my fist. I was gratified to hear more cursing behind it, and again the door whipped open. "What?!"

"Irvine's on board the train, and he's saying we have to get off now," I murmured, glancing behind him to make sure the girl hadn't heard. She was again arranging her dress, her face sporting an annoyed look. "He was going to be our contact in Galbadia Garden but something's wrong and he came to get us early."

"So what?" Seifer asked belligerently, but I could see him thinking. He glanced back at the girl, then looked at me. "Can't we wait just a few more minutes?"

"You know we can't Seif..."

"She doesn't know who I am."

It took a second before the statement made sense. I had never in my life heard Seifer beg, or seen this look in his eye. He was pleading with me over this, when we really didn't have any time. Irvine's agitation had washed over onto me, but looking into the man's eyes I was tempted to give him those five minutes, really tempted. I wanted to make up for my slight, but now wasn't the time. I couldn't...shouldn't.

Slim arms reached around Seifer's torso, and the girl's head peeked from behind his shoulder. "Are you coming back in, Seifer?"

"In a minute Mina," he replied, eyes still pleading with me.

It tore me up inside, but I made my decision. "Seifer, I'm giving you an order as your commanding officer to step out of that room and come with me."

I knew there was a ninety-nine-point-nine percent chance he'd disobey me. I'd never been able to get him to follow my orders, he just didn't see me as his superior. His eyes lit up just like I'd known they would, and I braced myself for what would probably be a rather heated 'No' on his part.

Almost as quickly as it had come, the fire died in his eyes. His shoulders slumped and he nodded without meeting my eyes. I barely managed to keep my jaw from hitting the floor when he turned around to Mina and said, "I'm sorry, but I need to go."

"Are you sure?" she pouted, her body pressing against him.

He did send me a look then, one of pure spite which made me shiver, but nodded his head. "Maybe we'll meet up again?"

Mina sighed. "Damn, now I gotta do this the hard way?"

"Wha..."

Twin knives almost magically appeared in the hands that encircled Seifer's chest. He froze as she fluidly shifted position and settled one knife over his neck, the other moving to the small of his back. "Out, now."

The light, airy voice I'd heard a minute ago was gone; her tone was no nonsense now. She no longer even looked our age but older, her features set in a decidedly neutral expression that would have rivaled anything Squall had ever given.

I did as she said, backing away as she slowly led Seifer out into the hallway. She flicked the wrist holding the knife to his throat and stated, "I have him in car seven, but we need a pickup ASAP."

"Roger that, escort on its way," a disembodied voice replied.

Irvine had been right, apparently, but what was going on? "Who are you, and what do you want with us?" I asked after a moment.

She just smiled. "Does it really matter? You'll all be dead in a matter of minutes."

"How can you do that without tipping off the whole train?"

"There are ways," she replied simply.

"But why do you want to kill us? What did we ever do to you?"

"Who said I was going to kill you?" Silence.

Well, so much for getting her to brag the plan. It only works in movies, apparently.

I heard a shot, and felt the wind of something fly past my cheek even as something wet and warm landed on me. The girl gasped, and that was all the warning Seifer needed; his elbow lashed out and connected with her midsection, and before she even had time to react to that he swung her over and smashed her into the floor of the train car. He ground the other hand still holding the knife until she let go, then kicked it towards Irvine.

"Miss me?" he quipped with a lopsided grin, blowing the smoke off the tip of his rifle.

Wiping blood from my cheek and ignoring the sharpshooter, I approached the girl and picked her head up by the hair. "Who sent you to do this?"

She just smiled at me, a thin stream of blood trickling down her cheek. Irvine's shot had torn through the girl's elbow, which Seifer was now grinding into the floorboards, but the blow to the floor had split her scalp. Picking up one of the knives, I held it to her throat and repeated, "Who sent you to do this?"

She opened her mouth as if to speak, and I saw something roll across her tongue. Before I could do anything she bit down hard, then almost immediately started convulsing in my grip. Swearing, I started to roll her over, but before I'd even finished she was limp, her eyes staring blankly forward. I checked her pulse and it was nonexistent.

"Damn," I muttered, then repeated it as I realized we were in a very public area. "Help me get her into the cabin."

Irvine grabbed her arms while I got the legs. we carried her into the room and laid her out on the floor behind a desk, arranging her so she was as hidden as possible. She was so small I could almost forget that she had almost tried to kill us.

Grimacing, Irvine wiped his hands on his pants as if trying to get rid of the essense of the dead. "We need to get off this train, now. On my way here I ran past some-- Seifer!"

Seifer had given the body of the girl a hard kick in the torso, one which had propelled her the few feet to the wall. He gave me a tortured look that Irvine completely missed, then pushed past us back into the hall.

"Geez, what a prick," Irvine stated angrily. "He didn't have to kick her like that."

"It's just a body now Irvine," I answered, rising to Seifer's defense. "A body of someone who betrayed him."

"But she was, well, a she."

Irvine, sexist? Nah. "Give him a break, how would you feel if a girl you'd just been making out with tried to slit your throat?"

That shut him up for a moment, but he still scowled. "I don't trust him, how can you? We may come from the same place, but he's changed and not necessarily for the better..."

"Irvine, shut your mouth before I do it for you." I think I shocked him being so blunt, but we didn't have time for this and it was making me ... uncomfortable. I guess I was feeling guilty, but now wasn't the time to think about that. "We've gotta get off here."

"Yeah, we need to leave NOW. I didn't tell you, but if we get into the tunnel under the water, we're screwed. There's no room to jump; the walls are too close and we'd be sucked under the wheels."

Ouch. "Alright, let's go."

Seifer was waiting just outside the doors. I knew he'd heard our conversation; he couldn't help hearing it from his position. I felt my face heat up slightly, but ignored it and headed towards one end of the traincar.

The door there suddenly burst open, and three people came through. I stopped, confused, and heard Irvine yelp behind me.

"Quistis, this way!"

"But..."

"Come on!"

Torn by indecision, I followed Irvine's orders just as bullets started whizzing by my head. Cursing, I dodged as best I could, diving behind the door leading to the connecting room between cars. Irvine slammed it shut and locked it behind me, then ducked behind the sturdy metal door as bullets pinged off it.

Seifer unsheathed his gunblade and sliced through the door to the outside of the train. The small compartment was immediately filled with the howling wind from outside, sucking us towards the opening with amazing power.

"Go, we gotta jump!"

"Irvine, those are SeeDs! What's going on?"

"I'm telling you, they're the bad guys. Now JUMP!"

I felt power being drawn, and looked up just in time to see Seifer form a fireball and hurl it to the door we were hiding behind. It crashed against the door, ripping it off its hinges and back into the compartment, blasting back the soldiers standing behind it.

I glanced outside. The tunnel was coming up with amazing speed, and with one last glance at Irvine's desperate face I took a flying leap out the door.