It had begun like any other day in Garden. Students and SeeDs had slumbered peacefully within its familiar, secure walls, resting up for the new day that lay ahead of them. And they had gone about their business, until, at approximately 4:14 PM, the Dreamcasts had begun their revolt. Every one of the consoles - scattered about the dormitories - had simultaneously begun downloading the Devil Summoning Program from Dricas.

And now Nida and the Arrogant SeeD from the library - things were getting so desperate that Garden had to trot out the unimportant characters that didn't have names - now stood back-to-back in the dormitory corridor, fighting off unending waves of black mages and ChuChu Rocket! mice. "Why doesn't anything normal ever happen here?" Nida bemoaned as he cut down a mage with his completely generic, featureless short sword. "Why can't a week go by without people killing themselves or being arrested or everyone's sexual orientation being reversed or fighting breaking out over Internet music videos or our home video game consoles attacking us with cartoon mice?"

The pair gradually hacked their way to the dorm door they had been directed to. Still fighting, they ventured inside and found the enemies even thicker within. Mages and mice were materializing in blue light one after another in front of the entertainment center. Nida summoned his Guardian Force. A plain-looking green dragon flew through the room, breathing out fire. The attack created a big enough gap in the onslaught that the Arrogant SeeD could rush in and smash the piece of furniture with his axe. It collapsed, splinters and sparks flying everywhere as various electronic devices slammed into each other. New mice and mages stopped appearing, though the victory did nothing to halt the hordes that were already rampaging about.

"There's another one down," Arrogant SeeD panted. He and Nida battled their way out of the room to find the next room.

* * *

A battle was raging outside her door, but Mikoto was still seated in front of her Macintosh, drafting "Attack on B-Garden: Thumbnail Theatre." She smirked, knowing already that her clever deconstruction would deal a crushing blow to the follies of the idiots that surrounded her. They were all acting like this was the end of the world. Like Balamb Garden had never been attacked before! Like there had never been any wars in the history of the world! Well, this was what they got for being so insular. One military academy, one battle was hardly cosmically significant.

Someone male pounded on the door. "Mikoto!"

"Go away."

"We're under attack!"

"Yeah, well, I don't get a flying fuck, an aquatic fuck, a land-dwelling fuck, a tree-climbing fuck, a deep sea-diving fuck, or any other sort of fuck I neglected to mention. Buzz off."

"We need your help! Everyone must assist in Garden's defense!"

"Eh, I already cleared the buggers out of my room; that's good enough -"

Thunder crackled and the male voice screamed. Mikoto finally dropped her pretext of complete apathy and dashed outside. The Man From Garden - also known as CC Joker - was lying on the ground, trying to beat out the fire consuming his pants. Three familiar-looking winged black mages stood over him, staring Mikoto down with unblinking glowing eyes. Lightning crackled from the staff of the lead mage. "The Black Waltz, huh?" she muttered.

"Hardly," their leader intoned. "We are ... the Black Polka."

"I exist only to polka! I exist only to polka! I exist only to polka! I exist only to polka!" chanted one of the other mages.

"Oh, brother." Mikoto rolled her eyes. "Another predictable, hackneyed attempt at creating a team of bumbling, recurring minor villains. When will they ever come up with something original? Note that by cleverly pigeonholing you into a cynical stereotype, I have completely nullified all right you have to exist. Also, I hate sprite-based webcomics."

Oblivious to Mikoto's insults, Black Polka 16 - or was it 18? Mikoto couldn't keep them straight - produced an accordion from inside its robe. "Shall we polka?"

Mikoto was already charging up an energy blast. "Sure, let's polka ... IN THE NEXT DIMENSION!!" she cried, blasting the Black Polka out of existence.

Man From Garden looked up. "Oh, thank you."

"Eh, I was just tired of all the noise they were making," Mikoto said. "Those were such crappy villains. Seriously, I could be a better villain than that. They have no talent at all."

He rose and smoothed out what was left of his pants. "Hmmph! Can't you even ask if I'm okay?"

Mikoto grunted. "Oh. Huh. Well, are you okay?"

"Yeah." Man From Garden looked around. "Gosh, what should I do? I'd like to enjoy my fifteen sentences of fame before the heroes return and it's time for me to fade back into obscurity again."

"Bah, those are such crappy heroes anyway," Mikoto said. "It doesn't take any talent at all to do what they could do. I could do it."

"Oh yeah? Why don't you?"

Mikoto shrugged. "This is all cosmically insigificant anyway. Why bother? Andrew W.K. is the savior of rock'n'roll. ¡Viva la apatía!"

Then, seemingly at random, she took a deep breath and prepared to go Super Terra-jin. As she clenched her fists and roared, yellow energy enveloped her. Her hair grew and stood up on end. She blasted off into the air and streaked down the hall, leaving her associate in the dust.

* * *

Cid called again while the missing SeeDs were driving back to Garden. "Xu, how close are you to Garden?" he asked. The request was obviously urgent, but he was managing to stay calm.

"Almost there."

"Good. The mages have let the monsters out of the training area. We're going to need you to hold down the front gates; we can't let them escape into the countryside!"

Mengshi relayed this information to the others. "You can lift off Garden. If we're floating in the air, nobody will be able to escape!"

".... we ... ... ... ... and ... ... Nida ... floor."

"Hold on; I can't hear you!" Mengshi shouted into the phone. She leaned out the window to try for a better reception.

"No ... ... ... ... broken ... ... ... hear ... me?"

"NOT REALLY!" She opened the car door and climbed up onto the roof of the PokéBeetle. "CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW?"

"YES," Cid said. "HOORAY."

"Maybe you should invest a new phone," Selphie suggested.

"But I can play Super Monkey Ball on this," Mengshi protested, hurt.

"Xu, the elevator's broken," Cid continued. "All the students and SeeDs have been trapped on the first floor since this morning! Neither Edea nor I know how to pilot Garden and Nida's stuck in the dormitories. And on top of all that, Squall's vanished!"

"Can't Nida use the stairs?"

"There aren't any stairs in Balamb Garden; remember?"

"Oh, right."

Seifer poked his head out of the car window and looked up. "Hey! Xu! Maybe the power cords to the elevator have snapped!"

"Seifer thinks the elevator power cords might be broken," Xu explained into her phone.

"Hmm, we haven't checked that yet. But they're up on the roof."

Heh. The world seemed to be offering her numerous ways to put her sorceress powers to good. Or perhaps she simply didn't see them before, when she was horrified at what she had become. But she rather liked being useful. It felt good that what made her unique made her useful to the world - and that her help was desired because of her specific characteristics and not simply as another drone worker. "I think I can take care of that. I might be able to pilot Garden, too; I brushed up on how it works in case we ever needed a back-up. I'll be right up. Don't worry; I'll explain later!"

She sprung from the back of the moving vehicle. Her wings instantly sprouted again and she took off for the roof of Balamb Garden.

* * *

"It sounds like somethin's goin' on out there!" Kid pressed her ear to the sealed elevator doors.

Rikku flopped back and forth in her carpet. "Maybe someone's finally coming to rescue us!" She couldn't believe that no one had found them missing yet -- they'd been in here all night! At least the roll of carpet had functioned as a convenient sleeping bag, but, dangit, she was getting hungry. And that cute emo boy still hadn't spoken a word to them. Sure, she was used to people not telling her their names, but couldn't at least say something really deep and sensitive? He probably wrote a lot of poetry, why didn't he read some of it? "I'll miss you, mysterious emo stranger!"

Well, these girls aren't so bad, really, Squall decided. They hadn't really done anything to offend him - in fact, unlike all the mean people here in not-Esthar, they even felt sorry for him. Maybe if he was nice to them too, he could get to know them better. Too bad he'd already lost his mojo several weeks ago. "I guess I'll miss you too," he said. "Thanks for keeping me company."

"Hey, you're talking to us!" Rikku said. "Yay!"

"D'you have any deep poetry to read us, mate? What's your name?"

"Squall," Squall grunted.

"Hi Squall!" Rikku said.

"Yeah, nice to meet you for real!" Kid put a friendly hand on his shoulder. "Now don't be so glum, chum!"

"That's right, I have a joke for you!" Squall recalled Seifer's advice. "Okay, here it goes: Two pretzels are walking down the street and one is assaulted."

Kid and Rikku exchanged puzzle glances. Where was the funny in that? It must be some of his deep, sophisticated emo humor, because he was a true artist and all. They both giggled in appreciation. They wouldn't want to look shallow, after all!

"Squall! Hey Squall!"

Huh? Someone was most definitely calling his name, but where was it coming from? It sounded muted and distant. And it couldn't be Ellone sending him into the past; he would have recognized that. He paced the elevator, looking for something that might tip him off.

"SQUALL!"

From above! The voice was coming from above! He looked up. No one on the ceiling; it must be coming from outside the elevator. But it couldn't be too far away. Then he spotted a trapdoor on the ceiling of the elevator. Maybe someone was in the elevator shaft. He could go out and checked.

"Help me!" the voice continued.

That could be only one thing in Squall's mind. "I'll save you, Rinoa!" he cried. Driven by chemical reaction more than anything else, he ran forward for a moment before realizing this would not accomplish anything. No, he needed to have a semblance of a plan. He turned to Kid. "Quick, help me up to the trapdoor."

She offered her hands for him to stand on. Squall stumbled on them and, while she was bobbling him back and forth, managed to tip the trapdoor open.

Kid looked down at Rikku. "Who's Rinoa?" Kid whispered.

"His ex-girlfriend, duh!" Rikku hissed back. "He's going to save her even though she rejects him! How noble and heroic." She sighed wistfully. "I think I'm in love."

Squall climbed up into the elevator shaft. He looked up for the source of the voice. About half a story above him lay a small hole in the wall. A straw voodoo doll adorned with cannel poked his head out of said hole. "Hey! Squall-man! Get me out of here!"

Sweet Hyne on a leopard-print wakeboard! It was his mojo! Some mice must have taken him to make a nest! "Hang on, Dan, I'll get you out," he said. He grabbed hold of the elevator cables and inched up them.

Lucky Dan wriggled most of his body through the hole and remained poised to spring out. Squall anticipated his jump and reached out with his right arm - his left one still gripped the cables. Dan took a flying leap towards Squall; Squall's arm snapped out and seized his mojo by its neck. "Whoa, watch the straw!" Squall hefted Dan up and folded his arm in a secure more grip around his waist.

The elevator finally rumbled to life and resumed its descent to the first floor. Squall looked down just in time to see the car, with a cry of "Crikey!", drop several yards to the lobby.

Squall stared down the shaft, trying to judge the distance to the elevator's new position. Damn, it was too far to jump, especially when he was carrying a wounded voodoo doll. He started to shimmy back down the ladder while keeping his mojo firmly ensconced in his arm. That didn't last for long, however - a slight slip of Squall's feet caused Dan to bounce about while Squall slid straight down.

"Hey! Aren't you're not supposed to let my neck move, or something!?" Lucky Dan protested. "They must not have taught you anything in first-aid class!"

Squall stopped. Shoot, what was he supposed to do? He didn't trust himself to climb back down, but he couldn't hang here indefinitely.

Maybe he needed another plan.

* * *

Super Terra-jin 2 Mikoto closed in on a quartet of Black Mages she had been pursuing over the Garden rotunda. "Didn't I just fight you shmucks?"

The lead mage - fatter and slower than the rest - stared at her. His eyes flickered ominously. "No one has fought the Black Foxtrot and lived."

"Yes, but that's because they were weak. My Trance level is 470,245! I am the mightiest of all Terra-jin!"

"But my Trance level is 512,489!" Black Foxtrot #27 1/2 declared. "You cannot hope to defeat me!"

Quina bounced out of the cafeteria hallway. "I eat you all up!" He leapt forward and waved his arms several times. Black Foxtrot #27 1/2 turned into a giant cookie that fell to the ground. "Mmmm... cookie. That good enough for me!" Quina started munching away on what was once the mage.

"....HAHE FOR YOUR MOM TO POOP ON IN THE NEXT DIMENSION WITH A STICK!!" she cried, blasting Black Foxtrot pi, Black Foxtrot 8, and Black Foxtrot -1 to the next dimension.

She looked down at Quina. "By the way, that wasn't funny or clever and I'm a crappy writer, so if you appreciate my work, you're an idiot. The Doves are the saviors of rock'n'roll."

* * *

"BOOOOOOYAKAAAA!"

"Love and peace!"

"Free Mumiiiiia!"

"Eulaliaaa!"

A chorus of war cries rang out as Selphie and her friends battled the Dreamcast-spawned forces. The mages and mice had the advantage of numbers, but they were none too swift. Most attacked the heroes in groups of two or three and patiently waited their turn to be attacked and dispatched with a single hit. Selphie had to admit, however, she was unused to fighting in such a large group - she never seemed to be in any parties of more than three people. The last time she'd been in any kind of substantial battle was ... the last time B-Garden had been attacked.

The elevator slid down into place and the doors opened. Rikku came rolling out and, whooping with delight, bowled through a whole contingent of mages, knocking them over left and right. Her carpet finally stopped near the door. She wriggled out of it and jumped to her feet, full of pride at her devastating attack. "THAT's how it's done!"

The T-Rexaur marched closer to the group. Kid gasped. "Crikey, it's a T-Rexaur!" She sprung down the stairs to get a closer look. "These rare kings of nature are usually seen only on the Island Closest to Hell!" She inched closer to the monster and pointed at its side for the benefit of the others. "Check out these scales! What a beauty!"

The T-Rexaur roared. Kid crouched and looked over her shoulder at the others, speaking in a stage whisper. "She's a big one, ain't she?" She sprung up on the T-Rexaur's back and perched just below its head. The others watched her with amazement -- stupefied that anyone could be so foolhardy as to jump on a dinosaur, yet impressed at her ability to survive. Kid forced the T-Rexaur's jaws open. "Woooow! Look at those teeth! I sure wouldn't want to have my arteries punctured by those!"

The T-Rexaur stomped around in circles, trying to shake her off. Kid held on for dear life as she was shaken back and forth and bounced up and down. She attempted to continue her narrative despite the chaos. "One bite from these huuuge jaws," she shouted, "could rip a shoopuf in half! I'm going to stick my hand in there." She thrust one hand into the T-Rexaur's open jaws while trying to coax it into submission. "Hold on there, mate." The jaws snapped down and Kid's hand jumped back in a flash. "Crikey, that was a close one!"

Kid hopped back to the ground and patted the angry dinosaur on its side. "Thanks for the ride, mate!" The beast roared again and tried to turn itself around to bite her. Kid kept running, staying to the sides of the dinosaur. "Now let's see if I can cruelly drag you around by your tail, little fellow." Trying to move stealthily, she reached for the tip of the creature's tail. "You should never, ever grab a T-Rexaur by its tail, but just this once... oh!" The T-Rexaur slapped its tail up and down, slamming Kid against the floor. "He's an ornery little bugger!"

The T-Rexaur roared once again and stomped around in circles. Hanging onto the end of its tail, Kid was whipped every which way. "CRIKEY! These dinosaurs have a nasty temper!" she yelled. "Don't worry, though, I've got it all under control -- as soon as we cut to a brief commercial break, that is!"

BANG! The T-Rexaur cried out and topped over. Kid flew through the air and splashed into the water in the middle of the rotunda. Irvine lowered the smoking barrel of his shotgun. "You have to be crazy!" he said.

Kid's hands seized the railing and pulled her out of the water. "No mate, I'm Kid!" she said.

Quistis raised a suspicious eyebrow. "Is that Australian for jailbait?"

Kid hopped onto the floor and shook off some of the dripping water. "You blokes have gotta help Squall! He's trapped in the elevator shaft!"

Rikku spotted Rinoa lurking in the middle of the combat. How could she be so horrid as to stand here, like nothing was going on, when Squall was risking his life for her? Rikku ran towards her, waving her arms and yelling, "Rinoa! Rinoa! Squall's trapped in the elevator! Don't stand there; you have to help him!"

Dammit! Why was everything about Squall? None of them would ever give her a break. She didn't care if they had a point, not when they lacked the respect and decency to not jab hot pokers into her open wounds. Why didn't anyone make allowances for her failings, only Squall's?

"Screw you!" she shouted at them. She ran off in a huff around the circling main hall.

"Wait! Wait!" Rikku and Kid raced after her. "You've got to do something!"

"PRINCESS! BEATRIX AND I ARE HERE TO RESCUE YOU!"

A whole team of chocobo-riding soldiers barreled through the front gates of Garden. They clattered to a sudden, uneasy halt; Steiner, of course, went flying off the front of his chocobo. He jumped to his feet, all in a tizzy, and struggled to cram his helmet back into place. "Egads! Those infernal contraptions are all over the place! I should have suspected they were behind these foul deeds!" He started smashing the nearest mages with his sword. "Die, monsters! You don't belong in this world!"

Steiner sprung back on his chocobo and waved to Beatrix, Freya, and the other Alexandrian soldiers. "Quickly, we must find the Princess!" He raised his sword aloft and the chocobos went charging around the hall. The chocobo's feet alone cut down scores of mages and mice; their rider's swords took out many more. Steiner continued to hurl out archaic insults at the mages he smashed apart. "Fie! Have at you, machina! For Alexandria!"

"What the hell is this?" Seifer demanded.

Quistis cast a Shell spell on herself before engaging another group of mages. "As long as they're helping us fight these monsters, I don't care who they are!"

The floor rumbled slightly, and it was not just the charging chocobos. Warning lights flashed and the doors closed themselves -- Garden's take-off was beginning. "Great!" Quistis said. "Mengshi must have taken over the controls! Let's fall back to the quad; we can team up with the other SeeDs and we'll have more space to fight there."

* * *

Rikku and Kid scrambled around the looping main hall in pursuit of Rinoa. The mages and mices appeared to be slightly disoriented by the take-off, giving Rikku and Kid a chance to break through despite their disadvantage in numbers. But then several winged mages, all wearing poodle skirts and bobbysocks, descended in front of them, cutting off their path. All their eyes glowed with menace -- scary enough, but each mage was also radiating lighting from his staff.

Rikku screamed and shrunk back into a cowering crouch.

"Rikku!" Kid exclaimed. She was unaware of Rikku's fear of thunder and didn't know what was wrong. She knelt beside her friend, trying to discern the problem while taking nervous glances at the mages looming over them. They would strike any second. This didn't look good!

"MA... MI... MU... ME... MO!" A bright energy blast streaked over their hands and blasted the Black Lindy Hop to the next dimension. Super Terra-jin 5 Mikoto flew over them a second later, following her successful attack. "Suck it down (TM Ion Storm)!"

"Fa'na cyjat! Ruunyo!" Rikku babbled Al Bhed in her excitement. Good thing her kevlar hotpants had protected her from any harm.

Mikoto looked down. "Sorry, I don't speak 'Crazy Bitch.'"

"Oh, oh, excuse me." Rikku shuffled her feet, embarassed. "I mean, 'We're saved! Thank you!'"

"Don't be so happy; your life is meaningless anyway."

"What?"

"The harrowing truth of our existences is that what we lack is a self at the center of the twisted morass of illusion and automation we refer to as 'I.' We are increasingly being absorbed into our consciousness, or 'black hole,' through our use of it, and at the same time, we are using our consciousness to absorb all other life-forms into its emptiness. Since our consciousness itself appears empty of who we are, we also appear to be replacing everything else with our empty knowledge and its material extensions; and if we carry this perspective through, our systems of knowledge and its material extensions, will replace everything else, including ourselves, and then become nothing. There is no God. Also, I really like Klonoa."

Rikku could not help but laugh. "You're so weird."

"You have no idea," Mikoto murmured. She blasted forward again in search of fresh prey.

* * *

The timely intervention of the Black Lindy Hop gave Rinoa a sizable lead on the the two Squall fangirls chasing her. But she could not hope to outrun the chocobo gunning for that thin black-haired woman that was surely the Princess. "Your knight is here, Princess!" Steiner cried as he toppled off the front of his mount.

For a second Rinoa thought Squall was being even more self-important than usual - Princess was an old nickname of hers, after all - but, wait, that wasn't his voice. She turned around to see what was going on. It was some creepy medieval knight guy she didn't even know!

But as soon as Steiner saw her face, he realized that this one serious case of mistaken identity. "Wait ... you're not the Princess!"

"No, I'm not," Rinoa said icily. "And I certainly don't need any knight to rescue me." She slapped him in the face and ran off the way she had been going.

So what had happened to Garnet? "PRINCESS!" Steiner howled, running around in circles. "Where are you?"

Super Terra-jin 12 Mikoto lit on the floor near him. "Thanks for coming, Rusty, but I think your princess is another castle."

"WHAT? Where have they taken her?"

Quina hopped over. "Dagger never here, Steiner," he explained with more vigorous nods of his head. "No have anything to do with mages! You diving in the wrong mud puddles again."

"Then..." Steiner struggled to make sense of this development. Had the world worked the way it was supposed to, the Princess would have been here! "Then I have been duped! Curse you, foul snake-tongued harlot! May moombas nest in your bedclothes and a thousand ferrets gnaw through your heartstrings!" He paused to bash another couple mages apart -- whether they'd kidnapped the Princess or not, they were still his sworn enemies.

But ... where could the Princess have disappeared to, if not Balamb Garden?

* * *

"Where do you guys want to go next?" Garnet gazed at all the pipes before her in rapture. The Gold Saucer had so many places to go! Any thoughts of Steiner or boring stuff at Alexandria had been blessedly banished from her mind long ago.

Eiko pointed towards a colored tent and hopped up and down. "I wanna get my fortune told! I wanna get my fortune told!"

Garnet obliged and her party of four proceeded inside - except for Vivi, who tripped over his feet and fell on the ground. But within, there was no friendly cat to greet them, nor even Cait Sith. All that was inside was an unmanned giant moogle and a cardboard signed that explained "FORTUNETELLER OUT -- SELF-SERVICE ONLY. (NOW AVAILABLE EXCLUSIVELY ONLINE: THE LEGEND OF CAIT SITH GETS SOME.)"

Zidane rubbed his chin, puzzled. "Self-service fortune-telling? What, do we just write our own?"

"Ooh! Then I predict I'm going to marry Zidane and be a ballerina!"

But Cait Sith had left them a little more than that. Vivi had quietly stumbled over to the moogle and now discovered that its mouth was shaped like a slot. "I think the fortunes come from this," he said.

"How does it work? How does it work?" Eiko quickly searched the moogle's front side for some controls and, having failed to find any, ran around to the back. Oh, a bunch of switches! She climbed up on the moogle's back - not being much bigger than Cait Sith, she fit on just fine - and started pushing them.

Garnet watched the moogle's mouth for any sign of a fortune. "It doesn't seem to be working," she said.

"WORK!" Eiko howled, slamming her fists up and down on the control panel. She rocked the moogle back and forth, hoping to coax at least one fortune of the stupid machine.

Then the flood started. There was no tentative beginning, no warning of the coming deluge. No, the fortunes started to pour out all at once. Not one, or a few, but an endless stream, gushing out of the moogle's mouth. Poor Vivi was buried beneath the slips of colored paper until even his pointy hat had vanished from sight. The pile continued to grow and grow as the moogle vomited out every fortune it had inside.

Eiko pounded more buttons. "It won't stop!" she wailed. Garnet, meanwhile, had covered her mouth and was staring at the debacle in mute horror.

At last the onslaught reduced itself to a few remaining slips that floated gently from the moogle's mouth. And then all was calm.

Garnet reached out and gingerly took the top one off the pile to read.

"'You will experience an avalanche of good fortune.'"

* * *

Running first from Kid and then from Steiner, Rinoa found herself having made a complete circuit of the Garden rotunda. Now she was back at the lobby ... where Squall was...

She hesitated. It was easy to pretend not to care about what happened to him - and she was tired of his unwanted advances - but she did. He was in physical danger this time. Regardless of what she felt about him - she was not ready to answer that question - she did not wish death on him. He might be a nuisance but there was no way he deserved that. No one did. So she could hardly stand here and do nothing when she had the chance to save him.

That was a quick decision. Rinoa stepped into the elevator but didn't touch any buttons. "Squall, are you up there?" she shouted.

Oops! She'd shown up before he was ready to spring to her rescue. He felt terribly embarrassed that she had caught him in this decidedly non-gallant state. "Rinoa!" he shouted through the ceiling. "Don't worry; I'm coming to save you!"

"I'm not the one who needs rescuing, you numbskull! Where are you; what's going on?"

"I'm holding onto the elevator cable but I can't climb up to the next floor. I've got a wounded mojo!"

"You never had a mojo in the first place, Squall!"

"Yes, I do! He's made of straw and he's named Dan!"

"All right, I'm going to lower the elevator down to the basement so you can climb down to where I am! Hang on!" Rinoa tapped the button so the elevator would descend to the basement where NORG used to reside. Immediately after doing so, she dived through the closing doors and rolled out into the lobby. Success! The elevator dropped out of sight, leaving Rinoa facing an empty elevator shaft.

She peeked inside. Yep, Squall was up there, clinging to the cables with one arm and a giant voodoo doll with the other. "It should be clear!" she shouted up to him. "Climb down; I'll help you out!"

He hesitated. Now that he was supposed to escape, he realized that he was no longer able to. This situation was more desperate than he had thought. "Uh... I'm not sure I can!" he said urgently. "It's taking all my effort just to hold on; I'm not sure I have the strength to climb anywhere!"

Shit! What could she do? Rinoa looked around a panic. The SeeDs had deserted the lobby for the quad, there was no one around to help. She could run and get someone, but what if it was too late? She could try catching him if he jumped, but that was probably no good. "Maybe you could unravel your sweater and tie that to the cables?"

"No one touches my sweater!"

Then she remembered what Xu had told her last night. She was still a sorceress. If she did something risky - like, say, jumping into the shaft - she'd get her wings back and could fly up there to rescue him.

But that was all only according to Xu. Rinoa had no proof and no time to test it. It would mean accepting Xu's word on blind faith. And how did she know she could? Xu had been her enemy; maybe Xu had lied to her to trip her up somewhere. Maybe to make Rinoa die like she had.

She looked down the shaft. The basement lay a substantial distance below the lobby. It would be a long way down -- too long -- if her sorceress powers failed to kick in.

Rinoa bit her lip and stepped to the edge. She knew in her heart that Xu was telling the truth. Xu really had no reason to lie; she was a good person and wasn't out to kick shit all over the world. But when Rinoa looked into the shaft, she couldn't make herself jump. She didn't know she'd be safe, and she couldn't make herself believe it enough to do it.

That was what Selphie had told her to do. Trust others. Let go of her fears and have faith in them. But she was no good at having faith. She never had been. Fear and doubt bubbled too quickly within her. After mom dying, after fighting with her dad for so long, after Seifer ... it was so hard to believe that what was out there was good for her. Oh, she took plenty of risks, but only when she was pissed, when she was too angry to know better. And when she wasn't, she was terrified. That had always been what separated her from the SeeDs, from her friends. They knew how to trust. They knew goodness lay out there -- out elsewhere in the world and out ahead in the future -- and so they did not have to get so upset over quandary along the way. She, on the other hand, was like a car going at maximum speed. Every little bump jostled her into a painful flight up and down.

But how could she trust the world? She honestly couldn't think of a time when she hadn't been let down. Life had given her nothing but betrayals and ulterior motives. Or at least until Xu and Selphie had given her a much kinder fate than she had been expecting at the museum -- perhaps there was one time that the world had given her good, after all. But was that enough to maker her believe? If the world gave her something it didn't need to even once, it couldn't be all bad.

"Rinoa, help me!" Squall screamed.

Fear tore apart her stomach and panic crawled over her skin. Curling up into a little ball and letting the world win never sounded more appealing. Squall was going to get hurt if she couldn't trust Xu enough to let go. But it was too late. She couldn't learn to trust in a rush right here, right now.

"HELP MEEE!"

But she had to. She just had to. And she wouldn't know if she didn't try. Even if it meant letting go and hurtling into the unknown...

Rinoa dived into the elevator shaft. She plummeted a short distance before the angel wings unfurled from her back. She did a somersault, reversed direction, and soared up to where Squall hung. Squall climbed carefully into her arms while still holding Lucky Dan in his own.

"Thanks," he said.

Rinoa filled him in on the present situation as they flew down the shaft. "Garden's being attacked. All these mages named after different kinds of dances and mice started coming out of video game machines."

"I think I had that dream once." It sounded like another terrible, horrible, no good very bad day. Except that Rinoa was speaking to him, even holding him in her arms. And he had his mojo back. No, this was a very good day! Maybe he wouldn't move to Esthar after all.

Rinoa flew through the largely vacant rotunda towards the quad so they could catch up with the SeeDs. "Whoo, this is better than ValuJet!" Lucky Dan said.

"Squall, why is your mojo still living in 1996?"

"He doesn't get out much."

"I've noticed."

A vast battle raged below them in the quad. The SeeDs, students, and Alexandrian soldiers were holding out admirably against the mages, mices, and assorted training center monsters. They soared over it all, looking for a place to land as they drifted slowly towards the grass

Squall grinned. "Just like old times, huh?"

"Not quite."

Rinoa and Squall descended into the middle of the melee and touched down near where Selphie and Zell were battling a veritable nuclear family of mages: two full-sized mages and three super-deformed half-size ones. Squall readied his Gunblade, yet he could not help but scoff at the peculiar formation of their opponents. "What is this, the Black Cha-Cha?"

Lucky Dan sprung out of Squall's arms. "Cha cha cha cha!" he exclaimed, bouncing in a hyperkinetic rendition of a cha-cha. Whatever injuries he had sustained at the hands of the mice could not have been terribly severe.

"Look out!" Zell was about to shove him out of the Black Cha-Cha when he saw, to his great surprise, the mages mimicking Dan's moves.

"Hey, I think they like it!" Selphie exclaimed.

She was right. They did. The Black Cha-Cha had faltered in their attack to watch Dan. Hey, this could work! Selphie started dancing too, and Zell joined a moment later. Rinoa was still in her sorceress mode and casting spells uncontrollably. Zell punched her out (which, he had to admit, was kinda perversely satisfying after the trouble she'd put them through) and then brought her back to consciousness with a Raise spell. She quickly realized what the others were doing and also start dancing.

Squall, meanwhile, was too preoccupied with himself to pay the group any attention. "Hey, these damn things keep chewing on my sweater. This makes me a sad panda, I mean, emo kid," he muttered, trying to bat away all the mice nipping at him.

Rinoa gave him a push to get him started. "Dance!" After a moment of getting down with his patented Black Emo-Stand-Still, Squall joined the cha-cha.

The Black Cha-Cha were no longer simply watching, but dancing. Indeed, other mages were flocking over to get down to the music. The mice had stopped chewing on Squall's sweater and now gazed with hypnotized beady eyes at Selphie and the others. "Your technique amazes me!" Lucky Dan gurgled. "You're awesome! I love your style! Show me how to do it!"

"Hey, I think we're onto something here!" Selphie said.

She spotted Seifer fighting another cluster of mages and marched towards him. The other humans followed behind her in a cone formation, followed by all the entranced mages and mice. They danced in unison and together they formed one great army of dancers / combatants.

Selphie started calling out directions to keep everyone in sync. "All right, everyone, left, left, down, left, cha!"

"D'you have BREAKFAST today?" Dan shouted.

One of the mages surrounding Seifer had raised its staff to cast a Comet spell. Then it saw the oncoming troupe and instantly broke into dance. Seifer's head jerked around, watching in disbelief as the mages started dancing. All four of them shuffled over to join Selphie.

"Dance!" Selphie commanded to Seifer. After a moment's skeptical scowl, he quickly picked up Selphie's moves and found a place at the rear of the group.

The dance team cut a swath through the battlefield. All the SeeDs and students who encountered them quickly joined up, bloating the group's numbers to several dozens. The presence of Mother Brain's army continued to vanish, as more and more of her soldiers were absorbed into the entrancing dance.

Super Terra-jin 12 Mikoto zipped by them. Before she outpaced them completely, she managed to cram in one editorial comment: "What the hell is this, the Pied Piper leading all the mice? This is pathetic; you sound like a whole shelfful of self-help booklets!"

Needless to say, Mikoto did not join the troupe. "It's not the end of the world; there's always tomorrow!" Dan consoled them.

Selphie marched onwards. "Up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, chu, chu!" Heck, if she kept doing this, she could neutralize the entire invading army! So much for fighting them all! All they had to do was find all the mages and hypnotize them. She realized, however, that as the dance squad got larger, the people in the back would have a harder and harder time hearing her instructions.

"Up, down, left, right! Okay, time to split up! We'll meet at, um... the ballroom!" That should be big enough to hold all the mages. They could trap in them there and... and ... well, Selphie didn't know what they'd do next. But she'd worry about that when the time came. Right now she needed to keep dancing or they'd be in real trouble! "Chu, chu, chu!"

* * *

The youngest students cowered in the back of a classroom while Quistis and her new ally Freya stood guard over them. Both knew that the mages would show no mercy to the children - the silly-looking chains of flowers that this group wore did nothing to diminish their lethal intent. And judging from the chorus of approaching footsteps she could hear, more would be here soon.

Quistis stepped forward. "Come on, bring it on." If she could get these mages to wound her enough, she could take them all out with her blue magic.

"Down, left, down, right!" Selphie danced into the room, followed by several of their friends and a legion of mice and mages. "Dance, Quistis!" she called.

Quistis was reluctant to let her guard down, but Selphie seemed to know what she was doing. She and Freya started mimicking Selphie's dance moves. These three mages, however, failed to be mesmerized by the standard dance.

"Hula, everyone!" Selphie snapped her fingers and suddenly all her allies - including Zell and Seifer - were wearing grass skirts. Their swaying hips successfully entranced the Black Hula, who hooked up with the rear of the cone along with Quistis and Freya.

The ever-expanding team danced out of the room only to discover a whole group of winged mages waiting for them. All six of them had lined up in a perfectly straight line, ready to unleash their magic.

Selphie was still pondering what to use against these guys when Freya ran out of the group and seized her arm. The two stood back-to-back and tap-danced around in a circle. All six of the Black Riverdance threw down their arms and rushed to join the group.

"WHOO HOO!" Selphie exulted. "I am Lord of the Dance! Screw Sir Fratley; it's me!"

* * *

Rinoa's team, now including Rikku and Kid in addition to Squall and Lucky Dan, continued their march towards Garden's interior. A lone winged mage stood guarding the door. Rinoa hesitated. She couldn't figure out what the mage's pointed hat and ornate wooden staff symbolized. "Hey, what dance is this supposed to be?" she called between steps. "Up, up, left, left, chu!"

Whatever it was, Dan was prepared. "I'm ready to support your next effort," he proclaimed.

Rikku whispered something in Squall's ear. He rushed forward, snapped his fingers, and appeared with a staff of his own - not to mention a flowery white blouse and a fetching purple skirt. Squall twirled in circles and waved his staff in great sweeping movements. Sure enough, the mage started mimicking his moves and quickly joined up with the group.

Squall snapped his fingers again and reverted to his emo get-up. "I did NOT want to SEE you like that," Lucky Dan advised him. "PLEASE do not make me SAD anymore."

"Left, right, left, right, chu, chu, chu, chu!" Rinoa called as they proceeded into the building.

Steiner, Beatrix, and the Alexandrian soldiers were still scrambling around on their chocobos and bashing all the mages they could find. Four big mages, however, had hijacked chocobos from fallen soldiers. Armed with short swords, the four mages clashed blades with the Alexandrians. A host of smaller mages comprising the other part of the Black Flamenco kept time to the duels with castanets and handclaps.

"Hey! Get off the chocobos and dance!" Rinoa shouted. "Left, down, right, down!"

But this time the dance did no good. The Black Flamenco wasn't even watching Rinoa - they were busy fighting Steiner's cohorts.

Lucky Dan produced a guitar from nowhere and thrust it towards Squall. "Use this, Squall-man!"

Squall dropped his Gunblade, grabbed the guitar, and started playing the first song that came to mind. "YOUR HAIR, IT'S EVERYWHERE, SCR-"

"No, no, play a flamenco!"

"Oh." Squall started to stumble through a flamenco. It wasn't that good, but it was enough to attract the Black Flamenco's attention. Squall's guitar combined with the others' dancing mesmerized the Black Flamenco. The mages hopped off their chocobos and assembled with the other mesmerized mice and mages.

Steiner, however, was less enamored by this performance. "Ah-ha! So you're the one controlling these abominations!" He spun his chocobo around and charged towards Squall. Before he could strike, however, he went flying off the front end of the chocobo and landed on his chest.

Rikku and Kid gasped. "We'll save you, Squall!" They ran over and sat on Steiner to prevent him from getting up.

"Left, right, left, right," Rinoa panted. "Look, you guys, we're supposed to be dancing!"

The two girls reluctantly got off Steiner. "You need to get in our dance group!" Rikku explained. "We're bamboozling all the mages!"

Steiner jumped to his feet. "And could I not do the same with my sword?" He waved the blade at them to prove that it was indeed battleworthy.

"'ey, mate, that's not a sword," Kid said. She picked up Squall's Gunblade and shoved it in Steiner's face. "THIS is a sword. And it says if you don't start dancing, it's going to kick yer arse so hard you'll be kissing the moons."

Steiner, Beatrix, and the other Alexandrian soldiers joined with the dance troupe. "Evaluation....................... COOL dancer!" Lucky Dan said, even though they weren't.

"Up, down, right, down, chu!" Rinoa continued calling out instructions.

"No time to waste," Rikku urged them on. "Let's go!"

* * *

By the time Rinoa's team reached the ballroom, it already teemed with mages, mice, and Garden's forces. Selphie had been quite productive in gathering up the rest of the mages outside and in the classrooms. "Okay, guys, up, up, down, down!" Rinoa called as she squeezed her team inside.

"It's a world record!" Lucky Dan howled upon seeing the spectacle. "This is the BEST show I've ever seen! What a cool guy you are!"

Selphie had seized a microphone and was calling out her own directions over the PA system. "Left, right, left, right, up, down!"

Super Terra-jin 18 Mikoto perched on one of the archways over the doors. "Boy, this seems familar," Mikoto grumbled. "Can't you come up with any original ideas? The Flaming Lips are the saviors of rock'n'roll."

"Hey, get down here and dance!" Selphie shouted over the PA system. "Left, left, up, chu!"

Mikoto snorted. "Heck no. I am scorning you all! Scorny scorn scorn scorn scorn."

Selphie continued all her followers in a circular dance around the ballroom. But one group of mages had yet to be subdued. The three of them descended through the skylight and hovered over the humans whom they despised. Zell pointed up. "More of them overhead!"

Selphie glanced up. "Um... Black Minuet?" She donned a wig and danced a half-hearted minuet to no avail.

"It's the Black Waltz, sieve-for-brains!" Mikoto called.

Oh, of course! "All right, everybody waltz!" Selphie snapped her fingers again to change Rinoa into her party dress and everyone else into their SeeD uniforms. She grabbed Zell and the two started waltzing.

As the students, SeeDs, mages, and even the mice split into waltzing couples, Squall saw Rinoa looking around for a partner. He raced towards her, but she waved her middle finger at him and paired up with Quistis instead. Squall sighed and grabbed Lucky Dan instead, leaving Kid and Rikku rather disappointed. Seifer, much to his chagrin, found himself dancing with Irvine.

"Your dance is so great, it's like sunshine on a cloudy day!" Dan exclaimed.

"...whatever."

The waltz did its trick: the Black Waltz descended from the rafters and joined in the dancing melee. "What are we going to do now?" Quistis asked as she waltzed by Selphie.

"I don't know, but we can't stop dancing! This is the only way to keep them distracted!" "FUJIYAMA!"

* * *

Mengshi backed away from the steering column. The elevator was fixed and Garden was floating safely in the air. Crisis averted.

And now that that was settled, she could thank some of the people who had been so instrumental in getting her here. "Headmaster, Instructor Kramer, I don't know how to start to thank for saving my life after I was stupid enough to throw it away. I know that you played a big part in this all; it was your knowledge that everything was based on, and you gave Instructor Trepe the freedom to do what she needed to get me home."

"We all help where we can," Edea said. "Be happy for the chances that you have and make the best of them. Not everyone does."

"I know." For once, Mengshi was able to speak of her accomplishments with pride. She knew that her escape from hell demonstrated positive characteristics: hope, forgiveness, courage, self-confidence. Granted, she wouldn't have done anything else, but she still recognized this said something positive about her. "It should seem so easy to decide to live and be happy. But ... it's not. Not when you've trained yourself to see only evidence that you deserve to suffer. It takes a lot of courage to be happy when there's so many problems in the universe."

"Then you should feel proud of what you've done," Cid said. "We're happy to have you back."

"Thanks; I'm happy to be back." She thought back to the problems that had provoked her original spiral into despair. Funny how they all seemed so inconsequential now yet so overwhelming at the time. If she'd known back then how much worse things would get, she surely would not have been so quick to complain. "I hate to sound critical after all you've done for me, but I can't escape the fact that I was overworked. I guess I did get a sort of vacation, but is there any way I could reduce my workload a little?"

Cid nodded. "We'll see what we can do, yes."

Whew. That was one huge moomba off her back. Sure, she didn't have a nice quick resolution, but she'd taken the awful first step of bringing it up. If everything had turned out okay up to this point, she was sure this now-minor issue could be worked out. After all, what kind of issue was her job schedule compared to death?

"Thanks so much," she mumbled, a little over-eager in her relief. "And I know I should leave it at that, but I really have to make one more request." She'd been a little nervous about asking this, but the matter was too important not to address.

"Yes?"

"Ma'am, can you open the nether portal again? I need to go back to hell ASAP; Chu-Chu was left there and I promised myself I'd rescue her as soon as I could. I'm worried about what could have happened to her. I know there's a lot going on here, but this is what SeeD is trained for; I trust them. I need to help where I'm truly needed."

A request from Xu that didn't involve lots of self-apology and whining about her lack of choices? That was nice to see. But would it last? It was only two days ago that Xu had still been rotting in hell herself. "Are you sure that you're not going to convince yourself that you're better off staying there?"

Edea certainly had a valid concern. And something inside Mengshi that didn't entirely trust herself felt the same way. How could she be assured the feelings and thoughts swirling in her mind right now represented the deepest contours of her soul? What if this change was only an upswing, if she was still depressed and suicidal on the inside? But that kind of thinking led her nowhere. She could always doubt herself. Nothing could definitely prove her feelings, so she might as well adhere to what she believed in. "I'm sure," she vowed. "I'm going down there for a reason. I'll find Chu-Chu and we'll escape and that's it."

But that was not it...

She could fly free from hell's boundaries, but she could not escape the attachments her soul had made there. All her experiences affected her that way. Every person she met, every book she read, every lesson she learned - they all added little pieces to her life experience, pieces that could not ever be removed. And one certain purple-haired woman had awakened a very large piece.

Not only because she owed her second life to Miang's bizarre form of encouragement, but because Miang's entire life story had her transfixed. They had only spoken twice, but the extraordinary circumstances surrounding those conversations had drawn out plenty of her inner character. She had never met anyone like Miang. Those sad, distant azure eyes ... the way her body drifted through space with flawless grace ... the knowledge and inexplicable power that lurked just under the surface of every word she spoke. And her life story. Miang's ten thousand years of selfless suffering elevated her far above normal people in Mengshi's mind. To endure all that and still perform her duties required superhuman endurance and nobility, and Mengshi could not help but feel humbled by it all.

It was because of her that Mengshi could shrug off this attack on Garden so carelessly. Her mind was still trapped in the attic above the physical room, bouncing around in the lofty realms of her soul's many threads. And when her yearnings were not cuddling up to Quistis, they were crying out to do something about this enigma of a woman. A woman so selfless and caring she had damned herself to an eternity of suffering rather than risk harming the people she cared for.

Miang loved. But she could love in another way, one that would not destroy her but lift her up where she belonged. It was not impossible; Mengshi would see to it. Another chance on life, a reprieve from carrying the weight of the world, and Miang could be something else entirely. A happy person, whose charity was finally paid back in kind, whose associates were no longer tormentors by people who cared for her, whose soul contributed something to the world by existing. Something tremendous, perhaps, once all her talent and experience were channeled in a different direction. Miang had a big heart, bigger than anyone's. If only it could be seeded with acceptance and nurturing rather than solitude and suffering.

"There's someone else, too," she said to Edea. "She thinks she belongs down there, that she has to rend herself to shreds for the good of the world. But no one is that evil, not even her or Ultimecia. I know there's something good alive inside all her guilt and despair. She can't silence her soul entirely; it still wants to have a real place in the world. I can tell from the way she talks. She's dying to be loved. She must be terribly envious of me. And I know It's hard to imagine that someone who cares so much can be so wrong, but... that's why I want to help her. She could be so much more if only someone gave her that helping hand up. She has the same problems as me, but even moreso, if you know what I mean. And it's ... frustrating, witnessing someone being so like yourself. It reminds you that your body has never held your entire soul. It's been split into pieces and some people parts of it, and you might never have the whole thing. That's why I want so badly to rescue her. I want to have her here with me, where another piece of my soul will be within my grasp. Because it hurts for it to be separated ... my soul yearns to have all its parts together. I can't turn away, not after I've seen myself in her and her in myself. I don't want any part of my soul out there all alone where I don't know what'll happen to it. This world is a dangerous place to love in."

Her thoughts halted for a moment and reality quickly caught up with them. Her ramble immediately petered up. What she getting so worked up and excited about? Nothing was actually going to come of this yearning. Miang was, after all, dead. And even if she had another chance at life, ten thousand (and two) years of habit had certainly firmly ensconced her in one mindset. How could one person - one who had killed herself only a few weeks ago, no less - possibly hope to reverse that with a few words? But Mengshi believed the universe was a good and just place, and surely some deus ex machina would appear to ensure that the faithful were not let down. "Please, there has a way, do you have any ideas?"

Edea smiled. Hadn't she had this same conversation with Quistis a few weeks ago? "I think I have just the ticket." She walked to her long row of bookshelves and yanked a particular tome off it. "I'm sure Quistis has already shown you, but..." She offered it to Mengshi.

Mengshi looked at the book and grinned. "Oh, of course! Thank you; I understand. I need to go now; I'm worried about little Chu-Chu." She saluted and took her leave.

Mengshi was already out the door and bound for the planning room when Edea murmured something.

"Hmm?" Mengshi poked her head back into the room. She had not really been paying attention.

"You certainly have changed. I was merely remarking on it; that is all."

"Oh." Mengshi was a little started by the statement. "Well, no, I don't think I changed at all. I think I just learned to accept that I don't have to change who I am."

Next chapter: The Fifth Element