Part I - Vyctori and TFL in "When Love Is Concealed xRevised Versionx"

"OW!" Vyctori landed hard on the ground. She quickly scrambled to her feet, grabbing her scythe as she went, and glared at the portal, which was tilted at a forty-five degree angle. Looking around, she saw TFL brushing himself off.

She marched up to him and waved the scythe in his face. "And what in fury's name made you tilt the portal like that?!" she screeched indignantly. "Did you want to see me fall? Huh? Did that amuse you?!"

"Actually, I didn't," TFL replied calmly. "I have no idea why the portal is tilted like that."

Vyctori turned to glare at the portal, which make a rude noise before flickering and disappearing. "Well, somebody has a sick sense of humor, then!" she snarled. "And that person is going to die!"

TFL glanced at her, annoyed. "If you would please refrain from your whining for a while, I'd very much appreciate it."

"WHINING?!" Vyctori turned on him, furious. "I'll show you whining!"

"Oh, please," TFL said flatly. "As if you could hurt me!" He waved one hand nonchalantly. "Besides, we have a job to do here, and I'd rather start than continue bickering with you."

Vyctori glared, obviously holding her temper. "Fine," she said sullenly. "Where are we, anyways?"

TFL looked around. The world seemed to be in a flashback sequence, which rather reminded one of watching an old movie, except you were standing in it. "Well, this is the part where the author explains everything about the Sue, her angsty past and how she met up with Eliwood's group."

"Ah." Vyctori nodded grimly. "So, she was too anxious to get to the part where the Sue mucks with Sain and just decided to summarize, eh?"

"Yes, it would appear so," TFL agreed.

Vyctori's eyes glazed over slightly as she read the Words. "Typical angst-Sue past," she said. "Mother killed by bandits . . . sole survivor of her village . . . ." She stopped and chuckled. "Although, the houses screaming in agony is a first for me."

TFL nodded. "I shall add that to the charge list, then."

"Ooh. And look at the mighty power of the Sue," Vyctori said in disgust. "Permafreeze? An attack that freezes all the water in an enemy's body?! She is so going down for that!"

"It'll make for a challenge when it's time to kill her, that's for sure!" TFL nodded.

"And she learned it in only two years! 'With a simple gesture and a short chant'. If it was so easy, why is she the only one able to do it, something that probably even Athos couldn't do!"

TFL pointed at the Words and his lip curled slightly. "Look, after joining the Black Fang, she decides to go with the group with the more attractive men, so she steps back and lets Eliwood and the others slaughter her 'weak group'."

"How cold-hearted can you be?" Vyctori said in disgust. "Those people were trusting her, and she just stepped back and watched them die! She deserves a dagger through her heart!"

Suddenly they each realized that they had been agreeing with each other, and stopped to glare at the other.

"You know, it's just because I have no desire for a Nils/Athos story that I'm putting up with you!" Vyctori scowled at him. "Just so you know!"

"Believe me, the feeling is mutual," TFL said coolly.

"Just so that's out in the open," Vyctori told him. She gave a quick glance at the Words. "By the way, we're due for a complete tense shift any moment, and those generally aren't very pleasant."

TFL glanced at her in annoyance. "I've handled tense shifts before! I'm not a rookie."

"Really?" Vyctori smirked. "You act a little immaturely, so I just assumed . . . ."

"Immature?" TFL raised an eyebrow. "And in what way have I displayed immaturity?"

"In what way?!" Vyctori raised an eyebrow. "First you steal my Sue, then argue about it for so long that the blonde had to threaten the both of us with an Athos/Nil story, and then you set the portal to tilt, just so you could watch me fall, then denied it!"

"I told you, I did not set the portal like that!" He frowned at her. "And you're the one who kept whining to come along!"

"Whining?!" Vyctori protested angrily. "You dare call me whiny!"

"I only state what I observe," TFL said coolly. "And if that bothers you—"

He never had a chance to finish. They were so busy arguing that they forgot to keep an eye on the Words, and thus neither was prepared for the sudden tense change.

SNAP

Suddenly everything around them began to distort and twist, until it finally it snapped back into place with a stomach-jolting lurch, the new tense settling in.

"Urg . . . ." Vyctori staggered, barely managing to keep her lunch. Even TFL looked pretty green around the edges.

She glanced at him. "Er, truce for the moment?"

"Sure," he gasped. "Just for a little while." He straightened up and checked over his supplies. "Well, everything seemed to have survived that just fine. Now that the tense shift is over and the main part of the Sue-fic has started, I suppose we better go find the Sue. According to the Words, she's at the lake."

"Agreed." Vyctori nodded. She gathered up her scythe from where she had dropped it, and the two agents headed toward the lake.

They found the Sue sitting by the lake, skipping stones and eying the love of her life, Eliwood.

"Charge!" Vyctori said, whipping out the charge notebook. "Stalking Eliwood!"

"Far too shy and delicate to confess her undying love," TFL said in disgust. "Oh, see the poor little Sue pine! Disgusting!"

Sain came up and started to show the Sue how to skip rocks across the surface, changed from his friendly, obnoxious, flirty self to a shy school boy trying to figure out how to ask his crush to the school dance.

Vyctori growled at the un-Sainness of Sain at the moment, then, in a moment of curiosity, she dug out her Character Analysis Device and pointed it at him.

The Character Analysis Device gave a whimpering beep as it tried to identify Sain. After a few minutes of internal conflict, a message slowly scrolled across the screen.

[... Sain, I think ... canon character, I think ... if he is, he's so OOC that I CAN'T EVEN COMPUTE IT I'M GOING TO FRY SOMETHING! WHY ... WHY ME?! WHY DO YOU INSIST ON PUTTING ME THROUGH SUCH TORTURES?! I'M TOO YOUNG TO FRY! PLEASE DON'T MAKE ME DO IT! I WANT MY MOTHERBOARD!] It began to sob uncontrollably. [MOMMY!! MOMMY!!]

Vyctori stared, then hesitantly reached over and carefully patted the top of the sobbing Character Analysis Device.

"Hmm . . . I have never seen one do that before," TFL commented.

"Great!" Vyctori looked disgusted, trying to comfort the weeping machine. "It happened again! Upstairs isn't going to be happy! I think Make-Things has labeled me a machine abuser!" She thought for a moment. "Meh, I'll blame it on the blonde's kitty partner. Because of that coffeemaker, my analysis device had an emotional breakdown. Yeah, that sounds good!"

Sain did manage to teach the Sue how to skip stones, but then she saw Eliwood and Ninian kissing. Throwing a little hissy-fit, she froze a stone and skipped it across the lake, causing patches of ice to appear on the surface of the water before stomping away.

"Sue-powers . . ." TFL growled. "Sue-powers! Oh, yes . . . she's going to die!"

Vyctori was glowering, willing the angrily retreating Sue to burst into flames with each of her little angsty Sue steps. "She won't even say Ninian's name!" she suddenly burst into a rant. "She keeps calling her 'that weird-looking girl'! How dare she!"

TFL looked at her. "You find offense in the strangest places," he commented.

"And what's that supposed to mean?!" she hissed, turning on him.

"Nothing." He shrugged. "I was just making a statement. I didn't mean to offend you."

She let it go with a growl, then her eyes slightly glazed over as she read the Words. After a moment, she snapped out of it and grabbed her bag. "C'mon! We need to reach the inn before they do!"

"And may I inquire why?" TFL asked, shouldering his bag and following the fuming scythe-wielding agent.

"Because little Andraya here, so broken up over seeing Eliwood and Ninian together, can't sleep tonight and is going to wander around until she meets Kent. OVER MY DEAD BODY! There is no way I'm going to let her mess with my Kent!"

"Your Kent?" TFL asked, slightly amused. "And how are you planning on stopping her?"

Vyctori didn't say a word. She just held up a small, white tube as an answer.

"Is that . . . Super-glue?" TFL inquired.

"Yeah, swiped it from the blonde's kitty when she wasn't looking," Vyctori said bluntly. "That Sue is not going to mess with Kent if I can help it!"

That night, Andraya lay in bed. The inn only had two rooms, and, as such, both were pretty crowded. Of course, Eliwood, the love she could never have, was in her room. She stared at his peaceful face and decided she couldn't sleep. Maybe a walk would help.

She sat up, but, for some odd reason, her pillow was stuck to her head. Confused, she reached back and started tugging on it. It was really, really stuck. Why, it almost felt like somebody had glued it to her head!

Squealing in frustration, she tugged and yanked on the pillow, trying not to make much noise, as she didn't want everyone to wake up and see her like this! How undignified! But the pillow refused to get off her head. It yanked her hair and hurt her head when she pulled really hard.

Desperate to get the pillow off, she glanced wildly around, then her eyes fell on a piece of rope.

Perfect.

Grabbing the rope, she backed up to her bed and, reaching behind her, carefully tied one end of the rope to the pillow and the other end to the bedpost. Taking a deep breath, she suddenly sprang forward, hoping that the pillow would rip off. Instead, her head snapped back like a PEZ dispenser, her feet flew out from underneath her, and she went crashing to the floor.

She scrambled quickly to her feet, ignoring the burning sensation on her head, and glanced wildly around. Everyone seemed to be sleeping still, although she could swear she heard someone snickering from the closet. After a moment, she dismissed it as her imagination and went back to trying to get the pillow off her head.

Trying not to chuckle again, but unable to stop the silent sniggering, Vyctori slipped out when the Sue wasn't watching and headed outside to the stables where TFL was waiting.

"Ah, you should have been there!" Vyctori chortled, retelling the story to him as she wiped a tear of mirth from her eye. "It was priceless! To see her feet fly out like that . . . priceless!"

"Well, I'm not one to engage in childish pranks," TFL told her. "I'm merely here to charge and kill the Sue. And you do know that no matter what, the Sue still is going to meet Kent tonight? It's not like it's something you can stop."

"Yeah, I know." Vyctori was in too good a mood to be offended. "But I don't think I mind as much, since I've already punished her! The look on her face . . . !" She broke out into sniggering again.

"Quiet!" TFL scolded her. "Here she comes!"

The inn door slammed open and the Sue marched wearily yet triumphantly out, a ripped piece of pillow fabric still stuck to the back of her hair and feathers everywhere, yet free of the majority of the pillow.

Not even the Sue talking to Kent, who seemed completely oblivious to the fact that she had feathers from her pillow stuck all over her, could now dampen Vyctori's mood. She couldn't even look at the Sue without visualizing the way her feet flew out from underneath her, thus sending her into muffled sniggering and causing TFL to throw nasty looks her way.

"Would you quit that!" He frowned at her. "You're going to give away our position!"

"I . . . can't . . . help it!" she snickered. "Look at that shred of pillowcase stuck to her hair! Isn't it hilarious?!"

"I hardly think it would be amusing if the Sue discovered us and attacked just now, seeing as we don't quit have a full charge list."

"Yeah, but it's probably getting pretty full!" Vyctori shrugged. She peered through the fog. "Besides, I doubt she could see us with all this fog."

"It's pretty thick, isn't it?" TFL agreed. "All the better for the Sue to angst with, I suppose."

Vyctori turned to look at him. "Say, can we use that as a charge? Messing with the weather just so she can angst better?"

He shrugged. "Worth a try!"

After meeting Kent and discussing Sain for a little bit, the Sue headed back to the inn, where, surprise upon surprise, she ran into him. Or what was supposed to be him. All the cheerful quirks that made Sain, well, Sain, were tossed out the window. He was shy and stuttering around her.

After he left to take his turn for watch, who should she run into next but her lost lover, Eliwood, who was mooning about his newfound love for Ninian. When he saw her, he grinned like a love-struck puppy and began asking her what he should get Ninian as a gift, totally unaware how his questions were affecting the Sue. Unable to face him, the Sue bolted.

"Um, do you get the feeling we're watching a cheesy soap?" Vyctori asked TFL.

TFL was busy writing in the charge book, and didn't look up when he answered her. "I wouldn't know. I don't watch those."

The Sue, throwing another fit because of her lost love, once again took it out on the poor lake, only this time freezing the entire thing with an ear-piercing screech.

Vyctori looked thoughtful. "And I'm told I have a temper!" She turned to TFL. "Do you suppose there were any fish in there?"

TFL frowned, glancing at the lake of ice. "Well, if there were, there certainly aren't anymore."

"Can we put 'mass destruction of natural resources' as a charge?"

"I'll write that one down."

The two agents watched as the Sue bemoaned her forbidden love, then TFL headed back towards the inn to commandeer a room. He merely shrugged when Vyctori told him that she'd catch up in a moment and left without her.

Vyctori grinned and stalked silently towards the now-frozen-but-somewhat-melting lake. She pulled out her scythe and carefully began chipping at the ice. "Sleepy-time for the Sue!" she chuckled to herself.

Andraya was sitting sprawled on the ground, arms crossed and pouting cutely. Why that stupid little green-haired freak of a girl! How dare she steal her Eliwood! Why, she needed Eliwood a lot more than she did, and if she thought . . . .

She stopped as she heard a rustle in the bushes nearby. She stood up and took a tentative step towards it. "Um, hello? Anybody there?"

In response, a frozen fish suddenly whizzed from the bush, beaning her on the head and knocking her off her feet and out cold.

Vyctori stepped out from the bush and admired her handiwork thoughtfully. After a moment's thought, she reached down and pick up the fish, which had bounced straight up after hitting the Sue's noggin and landed a little ways off to the side.

She grinned as she turned the cold fish towards the Sue and spoke in a squeaky voice. "And lo, my people whom you have slaughtered are now . . . avenged!" she mimicked the fish's voice, moving it's jaw up and down as she spoke to make it look as if the fish were speaking.

She laughed and tossed the fish aside. "Oi, Vyctori, you're going insane!" she chuckled to herself. After a moment's thought, she added, "But that's not a bad thing, seeing as you are an employee of the PPC! Pretty much everybody is insane there!"

Admiring her handiwork one last time, she decided that the Sue was out for the night, hoisted her scythe over her shoulder, and turned back towards the inn, curious as to what TFL had procured for them in way of a room and whistling happily.

Her good mood was somewhat diminished after she arrived at the inn. As it was so full, there had only been one room left and TFL was lying on the only bed, hands behind his head and looking rather comfortable.

"What's this?" Vyctori growled. "Hey! Where am I going to sleep?!"

TFL opened one eye lazily."That really isn't my problem," he said simply. "I got the room, I get the bed. There's some spare blankets if you wish to make a bed on the floor." If one looked closely, they would notice the determined glint in his eye. He was not going to give up the bed.

"On . . . the . . . floor . . . ." It took a moment for this to process in Vyctori's mind, then her eyes darkened angrily, a dangerous glint in them.

TFL lay back and relaxed on the bed, convinced the argument was over and closed. Unfortunately for him, Vyctori was far from finished with the subject.

The next morning, the two agents were awakened by the sound of the troops of Rekka no Ken clanking around and getting ready to take off. It was a rather noisy affair, armor and weapons clanking, people talking loudly, horses, pegasi, and wyverns protesting being saddled, and anybody in the immediate area who could sleep through that noise was either deaf or dead. As the agents were neither, they were awakened rather rudely.

Vyctori groaned and burrowed her head deeper under the pillow. "Can't be morning already!" she complained in a muffled voice. "Night was just a few minutes ago!"

TFL groaned and sat up, arching his back and trying to get all the kinks out of it. "And remind me again why I ended up sleeping on the floor?"

Vyctori sat up and stretched. "It was either that or outside, but it was wet out and I was feeling rather merciful."

"Your compassion astounds me," TFL said dryly, readjusting the assassin's cloak.

"Now who's whining?" Vyctori asked him. "C'mon. They're going to take off soon, and we're going to miss the Sue if we don't hurry!"

TFL checked to make sure the dirk strapped to his side was properly in place, then nodded. "Shall we be off, then?"

It turned out that the Sue did not have a very good night. While the two agents had spent their night in a comfortable bed (or floor, in TFL's case), the Sue had spent the night outside in the rain and was now feeling miserable and dizzy. In spite of that, she managed to look perfect, even with the large bump on the back of her head.

Vyctori noticed that the Sue seemed to have a headache and grinned evilly. "Fish: One, Sue: Zero!" she chuckled.

TFL looked at her strangely, but decided not to say anything.

Lyn walked over to the Sue, looking very worried. After inquiring about her health with great concern, Lyn decided to talk to Eliwood and Hector about having the entire caravan stopping so the Sue could rest.

TFL and Vyctori lounged around. As the Sue only seemed to know about eight members of the group, they had figured that she would just place them in the "unknown party members" group and not find their presence strange.

"Man!" Vyctori complained. "We were on the road for, what, ten minutes, then we have to stop? How on earth did they managed to beat Nergal making such time?"

TFL frowned. "Okay, now she's affecting the entire party!" He glanced down at Vyctori. "I don't think I can take much more of this Sue!"

She looked sympathetic. "Just a little longer, then she dies!" she said comfortingly. She then glanced around. "So . . . what'll we do until the Sue's done with her little nap?"

TFL gave her a sharp look. "No card games."

"But it's a PPC tradition!" Vyctori defended herself.

"No. I don't play," he told her flatly.

"Phooey." She put away the deck of cards she had gotten out, sighed, and leaned against a tree with her arms crossed. "Well, the other traditional thing to do is to take a much-needed nap, as there's little time for that back at Headquarters, but as we've just woken up about an hour ago, I'm not tired. So what do you suggest we do?"

TFL shrugged. "Can you not amuse yourself?"

Vyctori slowly stood up. "Fine!" She rolled her eyes. "I can do that!"

She marched over to the sleeping Sue and grabbed her traveling bag. Dragging it over to the creek, she plopped down and began picking through the rocks by the water and placing them in the Sue's bag.

"That's rather childish, you know," TFL told her.

"Hey, anything that makes a Sue miserable makes me happy!" Vyctori said in her defense, hefting a smooth stone a few times before putting it in the Sue's bag. "Especially one that messes with Sain so badly!"

TFL just feh'd and leaned against the tree, waiting patiently. He glanced at the Words momentarily, and noticed that the Sue was now dreaming about her lust object, Eliwood, again. He snorted in disgust and wondered if he could put down stalking Eliwood as a charge more than once.

It was about half an hour before they were finally about to take off again. Andraya, having been rudely awakened by Kent, reached down to pick up her bag and swung it over her shoulder. Unfortunately, it was much heavier than she remembered and she toppled over backwards with an "eep," landing as gracefully as only a Sue could. There was some snickering from one of the two assassins helping to load up Merlinus's wagon. She stared at them suspiciously, making a mental note to ask someone what their names were. She couldn't remember. There was something funny about them, though.

She lost her current train of thought when Sain came riding over and offered her a ride on his horse. After a moment, she accepted.

On the ride over to a town called Gartia, the Sue eventually fell asleep, looking very cute while cuddled with Sain's shoulder. It was all Vyctori could do not to strangle her.

Kent rode up, and he and Sain talked a bit. Sain finally admitted that he loved her, but bemoaned the fact that she was in love with Eliwood who, in fact, was in love with Ninian.

"Yup!" Vyctori said, studying the scene unfolding in front of them. "Definitely soap-opera material! Now all that's missing is to discover that Eliwood is her long lost twin brother or something."

TFL's face paled. "Dear heavens, no! Don't even joke about such matters!"

Vyctori shrugged. "Hey, I've seen worse!"

Sain continued to admire the sleeping Sue, her navy blue hair, her blue cloak wrapped around her robes of multiple shades of blue, and her blue eyes that sparkled with playfulness.

"Really?" TFL raised an eyebrow. "From what I've seen of her, 'playfulness' is the last word I'd use. More along the lines of 'obsessive' and 'angsty'."

"Think she likes blue, though?" Vyctori said dryly. "And it's this next line here that kills me!"

Indeed, Sain was telling Kent how the Sue was more capable of battle than any girl he ever met, "and stronger too."

Vyctori glowered. "Let's see if she's stronger than this girl!" she said angrily, waving around her scythe.

TFL glanced at her. "Don't take it personally," he said, almost comfortingly. "It's just a Sue thing."

Vyctori glanced at him in surprise. "Why, TFL, was that a nice thing you just said to me?"

He gave her a cool look and feh'd again.

It was a little while before they finally reached town. The Sue had a tremendous headache now, a combination of heartache, frozen fish, and a cursed pillow. She decided against going to Priscilla or Serra to help her and headed for the apothecary. Sain decided to follow her, and the two agents decided to follow him.

"I know we have the charge of Andraya being a stalker, but can we add one of turning Sain into one?" Vyctori asked.

TFL shrugged. "Couldn't hurt."

Once the Sue had reached the apothecary to purchase a vulnerary, however, she discovered that the shopkeeper was charging 500 gold for it. That posed a dilemma, as the Sue only had 250 gold.

When asked why the vulnerary was so expensive, the shopkeeper would only say that it was "very special" and "his own creation," with a slight twinkle of amusement in his eyes.

"Well, if that isn't suspicious, I don't know what is!" Vyctori huffed.

Sain came to her rescue and bought the vulnerary for her. She tried to pay him back, but he wouldn't accept it. The Sue, although her headache was gone, suddenly grew dizzy and would have fallen, but Sain caught her.

"Alright, that proves it!" Vyctori said. "That vulnerary was definitely laced with something!"

"Poison, hopefully!" TFL said. He looked thoughtful, and began to watch the shopkeeper more closely. "Wait a moment . . . ." He started walking towards the counter. After a confused moment, Vyctori followed.

The shopkeeper watched the Sue limp off with Sain's help with a look that could only be described as very smug satisfaction, then turned and noticed the two assassins heading his way. "Oh, good day, gentlemen. May I help you?"

"Hey, wait a minute!" Vyctori protested. "First and most importantly, I'm not a gentleman, and second, you can see us, so that means you're not canon! What are you doing here?!"

TFL merely grinned. "Hello, Treak. It's a surprise to see you here!"

"TFL!" Treak said happily. He pulled out a device and pressed a button on it, and suddenly his appearance wavered and instead of a cheerful, plump-looking shopkeeper, a younger man with shaggy blonde hair, dressed casually in khaki pants and an unbuttoned plaid shirt over a T-shirt, stood in front of them. "It's great to see you!"

Vyctori glanced around. "Okay, I'm confused here! Who are you?!"

TFL gave her a look. "Didn't you hear me? His name is Treak!"

"I heard you!" Vyctori snarled at him. "I'm not deaf! I meant, why is he here? 'Cause if he's after this Sue as well . . . ."

"Oh, no, no, nothing like that!" Treak chuckled, reassuring her. "I'm not employed by the PPC, and so I don't have a license to kill, so to speak. I'm more . . . freelance, you might say." He chuckled again. "I pretty much just go from story to story, searching for Sues. I tell the PPC of a potential Sue, and they pay me a bit. I also make a little money on the side just making the Sues' lives a little more miserable." He held up the bag with 500 gold in it.

"So that vulnerary was poisoned!" TFL let out a rare grin.

"Well, nothing fatal . . . but yes, you might say that!" Treak winked. "Just a little to make her woozy and slightly ill. I had no idea they had PPC agents on the job already, though. That means I should probably be going, as this Sue won't be around much longer."

"You got that right!" Vyctori growled, clutching her scythe tighter.

Treak checked his watch. "I probably should be going, anyways. There's this new story in which a potential Sue is dying to meet me, I'm sure!" He grinned and bowed slightly. "Well, I'll be taking my leave, now, and I wish you both the best of luck! Who knows, we may meet up again!"

With that, he swung his bag of, well, Sue-stuff, over his shoulder and walked off, whistling cheerfully.

"What an odd person," Vyctori commented. She glanced at TFL. "Well, shall we do as the funny man said and go kill the Sue?"

TFL nodded. "I suppose we better wait until the Sue is alone to kill her. We really don't need to try and hold off the entire cast of Rekka no Ken as we're doing it."

Vyctori's eyes glazed as she glanced at the Words. "Well, right now, the Sue is eavesdropping on Sain and Kent arguing, which I think we should add as another charge." She shook her head. "Although Kent may get frustrated with Sain's ways, he'd never get mad about him buying a vulnerary!" Her eyes glazed again. "She's not alone too often. I'd say the best time to strike at her is after a battle, when Sain takes her for a romantic walk to see a sunset."

"Sounds good." TFL nodded again. Both were avoiding the somewhat sensitive subject of who was going to kill the Sue.

Somehow, the two agents managed to make it that far.

They made it through the part where Sain, comforting the Sue, fell asleep in her room, which Kent interpreted wrong; the two cavaliers almost got in a fist fight.

They made it through the part where Matthew was reduced to the camp gossip and busy-body, always nosing in people's diaries and eavesdropping on their rooms.

They made it through the battle where the Sue easily took out all the enemy mages (who, according to her, couldn't aim to save their lives), was shot in the arm by a Sage with Bolting, took out the Sage with Bolting, got stabbed in the back by a cavalier with a poison lance, killed the cavalier with the poison lance, was chased down by the cavalier with the poison lance's three friends (also armed with poison lances), and was dramatically saved by Sain.

They made it through the part in which the Sue was healed by Priscilla, who scolded her for always having the worst wounds, while the Sue acted all tough and claimed that it really wasn't that bad. ("Now, if anybody else was stabbed in the back with a poisoned pointy object, it'd be a whole 'nother story!" Vyctori had grumbled.)

They made it through the part where Sain very shyly asked the Sue to go for a walk with him, though Vyctori came very close to snapping at the extreme breach of character. Her eye also made odd twitching motions when Kent, watching the newest couple walking off, suddenly started feeling very lonely and jealous.

"That's it!" Vyctori growled. "Sain and Sue are alone now. Time to kill!"

The Sue was gazing lovingly up at Sain, admiring his features, which seemed silver in the moonlight.

"Sain . . ." she sighed.

"Andraya . . ." he sighed in return.

"Vyctori . . ."

Suddenly, a scythe-wielding assassin stepped out of the brush, followed closely by a slightly taller one.

"And TFL. Now that we all know each other, how about you read the charge list, TFL?" The scythe-wielding assassin grinned unpleasantly.

"It would be my pleasure," the taller assassin spoke up. He pulled out a sheet of paper and cleared his throat. "Andraya, you are charged with having an angsty Sue past, with making houses cry out in agony, with causing a tense shift by merely summarizing the past so you could get to mucking with the continuum faster, with having a Sue power, with stalking and obsessing about Eliwood, with turning Sain into a cardboard character, leaving him very little of his original personality, with messing with Kent's personality . . ." he took a quick breath of air and continued. "And with mass destruction of natural resources just because you were unhappy, with causing the entire troop of Rekka no Ken to stop because you had a headache, with almost causing a fistfight between Kent and Sain, with messing with Matthew's personality, with being a Super-Sue in battle and wiping out most of the enemy easily, and with receiving wounds and not being affected by them, for which, in a moment, we will show you how painful a pointy object sticking into you can really be. Charged as such, you are sentenced to die. Any last words that aren't sappy? They make me rather sick and I shall add them to the charge list as well."

Through all this, Sain and the Sue merely ogled at the two agents, their mouths open as they tried to comprehend this all.

"Huh?" was all the Sue managed to say.

"Sorry, sweetie, that doesn't count." Vyctori gave a rather smug smile as she brandished her scythe in front of her.

TFL drew his sword as well.

"No!" Sain suddenly snapped into action. He drew his sword and stepped in front of the Sue, looking protective. "I won't let you hurt Andraya!"

The two agents stopped and glanced at each other, then Vyctori let out a disappointed sigh. "Fine, fine . . . I'll take Sain, you take little miss Sue."

She looked rather disappointed for a moment, then she turned to face Sain and suddenly leapt at him, swinging her scythe to catch his blade in it. "RAGABARAGHOHAHA!"

She managed to knock the sword flying out of his startled hands (that warcry tended to startle a lot of her victims, just from the sheer surprise that she could actually pronounce it), so he threw himself off to the side and scrambled for his sword. Vyctori followed.

TFL nodded at the Sue. "Alright, it's just the two of us now. Are we going to do this the easy way, or are you going to make this more difficult for yourself then it needs to be?"

The Sue merely snarled at him and readied her magic.

"The hard way, then." He sighed, then let out a barely visible grin. "Good."

He leapt aside as the first of the Sue's magic iceballs hurtled towards him, and it smashed into the ground, shattering and causing a little mountain of ice to appear on the spot. He stopped and stared at it disgustedly. "Sue power. While the rest of us have to work for our skills, you Sues are given them in mere seconds!"

The Sue merely squealed in frustration and shot another ice spell at him. He dropped and rolled, landing easily on his feet. The ice hit the tree that had been behind him and encased it in a thick sheet of ice.

TFL actually looked like he was enjoying himself. "You're going to have to try harder then that!" he told her rather smugly. "I come from the department that deals with the Uber-Sues, the ones that are too powerful for normal agents to dispose of. Believe me, you're cake compared to them!"

The Sue's face paled, but she prepared another spell.

"Okay, Sain!" Vyctori growled at the cavalier. "Just a little while until the Sue's gone, then you'll be back to your old, flirty self again!"

"I will never love another woman, only Andraya!" Sain proclaimed. "And I won't allow you to hurt her!"

With that, he swung his sword (which he had managed to grab again), but was swinging rather wildly and Vyctori dodged it easily.

"Quit that!" she complained, ducking another swing. She didn't actually want to hurt him, so she was using her scythe as little as possible. "You're really not making my job any easier!"

"I shall defend my love to my last breath!" Sain declared, charging at her with his sword ready to strike.

Vyctori merely rolled her eyes, stepped back, and tripped him with her scythe handle as he flew by.

"Whoa-ah!" Sain yelped as he flew forward and smashed headfirst into a tree.

Vyctori grew a little worried. He had hit the tree a little harder then she thought he would. Running up to him, she knelt down next to him. "Sain, are you alright?"

"Er, yeah, I think so . . ." the cavalier groaned, slowly sitting up while holding his head. He opened his eyes and noticed Vyctori. "But then again, perhaps I died, for who else except an angel in heaven would have a face shining with such divine beauty?" He gave her his most charming smile.

Vyctori was so used to him being out-of-character that this took her completely by surprise. "Excuse me?"

"Ah, and the melodious voice of an angel as well!" Sain sighed. "How softly it falls on this mortal's unworthy ears! Almost enough to soothe the pounding in my head and increase the pounding of my heart!"

"Hey, that sounds more like the Sain I know!" Vyctori said happily, standing up. "Glad to see you're back!"

"Excuse me, vision of loveliness?" Sain glanced at her, confused. "You speak as if you know me, yet I'm sure such a angelic face has never graced my presence before."

"Believe me, you probably don't want to know," Vyctori told him wryly. "Now, why don't you head back to camp? It's getting late and they're probably wondering where you are."

"And leave such a beauteous angel alone and defenseless?!"

"Sain . . ." Vyctori growled, brandishing her scythe. "I'm far from defenseless." As an afterthought, she added, "Besides, I'm going to head home in a few minutes, so don't worry."

It took a few minutes of arguing, but Vyctori finally managed to send Sain on his way. She turned back to find TFL, finding him after a few minutes waiting for her, bored. The Sue was dead, pinned to a tree by a shard of ice.

Vyctori glanced at it with an eyebrow raised.

TFL shrugged. "Thought it was rather fitting."

"Ah. Well, that would explain why Sain suddenly snapped back into character!" Vyctori said dryly.

"He started hitting on you?" TFL looked slightly amused.

"Yup. But I'm glad to see he's back to normal. Or, as normal as he gets." She glared at him. "But next time I get to kill the Sue, capisce?!"

"Assuming there is a next time." TFL waved off her comment. "Normally I work alone."

"I noticed," Vyctori said dryly. "Your manners suggested so."

"Meh." TFL ignored her comment as he pulled his battered and worn remote portal activator from his pack. "Well, as the Sue is dead, shall we head back?"

Vyctori suddenly grinned. "Sure. I can't wait to give the blonde a piece of my mind! Threatening us with an Athos/Nils story!" She snorted.

TFL opened the portal, and the two agents stepped through it together.

---

A/N - Well, this story really didn't bother me all that much. It had good grammar and spelling, though I must admit, Sain was in-sain-ly out of character. (Sorry about that pun! Couldn't help myself!) But both TFL and Vyctori were rabid about this Sue, so I said I'd write them in it. They both want me to clarify so that everybody knows that this is in no way a romance, that they just gain a feeling of mutual respect for each other. Just so everybody knows. ^_^

To Part II - Echo and Kat in "Life and death of Kireion the falcoknight"