War in Peace

Jericho sat in the commander's seat of the massive flying Battle-cruiser, he stared down at crew screens that showed a passing landscape of fire, lava, and brimstone. Jericho face-palmed for what seemed to be the fifteenth time.

   "Hell..." he thought with irritation, "...He sends me to hell with the new guys to stop a Galbadian outpost from attacking ours... we had better just be here to reinforce the troops already there otherwise we're going to need a lot of Phoenix Down. After he issued a few orders for the lieutenant to take over his position while he was in the training room, he proceeded to a sealed room that was completely barren.

   Jericho made a quick gesture and the room's walls seemed to fade to something that was similar to his VR Station room, but with more of a focus on the cool color spectrum. Jericho only had a few seconds before the weight of the atmosphere around him seemed to increase, when the pressure stopped, though, he looked back where he had entered and shouted.

   "C'mon! You know I do four hundred thousand back at garden... max this one out!" a thought flashed across his mind and he quickly spoke again, "and do it quickly!" in response, the weight of the room dramatically shifted to a greater amount

"One-fifty eh...? Well… It’s not like our soldiers ever usually get to this point anyway..." He thought as his own body weight was increased by a hundred and fifty times its regular weight. Several types of weight-lifting equipment appeared nearby as if he had willed them to appear, he took the dumbbell that would've normally weighed a hundred pounds and placed it onto a mount for his shoulders as he began to train.

   About an hour later the gravity of the room began decreasing back to normal, he looked around as the weights faded and the room turned back into the cold-metal one. The main door of the room beeped and slid open automatically as a petite brunette woman walked through it, she had amber eyes similar to Jericho's but a bit more on the Brown side, her hair fell neatly down her back and looked incredibly soft. Jericho turned to the woman and gave her a warm embrace as she walked up to him.

   "I see you finally decided to walk around the ship..." Jericho said playfully, He knew that the woman wasn't afraid of flying, She was a dragon like him, But she was painfully shy of most people and got embarrassed or felt awkward easily. He let her take a step back and she smiled at him with a face that he always found to be beautiful when complimented with a smile. He spoke once again.

   "So Blissera, you ready to face down the terrors of hell?" a certain playful joking tone was evident in his voice, and the woman cocked her head to the side like a cat and smiled as she replied.

   "Viola has been trying to become the dominant personality ever since she knew I was being paired with you... I think I can handle devils and Galbadians." her voice was filled to the brim with sarcasm.

   Jericho sighed as he thought of Viola, that woman was Blissera's version of Zephyrus, for both of them... a lifetime of suppressing negative emotions proved to let said emotions take on a life of their own. But Jericho and Blissera had learned to live with these 'other personalities' and it was actually them letting these other personalities take over from time to time that they found out letting out their repressed emotions calmed them... And it never stopped interesting Viola to try and find ways to kill Zephyrus... Fortunately for him, He was an unkillable demon... But it didn't stop her from trying.

   Whatever had been going on though between them was halted though, as a sudden shockwave resounded through the ship, sending the couple and most likely a good section of the crew to the floor. Jericho and Blissera quickly got up and made their way to the command room, with Jericho still in his training gi. The second the doors to the command room opened he saw the flashing red lights that meant their ship took a direct hit from something powerful. He quickly made his way to the center of the room and began barking out orders.

   "Sergeant! Divert power from auxiliary facilities to the shields! Captain! Switch to secondary lighting! We want to conserve as much power as possible... AND WHAT THE HELL HIT US!"

   One of the recruit pilots who was manning the system controls replied to him.

   "Our main engine was reduced to less than fifty percent by a class nine seeker rocket!" the private shouted above the warning alarm. Only one thought passed through Jericho's mind as he heard the attack.

"...Damn Galbadians..."

   He used the metal bracer on his left wrist to quickly bring up a nano-screen and switch his outfit to his Balamb elite uniform before resuming his position at the command seat. He called out to each of his soldiers, trying to find out where their attacker was now.

   "Gunners! Sweep your arcs! I want someone to find out how the hell we got blindsided like that when we have the most advanced sensor array in the military!" His growing anger caused Zephyrus to stir from his sleep.

"You know... you could just use your god power to destroy whatever hit us..." the voice hissed in his ear with a... chuckle? Jericho's mind rounded on the demon, "My purpose here is to get these guys field training... not fight their battles, it is against my orders to engage the enemy directly... no matter how much I want to." No sooner had he finished his thought than Zephyrus began to laugh his hoarse, hissing laugh that Jericho knew still haunted the minds of more than one galbadian. "...you used to be so much more fun... rebelling against orders of staying where you were... and annihilating all that stood between you and your quarry." Jericho felt his anger twinge as the demon brought up that subject, and Zephyrus laughed once more, "struck a nerve?" he asked as more of a joke than a question.

"if you don't shut up in the next few seconds I will send you into the most cramped part of my mind that I know you fear to venture..." he threatened, and he felt the influence of the demon cringe at the threat, "you wouldn't... you're bluffing..." the voice hissed with a twitch of fear, knowing full well that Jericho didn't bluff when it came to threats.

   Since Jericho's attention had been on the mental argument between him and his inner demon, he hadn't noticed when the lieutenant had shouted for him, warning of a large Galbadian attack cruiser coming in behind them. Once his lieutenant had shaken him out of his trance and told him about the attack cruiser coming in, one of the soldiers stationed at an energy signature radar shouted above the warning siren.

   "Commander Strife! Massive energy rift off of our bow! the gravity of the energy is making it impossible for our damaged engines to take us away from it!" Jericho cursed under his breath as he tried to come up with a solution, but as he saw the purple, swirling and pulsing rift enter the view of the command chamber's main window; only one thing crossed his mind as he grabbed the intercom to issue his soldiers an order.

   "...Everyone! Brace yourselves for an imminent Rift Jump!" he shouted over the intercoms as all of his soldiers tried to grab onto something before their ship was dragged into the vortex. Everything about his vision was filled with a blinding white light before he forced himself to close his eyes, Shutting himself in a total darkness.