Final Fantasy IV: Dark Infinity
Prologue: Worlds
The Light Warriors were dead. The ones who were to save the world, the heroes... all dead.
Well, that wasn't quite true. One was sealed in an alternate dimension after her magic was stolen from her. Another would have been better off dead-- his fate was to be enthralled by the sorcerer's spells. The third was simply overlooked. But the rest were long gone.
The Great Battle-- the last days of the free world-- had been five long years ago. After Golbez finished gathering the Crystals, he used them to increase his magical powers to godlike levels. Cecil and his allies hadn't stood a chance. The Army of the Resistance that tried to avenge him fell within a few months, followed quickly by the few free cities.
Now, the only "resistance" that still existed only fought a quiet battle to keep the memory of the Time of Light alive. They had no real physical power-- could have none, because Golbez had preemptively "recruited" anyone powerful enough to be even a minor threat, and stripped anyone too strong of will to join him of whatever power they had. His agents constantly kept a lookout for anyone who could be of use to him.
In a small village founded after the Great Battle, a few miles east of Mysidia, a handful of people quietly slipped into a few of the small shacks. Among them was the last free Light Warrior, overlooked for one simple reason: he couldn't fight his way out of a paper bag. He simply wasn't a threat.
He was the Dark World's only hope.
He called himself "Sandpiper," after a small desert bird with a beautiful song. It was rarely seen because its golden-brown feathers blended in perfectly with the sand, but its songs filled the air every morning.
That day, Sandpiper carefully lifted the cellar door and stepped through, thinking about his situation. Although the members of the resistance all used code names in the meetings, they all knew each other-- over half the population of the small, mostly unguarded village were part of the movement. An Agent would come and look for warriors once or twice a month, but the only way off the continent was through Mysidia or by boat, neither of which was safe, so the search was half-hearted at best.
Sandpiper opened a closet in the cellar and opened another trap door, revealing a ladder. He slowly climbed down, finally entering the cavern library. The large, dim cavern was filled with books: books on shelves, books in boxes, books on tables, and books in uneven, tilting stacks. All the remaining books of the once-great library in Mysidia were in that cave. It was, perhaps, the greatest treasure left in the world. It was completely safe, because Golbez thought all the libraries of the world burnt to ashes. His focus had shifted.
"Sandpiper!" a brown-haired woman called as he entered. "Come look at this!"
Sandpiper walked over to the table the woman was sitting at. "What is it, Hika?" he asked, peering over her shoulder.
"I think this might be what we're looking for." She pointed at a passage in the book she was studying.
"It's... Mysidian," Sandpiper replied. "I'm no mage; I can't read it."
"It's a bit complicated. You know the Theory of Infinite Dimensions?"
"'Every time a choice is made, an alternate World forms where a different choice was made'?" Sandpiper quoted.
"Exactly. Well, this is a theory that the Crystals of Dark and Light, when used together, can make a... how can I put this... a rip between the universes, allowing one to travel between them."
"So according to that, Golbez could--"
"--Go to another World? Yes. In fact, he hasn't been seen in a while, right?"
Sandpiper frowned. "According to my sources, yes."
"So... what if the author is right, and Golbez happened to discover it?" Hika asked.
"And the Crystals' power extends between Worlds..."
"And assuming that in at least some of the other Worlds no one has the Crystals' power..."
"This could be bad," Sandpiper ended, frowning. "Is there anything we can do about it?"
"That's what I'm doing now," Hika replied, holding out a book. "Here, take this. It seems promising..."
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The author of the book was almost correct. It wasn't the Crystals of Light and Dark; it was a link forged using the combined power of the Crystals that allowed the teleport between realities.
In one of those realities, Baron was under attack.
"Your Majesty!" a captain cried, injured and out of breath. "The... the Airships... have been turned against us..."
Cecil, the Paladin-king, turned to face the soldier. "How did that happen?" he asked, surprised.
"We don't know... your Majesty... they just started firing on us."
"Order the troops to retreat. They only have limited ammo, and the Dragon Knights should be here soon."
"Yes, sir!" the captain replied, leaving to inform what was left of his unit to retreat.
"You know, it is of no use," a dark, familiar voice commented. Cecil turned to look.
"Golbez?" Cecil wondered, surprised. But he left with the moon...
"Yes." The sorcerer stepped out from behind a curtain. Cecil was surprised to see him dressed in the dark armor and horned helm he had worn while allied with Zemus. "But not as you knew..."
Cecil fell to the ground, hit by a paralysis spell that Golbez hadn't even chanted. "How did you--?"
"Silence!" Golbez shouted, and Cecil found himself speechless. "I am not beholden to answer you. You must know only this... this world will fall just as the others have. You will fall just as you have in every other world. Now..."
Cecil went limp, already dead from the spell of complete darkness that had been cast on him. He was lucky; any other man would have been transformed into a mindless monster.
"Lenaya! Let's go!" a familiar voice called. Golbez turned and cast a spell of invisibility on himself, and watched.
"I came as fast as I-- Cecil!" Kain dashed into the room and knelt at Cecil's side. "Ceece... no...." He got up and looked around the room. "Where are you?" he muttered. Who could have so much power as to kill the Paladin-King so quickly?
Golbez released the spell keeping him invisible and cast another one to paralyze his future plaything. "Do you remember me,little Dragon Knight?" he asked mockingly.
"Golbez! Didn't you leave?"
"I might have in this world, but in my own..."
"'This world?' What?"
"So stupid, just like in every other world... I am from a world that I conquered. I learned the true power of the Crystals. I can travel between worlds... I can use the powers of three dozen sets of Crystals from as many worlds... and you will obey me once more....."
Kain looked at him quizzically. "What makes you think it will work this time?"
"It will work just like it has in every other world! Now, you will obey my command!"
Kain took his chance and leapt at Golbez, as he had stopped the paralysis spell when he cast the control spell. Unfortunately, it didn't work very well-- his spear splintered against a magical barrier around the sorcerer, and he ended up paralyzed on the floor once again.
"Why won't it work?" Golbez demanded. "What power do you have that blocks even my power?"
"That, you monster, is something you'll never know."
"Then die!" Golbez grabbed the end of the broken spear and thrust it through Kain's heart.
"Lenaya... run... fight later...." Kain murmured. And so he died, and so the World of the Hiryuu began its slow decent into the darkness....
--Three months later--
"Hopeless. It's hopeless." Astran Shaylett commented. Derri, his partnered Hiryuu, nosed him in sympathy.
::Never hopeless:: the mystic dragon, his eternal partner, replied into his mind. ::There is always a way for those born of the True Blood.::
"There is no way! We thought Golbez had been bespelled, but he's come back and he's managed to conquer our world! Three out of every four of us are dead, and some of the ones left living are unpartnered.
::Yes, it has been a terrible battle for our freedom, and we have lost. But those dead are lucky; there are those whose fate is worse than death.::
"'Worse than death'? Some of those whose partners were killed are going crazy! Did you hear Lenaya claiming that she saw her partner-- who we all saw dead-- standing by Golbez' side?"
::Yes, I did hear. You know that you humans, as our partners, are immune to that use of his power, but for those unpartnered, it's a terrible life.::
"Well, what makes you so optimistic then?"
::I've heard rumors that could be true. If those rumors are true, for us there is one hope: the Mystic Gate.::
"No! I will not flee, I will not abandon my world to that... that monster. Even if it means my death, I would not live my life in shame in a World other than my own."
::The Golbez we fight is from one of those Worlds.::
"How can it be? No one not born of the True Blood can use the Gate!"
::He's found a way to jump between Worlds. He is conquering them for the power of the Crystals. We've found one human who managed to break free-- a common foot-solider named Eriak-- and he told us what he knew before Golbez took him again. He uses the crystals to make a portal that allows him to teleport from World to World, seeking Infinus.::
"Why does he need Infinus if he can already travel between Worlds?"
::His travel is random. Although he can choose his destination if he's been there, he must travel to new Worlds blindly and conquer one at a time. With the Mystic Gate he could go straight to Infinus and corrupt the very core of reality. Nothing could escape.::
"Then... what is the point? What is to keep him from going to another World and using someone from there for the Mystic Gate?"
::The gift of the Mystic Gate was given to us, the Hiryuu. In every other one of the Worlds every one of us have been killed. We who survive are all that remain of a race that once existed in every World. We must flee forever from Golbez's influences, until he is finally defeated.::
"But what if nobody can defeat him?"
Derri was silent for a while. ::Somebody must,:: he finally replied, ::or the Worlds will be doomed.::
"Derri." Astran looked at him. "What if we-- the living Dragon Knights-- traveled the Worlds to search for one who can defeat Golbez? Study what he has conquered, learn his patterns, and help his next target before he can strike?"
Derri nodded. ::That could work.::
"Call a meeting. We may still fight on the battlefield of our choosing."
::The time will come for Golbez to fall.::
I'm really not too sure about this. It's weird and I feel like I'm kind of repeating myself: beating it into your heads that the attacking Golbez is not the Golbez you fight in the game. In fact, none of the presented worlds have been the world of the real FFIV. But that's half the fun, eh?
Please leave a review, even if you disliked it. I'm not sure if I should continue this or just drop it, and I need honest opinions.