Chapter 3

Time Travel

As the Red and Blue teams made their way across the snowy fields towards the Red Base, a sudden sinister laughter brought them to a stop. They looked up to see Mithos/Tenebrae and Aska standing on a cliff.

"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA!" Tenebrae's voice called out. "You fools have fallen right into my trap! Only now do you realize the folly of your follies! Prepare for an oblivion, for which there is no preparation! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA!"

At once, the two armies raised their weapons up to the possessed medic. "Tenebrae, the Reds and Blues are working together now!" Sheena called up. "You can't hope to beat us!"

"You fool!" Tenebrae retorted. "My metallic friend is the only ally I need. Aska, activate weather control routines!"

"Okay." Aska replied as he raised his arms. At once, his body began to glow and two beams of light shot out from his hands into the sky. Lightning flashed from the robot as the clouds rolled in and he was surrounded by strange mystic runes.

Sheena gasped in amazement. "Are those runic symbols a sign of some ancient technology?"

"No, I used to draw them in my binder during study hall," Mithos called out. "I always wanted to use them for something. Aren't they cool?"

"Shut up!" Tenebrae snapped.

"Oh, Sampson's back hair, they found our secret weapon!" Kratos cried out. As the wind began to pick up, he quickly explained to Lloyd and Genis, "I developed a weather control device, but I was missing one critical piece of technology to make it work."

"Hahaha, yes," Tenebrae chuckled. "And now that I've located those 'D' batteries, the Universe will be mine! MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA!"

"Are you serious?" Lloyd cried out in disbelief. "You couldn't find D batteries."

"Only at gas stations," Kratos replied sheepishly. "And they're just so darn expensive there."

Just then, a loud ticking faded in and everyone turned to see Emil running up, a look of worry on his face. "What's going on?"

"You want the long version or the short?" Kratos asked. "Basically, you've got a fifty megaton bomb in your gut-"

"Ten, sir," Sheena corrected.

"And Aska is about to kill us all," Kratos finished.

"That didn't make any sense," Emil said, scratching his head in confusion. "What's the long version?"

"That was the long version," Lloyd yelled. "The short version is 'we're boned!'"

As lightning flashed across the sky, Zelos arrived and Sheena went to join her puffing orange teammate. "Hey, Zelos, are you okay?"

"I've done hard time, Sheena," Zelos panted. "I'm not the man you used to know."

Sheena looked puzzled. "Hard time? We were only separated for five hours."

"Time moves slower on the inside, Sheena." Zelos explained. "It seemed like seven or eight hours to me."

Suddenly, a rocket shot over their heads and hit the ground behind them, making the teams scatter in all directions.

"You foolish fools will never defeat me!" Tenebrae jeered as he hefted the rocket launcher. "You're far too busy being foolish! HAHAHAHAAA! Oblivion is at hand!"

As Tenebrae kept firing the rocket launcher, Genis and Presea ran towards some trees, Lloyd and Emil dived for a nearby snowdrift and Kratos and Zelos dashed behind a rock while Sheena scurried across the field, calling out, "Sarge, I have an idea, but I need you to distract him!"

"Will do!" Kratos called out then he turned to the orange soldier next to him. "Wilder, I never believed in you, not even for a moment, but now is your chance to prove yourself… to me."

"What can I do, sir?" Zelos asked.

"I need you to run right at Tenebrae," Kratos began.

"And shank him with my shiv?" Zelos interrupted hopefully.

"No," Kratos retorted. "When he blows you up with the rocket, try to see if you can get your dismembered limbs and guts to clog the barrels of his rocket launcher."

Zelos stared in horror. "You're kidding."

"It's a remote chance, I know," Kratos agreed. "But it's worth a shot."

"OOOOOOBLIVION IS AT HAND! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAA!" They had just noticed Tenebrae with the rocket launcher right behind them, pointed directly at them.

"Cover your ears, guys," Mithos's voice called out. "This thing is really loud!"

"This is it!" Zelos yelped as he grabbed his CO tight and closed his eyes.

"Not so fast, Tenebrae!" Sheena's voice called out. The possessed medic turned round to see the maroon soldier standing in the middle of the field, a remote control in her hand. "Maybe we can't stop you, but I know who can!"

Sheena pressed the button on the remote and a glowing green doorway appeared next to her. Seconds later, the two Battle Creek armies came charging through it, cheering and shouting, "Alright, new level, yeah! Woohooo!"

"Hey, guys!" Sheena called out, attracting their attention. "You want your flag? He's the one that has it!" He pointed to Tenebrae who gulped in worry.

"The crusade has begun!" the Red Zealot yelled out. "Our hour of glory is at hand! Let all who would stand against us be washed in our divine light!"

As the two armies charged forward whooping and firing their weapons, Tenebrae dropped his rocket launcher and ran for his life. "Get away from me! No! Get out! OWWW!"

Sheena ran up to Kratos and Zelos and grabbed the rocket launcher. "We need to disarm Castagnier's bomb, Sarge."

"Right," Kratos agreed.

But as they, Genis and Presea ran towards Emil and Lloyd's hiding place, a bolt of lightning shot out of Aska's body and struck the Blue leader right in the crotch. "YEEEHAHAHAOOOOWWW!"

Just then Kratos and the others ran up to him. "Hold still, son, this'll just take a second."

He knelt down and carefully pulled off Emil's codpiece, making the Blue leader sigh in dismay. "Don't you ever install anything above the waist?"

Once the codpiece was off, Kratos located the timer of the bomb which showed they had sixty seconds left and he quickly hit the off button… and then again… but nothing happened. "Oh no!" he yelled as he jumped to his feet. "That last lightning bolt fused the detonator! There's no way to turn this thing off!"

"Can't you do it manually?!" Emil and Sheena asked.

"Impossible," Kratos replied. "I specifically designed it so that I wouldn't be able to defuse it."

"Why?!" Zelos cried out.

"In case I fell in to the wrong hands and was brainwashed to help the Blues," Kratos explained.

"Nice thinking, sir," Sheena said loyally.

Zelos just scowled at her. "You had to get just one last ass-kiss in before we die, didn't you?"

Lloyd snatched the rocket launcher from Sheena's hands and pointed it at his leader. "Castagnier, there's only one thing I can do."

"Hey, what the hell?" Emil cried out, taking a step back.

"There's only twenty seconds left!" Sheena yelled.

"If I blow you up before the bomb goes off, there's at least a small chance the rest of us will live," Lloyd explained.

"But the rocket will kill me!" Emil shouted.

"Ten seconds!"

"You're gonna die anyway when the bomb goes off!" Zelos screamed.

Emil just shrugged. "What can I tell you, pal? Misery loves company."

"Five seconds!"

Lloyd sighed as he loaded the rocket launcher and pointed it at his teammate. "Sorry, dude."

"Man this blows," Emil scowled. "You guys suck."

Suddenly, a shot rang out and the rocket launcher was ripped right out of Lloyd's hands. "What the hell?"

Everybody looked up to see Richter standing on an icy peak, holding a smoking sniper rifle in his hands. "Sorry, Private Irving, but I always get my man." He pointed his gun at Lloyd's head. "Say goodbye, mate."

Just then, a loud bleeping noise rang out and Sheena gulped in alarm. "Uh guys, I hate to interrupt but… zero seconds."

All eyes turned to Emil as the bleeping grew louder, faster and higher in pitch. "Uh oh," Lloyd murmured.

"What?" Emil asked before he felt a strange grumbling feeling in his stomach. "Oh, son of a-"

KABOOOOOOOOMMMMM!

As the light faded, Lloyd suddenly found himself in a strange glowing tunnel and he saw the others flying alongside him.

"What the…?" Sheena muttered.

"The bomb must have gone off," Kratos guessed.

Zelos looked around in confusion. "Where are we? Are we dead?"

"I don't want to be dead!" Genis called out. "I want to be alive, or a cowboy."

"Dead? Oh man," Presea cried. "Tomorrow was all you can eat day at the chow hall, and I wanted to eat all I could."

"We're not dead, idiots," Kratos yelled. "We're stuck in some kind of temporal… whoa no! Heads up boys, prepare for impact!"

Then Lloyd felt himself falling for a while before he hit the ground and knew nothing more…

With a loud groan, Lloyd slowly opened his eyes, and just by looking at the sky, he knew he wasn't on Flanoir Island or Blood Gulch. The clouds were a bruised red and the sun was a darker yellow than the one over Blood Gulch. "Ohhhhh," he moaned. "What happened?"

Just then, a figure in polished pink armor appeared in his blurred vision. "Hey, he's awake," she cried out in Presea's voice.

Then Lloyd heard Zelos' and Sheena's voice arguing nearby. "I still wanna know why I don't get a laser gun." Zelos muttered.

"Shut up, dumbass." Sheena retorted.

"Guys, Lloyd's awake." Presea called out.

"Huh?" Sheena came forward, wearing glossy maroon armor. "Hey, hey, hey, take it easy, Lloyd. You've been out for a while."

"And I thought I was lazy," Zelos muttered as he looked down.

Slowly, Lloyd sat up and stared at the gathered figures. "W-W-What's going on? Who are you people?" It took him a second before he realized who they were, as somehow, they looked a bit different. Aside from the shiny new armor, Sheena's hair had grown some past her shoulders, and looked like she had gotten slightly taller. Zelos was relatively the same, while Presea's hair was no longer in pigtails, and now reached about halfway down, looking exactly the same when she first joined the Reds, though her hair was still colored pink.

"He has amnesia! Lloyd, don't worry, you are safe. We're the Reds; we are your mortal enemies… Wait, that didn't sound right." Presea said.

Just then, a shiny blue-armored figure ran up and grabbed the teal soldier in a hug. "Irving! I am so glad you are alive."

Lloyd pulled out of the hug and stared at the figure. "Genis? Still so dumb, but you look so different." Genis had actually gotten taller, just about matching Lloyd, and even had some muscle now.

"We're in the future," Genis cried out, holding his arms out. "Things are very shiny here."

"The future?" Lloyd sighed as he rubbed his head. "Oh, I can't fucking wait to hear this one."

At that moment, Kratos came round the corner, his red armor not quite as shiny as the others and covered in dents and scratches. "Obviously Aska's weather matrix combined with the power of the bomb to create an explosion so large, it caused a temporal rift in time that cascaded throughout the blo-"

"Whoa, whoa, wait a second, wait a second," Lloyd interrupted as his head started to hurt. "I don't understand."

"Sarge, can we do the skit now?" Presea cried out eagerly.

"Yeah!" Genis cheered.

"Yes," Sheena agreed.

Zelos shook his head. "I don't wanna do that dumb skit."

"Fine," Kratos sighed. "But only because I wanna see Wilder be miserable… I miss the old days."

"Great!" Presea cried out. "Places everyone!"

As Lloyd watched the others run towards a nearby rocky clearing, Presea cleared her throat and spoke in a deep voice. "The Red vs. Blue Players present: A Presea Combatir play. Written and directed by Presea Combatir, in association with Light Red Danish Productions."

"Can we just start?" Kratos yelled impatiently.

Lloyd turned towards the clearing as Kratos, Zelos and Sheena stood in a row and Presea stood some distance away. "Annnnd, action!"

"Hello, weary traveler," Sheena said calmly. "We represent the timeline."

Kratos stepped forwards. "I am the past, where things cost less and people knew the value of a hard day's work, but they only lived to be twenty-eight years old."

Sheena then came forward. "And I am the future, where people have no morals and no emotions, but we have a bunch of kickass gadgets!"

"And I'm the present which sucks," Zelos said sulkily. "We have nothing cool and also no morals."

"And I am the helpful narrator," Presea added. "A faceless voice used by poor writers."

"You have a face." Lloyd muttered.

"Shut up, audience, you're ruining my play," Presea snapped before retaining decorum. "Everything was fine in the timeline, until one day, in the present…"

"Why does bad stuff always happen in the present?" Zelos asked.

"Because that when people do stuff," Presea growled.

"Ah, quit your bitching," Kratos cut in. "I have atrocities and a crapload of wars that seemed very important at the time, but now seem trivial and stupid."

"Yeah, and I've got apocalypse," Sheena agreed. "That's way worse than anything you two dipshits have." She became aware of Kratos staring in amazement at her and hastily added, "Sorry, sir. That dipshit was in character."

"Oh," Kratos realized. "Well, bravo, Fujibayashi."

Presea continued his narration. "One day, in the present, a terrible thing happened."

Genis then walked onto the stage. "Enter Stage Left," he said before taking a bow. "Hello, I am stupid Private Irving. I am going to set off a big bomb now, and totally mess things up for everyone, because I am stupid." He then turned to face Zelos. "Turns around... Hello, present. I am going to set off a bomb in you."

"Don't do that, stupid Private Irving," Zelos cried out. "That might kill me."

Genis looked thoughtful. "Thinks about this for a moment…"

"Genis, stop reading your stage directions," Presea yelled out.

Genis turned to glare at Presea. "You told me I was supposed to read anything with my name in front of it."

"Just the lines, not the blocking," Presea argued. "You're ruining my big debut!"

"I do not think we are meshing artistically," Genis retorted, folding his arms. "I think you should talk to my agent."

"This is stupid," Zelos shouted as he walked off the stage. "I quit."

"You can't quit," Presea yelled. "End scene! This has been a Presea Combatir joint."

With the skit over, Kratos stepped forward and helped Lloyd get to his feet. "Listen, son," he explained in simple terms. "You and your buddy Castagnier set off a bomb which, when combined with the weather machinery in Aska, made an explosion so large it destroyed the present."

"Destroyed the present…" Lloyd couldn't believe his ears. "Then where are we?"

"We're in the future, numbnuts," Sheena replied angrily.

"Aren't we in the present right now?" Lloyd asked. "Aren't we always in the present?"

"Unbelievable," Sheena sighed. "He can't cope with the loss. He's in denial."

"That is so sad," Zelos muttered, shaking his head.

"Son, you're just not listening," Kratos reasoned. "The present has been destroyed. It no longer exists. We are in the future."

Lloyd grabbed his pounding head and yelled out, "AHHHHH! It makes no sense!"

"I'm currently working on a short film to explain it," Presea said helpfully. "Tom Cruise has the script, and I hear he's verrry interested."

Lloyd shook his head in disbelief. "You're telling me a bomb sent us into the future."

"Yeah," Sheena replied. "You see, luckily Castagnier was facing forward when the bomb went off, and we were standing in front of him. So that sent us forward into the future."

"Of course he was facing forward," Lloyd scowled. "What other way can people face?"

"You see?" Sheena exclaimed. "That's what I meant by luckily."

Lloyd then realized that someone was missing. "What happened to him anyway?"

"Hmm," Kratos muttered. "Never really thought about him."

"Yeah, weird," Sheena agreed, scratching the top of his helmet. "I-I guess he's dead."

"Sounds good to me," Kratos nodded. "Let's go with that."

But Lloyd wouldn't allow it. "He could be hurt and trapped in the present."

"That's impossible, son," Kratos argued. "The present doesn't exist anymore. What you're proposing just isn't very good science."

Lloyd then had a horrible thought. "Don't you see? If he was facing forward during the explosion, and that blew us into the future, that could mean that he was blown backwards into…" He let out a gasp. "Oh no!"

"Backwards into what?" Kratos asked. "A wall? A broom closet?"

"A big rock?" Zelos added.

"Another big rock?" Genis put in.

"No," Lloyd yelled. "Into the past!"

At that moment, nearly two thousand years ago, Emil was slowly coming to. He sat up and rubbed his head. "What the hell…?" he muttered. Then he opened his eyes and found himself sitting by the edge of a huge complex and no one else in sight. As he stood up, he glanced around in complete confusion. "Where the hell am I?"

Since no one had any idea where, and when, they had landed, the Red and Blue teams split up to search for any signs of life, human or otherwise. Kratos waited at their starting point, Genis and Presea set off towards some mountains and Lloyd, Zelos and Sheena explored the rocky fields.

After a few minutes of exploring and finding nothing, Zelos stopped, fell to his knees and shook his head sadly. "They destroyed it all, Sheena. Those damn stupid bastards; they blew it all up!" He bent over and slammed his fist into the dirt. "Damn them! Damn them to Hell! Those damn dirty apes!"

"Calm down, Zelos," Sheena said. "We don't know that the whole world is like this."

"Yes it is," Zelos sighed as he got to his feet. "They destroyed it all. I guess the society of man just wasn't meant to survive."

Sheena rolled her eyes. "Hey, how about this: How about we explore more than two square miles before we jump to conclusions."

But Zelos was already in too deep. "It was definitely nuclear weapons; that's what did it. And the explosions caused massive power outages which caused the failsafe to fail, which released a super-bacteria from a secret lab."

"Oh come on," Sheena sighed.

"That caused a huge plague," Zelos continued. "And as the victims died, they rose from the dead twelve hours later to roam the Earth and feast on human flesh."

"What?" Sheena cried out in disbelief.

Zelos waved his hand for silence. "A handful of gritty survivors from all walks of life were able to keep the legions of the infected radioactive undead at bay, using only their wit and an inexplicable comprehension of agricultural science and engineering. Everything was looking good… and that's when the meteor hit!"

Sheena just stared with her mouth wide open. "I think you just quoted every crappy Hollywood apocalypse movie ever."

"Hollywood doesn't understand apocalypse." Lloyd argued. "They think that just one thing from everyday life goes away and that changes everything; like in 'Road Warrior' it was gas, and in 'Waterworld' it was land."

"What went away in 'The Matrix'?" Sheena asked.

"Sunlight." Lloyd replied.

"I thought the missing element was plot," Zelos said, scratching his head in confusion.

"I'm talking about 'Matrix 1'." Lloyd said.

"Oh right." Sheena muttered.

Zelos looked towards the burning horizon and sighed. "Face it Sheena, the age of man is done."

Sheena pondered over Zelos's story of the apocalypse. "If all of that happened, then where are the zombies? Why aren't they still around?"

"The meteor killed them," Zelos replied as if it was obvious.

"And what about the super-bacteria?" Sheena added.

"It was infected by alien bacteria brought by the meteor and was wiped out in a massive bacteria on bacteria war." Zelos sighed and shook his head. "Very ironic…"

"Okay," Sheena said slowly. "Then why haven't we been infected by the new alien bacteria?"

"It only infects other bacteria," Zelos clarified. "Are you even listening to me?"

Lloyd listened to this conversation with growing puzzlement. "Do you guys ever get anything done, or do you just stand around and talk all day?"

"We don't get paid enough to do stuff," Zelos muttered regrettably.

"But what about Castagnier, idiot?" Lloyd cried. "How're we gonna get him from the past to the future?"

"I guess he can just wait," Zelos replied with a shrug. "That's how it usually works."

"But when he gets to the present, he'll just be destroyed like everything else," Lloyd pointed out.

"Well, he'll just have to fix it on his own then," Sheena replied.

"And if he's successful," Zelos added, "he'll get to live through the coolest apocalypse of all time!"

Just then, Kratos's voice came through their radio headsets. "Wilder, Fujibayashi, get your butts over here!"

Sheena, Zelos and Lloyd ran back across the fields. They found Kratos waiting by a small gully and in the gully, Genis and Presea were standing next to a large vehicle that looked very similar to the Warthog they'd left in Blood Gulch.

"Look what I found!" Genis called up as the others approached.

"I found it!" Presea yelled angrily.

"Look at what I took credit for finding," Genis corrected.

"Amazing that these two actually accomplished something," Kratos muttered to himself.

Zelos clambered down to have a look. "It looks like some kind of an alien transport mechanism that could be used to-"

"Or it's a jeep," Sheena interrupted.

"You have no imagination," Zelos muttered.

Kratos was next to climb into the ditch and he looked over the vehicle. "Hmmm, let me see if I can get this thing working…"

"How?" Sheena asked puzzled. "There's no parts, and what're you gonna use for fuel?"

Kratos sighed in pity. "Wilder was right. You don't have any imagination."

"Thank you sir," Zelos replied.

"Shut up, scumbag," Kratos snapped. "We're not having a moment."

"Hey, we need to find Castagnier," Lloyd reminded everyone.

"He's dead, son." Kratos called back. "Why haven't you given up hope yet and just moved on?"

"It's only been a couple of hours," Lloyd retorted.

Kratos looked up at the teal soldier. "Well, this should make you feel better. When his body was blasted into smithereens, at least he took all our enemies with him."

Under a sign warning people not to swim here, a disembodied head lay in the sand. To the casual observer, it looked like the head was just a prop discarded on the beach… until they heard it speak.

"Peligro. Error. Error." (Warning… Error, error,) Aska moaned as his power gradually faded. "Peligro. Error. Error. No puedo tocar mi cuerpo." ("Warning… Error, error… I cannot feel my booodyyyyy…")

As Aska finally switched off, a purple-armor figure approached, his face in a grimace and his eyes glowing red. "Hahahahaaaa! Don't worry, my metallic friend," Tenebrae ensured his lackey as he pulled him out of the sand. "You'll be up and about in no time! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAAA-uh-heh. Hahahahahaha…" He broke off with a cough and then finished, "Ha-ha-hah!"