Disclaimer: Maria sidles out shyly. "Hello, everyone, I get to tell you all that Alenida doesn't own Chronotrigger, even though she wants to. She does own me though--" (shooting a glare somewhere off to the side) "--which is why I do her stupid disclaimers for her!"
A/N: I forgot to mention in the Prologue that "Flammate" means "Burn," but I'll try and make sure I have translations in future. Now, to make up for the extremely short second chapter, here comes a much longer third chapter. Enjoy!
Chapter Three: To The Black Omen
Magus stared angrily at Lucca as she pulled her boots on. How dare she? How dare she force that confession out of him? Lucca's long purple hair fell forward in a businesslike braid over one shoulder. A second later she shook it back and stood up. "Ready," she said calmly. Magus allowed a smile to force his thin lips apart. He moved toward her and, without warning, grabbed her around the waist and flung her over his shoulder. Lucca screamed in surprise and rage and, as he took off, her fists and feet beat a tattoo against his shoulder, but he ignored it, holding her down with one arm.
"Let go of me!" Lucca yelled. Magus curled his lip in scorn and abruptly dropped her. Lucca cried out, but before Magus could catch her again, she yelled, "Columna flammae!", her voice muffled by the howling wind. Twin pillars of fire shot from her hands to splash redly against the black ground. The momentum kept her from falling freely, though she was slowly sinking groundward. Magus sighed, grudgingly admiring of her skill. An instant later he had scooped her up, his arms supporting her neck and the back of her legs.
"Better?" he asked laconically. She glared at him.
"This isn't getting us anywhere," she growled breathlessly.
"On the contrary, my dear Lucca, we are rising steadily toward the distant Black Omen," he replied, with a smirk.
"You know that's not what I meant!"
"Really. What did you mean, then?"
"I meant this fighting. It's getting us absolutely nowhere!"
"What would you suggest?"
"A peace treaty! A truce! Whatever you'd like to call it!"
Magus shook back his long blue hair, and the beads in their leather strips rattled against one another. "Very well," he said. "I promise not to crush you against the wall anymore if you promise to refrain from asking personal questions. Agreed?"
"Agreed," Lucca held out her hand to Magus warily. Equally warily, he took it, curling the hand that was supporting her back around it and inadvertently pulling her closer to him as he did so. Lucca didn't seem to notice, but Magus did, and he pulled back quickly. Lucca's eyes suddenly focused upward, past Magus' head. "Look!" she exclaimed. "The Black Omen!"
"How did you plan to get in?" Magus asked. Lucca frowned. "I suspect you'll be able to get in with no trouble."
"What do you mean, you foolish girl?"
She sighed. "I mean that you're related directly to Zeal. So it probably will be possible for you to reach it without the pendant."
Magus shrugged. "I suppose it is worth a try."
He flew straight toward the Black Omen, which was a huge dark splotch, blotting out the sunlight like some bloated tick grown fat on the blood it leeched from others, a parasitic shadow on the sun. As he reached it, a door in its side swung open with a hollow creak. Lucca grinned. "See?"
Magus snorted but did not reply. Instead, he set Lucca carelessly down on her feet and gripped his scythe. "Next time I'll go for the piggy-back," Lucca murmured to herself, her hand already resting lightly on Wondershot. Magus moved into the door. "Now where are they?" he asked. "So that we can get them and go?"
"Shhh," Lucca quieted him with a finger on her lips. She moved toward the side of the passage, where she hooked her fingers around a panel and pulled back hard. The panel chunked loudly as it popped out of its place and Lucca staggered backward under the sudden weight.
"What are you doing?" Magus asked, taking care to keep his voice low.
"Getting us into the air supply, so we can get to Crono and Marle without alerting the entire ship that we're here. Now come on." She ducked inside the panel, motioning to Magus to follow her. He sighed and did so. By the time he straightened up she was already moving hand over hand up a series of steel rungs riveted into the thin passage. Holding his scythe tightly between his shoulder and his chest, he followed her.
They soon found themselves crawling down the air duct, a passage made of metal and so narrow that Magus was forced to push his scythe along with one hand. The air supply hissed past his face like a scented breeze, and he felt a deep thrumming underneath his hands--the faraway hum of the engine. They seemed to have crawled for interminable ages and the dark closeness began to get to Magus, though he would not have admitted it to Lucca for anything. Magus was used to the wide-open plains and sea he roamed over in the night, and the open glass of the top room of his lighthouse where he sat the rest of the time.
Lucca stopped suddenly, and Magus, lost in his own thoughts, crashed into her, knocking her down. She scrabbled and managed to regain her balance, turned her head and glared at Magus. He turned away, knowing that it was his fault but not feeling himself capable of apologizing.
"We're going down now," Lucca whispered, sounding breathless.
"I had gathered that," Magus replied with his maddening equanimity.
"Yes, well, follow me," Lucca continued, with a slightly irritated tone in her voice. Soon they were slipping down another flight of metal rungs, through the cool dark air.
"Why should they build ladders into the air supply?" Magus questioned scornfully, shaking his head.
"Maintenance," Lucca replied with a distracted tone in her voice. She had stopped again, and judging from the clanking sounds, was attempting to remove another panel. After a minute, she stumbled backward, and Magus, flinging out his arms reflexively, found her deposited in them. He set her quickly on her feet, as she looked as if she didn't know whether to glare or thank him. She finally settled for a quick, "Thanks," before ducking through the panel and motioning for him to follow.
They were standing inside a small cell, dimly lit with watery sunshine that leaked in through a tiny barred slit high in the wall. A man and a woman were lying near the wall, to all intents and purposes, asleep. The man was flat on his back, his red hair matted and tangled. He had a smudge of dirt along one cheek, and the skin around one eye was the blue-black fading into yellow-brown of a healing bruise. He was wearing loose, baggy trousers of brown leather and a ripped, dirty, white shirt. The woman lay with her head pillowed on the man's shoulder, her long, honey-blond hair spreading out under her head. Her freckled face was pale and drawn, and she had a long scratch across her nose, the skin around it still pink and inflamed. She was wearing long, white baggy trousers, coupled with a frayed white blouse.
"Crono! Marle!" cried Lucca, running over to them. The pair stirred and started to wake up. "Come on, quick," Lucca knelt beside them. "We've got to get out of here!"
"Unh…Lucca?" Crono blinked and rubbed the sleep from his eyes, sitting up. "Wow! You made it--" he stopped suddenly as he caught sight of Magus standing in the corner, quiet and motionless. "What the--where'd he come from?"
"No time to explain now. We've got to get out of here!" Lucca replied, helping Marle to her feet.
The blond woman was dazed with sleep, but she was beginning to recover. "No," she said quickly.
"What? Why not?" Lucca exclaimed, irritated.
"There's someone in the other cell," Crono explained, getting to his feet. "We've heard Zeal go in there--I think the girl could have been here for awhile. We have to rescue her."
Magus stepped forward, the scorn plainly written on his pale face. "Far be it from me to disparage the heroic instincts you have doubtless cultivated," he began condescendingly. "Nevertheless, I must point out that leaving with all rapidity would be the most sensible course."
"We can't just leave her!" Lucca growled, swinging on her heel to glare at Magus.
"And we haven't got time to bring along someone who may be an invalid, for all we know, or dying," Magus snapped back.
"Look, you can leave. We're not going," Lucca replied hotly, the angry flush spreading across her face.
Magus smiled with the air of one who has complete control of the situation. "Without me, you are trapped here, Lucca. Don't forget that."
Eyes glittering with angry fire, Lucca stepped up toward him, balling her fists. "And what if this girl were Schala?" she hissed in a low voice that only Magus could hear. Magus' eyes flicked to the ground, and he ground his teeth together.
"Very well," he muttered ungraciously.
"Come on," Lucca said. She led them to the airvent. "It's a good thing that it's possible to open these at all, at least from the outside."
They crawled through the vents for just a moment or two, stopping when Lucca pointed out the entrance to the next cell. She yanked at it, but it was stiff, stiffer than the last one had been, probably rusted. "Ungh," she grunted. "Could I have a little help?" she asked, not looking over her shoulder.
"If you insist." Magus placed his hands over hers and yanked hard. This time, with both of them straining at it, it finally gave up the unequal struggle and popped outward, with the result that Lucca and Magus went over in a heap. Lucca extricated herself from the mess, blushing, and Magus picked himself up with a glare. Then he stepped toward the opening to look into the cell, a supercilious smile on his face. It vanished in an instant.
"Gods…" he breathed.
The girl lying in the cell was only a few years younger than Lucca. Her face was pinched and white, and her eyelids had a bluish cast about them. She was thin, almost emaciated, and the skin of her face seemed to be almost stretched across her skull, the cheekbones were so prominent. Her blue hair was tangled and matted into tangled locks that fell about her tired—her tired and oh-so-familiar—face.
"Schala…" Magus whispered, unbelieving. In an instant, he was in the cell, kneeling beside the girl; his hand was on her wrist, feeling for a pulse. It was there, not too faint. He shook her gently. "Schala!" The eyes blinked open, the deep purple eyes that had haunted Magus' dreams for the last twenty-five years. Groaning, Schala sat up, pressing her hands against her temples and looking at Magus in bewilderment.
"Who are you?" she managed. The question, though expected, still tugged at Magus' heart-strings. He choked, trying to answer.
"Wait…you're the Prophet, aren't you?" she asked, peering into his face and drawing back. "What are you doing here?" She pulled herself together and sat upright, though she looked utterly exhausted.
"I-I am the Prophet," Magus managed in a voice that was cracking badly. "But I'm not just the Prophet. I was--flung out of time, Schala, S-sowomea." When Janus was younger and had just begun to learn Ancient Zealian, he had somehow discovered that "Soror mea" meant "sister mine" and, though he couldn't pronounce it any better than "sowomea" it became Schala's nickname.
Schala stared at him and reached out with a trembling hand. "It is you," she whispered in a voice which was beyond astonishment. "But you don't feel--there's so much darkness inside of you--what happened to you?"
Magus turned away, desperately trying to blink back the tears rising to his eyes. "I was lost--for a long time--I can't tell you now, we don't have time. We need to leave quickly."
"Of course, of course," Schala managed a smile, just before Lucca's startled yelp, "Too late! We've got problems, people!" Magus dragged Schala to her feet and pulled her out the vent. Lucca, Crono, and Marle were already running, as fast as they could, away from the guards which were even now sounding the alarm.
They raced down dark, twisting passageways for what seemed like forever, before Lucca screamed, "There's the exit!"
Magus and Schala rounded the corner a few seconds after the first three and stopped cold. Looming in front of them were three giant troll-like monsters, with green skin and brown eyes shining with blood-lust. "No problem; these guys we can take care of," Lucca sniffed, grabbing for Wondershot. As if on cue, the floor rumbled and about ten more giant troll-like monsters rounded the corner.
"Uh oh," Lucca squeaked. "Or not," she admitted nervously.
Schala, standing weakly by herself with her hands on the wall, gasped, "If you escape, I can hold them off! I've still got my pendant!"
Magus rounded on her. "Are you insane? I'm not leaving you!"
"You'll have to, or we'll all die. I don't dare do what I plan on doing with all of you here."
Magus ground his teeth together, trying not to show the agony he felt boiling up inside of himself.
"I'll be fine," Schala's eyes were commanding. "Don't you remember what I said? If you keep a light burning, Janus, I promise to return to you."
He swallowed hard. "Cross your heart?"
"Cross my heart."
"Come on!" Magus yelled to Lucca, Crono, and Marle, and the four of them made for the exit, Marle tossing the pendant toward Schala, who caught it and straightened up. It began to glow, dimly at first, then brighter and brighter. A low hum began to grow louder and louder. With no time to open the door, Lucca screamed, "Columna flammae!" over the rapidly growing whine of the pendant. The flame that burst from her hands melted through the door, leaving only a smoking hole in the side of the ship. "Jump!" called Magus, and everyone obeyed. Marle and Crono grabbed each other; Lucca, screamed and shut her eyes. Magus twisted his head and stared backward as the Black Omen lit up with a light brighter than any the sun could produce.
"Schala!" he yelled, but there was no answer, and far away, very far away, heard Lucca's cry to Marle, "Antipode! We have to use Antipode to slow our descent!"
Magus did not turn his face away from the ball of light that had been the Omen, but gradually everything seemed to grow darker and darker, and finally he slipped away into a black, quiet place of nothingness.
When he woke up, he panicked. There was no light, and there should have been. Wasn't he in the lighthouse? Who had turned off the light? Schala would never make it home! He thrashed wildly, trying to tear off the encumbering sheets, so that he could run up the stairs and turn the light on—
"Magus! Magus!" It was Lucca's voice. "Stop, don't move!"
"Lucca--who turned off the light? What about Schala!" He tried to throw his feet out of the bed. "Magus!" Her hand was on his arm. "Stop moving. Nobody has turned the light out. It's still on! Do you hear me? It's still on!"
Translation(s): "Columna flammae": "column of fire"