Disclaimer: Just check out the previous chapters, okay? They explain everything you need to know.

A/N: Nothing much to say again. Just one thing though, having nine-hour shifts at work really gives me time to think about this story. They're handy. (grins)

Chapter 9: Intervention

I heard screams, distant cries of terror and pain from an unknown place. What was happening? Was I dead?

Slowly, light began to filter in on my dark world, and I saw a dark grey wall, illuminated by a soft glow. Something shook me by my shoulder, not too roughly though. I turned my head to see a black and grey-ish blurred blob, a silhouette in the gentle halo of light that radiated from a place I could not see.

"Are you alright, can you move?" I heard a vaguely familiar voice ask.

"Uh..." My vocal chords responded, my head thumping with the oncoming of one killer of a headache. My vision started to clear a little, and the blob before me slowly transformed magically into the familiar figure of Joachim, looking a little fraught with worry. Behind him was one of the most gobsmackingly beautiful sights I had ever seen.

There was a giant pillar of benevolent light lancing into the heavens, surrounded by, from what I could tell, a huge circular building that curved upwards into what seemed like a massive funnel, from which this wondrous divine light emerged from. The sky far above us was a cold pale blue in a combination of the morning light and the glow that came from the very centre of the building. What really got me though were what were in the sky. Hundreds, maybe thousands, of pale ethereal figures floated effortlessly on the gentle breeze, the spirits of those whose mortal shells could no longer hold them. They were barely visible against the divine light, but they were definitely there.

"Where did that infernal machine throw us?" I muttered, clutching my head as the ache grew more and more prominent, each pump of blood from my heart causing my brain to bulge painfully against the inside of my skull.

"I don't think we've moved." Joachim explained thoughtfully. "We're in the exact same spot we were when we left."

"So that would mean...that this is Zion?" I replied, looking around in awe. It was everything Rin had said it would be, the towering crystallic buildings shimmered in the light, refracting it and firing it out in every direction in some sort of spectral light display, dazzling colours struck everywhere.

"Must be, what else could it be?" Even Joachim felt mildly impressed by the city of the dead, the aura the place gave off seemed to calm the very depths of his soul.

"So this is the place where we came about then?" Firenze thought. "Pretty nice." He added nonchalantly.

Joachim suddenly began to develop a particularly daunting feeling. He'd never met his parents before, how would he react seeing them for the first time? What was even more daunting was that in this time period, he hadn't even been conceived yet, and both Eve and himself would have to have a part in bringing our parents together safely, lest they completely cease to exist.

I watched Joachim's face carefully, his face creased with deep thought and worry.

"What's bothering you? Ease up a little bit." I climbed to my feet and patted him on the shoulder comfortingly. Carefully, I reached into my pocket and took a look at the device that Rin had given me. It was small and silver, with light electric blue writing on a tiny screen. It was about the size of my hand altogether, the screen taking up most of the surface. The tiny writing currently told me what the time was where I stood, what the date was, what phase the moon (or moons, in Gaia's case) was going through, what the temperature was, humidity, air pressure, altitude, location, and hundreds of other bits of information. I tapped the screen curiously, and a little alarm bell came up, tinkling in a tiny high-pitched fashion. The screen cleared, and a small extract appeared, which I read carefully.

Current Date: 3rd September 2005

Event Date: 4th September 2005

This is the day that Zidane Tribal proposed to Queen Garnet of Alexandria. It is also the day of the first registered contact between Spiritseer and Gaian leaders.

Rin Ashford (2025)

I blinked a few times, re-reading it several times over before handing it to Joachim so he could have a look.

"We're further back than I thought." He muttered, handing it back. "I figured he'd put us back to a week before everything went wrong."

"Well there must be something important about to happen then. Think back, did anything happen during this time?" Joachim thought for a few seconds, before clicking his fingers in realisation.

"There was an incident at the wedding ceremony, some sort of terrorist attack. My foster parents never told me the details, but apparently there were sounds of explosions and strange bangs coming from the castle grounds. Those must have been gunshots."

"So that must mean this is when it all started, when the war began!" I exclaimed, finally beginning to understand. "We've got to get to Alexandria for the wedding!" He nodded in agreement, before we set off down the bustling street.

While we were making our way through the city, I began to notice the strange looks that some of the spirits were giving us. I admit, we must have looked a little strange, a girl with a slightly torn thin black blouse on and a long black dress, along with a shirtless guy wearing a black longcoat, but some of the looks we were getting looked almost...suspicious. Then I realised that we were alive, while the others were dead. In fact, we must have been the first living people here for a heck of a long time, since this was, after all, the city of the dead.

I reached beneath the blouse and revealed the pendant my mother had given me, and some of the spirits around us seemed to relax slightly. Joachim was still getting funny looks, but as long as I made sure he stuck with me, it wouldn't be too suspicious.

It began to dawn on me just how big Zion was when we had been walking for little over an hour, and I still couldn't see the edge of the city. All around us were endless stretches of metropolis, and at that moment I would have given anything to be dead like the spirits around us. After much experimentation with my spiritual form, I'd discovered that flying was a lot easier than walking, plus much faster. There was no traffic around in the streets, which I found slightly odd for a city of it's size, until I remembered that no-one actually needed transportation. It wasn't exactly designed well for the living.

After another hour of walking, I had grown quite tired. My legs were beginning to feel as though they had been filled with lead, each step starting to become a chore. Finally, we came across something that seemed like some sort of transport terminal, a sign above it spelling out the words "Teleport Centre".

"Well, that could be useful." Joachim commented, leading me inside. Within the building, it was practically abandoned, barely any spirits were hanging around. However, these ones were standing around instead of floating, which lead me to believe that they were freshly deceased. They looked confused about the whole experience, being advised by some kind of officials on what to do. Along the far end of the chamber lay several circular pods, shaped much like the Chronos, only without the metal legs around them.

"Can I help you?" A blonde-haired spirit floated over, her partially transparent body was clothed in a simple blue top with a single thin white line across the upper chest area. She also wore a pair of navy blue trousers, and looked much like a receptionist.

"Erm, we'd like to get out of Zion please." I replied sheepishly. She nodded in a polite and understanding manner.

"Certainly, there's the North, South, East and West gates to choose from." I tried to remember the location of Zion in relation to Alexandria, but Joachim answered before I did.

"South Gate please." She nodded once again, and indicated towards one of the glass spheres.

"Okay, just step inside here please." Tenderly, I stepped inside, looking at the light filtering gently in through the windows that lined every other wall in the massive room. Before I knew it, a handsome young fellow was walking up to us with a smile on his face and opening the door again. I blinked a few times, looking at him.

"What's wrong?" I asked, and he looked a little confused.

"Wrong? What makes you think that?" Suddenly, his face snapped. "Oh, this must have been your first teleportation. You didn't notice anything?"

"Notice what? I just walked in, and now you're getting me out."

"You're at the South Gate, you've just teleported from Light Central." I turned around to see Joachim climbing out of his glass ball, a look of sheer confusion across his face.

"Does someone mind telling me what just happened?" He asked, and the man in front of us sighed patiently.

"Look, you just got into the teleporter didn't you?" I nodded.

"But nothing happened." He was still incredibly patient.

"Of course you didn't notice anything. If we teleport the living, some of the energy used in process tends to have a strange effect on the bio-electric flow around the body. In other words, it screws with your nervous system." He felt like he was running full pelt down the home stretch now. "A consequence of the process is mild amnesia, so you won't have remembered anything happening."

"So...we've teleported all the way over here?" I was starting to get a grasp on what had just happened.

"Yes." The young man felt as though he'd won some sort of small victory in the fight against stupidity. "Altogether, you travelled over a hundred kilometres in a little over a second. If that doesn't mess you up, nothing will."

"Ah trust me, we've been through worse." Joachim replied in a cryptic manner, smiling slightly.

---

"Phew, it sure is cold out here." I muttered as I tramped after Joachim over a wide open field of bright green crisp grass that crunched softly under our feet as we moved onwards. The sun had long since set, leaving us in practically total darkness, except for the two glowing moons that hung delicately in the night sky. Eventually, we had to come to a stop, my legs plainly refusing to carry me any further. Joachim, on the other hand, looked barely out of breath.

"And you were supposed to be the Gemini's one true saviour?" He raised an eyebrow quizzically.

"Hey, cut that out Joey." He blinked in pure shock.

"What did you just call me?" I laughed a little.

"I think it's cute." He crossed his arms and laid down on the grass, looking up at the night sky.

"Doesn't exactly go with my image though, does it?"

"What image would that be? A cool, calm, and collected mercenary who prevails against all odds?"

"Pretty much."

"Well you missed it by a long shot." I sat down next to him, the ground was actually quite comfortable here, the soil was soft and well-turned. I guess it helped being so close to the Light Crystal, everything I had seen as I progressed away from Zion had been in almost perfect health. I lay down on my back, looking up at the dazzling array of stars in the sky, all twinkling away without a care in the world beneath them. It was all quite peaceful around here. If only it could stay like that.

We lay there, silent in wonder, staring at the stars above. Slowly, I felt Joachim move.

"Eve?"

"Yeah?"

"You know how you can read people's memories, like when we were back in that cryogenics room?"

"Uh-huh. What's the problem?"

"Could you...show other people those memories?" I sat up, looking at him straight in the eye. I could almost anticipate which memory he wanted to see.

"I don't know. I suppose I could give it a try." I took his hand in mine, slowly slipping off the thin black glove that adorned it, revealing his pale white skin beneath it, which almost seemed to glow in the moonlight. I closed my eyes and concentrated, searching my mind for a certain scene. It was almost like looking into a mirror and willing a moving picture to appear instead of your face. My mind started to go into some sort of hypnotised trance, like I was staring beyond the very boundaries of reality and into the netherworld of beyond. I felt something begin to surface, and I concentrated on it, willing it to show itself to us.

We were in some sort of bedroom, the light peach wallpaper reflected the dying sun outside so the entire room seemed to glow. The long rectangular window at the far end of the room lead out onto an empty and desolate street, some bodies still lay there, small streams of crimson oozed slowly out of them. Next to the window was a desk, strewn with all sorts of artistic materials and bits of paper, arranged much like it's owners mind, in chaotic fashion.

Slowly moving across the room, my sight picked up on the bed, where a bloodied young woman lay, fighting for breath, a long silver blade still jammed in her shoulder, her life fluids staining the bedclothes beneath her. Her eyes were flickering, fighting to stay open against the overwhelming cold that threatened to take over her body at any moment. Her curled brown hair was a complete mess, blood matting it to the side of her head. I moved down to the side of the bed and leant over, placing my hand around the exposed hilt of the rapier firmly stuck in her flesh. Gently, trying not to cause too much harm, I pulled it out, trying to ignore the horrible slurping sound that followed it, as air rushed into the gaping wound. She groaned in pain, arching her back to allow the blade to move out easier. Finally, I held the full length of the sword in my hand, the blade drenched in deep red blood. After placing it on the floor, I moved back over to her, placing my hands over the wound that she suffered from, drawing the sides together, stopping some of the more intense bleeding. Of course, I left a little of the wound, just enough so the intense pain would stop her from jumping up and trying to knock my face off. It would also stop her from struggling during the next phase of the plan.

"Who...are you?" Her voice sounded a little strangled and faint, probably from the duress she was under.

"My full name is Styx Katar, but it's not like you needed to know that." I leant forwards, pressing my lips against her's, but she turned her head away sharply.

"Get away from me..." I slowly removed the armoured gloves I wore, and revealed the slender pale fingers beneath, flexing them a little in discomfort. I began to brush one finger up and down her stomach, and once again she tried to move away, only to cry out in pain. Since there was still a massive hole through her chest cavity, she found it difficult to move without causing an intense amount of agony, but she still seemed determined.

"Now stop that, you'll only end up hurting yourself." I gently grabbed her shoulders and held her down, staring directly into her confused and angry eyes.

"Why are you doing this?" She asked bitterly. That one caught me out, I'd never even considered why I did these things. All I knew was that I liked it, therefore it was a good enough reason. "Didn't anyone ever teach you that no means no?"

"Come to think of it, no."

"What about your mother, what would she say?" I liked it, she was desperately vying for time, probably trying to wait until that genomic idiot outside decided to wake up, or perhaps until she was strong enough to fight back. It was pretty useless though, the spell I had knocked him out with was strong enough to keep him down for at least several hours, and she wasn't going anywhere without a large amount of healing work.

"My mother?" I laughed, shaking my head. "My mother abandoned me while I was still in her godforsaken womb. My father left her to die, but he lived to regret his decision. Why, if it wasn't for the master, I wouldn't be here now, would I?"

"What a pity that would have been." She replied sarcastically.

"He showed me the way, showed me how to get my revenge on the ones who had spurned me. I owe him my life."

"So this is how you live that life he gave you? Killing innocent people and desecrating innocent women?"

"In a nutshell, yes. It's not like there's anything better to do. I follow his orders, gain his trust. He's like the father I never had. I even kept his name, just to keep things simple, and to eliminate any evidence that the piece of scum that gave me the gift of life so foolishly."

"Hmph, what a father figure he must have been. A psychotic old fool with a penchant for wiping out civilisations." I felt like hitting her for that remark. No-one dared to insult my master and live with the same amount of limbs afterwards. I grinned darkly though, I was about to take something far more precious than any of her limbs. "You sicken me." She finished bitterly.

"That's strange. The others said the exact same thing...right before they died screaming in agony."

"So why don't you kill me then? Go on, I'm practically defenceless." Silly girl, trying to lead me astray. It wouldn't work though, my mind was already salivating at the prospect of another victim, and I wasn't one to deny my feelings. I leant forwards and kissed her again, this time she didn't move. However, when I pulled back a few seconds later, I realised why.

"Silly little girl." I pointed at the small gemstone stuck in the wrist of my armour, a deep sensuous purple in colour. "This little one shuts your little wraith friend up. It's a spirit stone, and it keeps mine firmly where it belongs; inside my body." She looked both shocked and horrified, her final defence plan gone down the drain. She once again resorted to squirming, and I sighed, placing my fingers on the side of her neck and pinching. She cried out, stopping all movement. "I didn't want to have to resort to that, but you left me with no choice." She looked up at me, tears in her eyes.

"You bastard." She muttered angrily.

"Good observation there, I am indeed a fatherless child." I leaned forwards, placing myself over her, before drawing her face up to mine and letting myself go...

I didn't want to go any further. I knew what happened next, and I'm sure Joachim could have guessed. In fact, from the way he began bouncing around, cursing like a madman, it's quite possible he was angry about it too.

"I'm going to kill that maggot!" He shouted angrily. "I won't let him do that to her!" I listened with half-interest. I was far too preoccupied with what I had just witnessed. Styx had described his parents, with a horrifying resemblance to my own. My mother had died before I had even had the chance to be born, my father had killed himself out of sheer hatred of what he just done to her. Just another reason to learn from Styx's mistakes in life.

---

I stirred under the gentle heat from the sun, blinking back into conciousness slowly, stifling a yawn. The night had passed without incident, and I found myself snuggled up under Joachim's left arm, trying to escape from the bitter cold of the night. The sun slowly rose, blazing into life on the horizon, casting a wonderfully warm light across the world. My neck was a little stiff, mostly from the lack of a decent pillow to rest my head on, but apart from that, I was fine. I turned to look at Joachim, who was lying awake, gazing blankly into the lightening sky.

"I take it you slept well." He whispered, looking down at me. I smiled a little.

"Yeah. Did you get any sleep at all?"

"Not really. I'm not a big sleeper...when I sleep, I remember things I'd rather not." I looked at him quizzically, but he left it at that, and showed no interest in continuing further into the subject. I wasn't one to pry, so I left it well alone.

"We'd better get a move on, unless we want to miss the wedding." I explained, and he nodded in agreement, rising to his feet quickly. I pouted, it had been quite comfortable lying close to him, and I reluctantly got up after him, before we set out towards Alexandria.

---

The city was slightly different than when I had last saw it. In our time period, life had been pretty subdued in Alexandria, people just went from place to place, getting on with life. There was no atmosphere there, no sense of purpose.

Today, however, it wasn't even that. The entire place was practically deserted, a few people still wandering around aimlessly. It reminded me of a ghost town, which was very eerie.

"What's going on?" I thought out loud.

"Hmm, Garnet must be breaking the news to the general public. My foster parents said that most of the city's population was in the castle grounds at the time, listening to the announcement with great joy. Heck, it wasn't like they hadn't expected it though, ever since that Zidane guy showed up a few days earlier." He looked puzzled for a second, his eyes focused somewhere in the middle distance. "They also said there was some sort of mugging just outside the main gates to the grounds." He smiled. "Bloody kids, they said." We carried on up the main street, nothing but the sound of the cobbles clicking beneath our feet to greet us.

Suddenly, I heard a gigantic roar up ahead, and wondered what monster could possibly make such a sound. Then I realised that it was not a single creature, but rather a mass of people cheering in celebration. We hurried on, but I stopped just before the main gates, looking in sheer awe at the sight that greeted me.

The castle was as beautiful as ever, it's towering spires and massive shining crystal were a masterpiece of architecture, but it wasn't that I had my eyes on.

Instead, I was concentrating on the two people standing by the gate, looking out over the moat, one listening to the other explaining something.

"I don't believe it..." I muttered. One of the two teenagers was a young light-haired individual, wearing a long deep blue cloak, it's depths were a murky shade of twilight blue, while the lighter areas were a slightly brighter navy blue instead. It seemed to shimmer in the sunlight as he seemed to be explaining something complicated to the girl next to him, who was listening intently to his words.

She was slightly shorter than him, curled brown hair fell down over the shoulders of a deep purple top. She also wore a short-ish black skirt, topped off by a little black cap perched atop her head. Suddenly she came out with something that made both of them laugh, and they turned to look at something happening across the lake.

The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end as I felt something brush past me. I turned to look, but I couldn't see anything around me. The air suddenly grew colder, and I started to feel a little scared. Something was wrong.

"What's he doing?" Joachim asked, and I looked back at the scene before us. The young man had fallen to the floor, clutching his head in agony, while the confused-looking girl bent down beside him, asking him something. I heard something move behind me again, but this time it was a pair of Alexandrian guards wandering down the main street, chatting idly. I grabbed Joachim by the hand and pulled him towards me, leaning back against the stone wall of a shop beside us, trying to look as inconspicuous as possible.

I jumped in shock as the young man removed a small dagger from his belt and proceeded to ram it into the girl's chest, prompting a strangled cry of both terror and pain. The two guards behind us almost shot out of their skins, and ran towards the scene of violence, pushing past us as went. Again and again he stabbed her, until she fell to the floor, twitching sickeningly, blood drenching her clothes.

Joachim was beside himself in anger and shock. He went to move towards them, but I tightened my grip on his hand, and pulled him against me, pressing my lips against his in an attempt to stop him from shouting out. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw one of the guards give the boy a sharp blow around the side of the head with the hilt of her sword, knocking him out instantly, before turning to the girl and checking her for any signs of life. After a quick check, she turned to her comrade, giving her rapid orders and pointing towards the castle.

Almost as quick as it had happened, it was over. Another three guards had turned up, one of them helping to carry the girl away, while the other three carefully lifted the boy's unconscious body away towards the little wooden boat across the twinkling waters of the moat. Slowly, I finished our embrace, gazing at him directly in his icy blue eyes.

"Calm down, she'll be alright."

"Why did he stab her? She was completely defenceless!" He hissed angrily, but a placed a finger on his lips.

"He was possessed, he couldn't have done anything to stop that from happening...and neither could we."

"But we could have gone over and stopped them!"

"No. Think about this. If we'd have stopped him, what repercussions would that have? She wouldn't have got injured, which means they wouldn't have had to go to Zion, and some important bonding events would not have happened."

"How do you know that?" I looked down at the ground in thought.

"My mother's memories are still fresh. There's something he said to her during the journey to Zion that stuck, I don't want to mess with that."

"So you'd be perfectly happy to watch my mother die then?"

"Look, if she was dead, you wouldn't be standing here right now, and neither would I." I shook my head. "We have to be careful what we change, we can't just run in willy-nilly and start messing around with everything. This is the only chance we'll get to sort this out. If we screw up, then the whole universe is doomed." He seemed to struggle internally, but finally gave up and nodded solemnly.

"Alright. Just...tell me what to do when the time comes." He leaned in closer. "And warn me next time you plan on doing that." I grinned.

"It was supposed to be a pleasant surprise. I could easily never do it again if you like."

"No, I liked it too much for you to stop now." He said those words with a grin, but I could sense something different inside him. It almost seemed like...fear...