The Final Battle

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Crono Thrigger or

the characters, just the plot in this story.

The Black Wind

Part IV

Chapter V

BY

D A R T H V A D E R


"Prophet!!!!! I'm talking to you!!" Dalton demanded.
"What?" Where's Schala? Where's King Guardia..." and Magus trailed off.
"You blithering fool....Schala died in the Ocean Palace. How many times do I have to tell you?! And I'm not even gonna ask about this 'King Guardia' person you're talking about. Now get to work and write me up a speech for tomorrow's big event. I don't wanna sound like an idiot up there."
"Oh...yes...sorry, Sir Dalton..." said Magus, suddenly remembering it all.
His memories carried him back to the Ocean Palace. He remembered Dalton coming back to the Mammon Machine room and boasting to Queen Zeal that he'd taken care of the spiky-headed kid and pals with the Golem Twins, and then...then when Lavos was summoned, Dalton somehow managed to tap into the Mammon Machine's power supply and become immortal....
When Lavos tore up the Ocean Palace and thanked Zeal for supplying him with power by destroying it, Dalton immediately teleported to the inside of the Blackbird and hightailed it outta there before Belthasar's other architectural marvel got destroyed.
From that point on, Dalton used his immortality to make all the remaining citizens of the world his slaves. Magus was stuck in the Dark Ages and decided that the easiest way to live it out was to get on good terms with Dalton, and he ended up becoming King Dalton's chancellor.
Now, thousands and thousands of years later, on what would've been December 31st of 1998 AD if someone had decided to convert the timeline from BC, the world had re-developed from the tiny island left over from the aftermath of Lavos's attack, and Magus was in his quarters in Dalton Castle (where Choras Village would've been), faced with the challenge of writing up a nice speech for Dalton to make at Dalton Square (where Porre Village would've been).
A comfortable existence, to be sure, but also a rather empty one. Cursed with the immortality that Dalton had forced upon him, Magus had had and then lost somewhere around 200 wives over the past 14,000 years. He remembered each and every one of them with crystal clarity, since fortunately, each marriage was a very happy and long-lasting one (an average of about seventy years for each). His memories would be the only things to keep him going, and now even these were being infected by visions of inexplicable alternate realities.
When Magus was finally done compiling the five-page speech, he retired his quill into the ink bottle and got into bed.

He was woken up from his peaceful sleep by Ozzie. The pickle had its hand on his shoulder and was shaking him. "Sheesh! Finally. I didn't think you'd ever wake up. It's almost 11:00, for cryin' out loud!!" the pickle complained.
Magus rolled over to face Ozzie. "What..?"
"Your speech, at the Ozzie Fairgrounds. Remember? I told you about it yesterday."
"Oh, yeah, Dalton's speech is over on my writing desk. Unless he has some other assignment for me, I'd like to get back to sleep if you don't mind," Magus replied, and he rolled over again.
Ozzie stared blankly at the already sleeping wizard. "Huh?! What are you talking about? Who's Dalton?"
This woke Magus up once again, and he rolled over faster, more angry this time. "I told you! Dalton's speech is on--" and he stopped in his tracks. Now everything was coming back to him. He remembered everything that was going on in all of the realities, but had no idea what all this meant. He looked straight up at Ozzie and thought about whether to tell him.
No, he thought to himself, he's too much of an apathetic, bumbling fool to care. I'll have to wait for the next shift...
He took another second to review the things that were going on in this reality, and then said, "Oh, that speech. Forget about what I just said, I guess I thought I was still dreaming. I thought you were gonna cancel the speech cause I wasn't feeling well?"
"Well yeah, but I figured you'd be better by now. Are you?" said Ozzie.
"Yes, I suppose I can make the stupid speech. Now get out and make me breakfast while I get dressed. And have the speech ready at the breakfast table by the time I get out there. I wanna look over it and tweek it a little so I don't sound like too much of an idiot," Magus replied in the sourest tone he could muster.
"Sure. No prob," said the pickle, and he left the room.
Magus got dressed in his usual attire and went out to the kitchen. Flea had whipped up some fried eggs and snake meat (which tastes just like bacon).
"Hey, Magus!" Flea said brightly. "How ya doin'?"
"I..suppose I'm as well as one could be expected under these conditions," he replied, still keeping up the sourness in his voice. He sat at the table and picked up the speech in his left hand, then reached down with his fork and brought up a portion of a fried egg.

As he bit into the cotton candy, he looked at his left hand to review the speech and decided to take a sip of the chocolate milk in that hand. Within seconds, he remembered the reality shifts and looked behind him. Schala and Sonaro were still in an embrace, and the float with Ayla on it had just sailed by.
"Schala, I need to talk to you. It's an emergency," he said urgently. Schala turned her head.
"What's wrong, Janus?"
"Yeah, what happened, Bud?" asked Sonaro.
"...This isn't the best place to talk about it. Can you teleport us back to...the palace?" he asked.
"Janus, I'm not going to--"
"Please, Schala," he pleaded. She sighed.
"This had better be good," she said through clenched teeth, and turned to her boyfriend. "I'm really, really sorry, Sony....I'll try to get back here as soon as I can, alrighty?"
"No biggie, Babe. I'll see ya then," said Sonaro.
"Here's a little something so ya don't forget me," said Schala, and she kissed him for about ten seconds before they let go of eachother. She threw her arms in the air, and then she and Janus were back in their quarters in the palace. "Now what's SO urgent that we just HAD to come back here immediately?"
"My consciousnesses from a whole bunch of other alternate realitied have somehow merged and now the merged consciousness is randomly leaping back and forth from one reality to another," he explained, trying to be as concise and comprehendable as possible.
Schala just gaped at him. "What?! You drag me away from my boyfriend at one of the most anticipated holidays of the year just to play some stupid practical joke on me?! I don't believe--"
"It's the truth," Janus said, more frustrated than she was. "I'll give you some examples of the alternate realities if you'd like."
"Ok, let's hear it," Schala challenged, crossing her arms.
Janus thought of a reality with characters and situations that Schala would be familiar with. "Well, there's one where Dalton managed to become immortal from the Mammon Machine, and also, me and the Gurus don't get there on time to destroy Lavos so he sends the four of us into time gates and then proceeds to destroy the Ocean Palace, Zeal, and most of the land in the rest of the world. After all that, Dalton uses him immortality to take over the world." He thought it best not to mention the part about his older self showing up as the Prophet.
"How do you know he took over the world if you were sent through a time gate or whatever?" asked Schala.
"Cause in the time I was sent to, he was still the King," Janus answered. He was ready for that one.
"Ok, then if Lavos managed to destroy most of the world, how come he didn't stay out and rule over it himself? He could've easily stole away Dalton's immortality," Schala countered. Janus was beginning to see that Schala still thought this was some sort of childish game.
"Forget that one then. Here's another example," said Janus. "There's another where Lavos destroys the palace and all that, except Dalton didn't become immortal. Then, 14,000 years later, Lavos decides to come up again to destroy the world that had developed during all that time, but those three people who died in the Ocean Palace in this reality went over there and defeated him. Now, that time period just happened to be the one you were transported to when Lavos--"
"Janus, I'm worried about you. I think we should get you to a doctor or something. You're talking crazy talk!!" said Schala. She was genuinely concerned.
Janus quickly realized that the Schala in this reality wouldn't be the ideal person to turn to for help in this situation. "I'm sorry," he conceded, "I was just making it all up. I didn't mean to make you all upset and worried. And I'll apologize to Sonaro when we get back, if you'll let me go back."
"Yeah, you'll apologize alright. But at least you were brave enough to tell the truth, even though it did take you a while. C'mon, let's go back. I'll have to think about some kind of punishment later," said Schala. She had this twinkle in her eye that signified to Janus that she'd conveniently 'forget' about punishing him. She threw her arms up to teleport them back to the parade.

Instead of the parade, Magus found himself outside Keeper's Dome in 2300 AD. "Let's see...I'm back here. Who can I turn to for help?" he asked himself outloud. He then realized that he was extremely raggedy and very hungry, so he figured he'd better hightail it to the nearest time gate before he starved to death.
After briefly going back in the dome to retrieve his only weapon, the wizard fought through the sewer access and wearily walked to Arris Dome, where he gathered up what little strength he could through the Enertron. Then he went to Lab 32 and hotwired Doan's racecar.

While he was working on hotwiring the vehicle, Johnny stipulated that they would race down the highway, and who won determined whether Magus would be let through. Magus nodded nonchalantly, apathetic to the robot's musings.
When the 'race' was over and Magus wound up losing, Johnny's robotic flunkies tried to carry Magus back to the beginning of the track. He simply tossed a Dark Bomb their way and they ran like chickens with their heads cut off.
In the End of Time, which Magus accessed through Proto Dome with Lucca's Gate Key after another small energy refill in that dome's enertron, he approached Gaspar.
"Hello, Prince Janus. Pardon me for saying, but you look ghastly. Go over there and drink from the bowl of water over there," said the old man, gesturing with his cane. Magus drank from the small bowl, and before he knew it, his hunger was gone, his clothes looked brand new, his hair was back at normal length, and he was cleaner than ever.
"Wow...that stuff is powerful," said Magus.
"It certainly is. How else do you think I'm able to stay here for eternity and never have to bathe or eat?" said Gaspar. "So, Prince, what brings you here?"
"Magus. Call me Magus," said Magus. "And I'm here because I need your help, since I have no one else to turn to."
"Well, Magus, it seems that you've come to the right place. But don't bother trying to kill Lavos and save the world. It's not worth the effort. If Crono and his friends couldn't stop him, neither can you."
"I have no intention of trying to save this world," said Magus.
This caught Gaspar off guard. "Then...what do you need my help for?"
"I'm here because I'm somehow jumping back and forth between realities and I don't particularly enjoy it."
Magus went on explaining things, much as Janus had done to Schala in the other reality. Gaspar listened quietly, much more understanding than Schala had been since he knew about all the people, places, and events involved.
After Magus finished describing all the realities, Gaspar said, "This is indeed some predicament. I'm not yet quite sure yet what I can do to help, but I'm sure I can come up with something after a short while. In the meantime, I suggest you travel to 1000 AD and get Melchior, the Guru of Life, to come here. If what you're saying is true, then all of us might be in trouble."

That's when Magus was in King Guardia XXXIII's room again.
"Magus, what's wrong? You said you could tell something was wrong," Crono persisted. It took Magus a moment to remember what he was talking about.
"Magus, are you feeling alright?" said Schala.
"To tell the truth, no I'm not feeling alright. No offense, King Guardia, but is it alright if we leave early?"
"Why would we want to leave early?" asked Marle.
"So I can explain everything to you. Surely the king doesn't need all this stress after the ordeal he's been through," said Magus.
"Go on," said King Guardia, "I'll be fine. Besides, if it's really that important, you'd better have it taken care of as soon as possible."
"Don't worry, Daddy. We'll be back soon," Marle promised. The King gave a fatherly 'I know' smile, and they left the castle.

"Ok, so what's wrong, now that you dragged everybody out of the castle?" asked Marle, a bit preturbed.
"Listen and listen carefully," said Magus, "Because this will get complicated."
"Alternate realities?" said Schala once Magus had explained. "Don't you think that seems a bit far-fetched?"
"Absolutely. But I know what I've experienced and it can't be good, so I need your help."
"The way I see it," said Crono, "If Gaspar is helping you in that one reality, he's the best person you could've asked. And his advice couldn't be any worse than the Gaspar's in any other reality, so you should probably just play everything out normally in all the realities and wait till you get to the one where he's helping you. That'd be your best course of action, rather than explaining this over and over again each time you jump realities and getting the same advice every time."
Magus contemplated this advice. "You know, Crono, that's probably the best advice I could've received from anybody. Thanks. So now what do we do while I'm killing time?"
"We're going back in the castle to keep my dad company," said Marle, and she grabbed Crono's arm. "You two are welcome to come along with us if you want."

After Magus walked through the doorway to the King's room, he was suddenly in the king's bed. Inputting the situation into his mind, he realized that this was the one where he was the king of Guardia. He got up and quickly remembered that his body wasn't nearly as young as it was in the other realities--the body of a 180 year old Mystic is roughly equivalent to that of an average seventy year old human.
He grabbed his cane and slowly made his way down the stairs to his throne, where the Chancellor was waiting for him. "Oh! King Magus, I see you're up early. That's wonderful! Can I assume this means you're feeling better?"
"Yes, thank you, Clancy," said Magus. Clancy was the Chancellor's first name. "What's on the agenda for today?"
"Well, all the paperwork's already been taken care of, and there are no scheduled appointments, so I thought today you might wanna go over to Leene Square."
"To sit on a bench and feed the pigeons? I don't think so. I may be old, but I still have some energy left," Magus protested.
"I knew you'd say something like that. And you don't have to worry. All this week there's gonna be a carnival in Leene Square. I didn't tell you about it sooner cause I wanted to surprise you," Clancy said with a sly grin. Magus let out an old person's laugh.
"Well then, what are we waiting for? Let's get a move on!" he said enthusiastically.

Then, once again, Magus found himself just waking up in his bed, which had been happening alot during the past few reality jumps. A quick survey of the area indicated that he was in Dalton Castle.
Seconds later, Dalton stormed into the room. "Prophet," he said sternly, "Where's my speech? It better be ready."
"Yes, Sir, it's on my writing desk, next to the ink bottle," said Magus. Even though Magus had told Dalton his real name, Dalton stilled preferred to call him 'Prophet', and that was just as well.
Dalton turned around quickly to face the writing desk, and perhaps a bit too quickly because his turning cape knocked over the ink bottle onto the speech. "Damn it!" he yelled. "Prophet, this is all your fault!! For your sake you'd better have that speech committed to memory!"
Magus was used to this constant verbal abuse, mainly because he'd found long ago that none of the threats meant anything at all. "Don't worry. I have most of it memorized. I'll take care of everything. You go ahead and get ready." Since he'd gained all the memories from the other realities, listening to himself made Magus disgusted that he'd been degraded to becoming Dalton's mother.
"Yeah, well, it better be taken care of. I'll be in my room shaving," said Dalton, and he left. Magus took the paper and used magic to clear away all the ink that hadn't yet dried up, which luckily included everything that had spilled from the bottle. All that was left on the paper was the speech.
Deciding that he had some time before he had to present the speech to King Dalton, Magus fixed himself a bowl of cereal and munched on it for about five minutes, then went on over to Dalton's room.

Schala collapsed onto the floor of Crono's kitchen as Crono hunted through the fridge for picnic food.
"Schala, what's wrong??" asked Marle. She stopped making sandwiches and rushed to her side. Crono and Lucca stopped what they were doing, too.
Schala said nothing. She looked dead, except her eyes still had a sparkle in them and she was still breathing.
"Lucca, any ideas?" said Crono.
"I dunno. I'm no medical scientist," Lucca answered.
"Oh man....why'd mom have to pick today to go visit Aunt Mabel..." said Crono. Mabel was Crono's mom's sister, who lived in Choras.
A few minutes later, Schala finally woke up. She looked disturbed.
"Schala, you look disturbed. What happened?" asked Lucca.
"That man in my dream, with the sickle...I think he just sent me some kinda telepathic message from beyond the grave...he said he was my brother...."
"What? Your brother?" said Marle. Then she remembered something Gaspar had said to Cyrus a long time ago. She gasped. "That must've been Magus!!"
"Huh? That guy Cyrus killed?" said Crono. Lucca snapped her fingers, as she always did when she had a revelation.
"That makes sense!" she said. "Schala, what else did he say?"
"He said something about all kinds of alternate realities, or something, and he was being thrown back and forth between them. He also said he really didn't have a point in telling me all this, but he only did it because the afterlife was boring...."
"What?" said Marle. "That sounds a little screwy to me."
"Trust me, it was real," said Schala.
"I think we should see Cyrus and ask him if he knows anything about this," proposed Crono.
"Good idea. I'll get the Epoch ready," said Lucca.

Magus was in his kitchen in his castle with a fork in one hand and a sheet of paper in the other. He sighed with relief. The afterlife really was boring.
Flea noticed him just sitting there, staring blankly at the portion of fried bat egg on his fork. "Hey Mag, wake up, Buddy. Are you alright?"
Magus looked up at her. "Yeah, I'm fine, I guess," he said, and then remembered he was supposed to have a sour tone. "Why do you care?"
"Well, you were just sit-- Oh, never mind," she said, and resumed washing the load of dirty dishes accumulated from the party the night before.
Magus read over the speech Ozzie had prepared. It sounded surprisingly clear and thorough. He decided it was fine just the way it was.
Just as Magus was finishing his last bite, Ozzie came into the kitchen. "Hey guys, we should probably go. It's 11:15, and it'll probably take us at least half an hour just to get to the fairgrounds."
Ozzie, Flea, and Magus (Slash was killed during the war) got on a boat outside the castle and went on their way to the Fairgrounds. Once there, Magus got behind the stage and reviewed his speech for five minutes, and then he was called out.

As he walked out through the curtains onto the stage, Janus appeared on the street by the parade again. Schala and Sonaro were already locked in a hug.
He decided there really wasn't much to do but watch the floats go by, so that's what he did for the next five or so minutes.

Then he was in the End of Time again, with Gaspar.
"Well? What are you waiting for?"said Gaspar.
"Huh? Oh, good, I'm back here again. I just went through a cycle of reality jumps. I'll get right to finding Melchior," said Magus. He hurried and found the gate to Medina Village, 1000 AD, and hopped in.
S..Sir Magus?!" cried one of the little imp people occupying the house he'd ended up in. "You're...you're the legendary leader of the Mystic Army from 400 years ago!!! What are you doing in our lowly abode?"
"Save it," said Magus, "I've gotta find Melchior."
"That weird guy? His house is to the west," said the other imp person.
"I know, but thanks anyway," said Magus, and he rushed to Melchior's house.

"So Gaspar told you to get me to come to the End of Time with you?" Melchior echoed after Magus explained everything.
"Yes. Will you please come?"
"Sure. This sounds serious. We'd better hurry back before you jump dimensions again."
Luckily, they made it back to the End of Time before any jumps had taken place.
"Gaspar, hurry," said Melchior, "We've gotta put up a stability field around Magus before he shifts dimensions again. That should keep his consciousness here while we try and figure out a plan."
"How do you plan on doing that?" asked Gaspar.
"Just..here, I'll grab your arm so my powers get amplified by yours, and then I'll cast the spell myself," said the Guru of Life. He put a grip on Gaspar's arm and said a few magical chants, and a barrier was erected around Magus.
"So as long as this thing is here, I won't go anywhere?" Magus asked, staring at the visible forcefield.
"That's right. Also, I made the shield mobile, so it'll travel around with you wherever you go. It should come in handy," said Melchior.
"Great. So what am I supposed to do about this?" asked Magus.
"I came up with a theory while you were gone," said Gaspar. "I think I might know the reason for all this."
"What? What's doing this to me?" asked Magus.
"The Black Wind."
While Magus stood there, stupefied, Melchior said, "Yes...yes, that makes sense...I'll bet you're right, Gaspar."
"Wait a minute. How can the Black Wind be causing this? It's not a sentient being...it's just...just a condition that causes things to happen. Sort of like El Niño," said Magus.
"No," said Melchior, "The Black Wind is very much a sentient being. Only us Gurus knew about it, though, and we didn't tell anyone because we were afraid of it and what it might do if everyone found out that it was actually pulling strings behind the scenes."
Gaspar continued, "The Black Wind doesn't come from this realm. It's from another place, a very dark place, where it had already consumed everything and completely filled up all the space in that realm. In Zeal, when we stumbled upon Shadow Magic, a kind of rift opened up for a very brief period of time that led to this dimension that had been consumed by the Black Wind. A small piece of the wind escaped into this dimension before the rift closed."
"How do you know about all of this?" asked Magus. He was getting a little nervous now.
"From the natural enemy of Shadow magic: Lunar Magic," said Melchior. "Once the Black Wind entered this world and Shadow magic developed further, the natural order of things in this world called for the forces of darkness to be counterbalanced by a force of purity. That counterbalance was Lunar Magic."
"Along with Lunar Magic, a sentient being was brought forth, just as the Black Wind had been brought forth with Shadow. This being was much more subtle than the Black Wind, but still equally powerful, only in a different way. Because of its subtlety, it was never discovered and therefore never given a name. But it spoke to us. It spoke to Melchior, Belthasar, and me, and it told us all about Shadow magic. It is also responsible for the creation of all the time gates. Robo was correct in assuming that an outside force other than Lavos was the cause of the time gates," Gaspar explained.
"And if this unnamed presence is supposed to be a counterbalance for the Black Wind, then how come the wind has been able to do this to me?" asked Magus.
"Because you gave yourself to the Black Wind once you adopted Shadow Magic as your magical affiliation. You weren't born as a Shadow Wizard; that's only what your mother wanted you to think. She saw to it that you become a Shadow Wizard as soon as your first signs of magical prowess started showing," said Melchior. "And once your soul was presented to the Black Wind, it had control over you."
"So how am I supposed to solve this problem?" asked Magus.
"I believe I have an idea," said Melchior. "Two ideas, rather. One, you could study tediously over a long period of time and attempt to change your magical affiliation to Lunar."
"What's the other choice?" asked Magus, who wasn't particularly crazy about this idea.
"The other is, you could try to defeat the Black Wind."
"What..?" said Gaspar. "How is that possible..?"
"There is only one way to defeat the Black Wind," said Melchior. "I've done alot of research on it, and I've found that Lunar magic cannot and will not destroy it. It can only balance it out. The only way to defeat the Black Wind is to use its own power against it. And Magus, given that you are the ultimate Shadow Wizard, you would be the ideal opponent."