Author's Note: I actually listed 108. You can count if you want, if you have nothing better to do, like me. (If Rose lived for over 11,000 years, how would you figure out the formula for the number of Moon Children she sacrificed? I kept it as one hundred and eight. To help the prophecy) Furthermore, all the names listed (aside from the mythological ones) are creations of the author's imagination (and her brother's). Any relation to persons you know, living or dead, is purely coincidental. By the way, one of those names is mine. Can you guess which one? (And I am terrible at fight scenes, so please don't blame me.)
ABSOLUTE
"Melbu Frahma!"
I all but spat the name. "It was you! You were the one controlling Zieg!"
A part of me is screaming in rage, the other part sighing in relief. I was right. It wasn't Zieg who was attacking us, Zieg who nearly killed me, Zieg who called me a pathetic child. He was being manipulated.
The spirit inhabiting Zieg's body suddenly leaves. Zieg's body falls like a limp rag doll to the ground, lifeless? No. Couldn't be. The spirit becomes a ghost, a phantom, a specter. It is a simple floating mass of sea-green color, with Frahma's face sketched in the center. The pale, pale face with the sharp features like a Dark Elf. The veins that appears in his forehead. What ran through those veins, I will never know. But it cannot be blood.
It speaks, in the same voice that had once raged, 'how dare you?' Cold and precise. "I am the famous Melbu Frahma, Supreme Leader of the Winglies. I have been waiting for this moment for over ten thousand years."
Dark Death is now a familiar weight in my hand, surging with power. "Why?!" I shriek. "You must have been defeated by Zieg!"
Melbu Frahma turns his face toward me, as if noticing me for the first time. He has disdain on his face. "It is true that the sword of that man," he nods at Zieg, lying on the ground. "Penetrated me. But what vanished is only my flesh. I cast a petrifying spell on the man, and at the same time, I transmigrated my soul to the spirit. The sublime soul is immortal."
It wasn't Zieg that hated me. It was you. But for every second that you took over and possessed my fiancé's mind, I will break one of your bones.
"How long have you been manipulating my dad?" Dart demands.
Melbu Frahma laughs. "At that moment I reentered the light. The first light after 11,000 years. When the Black Monster came to Neet, that foolish soul tried to release the power of the Dragoon without knowing that I was waiting for that moment.
"So…it was then!"
Oh. Oh…so it had been I that sealed his fate. I had always wondered where Zieg was when the Black Monster attacked Neet. He had tried to fight but he was overcome when Frahma burst out of the Dragoon Spirit. Oh…I'm sorry, my darling. In the end, it still ended up being my fault.
"I was released from the Spirit and revived. In order to obtain an eternal body that is proper from an immortal soul! And now I am becoming a god!"
He turns the front part of his floating self toward the glowing sphere. Something is happening.
Shana is being drawn toward something on the right of the sphere, as if she is an animal drifting lifelessly in the tides of the ocean. There is a dense mass of vines inside there, with a hole in the center. From the hole stretches out five tentacles, latching onto Shana and tugging her in.
"Shana!" Dart yells.
Frahma moves quicker than any of us, moving into the sphere. It shimmers like a wall of water, though tight and ungiving, but he forces his way in. The veins on his forehead stand out even more as he strains his mind. Shana is pulled away from the tentacles, shoved outside the sphere without a second thought. Dart runs forward, not thinking of his own safety. Frahma shifts himself into the grasp of the tentacles and into the "hole".
"By the gods' hell…" I murmur. "Is he merging with the Virage Embryo?"
"The prophecy said that Shana would be the god of destruction." Miranda says, her voice shaky.
"But it seems that Melbu Frahma has decided he would be a better candidate for that position." Albert sums up. "He's merging with the Virage Embryo now. Soon he will be the god."
"But Shana is safe." Dart says, coming back to us with the petite girl in his arms. She looks tired even in unconsciousness, as if her life force has been drained away. She groans slightly, like a ghost trying to find her way home. "Now all that is left is Melbu Frahma."
"Dart, you can't transform." Haschel reminds him.
"I don't care." Dart replies, his infamous passion flaring. "I don't care if I have to fight him with a pointed stick. I'm not sitting out of this. At the very least, I can be the medic if nothing else."
I walk forward, kneeling down besides Zieg and lifting his head into my lap. My darling, I'll get revenge for you. Please wait for me. Don't go anywhere. We'll have a chance to be together again. For all eternity. Even if one of us dies, our bonds of affection are forever, right? I love you.
"The Virage Embryo…" I stroke Zieg's face one last time and place his head back down gently on the ground as I stand up. "You have its power now."
"You are right." Melbu Frahma is a grotesque form, the lower part of his torso melding into the Virage Embryo, which was now a red-yellow. He leaned forward and the junction where flesh met physical power stretched like chewed gum. The five tentacles writhe like impatient eels. The room is lit up now. "I obtained the flesh of the god of destruction. I am the god that will begin a new world!"
"A god? Don't make me laugh."
The voice was cool and collected, hypnotizing and oddly familiar. Who?
Someone in full battle armor drops in. Shaft-of-light wings grow from his back and he wields the Dragon Buster in his hand. Like a slender silver flame, he gives off an aura of mystery and command.
"Lloyd!" Dart yells. "You are alive!"
The platinum-haired swordsman smirks at Dart and then turns to the monster. Anger twists his features. "I cannot die with the wrong god still around. You forgot our supernatural spirit and pursued your own interests! It is unforgivable! Destroy yourself and preserve my vision!" He hefts the Dragon Buster. "There is no room for you in my utopia!"
Perhaps it was Lloyd who was the most innocent of us all. Believing in ideals that many had already given up on. He wanted a new and better world, but not by eliminating everyone. Lloyd…you would have made a good teammate. Maybe even a good friend.
His Wingly wings bring him up, and the tentacle reaches for him. He dodges easily. "Too slow!" he taunts, almost playfully.
The next one is also avoided. "Missed!"
His smirk is consuming. I feel triumphant at his defiance. "Over here!"
But the third tentacle, as it was going back to Frahma, suddenly reverses direction and catches him in the chest. Knocking the wind out of him and confusing him, Frahma unleashes an energy beam. More concentrated and well-aimed than the energy spheres, the beam pierces Lloyd through his heart.
The look on his face is unbearable.
To keep myself aloof from hurt, I am transforming, flying up to catch his body before it thuds painfully to the ground. Instead, I lower him gently and he takes a deep breath, unafraid of death.
"Dart." He calls. "Rose."
I frown at the red-clad warrior as he walks over to us. Wordlessly, Lloyd takes off something from his neck and tosses it at Dart. "His birth will be the death of the world. Hurry up and stop him. Here."
He catches it. "What is this?!"
Lloyd turns his head to look at him. The blood is flowing freely, and I know that even if I staunch it now it would be too late. "It is the Dragoon Spirit of the Divine Dragon." He says. "You're going to have to help fulfill my utopia."
Dart turns over the silver pendant in his hands. It glows, star-like. The Divine Dragon recognizes him as a worthy master. He slips the necklace over his head and around his throat. "Thank you, Lloyd."
"And Rose…" he holds out his hand, and lying on his palm is a carved dragon hilt. "The Dragon Buster is yours. You're the only one who can use it."
I take it, and suddenly ever piece of knowledge, about everyone who ever wielded the blade is in my mind. Its full power, its potential, and the movements it can and can't do. The Dragon Buster's hilt is carved out of a precious type of red crystal, in the shape of a dragon's head. The guard covers up to my forearm. I close my eyes for a second, wishing for the blade, and it appears, just because I willed for it to. That is one of the things that is unique about the Dragon Buster: its blade is retractable. The blade is like fire spouting from the mouth of the dragon, a shimmering yellow color, curved and jagged. I shift it over to my right hand, the Dark Death in my left. The Dragon Buster is heavy to hold in one hand, but I do not want to give up Michael's final gift to me. "Thanks, Lloyd. You came through in the end."
Lloyd smirks. It is obvious he is in pain, as his breathing is labored, and every word is strained. But he just has to go out with a bang, doesn't he? "Don't get conceited. I just ended up here while I was pursuing my own ideals. It's not like we're the same or anything."
I smile, for him, and he winks.
"Don't get conceited." I echo his words. "I'll say hi to Wink for you."
"You do that. But take care of this bastard too. I want my utopia to succeed even if I am not there to see it."
"We will." Dart promises. "Thank you for your help."
"Farewell, people who confront the fate of Soa." Lloyd smirks again and it turns into a grimace as he arches his back, gasping. With no one else here that would do so, I reach out and hold him, trying to lessen the pain, shutting my eyes. There is no one here that knows Lloyd very well. I suddenly realize. Meru is perhaps the closest one to him and only because they are both Winglies. But it doesn't mean that I can't help him. I tighten my arms, keeping him still throughout his struggling. The painful death throes don't have to be painful. I ease thoughts of peace into his mind, of what would happen after his utopia was fulfilled.
When he suddenly falls flaccid, I release him, putting him back on the ground, gently. His eyes are closed, meaning he is content. Does he trust us that we will help him? Does that make us friends? I run the palm of my hand along the length of his face, not quite touching, but giving him my blessing.
I look at Dart, asking him a silent question and he shakes his head, backing away to Shana's side again.
I start to close my eyes, lifting my hands, but Meru interrupts, kneeling beside me.
"I'll do it." She says somberly. "He's my kin. I should be the one to help."
I nod, moving to Zieg's side again. His vitals are normal; I can feel a steady heartbeat. I can hear Meru quietly singing the prayer to guide Lloyd's soul safely to the next world. When she turns back, I can see tears on her face, and I take her hand for a second to comfort her.
Dart comes up besides us, and the rest of the team gathers around. "This is it, everyone. The final stretch. If anyone feels like they cannot pull it off, this is the time to leave."
"No one here would do that. We have come too far and gone through too much to abandon our friends at this time, am I correct?" Haschel's words are rewarded by enthusiastic nods. "Dart, you look just like me when I was young. Did you notice? I didn't understand my daughter's pain at all. That's why I dragged it around until now. Shana is the chosen one, as the soul to destroy the world… When she discovered it, nobody but Shana suffered as much. When Shana comes around," he waves a hand at the unconscious girl. "I don't know where we will be. But I know one thing. Dart, you are the only one who can ease Shana's pain. But it won't be realized unless we stop the Wingly who wants to be a god. Now! Let's finish it up! I'll pound my secret art into his fat belly!"
Dart nods thoughtfully. "If anyone has any words to say, say it now. You may not have a chance later. Only do this if you are sure and you are ready. I don't want anybody regretting this."
Kongol's deep voice rumbles. "Emperor Doel would often say, "To make a world where all species are equal, a strong leader is needed." Kongol used to think that Dart was the strong leader, and Dart is strong leader. But I know. Anybody can make a world where all species are equal. Even if you are not Dragoon. Gigantos, Humans, Minintos, Winglies, anybody. Anybody having the feeling can do. But Kongol found out that anybody can destroy the world too. But we can stop him. Dragoons can save the world. Kongol, hero of Gigantos. Kongol doesn't fear god." He slammed the axe into the ground and lifted his head.
"When I decided to go with you, Queen Theresa told me to learn the meaning of the 'fate' that Soa gave us." Miranda's voice has not lost its normal contempt. "This is what I think. Fate belongs to those who are living. We can destroy the fate that somebody else made up. And this is the moment. Dart, let's do it. Stop him for all living creatures and their fate!"
Albert held out his hand. "We have been together since the Moon Gem was taken and Lavitz passed away. We have fought, laughed, cried, and walked together all the way here. But we have the end the walk here. For the sake of the goal that led us here. And…for the sake of all living creatures. Now let's go!"
"Meru?" Dart asks.
The petite dancer starts to giggle hysterically, pirouetting wildly. "I was just gonna give you a little tour, but I ended up coming all the way here! But I was right." She pauses, her giggles fading away. She looks more serious than I had ever seen her. "I was right in following Dart. I realized it. In this world, there are lots of people living with lots of thoughts. So that there are lots of fights. But there is happiness and joy as well. This is such an awesome world; I won't let him destroy it! I'm totally ready to go!"
"Rose?"
I pause. What can I possibly say? I want to apologize for my previous behavior, I want to tell them how much they mean to me, how far I would go for them, how far I had come already. But instead I just nod. I can't… "I'm ready. Let's go. Any time." I stroke the side of Zieg's face with a gentle hand. "Soon." I tell him.
Dart kneels down next to his father, taking Zieg's limp hand. "Dad. I'm sorry we didn't figure out the truth soon enough. I'm sorry that we missed out on many years. But don't worry. After this is done, we'll all catch up. You can tell me what happened, and I'll tell you what's been going on. Okay, Father?"
Melbu Frahma watches our little pep rally and spilling of souls without any expression on his face. He had earlier smiled at Meru's attempt to make Lloyd's passing easier, thinking her foolish. He smiles now, cruelly, at our motivational efforts. He doesn't care about us healing, because he figures it will not do us any good anyway. Of course he will defeat us, after all he is the all-powerful god of destruction and we are only seven measly little Dragoons, right?
Wrong.
With the Dark Death in one hand and the famed Dragon Buster in the other, I stand, facing off. Dart joins my side, standing shoulder to shoulder, and without looking I can feel Albert, Haschel, Kongol, Miranda, and Meru move up next to us. Three swords, a lance, brass-tipped gloves, an axe, a bow and arrows, and a hammer. The seven of us, of all different races and sizes, are quite a crew.
I lift my head proudly. I may die here. My life, gone. The joys of life, never mine. I might never feel the wind in my hair again, or the sweet tension of wings in the sky, or the welling up of restrained laughter, or the gentle warmth of a friend's love. I might die, move forever into the darkness.
But I knew one thing.
That son of a bitch was gonna die first.
"Demon's Dance!" My two swords draw blood. First blood, sweet and tinged with a coppery scent. The Dragoon Spirit flares, and the gentle pain stretches my shoulders blades.
Change…change…
I allow the magic to sweep over me, changing every cell of my body. Stronger, faster, more agile, more powerful. I scream at the raw sheer power. Armor plating slides into place, veil-like powerful wings burst open, energy shimmering on me. The Dragon Buster is a heavy weight in my right hand, and the Dark Death a comforting presence in my left.
"Die! Dark Existence!"
The new spell flows straight from the core of my power, and out through my fingertips. Spider web strings lash out, latching onto him. Mind-link attached through physical contact, I pour out everything. I bring the darkness smaller, compressing it into him until it is a solid thing, sharp and painful. The darkness seeps into him, and I retract the appendages, the spell dissipating.
I stand back while the others take their turn attacking, contemplating my next move. No longer could I act on impulse, using my most powerful attack simply because it was the strongest. I must think things out, because this was the most important battle of my life. Now I understand how Zieg felt when he fought one-on-one with Melbu Frahma's original form.
Zieg…my love…I do this for you.
Meru tosses in a Spectral Flash and I pause. Damn, now I need a different offense, instead of an attack item. The demon's body would have become attuned to the magic an attack item imitated, therefore making the second magic item basically useless unless it is interrupted with a physical attack or Dragoon magic. I need a different attack now.
As Kongol's axe comes down, Frahma moves one of the tentacles to block. In that instant, I dive forward, aiming for an exposed patch of soft skin. The second tentacle reaches out and I leap over it, thrusting the Dragon Buster. Frahma screams, tentacles flailing in reflex. I slash one, slicing the tip off, but the other one cuts across my cheek, like the Virage's tail did. It stings, and my head swivels on my neck, the momentum making me fall to the ground.
Kongol, who had not retreated after his attack, bends down and scoops me up, running back to the others and setting me down.
"Thanks, Kongol." I mutter.
"Moon Light!" Miranda's Dragoon spell heals the fresh scar on my cheek and brings slight energy back to us all, as well as draining some of the demon's power.
Good. Now as he is attuned to light energy, I can use darkness. We should do that, using the opposite elements after the attacks. Darkness to light, wind to earth, fire to water. "Astral Drain!" My attack imitates Miranda, but with darkness-based magic on Melbu Frahma.
You are the devil that caused so much suffering to…to everyone. To the Moon Children. To the people you manipulated. To the Dragoons. To the Winglies. To the Virages. To me. I slash first with the Dragon Buster then with the Dark Death, an X on the sticky-appearing substance that binds him to the Embryo.
"Cat's Cradle!" Meru is thinking, I can tell just by looking at her fighting, a subtle change, but I had learned to read each and every one of them well.
Melbu Frahma, you tore Zieg from me. You took away eleven thousand years of potential happiness. You took away my chances of being content and blissful. Instead, you gave me over ten thousand years of suffering, labor, sacrifice, and pain.
But then again, because of you, Zieg was married to Claire, and Dart was born.
Perhaps there are two sides to every story, both acceptable in different perspectives.
But now, he threatened the fate of the world. It doesn't matter what good he did before. He needs to be stopped, now. I am sure that was what Dart had been thinking when we fought in the Death Frontier, after he discovered that I was the Black Monster that he hated so very much.
"Come!" Frahma claps his hands once, bellowing the command in a masculine tone.
The ground shakes violently, and I careen my arms wildly, trying to keep my balance.
The three Virages are not Super-sort, but powerful indeed. The jewels on their throats glow and the universe is filled with a pale green light. I cry out as fatigue runs through every part of me, helpless to defend against a physical magic attack. My swords drop and I put up a shield to try to block the pain but it doesn't work and all I can do is suffer. The Virages increase their attack and I can hear everyone's screams.
When the light fades the Virages are gone, with Melbu Frahma swerving around like a pendulum, craning his neck to look at each one of us, scattered about the cave. There is a vague look of triumph on his face. "Fools." He snaps in disdain. "No one can stand against the will of Soa! It's over!"
"Not yet!"
Miranda climbs to her feet, using her bow to steady herself. The attack had nearly knocked out all of us. She closed her eyes. "God save us!" She beseeches the entities.
White light, pure this time, soft, surrounds me, and it is almost physical, holding me in a tender embrace. I whine softly, like an injured puppy. The light breaks into little orbs, fluttering around like faeries. But it is only an introduction to the streak that shoots down into the earth, the brightest purest light I have ever seen. Darkness pauses and watches in tired awe.
Miranda exhales; the power is too much for her. "Gates of Heaven!"
The light beam changes, growing wider, filling the range of my vision. It swells like a snake just swallowing a large meal, until it strains at the edges and Miranda makes a motion with her hands. The bulge bursts open into a pair of gold-white wings like a white-fire phoenix. The faceless healing phoenix wraps its wings around us, and suddenly I am on my feet, swords in my hands, fully healed. The bruises on my skin are gone and the pounding in my head is gone as well.
The Sacred Sister falls to her side, struggling to get up. Watching my back, I make my way over to her. "That spell took a lot out of you. You weren't prepared to borrow that much Spirit from the universe. You should rest for a while until you get back your Spirit Points and your energy."
She starts to snarl at me and then gives up, too tired. Lifting her to her feet, I help her over to a farther part of the cave, seating her on a clear spot near Shana and Zieg. "Get your power back and then come to help. Without your Spirit Points you can hardly do anything." I run back to the others.
Melbu Frahma snarls, his upper lip peeling back to reveal jagged teeth. Making a sharp summoning rune in the air with his torso's hands, he calls upon creatures to help. Typically weak monsters that we have fought along the way, such as Canbria Dayflies and Psyche Druids.
"I'll take care of them!" I call to the others. "Concentrate on Frahma!"
I scan my eyes quickly over the lesser enemies. A quick Dragoon elimination spell should take care of them. I hold the Dark Death parallel to my body like a candle, and the blood on it begins to drip. Upward. It crawls upward to the tip of the blade, and I narrow my eyes at it. The black-red blood spurts toward the enemies, coating them, marking them. I turn my back and make a sharp motion with my sword. "Death Dimension!"
The area around them simply freezes, stops and is suddenly gone. The rocks are there, although they are no longer the same rocks as they were before. The monsters are gone, shifted into a different plane, harmless to us now.
I can see it move at the edge of my vision and I hurry upwards, but it is too late. The tentacle wraps tightly around my ankle, and I am dragged down. "Ow!" I yell as it hurls me against the ground and then jerks up, slamming me against the ceiling. The next time I hit the floor, I twist and slash at it with the Dark Death, successfully freeing myself.
"Grand Stream!" Kongol cleaves the earth with his axe and the fracture runs along the ground to underneath Melbu Frahma, where it splits open entirely and stretches up to swallow him. He resists, pulling back, warding off the earth with his tentacles. Kongol calls it back.
I interrupt the flow of magic by transforming back to Human, and running forward. "Die! Demon's Dance"
Frahma reels back from my physical attack and Meru takes this to her advantage. Tipping her hammer upside down so that she perches precariously on the tip of the handle by her toes, she clasps her hands together. Her armor and helmet fits her well, making her look elegant and stately, like a refined young woman.
The ground underneath us turns to ice, and I crouch slightly to maintain my balance in the frictionless area. The ice cracks and lifts up, formulating a ring around Meru, swirling like an asteroid belt and she guides them forward. The ice crystals stick into a solid object, like a glacier, around Frahma and Meru claps her hands together. "Diamond Dust!" She pulls her hands apart and the ice breaks, disappearing.
The demon rears its head up, yelling incoherently. Seeing him ready for another attack, Albert raises his lance, in Dragoon form, ready to cast a spell.
An arrow flies through the air and pierces Frahma's skin, buying us some time as he pauses and pulls it out. Miranda has disobeyed me, of course, and decided that she could help from a long range and she rebuilt her energy. It is a good thing too, since it has given us the amount of time needed for Albert to cast the spell.
A single red rose petal floats down, pressing itself against my cheek for an instant before letting gravity drag it to the ground. The single rose petal is soon replaced by hundreds, all of them floating down like rain. Albert begins his magic and I am reminded of something that happened nearly a thousand years ago. Her good friend Darius had filled her room entirely with flowers, roses.
"You like?" Darius appeared out of the air, picked up one lush red rose, and tossed it at her. She caught it with a warrior's reflexes.
"You did this?" She asked him, too shocked to yell at him.
"Yeah. It's why I was late. You told me that you didn't like your name, so I figured, if I surrounded you with roses, you might get to like them." Darius smiled.
I feel my mind smile wistfully at the memory. Dar, you were always so sweet.
The rose petals lay on the floor now, and Albert picks them up with his mind, swirling them around us like a shield. "Rose Storm!" Green power, representing the wind, surrounds us. It will act as a defense for a while, giving us time to attack with some of our fiercest magic.
"Demon's Dance!" Building up my Spirit Points for the fifth time, I transform to Dragoon, but instead of using magic, I try a physical attack. I duck in open spaces where the tentacles are too slow to catch me, jabbing here, thrusting there, too quick and agile for Frahma to swat aside.
He casts the Virage spell again, and I dive out of the way to avoid being stepped on by one.
The spell is not quite so painful this time, with Albert's defense magic taking most of the blow, and I can see the Wind Dragoon's brow break into sweat and he gasps. Dart runs to his side, pulling out a Healing Fog and pouring it into the Serdian King's mouth until he is rejuvenated.
Strange. Dart has not tried out his new Dragoon form yet. Why hasn't he? Is he afraid of it? No time to ponder about that now. I have to find out a way to bring the half-depleted energy back to the rest of the team. I cast a glance at Miranda, but she is still breathing hard, leaning against the wall with her bow in her hand. She is in no shape to try that Gates of Heaven spell again. It has taken too much out of her as it is. Maybe it is too strong a spell for mere humans to try, or even Dragoons.
Maybe this battle is too far out of our reach. We have been using our strongest spells and yet it does not seem that Melbu Frahma is weakening, while we have each been staring at Death at least twice now.
"Rainbow Breath!"
Meru hovers in the air, just out of the tentacles' reach, and twirls around gracefully, one, two, three times. Each time she does, a prism of light follows the movement. A rainbow circle appears at her ankles and she lifts her hammer high in the air. The rainbow light follows it, trailing upward and into the air. The colors break apart, disappearing into each of us.
It is not as effective as Miranda's healing spell, but it is better than nothing and quite impressive.
"I didn't know you had a healing spell."
She shrugs. "It just came to me."
I ignore the brief exchange, thinking. Death…what is it? Will it come in a physical form and take my soul away? Will it be a figure dressed in black with his face shrouded in a hood? Or will it be a beautiful woman dressed in white with sad, sad eyes? Will I see it now?
Reflexively I leap away from the tentacles, and that in itself tells me my answer.
No.
I refuse to die now. My body says so, and with it, my mind. By jumping away, I have learned that I don't want to die. So I will keep fighting, alongside my friends.
"Die! More and More!"
My attack brings a new spasm of writhing to Frahma, and I step back, frowning. "What's going on?"
"The first generation!" The words come out of the demon's mouth in a hiss, the way a snake would sound if a snake could talk. The landscape shimmers, and I can feel powerful magic working, twisting the carefully fabricated threads of magic that are present here.
Like harp strings being strummed, the magic shudders and changes. This is no other way to put it. The stone room filled with lava glows warps and moves without my feeling anything physical into empty space.
Frahma has changed forms now. The Virage Embryo is nowhere in visible sight, and the demon himself is a monstrous creature, more terrifying then before, crafted of thick metals with indescribable features.
For a moment I am frightened, seeing my feet standing on nothing but void, with only the stars as features of the surroundings and unsure of the oxygen compartment here. I had learned how to hold my breath for a significant amount of time, but I do not think I can hold it long enough to defeat Frahma.
But then I breathe deeply, restoring my calm. There is oxygen here, and my footing is solid. Perhaps it is only another illusion of the moon. But Frahma is still here, still alive, still powerful, until we kill him.
Apparently the others have reached the same conclusion. "Omni Sweep!" A powerful name, befitting the flurry of kicks and punches that Haschel delivers.
"Bone Crush!" Kongol's axe is strong enough to fulfill the reputation of its attack, the Giganto moving nimbly for one his size.
"Blossom Storm!" Such a delicate, seemingly feminine name for such a powerful attack, but Albert pulls it off with a masculine grace.
Melbu Frahma staggers from the attacks pummeled onto him. A limb of some sort moves forward and he slashes it toward Meru. The petite Wingly female ducks and the glittering whip-like limb strikes Kongol's upper arm instead. Meru gasps, immediately looking up to apologize, but it did not hurt the Giganto hero as much as she had thought because he recovers instantly to toss in a magic item.
"Demon's Dance!" I start the combination of sword dance motions, but when I am pivoting on the twirl, something stops me. A pulling, like gravity, but much stronger and more noticeable. A magical drawing. The demon is drawing me into him. I slash out with both swords but it is too late.
Suddenly I am in a black void. The stars are gone and so are my friends and Frahma himself.
Sheathing both swords, I walk. I cannot even be scared as I had been when the first generation started, because there is no light here. I can't be frightened by the fact that I am walking on nothing because it is not a fact to me. It is simply too dark. I can't even see my own hand in front of my face.
"Dart?" I call out.
There is no answer.
"Meru! Albert!" I raise my voice, starting off in one direction. It is so dark in here, I can't see anything, but desperation fuels me and I start to run, frightened at the lack of senses I seem to be having. "Kongol? Haschel?" My demands for their appearances deteriorates into pitiful whines, begging. "Miranda? Zieg? Anyone?"
I am running, furiously. "Is anyone here?" I scream.
To test reality as I had before, I reach for my swords. Gone! Where are my swords? They could not be gone; I had just sheathed them a few moments ago. Moments? Hours? How much time has gone by? I grasp at the belt on my hips to find that is no longer there either. Frantic, I strike at myself and nothing is there.
I gasp, terrified now, too completely irrational to figure out how illogical that was. It should not be hard to find oneself like this; normally all one has to do is reach out to oneself and find the body. The mind controls both parts, the part that is trying to find and the part that will be found. But this is like groping around in the dark for something foreign.
Foreign? How do I know my body belongs to my mind? Maybe it is two different things, and I am gone now.
"Where am I?" I yell at the nonexistent entities. "Why am I here, when I should be fighting beside my friends?"
My friends? If they are my friends, why are they not here with me? Why am I alone in the darkness again? Deprived of all sensations, I lash out at the things I cannot see with my fists, to strike nothing but what air is composed of.
Friendship. What a terribly confusing and annoying concept. It screws with my mind, making me believe for one glorious moment that I had friends, people that cared about me, about what happened to me. It had clouded my mind, but now truth comes back to me. I am alone. I have always been alone and I must always be alone. Friendship is but an idealistic theory imagined by someone to take away the loneliness. But my friends would be here if I wanted them to, wouldn't they? And I want them to, but they are not here. They cannot be my friends then. I am alone. I am the darkness, forever eternal and forever separated.
Pain flashes in my eyes as light returns to them and I can see again. I am hurtling through the air at unlikely speeds. I crash into something soft and tumble to solid ground.
The old man with the black hair and moustache, dressed in a violet fighting uniform, climbs to his feet. He reaches out a hand to help me to mine as well, and I am confused.
Why do you help me, old man? I wonder, but he grasps my arm and hauls me to my feet. A name comes to my mind, a former memory.
Haschel. That's right. You like to act younger than your age, and you're Dart's grandfather. You are the Violet Dragoon and you and Meru like to pull jokes on people, especially Miranda and me. You are my friend…
Melbu Frahma's torture clears out of my mind when I shake my head, growling and I am back. My memories, and the reasoning of knowing my friends. I look around at the six Dragoons and I am reassured. You bastard, what the hell did you almost do to me? You almost made me throw away one of my most prized possessions!
"Demon's Dance!" The words are snarls from my mouth, unholy and foreign.
The demon draws another toward him, Albert this time, and I scream, my hands reaching out to grab the Serdian King, but he is gone. Must he too, feel the torment?
"Let him go!" I yell, abandoning the sword dance combination of Demon's Dance and furiously slashing wherever with both swords until Melbu Frahma raises the light tentacle and swats me away like an annoying fly.
Albert is shot out then, towards me. I am knocked back at his force and quickly climb to my feet, extending my hand. "Come on, King of Serdio, we're your friends. Let's get a move on."
My summarization must have helped him because he is back quicker than I had been, nodding.
"Divine Dragon!" A brief flash of silvery light makes me turn my head toward the red-clad warrior. He is clenching the Dragoon Spirit that Lloyd had given him in one fist, holding it high in the air. The light spills down and surrounds him. I shut my eyes for a second as the illumination is too much for my pupils, which cannot contract that quickly.
Good gods!
The Divine Dragoon is enormous, half a head taller than Kongol! Silver armor covers every inch of him except for his throat and face. Even the arm plating covers his hands, so that the hilt of his sword is hidden underneath it. The jewel on his chest is the pale green with the red slit of the Divine Dragon's main eye and his arms are incredibly long, giving him a skeletal look. The armor is rippled and scaled, like the skin of the Divine Dragon itself. Seven wings, silver and lava-colored, protrude from his back. I don't know how they all came from his shoulder blades, but good gods, it is monstrous and colossal and absolutely amazing.
"Divine Cannonball!"
Like an atomic bomb exploding, the force of Dart's attack manages to make Frahma spin like a twisted pendulum and when he turns back his face and voice sound surprised and wise at the same time. "The second generation."
The warp-speed stars and black void pauses. Everything seems to stop, including the devil himself, with a smirk on his face. Kongol is standing in the center of us all, and at his feet there is something spreading, growing. A patch of earth? Floating in what is seemingly nowhere, it spreads out like a bloodstain on a white carpet, until it is stretching past the horizons and it we are back on what looks like a planet again.
Meru stoops down and grabs a fistful of earth. "It's real. There's dirt and the little rock things—what are they called, gravel?—and grass and oh gross, a worm." She shakes off the dirt and the worm and brushes her hands clean.
The land was barren and rocky, like a desert, forever stretching. But what worried me was not where we would go from here, but where Melbu Frahma was.
"What happened? Rose, Albert, where did you two go?"
"One of Melbu Frahma's attacks was to draw his opponents into a void. It was like being deprived of your senses. I lost the feelings that create me and I had to find my way back. Thank you, Haschel." I say to the surprised martial artist. "It doesn't matter now. What matters is the world."
"The Third Generation."
The magic warps again, as it had the first two times. The sky, which had been relatively cloudy but acceptable, darkened. A chilly wind blew from nowhere, blowing my hair into my face. I pull the dark strands away to see that the clouds had become black, and lightning is illuminating the dark sky, followed immediately by thunder.
What the hell is he trying to do?
The wind increases in speed, and I brace my feet against the ground to avoid flying. Meru, the lightest of all of us, is picked up into the air despite her heavy hammer. But luckily for her, Haschel and Kongol are right behind her and they reach up to catch her before she is blown away.
Mist starts to form, creeping along the ground and twining around my ankles like it is alive. I kick at it, shaking my leg, but it clings. I do not like the feeling of this mist. It is not like I have never seen mist before, but this seems untrue, not real, not right.
"The fourth generation."
The mist suddenly retreats, pulling away from me back into the cliff-like formations that are protruding out of the earth. The rain stops and the wind slows to a gentle breeze. The clouds disappear, leaving a calm night dotted with stars. Like being lost somewhere in the desert at night.
There is a sliver in the sky, as if someone had taken a sword and sliced a hole in the sky. A tear, glowing with pale blue light, a fissure crack, looking almost like a different galaxy.
I turn at Miranda's gasp to see that our opponent has returned, in a different form.
Like a spaceship he was, with a large bulging body and a face that revealed as a machine-like component. He reminds me of hundreds of the gears that I had seen in giant clock towers pieced together.
I could feel his evil smile rather than see it. And that brought out a part of me that I had learned to hide. The Black Monster. No, I would never free it unless I absolutely needed to, and if it was for evil purposes. I frown, building up yet another wall of self-control as I transform.
"Darkness Dragon!" When Michael's shade's attack is finished, I immediately cast another. "Dark Existence!" I know the penalty for casting two magic spells in a row without pausing, but this feeling that rises inside me…it's like…like the tide swelling up or a pregnant bud ready to give birth to a flower. This new sensation is all-consuming and makes me feel lightheaded, the way I had always felt when Dart showed…the same feeling I am experiencing now.
Am I finally being able to have the same emotions as he?
Still, emotions or not, it cannot battle the magic depletion. I swallow as the fatigue runs through me and I have to swoon.
Miranda immediately comes over, grabs both my swords in one hand and my arm in the other, fairly dragging me to the sidelines, away from Frahma's normal attack range. "You stupid witch." She curses under her breath. But she is hissing at me not from sheer rage, but from angry concern that I would do something irresponsible like that. It is like she is the Dragoon with the thousands of years of experience and I am the rookie. "What possessed you to cast two of your most powerful Dragoon magic attacks in a row?"
I swallow the Healing Fog she holds out to me. "Passion…" I murmur.
She sighs melodramatically. "You rest, witch." She uses the term not nastily. It is like she believes it is my actual name. I suppose she means it fondly. "When you come back, you better be ready to fight correctly again."
I nod obediently, the effects of the spell she put on me starting to seep in. I don't resist the sleeping herbs this time, and I welcome the well-deserved rest. Just for a little moment. I tell myself. Then I'll be ready to fight again, this time properly and responsibly.
Even as I drift into unconsciousness, a small part of my soul is wondering. Is that what passion can do to someone? Feel her with such a strange and powerful emotion so that she does reckless and irresponsible things?
Passion always wins over reason. I tell it with half a mind. That's how powerful it is. That must be why Dart never gives up.
Dart… I come out of my trance, fully charged and ready to fight again. My Spirit Points are depleted but that can be rectified with a few rounds of Demon's Dance.
My mind finds full battle mode just as Melbu Frahma makes a gesture toward the sky. The sliver there sets and the sun rises. Just like that. Has he the power to control time itself?
Soa. Soa is the reason for all this. But strangely enough I do not find myself in the rage that I always experienced when I realized who was behind the suffering I had. Thoughts, strange and unbidden, march a parade through my head. Zieg wasn't evil. He was being controlled by Melbu Frahma. But it seems Frahma is not evil as well. He is only trying to carry out Soa's will, the will of the god that created all of us. So is Soa the evil one, the one behind all this? But…Soa isn't evil. Perhaps there is no true evil in the world, only opinions. Soa isn't the evil one. Not only because it was it that created us, but because he has a logical explanation. To recreate the world, to take away all the suffering and begin a new generation of perfection and peace. To take away the murders and the killings, the rapes and the matricides. There is reason behind his theory. But he had miscalculated one thing. He didn't expect that the creatures he had already created, the creatures that have life, would stand against him. He didn't think they wouldn't want to give up their life.
Well, what did you expect? That we would just sit here and wait for our destruction!? No! I'll fight against you and your fate to defend my friends and myself. For everyone and everything that was ever sacrificed on this journey, I fight. For the Dragoons of the ancient powers. Shirley, Kanzas, Belzac, Syuveil, Damia. I fight for you. For the 108 Moon Children that had to die to keep you from killing us all.
"Demon's Dance!"
Miraka, you were the very first. Such a sweet child, who smiled at me when I leaned over you with a naked sword in my hand. It almost made me change my mind, to turn and flee this sin. But I didn't, because that would have been a greater sin. Tyoshi, who giggled, the second victim of that curse. Then many more, too many more. Pai, who would have been a simple shepherdess in a faraway land. Kila, an infant that radiated magic power. Osaka, the first male Moon Child. At first, I thought I had the wrong child, and I fled the house in fear, but when it was verified I had to sneak back in. Wial, the sixth one. You hit me when I reached out for you. I paused, so frightened and regretful. Torrin, you were the seventh. Then Payton, the bald one, then Catryn, so sweet as she slept, then Evelyn who didn't even cry.
"Omni Sweep!"
Sa, Mierk, Rirse, Alucard, Farryn, Anjela, Shiara, Kano, Atkeno, Saluck
"Cat's Cradle!"
Warez, Yotoh, Isehlos, Perclymj, Iao, Timano, Torwz, Rokan, Morshak, Mezoso. Ten male Moon Children in a row.
"Bone Crush!"
Mahs, Pallay, Lishatar, Cora, Misa, Tiseka, Istea, Mkya, Keit, Samean. Ten females.
"Blazing Dynamo!"
Arybant, Roupi, Traaz, Yaro, Ishak, Mlarta, Imaina, Chiwok, Idda, Siban.
"Blossom Storm!"
Chao, Bya, Lta, Plarm, Ifai, Kanbe, Tomaira, Weelson, Tarita, Lira.
Melbu Frahma hisses in pain and rage at the torrent of attacks that rip open what is perhaps flesh. A flashing fireball comes from him, landing on the ground in front of our feet. It explodes into magma, forming a circle around us. Heat sears my face and I throw up an arm to shield myself. Fire, surrounding us…I am reminded of the arrows of fire that the townspeople had shot at me five thousand years ago when they thought I was a witch and responsible for the terrible disease that had killed their magistrate's twin daughters.
Dart takes a deep breath, sucking in the pyro-energy of the flames and feeding it into his own energy, drawing it into healing power.
Frahma lashes out with something invisible, and it catches across my face, knocking me back. I wipe the trace of blood off my mouth.
For Tariento, Morga, Kacdra, Chava, Mariya, Laveero, Miskoa, Eeven, Jayne, Sou.
The next healing item brings a circle of ice over our heads, like the palace of the Ice Queen in the myths. A chandelier carved of glittering ice crystal hovers above me and I crane my neck up to look at it.
Frahma makes a movement of his hand and it falls, faster than I can comprehend. The giant icicle pierces my torso and searing pain suddenly rips through me. I scream, the white-blue ice stained instantly with the dark red of my blood. I choke on my own blood.
"Gods!" The others run over. Kongol gives me a warning look right before he yanks the icicle out of my chest. I scream again at the pain.
Haschel and Meru keep the demon distracted from making another attack while Dart forms warmth in his hand, holding it close to me so that the remaining ice inside my body melts. I arch my back, hissing.
"Hang in there. It's almost done." Albert says, holding my hand tightly. I am glad to have a friend like him by my side, caring and reliable. He will be a wonderful king if we ever get out of here, compassionate person that he is. "Don't you dare die on us."
"I'm not dying." I growl. "Not until he's dead. I've been through worse injuries by myself."
"Yeah, well, this time you're with friends. This is going to hurt." Miranda puts one hand over my forehead and the other over my wound. "Healing power of the White Silver Dragon!"
I can't muffle the shriek of pain as my skin regenerates in a matter of seconds and patches itself back together. Albert and Dart take in deep breaths when my nails dig into their skin. I am almost laughing, for some reason. Mortals…Humans…
When the pain is gone and Miranda stands up, the wound is closed and although sore, I am otherwise fine. No time for gratitude, we rush back to battle positions. Not going to die. I will myself. I'm not going to die until I make sure the world is safe. For the Moon Children that were sacrificed, for my friends that were sacrificed.
Liza-Jane, Tia, Aloria, Selwin, Bocner, Eria, Devskai, Mingyue, Kay, Phoebe, the eightieth.
I pour the Healing Fog down Meru's throat when she passes out in fatigue, then stand protectively in front of her unconscious body should Melbu Frahma attack her. But it is unlikely that he would attack a downed warrior. Probably he would attack the ones still fighting him, the ones still drawing his blood.
Ahna, Crystal, Mikihel, Lindsaya, Leah, Sara-Kate, Alexis, Tonie, Christin, Jordan.
"Astral Drain! Aah!"
Mayra, Erikk, Andurs, Karatosis, Alvara, Amandee, Tara, Daniella, Stefan, Clymene.
A whirlwind appears, unsurprising, for nothing can surprise me anymore. Knowing I cannot fight it and will just waste my strength if I do so, I clench myself tight and hold my swords as the wind lifts me up and swirls me around and around. It is an unpleasant experience, not at all like when Michael swooped through the air and I had to laugh from sheer joy.
When I am deposited unkindly back onto the ground, my head throbs like after I stretch past my limits in the mornings and the blood rushes to my head. I take a few seconds to regain my equilibrium, for one slightest mistake could mean the end of my life.
The few seconds brings Frahma enough time to slash out with his invisible psychic attacks, sending Haschel sprawling onto the ground. The Rouge martial artist groans as he climbs back to his feet. Perhaps he needs a rest. This must be too tiring for his bones. But I do not suggest it.
Tirana, number 101, then Meeshell, Zane, Franco, Joan, Elizabeth, Davidien.
Shana.
Too many people had died in order to preserve the world. I'll not let their deaths be in vain!
Even those that weren't Moon Children, but had to die simply because.
Louvia, who was innocent, a victim of my mistake. Greham, who died for his honor. Doel, a misunderstood tyrant. Lenus, who died for her unrequited love. Gehrich, Haschel's student who reacted wrongly to his exile. Lavitz, who died to protect his king. Feyrbrand, Regole, Michael, the Dragons. Damia, Shirley, Syuveil, Belzac, Kanzas, the original Dragoons.
Those who were hurt.
Drake, guardian of Shirley's shade. Wink, her love unknown. Emille, staying in her tower in Fletz, wondering if Albert was still safe. Kristoff from a thousand years ago. Darius, with his gentle sweet humor. Thousands more.
Lloyd. Zieg.
Names parade through my head, wailing songs of lament and sorrow. It is for them that I fight, for them that I will defeat the Melbu Frahma, for them that I go against fate!
The passion, the adrenaline, gives me a bout of sudden strength. Demon's Dance is a fluid combination that makes power flows through me and into Frahma, stunning him.
I don't care if you are the god who created me, Soa. If you want to kill me, you can bet your divine ass that I won't go down without a fight! Soa, you were a fool to think that your "creations" would just lay down and wait to be annihilated. How can you be a god if you don't know your own people, your own worshippers, your own creations? I'm going to fight for those in the past, present, and future.
There is one more person that has seen the past and the present and may not live to see the future that I fight for.
Rose. All her forms, all her times. The spoiled little brat in the past, who changed. The gentle soul who was so deeply in love, who died when Zieg was torn from her. She died then, the old Rose. Rose who had to kill the Moon Child every 108 years, and died with them. Rose, who was awakened by Dart in the forest and is now fighting Melbu Frahma for the sake of the world. It is also for her, myself, that I fight.
"Death Dimension!"
"Meteor Strike!"
Melbu Frahma is knocked back at the force of the simultaneous blows, crashing into one of the cliff-like formations behind him.
"The fifth generation."
Silent music fills my ears, and I sit on the ground, watching the earth intently. It is shimmering, the way a lake surface wavers. Something jumps out, making me lurch back. A crystal-fish, a very rare species, seemingly made of nothing but rose quartz and peridot. It leaps out, makes a perfect arc and then dives back into the water-earth.
The ground transforms under my feet, the dull gray and brown turning to a lush green field as if someone had painted it over. Grass so fresh that I can smell it. Groves of trees spring up. A tree frog croaks and I hear a blue jay chatter, mixed in with a cardinal's sweet trill.
Paradise…
I close my eyes; I can't help it. I inhale the smell of the fresh grass and listen to the songs of the birds. I reach down and cup a flower against my hand. It is like everything is perfect.
Is this the fifth generation? It seems normal, almost like a few years before the present day…
Gods! That's his power! I suddenly realize the key to Melbu Frahma/Virage Embryo's power. The one thing he rules over that cannot be ruled or changed.
TIME.
Gods above and hells below, this bastard rules time. No wonder he's been showing us the generations! It's the timeline of Endiness, from the nothingness of space to a barren land to rain to earth formations and light to the beauty of nature. Time ruled everything and it was a small surprise why he could take so much fight from us, because time could never be defeated.
"The sixth generation!"
The final generation.
Carved reliefs float in front of my eyes. An old woman holding hands with a little girl who had her hair in pigtails. Two lovers embracing in fear. Two armies clashing. A baby boy clutching at the index finger of his mother.
The world burning. People turning to skeletal creatures and dissolving.
Is this what he thinks will happen next?
I steel myself. I will struggle against this, if this is the fate that awaits us.
Melbu Frahma appears, dropping out of the sky and hovering a few feet off the ground.
Think mushroom. Think umbrella. Think seahorse. Think scorpion. Think titanic. Think ugly. And there you have the final form of the demon god.
Meru screeches as he attacks immediately, tossing a Fire attack item at her. Her skin scorched, she retaliates with Freezing Ring, which makes him back up a few feet.
You almost made me forget my own existence. You almost made me forget my friends.
The Minintos' words float back into my mind.
"For we are only real if we believe we are. Do you believe in your own existence?"
It had been haunting me but I finally have an answer.
Yes.
I believe I am here, with the Super Virage's scar on my face, with a hole in my new armor, with my friends beside me. I believe I am here, and I believe that they are here with me too. I believe in Meru's sweet voice and watery spirit as she calls out her magic attacks, in Miranda's spicy cinnamon and peach perfume and light-like kindness. In Haschel's breathing as this is a strain on his back and steady as thunder reliability, in Kongol's muscles straining as he lifts the axe high and his earth-strong compassion. In Albert's purity as he casts Rose Storm on all of us and the gentle wind of his caring, and in Dart's fiery passion, so strong I can feel it physically.
In my own pain and newfound joy. The darkness that had light.
I think I am starting to forgive myself.
Frahma plunges forward, ramming all of us backward because he is so large and powerful. He pulls back, screaming, and two monsters come to help him. Pawns, dazed and confused, here to obey him and nothing else. I pity them.
"Demon's Dance!" One combination is enough to down one. Kongol quickly takes care of the other with a swift cleaving of his axe.
Frahma lashes out again, and a sharp pain manifests at my left wrist. The Dark Death is swiped away, landing somewhere in oblivion far away.
"You bastard!" I scream. That was Michael's gift to me! How dare you!
It would be too selfish and time-consuming for me to go get the Dark Death. Melbu Frahma had tossed away one of the only remains I had of my old friend. I shift the Dragon Buster to be held in both hands. "Demon's Dance!" Anger lends me strength, but I have to calm myself before my judgment is clouded. I know that anger makes you strong, but it also makes you pivot half a second too slow, or bring down the blade a moment ahead of time.
I reach into one of the numerous pouches attached to the belt at my hips. My fingers close around a small bottle, a familiar cool weight, and I pull it out.
Instead of being filled with the illuminated blue liquid of a Healing Fog, it is filled with black smoke.
Michael's gift to me.
I lift it to my lips, taking the cork out. I inhale the smoke, letting it power me for a moment, bathing in its comforting familiarity before tossing it into the massive bulk that is the body of the Virage Embryo.
"My Spirit. My memories. My thoughts." I shout to it. You can never take those things from me! Michael and others died to prevent this—you—from happening.
As the black smoke engulfs Melbu Frahma with its sheer emotion and preciousness to me, I wonder if I would have done the same to Shana. She was the one who would have been the Virage Embryo. Would I have defeated her, tried to kill her like this, with the same raw emotion?
My memories and the way I feel about everything, about that black smoke, is trapped within the dark fog as it swirls around Frahma. He yells, flying away but it clings to him. I control it with my mind, broadcasting my hate and suffering and agony into his mind, forcing a distant mind-link and attacking his mind.
Vaguely I can feel the others doing the same. Miranda with her flower petals, Haschel with his daughter's headband, Kongol physically with his axe, Albert with the two shards of light and darkness, Meru with the circlet that the Archangel had given her. Each of us attacks with an emotional fierceness that the demon could never hope to achieve. Raw passion that the god could never understand, because she/he could never understand what she/he is not. Soa may have created us, but it didn't mean that the god understood us. We were fighting our creator now, aren't we?
Watching them fight, I know that everything would be all right. Even if I were to die now, everything would still end up okay, because everyone's attributes and unique capabilities gave the world a chance. Soa would be defeated and the world would go on.
And humankind owed it all to passion.
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Author's Note: Done! Now all that's left is the epilogue, which will be posted shortly and then this entire thing is done. I know, lousy ending, but I just totally came up against writer's block. Again, I apologize if any of the names I've listed are related to anyone you know, but it's unlikely since they're mostly strange names. One of them is mine, can you guess which one?