Chapter 10 : Is he gone? Behold the power of Jello.
"Good thing I stocked up on Jello right before this," Stragus thought to himself. "It would be bad not to go out full of it."
A slight rumble of rocks near Stragus prompted him to look in that direction.
"I'll tell you what your full of!" Bellowed a familiar Thamasa champion golf master's voice, "Why did you do that!? You could have killed us! And you destroyed the palace."
"It wasn't all me," said Stragus, "the King-dude and the other royal-guy casted Grand Train at the same time. They must have felt his energy presence as well."
"Energy presence?" Asked Gungho, "Are you saying you knew he was here the whole time?"
"Oh yea, sure," said Stragus nonchalantly.
Setzer appears out of the rubble. "Why didn't you tell us?" Asked Setzer.
"Well, the King knew about it too," explained Stragus, "I guess he knew what he was doing."
"Actually," said the King lifting himself out of the rubble as well, "I just hired him because our palace is an equal opportunity employer."
"Its all part of the system," said Valeous, seemingly unharmed on one side.
"Is he gone, two-face?" Asked Stragus.
"That's Valeous! Valeous Starchaser."
"Whatever." Said Stragus.
"Well," Valeous thought, "its tough to say what happened, because I was never sure how powerful he really was. But I'm sure most demons would have been destroyed by that."
"Don't count me out yet," bellowed one Ka zi lao as he appeared before them. "It may have destroyed me, if I still had apothropolunderblunderepriciliosus complex number 324 disease. But since there is now a cure, and I have the King's Omega weapon, I have enough to destroy all of you. It would take 501 Grand Trains simultaneously to defeat me."
"Okay," Stragus said, as if he had a brilliantly conceived plan to destroy him, "I wish I had a brilliantly conceived plan to destroy him!"
"What do you mean," asked Gungho, "What about your Jello Sword?"
"Its not powerful enough," explained Stragus, "He not as powerful as in the future, but just enough to survive a full blast."
"That's no problem," said Valeous.
"Its not?" Asked everyone else.
Valeous continued, "There were two Omega weapons created, and one was sealed within the palace."
"And he has it," interrupted Gungho.
"True," Valeous continued, "But the other is with me."
Valeous pulls out the second Omega weapon. It shined like the sun, and it was passed sunset. Now the plan was brilliant.
"Perfecto!" Yelled Stragus. "Gungho, you know what to do."
"Right," Gungho agreed. "Everybody, RUN!!!"
"UH…" interrupted Ka zi lao, "I'm still in this story, right?"
"That's more information than we need," answered Stragus, the town teleporting in the background.
"Ready Valeous?" asked Stragus.
"You got it!" answered Valeous.
"Double…"
"Jello Sword…"
"ATTACK!!!
Yet again, much could be expected of this moment as a large-scale war. The combined forces of Stragus and Valeous was about twice the power minus one too many. The explosion ripped the fabric of space-time itself, which was probably a good thing, for without that, the future could not have felt the effects of the changing time line in the past. Although no one knew, no one seemed to care. All they wanted was this demon gone, which did happen. Later there would be much rejoicing and eating of Jello. But in the farthest reaches of the galaxy, there was a lot of cleaning up going on. TASSLE and Duu Ainoyu were fixing all the temporal incursions that were a result of Manami's evil work. They finally got to the point where they can recover the ship that caused all this mess. Although they did not find it where the instruments had originally expected it, they adjusted it about a thousand year's back. Duu himself was conducting the survey of the area at Thamasa.
"This place is a mess," understated Duu, "We'll have to find the parties involved and find out the damage."
"There right here sir," said Peon.
"That was fast," said Duu, "How'd you do that?"
"They were in the center of the crater sir, and they're still alive." Answered Peon.
"Oh."
Stragus, Valeous, Setzer, and Gungho were taken to the TASSLE headquarters where they stayed for about a week answering questions and eating strange cuisine. A final report had to be made in front of the Grand Respectable Administration of Plenty Executive Seniority (GRAPES) the following Tuesday at 4:00, because everyone's favorite kenny shows came on at 3:00.
"…And that's the final report sir," finished Duu.
"Very good," said the Chairman of GRAPES, "and these are the subjects from the planet where the ship was found."
"Yes." Answered Duu, "They were able to operate the high-energy class time ship…"
"Chocobo!" Interrupted Stragus.
"Be Quiet, Stragus!" Yelled Gungho.
"Right," continued Duu, " they were able to save their own world and possible a good portion of Sector 01578 to the plasma life form using the time ship."
"Really?" Said the Chairman, surprised, "Well, let's have this Stragus say a few words."
"Okay," answered Duu. "Come up here, Stragus."
"Huh," Stragus was surprised. Not only was he not paying attention to what was going on, he had completely forgot where he was for that moment. "Oh yeah, I was about to cast a spell when…"
"Stragus!" Yelled Gungho, "Stop, they just want you to say a few words. Oh, and your shoe laces are untied"
Stragus got up and started retying his own shoelaces. This was not taken very well. The guards went immediately after them. After a long chase, Stragus lead the party to the hanger bay.
"How'd you know this was here?" Asked Setzer.
"I got lucky," answered Stragus. In actuality, Stragus got so bored on this trip he read every book in the computer's technical database.
Setzer saw a ship that caught his eye. It was large and very sparkly. "Hey guys, how about we take this one?"
"Let's not," Stragus answered, "It's a Tulip class ship, not very fast. Ah, this is what we need."
Stragus pointed to a small ship, not very spectacular at all. "This is the fastest ship they have."
"Oh," Said everyone else.
They proceeded to enter the ship, and were easily able to get it started. Surprisingly, the ship's computer responded to Stragus as if it knew him personally.
"Stragus," asked Gungho, "How does this ship know you?"
"I don't know," answered Stragus, "Maybe we'll find out one day."
Gungho was not surprised. He should have known to never doubt the power of Jello.
'Twas a day like any other. Stragus was at home trying desperately to find his soupspoon, while explaining to Relm where he was this whole week.
"So," said Relm, "You expect me to believe that you saved the world, in the past, and prevented the eventually destruction of Thamasa and an owl, and helped return 27-finned dolphins to some distant part of the galaxy that we'll never visit?"
"That's about right," answered Stragus looking at the same cupboard he did about 10 minutes earlier.
"Do you have any proof?" Asked Relm.
"Well," Stragus thought, "We're all still here, aren't we?"
"Uh… Yes…" doubted Relm. "Unfortunately…"
"Do you know where I put that soup spoon?" Asked Stragus.
"You ignoramus!" Exclaimed Relm, "you're holding it in your OTHER hand."
"Oh," remarked Stragus, "now why would you put it where I wouldn't find it?"
"Hmmm… Have we done this before?" Asked Relm.
"Maybe," answered Stragus. "Time has a strange way of repeating itself."