Final Fantasy IX and everything related to it is Squaresoft's property.

This story was written by QualmC661.

Final Fantasy IX:

The Future of the Past

Chapter Three

ZIDANE CLEARED off the table, and laid a map down on the open area. "Okay, here's what we do." He pointed to a southern part on the first continent. "This is where we are. Vivi, which way are they going?" Vivi ran to the door, cracked it open, and watched about twenty chocobos, two men to a bird, ride off.

"North."

"North. Okay. Since the province of Lindblum stretches out to here-" he pointed to the center of the continent, "they will most likely turn east and head towards Alexandria for two miles."

"But we don't know where they stop," argued Blank.

"I know. We're not attacking just yet. We're finding out we're they're based. Okay, I will take a chocobo Northern of Alexandria and use binoculars. Baku, you know where they left that part of the stone mountain standing?"

"Yeah...a little North of Lindblum, far West of Alexandria."

"Right. You and Blank go up there, and watch. Marcus and Vivi, follow the rebels from behind."

Everyone was preparing to leave as Vivi caught Zidane. "Zidane, I saw that leader."

"Yeah? You recognize him?"
"It was Nmi." Zidane stopped cold. He hadn't expected that answer.

"Nmi...what's he doing with rebels?..."

BAKU LOOKED out over the stone mountain. He was on a solid black chocobo, like Blank, a few miles West of alexandria. He could see the ruins of the city. The sacond they came into view, once again like Blank, he got a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach. Something wouldn't let him believe that Zidane hadn't destroyed it...

"I see them," said Blank. He pointed to an area that Baku couldn't exactly see. Then he saw nearly twenty yellow dots slowly budging Northward. "They're heading North." He and Baku raced down the side of the mountain. While they were going extremely fast, thay actualy managed to talk.

"Blank."

"Yeah?"

"You think Zidane really wrote that letter?" Blank didn't answer, he simply stared foward. "C'mon. Tell me."

"I don't know what to think. Let's do this first, and talk about it later."

MARCUS AND Vivi followed closely behind the rebels. Only three hundred yards ahead, the closest rebel could be seen. Vivi sat behind Marcus on one chocobo, since he was still too small to take his own.

"They're going too slow to be running away," said Marcus. Vivi didn't reply. "They must be doing something..."

"Maybe they're expecting us follow them?" Vivi asked. "You know, a trap."

"But they haven't set anything behind them, or avoided anything."
"...It seems like they know we're following them, though..."

BLANK ASKED, "Okay, what do we do now?" He and Baku, ten minutes later, had slowed to a trot. They could just barely see Marcus and Vivi almost a thousand feet from the rebels, who walked slowly forward, to Blank's left. They were facing them from the West to the East.

"I don't know. Zidane didn't give us any orders after that.... You notice something funny about them?"

"What?"

"We're the only ones in this field," he explained, "and we can be easily seen." Blank then noticed that they were. Nothing was closer than a mile, and they were in a wheat field. Despite the brown three-foot tall stems, their larger-than-horse black chocobos stood up to their knees, and both Blank and Baku were wearing somewhat bright clothing. It was midday, so the sun was very bright. Yet the rebels didn't even turn right...

...Or they had, and ignored the two.... But why would they do that? "...I didn't notice until you said..." answered Blank.

"Something's wrong."

THE CHOCOBO reared back and squealed underneath Zidane as he stopped on the edge of the rocky mountain, opposite of where Vivi and Marcus were. He calmed the golden beauty as it breathed very hard, shaking him. Then he looked down over the cliffside to see twenty dark-colored chocobos riding very slowly Northward.

Then he saw Baku and Blank in the field ajacent to the path. He waved to them...and realized the rebels were'nt looking up at him. Surely he was perfectly visible? ...Wasn't he?

NMI SLOWED to talk to a cloaked person behind him, one he hadn't even met yet. When they were side by side, he whispered, "You saw them?"

"Two to our left, two behind us, one up on the cliff," the deep male voice answered.

"How do you know?" The hood came off his head, and Nmi could see a third eye in the back of his neck. It really made him sick, seeing dried red tissue with a hard, clear film wrapped around the edges of it. "...I never knew you...uh...had that."

"Not very many do. My name is Aein."

"Aein, I am Atrogghus Bersobin. People call me Nmi, though."

"I've heard of you. Terigan's brother," he said, putting the hood back over his solid white hair.

"Who told you that?"
"I've known. Where is Terigan now?"

"I'm not at liberty to say," answered Nmi. He could almost tell Aein was smiling.

"Oh? I suppose not, with what you did." Nmi stopped dead in his tracks, and Aein stopped when seeing that he did, the smile leaving his face. The other moved on ahead of them.

Nmi gave him a cold stare.

"With those words, you put your life in danger."

"With those words, I'm able to turn everything on top of you." The longest moment passed before Aein said something further. "It is not your place to kill me, nor your place to say anything else."

"...What do you want?" They continued walking, now at the rear of the crowd.

"Want?" Aein smiled again. "I want...I want Alexandria restored again. I want everything to be the way it was. I would blame Zidane, but not now, with what I've been told..."

"With what you've been told..." nmi thought for a second. "What have you been told?"
"Only enough to turn this army on you."

"...Then don't you tell it anymore."

"Why not? Some of them must know." Nmi was frowning. He wished he had never begun talking to this shady character...

"I have something to show you, if you'll shut up," said Nmi.

"That is-" he stopped, and leaned foward.

"Something wrong?"

"Get off your chocobo." Aein climbed off his, and walked to the side of the mountain. Nmi simply stared at him for a long time. "Get off your chocobo, if you trust me."

Nmi obeyed. He climbed off, and walked to Aein. "Look," said Aein, pointing to the crowd. Three minutes passed, and the crowd was now several hundred feet away.

"What? Look, we're going to lose our time if we don't hurry. I'm expecting to s-"

He stopped talking as arrows whizzed from each side of the crevices in the mountain. They drove through the rebels, knocking them off their chocobos. The innocent birds themselves, too, were being killed. Nmi couldn't tell what the arrows were coming from. The poisonous sticks shot from everywhere, killing everything, and sticking into the carriage the rebels had stolen.

The arrows stopped when everything was still. Men lie on the bloody ground. Chocobos were still alive, but not moving enough to appear so. Everything was quiet.

Nmi didn't say a single thing.

Aein climbed back up on to his chocobo, and looked down at him. "Perhaps you would like to take another exit."

BLANK COULDN'T believe what he had just seen.... "What in the world?" Baku was amazed, too, but smiled when he looked closer.

"...It was a trap...." It was one he didn't like, but nevertheless, it was a trap. "Zidane must have set it. How else would we ever get them?" Now he liked the trap more, seeing that it had saved his family.

LATER, AFTER Baku's family had been taken back to where Tantalus now existed, he began talking to Zidane, alone. "Zidane...thanks." He said.

"No problem," he answered. He looked on to where the trap was placed.

"My family means everything to me. I don't know what I would have done if they had all died..."

"I know what you mean...but I didn't set those traps." Baku was blown away. Then who had set the traps. I know what you mean.... He understood what Zidane was saying, and then wondered something...

"...How is Garnet?" Zidane smiled.

"Great, as far as I know. Haven't seen her in a week." He paused. "Since we have Tantalus reformed, we're going to return there."

"How old are you both now?"

"Twenty seven." Baku was surprised. But what can I expect? he asked himself. Maybe he was only thinking about how he had aged, not everyone else.

"Why did we do it?" he asked Zidane. He didn't say anything for a few seconds.

"...Because I can't do this without your all's help," Zidane answered.

"...Do what?"

"I need all of you to help me prove I was innocent. No one will believe me if I just walk up and shout, 'I didn't do it!', with nothing to worry about. In fact, people would attempt to kill me if i did that." Baku thought long and hard about it.

Should he help him? He was a very close friend, but he remembered everything that happened during the destruction. He had lost so many friends and family members.... What if it were now? he asked himself. What if we all lived in Alexandria right now? His family, his wife, his children.... But Zidane was a close friend, too.... He was his brother.

He couldn't think about it anymore.

But then there was the other question.

What if it wasn't Zidane?

That sparked a whole new meaning on everything. It meant that if Zidane hadn't done that, then whoever did deserved more than death. He wasn't even worthy of a punishment.... And he knew, if it were true, that Zidane wanted to get the traitor back for destroying everything.

"...What do you want us to do?" asked Baku.

AEIN, NMI noticed, wasn't saying anything during the entire report, which took place that night. Nmi was giving his senior the statistics about everything during his mission. The senior was a head taller than everyone else there. He was very muscular. His hair was long and black, and a black goatee decorated his blank expression.

Nmi really wished Aein would help him, but the cloaked man wasn't saying anything. "Everyone," he continued, "is dead. Someone set a trap with poisonous arrows out perfectly West of Alexandria." The other man said nothing. "The only survivors are my, and this man, Aein." He nodded towards Aein.

The man finally talked. Aein wasn't surprised at how incredibly deep the tall man's voice was. "You are new to this society?" Aein simply nodded. "Then we welcome you." He looked back at Nmi. "Why are you two the only survivors?"

"He told me to get off my chocobo, and let them go on. We watched from about sixty yards away." The man smiled.

"Well, Aein, you seen to know a lot." Aein nodded once, not smiling, not frowning, just looking at him coldly. "From what I've read about you, you seem to have an ability to predict things very well. Outcomes, I mean. What, do you have eyes in the back of your head?" Nmi looked off.

"Yes," Aein answered, meaning it literally.

Nmi pulled the taller man closer, and whispered something into his ear. "Oh, I see.... Uh...I'm very sorry about that."

"No problem here."
"Then let me introduce myself. I-"

"I know who you are," answered Aein, roughly. "Nmi said he would show me something. I want to know what it is."
Nmi once again pulled the taller man closer, and whispered something. "Hmm.... It appears as if those eyes are a real help." The man smiled. "Fine, then, we shall show you."

TANTALUS WATCHED through the window as the entire conversation was goign on. Even though he was very perceptive, Zidane found, he couldn't predict that they were in the window. All three left the room, and Baku opened the window. They all slipped in to the meeting room, where Barrer had shown his "equipment" to the leader, who was the tall man.

Zidane and Baku, alone, ran through a door, and slowly followed Nmi, Aein, and the tall man for a distance.

"I think you will be quite surprised at what we have found," said the tall man.

"I am not easily surprised," Aein answered.

"I can change that," he came back. What did he mean by that? Baku asked himself. They walked for about ten minutes through massive halls and staircases, until they were underground, in a cavernous area. The floor was several thousand yards wide and long, making an incredible amount of room for absolutely no one.

"We are the only ones who are allowed in here. It is strictly guarded." But Zidane and Baku had so easily slipped into the building.... Something was very, very wrong here...

"What do you have to show me?" Aein finally asked, when they reached the bottom. Nothing was around them anywhere except a thin, metal spiral staircase that they had just come from. Pushed into the wall ahead of them was a large metal door, three hundred feet high and five hundred feet wide. Nmi pushed a button at the tall man's order, and there was a cracking sound.

"We have not used it yet, but understand it perfectly," said the tall man. The door rumbled, then very slowly slid upwards. When it was fully open, electronic lights cut on.

"What are those?" Baku asked quietly.

"Electronics. They use something called electricity to operate, a lot like the Mist, but safer. All you have to do it push a button, and those lights cut on, a door can open, etc..."

When the lights had gone from dim to extremely bright, Zidane, Baku, and Aein were amazed at what they saw.

A large, solid silver collection of three balls rolled around each other at a very great speed. Several smaller, purple and black balls whizzed around everywhere. The large silver ones had a radius of a hundred feet, and the small ones were the size of a fist. It was stunning.

Nmi pushed a button, and everything stopped, but it seemed as if they did in a specific order. The three balls lined up from top to bottom, as if balancing on each other, and the smaller balls acted as a purple/black coat for each one, covering the outside of all of them completely.

"What is it?" asked Aein, very impressed. He had seen nothing like this before.

"We didn't know what it was, at first, until he-" he pointed at the taller man "-used it once. He used it for the purpose you described to me on the way here..."

"...But what is it?"

"That's what we call it, now. We cal it 'Is'."

"Why?"

"When you use it," explained the taller man, "you can change anything you want to."

"Huh?"

"What I said. You can change anything you want to. History, the way the world works, systems, people, events.... All you have to do is use it."

"...How can I use it?"

"Nmi and I are planning to use it for...special reasons..."

"...What have you done already?" asked Aein, not taking his eyes off of it."

"We controlled a Burmecian named Barrer, and had him bring much of the newest technology to us for better use."

"...But it's not real technology, is it?"

"No. We made them think of things people will discover in several hundred, if not thousand, years."

"What else?"

"We changed history...in a way..."

"Huh?

"You know the incedent you brought up?" Aein looked at him.

"...That was you?" asked Aein, in surprise. "...Explain."

"Quite simple, really. I had Zidane write a letter to us to destroy Alexandria, ten years ago. Alexandria could still exist, but we haven't used it to do that, yet."

Zidane was stunned. They had done it. They were the traitors. His memories, ones of writing AND not writing the letters...which ones were real?

Had he destroyed Alexandria?

What else had they done?

What were they about to do?

Then Zidane suddenly recognized, with great pain and disbelief, who the tall man was. His old friend, who had no reason to destroy him at all. The man who used to have long, white hair, beard, and mustach. The man he trusted Alexandria with.

It was Terigan.

CONTINUED IN CHAPTER 4