Chapter 22, The fun has just begun…
"… A headache was the best name for Flea as of yet!" Marle called from behind as the four dashed through the eerie lit corridors of the Ocean Palace.
Seeing the magician's head pop out of Janus' back was a quite disturbing sight, even if he was much smaller that normal.
"I am not a headache!"
A human hand reached out and grabbed his crag.
"Get back in here you idiot," the Prince's voice snapped and his hand ripped.
"Hurk!"
Eww… Crono winced.
"What?" Janus said over his shoulder.
Nothing…
"Ayla think this strange," the cavewoman stated, running on all four like an animal as usual.
Janus never managed to get a grip of how a human moving like Ayla did could look natural.
"I'm not too fond of it either," the wizard grunted.
I wonder how Frog would react if he found out… Crono thoughtfully smirked.
"Better not…"
They entered a fairly circular room. On the floor was two dark orbs and the roof… was nowhere in sight.
"Will it hold us?" Marle nervously asked as she saw the floor swing lightly with Janus' steps.
"Don't worry, it's an elevator," he calmed her and the other two warriors.
Not that Ayla knew what an elevator was, but as the others seemed calmer she trusted them.
Cautiously the non-Zealans stepped on.
"We're near now," Janus grimly said, "be ready for anything."
"Okay!"
'What about you?' the wizard thought.
'I'm not sure,' the Pawn grunted, 'getting close to Lavos might not be the wisest thing for us to do. But if we leave you now we won't be able to come along when you follow the boy. If he's still alive.'
'He has to be!' Janus growled.
'We have to hope so. But it's reality that the big hedgehog might not want to take risks.'
'Back on topic boys!' Flea said, frowning and sounding quite serious however, 'we'll have to think about your recent allergy to him, m'lord. You know how you reacts after all that happened back home.'
Janus touched the orb closest to him while the Prince muttered something in reluctant agreement. It sparkled slightly in bright blue and the floor swung before starting to quickly descend. They had hardly gotten ten yards before a group of scouts in different colors and a couple of creatures with peculiar hoods materialized. It was questionable whether the latter foes were human or not.
Janus, you handle the red scouts and Marle the blue, Ayla, you and me take care of those… things! Crono shouted as they all grabbed their weapons (or raised their fists).
"Got it!"
'Can you hide somewhere deeper inside my mind?' the wizard thought even as he chanted, aiming for the flyers.
'I don't think it would help,' the Prince says, 'he'll most certainly look for us at any given chance and sense us anyway.'
'Is there nothing I can do to shield you?'
'Not sure how that would work, unless you can think of something.'
'We have a problem here. Uhuh. Yeah…?'
Janus thought he heard Flea mutter to himself, but had to concentrate on battling the yellow scout that tried to latch onto his face. In the next heartbeat a lightning bolt zapped the cretin and it dissolved in a puff of smoke.
'See? Those are evolved!' Flea absentmindedly huffed.
'Who are you talking to?' the Pawn suspiciously asked.
'Wasp, my great, great, great, great grandmother,' said with an alarming smile, 'take or add a great, I loose track.'
'And she has any ideas in this matter?'
The Prince's voice had a quite wary tone. Flea's fists hit his hips.
'Why my lord!' he said in a stupidly mock shocked voice, 'don't you trust me after all I've done for you?'
Marle's arrows got the last hooded creature and the four continued downwards in peace.
'You still have a sea of deeds to make up for before I'll consider trusting you,' the Prince stated, 'especially when your eyes glisten like that.'
Flea pouted and floated closer to his old leader, who suspiciously eyed him.
'My lord, you will just have to learn to trust your old teacher!'
On the last word his hand fell down on the Prince's shoulder.
Janus more felt than saw the flash that erupted from the spirit. Flea leaped at the Pawn, who still stood blinded by the magic force and fell to the same fate.
The magician's hands clenched into fists around something very small.
'Gotcha!'
'What are you doing?!' Janus shouted in his thoughts, his frail trust in the mystic wavering violently.
'Relax, cutie.'
Flea unclenched his hands and swept them over each other. Then he held up his right hand for Janus' inner eye. He kept two glistening pearls between three of his fingers.
'They'll be safe like this,' he explained and grimaced, 'but they'll sure be sour when they get out of there.'
'Think they'd prefer being warned before you do something like that,' Janus pointed out in a calmer voice than earlier.
'Ahh, that's a good idea. I'll do that next time,' Flea nodded with a chuckle.
He opened one of the pouches in his belt and neatly dropped the two pearls into it.
Janus shook his head with a light sigh.
'What about you then?' he asked.
'I think I'll be alright. My mind has no weak point in that parasite and I haven't got him inside of my head either.'
'Let's hope so then.'
'Aww, Janus, you care too?'
'Don't push me.'
The elevator reached the bottom and the passengers hurried onwards, knocking everyone getting in the way aside.
'By the way, haven't you learned to float?' Flea said in a casual voice.
'Float?'
'Ah, I guessed your teacher didn't learn. You'll need to take a rather wide leap soon, this should do it less complicated…'
Janus learned rather instantly that studying and running at the same time is a hard thing to do. He nearly went cross-eyed. Luckily Flea was done copying his knowledge within a couple of seconds.
'I can't believe I'm taking lessons from you…' the wizard grunted.
'You informally always did, cutie. Well, a version of me. In any case, here we go!'
"Whoa!" Marle shouted as she almost crashed into Crono, who nearly sent Janus into a sea of molten metal.
There's got to be a button for a bridge here somewhere! the red-hair called.
"The Mammon hall is just ahead!" Janus growled and took a few steps back.
"Jump that far?" Ayla skeptically said.
Janus shook his head.
"I'm not sure. But Flea seems to think I can fly, so let's try it out…"
"Jaaanus!"
But he rushed forwards and leaped on the hot edge, closing his eyes in concentration.
For a moment he felt insecure, then the air around him slowed down and he opened his eyes to see the other side of the lake closing in safely.
'You could have done it anyway,' Flea chuckled.
'Thanks, I guess.'
Janus turned around as he landed, smiling a bit at his surprised but cheering friends.
"I'll be gone saving the boy," he called, "I'm not sure when I'll be back, but I'll return!"
"Good luck, Janus!"
"The same to you…"
Clenching his teeth he turned to the open doorframe and dashed forwards, his feet leaving the ground as he sped up.
"Go to hell, Dalton!" he growled as he passed through the following room, feeling the man hide but not caring to fight.
'Oh, the look on his face!' Flea chuckled, 'though there's no use to ask someone to go below…'
Janus ignored him and zoomed forwards, Lavos' presence ripping closer in torn waves.
"If you don't let Janus go you'll never get my help!" Schala's voice screeched.
"And if you don't help he'll die!" the queen snarled back.
The royal wizard swung his staff at the guards on the bridge, sending them flying before they had time to realize what was happening.
"Zeal!" he roared.
All his life, all his training, all his worries, sacrifices and pain led up to this one moment.
Flea grimly smiled.
'We're with you all the way, Janus.'
Schala spun around and for a moment the prince stopped struggling against his guards. Even Alfador stopped hissing, trapped in a small cage behind the soldiers' feet.
"You could have chosen a wiser timing!" the queen growled and snapped her fingers.
The relieved glistening in the royal children's eyes wavered as the common Enlightened ones in the hall reached out and took each others' hands. They began to chant.
'Janus, Lavos is trying to make you use magic,' Flea warned, 'he doesn't really need Schala at this point; if the Mammon machine manage to transfer just a little bit more of Shadow energy to him, his body will have enough power to move.'
For half a second Janus hesitated.
'What would happen if he wouldn't show up now?' he wondered.
'Give me a second, I'll look it up to make sure… stall it somehow!'
"Zealans!" Janus shouted, "if your god awakens today your kingdom will crumble and be swallowed by the ocean!"
It affected a couple of the men and women, which halted the chanting for a brief moment.
"Don't listen to him, you fools!" the queen snapped and got them started again, "he's a madman!"
The whole list that Flea muttered took less than a heartbeat for Janus' mind to absorb, as the magician simply placed the information in the middle of his thoughts.
'If neither you nor Schala does his bidding then Lavos will make the queen fire her dark energy at the prince in two blasts. He'll parry the first with his own powers but will of course collapse, and the second wave will kill him.'
'Easy pick… crachert.'
'Indeed.'
'Crono, everyone, forgive me…'
"Dark powers of the Underworld, I dare to ask thee of strength! Worch crahela krun shar retetack!"
The Dark Mist flared towards the Mammon machine and stuck itself onto the statue's chest.
For a moment time seemed to stop function.
"At least it wasn't your fault this time, Schala," Janus said with a faint, bitter smile, now carrying hundreds of lives on his conscience.
The darkness dissolved, sucked up by the machine.
A quake tore through the room.
'If it's anyone's fault, it's Fate's,' Flea said in a surprisingly gentle voice, 'don't blame yourself.'
Janus sighed and mentally shook his head bitterly. Then he narrowed his eyes and swept straight towards the prince through the shaking room.
A sparkling darkness had begun to grown in the air only a couple of feet behind the boy.
With the shock of seeing the blue-haired man with the sharp staff added with the unsteady surroundings, the two soldiers choose to get themselves out of the line of fire. Janus' hand closed around the small prince's fingers and safely pulled him up against his bigger chest with an encouraging smile. His momentum was bringing them both into the Gate, even though its gravity would have done the job anyway.
"Don't worry, Schala!" Janus called over his shoulder, his free hand fumbling for Alfador's cage…
The flashing blackness surrounded him, the boy and the cat, and he stumbled forwards.
'It's Fate,' Flea's voice mildly said somewhere far away, 'did you remember to bring aspirin?'
'What…'
Janus staggered out in autumn cold grass, lost his balance but managed to spin over to avoid landing on the child. The cage left his hand but thumped onto the ground safely.
"What the hell?" an all too familiar, hoarse voice exclaimed.
The back of the wizard's head hit a rock and his world turned so white that he for a fading moment thought that his mind would implode.
But it faded… faded to black… black… stillness…
'Oh,' was his last, concluding thought before he lost consciousness.
"Get them!" he heard Ozzie command, as through a wall as he slipped from the world.
"Leave us alone!" the boy screeched.
If Janus had had the strength, he would perhaps have smiled a little.
Unheard, Flea said something quite uncharacteristic as he took a closer peek at the Ozzie before the troop.
'Bloody hell.'