It awakened from the darkness.
There! A call to awaken and serve! To move across the planes of time and space, to grow in power and dominate lesser beings. A dream lost for many years, lying dormant in the soil of the little planet housing the few city states that decryed themselves as great. A sparsely populated place, that much was true; and with little hope to ever leaving it. The First had come here, yes, but then it had also been destroyed, together with olders. They did not care for leaving.
But it could smell it in the faint line of power that called it to awaken. Another world, ripe with thousands, waiting to be invaded by a greater intelligence. Begging to be subjegated to its power, directed for its benefit. The time at last had come... and with that thought, the planet shifted, shaking the creature fully awake from it's slumbers.
Yes indeed, the time had come...
Garrett stirred lazily as the breeze wafted along the upper deck. Beside him, Felix shifted his feet as he stared out across the railing. The voyage had been pleasantly uneventful, lacking even the customary attacks by the occasional sea creature. The continent was due to come into view sometime before sundown, and yet for some reason that he did not fully comprehend, the earth adept was nervous. Garret smiled to himself, thinking of the purpose for the visit.
Felix was of course impatient and slightly nervous to meet the young wind adept again, but at present his mind was fidgetting over a concern that was nagging at the edges of his consciousness: the stillness of the voyage. Usually there was at least one or two pseudo-combats per journey with the creatures that inhabit the waters betwixt each of the continents, but according to the captain, not even a single sighting on this trip. The superstitious members of the crew murmured low and long about bad omens and shipwrecks, while the more open minded enjoyed the reprieve from danger.
At first, Felix had been grateful for the lack of monsters to engage on the journey. He'd done enough of that sort of thing while on his quest to light the four elemental lighthouses. Peace was what he'd been hoping for ever since then. But as the voyage drew near to it's close, the venus adept began to ponder the possible meaning behind the phenomena.
"Land ho!"
A shout from atop the mast brought him out of his reverie with a start. Beside him, Garret jumped to his feet and gripped the railing to steady himself against the movement of the ship. "Yes! Finally we get there!" Red hair blowing back and forth in the wind, the fire adept looked almost like a living torch. He grinned and winked as he looked back at Felix.
"Think they know we're coming?"
The earth adept pondered the question for a few moments before tendering an answer. "They know." Garret frowned as he puzzled it out. "Oh yeah, I forgot, they have Master Hamma with them. She seems to know a lot of stuff before it happens."
"Yeah, that's the way it is with Jupiter adepts. Something about the wind allows them to see things beyond the present." Felix paused to lean again on the rail and gaze longingly at the dark strip on the horizon. "Sheba is like that. She, well, she makes me really want to go out and do good. To win her favor, just to make her smile. It's almost as if I can see her with me in the future, and I hope..." the adept stopped fumbling his words together as they didn't make any sense, even to himself. The ideas were there, but the mind refused to allow the tongue to do them justice.
Garret nodded sympathetically. *He understands.* Felix sighed with relief, a feeling that changed to terror in the moments following.
From behind them, someone shouted an alarm.
The captain turned to look and swore aloud. "All hands! Batten the hatches and prepare for rough weather!" The two adepts blinked at one another in confusion, before turning to ask what the problem was. There was nary a cloud in the sky...
The question went unasked as they stared in amazement and rising fear at the wall of water rushing towards them.
The scene at the castle was pure pandemonium. Marle had been awake for some hours, staring at the patch of sky visible from her balcony, but the growing noise in the courtyard and castle hallways had brought her out of her contemplations. Frowning, she hurried to the throne room, certain that explanations could be had there.
As she stepped through the private side door, the princess could see her father, the King Guardia, listening with grave attention to the three persons standing in front of the throne. Moving forward, she recognized them as some of the villagers she had seen during the past festival. All three were drenched with the ocean's spray, and seemed to have had a rough fight with the elements, if their clothes were any indication.
"...village is gone. Now we're just trying to pull out survivors. Is there anything you can do, your majesty? Boats? Anything at all?"
King Guardia looked over at his daughter, standing still by the door and nodded sympathetically. Turning back to his subjects, he stood and gestured to the soldier by the door. "Captain, tell the guard to gather every man available for the rescue effort. See to it that any boats we may have are sent out to comb the ocean for survivors. Also, make sure that field shelters are provided for temporary housing - and food!"
The soldier saluted his liege and turned quickly on his heels to rush out of the room. The villagers looked extremely grateful and bowed their heads before trudging out to resume their work. The king looked back to where his daughter had been but a moment before; she was gone.
"Ah, Nadia..." the old king sighed to himself, "For your sake, let it not be a time of grief. Let your loved one survive."
Lucca held on to the pole with a deathgrip. The water that swirled around her waist still threatened to take her out with the tide, but up to the present, the flag pole that she had managed to cling to still held firm. So she closed her eyes and held tightly to the only thing that gave her a sense of safety. No Lucca the Great here, just Lucca the frightened teenager, who'd just seen her best friend get washed out to sea.
Well, seeing wasn't exactly the most technically correct word to use in the circumstance - she'd been submerged when Chrono's hand had been ripped away from her's and by the time she broke the surface and found something to keep her steady, there hadn't been a soul in sight.
She shuddered with cold and cautiously peeked her eyes open to peer at the surrounding area. Debris from houses and sheds littered the water around her. Some buildings farther off the shore still stood, and she could make out lights in the windows, so someone should have escaped... Hope they come for me soon; I'm not sure how long I can stay here like this.
Her silent plea was answered by the sound of oars, and a large rowboat manned by four soldiers from Guardia Castle. They spotted the girl and pulled for her direction. "Hang in there! We've almost got to you!"
Lucca sighed with relief when the boat glided even with her position, and a pair of large hands pulled her into safety. A blanket was wrapped around her shoulders, and the soldiers took up searching the area again for survivors...
Later, Lucca huddled in front of a large bonfire, far back from the current waterline. Her clothes were dry by this time, and she stared morosely into the flames, absorbed in the total insanity of the 'natural disaster'. As far as she could recall, nothing like this had ever happened - excepting of course, the planetary implosion caused by Lavos in a future that would never happen.
A hand on her shoulder brought her back to the present, and she looked up into the worried eyes of Princess Nadia. "Lucca, are you...?"
The inventor nodded, bringing up her hand to adjust her glasses on her nose. "Just fine, but Chrono..." Her voice trailed off and a tear spilled over to run down her cheek. "Damn! Why now?"
Marle knelt down and embraced her friend, tears running unchecked on her own face. For some minutes the two sat commiserating their loss. Finally Lucca worked up the courage to continue on. "We were sitting on the beach watching the sun come up, since we couldn't sleep," Here Marle's eyes widened and she nodded in understanding. "when this wall of water rises up out of the blue and decides to swallow up our entire home. Chrono tried to get us back to safety, but something ripped us apart, and I haven't seen him since."
"So, he might be dead or," Marle hesitated over the word, "alive."
Lucca merely nodded. "Seeing that it's Chrono we're talking about here, I'd like to think that it's the latter, but we should be prepared just in case..."
Guardia's princess nodded mutely, unwilling to even acknowledge the possibility with a verbal assent. Oh Chrono! Be safe, come back home!
Meanwhile on an unknown shore...
The lone swordsman paused in his trek across the brush and rocks to look back across the sea. Be strong, Marle; I'm coming back to you! His shoulders squared to the task ahead, and he plunged forward over the crest of the hill and was lost to sight.