Chrono Cross Second Journey

Fan Novelization

2   A Calling From Beyond Time

Serge grabbed his swallow and headed for the woods. After estimating the time it would take for Leena to end the swim and bathe the kids, he decided to take a short detour to Cape Howl before heading to the Lizard Rock.

Cape Howl was an outcrop in the hills beyond the woods, northwest of Arni, facing perfect west. Below the end of the Cape was the sea where the waves below crashed periodically into the jagged walls of the cliff, as though the sea had its own life, beating a slow heartbeat of its own. Islands of trees and sandy beaches, and dormant volcanoes as mountains adorned the vast expanse of an ocean blue, a picturesque panorama that one could behold only from such altitude at Cape Howl. The Sky Dragon Isle was among of these islands, unusually tall, crescent-shaped when looked down upon from above. It was an island on which many years ago lived the Sky Dragon and overlooked the lands and the people in El Nido.

The sun was up in the sky, but it shied behind the plumes of cotton white that mushroomed under the cerulean blue. Little wisps of clouds drifted quickly as if energetically; large ones drifted slowly, burdened by its weight. They merrily gathered, painfully separated and then joyfully reunited. Those who came into path of the sun burned at the edges of its silhouette in its moment of darkness. Yet, they remained resilient, unwavering, as they went about unhindered until they drifted clear off the sun's path into peaceful skies.

The Cape was a place to enjoy the breeze, take a nap, or ponder over life, whenever Serge had the time. Then again, he had plenty of time.

The particular landmark was an unusual stone that protruded out of the ground, like the lower tooth of a huge, monstrous beast. On the face of the stone was the inscription of the mind of a young, innocent girl by the name of Leena, an inscription that Serge had little need to read, for it had already been etched into his memory:

In our hearts forever,

Our summer when we were 12.

Serge and Leena.

He walked further to the end and lied down near the edge of the protrusion. It had been five years since that evening. Yet, it seemed only like yesterday.

That evening, Leena had just turned twelve. Serge's birthday was over several weeks ago, but his mother, Marge, and everyone else in the village had decided to hold the celebrations on Leena's. He could not remember any birthday celebrations held with such grandeur, not in the royal sense, but by Arni's standard. It was an extremely joyous evening for the entire community, one never to be forgotten, one with the singing, dancing, feasting and heavy boozing (for the adults only, naturally).

He had indeed found the bash quite a refreshing, welcomed change, up until Una found it necessarily to rally the villagers to coax Serge and Leena into dancing in the center of the village, which he found to be extremely embarrassing. The invitation was difficult to refuse, just as it was difficult to accept. Leena pulled him from his seat and bravely initiated the dance, much to the delight of everyone. He often suspected that the entertainment for that night was not the food or the wine, not Leena's gleeful and sometimes innovative hops, but his flushed face and his clumsy falls while hopelessly trying to keep up with Leena's lead. Admittedly, he did not put in any effort.

The dance was over, but the ordeal wasn't, for that cheeky brother of Leena's had to suggest Serge kiss Leena, a suggestion at which the whole village roared in encouragement. Serge found no reason to put his lips onto hers. He lacked the courage to voice his mind, and lacked the heart to hurt a good friend. The audience's claps and encouraging chants grew in strength. If his face wasn't hot enough to cook an egg before, it was now. Leena eventually came slowly over to him, held him close to her, arms wrapped round his neck, and laid her warm lips softly onto his. Silence fell, and that moment froze for as long as he could remember. Leena's lips finally left his. Immediately, she turned away from Serge and ran back home, covering her face in blissful embarrassment. Completely stunned, Serge stood rooted to the ground, his cheeks and ears burning in the cool summer night. The whole village broke out in laughter and claps, as if it were already a wedding.

Later that night, when the village was sound asleep, Leena sneaked into Serge's room and pulled him out from bed. He was initially reluctant. He eventually caved and permitted Leena to drag him out of the house and out of the village.

"Shhh!" hushed Leena. "Let me bring you to a secret place!"

"Where?" Serge asked, dazed, unimpressed. He wanted to curl into his bed, curl into hiding from Leena.

"Come with me and you'll know!"

Leena thoughtfully brought with her an oil lamp, which she made to sure light only after they were safely out of the village.

"Mom always tell us not to wonder around," Serge reminded, afraid of the wild animals, especially of the panther-demons, who might find him once again an easy bite, like one did some nine years ago.

But twelve-year-old Leena seem the least bothered.

"No worries! I brought along the pans! We can fight them off if they bite us!" said Leena optimistically as she gave to Serge one of her two pans she stole from her mother's kitchen. "Here, take it!"

The "secret place" was Cape Howl, where Serge had never visited before. That night, he learnt of its name for the first time, a name so terrifying, it made his hair stand on ends. He imagined a "cape" worn by an assassin who stood on the edge of a tall mountain, his silhouette jet black against the backdrop of the star-studded night. He imagined the "howl" with which the assassin's wolf companion would eerily cry into the full moon in the sky. He imagined too much. But he wondered how he could have permitted himself to be at this very place, at this ungodly time of the night.

Leena walked over to the stone protrusion, bent down and put the lamp beside her. Leena turned around to Serge.

"Serge! Over here!" she called out.

"What's that?" asked Serge impatiently as he shivered in the dark. He was unsure of whether he shivered from the cold breeze rushing towards the sea, or the fear of the prospects of another encounter with a poisonous creature.

"See this?" she said, pointing to the stone protrusion excitedly. "I am going to write something on this; something only the two of us will know!"

Leena took out a little sharp stone that she hid in her waist sash and began carving furiously on the rock. Serge stood behind her and kept watch on their six. Hands folded across his chest, the watchman shivered and chattered, as if he suffered withdrawal from an addiction, an addiction such as his safe, soft bed. Every single stroke she took was a longer drag that Serge could not wait to get out of. In a less tense circumstance, he could be thinking beyond the world into the profound concepts of living and dying. But in such a night, at such a place, his mind and thoughts were frozen from the cold clasp of terror.

"Yes!" Leena declared when she finally finished. Beads of perspiration on her forehead gleamed under the yellow of the lamp. "It's finally done!"

Serge bent down and ran his fingers through the face of the rock. "It's deep," he said.

"Like it?" she asked with a grin.

"Well..." Serge hesitated, "it's er... okay."

"Okay? After all the effort, it's just okay?"

"It's nice," Serge swallowed uneasily.

"That's more like it!" she said proudly.

Leena pulled him to the edge of the crop, sat beside each other at the edge of the outcrop, facing a void of blackness that was the sea. Serge found himself intermittently turning his head back to look. Each time, he expected to see a pair of eyes, that of a black poisonous panther, that which glowed by the yellow of the lamp. Fortunately, he saw nothing of the likes.

"Serge?" asked Leena.

"Yes?"

"The stars are pretty, aren't they?"

"Yes."

"Look at the two moons!" Leena said, as she pointed her finger into the sky.

"What about them?"

"They are always together, side by side," Leena said with a softer tone, as she brought her hands back down.

"Yes, I know."

"Do you know that there was only one moon long, long ago?"

"Is that so?"

"Yes. I heard that from my mother. She told me that there used to be only one bright, silver moon, all alone in the sky. He was such a poor thing. A smaller, red moon then came from a far away place. She realized that the silver moon was lonely, and she decided to stay by his side for the rest of his life."

"Okay."

"She's so sweet, isn't she?"

"Well..." Serge shrugged, unable to comprehend her strange personifications.

"Serge?"

"Yes?"

"Promise me something, Serge."

"What?" asked Serge, puzzled, and fearful of a commitment he might be too soft-hearted to refuse.

"Promise me that you will always remember this day."

"What for?" Serge breathed relief.

"Just promise me!"

"Okay."

"Hee-hee. Thanks, Serge..."

Serge opened his eyes.

He shook his head and smiled at the silliness. At the age of twelve, he understood little of what Leena meant at that time. But, as all girls do, Leena probably took the incident very seriously; evident from what she had done for Serge. He had to tell her that things weren't they way they were. The only question was how.

He got up, stretched himself and took a half hour walk down south.

The Lizard Rock was a set of rocky hills that divided Opassa Beach and the central continent down the southwest of Arni. Each side of the Rock was a shallow bay of water that was part of the larger ocean. A layer of sediment, garbage and the looks of a swamp carpeted the water bays. Sand rocks from the small to the monolithic stacked on top of each other formed the rocky hills that were a sight of dirty brown from afar. Soil and sand coagulated between the stacked rocks, from which abundant grass and dry bushes sprouted.

Small caverns the height of a child and few large ones tall as a five adults were homes to dragon-like lizards called the Komodo Lizards that littered the Rock. These Lizards were generally believed to be the offspring or the evolved descendants of wild Dragonians in the distant past, for they bore the same look of the reptilian beings. Yet, unlike their ancestors, their species lacked the intelligence and the lucrative lure the northern settlers wanted. The lizards were independent animals which usually moved about alone, so hunting down one was usually easy.

The little caverns were also homes to a blue animal that looked like penguins but weren't quite. They had huge bulky frames that looked like eggs, walked on two and grew two fins. They had no head, but had eyes and mouth on their egg-shaped body. They were lazy creatures that looked silly and acted silly, and had therefore been conveniently associated with a person's backside. Put two side by side, they looked like such, too. People called them the Beachbums. It was an acronym for the longer "bums on the beach," a common colloquial slang.

He spotted a small lizard the height of a child from far, standing and unsuspectingly gazing at the vast ocean near the bay of the Rock. Serge crept up slowly to a strategic hill several meters behind the lizard. He hid, watched, and waited for the moment to creep over, pounce for its neck, then severe it instantly to ease its death.

Fine plan, he thought.

Gripping his swallow tight behind him, making sure that its long blades did not brush plant growth and scratched the ground, he stood up quietly from his vantage point. He advanced as the lizard bent its head down into the sandy water for a sip. As soon as the lizard dipped its head deep into the water, Serge leapt at it, his left hand aiming straight for its neck. He missed. The lizard jolted, screamed and fled. Serge jumped to his feet and gave chase.

The lizard was nowhere as fast as Serge, but it negotiated the terrain with agility, hopping from side to side and darting across the brown, dirty hills. The lizard was heading home to its cavern, screaming away for help.

Serge stepped up his pace, determined not to let the lizard have its wish. The lizard jumped across a small hill to another. Serge leapt. The distance between the lizard and Serge was closing, as was the distance between the Lizard and its home. Serge full throttled forward at a point where the lizard's safe haven was less than two hundred feet away. Predator and prey knew the lizard would never make it safely back. Just as Serge opened his steps and closed in for the catch, the lizard made a bolt to the left, just less than fifty feet away from the mouth of his home. It jumped up the slopes of a rocky hill to its top and darted into a bush. Serge reacted immediately, turned sharply to his right, leapt and ascended the hill to continue his hot pursuit. At only about twenty feet from the lizard, Serge was fairly close. While the bushes that covered a large area of this hill hindered his movements, it also slowed the lizard's speed. When they were out of the bushes into the sandy terrain, this spelled trouble for the creature. It shrieked for life.

Serge made the jump as soon as he was close enough and caught the lizard by the neck. Terrified, it screamed, squirmed and clawed wildly. Its tail flapped from side to side violently as it tried to wriggle from its predator's clutches. The muscles at the shoulders of the Lizard contracted vigorously as Serge held on to its scaly, slippery neck with his left hand, which began to slide from his grip.

Serge sliced his swallow neatly through its neck, from which blood gushed forth, soiling his clothes. The headless carcass thumped to the ground, twitching for a short while before it came to a complete stop. The lifeless head had stopped screaming, its eyes wide open. The blood that was initially spurting was now steadily oozing out of the neck of the carcass. The head, from which blood had been completely drained, now felt cold to the touch. Discarding the gut-churning remains from his hand, he bent down to the carcass on the ground and began to skin the Lizard's scales.

When he finished, he stored the scales away safely in his vest pocket, and decided to head to Opassa Beach. Before he could stand, he heard a loud roar and felt his whole body volley forward. His swallow slipped.

The cries of the young Komodo Lizard had roused the attention of its mother, who was bitter and desired revenge, that her child had been brutally murdered. Serge, the hunter, was now the hunted.

Serge crashed onto the ground hard with a cry, at which the mother lizard gloated with a disdainful roar. Serge recovered to his feet and clenched his fists before himself in defense, paying no heed to the extra scratches on his arms, and the sore in his back and ankle. His arms trembled at the sight of the monstrous creature.

The mother lizard had a body about twelve feet tall, and including her tail, she was as long as five times the height of Serge. Her eyes were huge and grew out of her heads like that of toad, only their size were much bigger for the body she had. She was good for a pair of razor sharp dentals, a vicious stare and a breath worse than the pungent smell of rotten food. But she walked on fat fours that grew dirt-clogged and worn out nails. Her oversized, bloated body made her cumbersome and her movements rigid.

Its awkward body was an advantage that calmed Serge, but only for a while, for the mother lizard had all the weapons. With his swallow was now resting comfortably below the bloated lizard, Serge was a sitting duck. He cursed himself for having made a dear mistake. One wrong move, he could be this creature's teatime.

The mother lizard roared again as she inched slowly towards him, sending a wave of fear through his ribs. The weaponless Serge retreated as mother Lizard advanced. She stopped. Serge stopped. The two looked at each other's eyes, sizing up each other's weakness, looking for one moment of fear which would undoubtedly fire the trigger for the fearless' attack. The pupils in the mother lizard's eyes contracted and relaxed as she focused on Serge, the very being who murdered her child. She opened her mouth with a stinking, suffocating bellow, and exposed her teeth hungry for vengeance, ready to sink them into its foe and meal.

At the sight of her vibrating tonsils and the thought of being swallowed whole, Serge jellied at his legs. He took a wobbly step back slowly and carefully, and then one after another towards his survival. His head, bandana and his back was wet with perspiration. His breathing was quick and totally out of rhythm. His heart pounded and resonated throughout his every muscle.

Waiting was no solution. Serge slowly reached for his Elements in his pocket. The suspecting lizard bellowed as she squinted and crept towards Serge. Lifting the Element bead between his eyes, he spelled a blazing fire that exploded upon the lizard's body. The mother lizard cried in pain as the flare burnt away at her skin. Seizing the window of opportunity, he spelled another two fires on the mother lizard that erupted large balls of flares over the lizard. She stomped, wriggled and circled hysterically, desperately trying to rid her body of the fire that was slowly but surely consuming her body and her very soul. But her desperation and wild movements only hastened the spread of the fire to other parts of her body. The roars soon reduced to weak murmurs, her fours rooted to the ground. Her fats were burnt to the crisp, overcooked, charred, and her vision completely disabled. The mother lizard resigned to her tragic misfortune that had befallen on her family on a single day, resigned to death that was coming to claim her.

With the fire still raging fiercely, eating its way past the flesh, the mother lizard was decapitated. But only until Serge was sure the mother lizard was completely motionless did he retrieve his swallow. Weapon back in hand, he finally breathed with ease and proceeded to the meeting point with care, and his six carefully guarded.

Opassa Beach, a beach south of Lizard Rock, was touted as the beach with the softest, whitest sands that stretched a mile-long expanse. The beach was also known for its crystal clear waters, the breaking waves that foamed a soft sheet of white over the sands, the reflection of the sky's colors on the wet of the sands as the waves retreated, as if there were another heaven on earth. The air was fresh, the wind cool, and the panoramic view of the southern isles of the entire archipelago scenically unobstructed. But the qualities never drew the crowd to this potential recreational escape, for its inconvenient location across the Lizard Rock made it dangerous for many to venture over, especially children. Perhaps that was why the sands could remain so white, its waters so clear.

Serge walked over to the waves, bent down, washed the blood stains off his arms and clothes, and had the lizard scales scrubbed thoroughly until they gleamed with a gradient of the rainbow against the afternoon sun.

"There you are!" came Leena's voice from behind Serge, just as he finished cleaning the last of the scales.

He stood up and walked to Leena.

"Sorry I'm late. I hope you didn't wait too long, Serge. Well? How'd it go? Did you get the Komodo scales?"

"Here they are," said Serge as he handed the now glittering Komodo Lizard rainbow-colored scales over to Leena.

"Oh, they're beautiful!" exclaimed Leena delightfully.

Soon, the smile departed from her face, and she stared blankly at the scales and never looked up. She mumbled softly under her breath, and then she stopped and bit her lips. She said nothing more, walked a little further way from him and took her seat there.

Serge put his swallow down on the sands before him. Hands on his waist, he gazed into the faraway skies. The close encounter with the mother lizard quickly forgotten, he was soon lost in thought, pondering over the beauty of the simple azure in the skies above the fluffy clouds. The two were quiet for a moment as the waves washed gently up and down the beach, speaking its presence in the absence of speech.

"Serge?" said Leena finally, breaking the silence.

"Yes?"

"The sea..." she said unusually gently, a behavior that troubled Serge.

"What about the sea?"

"The sea never changes, does it? It's been rolling in and out, like this, since before we were born," said Leena slowly, pausing sentence after sentence as she closed her eyes and listened to immerse herself into the environment, to be part of it. "It's been here for eternity, it seems. It's probably seen many things, heard many things. It'll probably keep rolling in and out, long after our lifetime. Without a single change."

Serge agreed, but only in silence.

"Hey, Serge," called Leena as she turned up to look at Serge. "Remember we used to sit and talk like this when we were kids? With the gentle sea breeze and the tranquil sound of the waves?  Just the two of us, talking. Serge? Do you still remember... that day?"

"Yes, I do," he said softly, as if he almost didn't want to be heard.

"Really? You do?" Leena sounded as moved as she was delighted. "You haven't forgotten about the promise we made? That makes me... happy."

As Serge expected, she took the promise seriously. Her indulgence in the bliss made him wonder how he would tell Leena that the promise he made meant nothing more than a promise made to a friend.

"But aren't memories strange?" she continued. "Just when you think that you've forgotten about something, it comes floating back into your heart. I guess it's just lying there in wait, waiting for that right moment. Why, we might even remember this very moment someday! In ten, twenty years, when we're all grown up and married, and have kids of our own. Then one day, when that time comes, I wonder what kind of adults we'll be? What kind of life will I be leading? I wonder what to make of this day? I wonder if we'll forget all that happened today?"

Leena paused for a while, seemingly waiting a response.

"I doubt so," Serge finally said.

"Yes, I hope you're right," Leena said with a smile in her voice.

An odd wind blew. He felt its strength tingle his cheeks and brushed his arm, but it failed to ruffle his fringe, flap his sleeves, and howl in his ears. It felt as though wind blew, and as though none did. It was probably the climate, Serge dismissed, which had been experiencing unpredictable changes in the recent years.

"Serge, there's been something I've wanted to say for a while now," Leena said, breaking Serge away from his climatic conjectures.

He turned to look at Leena, who was looking down at sand and tracing little circles on it. She had something to say, but was hesitating, something she didn't do often. The unlikeness of her troubled him more.

"Serge."

A sudden, strange and mysterious voice out of nowhere startled Serge, as he looked anxiously about for the person who called him.

"What? What's wrong, Serge?" Leena asked curiously.

"Serge," came the strange voice again. It was that of a girl's, but not of Leena's. It spoke from far away, yet starkly audible. The voice was omni-directional, yet, it seemed to come from a definite source. He waited and hoped hear that voice speak once more. But he heard none. He stepped forward as he continued to turn and investigate his surroundings. But he saw nothing visually unusual.

"Serge? Are you alright?" Leena asked as she stood up to her feet.

He turned to Leena and wanted to ask her if she heard anyone calling. Before he could speak, he heard the washing of the waves.

He turned to the sea, only to see, to his horror, the waves of the sea crawling towards him, defying all gravity, defying all logic earthly. The foam of the waves gained in size and grew from little specks of white to large bubbles huge enough to swallow him. He wanted to run, but his legs refused to move. He wanted to shout for Leena, but his mouth insisted that keeping shut was his best option. His vocal cords quivered feebly, without a tone of shriek audible to his own ears.

The waves crept up to him, rose up above his eye-line and soon totally surrounded his field of vision. A huge swirling whirlpool of water and bubbles engulfed him, masking his hearing with a familiar yet horrifying sound -- the sound of him drowning and gasping for breath as he coughed bubbles of air from his mouth, like he must have experience ten years ago. The water whirlpool before him spun faster and faster. Its gyration vacuumed the sense from his mind and the soul from his body. He felt himself plunging, free-falling into an abyss, gradually overcome by a darkness that eventually engulfed him completely.