Chrono Cross Second Journey

Fan Novelization

Book 3

0 Prologue

The old man pulled a white coat over him and into great chamber he walked. He had his clammy hands clasped behind him as he did. Walls of silver greeted him and on his weathered, wrinkled face they cast a faint color of blue. Yet in the centre of the chamber, sealed behind a great sphere of glass was a faint glow red as the flames of molten rock. It threw against the wall a great shadow of the old man, one as dark as it was looming. He regarded the fiery glow with caution whilst he walked and had raised around his mind a firm wall of resistance. But a moment later, when he tried to look away he found he had to peel his eyes from it. With much strength he finally tore himself from some growing desire in his heart, from a longing that nearly brought tears to his eyes.

He took a deep breath and sunk himself in the cool scent of metal and concrete. And behind his thick, white beard he wore a smile of bliss, for into his mind came drifting the fond memories of this place only a long day before. It was then a place of magnificence, a place where many dreams were chased and many hopes realized. It was a place with people who earned their lives through laborious routines, who loved each other like family, who, most of all, devoted their time to great causes. Amongst them he had lived, worked and laughed for several years at least. Through their temperaments and their struggles he had seen them, occasionally at best. Until it came a time when his task was done, when he had to depart with no more than a word he could leave behind. Then on, he left all else to the enigmatic designs of fate and this empty room was her result.

"Good day, my friend," said the old man.

"The craft you arrived in," said the cold, unfeeling voice of a lady from somewhere within the walls. "You must be..."

"You are observant," said the old man slowly. "Yes, indeed I am."

"It's about time you arrived. But if you were here early..."

"Surely I can't be late! No one runs late to the clocks of fate. And there's naught to sound wistful about! What has happened will happen. Not even I can stop it. You must know best by now: there is no such thing as speculation, no such thing as prediction. History is not being written as time flows; it has already been written many eons before our planet even existed. This conversation between you and I will always take place at this moment at this point in time, even if time were to rewind and the world would start from zero once more."

"That applies to no doubt everyone else in the world. Everyone, but one. He alone has the power to rewrite future."

"Speaking of which, what has happened thus far? It has been two long years since I met Serge at Viper's library. I suppose the Sacrament would just be over now? He has much to bear for a young boy," said the old man as he stroked thoughtfully his long, white beard.

"The Sacrament is over, and his soul now resides in Lynx's body."

"Is he all right?" asked the old with much concern.

"You know he is. You wouldn't have done all these otherwise."

"That is true," said the old man thoughtfully.

"For Serge, it will only be two short weeks. For you it has just been two years. But for me, a great many millennia have come and gone."

"Ten thousand years it has been, has it not? Yet this place hasn't aged a day."

"The passing of time erodes nothing here. We are forever caught in one point in time in the future, and the same moment rolls over again and again."

"The ultimate power of the Frozen Flame. The power which all seek to gain. That which is already in your hands."

"Power is worthless without control."

"Indeed! No one can control its power, unless he was the Arbiter himself. But still we have done well thus far. At the very least, we have tapped from it what we needed to achieve our goal. Already it is within reach, and soon it will be over. The past ten thousand years has certainly been hard on you."

"Nothing has been hard save for the fact that hardly I can find words to describe it. The passing of ten years is the same as that of one fleeting moment. Perhaps if I were a normal living being, then I would say that it has been long and wearisome."

"I see the Goddess knows humor."

"What humor that you think I have I don't. In any case, Dark Serge will walk past that door two days later, at exactly two hours and twenty-six minutes after midnight. What should follow after, I can no longer predict. It is my duty to inform you that you should leave this place before then."

"That will be two days away, so there's little to be worried about. For I trust fate and the delicate fabric of destiny: I will never stay long enough for him to find me. I'm here merely to bid farewell to a very old friend, and you have served your purpose well, I'm glad to say, though few would know of your noble deeds. But that is often true for heroes I fear! It just pains me to meet you for the first and last time and then at the end of it all, bid you goodbye."

"I need no recognition, for I would not appreciate any of it."

"For that we owe Prometheus gratitude. In what you now do, only the heartless will succeed. Those who harbor the slightest of feelings and those who desire and wish will err gravely."

At this, the old man flicked a wary glance at the fiery glow set within the sphere of glass. Immediately, the old man felt stinging in his heart a sharp pain, as if it was meant as a demonstration of certain reprisal from the brilliant flame. For that instant, he felt as if he had forcefully stolen from him his living breath. Sweat broke on his forehead like cold dews of a bitter icy morning while the vision in his eyes burst into all shapes and all colors. But as quickly as it came, the pain receded and life came back to him once more. After a deep, gratifying breath, he smiled and thought silently to himself.

"You do not seem well," said the cold voice of the lady.

"I'm a old man!" said the old man jovially. And then into laughter he burst.

x

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The boundaries of this mind reached far beyond the spaces of the earth and the time of the world. And there lay in its void an inexplicable calmness deeper than the night. A consciousness drifted then into the void, and sadness carried in it disturbed the stillness. A troubled memory wavered in the darkness, like the depths of the ocean beneath a rippling surface:

A fortress formed of stone fashioned to the like of a great bird whose wings spread in flight proudly stood in the center of the world. Built by the inhabitants of the world, it was an epitome of their age and their evolution and a great shrine to great beings of that world, who in that world and tongue was known as the Powers. For these Powers gave light and night to the Planet, and wind, rain, fires and all things that grew also. And the followers worshipped the Powers like kings and they in their hearts were glad.

At some time, it was decided that an offering be made, and the followers wrought in the caverns below the seas a gift to the Powers. They poured their souls into it and, watered with the heart of the lands and the seas, slowly it blossomed. And a hundred years had passed before the toils of both people and the Planet bore fruit, and a crystal was born in the embrace of the Planet's elements. Its size was small: it could be held in the palm of one's hand. But its love was great. For the sea shimmered within its crystal and the salts of the land shaped around it a sturdy shell. And in it was stored full of memories and knowledge of souls who had passed on creating it.

At last the gift was brought before the Powers and they were moved. But when they learnt that many had perished crafting it they became upset. They doubted its need and for all gifts to the Powers they needed not one spilled by the blood of the people who enshrined them. Yet, the Planet's role also was great, and for the fact She assisted meant only that the gift was a necessary honor. Then for a time the great Powers hesitated. But at last, they accepted with shame and humility the precious crystal, and thereafter in their tongue named it the Spirit of the Planet, the embodiment of the Elements. And they guarded safely the crystal and its secrets within that were yet to be unlocked.

And a time came when a man that entered their world forebode an ill future. Dressed in blue robes and stroking his long white beard he said to the Powers, "At last I have found you and your world, and now with me you shall soon follow! Fear not! By your grace both our worlds shall be liberated from the one being known as Lavos."

"Who are you? And whence you come?"

"I am a prophet in a world where the histories of our worlds since the beginnings of my kind divided. But they soon will intertwine in ways beyond even my own imagination."

So ended the memories of the past, about the time another drifting consciousness entered this realm. Their presence could be sensed by the first, Words were not spoken but instead communicated through thought.

"Early as usual," thought one consciousness.

"This is where my mind sits comfortably, in darkness and deep meditation," replied the other. "We'll just wait for the rest."

One by one came the minds into the realm, until six had arrived, and a council proceeded.

"The Arbiter chooses his path and the end is in sight. To what end it will now lead depends on him. A dark shadow lies in the east, and out of it the fires of the red crimson star will rise and once more smother our planet in flames, if he fails."

"The Seventh is now poised," said the leader.

"And the wheels have already been set in motion. Ever our sleeps have been plagued by painful memories of the Great Battle ten thousand years ago. Time and again we ask why: Why did the Planet send us over? To witness how far the mutants have gone with the art of tempest and destruction? Surely we were weak against machines that have no souls, machines that feel no pain."

They fell silent. In the darkness of the mind a memory of the blue sky took shape. And the fortress stood within a sea of great bergs and glaciers. A great host of crafts of silver metal soared across from the east towards the great fortress and there they unleashed from their bellies pellets that struck the citadel with the cracks of thunder and scorches of fire.

Defenseless the fortress could but resign to the ruin brought upon them. But in desperation the Powers prayed to the Planet for salvation, and the Spirit of the Planet answered. Six components of the Elements burst forth as energy from the blue crystal and swept outward of the fortress, and the crafts of metal disintegrated. Men were seen falling from their crafts and plunging into the ocean, to their deaths. The crystal was thus shattered and its power lost, but the enemy was not broken. A great seal of flame enclosed the fortress and slowly into a depthless dark it consumed the Powers. In time the seal faded, and the fortress was left to stand without lord or owner.

"We fell to the enemy."

And night blotted out the memory.

"Ten thousand years has been too long a time to sleep behind the seal of fire. Once evil is cleansed and the seal broken, we shall wake from our sleeps. Together, we may yet live to witness the death of the red star and its progeny."

"Do not yet throw caution to the wind, if ever there is any here to speak of. The Seventh may still flounder. She may have our souls but still she remains human. Her heart already has been shaken."

"She will succeed," said the leader. "For only in her, we must have our faith. She will succeed."