"Reeeoooow….."
"Reow?" The soft sound was coming from somewhere by her left ear. Lucca groaned and rubbed at her eyes.
"Reow!"
Something soft and furry nudged her face, but she laid still... until something warm, wet, and sandpapery began licking her nose.
"Wha?" she exclaimed, eyes snapping open in surpise.
An orange and green little fur ball slipped under her arms and began purring loudly. A smile lit up her face at the adorable image, but something sinister nagged at her. She stared up at the ceiling in dazed consternation, but the spell broke as Kino entered noisily.
"Ah! Lucca wake! Kino hear scream, find Lucca in trees. (I was in the trees? wondered Lucca) Also find many animals. Lucca hunt good. Big feast now for many days," Kino spurted out without pause. Or breath.
But it stirred something restless within her. Disjointed memories began to resurface and a sense of myterous urgency sprang into her. Lucca cuddled the blissful kitten to her, before rising unsteadily to her feet. Kino was perturbed by her silence as he watched her amble out of the hut, but there was a haunted look in her eyes that stilled his speech. He shook his head thoughtfully, and turned his attentions to simpler matters. He hated complexity.
By the river's edge, Lucca gazed contemplatively into the rippling waves. Her iridescent image was glistening in the sunlit water; a fallow cavewoman stared back at her, and the false identity woke her to reality. It was time to stop the façade. Maybe one day, she might come here once more. A fluffy little cat joined her reflection and looked up at her with silent questioning. She turned to it.
"I have to go back," she affirmed, more to herself than her companion..
I know, the cat seemed to say. He nudged her foot affectionately.
"You're a silly one, you know that?" Lucca kneeled down upon the earth and scratched its chin. Her sweet comrade smiled at her and she picked him up warmly. "Well, let's go then!"
"Reow!"
Lucca was back in her regular outfit once more, and she was surprised at how odd it felt. The orange and green attire had been with her for years, and since it could be adjusted, she literally grew up with it on. Many people in Guardia had often teased her for wearing such unflattering, unfashionable clothing, but it was practical for her trade and earlier adventuring. Her kitten seemed to be fascinated by her "change of skin" and had been staring wonderingly at the colors they now shared. When she had arrived at the chief's hut, she tried to give back her furry clothing, but Kino had told her, "This gift, Lucca keep." And strangely, she had been reluctant to part with it, and gratefully slipped it into her bag. Kino had also handed her a sack of supplies that he said were for all the animals she had hunted for the village. In it were twelve mid-tonics, six heals, and a prehistoric shelter.
She had thanked him sincerely and with her cat sitting precariously on her left shoulder, had made her way to the Mystic Mountains.
Her fiery reputation had spread through the ranks of all the monsters, (by various squeaks, roars, grunts, and squawks) and none dared to enter in her vicinity. Except for the shist she had unfinished business with, which she had easily dispatched by accidentally stepping on its tongue (it wobbled off crying).
They soon reached the portal, and Lucca cradled her kitten in her arms.
"This will be a bit scary… hold on!" and she took a running leap off the ledge. Her kitten squealed in fear as they became airborne, but was cut off as the gaping portal swallowed them.
Once more, Lucca was hit with a feeling of pressing urgency as she entered the End of Time. An unnatural silence seemed to blanket the area, and her breathing became fearfully loud and raspy. Her kitten had scuttled out of her rigid embrace and was actively smelling everything in sight. His human took no notice of him but was staring intently at the door that led to the main room. She took a deep, uneasy breath and hesitantly pressed on the door. It opened little by little, creaking sharply as it progressed. When it was a good ways open, she slipped though and prepared herself for whatever greeted her.
Nothing.
She drew a sharp breath. Ayla's usual corner was oddly empty, and the engulfing silence meant the wild cavewoman was not in Spekkio's Room either. What sent chills down her body was the absence of the old man, who never ever left his post. The bucket-portal to Lavos leered at her, and she nearly scurried out of the room. Increasingly irked by the second, she tiptoed towards Spekkio's door and abruptly halted as hushed whispers pierced her ears. Lucca shakily leaned her head against the door and swallowed.
"This wasn't supposed to happen, Spekkio…"
"Oh? The kid shouldn't have…" she couldn't catch that bit, "…was brave though."
Kid. It struck a deep chord within her, and she tore back into the Room of Pillars. Without pausing to answer the questioning meow of her pet, or the sudden calls of Gaspar and Spekkio who had heard her hasty retreat, she threw herself into the pillar to 12,000 BC.
Faster, faster! she silently urged the blue vortex of time travel. But the swirls lazed around her, and she was forced to withstand minutes of eternity, a sluggish pace to her million-miles-an-hour thoughts.
At last, the hazy violet winds cleared away, and she was dropped into a sea of blinding white. A sudden pop erupted behind her, and she turned to see the portal mysteriously vanish. If she could not find her friends, she would be stranded here. Lucca forced this new turn of circumstances out of her mind, and allowed her dark premonitions to occupy her. When she finally opened her eyes to her scenery, she immediately sensed that something was terribly off. It was true that she had only been to the time period once, but a feeling of disaster enveloped the air. She looked up towards the continent in the sky and gasped. Gone was the kingdom that hovered so naturally in the sky above. Gone was the shadow it cast over the lower lands. But she knew that the deepening hole in her heart had nothing to do with it, and staggered onwards.
Icy winds wrapped their cold fingers about her, and she scolded herself for how ill dressed she was. She slung her fur cape about her shoulders, but it could only do so much. Her innate fire magic protested harshly against the weather, and a fire aura burst out protectively around her. Lucca had been traveling southwest for the past three hours, but the snow uniformly blanketed the ground miles in every direction, and it made her stomach queasy. It felt as though she was headed nowhere, and her only reassurance was the compass clutched painfully in her right hand. Her left shoulder was stiffened by the weight of her bag, and she shifted it ceaselessly.
Accompanied only by the sounds of her own breathing and the crunchy footfalls into the snow, she was lulled into a deep reminiscing state. Memories long forgotten, buried under the soil of industry and knowledge, untied themselves from her subconscious.
Flashback
A young boy with tousled red hair rested snugly in the snow, green-eyes beaming as the falling snowflakes danced on his nose. His eyelids gently closed as he submerged himself deeper in his fluffy nest of sparkling white.
"BLMPH!" An explosion of snow mopped the peaceful expression off his face, and he shot out of his snowy bed.
"LUCCA!" he hollered out, bits of snow flying off his face.
The giggling girl ducked behind a tree and hugged her heaving sides. She had been strolling towards Leene Square to hear the bell chime, when she stumbled upon his snowy serenity. It was an opportunity she couldn't miss, though his tranquil expression had almost deterred her. Almost. Crono's transformation had been priceless, and she burst out laughing as she replayed it.
"WHUMPH!"
"Hey!" she cried as the bulky snowball plowed into her side. Crono was advancing rapidly with an armload of arsenal, and she was snowball-less. Lucca dove behind a boulder and a snowball detonated at the very top of it. As she heard his footsteps crunch closer and closer, she coiled her legs and braced her hands against the icy ground.
And… NOW! She launched herself forward and tackled him. They tumbled cacophonously to the ground, and when they tried to break apart, a large snowdrift collapsed upon them. Like moles, they burst out of their snowy prisons, laughing that sweet chiming laugh that only children could. After another hour of frolicking in the snow, they laid side-by-side and gazed up at the cloudy sky.
"Where do you think the snow falls from?" came a soft, imploring voice.
And Lucca answered unhesitatingly, "The sky, of course!"
"…No… I mean… why does it-? Do you think its magic?"
The girl thought hard about it, calling up all she had ever heard about snow. Most of the comments had been outlandish complaints from grownups, (how could they hate the feathery, white clay?), and she dismissed it all. Lucca held out her hand and let the snowflakes twirl gracefully into her open palm.
She smiled a deep, bright smile.
END FLASHBACK
Night was falling all around her, and she had yet to encounter any sign of life. Idly, she wondered if the entire era was deserted, and she wrapped the cape about her tightly. When her eyesight failed by the deepening shadows, she awkwardly pitched up her shelter and dove straight into it. Though she forgot her sleeping bag, her furry cape worked suprisingly well, and she snuggled her furry arm bracers for warmth. Exhausted in mind and body, she fell asleep easily.
The sun did not rise to meet the day, for the elderly clouds were rooted to the very sky. Mists of unease wrapped into her thoughts as she walked out into the morning's shadows. Lucca felt the static in the air, intense and remote, and she knew that something big was on the horizon. Within about an hour of walking, distant brown shapes broke the skyline. As she approached them, they morphed into crude huts of twisted metal and vegetation. The people there, however, were in far better spirits.
She approached one, a young Enlightened man.
"What happened here?"
He seemed a bit thrown that she had asked such a question, but her clothing tipped off that she wasn't from around there.
"About three days ago, great big orange spikes shot into Zeal and it was entirely demolished. Very few of us survived, and the Earthbounds didn't fare much better." He tilted his hat, and sighed. "Though I'm a bit reluctant to admit it… I believe it might have been Lavos."
Lavos…
A shudder rippled through her and she fought to suppress it. Her deepest fears were starting to play out, but she could not quit now.
"Have you seen an odd-looking group? A guy with red, spiked hair, a large frog, and a blonde-haired girl in white? There may have been an Earthbound-looking woman with them as well."
"No," he said apologetically, "though I did hear word of a strange group of travelers. I believe they are still around here. You might try that enclosure over there. I'm sure someone there will know."
Lucca let out the breath she held and thanked him, before heading briskly to the meeting area. It was flanked protectively by mountain walls, and a great gathering of people stood in its rocky arms. A purple cat skittered over to her and gave her a snooty sniff before bounding off. Something, a recollection from the past, tickled at the edges of her thoughts, but when she found no connection, she brushed it off uncomfortably and continued on. She found an elderly man with an amiable air and she asked if he knew the whereabouts of her companions.
"Ah, yes!" he had spoken benignly, "A dark, tall man came and asked about them only a day ago. Your friends set out to find him just thirty minutes ago, I believe. They went north, to the cape that overlooks the ocean."
Relief spilled though her as he mentioned her friends' destination, and she felt a refreshing sense of vigor.
"Thank you so much," she beamed, before tearing off with the snow flying behind her.
The old man smiled at her exuberance and turned once more to his reflections on the past.
"Marle, look out!"
"AAAAAHHHH!"
"Your left, Frog, he's on your-"
"CLNKK!" Metal clashed metal in a sharp resounding clank, then broke away.
Lucca urged her feet faster. The cape rose steeply ahead of her, but she could not see what lied upon it.
"Keep thy eyes open!"
A bloodcurdling scream ripped out, and Lucca horrifically identified it as Marle's.
"I'm coming!" she tried to shout, but the words were swallowed by her heaving breaths.
The beginning of the cliff was only a hundred feet from her, but she could only hear the heartrending sounds of a quickly worsening battle.
"I shall have thy heart for this!" Frog's battle cry echoed across the snow.
Then it stopped. A deafening silence rung in her ears as she stumbled up the cape and threw herself up the final distance. Her heart almost failed to beat. Sprawled across the ground, burnt and bleeding, were Ayla, Frog, and Marle.
She rushed towards them and rapidly checked them over. None of them seemed to be fatally wounded, and she slowly allowed her breathing to steady. The perpetrator appeared to have left, and she wondered what the heck had just happened.
Before she could administer the revival potions, an instinctive warning ripped through her, and she spun around. A shadowy figure stood ominously before her, danger rolling off of him in waves. His skin was unnaturally pale, sculpted harshly in snow and ice. Silvery blue hair cascaded down taut, strong shoulders, and each strand glinted metallically. A chilling breeze wrapped about the cliff, and his deep red-violet cape billowed behind him. His eyes were from too far of a distance to see, but they felt odd and abnormal. He began adjusting his gloves slowly and deliberately.
"You are unfamiliar to me," said a deep, rich, aristocratic voice. "Are you a member of this group of… weaklings?"
Lucca bristled slightly. This… this mysterious man seemed vaguely familiar, but she could not put a finger on it.
"And if I am?" Her confident tone hid the uneasiness that gripped her throat. She could sense that she was playing with fire, the kind she could not control.
"I would suggest that you refrain from following in their foolish footsteps." In three swift strides, he had reached her fallen friends and kneeled next to Marle.
"HEY! HEY! What are you doing?"
He did not cease his actions, nor act as though she had spoken at all. As he reached for Marle's pendant, Lucca whisked out her gun and fired a warning shot.
The man stopped his arm, but did not move away.
"Are you looking to perish in the shadows?" His voice was emotionless and eerie.
She said nothing but kept her gun aimed directly at him.
"So be it."
AN: snickers evilly
Reviews please? Big thank youto Zipis1 who has been my one single review.I'm beginning to think that no one wants to see a battle between Lucca and Magus unfold, so please prove me otherwise.