Chapter VI: Party Crashers

"Exactly how much farther do we have to go, Kratos," Yuan asked as the two Seraphim floated down a dark corridor.

"Not much farther," the solemn man replied as he opened a door. Inside, there were several jail cells, but only three were currently occupied. "In fact, we're here."

"Kratos!" yelled the teal-haired professor as she ran toward the bars of her cage, "Your finally back! I was becoming tired of thinking of excuses to tell Lloyd on why the Mana Cannon doesn't work."

"As was I," the silver-haired professor agreed.

Both Kratos and Yuan looked surprised. "Thor's Hammer is operational!" Yuan asked.

"You two already figured it out?" Kratos inquired as he and Yuan opened the locks to the scientists' cages.

"Yes," Raine and Kate replied as they stepped out of their cells.

"Come on," Yuan said, grabbing Kate's hand, sprouting his wings, and turning to exit the dungeon. Before he could leave, there was a tug at his arm and he turned back to face the scientist, "What?"

"There's someone else in here," she said.

"Who-" he began, but he was interrupted by Raine.

"Colette," she said, pointing to a cell in the darkest corner of the dungeon.

The four of them walked over to the cell where the blonde-headed girl was sitting, her hands in her knees. She looked up, noticing that the two professors were free, and turned around to face the corner. "Please go away," she asked calmly.

"Colette, we are here to let you out," Kratos replied as he reached for the lock.

"No! Don't!" she yelled, quickly spinning around.

The party of four looked surprised. They each looked at one another and then back at the maid. "Why?" the Seraph Master of Lightning asked.

"I…" she began, taking a deep breath, "I haven't spoken to Lloyd yet…"

"Why, in the name of Sylvarant, would you want to talk to that—that—that monster!" Raine yelled.

"Because… I… I just want to, okay!" she said, spinning back around to face the wall.

Once again the party looked at each other as if one of them carried the answer to this predicament. After failing to retrieve any sort of solution from any of his companions, Yuan spun around and began to walk away. "Suit yourself," he said coldly.

"We can't just leave her here!" Kate screamed, grabbing on to Yuan's suit jacket.

"We have a job to do, and if she wants to be stubborn, let her stay."

"But-" the teal-headed scientist stopped when Kratos placed his hand on her shoulder.

"Don't worry, I'll make sure no harm comes to her. But first," he then grabbed her hand and sprouted his wings, "we've got a job to do." He then took off down the same corridor he came.

Yuan snatched up Raine in his arms, "Come on, or we're going to get lost." He blasted down the hallway to catch up to his friend, who was flying quite fast and giving Kate what seemed to be motion sickness. When he did catch up, he asked, "What's your hurry, Kratos? You're usually more cautious."

"Something doesn't feel right," the Seraph of Judgement replied gravely.

Yuan shrugged, "Well it's a good thing you're moving so fast."

"Why?"

"Because I have this strange feeling things are about to go awry."

In the throne room of Castle Raptor, Group A continued to schmooze with the big shots—well, all of them except Mithos who had busied himself with running away from lecherous old men—and things were proceeding more or less as planned. Zelos had managed to only get smacked ten times within the past hour, Presea had managed not to attack Sheena, and Regal had managed to only say the word angst three times.

"So Lloyd, what exactly have you been up to?" Regal asked.

"Planning the conquest of the world, rebuilding the Mana Cannon, you know, the usual," the Demon Falcon replied.

The two shared a laugh at Lloyd's remark, before Regal said, "Funny! Funny! But seriously, what have you been up to?" It wasn't difficult for Regal to hide his disgust, but in his mind, he thought, 'He outright told me his plan… Of course, I already knew, but still… That must mean something's going well… Boy do I like ellipses…'

"Truthfully, I've been travelling around, finding homes for orphaned children," Lloyd lied. His face brightened as tears began to form in his eyes and he said, "Ah, those children and their beautiful smiling faces! They were all depending on me!… But I couldn't help them all! Why couldn't I help them all!"

Regal placed his hand on the young tyrant's shoulder. He hung his head trying to hide his shame, "Lloyd, you are a much better person than I. All I do is sit around and think about my crimes when I should be helping the children. Oh Martel! I've committed another grievous sin against Aselia! Why! Why can't I be better! Angst!" The Demon Falcon patted Regal's back, turning his head so that no one could see as a look of bewilderment crossed his face at the strange outburst of President Lezareno. After calming himself, Regal had prepared himself to speak again, but before he could, there was a large crash as a table was knocked over. Both he and Lloyd looked to where the sound had come from, trying to discern what it was over the mass panic of the guests. Soon they were able to locate the spot as the mass of people scattered away, frantically running out of the room screaming like lunatics. There stood two men, one with blond hair, and the other with black hair. They both did some sort of dance before sliding on their knees and landing only a few feet before the president and the lord.

"Who are you and what are you doing at my party?" Lloyd asked coolly, cocking an eyebrow.

The two turned their heads, looked at each other, and grinned before the blonde-headed one answered. "Meet a guy, pull up a chair! The air is humming and something great is coming!" he sung.

"What the heck," Zelos said after he, Presea, and Sheena took notice of the two strange men.

The two men stood up and stood back to back. "Name's Riff," the blond one said.

"Me llama Bernardo," the black-haired one said.

They both pointed at once to Zelos and shouted, "And we're here to kill you, Zelos Wilder!"

"I knew it!" Sheena shrieked as she smacked Zelos in the head. "I knew it was you Zelos! No other man could be so perverse! Or so-"

"Unbelievably, stunningly, handsome!"

"No!" and Sheena smacked the Chosen again, leaving a large red mark on his face.

"Calm down Sheena," Lloyd said as he walked over to the Card Mistress. "What were you planning Zelos?" he asked the Chosen smugly.

Zelos was rubbing his cheek where he was smacked, "Nothin' you need to know."

"Very well then," the Demon Falcon replied, "Do as you please, I don't care."

"Enough of this!" the street punks yelled as they began to snap, "We came here to fight, and we're gonna do it!" The two of them crouched somewhat and began to advance toward the Chosen, snapping the entire time. "So," they began as they pulled out switchblades, "Let's fight!" they shouted while jumping toward the air. Zelos flew backwards as Sheena, Lloyd, and Presea dodged to the side.

A voice that everyone had forgotten let out a shout, "Hey, we are not doing this if there's no stunningly awesome battle music!"

"So you brought Mithos along as well?" Lloyd asked, turning his head toward Presea.

The woman pulled out an axe and swung at the tyrant as she answered, "Of course!" Lloyd easily moved out of the way of the axe.

"Silly Presea. Why do you-"

"Seriously!" the Seraph Leader yelled as he ripped off his dress, "No music, no fight!"

Suddenly, Mithos was grabbed from behind, a switchblade held at his throat, "You want music?" Bernardo said threateningly.

"We'll give you music!" Riff shouted as he lunged at Zelos once again. Zelos evaded the blow and Mithos grabbed his attacker, throwing him off of his body.

The two gang leaders burst into song as Bernardo regained his composure, "Boy, boy, crazy boy. Get cool boy!"

Mithos, Zelos, Regal, Presea, Lloyd, and Sheena all looked at each other puzzled before saying, "What kinda crap is this?"

"Got a rocket in you pocket," the two continued singing while they took rocket launchers out of seemingly nowhere, aiming them at the Seraph Leader and the Chosen. "Get coolly cool boy!" they shouted as they fired the rockets at the two angels, who evaded them with ease.

"Okay, that's it, no more Mr. Nice Pretty Boy!" Zelos and Mithos yelled as they charged the two street punks, knocking them into opposite walls.

Riff hit the wall hard and sagged to the floor. His eyes were half closed and with his last breath, he sung, "When you're a Jet, you're a Jet all the way… From your first cigarette to your last… dying… day…" before he fell onto the floor.

Bernardo hit the wall just as hard as his companion, leaving a dent in it. He pointed at Mithos weakly before singing, "A boy like that… he'd kill… my… sister…" He, too, fell to the floor.

"That was easy," Zelos said, brushing himself off and smiling cockily.

"Yeah! Well this won't be!" Sheena yelled as she lunged at the Chosen, the orchestra finally remembering to play something dramatic.

"Yipe!" Zelos yelled, jumping backward and grabbing his shield from his back.

Lloyd smiled as he unsheathed a blade, "Finally, those idiot musicians do something right!" He charged at Regal, who barely avoided the slash of the mighty Demon Falcon's blade.

'He doesn't even deem us worthy of two swords!' Regal thought as he steadied himself to counter the attack, 'Much less the Vorpal Blade!"

Mithos struck a pose as guitar riffs began to play over the orchestral music, "Yggdrasil! Transform!" Once again, wheels popped out of nowhere only to disappear while there were strange metallic noises and a chorus shouting something about Transformers and disguises. Soon the Seraph Leader was in his teenage form. "Let's see how well you do against me!" he shouted as he charged the two rulers of Castle Raptor.

"Is that 'Beat the Angel' I hear?" Yuan asked as the two angels and scientists sped down another corridor, "… And guitar riffs?"

"Which I might add don't sound very good over the music," Raine added.

Kratos's face grew more solemn, "They must be fighting, let us hurry!" With that, the two angels sped up to an unbelievable speed.

Kate's face grew very, oh so very, puce and she covered her mouth. "I feel ill…" she said, trying to restrain the need to vomit caused by the high velocities.

"Kratos," Yuan began.

"Yes."

"Take Raine and fly to the rheairds. They're just outside the castle," he ordered while handing the brown-headed Seraph the silver-headed scientist and readying his swallow.

Kratos struggled to find a position in which he could carry both half-elves. Once he found it, placing Raine on his back and carrying Kate in his arms, he guessed at Yuan's intentions, "Worried about losing your only contact in this castle?"

"Of course," the blue-haired half-elf replied. "Losing our inside man at this stage in the game would leave us at a huge disadvantage."

"Agreed," Kratos said as the group reached an area just outside the throne room where the clanging of swords could be heard. "Right then, you make sure everyone else gets out of here alive, I'll make sure these two get away.

"Regal, Presea, Zelos, cover me!" Mithos ordered as the other three attempted to fend off the attacks of the two rulers of Castle Raptor. He began to glow a pinkish glow as feathers surrounded him, "Sacred powers, smite these twisted beings with my awesomely awesome power. Alright now, taste my incredibly cool and awesomely awesome Judgement!" Several beams of light shot down from the air, striking the ground multiple times. Sheena seemed to dodge the beams with ease, but Lloyd did something different.

"Is that all the power you have, Mithos?" Lloyd asked as he stuck his sword into the air. One of the beams struck the sword and seemingly channeled through the tyrant's body. He pointed his other hand at the leader of Cruxis and the very same beam he absorbed shot out, "I was expecting a bit more."

A horrified look appeared on the angel's face as his own attack was directed back at him. He braced himself for the impact, but it never came. In front of him was a giant blade of electricity stuck in the ground. It crackled momentarily before disappearing and leaving the Seraph Leader unscathed. "Took you long enough, Yuan!" he shouted as the Seraph Master of Lightning flew beside him, his disguise now off as well.

"Well sorry," he said, readying his swallow, "I was a bit busy with our mission."

"Yeah, yeah."

"A little help here!" Zelos shouted as he evaded the razor sharp edges of Sheena's magical cards.

"You disgusting, vile, perverted-" Sheena yelled as she swiped at the Chosen's face.

"I'd love to help-" Regal shouted, ducking under Lloyd's sword, "But I'm a tad bit busy at the moment."

The Chosen simply groaned as the Card Mistress continued to slash at his face, "-deceitful, distasteful-"

"It's bad enough ya have to try to kill me," Zelos began, preparing his laser blade for a counterattack, "But do you have to call me names too!" The angel swung his blade with surprising force, but Sheena simply spun around, avoiding it. She continued whirling and lifted her foot into the air, delivering a spinning kick to the Chosen and knocking him into Yuan, who both promptly fell over.

"This is pathetic," Sheena yawned as she started to stretch her limbs out of boredom.

"I'll show you pathetic!" Presea yelled, readying her axe at her side, "Endless Infliction!" Presea swung her axe upward in the shape of a crescent moon, she did so one more time, lifting herself into the air, and then slammed her axe against the ground. Finally, she swung her axe into one more crescent moon motion. "Take that, you skank!"

The Card Mistress was sent flying head-first toward a wall, but before she hit it, she swung her feet behind her and equally distributed her "wall-landing" between her legs and arms, looking not unlike a spider. She pushed herself off of the wall back at Presea, a murderous look on her face, "Why you?" she screamed as she kicked Presea onto the pile where Zelos was struggling to get off of a very vexed Yuan. "Know your place!"

"Presea!" Regal yelled, taking his attention away from the Demon Falcon for just a moment. He was soon caught in the face with said Falcon's elbow and was sent flying onto the pile Tethe'Allans on the floor of the throne room. "Ow…" He said as he got up off them, the others following suit. He shook his head before saying, "Chi Healer." A green glow surrounded him and he seemed to be filled with his former vigor. He proceeded to use this spell on his companions, who each began to feel much better afterwards.

"This is going wonderfully, isn't it?" Mithos said, having noticed that he was the only one who had not been in the pile on the floor.

"Just shut up Mithos," Yuan replied, tightening his grip on his swallow.

Kratos made his way around the garden to where the rheairds awaited. It took only moments before he reached his destination, where both scientists got off of him. The teal-headed one fell to her knees and made retching noises as the silver-headed one approached the rheairds. She looked back at the Seraph of Judgement, who simply said, "Quickly, get on and get out of here."

Kate, having recovered from her motion sickness rather swiftly, mounted a rheiard; Raine seemed to be studying the thing. "This is a simply marvelous specimen of magitech-"

"Get on, Raine," Kate said as her rheaird hovered over the ground.

"Go, I'll make sure she gets to the Lezareno Company in one piece," Kratos ordered. Kate simply shrugged and took off at top speed into the night.

Raine began to get onto her rheaird, stopping halfway through when she noticed a large staff behind the brown-haired Seraph's head. "Kratos!" she yelled, trying to warn him of the danger that lurked behind him.

"Wah-urggh!" he yelled as the staff came crashing upon his head. Kratos slumped over onto the ground as two men walked up to, and took hold of, Raine.

"Well, that was easy enough," the staff-wielder said.

"Yes, and it didn't even involve trickery," a man in green replied.

"What do you two want with me," Raine shouted as she struggled to escape the grip of the two men.

"You're going back to work on that Mana Cannon," the green one answered.

"Well, darn it all…" Raine sighed dejectedly, already busy putting her mind to work on new ways to convince Lloyd that Thor's Hammer wasn't ready.

Things were not going well for our heroes, as each one was repeatedly knocked back to where they had been previously piled. No matter where they struck, the Tyrants would just parry the blow and throw them back. The entire group was exhausted, and this was voiced by everyone's favorite whiney Chosen, "Okay, I'm runnin' out of TP and I am tired. Anyone got any orange gels?" Everyone shook their heads, signifying that they had no such gels. "Shoot!"

"Now what!" Yuan asked, determination still in his eyes.

"We strike one last blow!" Regal shouted.

"No!" Mithos roared, "We strike one final blow!"

"That meant the same thing!" Zelos screamed.

"Just shut up and attack!" Presea shrieked.

"All together now," the five of them shouted in unison.

"Double Demon Fang!" the Chosen screamed.

"Holy Lance!" the Lord of Cruxis yelled.

"Thunder Blade!" the Seraph Master of Lightning shouted.

"Deadly Destruction!" the Axe Blossom erupted.

"Spin Kick!" President Lezareno roared as he kicked a large tile removed from the floor towards Sheena and Lloyd. The attacks charged forward, but each one was either deflected or dodged by the two Tyrants.

"Well, I'm spent," Zelos said, placing his hands on his knees.

"We're just too tired to effectively do anything; we've only achieved what I'd estimate to be thirty percent output," Presea stated.

The Demon Falcon shook his head before lunging towards the group of heroes, "Well isn't that just too bad." He readied his blade, and was about to swing it when-

"Chaaaarge Shot! NEEOOW!" came a heroic voice as a large beam came from behind Cruxis, hitting Lloyd square in the face and pushing him back.

"Lord Yggdrasil!" came another voice, this one feminine.

"Glory to the coming age that won't be ruled by Lloyd!" came a third, gruff voice.

Mithos sighed in relief, "That shot… those voices… it could only mean…"

A woman in a rather revealing red bodysuit and a strange metallic, separated cape floated next to Mithos. Behind her stood a man with red hair, a pole axe, and a purple vest with no shirt. At the door way was a third man with a large cannon around his arm and an eye patch over his eye. This man was taking a knee, his arm cannon in front of his good eye because he was the one who had fired the shot.

Lloyd went into a blind rage, "Is there anyone else who'd like to crash my party!"

The three strangely dressed people looked at one another and smirked. The woman began, "To protect the world from devastation!"

The gunman answered, "To unite all peoples within our nation!"

"To denounce the evils of truth and love!"

"To extend our reach to the stars above!"

"Pronyma!"

"Forcystus!"

"Grand Cardinals blast off at the speed of light!"

"Surrender now or prepare to fight!"

"That's right!" the red-headed one chimed in.

A large vain appeared on Sheena's forehead, "We know who you are!" she shouted. She pointed at each one in turn, "Pronyma," she pointed at the woman, "Forcystus," she pointed at the gunman, "and Magnius," she pointed at the axeman, "Prepare to die!" She lunged forward in an attempt to attack three of the Five Grand Cardinals.

"Leonazium!" Pronyma screamed as a lion head appeared and knocked Sheena back. "Magnius! Forcystus! Diversion! Now!"

"You got it boss lady!" Magnius shouted.

"Right away!" Forcystus complied.

"Flame Lance!"

"Air Thrust!"

A beam of red light struck the ground, creating a fire in front of the Tyrants. The fire was the raised significantly by the sudden green swirls of air that surrounded it, creating some sort of miniature firestorm. Taking their chance to escape, the group ran out of the throne room and out of the castle towards the rheairds. They passed a bush that seemed, for a brief moment, to move though there was no wind. As they ran, the group began to talk amongst themselves.

"So, Megaman," Zelos began, "How's it shakin'"

"My name is not Megaman!" Forcystus replied indignantly.

"Sorry, X," Zelos apologized.

"My name is Forcystus!" Forcystus yelled, Zelos simply snickered.

"Keep up the pace you two," Yuan ordered.

"Right, right, whatever," Zelos replied.

"My apologies, Lord Yuan," Forcystus answered.

"So Mithos, can we-" Pronyma began.

"No!" Mithos shouted, "I told you I'm not ready for… that…"

"But I-"

"No, Pronyma!"

"Would you two get married and get it over with?" Presea asked jokingly. Mithos simply blushed nervously while Pronyma grew large hearts in her eyes.

"I don't think they-" Regal abruptly stopped when he noticed Kratos's limp body on the ground. The group stopped behind him, each one looking in shock at the sight in front of them. "What the blazes!"

Kratos began to push himself up off of the ground, Yuan rushing to his side and giving him a shoulder to lean on. He shook his head in an attempt to regain a grasp of reality before speaking, "Argh… What happened?"

"Judging from your demeanor, I would assume you took a blow to the head Lord Kratos," Forcystus guessed.

"Raine?"

"Excuse me, sir?"

"What happened to Raine and Kate?"

"Judging from the fact that only one rheaird remains," Forcystus began, gesturing to the rheaird, "One of them escaped and the other was recaptured or they're both riding the same rheaird."

"I have failed…"

Yuan patted his shoulder sympathetically, "Don't worry about it Kratos, even if Lloyd still has one of them, that one person is quite capable of lying quite effectively to Lloyd's face."

"Hmm…"

"What?"

"I suggest you get out of here; it's quite obvious that you are in no shape for any further rescue operations on this night."

"But Kratos, we can't leave a cool beauty stuck in this dreadful castle," Zelos injected.

"And the world has no hope if any of you die," Kratos replied dissaprovingly.

"Oh… So a tactical retreat then?" Zelos asked unsurely.

"Yes, now get going!" Kratos commanded sharply. The administrators of the Lezareno Company climbed onto the remaining rheaird, the Desian Five Grand Cardinals walked away, where it can be assumed they found the form of transportation they arrived on, and the angels sprouted their wings. All except Mithos.

"Kratos!" he roared, "You are not the leader of Cruxis, you do not give the orders!"

"Listen to your teacher, Mithos," Kratos said rather fearsomely, yet coolly. Mithos shivered and sprouted his wings. Everone took off for the Lezareno Company Headquarters, flying speedily through the air. Kratos turned around and began to walk away, being thankful for his rather large and pointy head of brown hair that obscured the bump he must have had.

Before Yuan got to far away, he turned around, taking hold of his swallow, and flew back towards Kratos. He swung it at the Seraph of Judgement, who turned around at the last second and blocked it with his shield. Yuan smirked, "So it was just a fluke then?"

"Fear that I am unfit for my job?" Kratos replied, smirking as well.

"Fear that you've gotten rusty." Yuan placed his swallow back onto his back and Kratos relaxed his arm.

"No, I'm fine."

Yuan once again took off into the air, "Keep you guard up," he warned before rejoining the others who had left quite awhile ago.

"My beloved castle!" Lloyd yelled, having finally fanned the flames that had ravaged his throne room.

"Those dreadful-" Sheena began, only to be interrupted by a voice that had entered the room.

"Lord Lloyd, Lady Sheena, we have returned," a man dressed in blue stated.

"Bearing a gift," a man in green added.

"Kv-" Lloyd was interrupted.

"Kyle, sir," Kyle corrected.

"Then you are calling yourself?"

"Rhododendron, sire," Rhododendron answered.

"What kind of fool name is Rhododendron!" Sheena yelled, patting the soot off of her dress.

"I had to come up with something, ma'am."

"You said you have gifts," Lloyd scrutinized, "And why are you holding Raine between you?"

"Took you long enough to notice," Raine spat. She was promptly shushed by Kyle.

"Our gift is Raine," Rhododendron began, "She was trying to escape. Lord Kratos was assisting her, which is what is truly strange."

"This does not surprise me in the least," Lloyd replied. "I have had my doubts about Kratos's loyalty from the very beginning."

"Oh, does that mean we can kill him!" Sheena asked excitedly.

"No, let him go on thinking we suspect nothing, we may learn something from him," Lloyd said smugly. He than began to laugh maniacally, music befitting his evilness joined him.

"How are they still alive?" Raine questioned while pointing to the group of horribly charred and bruised musicians who had begun to play. She got a shrug as response from everyone in the room except for Lloyd, who was too engrossed in his cackling to notice her question.

Notes: As usual, I'm quite happy that everyone is enjoying the story. I know it seems random, and it mostly is, but there is some underlying plot, as loose as it may be. On another note, yes, Rhododendron is incredibly fun to say, and yes, Lloyd loves his blood red wine.