It's a pleasure and a sorrow, to announce…the LAST chapter! #sob#

I don't own Tales of Symphonia, but I notice a couple of plot flaws.

1) A lot of people have noticed the coffins in the Tower of Salvation. They are supposed to be failed Chosens, but there are much more than fourteen coffins. (Colette is the seventh Chosen, say that's only from Sylvarant, add Tethe'alla's Chosens and you get fourteen. If someone wants to be picky, thirteen.)

2) Raine says that she feels like she's seen the wingpack technology before. This is supposedly when she was young and her parents were on the run. However, Tethe'alla was in decline at that time, so didn't have modern magitechnology at this time. (This also helps unsupport #1 on the list, because in the space of around thirteen years after a world goes into decline a Chosen sets off to save the world.)

If anyone's noticed any more, please say. Similarly, if anyone has an explanation for any of the above, please tell.

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"I see. So this tree is the link that connects the world…Okay, I got it. This tree's name is…" Lloyd began. "…- in memory of the last four thousand years – Yggdrasil."

'What!' Stephen thought.

'He was destined to choose Yggdrasil.' I explained. 'In Norse mythology, Yggdrasil (can also be spelt Yggdrasill) is the cosmic ash tree which linked the worlds of Asgard, Midgard, Jotunheim, Niflheim, Vanaheim and Muspell.' (Most of that came from memory!)

'How are you so smart?'

'I read.'

The rest of the group climbed up over the rubble behind us.

"Way to go, Lloyd!" Genis said.

"Like we could expect anything less." Zelos pointed out.

Raine smiled contentedly.

Kratos even smiled! Like I was going to let him get away with that!

"Kratos, you're doing that weird thing when the corners of your mouth curl up." Yes, I am evil.

"Is it a crime for me to smile?" Kratos reply made everyone who wasn't already looking at him in disbelief, turn around and stare.

"Do we intend to stay here all night?" Regal asked.

The sun was setting fast, bathing the whole scene in golden light.

We decided to go to Meltokio, and spend a last night together before heading our different ways. For some of us, more different than others.

A fire filled the main room with light. We had all found a chair, or a patch of sofa, to sit on. Not an easy feat, considering that there was eleven of us.

"So, tomorrow evening we'll be heading our different ways home." I sighed, hugging my knees.

"It's not goodbye for ever, though. We can still see each other." Colette said optimistically.

That really tore me up. Knowing that they wouldn't see me unless I choose for them to. Kratos gave me a meaningful look. I gave him a look back, which I hoped said, 'I'll tell them soon.'

"So, what will you do? Regal?" Lloyd asked.

"I shall destroy the part of Toize Valley Mine which produces Exspheres. Then, I shall think of a way my company and I can make this new world a better place."

We went round the group. Raine and Genis said that they were going to journey to make people see half-elves differently, Lloyd said he was going with Sheena on a journey to collect all the remaining Exspheres, Presea wasn't sure what she'd do, Colette wanted to see her family again and Zelos would try and reform the Church of Martel.

"Something's still bugging me." Genis announced.

"Yes, when Mithos said you weren't from this world…" Raine said, attempting to lock eyes with me, who currently found the floor extremely interesting.

"He was right. Stephen and I aren't from Tethe'alla or Sylvarant." I said.

"You lied to us?" There was no anger in Lloyd's voice, strangely.

"Yes, and I hated every second of it. I was raised to be honest." I had been dreading this moment since the first lie, knowing that it would come to this, hoping that it wouldn't.

"Hear them out." Kratos said. "I knew they weren't from Symphonia and I didn't tell you. They have some good, if unusual explanations."

Genis wondered, "Does this have something to do with the time when you left, just before we formed the pact with Volt? We were asking you questions, and you said you couldn't answer them because it would destroy this world, or something."

"Yes, that's it."

"Well, what's your world like? How did you get here?" Genis asked.

"Stephen, do want to tell the tale?" I asked.

"Nah, you're better with words."

"Okay. Everything started on my thirteenth birthday. That sounds so clichéd, but it's true. I was brought before my birthday cake, with the candles on it. At the sight of even those tiny flames I did a double take and hesitated.

"For my party, I went paint-balling with some friends." I had to explain first what paintball was, then what a gun was, then I had to explain why it was fun to shoot each other with paint.

"Anyway, I was really good at it. Too good, for I'd never been paint-balling before. Hardly any shots went stray, I was hardly shot myself. At the time, my friends and I put it down to luck.

"Then came the sickness. No-one knew what was wrong with me. I had a bad headache, and my body was aching. When I fell asleep, I had nightmares like I'd never had before. Someone or something was coming.

"A few days later, I didn't feel hungry, thirsty or tired, so I didn't eat, drink or sleep. I started getting scared after five days of this. I was getting weaker, but couldn't eat.

"Suddenly, I had a sneezing fit, and at the end, my blanket was on fire. I quickly patted it out, but the flames didn't hurt. Even better, all my pains had gone.

"I never slept after that, except once. It was short, but filled me with a feeling of dread, and excitement. Something has come. Someone is yet to come.

"Now that I didn't sleep, I had my nights free. At first I read books, then made sure my homework was up to date, things like that. Then I heard voices. It took me a while to realise they were the birds outside. It took me even longer to find out how to talk back to them.

"I built a friendship with the birds. It was some of the more nocturnal birds that accompanied me outside at night for the first couple of nights. I would have been scared otherwise.

"In the dark and chilly night, I saw someone getting mugged. Normally I would have run away, and call the police or something.

"But I shouted, 'Get away from him!'

"I hardly impressed the mugger. 'A little girl like you is gonna stop me? Gimme a break.'

"The mugger left his victim and turned to me. Something just clicked in me. I ran towards him, fists in a ready position. I lashed out with my left fist, ducked under his own counter-attack and swung my right fist into his jaw. I circled to get behind him, then stuck a foot in front of him and pushed him over.

"I tended to the mugger's victim.

" 'Are you alright?' I asked.

" 'I don't need help from a girl.' The man spat and walked away.

"Some people are really charming aren't they? At least I could've had a thank you. I continued walking through the night, when an abandoned house caught my eye. I'd never been in it before, so I decided to explore.

"It was pitch-black and I thought of turning back, when I bumped into someone or something.

" 'What was that? Who's there?' A male voice asked.

"The voice sounded familiar to me. 'Hello. I'm Nia. Who are you?'

" 'Nia? Nia in Year Eight? SJT?' The voice asked.

" 'Yes! Who is this?'

" 'Stephen. KT.'

(A/N: The initials stand for form teachers in school.)

" 'Wait, what are you doing here? At-' I checked my watch, 'three in the morning?'

" 'The same question can be asked of you.' Stephen reminded me.

"A long silence followed before I tried to do something about being in the dark. I remembered the fire. I tried to picture it, but the flames kept twisting and flickering, making it tricky to grip. Eventually, I managed it, and fire appeared on my hand. It was small, equivalent to a candle flame, but it cast a fair bit of light on my surroundings. One of the walls of the small room, I found some writing.

" 'Plant o'r tân ar plant o'r dŵr…It's in Welsh.' I announced.

" 'What does it say?' Stephen asked.

" 'Child of the fire and child of the water…I can't read it all. It keeps repeating the words, 'tynged' and 'perygl'' "

Kratos interrupted my story to input the meaning of the words. "Fate or destiny, and danger."

"We found it out later. To cut a long story short, we found out about our powers, including the power to travel through worlds. We practiced our powers every night, went to a few worlds and then we came here. Did I leave anything out?"

"You haven't said how you knew what was going to happen in Symphonia." Kratos put in.

"It's a kind of magitechnology, which looks into other worlds. If I could, I'd show it to you."

"You knew everything that would happen?" Raine asked incredulously.

"So, you're going to go back in to your own world?" Lloyd asked.

"Yes. If we don't go back, our world would be destroyed, and that would probably destroy this world too. We'll stay for a bit, though."

After my story, the mood for conversation had gone, and everyone went to sleep. I stepped outside for a while. The nearby birds, sensing something different, came to investigate me.

"I'm glad the mana went back to normal." I told the birds, even though they wouldn't understand. "It means all of you animals are back to normal too."

"Big…hurting…head. Kill…die…humans…no more. All…good…now." I had forgotten how basic a sparrow's vocabulary and communication skills were.

I heard footsteps behind me. I turned to see Lloyd.

"Shouldn't you be asleep?" I asked.

He shook his head. "I couldn't get to sleep."

A thought occurred to me, but I kept it to myself. Lloyd was now an angel. Did that mean he couldn't eat or sleep?

"Anyway, I wanted to apologise. I guess I caused you a lot of problems by asking you those questions. I'm sorry."

"Don't worry about it. It happens all the time."

"Still, I shouldn't have…" I waved aside his apologies.

"Don't. Worry."

"Okay…You never really said what your world is like."

I thought for a while. "It's a world without magic, a world without elves and half-elves."

"So, there isn't any discrimination?" Lloyd asked hopefully.

"People are discriminated against for the stupidest things, like the colour of their skin. Just because the causes are different, it doesn't mean that discrimination doesn't exist."

"Oh. How bad is it?"

"Bad enough." I sighed. "My world's really messed up. It's overheating, there isn't anywhere left to bury rubbish and at any moment someone's shooting someone else…it's a mad world."

"How can it be that bad? You have to be exag…exager…making it worse." Lloyd gave up.

"It's overheating because there are too many gases in the air given off by machines, and not enough plants to absorb them. Overall, the people in my world are wasteful and throw a lot away. And some of the world leaders aren't mature enough to be a clown at a child's birthday party."

(A/N Full credit to my Grandma for the not mature enough quote. I asked for any suggestions from the people in the room at the time)

"I don't really get it, but I got it." Lloyd said.

I smiled.

'Cyclone, why don't you come out?'

'Clear some room, dragon on the way!'

"Lloyd, can you just stand over there for a minute?" I gestured towards a wall.

"Um, sure." Lloyd seemed confused, but moved anyway.

Cyclone appeared as normal.

Lloyd's confused look melted away.

"Thank you for - helping is too small a word – in the fight against Mithos, Cyclone." I said.

"You did just as much. We were a brilliant team." Cyclone sounded proud.

I was about to reply when I heard more footsteps.

"Hello, Stephen."

"How did you know it was him?" Lloyd asked.

"I'm a specialist when it comes to footsteps, and I've heard Stephen's before. Besides, not many other people are up at this time."

It turned out I was right on one account – Stephen was behind us. However, I failed to hear the second person that was with him.

Lloyd turned around. "Da…Kratos!"

I was in mini giggles. I got a glare off Kratos, but it was worth it.

"Sorry…I won't do it again." I tried to apologise.

I took the silence as forgiveness.

Then I heard more footsteps.

"Come on, Sheena. Everyone's already here, so join the party." I invited.

"How…" She started, then decided it didn't matter. "I couldn't sleep."

"Join the club." Stephen said.

"Anyway, I didn't mention this at the time, but in the Tower of Salvation when you said 'Shimazaki'…I wondered how much of Mizuho's language you understood. But coming from a different world…how do you know our language?"

"I want to learn Japa-" I sighed, knowing that they wouldn't know what Japanese was. "-an equivalent of Mizuhoen in school. But they won't let us until sixth form. Even though we learn a total of four languages already!"

"So, you wanted to learn more?"

"Yes."

We were silent for a while, Sheena apparently lost in thought.

Then Kratos started talking. "And Angelic?"

"That's from school too. We learnt it from about the age of six." I visibly shuddered.

I remembered all too well the horror of the once-a-week, hour-long lesson. At the age of six, sitting down and writing – in silence – for three quarters of an hour straight seemed like purgatory.

(It really seems ironic that I'm writing this, yet I've brought a Welsh dictionary on holiday with me! That, and the fact that I willingly added Welsh into this fanfic!)

"We make up a group of some really weird people." Stephen said suddenly. "I mean, Nia and I are from another world, there's a dragon standing next to me, there's a unicorn living in my head, we have four angels…"

"One of which is a pervert…" Sheena interrupted.

Stephen continued, "…two half-elves - technically four half-elves – the president of a successful company, a Mizuhoen, and…Presea."

"Oh, us the misfits." I said sarcastically. "I personally feel that we're the normal ones, and everyone else is weird."

There was a yawn from Sheena, who immediately looked sheepish. "I think I'd better go to bed."

She left. Just to re-cap, that left me with Stephen, Cyclone, Kratos and Lloyd. Speaking of which…

"Aren't you tired, Lloyd?" I asked.

"I'm just not sleepy."

"Kratos? What exactly is the Angelus Project? I only know that it was a new Cruxis Crystal for Mithos." I asked.

"I don't know." I turned to Kratos in disbelief. "Mithos didn't make the plans public. I only knew of it by hacking into Derris-Kharlan's computers. And that only gave the fact that it was top secret and the place where it was being…made." His voice was faltering, probably because this was a subject that was close to Anna.

"Wouldn't Yuan know?" Stephen asked.

Kratos shook his head. "Mithos was always less fond of Yuan, probably because Yuan was the only thing that could get in between him and Martel."

"The computers?" I asked, already knowing it was stupid.

"Fried."

"What about if you took the hard drive…" That was Stephen.

"If you can find a hard drive in all that rubble, you're welcome to it."

"So, I guess it's a mystery…Just don't tell Raine. She'll study it until she gets an answer."

"Yeah." Lloyd looked really uncomfortable.

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing." If he insists…

I saw a faint ribbon of pink on the horizon. Dawn had broken. It was time for us to go…

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Yes, this is the last chapter. But, I've done an epilogue! Which, hopefully, should be posted right now.

Thank you to all my reviewers. Without you, I really wouldn't have got this far. Also, please tell me whether you want any more Nia and Stephen 'fics. (I know some people already have…) I have a couple of other ideas, but they really are pathetic. (I started writing them and couldn't get inspired)