Lloyd just sat there, furious. How? How could he have let Stromm get the crystal? How could he let the lives of all those innocent Tiberians slip through the hole like that? How?
"Dammit!" Lloyd loudly screamed as he got up and kicked a large amount of dirt into the air. "Erg…"
Lloyd started running as quickly as he could and tried to catch up to Stromm before he got back on his boat and sailed away. He was exhausted enough from all the running he had done to get to Stromm and fight him, and he was exhausted from the fight itself. But the fact that Stromm won the fight infuriated Lloyd, giving him the necessary energy to be able to run with speed.
Lloyd once again had to shove bush after bush out of his way and tried his best to ignore any pains that he was feeling. He ran as fast as he possibly could and tried his best not to slow down, fearing that it would cause him to lose all his energy.
He finally made his way out of the jungle and back to the beach part of the island. There he saw the large warship with Stromm on it as it was floating out of reach. Stromm was standing on the deck and saw Lloyd running out. With the crystal in one hand, he took his admiral's hat off with the other and tipped it to Lloyd, mainly to taunt him.
Lloyd balled his hands into a fist and wanted nothing more than to sprout his angelic wings and fly over to Stromm's ship and tear him limb from limb. Then he remembered his angel wings didn't work for some reason, leaving him with no other option than to watch Stromm as he continued to sail away.
Lloyd had no idea how long he was standing there. He was exhausted after the long run and fight, but he was too angry to sit down and just try to calm himself. The area around him suddenly turned peaceful and no sounds were heard except for the soft crashing of the waves and the sound of a few birds singing and trees rustling. But just being around Lloyd, it was easy to tell he was very angry, and it changed the mood around him, even if it was still peaceful.
"Lloyd!" called out a voice from within the jungle.
The swordsman sorrowfully turned around and saw Kratos walking out of the jungle, also looking fairly disappointed.
"Lloyd, what happened?" Kratos asked.
"Stromm got away," Lloyd said. "He and I both found the crystal and fought, but he won and got it. Now he's back on the boat and probably far away now."
The father-son duo turned their head to the side and saw Sheena walking out of the jungle. She was walking pretty slowly and casually, but only because she heard that they had lost. She also looked like she was pretty upset with the result of the chase.
"So Stromm won?" she asked in a sad way.
"No, he hasn't!" Lloyd yelled, determination suddenly very clear and showing. "Just because he was the first to the crystal doesn't mean he's won the whole thing!"
Kratos and Sheena were suddenly awoken by Lloyd's rejuvenated attitude, and they were happy to see that Lloyd realized they still had some hope left. They soon turned hostile when they saw the pirate captain walk out of the jungle.
"You!" Lloyd yelled as he unsheathed his material blades.
The pirate captain gritted his teeth and was prepared to draw his scimitar, but then a voice interrupted them.
"Stop!" yelled a voice coming from inside the pirate ship. Lloyd and the captain turned their attention away from each other and to where they heard the voice. Leaning over the edge of the side on the pirate ship was Kayne.
"Kayne!" Lloyd yelled with his voice heightening in surprise. He turned his attention back towards the captain. "What have you done to him! If you've laid a finger on Kayne, I'll end your pathetic existence right here and now!"
"You little chump!" yelled the captain, and the two were ready to start fighting each other again.
"Lloyd, stop it!" Kayne commanded, jumping down from the boat. "Skelter, put your scimitar back! The last thing we need is you two hurting each other!"
Lloyd and Skelter continued to stare at each other for a while before Lloyd finally did what Kayne ordered him to and put his swords away.
Kayne walked over to Lloyd and looked like he had some explaining to do. "Lloyd, this is Skelter, a very experienced pirate who's been on the seas since he was five."
Skelter looked pretty proud of himself as Kayne was describing him. He crossed his muscular arms and nodded, causing his messy and long spiked black hair to go up and down with his head movements.
"Uh…hi,…Skelter," Lloyd uneasily said.
"Skelter and I are teaming up," Kayne said. "We were both trying to chase Stromm down before he could get the crystal and destroy Tiberia with it. And we would like you and your friends to help us, Lloyd."
"For what reason do you need us?" Kratos asked in an understanding voice.
"Now that Stromm has the crystal, we're going to need every bit of help we can get to save Tiberia," Kayne insisted. "Skelter may be strong and experienced, but when we go to stop Stromm, I fear the two of us might not be enough."
Lloyd turned around and looked at Sheena and Kratos. "Well? What do you guys think? Should we help them?"
"I don't know," Sheena said uneasily. "Don't these guys seem a little suspicious?"
"Sheena, their world's about to be destroyed!" Lloyd yelled.
"Actually, my world's about to be destroyed," Kayne corrected. "Skelter is just helping me because that's the kind of guy he is."
"All right!" Lloyd said, his voice full of anticipation and excitement. "Let's do it!"
"Thank you," Kayne said in an apologetic tone. "I'm grateful that you're willing to risk your lives to try to save our world."
"Don't worry about it," Lloyd said. "We've taken down harder guys than Stromm before, I'll tell you that much."
"Okay," Kayne said. "Why don't we just get back on Skelter's boat and we can sail back to the mainland and think about what we're going to do?"
"That won't be necessary for us," Kratos said. "Sheena can summon Aska to fly her back, and Lloyd and I can fly back with our wings."
"Uh, Kratos, our wings aren't working. Remember?"
"Oh, really," Kratos said. Without any trouble at all, he then sprouted his. "Try yours, Lloyd."
Lloyd was awestruck, but decided to try it anyways. And sure enough, his wings worked perfectly fine as well."
"What?...But…"
"Lloyd, that crystal is far enough away from us now," Kratos explained. "When you and Colette were stranded on an island and you couldn't use your wings to fly off, that was because the crystal was too close to you and it neutralized your angelic powers. Now that the crystal is far from us, its power can no longer cancel out our own."
"Wait, how do you know this!" Lloyd yelled.
"I have my reasons why," Kratos bluntly answered, then commanded everyone go back to the mainland and start talking about the situation there.
The group headed back to the mainland and soon were discussing plans on how they intended to stop Stromm from destroying Tiberia.
"So, how's Stromm going to destroy your world, anyway?" Sheena asked Kayne when they were back.
"I don't know," Kayne admitted. "Our spies just told us that he had a giant weapon in his secret hideout. We need to find that weapon before it's too late."
"That was probably the giant laser we saw inside that mountain," Kratos concluded.
"Wait, you saw it?" Kayne asked excitedly.
"Yes. We know where his base is and where the weapon is. All we need to do is head there and stop it."
"Splendid!" Kayne yelled happily, like a giant weight had just been taken off his shoulders. "When can we head there?"
"First, we need to discuss plans on what we're going to do once we get there," Kratos answered. "We should head to Derris-Kharlan to do that."
"Where's that?" Skelter asked.
"It's in a place impossible to reach from here," Kratos said as he pulled out his teleporter. "But Lloyd and I have a device to take us there."
Kratos hit the button on his teleporter, and soon everyone was enveloped in the bright light and taken away to Derris-Kharlan.
When the group appeared there, Skelter and Kayne looked very confused, and even a bit scared. They had no idea where Kratos was leading them, and they could only place their trust in that he knew what he was doing.
Kratos led them all down a path that Lloyd was now very familiar with. When their long walk ended, Skelter and Kayne were staring face to face with Yuan and were about to meet him.
"And just who the hell are they?" Yuan asked very sternly when he saw Skelter and Kayne.
Kratos introduced them and then explained that they were going to be working together to once again go in Stromm's base, deactivate the weapon and take the crystal back, and they weren't going to let anyone get in their way. Not even Stromm.
"The way I see it, if he has the crystal hooked up to it now, it should be ready to fire by tonight," Kayne said, obviously worried. It was very uncomfortable guessing how long it would be before his entire world was obliterated.
"That doesn't give us much time. However, it should prove to be enough," Kratos decided. "Since we already have our teleporters to take us to Stromm's hideout, it's really just a matter of figuring out what we have to do to successful break in, steal the crystal and deactivate the weapon without anybody noticing."
"Doesn't sound too hard to me," Yuan said.
"Sheena, I think you'd better go," Lloyd said, turning his attention towards their summoner.
"What?" Sheena asked, looking a little offended. "But why?"
"You're not really going to be needed too much," Lloyd said, trying not to sound too cold.
"All right," Sheena said, understanding but still feeling a little hurt.
Lloyd and everyone else warped back down to Aselia and headed just outside Mizuho. Lloyd and Kratos wished her good luck, and Kayne and Skelter followed in their wishes. When they saw that Sheena got back in safely, the four of them started talking about how they were going to go about the operation of stopping Stromm before he fired the giant laser with the power of the crystal and destroy Tiberia.
"I think we're going to need Genis and Raine for this," Lloyd said out of nowhere, causing a bit of confusion for everyone. (particularly Kayne and Skelter; neither of them knew who Lloyd was talking about)
"And what use would those two be?" Kratos asked.
"They're smart," Lloyd simply said. "If we're going to disarm a giant weapon, we're going to need some smart people, aren't we?"
"I suppose so," Kratos said.
The four of them headed to Iselia to see if Genis and Raine were still there after Yuan had sent them home, and indeed they were. They were told their assistance was once again needed, and both of them were more than willing to help out. (although Raine was very uneasy about working with two people she had never met before)
"All right!" Lloyd yelled. "Is everyone ready?"
There was a chorus of people who said they were ready to infiltrate Stromm's base and stop the laser from firing and destroying Tiberia. It had been a rough few days for all of them, but luckily, it wasn't going to last much longer.
Lloyd hit the button on his teleporter, and the bright light started surrounding all of them. When the light completely closed in on them, they were zapped on to the top of the snowy mountain right at the entrance to Stromm's lair.
The six of them stared at the doorway leading inside Stromm's base, still blasted open from when Regal helped them get in. There was a long silence before Lloyd finally spoke up.
"All right, let's go!"
The group of six anxiously ran inside Stromm's base. Kratos looked relatively calm; Kayne looked excited and like he was about to do something he really wanted to do; Lloyd, Genis, Skelter and Raine, meanwhile, all looked very determined and were ready to go through with this plan.
"Okay, Genis and Raine-you guys go around looking for the laser and try to disarm it," Lloyd ordered. "Skelter, why don't you stay here and take down any guards that come this way?"
"I don't take orders from you!" Skelter insisted, putting his hands on his hips and giving Lloyd a dirty look.
"Skelter, please," Kayne said in a low and sad voice.
As if Kayne was his boss or something, Skelter agreed to do what Lloyd asked him to do.
"And Kayne, why don't you follow us?" Lloyd suggested. "When we find Stromm, you can guard around us to make sure no guards come to help him. How does that sound?"
"Sounds pretty good to me," Kayne said.
"All right," Lloyd said. "Then Kratos and I will head for Stromm and take him on."
Everyone agreed to their jobs. Raine and Genis instantly ran off and tried to find the controls to the laser and hoped to disarm it. Lloyd and Kratos ran off, but they didn't hear anything behind them, so Kayne obviously wasn't following them like he was supposed to. Both of them turned around and saw Kayne talking to Skelter.
"…all right, I'll get it," Skelter said as he and Kayne talked to each other.
"Kayne! Let's go!" Lloyd yelled impatiently.
"Coming!" Kayne yelled after Lloyd with some exasperation showing through his answer.
Skelter ran off in a separate direction as Lloyd, Kratos and Kayne started running through the long, dark halls of Stromm's hideout, hoping to find Stromm and have him put an end to the destruction of Tiberia.