Start Date: September 3, 2021

Windwillow

Chrono Trigger

Chapter Eight

The truth had been laid bare: the future of the world led to destruction at the hands of an abomination known as "Lavos." Crono, Marle, and Lucca, having seen this, decided to try the impossible and save the world. Whether they could do it? Even they had doubts.

Scene One

"Like, not cool, dude! I wasn't supposed to lose..."

Johnny slunk in, head between his exhaust pipes. Crono and the rest had already dismounted and were waiting by the jetbike.

"Word's word, dudes... head on out whenever you want. BUT! I'm always up for a rematch!"

As he turned and left, the group huddled.

"Okay," said Lucca, "now we have to find Proto Dome. It's a few days away by foot, but with the jetbike and the shelter we can get there in a day and a half. When we get there, I'll suss the situation and get us back home. I need to see Dad..."

Marle opened her mouth, but closed it. Crono noticed, and could tell: seeing HER Dad might just mean his head and her freedom. Nothing much to say, and so the journey began. True to form Lucca was right, and the jetbike slashed through the wastelands with ease. One stop in the shelter, and they arrived at Proto Dome.

Crono stepped up first, moving towards the back room.

"Well, now that we're here-"

A hoard of killer robots zoomed to the fore. Crono sighed, and unsheathed his weapon.

"... we gotta cut some more stuff up. Dammit!"

These enemies were armed with lasers, and having dealt with the Guardian's own the gang quickly evaded. With a sharp cleave two of the robots fell to pieces, Crono swiftly turning to a third. But, that foe's laser had already charged. Lucca was zapping a group of her own, so... daisies?

Just before it fired a crossbow bolt ripped into its eye socket. Crono turned and saw Marle, armed and ready, smirking. Between the three of them another half dozen went down, and they continued. Through two rooms, though, they came across a bizarre relic.

It was shaped like a human, made of dull brass and plated with silver. Big, bulky, almost muscular (for a robot) it also had a strange left arm. The appendage was sort of like one of the grunts' lasers, but more of a rifle...

"Omigod!" Marle gasped. "Another one?!"

Lucca inspected the robot carefully.

"I think I can fix it," she said.

Marle yelled, "So it can kill us?!"

She shook her head.

"Machines aren't capable of evil... it's humans who made them like that..."

Marle paused.

"Is there something I don't know...?"

Crono eyed Lucca, but when she shook her head he sighed.

So you still feel guilty about your Mom, Lucca...?

"Fix it. We'll stand guard."

Scene Two

Several hours passed as Lucca worked. Marle found a steel door behind the robot, but couldn't open it. With Lucca doing repairs she couldn't get her to look, either, so she was stumped. Crono laid back with his sword laying on his shoulder just in case any other laser goons popped up.

"I've got it," Lucca said. "Gonna give it some juice."

The creature seized up and rose, alarming Crono and Marle. It slowly looked around, like it expected to talk to someone. When he saw no one he seemed... perplexed.

"Um..." Marle started. It turned to face her.

"Good... morning...?"

"G-good morning, mistress. What are your orders?" it said, bowing to Marle.

Marle cocked her head.

"Mistress? I'm not a mistress, I'm Marle!"

The robot said, "But that would be rude."

"Well, I guess all of us are rude... anyway, Lucca, here," she gestured, "fixed you, so I'd talk to her."

"Understood," it spoke. "Madam Lucca fixed me."

Lucca scoffed.

"I'm not old enough to be a madam! Call me Lucca!"

The robot didn't move.

"That would be rude," it repeated. "Some title or honorary is appropriate."

Lucca scratched her head.

"I'm not a title sort of girl, right, Marle?"

Marle giggled.

"Hate 'em!"

The robot again paused.

"Understood, Marle. Lucca fixed me."

Crono crossed his arms and leaned against an Enertron.

"So, get much company here?"

Again the robot was unsure. It looked around the room, expecting to speak to someone else, but there was obviously no one there.

"Strange," it said. "There should be many people and others of my kind here. Has something happened?"

Crono coughed.

"Yeah, we can put the party off. We need to get through this door," he gestured to the sealed room. "Can you bust it open for us?"

As it stepped to the door's control panel, a small, wire-like object slithered from its left arm into a slot on the console.

"The power has been disrupted," it said. "The factory in the north can restore it, given that I input the code."

Marle smiled.

"Okay! To the factory! Crono, and Lucca, and..."

Crono stepped to his feet.

"What's your name, anyway?"

"Name? My serial number is R-66Y."

Lucca adjusted her glasses.

"Cool!"

But Marle shook her head.

"Too techy. How about Robo?"

R-66Y turned to her.

"Information input, my title is now 'Robo.'"

Crono cocked his head.

"Nice to know yourself, but we need to get to the factory and open the damn door. Let's go!"

"Affirmative. However, someone must remain behind to connect the signal."

Marle raised her hand.

"Me! I don't wanna go to some scary factory!"

Lucca nodded.

"So it's decided. But, Crono and I can take the jetbike, so... how are you going to get there?"

Robo turned to her.

"Open the hatch on my left pectoral and pull the lever."

She did so, and Robo's legs folded into a set of treads.

"Then," Robo said, "only one more preparation is needed."

Robo turned his head towards his left arm. With a click the strange limb flipped around to reveal a normal arm.

"Shall we go?"

Another Angle

"Madness or Method?"

Belthasar furiously input a series to commands into his computer.

"Section 4 needs to be adjusted thirty degrees... power in Section 9-6-1 shiould be adjusted thirty percent right, twelve and a half up... and we need to get those speakers working again. Surround sound is paramount."

The strange creature moved towards his master.

"I have not seen you this lucid in some time, sir. Have you regained sanity?"

Belthasar shook his head.

"Nope, still nuts. But the machine MUST be ready before they return. If I am speculating correctly, Gaspar will be helping them soon. Give a few weeks, when they come back I'll have done my part."

Again the creature cocked its head.

"Master, your mental and physical limits are approaching critical. In approximately eight days you will cease to function."

Belthasar sighed.

"I can last that long. If we want to win this war, they'll need my..."

He paused, and a thin smile crossed his face.

"My Wings of Time..."

Scene Three

They arrived at the Factory in short order. The gang entered, and Robo stepped up to a console. He put in a few commands and, quick enough to shorten this chapter, the laser system disengaged.

"The path is open," Robo said. "All we have to do is take care of them."

Lucca cocked her head.

"Them?"

A series of the same slimes that greeted our heroes at the start of all this dropped from the floor, three in all with a sinister snarl from the bunch. Robo, however, swiveled his left arm into its other form and shot lasers that atomized the creatures. Crono and Lucca stared in shock.

"Better than I did," Crono sighed. "Next?"

Robo walked further through a conveyer belt (the other two followed), and came upon two elevators to the east and west, and after a quick pow-wow our heroes descended the eastern exit. They followed a route of muck and rust, finally reaching another door.

"So," Lucca said, "this is where we get the password?"

"Affirmative," said Robo. "The system's data can be accessed at this terminal."

Thus they entered the room. Seeing no scumbags or lethal robots, Robo stepped onto a small elevator that lifted him to a console.

"The password," he said flatly, "is Zabie. Let's continue."

They did. Um... that sort of covers it.

After taking the western elevator, they passed several iron gates that looked sort of ominous. Not spooky, just unusual for some reason.

"What was the password?" Lucca asked. "Zebes?"

"Zabie," Robo corrected. "This is the terminal... Password entered."

A series of klaxons and horns sounded.

Crono sighed.

"Should've figured this was too easy."

Another Angle

"Open the Gate"

"This sucks," Marle moaned. "I don't have anything to do here!"

She leaned against the Enertron.

"Maybe I'll try this... Eh?"

The sound of moving machinery pivoted her to the console, which she promptly activated with a green switch. The offending door slid open. Marle smiled.

"'Kay! They'll be back soon! No trouble at all!"

Scene Four

"We're gonna take a while to get back," muttered Crono. "These look like trouble..."

Before them were a series of robots identical to Robo, save their dark purple coloring. Each of them also carried a laser rifle-arm.

Robo moved towards them.

"R-67Y, R-68Y, R-69Y, R-70Y, R-71Y, R-72Y! I'd thought you'd all been-"

One of them decked Robo, sending him across the room.

"Your program appears defective. Our purpose is to eliminate humans. Please assist us."

Robo rose, staggering as he did, and looked back at Crono and Lucca. He didn't have a face, but they could sense determination. He slowly raised his left arm.

"I cannot do that, brothers. Please do not hurt them."

One of them fired, ripping part of Robo's left arm off. The rest followed suit, causing serious damage to his head and torso. Lucca rushed and held him as he passed out. His oil smelled and looked like blood...

R-67Y turned to the duo.

"Now we shall take care of the humans."

Lucca shuddered in rage, rising with a flourish and leveling her pistol at them.

"No! We'll take care of YOU!"

With that she fired, tearing off one of their heads. Another volley led to no result, as each of them aimed the rifle-arms at Lucca's chest. Crono, however, fumed in anger and dragged his sword against the ground. A pressure wave tore from it, and severed two of the rifles. As they fell, Crono glared furiously.

"'Brothers' my ass! I'll gonna cut you punks!"

"Crono, wait!"

Before Lucca could react though, he dashed forward and, with a mighty double swing, took out two of the bunch. Another lifted its rifle, only to be blasted away by Lucca. That left two.

One of them swung its right arm at Crono. Though he parried, a black sheen covered the forearm and he failed to penetrate. He struggled to no avail, breaking off the clash.

"Dammit! Their arms aren't nornal steel!"

Lucca held her arm against Crono's chest. He turned, sensing anger building in his friend. She aimed and blasted off that robot's head.

"The last one's mine," she hissed. She ruffled through her tool pack and withdrew a small, triangular device. Hurling it, the machine clamped onto the final foe's face. It raised its left arm.

"Your weapon has failed. I shall now execute-"

"Shut up!" she snarled with enough force to stop R-71Y. "Wanna know what I just gave you?"

She withdrew a small remote.

"A magnetic mine," she said cooly. "And I just pushed the button."

Since she had, the final enemy's head flew off in an explosion, only for Lucca to fall to her knees and vomit.

"Ugh! I needed that last bit of lunch, too! Stupid toaster oven!"

Crono directed his eyes to Robo.

"Can you fix him, Lucca?"

She nodded.

"I'll need to take some liberties but I can repair him. Let's go."

Crono cocked his head.

"And how are you gonna get him there? The jetbike won't carry all of us."

Without a word, Lucca opened Robo's hatch and turned his legs back to treads. Crono didn't want to fight the mood, and so they returned to Proto Dome, dragging Robo behind from a cord.

Scene Five

Repairs took the better part of a day. In addition to mending Robo's wounds, Lucca converted what remained of his left arm into a normal one, albeit reverse engineering her gun to create laser guns in his knuckles.

"Can you repair me...?" Robo croaked.

Lucca paused.

"Hush. I don't want to miswire you."

Robo said nothing for a moment.

"You said you want to change history...?"

She refitted a wire and slid a few slides back into place.

"Don't know how far we'll get, but that's the plan. What about you? What'll you do now, Robo?"

He gave no response for a moment, but his voice crackled...

"No one has ever asked me that, Lucca..."

Finally the repairs were done.

"Okay, I hope I never have to do that again," Lucca sighed. "Time to go."

Robo stepped forward.

"Take me with you."

Marle cocked her head.

"Pardon?"

"There is nothing for me here. If I go with you I may find meaning to my existence... that is what I'm going to do now."

The heroes nodded, and moved into the next room where the Gate stood. Lucca brandished the Gate Key, and as the Gate opened and they entered it a crackling energy surrounded them, seemingly short-circuiting the Gate...