Author's Note: As of June 27th, 2016, the entire fanfic has been rewritten. That means this chapter, all that came before it, and all that follow it now contain different content that they did previously. You are strongly encouraged to go back and reread the entire fanfic from the beginning, as the revised continuity may confuse you if you jump in part of the way through.

"Fone Bone! The Palace is collapsing! We need to get out of here!" Thorn shouted as she ran down the hallway. About halfway down she stopped and turned around. "What's keeping you? We have to move!" The sound of the stone smashing and the fire roaring almost drowned out her words.

"We can't just leave them! We need to go back!" Fone Bone wouldn't move. They had to go back and get… Where was he? Why was he here?

"We don't have a choice, they've already been caught! We need to get out before those troops circle back!" Thorn ran back to pick up Fone. The ground started to collapse behind them. "Shit!" She exclaimed. The two of them took off for their lives. The fire close on their heels, rocks smashing from every direction. Fone Bone glanced to his left and saw nothing but a sea of fire preceding a wall of blackness. He started running harder. They almost made it to what looked like an entrance when the ceiling gave way, and came crashing down on top of Thorn. Fone Bone turned around just in time to see the fire catch up to her and swallow her as the rock descended from above, crushing her. He cried out, leaping forward to try to pull her from her inevitable demise.

He sat up in the seat and hit his head on the ceiling of the car. "Damn." he whispered to himself. For the past couple of nights he had been having weird dreams. He and Thorn running down a hallway, arguing, everything on fire. She dies, and he isn't able to save her. It was more than just a coincidence. His time in the Valley taught him that dreams carried a certain significance. Something bad was about to happen, that he was sure of. And the more the days passed, the more he felt that whatever was going to happen would revolve once again around the Valley. He needed to go back. Make sure everything was ok. And if need be, help deal with whatever was heading their way. Because whatever was coming, he couldn't shake the feeling that he was the cause. He didn't know how, but they were in danger because of him. He could feel it. He didn't have time to think about it further, though, because now that he was awake, he needed to get moving.

He started the car again, and took off driving in the same direction that he had been. After leaving Argus City three days ago, he stopped off at Boneville and spent the night there chatting with distant friends, and in the morning two days ago left for the desert. Now he could almost make out the Dragon's Stair on the horizon. He didn't really know how he knew where to go, but ever since he left the Valley, there was this distinct emptiness to the air around him. as he went back to Boneville, that emptiness filled a little bit, and he just kept following that sensation until it lead him to the Valley. Maybe that was the dreaming? He didn't really know. He'd give it more thought when he knew that the Valley wasn't in eminent danger.

He approached the Dragon's Stair, slowly maneuvered his car up the rock face. When he arrived at the top, he parked his car and stepped out. What he saw took his breath away. For first time in five years he beheld the absolute beauty of the Valley. A sea of green tree tops stretched for miles, and in the distance he could see Barrlehaven and the smoke idly wafting from the tavern's chimney. He paused for a moment to take in the majesty of the sight before him.

After a while, he got back in his car and made his way down the path to the end of the pass. After reaching the end, he drove off in the direction of the tavern. The car sped forward without making a sound, and in no time at all Fone Bone was approaching the village outskirts. It occurred to him that the presence of a car would freak out some of the villagers, so he stopped, and getting out Fone locked the car back into stealth mode and started walking toward the village.

As he approached, Fone noticed that the sky was getting much lighter. He didn't know what time it was, but he decided to make as little noise as possible to avoid waking the villagers, and made his way straight for the tavern. He could hear the mild din of conversation and merriment coming from the other side of the door.

"Good." He muttered to himself. "That means that whatever's coming hasn't arrived yet." He paused as he realized he was talking to himself. "Or I'm just crazy." He sighed. Taking a deep breath, he opened the door. Initially, no one noticed him, which bolstered his confidence. Calmly, he strode towards the counter and took a seat. As he made his way toward the bar all of the conversations around the room slowly hushed. As the noise died down, Fone noticed that everyone was staring at him in silence. He had hoped to make his arrival as private as possible, but he paid them no mind. Most of them had known him or met him during his time in the Valley, so it was understandable that they would be mildly shocked at his return.

On his way to the bar, Fone saw Wendell working counter. He was having a very hushed discussion with Ted, who was perched in the end of his finger. As Fone approached, he caught the end of their conversation.

"I'm tellin' ya I saw somethin' movin' around out there in th' woods! It was big n' really fast, and headn' toward th' village!" Ted exclaimed.

"There's nothing out there that's going to attack us. We're in a time of peace. Maybe it was the dragon on his way to somewhere." Wendell replied.

"It wasn't no dragon, I can guarantee you that. There was no brimstone smell lingerin', and it didn't make a sound either. I was really freaky looking too. Like a big… Oh I don't know! I can't explain it! I've never seen nothin' like it before!"

"Excuse me, can I get some service over here?" Fone said as he took a seat.

"Be with you in a minute pal." Wendell said without turning around to look at Fone. "I think you're overreacting. But if you really think you saw something, go outside, find out what it was, and make sure that, if it does exist, it doesn't intend to cause any trouble." Ted leapt off his finger and left.

"I can tell you exactly what was travelling around outside. But I'll need a beer first." Fone remarked.

"Oh fine." Wendell, still without looking at Fone, poured a beer and placed it in front of him. Before he realized who Fone was he asked, "That'll be an egg."

"I don't have any eggs, but I'm pretty sure my credit's still good here." Fone said. Wendell finally recognized Fone, and stumbled back in surprise.

"Fone Bone? Bloody stars!" He shouted. He turned his attention to everyone staring at Fone. "Stop gawking." he said, "Let a man enjoy his drinks in peace." Reluctantly, everyone turned back to their meals and conversations. Wendell immediately started asking questions. "What are you doing back? Where are Phoney and Smiley? What did you say you could tell us about what's been moving around outside?"

"One question at a time Wendell." Fone said. He took a sip of his beer, and started answering. "The thing Ted saw moving around was me. Or rather, the vehicle I used to get here. I left it just outside of town, in the woods." He took another sip. "To answer your other question, I came back because I realized I didn't really belong anywhere else. Phoney and Smiley didn't need me anymore, so I had nothing to do back home. I tried writing about my travels to ease my mind, but that just made me miss this place even more. Eventually I realized I needed to come back."

"This is… Wow." Wendell ran his hands through his hair in disbelief. "What kind of vehicle was this?"

"It's called a car. It's sort of a cart that moves by burning a lot of oil rather than being pulled by cows. That's the best way I can explain it."

"Ok… I'm going to pretend that makes sense. This has been one strange night. Ted's going to be really happy to see you when he gets back."

"I'm sure he is."

"Hey, do you need somewhere to stay the night?" Wendell asked, not sure what to say to prolong the conversation.

"I hadn't planned that far ahead."

"Well, we've got some vacancies upstairs."

"Thanks. I suppose I'll take a room." Fone sat for a moment. "Not to be rude, Wendell but I'd like to finish my beer."

"Sure thing. We can talk more later." Wendell started attending to the other costumers that had since arrived, and Fone continued to drink his beer as he contemplated the magnitude of where he was sitting. He was back. And in a day or two, he would be back in Atheia. And he would see Thorn again.

Outside, Ted approached where Fone's car was parked. He scampered around for a few minutes, and when he found nothing, he hopped back to the tavern. When he saw Fone, he let out a joyous shout, and jumped right in front of him.

"Yer' back! Yer' back! Ohhhhh Thorn's gonna be so excited to see ya'! What's been happenin' back home Bone?"

"Oh, you might want to sit down for this one, figuratively speaking. They elected Phoney ruler of the whole country!"

"Why would they do that? Did he pull his old dragon slayer scam again?"

"Nope. He decided he was going to help people, and he got so popular they made him president."

"Your cousin. A decent person. You sure we're talkin' bout the same Phoney?"

"I'm sure. And that's not all…"

Fone ordered another drink and the two of them began swapping stories, laughing and catching up until late into the night. Outside, an antenna silently rose from an unassuming compartment in the side of the car's chassis. After clicking into place, a faint light on its tip blinked several times.

Back in Argus city, Archibald sat at his desk and finished his morning coffee. As he set the mug down, a light began to blink on one of the various screens in front of him. Casually, he pressed a small button in response. In the Valley, another compartment of the chassis began moving. A small section of the car's body just underneath the antenna slid away, and two dozen tiny eight-legged machines crawled out. Some sprouted wings after they reached the ground, others simply slinked away into the brush. After they had all gone, the antenna and the compartment both retracted back into the side of the car. Archibald reclined in his chair and lit a cigarette.

"Now to get to the bottom of this mystery. You can't hide your secrets from me forever, Dreaming…"

Jigafta Utenki snuck down a hallway in a black bodysuit. He had a black balaclava pulled over his face, with a hole cut in the middle to allow his nose through. He gripped twin silenced handguns, and had a knife strapped to his back just in case. As he made his way through the labyrinthine passageways of the facility, he felt a rush of adrenaline. He hadn't done any field work in decades, so having a chance to stretch his legs again after such a long wait gave him an intense rush. His elation was cut short, however, when a human guard rounded the corner in front of him.

As soon as he saw the guard, Jigafta rushed him. Before the guard knew what was happening, Jigafta jumped and slammed into his gut, knocking him into the opposite wall. Then Jigafta tripped one of his legs out from underneath him, sending him to the ground. As the guard's head passed him, Jigafta struck him in the temple, slamming his head into the ground even faster and rendering him unconscious.

Content with his work, Jigafta grabbed the guard's keycard and continued in the direction the guard had come from. Eventually, he ran into a solid steel door. It didn't have a handle or a lock that Jigafta could see, but there was a small keycard reader in the wall. Jigafta slid he guard's keycard through it, and the door shunted open. Inside was a large room filled, floor to ceiling, with databases and supercomputers. It was the central hub of a Rhumenese company's network.

Rhuma was a human country across the Wadral Sea from the Republic of Bone Territories. It was mountainous country on the Northeastern coast of the human mainland. Despite its terrain and lack of arable land, it was one of the world's leading superpowers thanks to its large military presence and large, cheap labor source exploited by foreign companies to manufacture their products. The company Jigafta had infiltrated was a private defense contractor responsible for advanced research in satellite technology.

As Jigafta walked around the network, he noticed a human technician crouched on the ground repairing one of the consoles. Jigafta approached him and put the barrel of his gun against the technician's head.

"Don't move." Jigafta spoke calmly. The technician froze up. "Don't speak. Don't stand up. This facility coordinates Rhumena's extensive satellite networks. I need you to shut them down."

"I can't." The technician replied tentatively.

"Pride will get you nowhere. And loyalty will get you killed." Jigafta shot the ground near the technician's foot with his other handgun. "I need you to shut down Rhumena's telecommunications."

"No, I mean I physically can't." The technician trembled. "They're programmed to reject changes to their operational status unless they receive clearance codes from the executives that I can't falsify. Short of setting off an EMP in orbit, there's nothing you can do to get them to shut down."

"Well then, you're of no use to me." Jigafta struck the technician on the back of the head, knocking him unconscious. After the technician fell to the ground, Jigafta began examining what he was working on. He had been operating a small touch screen mounted on one of the mainframe computers. On the screen was course data for a network of satellites labeled "thunderbird". Beside each satellite in the network, there was the option of editing their courses. Jigafta adjusted a few of the numbers for fun, but none of the changes seemed to stick. Then he noticed another option on the screen simply labeled "execute operation". Out of curiosity, Jigafta pressed it. Instead of adjusting the satellites courses, it pulled up a textbox that asked him to "input target location".

Confused, Jigafta rummaged around the unconscious technician's pockets until he found a cell phone. He turned it on and dialed the number of the Vice Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Satranik Haenkos.

"Hello, this is the Vice Chair's office. How may I help you?" A female secretary answered.

"I need to speak with the Admiral. Is she available?" Jigafta asked.

"She's not available for calls at the moment."

"Well, can you at least tell her Jigafta Utenki wants to speak with her?" The secretary didn't answer for a moment. Eventually, she spoke.

"I'll put you through now." She spoke much quieter. Jigafta waited for a moment before Admiral Haenkos answered the call.

"What is it, Jigafta?" She asked, partially annoyed and partially angry.

"I'm in the… Queshin Systems building in Rhumena, and I'm looking at something quite concerning."

"Wait, why are you at Queshin Systems? They maintain satellites."

"Well, I was planning on disabling the Rhumenese telecommunications network, but-"

"You were what!" Satranik shouted. "Why in the name of all that is holy were you trying to disable one of our ally's satellite networks?"

"You know me. I've got an itch to scratch, and figured this would be a way to start."

"I'm going to notify the Rhumenese military. Good luck fighting your way out of that."

"Wait. I didn't call to boast. I called because I think I've stumbled upon a network of Rhumenese satellite based weapons."

"Repeat that. Satellite based weapons?"

"Well, I'm not exactly sure. I'm going to try something out. If anything happens to Rhumena in the next ten minutes, it's probably my fault. On the plus side, you can start to prepare countermeasure after you see what it does. Assuming it does anything."

"Jigafta, what the hell are you talking abou-" Jigafta hung up the phone.

He turned his attention to the screen still awaiting a target location. He punched in the longitude and latitude for the Rhumenese capital city. The display read "calculating target area" for a moment, and then another message popped up with an "estimated effect radius" of 500 miles. That was enough square miles to hit all of Rhumena with whatever he was about to unleash. He was beginning to second guess himself until the text disappeared and a button that read "confirm target" appeared. Jigafta pressed it.

For a moment nothing happened. Then, without warning, the phone in Jigafta's hand began sparking. He tossed it aside in surprise, and then noticed that all of the lights had also shorted out, and the databases were offline. He got up and went to the door. The electronic lock had also gone offline.

"An EMP, huh?" He muttered to himself. He closed his eyes and took a long, deep breath. "It'll be enough to get me by." He opened his eyes and walked out the door.

Faldr Milzaek trudged ankle deep through the snow dressed in lightweight combat armor with a sword strapped to his back. Not that it bothered him much. He was born in the north, and never seemed to be bothered by freezing weather. He had been walking for over a day, slowly carving his way to Glaian's fortress through the frozen forest. The sun had set an hour prior, and as darkness settled over the landscape, Faldr began to make out the lights of Glaian's base of operations flickering in the distance.

"I'm stopping to make camp." He said into his earpiece, a small electronic device fitted snugly into the only slightly larger hole in the side of his head that was his inner ear. "I'll set out again just before dawn."

"Roger that." General Victor responded. He had volunteered to be Faldr's handler since they had worked together in the FIC for years.

Back in Argus City, Phoney, Daniel, Julius, and Victor all watched the progress of Faldr's tracker as he crossed the northern landscape on a digital map screen in their meeting room.

"I suppose all we can do now is wait." General Victor leaned back in his chair. "I'd recommend you all get some sleep. Tomorrow is going to be a busy day."

"I agree. Thank you for everything you've done, General." Phoney began to walk toward the door when the Presidential Mansion Chief of Staff burst through it.

"Mr President! Mr. Chairman!" He shouted, panting, as if he had been running through the mansion frantically.

"What is it?" Phoney asked, slightly alarmed.

"The Vice Chair, Admiral Haenkos, called me a few minutes ago. There's something you need to see." He frantically began tapping keys on the tablet he was holding. The screen showing the map switched feeds to the national news. The female news anchor's voice flooded into the room.

"-now theorize that the strange Electromagnetic Pulse that knocked out all of Rhumena's electronics earlier this evening originated from outer space, raising suspicions among the world's governments that a nuclear device was involved. Many countries have already released statements denying the launch of any such weapons, but the possibility still remains that a rouge faction could have been responsible." She paused for a moment.

"Hold on, I'm getting a report. This just in: a large cache of surveillance data from various Rhumenese companies was dumped onto the web just before the EMP. In said data, Wadralian authorities found footage of a masked bone assailant tampering with satellite information prior to the EMP." A picture of a masked bone in a black outfit crouched next to some mainframes appeared on screen. He had a scar across his nose. "The Wadralian government has, as a result, begun considering the possibility that Glaian Nagratek could have initiated the attack as a means of instigating conflict." The Chief of Staff switched the feed back to the map.

"How sure are we that Glaian is involved somehow?" Phoney asked, his mood quickly turning somber.

"That wasn't one of Glaian's men." General Victor responded. "He had a scar across his nose. I would know that scar anywhere. That was Jigafta Utenki."

"So I guess the question now is: Why did Jigafta attack the Rhumenese? And is he really the ally we suppose he is?" Secretary Freeman began to postulate.

"I'll talk to Admiral Haenkos about it, see if she can shed any light on the situation." General Victor offered.

"It doesn't matter." Phoney shut down their planning session. "What matters right now is taking down Glaian. If Jigafta did this for the hell of it, then it isn't really our problem. And if he is on Glaian's side, we can deal with that after the duel tomorrow. Now if you'll all excuse me, I'm going to go get a few hours of sleep." Phoney left the room without another word. Everyone else stared at each other, slightly confused.

"Well, I suppose I'd better get some sleep too. I'll see you gentlemen in a few hours." Daniel Deyavara left the room and walked a short ways down the hall to the room the President had lent him to use for the duration of the situation. Hastily, he ripped off his suit and tie, and climbed into bed. As he was about to go to sleep, he noticed something glinting on his nightstand. He picked it up. Only then did he realize it was the blue crystal he had locked away.

"How did you get out here?" He muttered to himself as he examined it once again. He got out of bed and put the crystal back in the safe hidden in the floorboards underneath before it could do him any more harm. As he was closing the door, he noticed his consciousness begin to slip. He wasn't simply tired, the crystal was affecting him again. Frantically, he rummaged through the room looking for the briefcase to contact Jigafta. His thoughts slowed. His vision began to narrow. Just as he gripped the handle, his vision faded to black, and he collapsed on the floor unconscious.