It's now officially post-Key! This chapter's a bit short, but the next will be nice and long. But don't expect it for...at least a week or two. Sorry. Teachers are NOT conducive to fanfic writing...
Only, Merle, Blake, and the plot belong to me!
Oh, don't own Kingdom Hearts II, either. That would be where the orb idea is from.
Chapter Three
"Now how to translate it?" Blake mutters, pacing the length of the room. Merle stays silent, watching the many orbs that float in the room. Each orb represents an Order member. If the orb glows blue, then the member is alive in the present; if the orb glows purple, then the member is alive in the past; if the orb glows red, then the member is dead; if the orb glows green, then the member has defected to the Guard. Green is expressly reserved for the traitors, which makes sense when Merle thinks about it; both of the Ordersmen who've gone to the Guard in recent years were green-eyed. At present, two orbs are green, sixty-nine orbs are red, and thirty orbs are blue. With a flick of her hand, Merle destroys all of the red ones, as Lathenia had often done. Dead Ordersmen are useless Ordersmen. Of course, this also means that there are only thirty left in the Order. Merle swears softly. The final—or so the Guard thought—battle had killed off most of the Order.
"We need to recruit more," Merle says.
"We need to kill more," Blake corrects. "And we're not going to be able to do any of that unless we can translate this damn Prophecy!"
"Mind your language, Blake," she says with a smirk. "But really…perhaps we should let the Prophecy be for now. We have it in the Underworld, which no Guard would ever suspect. Let's go on a mission, wreak some havoc first. Let's even leave the Chosen alone for now. Except for Midori, who'll need to monitor the sphere and open the portal to the right place and time, as always."
"Midori is Chosen?"
Merle scoffs disbelievingly. "Surely one of the Order's finest, whom Lathenia herself trusted to open the portals would be Chosen!"
"Oh…yes, of course."
So he doesn't want many others to be Chosen, hm? Or why would he get so worked up over an obvious choice?
"Besides, maybe if we capture a Guard member, we can get them to translate the Prophecy for us."
"Us?" he asks hopefully.
"Yes, you're going on this mission with me. How about…why don't we…now where was the next time in the past Lathenia wanted to go to?"
"Wasn't it Atlantis?"
"No, we've already been. It was…oh yes! I remember now. Blake, get ready for a mission tonight. Alert the Order to the true state of things—leave out the Chosen and the Prophecy—, and I'll handle getting Midori."
"Okay."
The moment she arrives home to her one-bedroom apartment, Merle picks up the phone and dials the number. A few rings, then…
"Hello?"
"Hello, could I please speak to Chloe?"
"This is Chloe, who's this?"
Merle grins. "Don't you recognize the voice of your new leader?"
"Ciara!"
"You heard from Lonan?"
"Yes! It's not over! This is great. What do you need?"
"A trip into the past. I'm thinking circa 1492. Can you do it?"
"Naturally."
Merle fills Chloe in on the details of her plan, grinning at the thought of their imminent victory.