YAHOO! ONWARD!

Oh god. Plenty of snickers right after they finally leave the 3rd Plane, by the way. Also, beware... This! (I don't really want it at the bottom for this one...)

Fun Fact: I finished writing this chapter, then went back to the final chapter of Re:ARitA and looked at it. You know what? Both are written in Dark's POV. The final line of Re:AriTA? 'This one's for you, Kairi.' The final line of this story? 'Thanks, Kairi... For everything.' ...I think Dark's started something here. And I'm scared of what he may do at the end of AetT.

"Still trying to figure out how a dead woman comes back to life, over here." –Cantabile

"Though she's spacier than a cheagle on a pot of coffee and her memories are a bit wonky." –Asch

"Kairi said she'd read about it, then told me not to ask questions. And, being slightly wiser than I was a year ago... I'm definitely not going to be the one to ask that question." -Asch

Chapter 13.12 – End Game
Part 122

Dark's POV

"So... any ideas on how we're supposed to leave the TimeStream?" Sync asked.

I shrugged, then paused as something small, silver and copper, and vaguely-cat-shaped started pawing at my leg. I bent down and was a bit amazed to find that it was made entirely out of metal, with a clock face at the base of its tail, almost like a bow.

"What is that?" Jade asked.

"It's... well, it kinda looks like an animal from Kairi's world. A fox, I think she said it was? But I'm pretty sure they're not made of metal," Asch said. I held out a hand tentatively, and the silver and copper fox sniffed it before sticking its head up against my hand.

Jade got hissed at when he tried to touch it, so I wrote it off as my usual ability with animals coming in handy. Especially since the fox came right back over a moment later to rub against my leg.

I tilted my head to the side. "Hey... You look like you might be able to help us."

The fox looked up at me, ears at odd angles.

"We're a bit lost, see. We're trying to get back to our mindscapes."

It didn't respond for a moment, so I repeated it in the liger language, just to see if that would have any effect.

The fox looked decidedly startled. But it nodded and started walking, tail waving almost like a hand, enticing us to follow. I smiled. "I think I can safely call it intelligent."

Asch snorted. "Okay. Well, we might as well follow her. We don't exactly have a lot of other options."

"Her?" Jade prompted as we started walking. I glanced back when Asch didn't immediately reply, and smirked when I saw the blush. Yeah, he'd been looking there, too.

"It's made out of metal, so I'm not sure if it's supposed to have a gender, but I could probably ask," I said. And then, just because I was curious, I did so.

The clicks, whirs, and hisses I got back weren't exactly the ligers' language, but a few moments of translating found me my answer.

"She said they don't have physical genders, but they tend to think up themselves one way or the other after a while. Asch was right, though. She considers herself female," I said.

"You actually understood that?" Sync asked. I shrugged.

"Same language, just different sounds. The tone is almost the same, just in a completely different and more mechanical pitch. It took me a moment, but yes, I can understand it," I replied.

Then she froze, metal armor 'fluffing', and I reached for my guns, only to find I didn't have them. The others were in a similar position, save for Sync, who at least had his original throwing knife set.

Another creature came lumbering over the hill, a human woman by its side, and she seemed as shocked to see us as we were to see the animal beside her.

"Easy, Koga," the woman murmured, a hand on the large creature as she walked forward. "They're not totally here... Interesting. Demetri said it was possible for people to find this place while mind-walking."

I forced myself to relax slightly. "We were looking for a friend... And trying to find our way back to our own mindscapes after we found her."

The woman looked curious, though now she was looking at the fox. "I figured that much. Though... That's odd. The clockwork creatures don't usually try to attach themselves to wanderers..." She looked back at the creature behind her, and it started having a conversation with the fox. I was barely able to keep up with the argument the two of them were having.

"Out of curiosity... what is that?" Sync asked, pointing to the larger of the two clockwork animals. The woman giggled.

"Koga's a bear. My ally, built out of the very clockwork creature that nearly killed me... the first one I killed."

The argument between the fox and the bear ended, and the fox walked off a ways. The woman sighed. "Eraia wants you to follow her. She's taken rather a liking to you," she said, looking at me. "I can't allow her out into the physical world, but with enough practice, you should be able to bring her onto the second plane in your world," she added. "In the meantime, she'll likely be breaking the rules of logic and hanging around in your mindscape while you aren't there. I know Koga does it all the time."

I nodded. "Alright. But, before we go... What's your name?"

The woman smiled, violet eyes shining past her brown hair. "Nanalie. My name's Nanalie."

The bear growled, and the warning it gave worried me.

"We must fix the broken timeline."

Nanalie looked as concerned as I felt. "Let's go."

Then they were gone, faded into nothing within just a moment of Nanalie fiddling with her watch.

Eraia watched them go, then turned back to us and let out what sounded more like a chirp than anything else. I smiled a bit and walked over to her. As worrying as Koga's comment about the timeline was, it wasn't something we could help with.

The fox happily led us through the meadows to a shadowy cave entrance.

Once we stepped through, it became very obvious that we were not in Asch's or Sync's mindscape. The sheer amount of light automatically eliminated Asch's, and while Sync's had been fairly well illuminated despite the ominous clouds overhead, it was nothing compared to the clear, sunny skies we found here.

"I'm gonna guess this is Dark's," Sync said. I rolled my eyes, but acknowledged that he spoke the truth. It was most likely mine... Especially given the environment.

Snow and ice made the light brighter, but it wasn't blinding... I had a feeling it would have been a year ago, making it impossible for the others to navigate. Pine trees, in keeping with the winter theme, dotted the landscape here and there. More often, large boulders, ice walls, and cliffs blocked off the area. It wasn't completely frozen, though, as icy water formed streams and rivers here and there.

Eraia's metallic body didn't seem to have any problems with the snow. In fact, she seemed to think it was quite fun, jumping around through the deeper snow banks.

Asch chuckled. "Kairi would hate this."

I snorted. "No kidding..." Then I paused and looked around. "Sync's gone..."

Jade nodded. "He faded much like Kairi did earlier. I think he's returned to the first plane... We should do so as well."

Asch nodded, and then he did as Kairi had done, vanishing almost into mist before disappearing altogether. Jade looked over at me, then at Eraia, then also disappeared.

I followed Eraia for a bit, curious about my mindscape and wondering about her. It wasn't long before we found a cavern of ice inside a glacier, and Eraia paused as she sniffed around.

"This'll do for a home," she decided. I smiled.

"Glad to hear it."

She gave me a confused look, and I repeated myself in the liger language. She understood it the second time, and then went about digging into an indent in the ice wall to make it larger. Deciding that she'd be able to settle in easily enough, I focused on my body and wondered idly if this would work the way it was supposed to...

*-.-*-.-*-.-*-.-*

"I don't know. Maybe he just felt like poking around a bit in his own mindscape?" I heard Sync say. I groaned and sat up. Damn, the floor hadn't been comfortable.

"Just making sure Eraia was settled in," I said. Huh, that was odd. I could still sort of see her in my mind's eye, digging her little den out. I stretched and hissed as something in my shoulder popped. "So, how long were we wandering around?" I asked.

Cantabile looked amused. "Ten minutes. I didn't even get a chance to go find some reading material."

Asch chuckled. "Looks like Kairi was right. Time passes weird in the TimeStream."

I smirked. "Sounds like it. That's kinda nice, though."

Jade shrugged. "Well, aside from that small chance of it passing faster in the TimeStream than here."

I conceded that point to him, then stood up, stretching out muscles that were sore from laying on the wooden floor for any amount of time.

Damn, I'd gone soft if the wooden floor was suddenly uncomfortable.

Not that I especially minded anymore.

"Then I take it you found Kairi?"

I looked over at Selenia, wondering idly when she'd come in, and nodded. "Yeah. On that note..." I glanced at Jade. "Since Zion tried to spill the beans anyway..."

Asch crossed his arms. "She'll have to explain when she comes back, anyway. Might as well save her one headache."

Selenia looked confused. "I thought you said she didn't know how to do that, though?"

Cantabile looked downright irritated. "She's dead, I don't know how she's supposed to 'come back' at all."

Sync smirked. "That's what she wants you to think."

Asch face-palmed. "She is an absolutely terrible influence on you."

Jade and I gave him a curious look, and he groaned. "When I found out about the miasma in her body, she mentioned something about Sync, and I said he was dead, because no one really knew any better at the time... She popped off with that exact same line."

Sync and I laughed. Jade and Selenia sighed. Cantabile just looked totally baffled. "Still trying to figure out how a dead woman comes back to life, over here."

"Simple. The body that was destroyed was a fake, and her soul jumped back to her original body... which, admittedly, isn't on Auldrant to begin with, so of course that complicates things, but apparently she's figured out how to build another doppelganger body," Jade said. Asch smiled.

"She'll be back in about a week, right after her birthday."

Cantabile stared at us, then looked over at Selenia. She didn't look as certain of this outcome as the rest of us did, but that was okay too. She at least knew that Kairi was from another world, even if she didn't understand the mechanics of it. "So, now what?"

Asch sighed. "Let's find the others first. We need to tell them about Kairi being from another world before we get too much farther into this... that, and Natalia and Ion—er, Solace—are going to be a big help in keeping people calm."

I sighed at Asch's slip-up. "We're also going to have to figure out how to explain... well. Solace."

"Oh, that? That's easy. Luke figured that out before I—Solace even made up his mind to change his name," he said. I crossed my arms.

"So glad that's not my problem. Alright, let's go," I prompted, seeing that we weren't exactly getting anywhere.

Once we were all gathered in the lobby—finally—Asch and Sync glanced at me. I raised an eyebrow in an expression that I hope said, rather plainly, it's not my problem, don't look at me.

Sync sighed, gave Asch a look, and then shrugged and looked at everybody else. "Kairi's from another world."

"Impressionable replicas, indeed..." I muttered, remembering some of the rather blunt statements Kairi had made at Tataroo Valley right after lowering the Outer Lands. Asch chuckled.

"What was it you said? Blunt as a brick wall?"

Ah, so he'd had that pop in his mind, too.

Jade chuckled. "Well, it got it out in the open for us to deal with."

"Whoa, wait, you're not actually buying this, are you Colonel?!" Anise asked. I laughed as another memory came up.

"Anise... this goes right along with the conversation we had about Kairi's telepathy in Baticul."

"Which was..."

"Right before we joined up with you," I said, answering Sync's question. "Though I find it amusing that we're once again talking about Kairi while she's not here."

"Hey, this time it wasn't her fault," Asch said. "I'm pretty sure she was busy dealing with Legretta and Dist during the time you're talking about... Or dropping the line that I mentioned back in the room earlier..."

Sync snickered.

"So, wait... You're being serious about Kairi being from another world?" Guy asked. Luke nodded next to him.

"Yeah. She's shown Asch memories of it, and he's shown me," he said. He looked over at Asch. "If I understand her doppelganger thing right, she should have snapped back to her original body when she died, right?"

Asch nodded. "Since the monolith was drawing on her soul, we were worried, but it looks like Danté cutting her loose worked like we hoped it would, though she's spacier than a cheagle on a pot of coffee and her memories are a bit wonky."

Flick snorted at that description, and while it wasn't totally accurate, it was fairly close.

"So... I'm confused..." Anise said. I grinned.

"Kairi's been existing in two places at once ever since... Hmm... Mid-Gnome-Redecan of last year. That was about when I met her, and I'm pretty sure I met her the day after she landed in a snowdrift," I said. "Given that her memories of Earth only line themselves up with her Auldrant memories when she's in her original body..." I shrugged. "She's got a lot of memories to finish getting straight."

Asch sighed. "Anyway, she'll be back in about a week. She wants to spend her twentieth birthday on Earth, since the last two—and yeah, their calendar is about half the length of ours—she spent here."

Natalia sighed, and noted that it was tinged with relief. "Thank heavens... So, now what are we going to do? We know Gnome is free..."

"Kairi said we needed to organize things so that we could start preparing to evacuate cities if needed. Since we know Myre and Lorelei were fighting in the vision Luke saw, at least some people survived." Asch paused to glare at Luke. "Also... You didn't mention Lorelei said Myre wasn't going to like us."

Luke looked confused.

Then he flinched.

Then he looked confused again. "Wait... I forgot about that completely, but... how...?"

Asch now looked amused. "Kairi said she'd read about it, then told me not to ask questions. And, being slightly wiser than I was a year ago... I'm definitely not going to be the one to ask that question. Because I know I'm not going to understand the answer."

Jade sighed. "We're assuming Kairi knows... And while we're sort of on that subject... Since we're now three weeks away from it... I'd like to invite everyone to Grand Chokmah for the Blue Lights Festival. Knowing Emperor Peony, even the Planet Storm's cessation isn't going to stop it."

Cantabile smirked. "Good. I was looking forward to it this year."

Natalia looked curious. "Blue Lights Festival?"

"You'll enjoy it."

Asch was right; Baticul had nothing like it.

Time to live, now.

'Thanks, Kairi... For everything.'