Author`s Foreword:

Here is my story, threaded so there is no confusion in the posting process.

---M

"Epoch has been primed?"

"Yes, your Majesty. It is ready. Admiral Thames awaits your arrival on the flight deck."

Derik turned and placed a hand on the shoulder of his friend and protector, Sir Toadus. Wearily, the knight opened his amphibian eyes. It took the knight only a moment to recover from sleep and rise to a ready posture.

Even in his cursed form, Toadus still stood a full head above the King. His was a powerful, commanding presence, and all but Derik seemed awed standing in the knight`s shadow.

Derik cracked a smile.

"Come then, old friend. Today we do away with the last bit of evil that haunts our waking nightmares."

Toadus nodded, and placed his helmet on his head. "Sire. The Masamune and I ride with you, always."

Though they did their best to hide it, the two were very near to tears. Derik turned to face the GSF officers who had come to fetch them. Clutched in one of their arms was a warped piece of metal, two feet long, wrapped in oily cloths.

Derik`s eyes rested on the object for only a moment before he and Sir Toadus walked past the officers and into the corridor.

Admiral Thames stood watching Gate III hanging in the heavens through the open bay doors of the Crownguard`s flight deck. It lay some distance off, for the nature of the Crownguard`s current mission mandated they fly close to the Gate Dimension`s sun. To avoid blinding everyone inside the flight deck, the Crownguard was facing away from the fiery orb, looking back toward home, to all the millions of people who were eagerly awaiting the completion of this grim task. As if seeking approval, or to offer reassurance.

At Thames` side, as always, was his feline ward Barry. Barry stood mimicking the Admiral`s ruler-straight posture, and furrowed his brow in homage to his surrogate father`s commanding glare.

"Why is the King going on this mission himself?"

Thames straightened his neck and looked down his nose at his young ward. The boy still had much to learn, if the Admiral was to make him a proper Guardian Officer.

"It is a matter of honor, Barry."

Honor was a word Barry had heard the Admiral -- and other Guardians -- throw around quite a bit. He didn`t understand, and didn`t want to ask, but he offered the Admiral a helpless look.

"When you grow older, you will understand, Barry. There are some things a man must finish himself. Our King has his own demons to slay... and the disposal of that *thing* will help him and his honor to heal."

It was then that the King and his Knight arrived on deck. All hands stood at attention immediately.

Barry, falling into line, whispered to the Admiral: "... why is the frog going with him?..."

Thames sighed.

"... that frog was a man once. That beast Rajaat did that to him. He has as much reason to go out there today as our King... but he does not go for himself. He goes for his lord, King Derik. To protect and be with him as he completes his mission." Thames looked down and his eyes met Barry`s. "That, Barry, is what honor is."

Thames regarded the King sadly. He had changed even in the few days since he last saw him... the eyes now had bags beneath them, the shoulders were even more sunken, and his red, spiked hair, once wild and vibrant as crimson fire, now had even more gray strands. From his return to Aryth through the battle with Rajaat, it seemed years upon years had been heaped onto the young King. But though time had been unfriendly to him, fortune itself had been downright cruel... wife and father slain, kingdom sliding downhill on the rubble of war. It was a miracle the King returned when he did, and the people celebrated. But Derik, it seemed, could do nothing but mourn. Even now, as he went to throw off a great weight from his soul, he looked as though he were attending a funeral.

Toadus looked no better. But then, Thames could never read the expression on that amphibian face. No matter how he felt, it seemed he was always scowling.

"Your Majesty. The Epoch is ready," Thames said with a bow. "I prepared it for you myself."

Derik clasped the Admiral`s shoulder. "Fly on my wing, Thames."

Thames took a beat. "Majesty?"

"You held together what was left of my Kingdom against the scourge of its greatest foes. I want you to witness what I`ve come here to do."

Thames nodded. "... Yes, your grace. Captain Needa, you`re my co-pilot. Admiral Bevel, you have the con --"

There was a tug at Thames` pant leg. The Admiral looked down.

"Let me go with you, sir!" Barry said, trying his best to sound authoritative. "I`m a better pilot than that know-nothing Captain anyhow."

The Admiral grinned and looked in Needa`s direction, as if to say "He`s right, you know." Then he looked down at his ward.

"Why do you want to go with me, Barry?"

Barry took a moment to think about this. He related it somehow to the reason Thames had given for Toadus` accompanying the King, but couldn`t put it into words better than to say: "... Because you`re my Admiral."

It was as good a response as Thames could have expected from his Tigran protege. Thames would make a Guardian out of him yet.

"Let`s suit up then, boy."

Thames and his ward hurried toward the nearest Dactyl class fighter, where a slew of officers were waiting to help them into their flight gear.

Derik and Toadus looked on for a moment and then climbed, unaided, into the Epoch`s cockpit. Derik was wearing his most comfortable clothes, and Toadus was wearing his golden armor. Neither had bothered with flightsuits. Once they were buckled in, the officer who followed them reached up and handed Derik the warped piece of metal. Reluctantly, Derik accepted the gift, wrapped in blackened rags like a child born in a mechanic`s shop.

Derik carefully removed the wrappings, as if shedding layer upon layer of mnemonic repression, delving into the wounds of the not so distant past, to reveal what lay within their care. Peeling them away, he saw a large key.
Unceremoniously, the King threw the rags out over the side and pressed a button on the console that sealed the cockpit glass. Toadus took the key from him, as the King busied himself with starting the Epoch`s engines.

The key was the length of a small sword`s blade, made of a dull black metal that had been warped and twisted by its travel down into the depths of the Gate Dimension`s sea along with the rusting corpse of the Keymaster. It was the last of the tokens that belonged to Rajaat`s minions, the three Fallen Archons who had helped the Warbringer to sow chaos in all of Gate. The Bell of the Mesmerist had been obliterated in the submarine U-Missile detonation off Guardia`s coast, and the Helm of the Deceiver had likewise been incinerated when Prometheus gave his life to destroy the Tomb of Zeal. Only the Keymaster`s Key, which had but recently been retrieved by the King`s Mercantile Navy, remained as a reminder of the dark days of the Cleansing Wars.

This key had been responsible for sealing off the Gate Dimension to contact from the Web of Worlds... and now that Dimension`s sun would devour the key and destroy it forever.

Or, that was how all hoped it would go.

With little fanfare, the two Guardian fighters emerged from the belly of the great ship Crownguard.

"Activate sunvisors," Derik called over the comm, flicking a switch that controlled a transparent amber-colored membrane, which spread across the cockpit glass like a lizard`s tertiary eyelid.

"Sunvisor activated," Admiral Thames called back. "Take the lead, your Majesty?"

"Stay with me if you can, Admiral."

The fighters lined up and came instinctively into formation; both the King and the Admiral were highly skilled pilots. This mission was hardly a test of their skill, but in his Dactyl fighter, Grand Admiral Thames knew that Barry was watching him and so he paid painstaking attention to every detail of his flight.

The sun blazed ahead of them. The solar winds began to whip and tug at the tiny fighters` wings, but they had to go closer still. The Epoch`s jettison didn`t have enough thrust to cover the rest of the distance to the sun`s surface yet... and King Derik had insisted there be no room for error in ensuring the destruction of the Keymaster`s token; just as he had gone to painstaking lengths to ensure its swift retrieval from the ocean floor.

"Sire, my core is taking too much heat," Thames called over the comm.

Derik sighed.

Epoch was built tougher than most Guardian fighters, despite its age. It had safeguards already built in and could probably go quite a ways further into the sun`s realm of fiery infuence before having to turn back. He had become so accustomed to Epoch`s nigh invulnerability that he had forgotten his fleet`s more mundane fighters were so frail.

"Activate heat shields and bear with me a moment," Derik commanded. "We don`t have much farther to go, Admiral."

"Pray you`re right... if not, it was a pleasure riding into the sun with you, Sire."

Derik smiled.

A ways further, and the King turned back to address the Knight.

"Load the jettison, Toadus."

Toadus, seated to the rear of the King, opened a port behind his seat and slid the key inside. The key tumbled down the tube and Epoch did the rest; a complicated series of thumps and clicks in the hull of the Epoch gave evidence of the loading and cocking process.

"Jettison loaded, your Majesty."

"Range is good, Sire," came Thames` voice. "Shoot it off and let`s go home... I don`t mean to complain but it is still getting mighty hot out here."

"Copy that, Thames..." Derik eased the Epoch to a stop. The King and his Knight now gazed into the muted glow of the Gatian Sun. They were so close now that they could see nothing but its intense glow. "Stand by to fire, Toadus."

"Standing by, your Majesty."

Derik waited. He didn`t know why he waited. He just waited.

"Sire?"

"I..."

There was a thrashing against the hull. It was a sound that neither Toadus nor Derik was especially familiar with. Then there was the flash of laser shots coming across the Epoch`s bow.

"Are we being fired upon??" Toadus asked.

Derik checked his sensors. "Thames is the only other ship out there..."

Then there was a blast of static, and a confused message trying desperately to crackle through the flurried din: "--- ire, come about, --ou a-- at thing!?... Sire? Sire??"

"Thames! Come in Thames!.." another shot. The Epoch`s wing knicked. "Thames, is that you firing on us??"

"My Liege, the-- --meone on y-- -ing! --"

Static, then silence.

Toadus glanced at the King. "Solar winds?"

"No, these comms are designed to pierce them."

"The turbulence then?"

"Thames wouldn`t shoot at solar winds."

Another thrashing, this time louder, and accompanied by a sharp jolt. Toadus rolled forward and his helmet cracked into the side panelling. The knight was fine, but Epoch`s interior now sported a lovely gash.

"Highness, the sun!!"

Epoch was tumbling toward the sun. Helplessly, it seemed.

And that was the last thing either the King or the Knight remembered.

The ground, the air, everything always seemed so flat here in this place.
It had texture, but only inasmuch as painted canvas might have texture. Dimensionally, in every way possible, this place was flat. It felt flat, it looked flat, it was flat.

Like an impressionist painting, the sky was streaked with plainly evident brushstrokes of blue and cotton white against the ever present yellowed-beige of reality.

Scorn laid in the grass, her hair spread out behind her and her taloned hands cupped behind her head. It felt less like laying in the grass than it did like laying on a canvas tarp, but in truth she didn`t mind it all that much anymore. She had no actual memory of what laying in grass felt like, so this place and its pseudo reality did not torture her as it tortured many of her father`s guests.

She looked up at the sky. It was more like a theatrical backdrop than a real sky; the few memories of reality that Scorn had told her this much.

But this wasn`t reality. Nothing here was real. If she flew high enough, she would hit the sky, and like a stretched drum-skin it would bounce her back toward "earth." She hadn`t measured the distance from ground to sky-ceiling; it couldn`t be measured. Nothing could be measured here, not distance and least of all time.

This was Sargasso, the Isle of Time`s Neglect. Nothing here was meant to be real. It was simply a place outside the realm of time`s passage, a place where the four dimensions of reality lost most of their meaning, a place where her father could recuperate and prepare for his glorious return to reality.

For Scorn it might as well have been a prison. But these were thoughts she dare not share with anyone, least of all her father. Between his two children, the mighty Rajaat had come to favor the willful spitfire of a daughter that Scorn had become. She had won him over and dared not take that for granted, lest he do something... unpleasant to her, like he kept doing to her poor stupid brother Iyana.

With a start, Scorn sat up.

He was summoning her. She cursed under her breath and spread her wings, then took to the air; the stale, windless air that never moved or flowed in this place. She flew over the verdant Fields of Glory (as Rajaat had named them), past the Mountain of Remembrance (where ghosts of memory`s past and monuments to Rajaat`s victories had been gathered or erected) and over the Sea of Nemesis` Blood (whose waters were red-purple, and which ebbed and moved as if it were a flip-card animation of a real body of water).

Though the distance was long (how long, no two persons could report in exactly matching measurements), in matters temporal it took next to no time at all for Scorn to move from the Fields to Rajaat`s Cell. This was because time was as flat as anything else in this place; it did not flow here, and it was disorienting at first because the lack of temporal flow played on a being`s perceptions in a way that was indescribable and dizzy. But Scorn, as well as her brother Iyana, adjusted to these effects rather quickly and could now operate more or less linearly. They were the children of a greater being, after all.

Scorn stepped reverently into the Cell. It appeared as a quaintly furnished one-room apartment, and it was the most "real" place in all of Sargasso; the tables, chairs, walls and floor played together in such a way that they left one with the sense that the room had actual dimensions. In fact, by this place`s very nature, Scorn knew this was not the case; it was a complicated illusion, woven through a combination of her father`s magic and that of her father`s most recent servant, Ariel.

At the far end of the room was a shrine. The shrine`s centerpiece was a winged, man-sized idol carved of glassy black rock. Resting atop the idol`s head was a warped and blasted helmet; sitting in the idol`s hand was a bell that had been bent out of shape. With these well-worn accoutrements, the idol had something of a weathered look, as though it had been the veteran of countless climactic battles. Which, given the nature of the spirit housed within the idol, was actually not too far from the truth.

"My child," came a voice that seemed to resonate within the idol.

"... Father." Scorn came closer to the shrine as she spoke. "I saw those ships crash on the Mountain. More hapless travellers for you to play with?"

The idol laughed without moving. "Tell your piteous heart there`s no harm done."

"Indeed... yet. I tell you, father, I have no love for humanity... but I am quickly tired of the savage torment you inflict on those you draw in from reality."

"I have done nothing but in care of thee... of thee my dear one... thee my daughter... who, despite thyself and all that makes thee shine in my eyes, art ignorant of what thou art, naught knowing of whence I am, nor that I am more better than Rajaat, master of a full poor cell, and thy no greater father."

Scorn rolled her eyes. Rajaat had been given to gradiose speeches since the loss of corporeal form. It seemed that, as a paperweight, he had lost all but his powers of speech and so infused into his words the former greatness of his being. Or tried to, at any rate. It was an infectious thing, Rajaat`s round-about (and some might say poetic) manner of speech; and Scorn found it was very difficult for those who held audience with Rajaat to avoid speaking in like terms.

"`Tis time I should inform thee farther," Rajaat said, with such glee that he must have known how his flare for outlandish speech drew ire from his beloved daughter, "Lie there, my art. The direful spectacle of the wrack, which touched the very virtue of compassion in thee -" Here Rajaat was plainly sarcastic, breaking character and form to take a well-placed stab at his daughter. Scorn sighed audibly. "- I have with such provision in mine art so safely ordered that there is no soul..." the Warbringer indulged himself in a light cackle. "No, not so much perdition as a hair betid to any creature in the vessels which thou heard`st cry, which thou saw`st fall. Sit down; for thou must now know farther."

"Hmm... no thanks, father. I have... things to do elsewhe--"

The magic of Rajaat was still quite potent. Limblessly, Rajaat`s presence stretched out from the idol and took hold of his daughter, forcing her with invisible arms roughly to the floor. Scorn could do naught but grumble and succumb to Rajaat`s might.

"The hour`s now come," Rajaat said trumpetously, "The very minute, in this timeless waste, bids thee ope thine ear. Obey, and be attentive... lest I am forced to draw out some manner of `savage torment` on thee, my lovely. Canst thou remember a time before you were bid by me come unto this Isle of Time`s Neglect? I scarce think thou canst, for then thou wast not out a year old..."

"And still, father, thanks to your Sargasso... it might be said I`ve not aged at all."

Rajaat laughed. "Too true, too true... Faith, thou`rt hardly a shadow of a minute the elder of thyself before thy arrival. Alas, we speak in terms alien to our new home, to make mention of such things as time. Timelessness is our substance now, as timeless as my penultimate revenge... you see, dear one, before we are come to this place, before our power was driven from the four dimensions by the agencies of petty mortal humanity, thy father was Rajaat the Warbringer, general of the Defilers of Xenos and Conquerer of Guardia."

"... I remember."

"By what?" Rajaat snapped. "By any other house or person? Of anything the image tell me that hath kept with thy remembrance."

"I have locked away inside me the memories of my mother... and to some extent I have your own memories, father... but it`s far off, like a dream..."

There was silence from the idol.

"Excellent," Rajaat said at last. "I had hoped as much. Indeed, thy creation hast served me well, dear daughter. With thy memories safe and thy brother`s strength, I am most sure to be made whole once more."

"How did you come here? My memories of that are not clear at all."

"By foul play was I heaved hence, but blessedly holp hither."

"... Huh?"

"There are many who play roles in my exile from life itself, some more subtle than others. Surely thou hast heard me speak before of figures as King Derik and Lord Prometheus. But the tale surely begins long before my true death, with a figure more close to thy reckoning than my now living nemeses. My lover and thy mother, called Lalali -- I pray thee mark me, that a lover should be so perfidious! -- she whom next thyself of all the world I loved, and to her put the manage of my armies, as at that time through all the signories it was the first, and Rajaat the Great Defiler, being so reputed in power and might, and for the arcane arts without a parallel. With these and other pursuits being my study, the government of my conquered territories I cast upon thy mother and to my state grew stranger, being transported and rapt in... secret studies. Thy false mother!... Scorn, dost thou attend me?"

"... sir, most heedfully." She was playing with her hair.

"Being once perfected," Rajaat continued, "In managing the chaotic masses of my followers: how to grant suits, how to deny them, who t`advance, and who to trash for overtopping, thy mother-wench new-created the creatures that were mine through conquest, I say -- or changed `em. Or else new-formed `em -- having both the key of officer and office, set all hearts i` th` state to what tune most pleased her ear, that now she was the ivy which had hid my princely trunk and sucked my venture out on`t. ... Scorn, thou attend`st not?"

Scorn was in the middle of a yawn when Rajaat stopped again. She quickly swallowed the better part of it, composed herself and said: "Oh, good sir, I do..."

"I pray thee mark me," Rajaat`s tone was skeptical. But he continued: "I thus neglecting worldly ends had gone off in mad pursuit of Clarice of Viper, who ought have been thy step-mother had I occassion to make her so... I was all dedicated to closeness and the bettering of my near-divine lineage, and with it reshaping the whole and form of our world, with that which, but by being so retired, o`erprized all popular rate, in my false lover awakened an ambitious nature, and my trust, like a good parent, did beget of her a falsehood..."

Scorn stopped even pretending to listen at this point. Was he even making sense? There were many who called Rajaat insane when he was a living and terrible entity... in his disincorporated and timeless form, he had become a jabbering spirit that could literally captivate an audience and enforce on them a droning, polysyllabic soliloquy for what seemed like an eternity -- but which Scorn knew well enough took no real time at all in this dimensionless place.
Scorn tuned in for a moment, just in case her father would call on her again. What was he saying? Still talking about Lalali. Traitorous strumpet, blah blah blah...

"... until at last most foully slain and ended by that one of House Pendouris whom I have mentioned before... Dost thou hear, daughter?"

"Your tale, sir, would cure deafness..."

"To have no screen between this part he played..."

Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah.

"... so Child, I have brought me here all those that have sought to undo my pow`r. Though they tried to destroy me, I have brought my own remnants and my children here to this place, where by all of time and space they may not touch me. Now clutched in their arms they bring me the very thing I need to restore myself. The final piece. The Key. And you still have yet a part to play in all of this..."

"A part?" Scorn almost whined this, as a child in anticipation of being told what her chores for the day will be.

"Away, child, and fetch thy brother Iyana. You must both be made aware of my plans for the now, with mine enemies in Sargasso. Away, I say!"

And like a leaf in some non-existant gale, Scorn was gone. She asked no question at being so promptly dismissed, but offered no thanks either; best to simply take her leave and *go*!

For a moment, a moment which meant nothing in a place without measure of moments, Rajaat was alone. It was an eternity of a moment, which Rajaat stretched out with Sargasso`s pliable dimensionlessness to last for aeons, in which Rajaat sat and composed his thoughts, wrote poems in his mind and concocted the devices of his revenge on his enemies.

When he was ready, he ended his moment and spoke once more.

"Come away, servant, come!" Thundered Rajaat, so loud his voice shook the idol in which his spirit was bound, "I am ready now. Approach my Ariel, come!"

In a swirl of colors brighter and more alive than any found in Sargasso`s impressionist two-dimensional landscape, a being emerged into Rajaat`s Cell.
She was human by all appearances, clad in a dark cloak which hid her face, save those piercing, glowing green eyes. Doffing her hood, she revealed a peerlessly perfect female countenance, framed on all sides by silky white hair. Spreading the cloak from her body, tucking it behind her like eagle`s wings, she revealed her lithe feminine form, garbed in a tight purple tunic, dastardly short purple skirt and black nylon leggings.

"All hail, great master!" the woman declared, her green eyes flashing as she bowed low. "Grave sir, hail! I come to answer thy best pleasure... be`t to fly, to swim, to dive into the fire, to ride on the curled clouds... to thy strong bidding task Ariel and all her quantity."

Again, Rajaat`s laugh echoed in the Cell. "Hast thou, Archmage of Time, performed to point the tempest that I bade thee?"

"To every article, my lord. With comet`s tail and solar wind I swept the dust-balls of thy vengeance into your pocket of no dimension. The King of Guardia and his attendants are crashed at the base of your Mountain of Remembrance. They awake now, no doubt, to find themselves bereft of all sense of time. Now they are excellent pawns to your work, mighty Warbringer."

"My brave spirit!... they are, Ariel, safe?"

"Not a hair perished." Ariel said with a coy grin. "Not even so much as a stain on their clothes."

"The ships?"

"Safely in harbor, my liege, at station atop the Mountain."

"... and the Key to my restoration?"

"Extracted from the hull of His Highness` chariot, and placed beside him with his sword."

"Ariel, thy charge exactly is performed. But there`s still more work."

Ariel frowned for the first time. She let her cloak fall back around her and glared darkly at the idol.

"Listen here, Rajaat," she said, speaking in an entirely different voice from her prior sycophantry, "I have given you Sargasso, the isle in time that was to be *my* sanctuary from Alkar. I have brought you your children and the battered tokens of your Fallen minions. And now I have brought you the last piece, the Key, and with it the objects of your revenge. Do not forget what *you* have promised in return, before you go giving me more of your `tasks`..."

There was a silence, and then more laughter. Twisted laughter.

"How now? Moody?" The laughter from Rajaat became even more wicked than usual. "What is`t thou can`st demand?"

"... my liberty. And the tools to acquire it... you promised me a portion of your power and knowledge of Defiling."

"Hah!! Before my vengeance`s done? No more!"

"I`ve more than earned it... look at all I`ve done for you!! The time and dedication..."

"Time? What meaning has time in this place you have wrought? Water in the desert, Archmage."

"I have performed above and beyond my call!" Ariel`s eyes flared an angrier green; a nimbus of emerald flame encircled her person. "Protected you and heeded your demands with no grudge or grumblings!! You promised me great things, Rajaat, and I haven`t seen a one!!"

"Dost thou forget from what a torment I did free thee?"

Ariel became silent. The flames abated. "No," was her simple response.

"I think thou dost."

"... I do not, sir."

"Thou liest, malignant thing!!" The backlash of Rajaat`s voice caught Ariel in its wake, and threw her against the wall. Picture frames of happy families, people of whom Rajaat had no knowledge (they came with the frames), were beaten off the wall with Ariel`s impact. With her the frames and their contented photographs crashed to the floor in a cascade of breaking glass.

"Hast thou forgot the Guru Gaspar, who with great envy of your mastery of his element, and you a spirit too delicate to act his earthy and abhorrent commands, refusing his grand hests, he did confine thee by help of his more potent allies, and in his most unmitigable rage, into a wrought-iron light-post, within which rift imprisoned thou didst painfully remain as timeless as evermore?"

Ariel stood. Slowly. She let on she had been hurt by Rajaat`s outburst more than she had, and secretly nursed a grudge despite being reminded of how she was indebted to the Warbringer.

"I remember, lord. You freed me when your spirit came to this place... I am sorry, master... I thank you."

Rajaat took a moment to consider. "If thou more murmur`st, I will rend an oak and peg thee in his knotty entrails till thou hast howled away half an infinitude."

"... I said I am sorry..." Ariel bowed her head. "What is thy bidding?"

Rajaat took pause to think.

"Go make thyself as a spirit; be subject to no sight but thine and mine, invisible to every eyeball else. Go take this shape and hither come in`t. Go! Hence with diligence! Reconnoiter my guests and keep watch on their doings. That is thy task. At once!!"

Ariel gave one final bow and began to chant her spell. She faded partially from view, but remained visible to Rajaat.

At her master`s wish, she left the Cell.

Derik awoke.
Or has he been awake for some time?
Is is hard for him to see, his face is covered in his own vomit.
Suddenly Derik will see a rift opening in the sky, the sky that looks like a painting from Jidoor. The rift opened and dropped from it the Epoch and Thames` Dactyl.
Derik was awake. Where was Thames? Thames is still inside his Dactyl, it`s falling.
What is happening? Epoch is falling into the sun. The rift opened. Derik will vomit. Derik was so dizzy.
"My liege? What... where are we?"
That was the voice Derik heard a good ten minutes ago. But ten minutes before it he responded: "I don`t know Toadus... wait, did you just say something?"
"My King?"
Derik doesn`t know who this voice will come from. He turns around and sees two figures climbing out of the Dactyl. They are five miles away. Ten miles. Right beside Derik.
Derik is dizzy. He fell down five minutes ago, but he is still going to be dizzy six hours from now.
Toadus is upside down, twenty yards away from Derik, to the west. Now east. Toadus is lying down on the sky. Ground. Where was he going when Derik will fall down? Toadus is trying to stand up, but he was still on the sky as of thirty seconds ago. Now he is swiming across the ground, or trying to, for four hours.
Thames and Barry fell down too, in ten minutes.
Thames will say something but Derik did not hear it yet. He is too dizzy.
Derik is climbing out of Epoch. He vomitted once. Someone is helping him, forcing him. Derik is on the floor, he was dizzy.
Derik looked down, and saw someone in the distance breaking open Epoch`s hull. The person, who is now standing right next to Derik, will pull out a key. A big key. A big black key. A big black evil key. She hasn`t done it yet, but did it five hours from now.
"Your Majesty, snap out of it!" was what someone said two hours ago, after he fell down next week.
The key will be dropped next to Derik, who is lying in a straight line from Toadus, who is still ten miles distant. Thames and Barry are trying to draw their guns, but they will get dizzy and then they fell down. They are now sliding away from Derik at a rate of ten yards per second, for some reason. But they will start to come closer again, two hours ago.
Epoch and Dactyl were gone then, ten minutes before they fell out of the rift in the sky that looks like a painting from Jidoor.
Derik turns his head to the bottom and closes his eyes to see, fifty yards away, the black-metal Key he wanted so badly to destroy six hours ago.
Derik will throw up, just like he did two hours ago, when he first started experiencing all of this, as he begins to experience it again.
Derik is dizzy. He fell down five minutes ago, but he is still going to be dizzy six hours from now.
Toadus is upside down, twenty yards away from Derik, to the west. Now east.
Epoch and Dactyl were gone then, ten minutes before they fell out of the rift in the sky that looks like a painting from Jidoor.
What is happening? Epoch is falling into the sun. The rift opened. Derik will vomit. Derik was so dizzy.
Derik awoke.
Or has he been awake for some time?
Thames will say something but Derik did not hear it yet. He is too dizzy.
Derik is climbing out of Epoch. Someone is helping him, forcing him. Derik is on the floor, he was dizzy. He vomitted once as Toadus collapses beside him.

There is shouting now, from Thames and Barry. Derik can`t make it out, he`s too dizzy. They are clambering out of their Dactyl and trying to draw their guns, but they faint and fall to the ground.

Is is hard for him to see, his face is covered in his own vomit, but Derik noticed the figure who helped him trying to pry open Epoch`s hull. She draws out the key, and lays it beside him.

His head is clearer now... he can think straight... but still, Derik was so dizzy...
He vomitted again, and wondered what time it was.

"Your Majesty, snap out of it!"

Derik looked up.

Looking down on him was a face he never thought he`d see again.

"... Robo..."

Carefully, Derik and his companions came to their feet. Immediately, as he recognized their savior, Toadus fell to his knees before the angelic Prometheus.
He was just as Derik remembered him... like a vision of the past... the distant past. He was born again in robotic form, like he was when he was simply Derik`s nurse-maid -- but now his casing was a glistening white in color, as it was while he was Lord of the Archons, and his human-like features had been scrubbed away in favor of a more robotic appearance. His wings were gone entirely.

"... Lord Prometheus..." Admiral Thames muttered, despite himself. "It... it can`t be!"

"Mighty Throne Archon," Toadus intoned breathlessly, "Highest of those Blessed by Spekkio`s Light..."

"But... Robo... how?" Derik was near to tears.

"No questions, my King," Prometheus placed a consoling hand on Derik`s shoulder. "I come back to you now as you have need of me most. Rajaat has endured. He seeks that key which you have brought with you, and believes that you are a pawn to be played to his best advantage. In truth, I think he also intended me to play a part in his scheme as well... it is by my magic alone that you are able to keep your wits in this dimensionless place, and for Rajaat there is no sport unless you are all fully in your faculties. But be that as it may, we can still defeat Rajaat and keep the Keymaster`s token from restoring him to his power."

Derik bowed his head. "Robo... to have lost everything as I have... and then find you still alive..."

"Time enough for reunions later," Prometheus said, "For now we had best get a move-on. Rajaat and his Archmage control the four dimensions of reality here. Though we have a short distance to travel, it will take us several days by our bodies` reckoning. Perhaps even a year, or three, or five. And yet, to the outside world and all appearance of age, no time will have passed for us at all." Robo turned his gaze to the mountain that the group was gathered around the base of. It looked like a stage flat that was impossibly high; it had only width and length, like a huge wall stretching up into the painted sky. "At the top of this mountain, which Rajaat calls his Mountain of Remembrance, the Epoch lies dormant. Epoch, with its ability to pierce the fabric of time, is the only means by which you may escape this place now. You must ascend the mountain with the Key and return to reality to complete your task. The sanctity of the Web may yet depend on it."

"Sounds simple enough," Thames smirked. He drew and cocked his gun. "Should we expect opposition?"

"From all sides," Prometheus declared, "And every direction in time: before, alongside and behind. Your memories will be of great use to the enemy in impeding your march, so as you come across Rajaat`s monuments and the shadows of your own hopes and fears, you must remember to forget yourself..." the Archon sighed. "Know that I cannot remain with you as you travel... and the spell I have cast on you is a frail one. What you must know of this place is that the dimensions of our reality have little to no sway here... or, better said, they have as little sway as this place`s masters would wish it. Time especially. You must travel with greatest discretion, and try to keep yourself hid from Rajaat and his minions. If he discovers you, and knows where you are headed, he will shift this reality and stifle your escape."

Prometheus turned to Derik and spoke directly to him: "Above all else, my King, remember... you must not let this key fall into Rajaat`s hands. I do not know why he has let you keep it thus far, but he no doubt intends to play some twisted game with you and your comrades. It is the key he wishes, however, not you; and if he thinks you are in danger of escaping with it, he will suspend his game and stop at nothing to retrieve his prize."

Derik snarled. "It won`t come to that..." he gripped the key and slid it into the satchel at his side. Despite its former size and girth, it seemed to shrink and fit easily into the pouch; where it was dense as lead before, it now seemed as little weight at all.

Prometheus embraced Derik. "Safe journey, my liege. I have tasks here which keep me busy... Tasks I must perform in order to ensure your smooth escape... Old scores that must be settled and battles that must be fought one final time."

"My Lord Throne!" Toadus uttered, daring to stand a moment to address the Archon. "... Will you not escape with us?"

Prometheus paused. His robotic face betrayed no emotion, but his aura seemed to dim a bit. "If I can, I will. If not... it is no loss to you. I am dead already."

With that Prometheus departed, speeding off so quickly into the distance that the companions soon lost track of him.

Thames, Derik and Toadus came together and stood before the base of the Mountain. All at once, the three followed the monolithic flat up as far as their eyes would let them see.

"How do we climb a mountain that`s as sheer as a wall?" Toadus asked, reaching under his helmet to scratch his head.

The three puzzled at this. Derik took a step toward the Mountain and gave a firm push. It didn`t budge.

"... I don`t suppose anyone thought to bring any rope?" Derik asked futilely.

"It doesn`t make a difference," came a voice from behind them. The Knight, the King and the Admiral all turned to look. It was Barry.

"Barry, do not interrupt," the Admiral admonished.

"But Admiral --"

Thames glared, and Barry was silent.

"Hear the boy out, Malvo," Derik insisted. Thames bristled at being called familiar, but could not admonish his King and so had to let it slide. "What do you mean, kid? It doesn`t make a difference?"

Without a word, Barry walked over to the Mountain, and kept walking on up the sheer face after thoughtlessly stepping over the ninety-degree meeting of floor and base.

"Direction and dimension don`t mean anything here," Barry explained, turning and looking up to face the others, "It`s why we were so dizzy before the Archon came... but now that we have his spell protecting us we can walk the distance like we`d walk anything else. Almost like normal."

Derik smiled. He clapped Thames on the back. "Smart kid you got there, Admiral."

The Admiral grumbled, but when the others turned away he tipped his cap and offered a warm smile for his ward.

Derik was the first to step onto the Mountain after Barry, then Toadus, and lastly Thames.

The fifth person to step onto the Mountain remained unseen by the first four.

Soon the landscape changed.
The terrain was no longer the simple, flat nothingness of Rajaat`s Mountain of Remembrance, which they were only just becoming acquainted with. The ground gradually took on more dimensional features... rocks and rubble became evident. Then the ground began to waver and lose its flatness. Soon the party found themselves cresting hills and walking over a landscape that was charred and pitted. Broken vehicles and mecha dotted the landscape, and the few plants there were had been blasted or otherwise damaged by rather intense fighting.

"Where are we?" Derik asked.

Toadus welled up with pride.

"We are in the Esper dimension." The Knight pointed off in the distance. Beyond the next ridge was an encampment, above which flew the Guardian flag.
"This was our camp during the Leviathan War. I know this area as well as I know the paths of Guardia Forest."

Despite the length of their trek up the mountain, and the fatigue it had put into all of them, Toadus was given a surge of energy at the sight of his old digs and so sprung forward with the vigor of a soldier half his age. Derik, Thames and Barry (who was by now riding the Admiral piggy-back) rushed to catch up.

Toadus approached the camp. The air was that of cold early morning on the Serpent Trench. Toadus inhaled... absorbed the smell, perfectly replicated as if from the Knight`s memory, and then released his breath in a condensed and wispy cloud that died within a second. Here, this place, was the finest battlefield of his career. Not the stretches before and behind Zenan Bridge, not the plains of Truce where he`d faced down the Defilers... here, in a land millions of miles from the place of his birth, where he fought alongside allies who were as alien to his home as the invaders he would slay. He was overcome with sensory recall and the images of the great glory that was to be had in these battles. Patting the Masamune`s hilt at his side, and forgetting for a moment his cursed frog form, he strode into the camp. JetBikes and Mauler suits were out and being serviced by technicians. Soldiers were polishing their armor and swords. As he strode past, the soldiers regarded the Knight and offered a silent salute. They did not seem to notice or care that he had been changed; and in their forgetting so did Toadus.

Goose pimples rushed up and down his arms as he watched his men make their morning preparations. One soldier he passed offered the Knight Captain a portion of his breakfast rations. The Knight accepted with a gracious bow and sunk his teeth into the jerky. It tasted like cardboard boiled in meat spices, but there was something to its taste, bland as it was, that served only to draw him further into drowning in the illusion. With a smile he finished the meat and patted the soldier on the arm as he walked on.

Toadus knew most of these men. Many of them he had seen die on the fields of the Leviathan War. So he knew this had to be a phantasm... it made all logical sense and should have dampened his quixotic acceptance of this facade... but he was beyond logic and reason. It was an effective enough illusion that the Knight lost himself in his memories and actually began to believe that he was there, with his men, in Esper, fighting the Protectorate invaders.

Word of Toadus` arrival spread through the camp. Soon, soldiers began emerging from their tents. They lined up on either side of the row, watching as the Knight Captain passed, hoping he would notice or recognize them.

Derik and Thames looked on.

"Esper Dimension?" Derik asked.

Thames nodded. "No doubt this is one of Rajaat`s monuments that Lord Prometheus mentioned. The Archbishop dispatched the GDF here to aid our Esperian Allies in the final days of the Leviathan War. There was terrible fighting back then... Toadus was here and he lead our troops. Rajaat, when he was Danarael the Chalice Archon, was also here... this was where our Archons met their test against the Scandian Dracoforms..."

As if on cue, the ground began to shake.

Derik`s hand flew to his sword`s hilt.

"What was that?"

Thames set Barry down and drew his gun. "... I believe, my Lord, that we are about to be given a taste of Leviathan War action as Rajaat remembers it. We should seek cover..."

Derik watched Toadus draw his sword and rally the troops to action. Together, Toadus and his men, armed with various Guardian implements and piloting various machines, charged off away from the camp. Derik silently swore.

"You keep Barry safe. I have to make sure Toadus doesn`t get himself killed..."

Derik sprinted over to the nearest JetBike and revved it to life. No sooner had he flared off in Toadus` direction, there was a roar and an explosion on the edge of the camp.

There it was... in all its sinister glory. A Dracoform, emerging out of the earth like a demon out of hell.

The Guardian camp immediately came to life. Soldiers rushed for their vehicles and weapons. Toadus, himself, had the Masamune drawn and was charging the enormous mecha on foot; a bold Knight intent on slaying the dragon in single-combat. Derik maneuvered his JetBike around the debris and camp trappings, hurrying for all he was worth after his amphibian friend.

Thames huddled down behind a Mauler and kept his eyes on the Dracoform and where it was firing.

"... I had hoped it would be years before you would see the fires of war firsthand, Barry," Thames said, never removing his eyes from the beast-like mech, "But take heart and know this is only an illusion... still, we should keep our heads down and wait out the fighting. Let the phantasms tear each other apart, and then be on our way. So stay close, Barry, all right?"

There was no response.

"Barry?"

The Admiral turned only to see that Barry was nowhere to be found.

Toadus leapt into the fray and unleashed a funnel of magical water at the beast. The Dracoform`s head shook off the blast and was distracted enough that it didn`t notice as Toadus passed under the beast and, using his froglike legs, leapt up to plant a potent slash into the mech`s undercarriage.

Had it been a weapon more mundane than the Masamune, the damage would have been minimal. But the sword flashed through the outer hull of the beast and left a sparkling wound that sent the beast reeling.

Derik sped up after Toadus, but managed to catch the attention of the Dracoform`s pilot. The King silently swore and swerved out of the way, but was too late to avoid a rocket aimed for his bike`s rear. Sensing his vehicle`s imminent explosion, Derik leapt and rolled just in time to avoid a rather nasty burn wound.

Coming out of his roll, Derik was instantly on his feet with the Rainbow Sword drawn.

"Toadus!!" he called out, "Come on, we have to get out of here!!"

"EST SULARUS OTH MITHAS!!" Toadus cried as he took another high-powered spring, this time onto the mech`s back. The Dracoform`s sensors must have detected the interloper, because the beast began to sway and rock in an effort to buck the Knight off.

"Dammit, Toadus!! Not now!!!"

"Highness!! Spire!!!" Toadus shouted down as he thrust his Masamune into the mech`s spine. "Now, my Lord -- SPIRE ME!!!"

"What!?!? Are you out of your amphibian mind!??! We have to leave NOW!! This is dangerous!!!"

The Dracoform, still aware of Derik, turned one of its Demolisher guns toward the King.

"Ah fuck," was all Derik managed to say before his survival instincts compelled him to begin running to avoid the spray of bullets.

"SPIRE!!!!" Toadus cried again, dropping back away from the free-standing Masamune and clinging to a flared piece of the Dracoform`s armor to avoid being thrown. "HURRY, MAJESTY!! SPIIIIIIIIRE!!!"

Derik leapt and dove behind a derelict Mauler, which absorbed the Demolisher shot nicely until the Dracoform found another target to focus on.

"... we`re going to have a very long talk about this episode later, Toadus..." Derik muttered, still huddled and under cover, as he began to prepare his lightning magic. He turned, saw the jutting Masamune in the mech`s exposed backside, took aim and let his mana fly. The lightning arced from the young King`s spread fingertips, forked through the air and struck the holy sword. Magnified by the Masamune, the lightning coursed into the Dracoform`s systems and shocked the beast. For a moment, the mech lit up and flashed with pulsing yellow light. It shuddered and fell to its knees immediately afterward; smoke began to pour out of several gaps in its armor, and huge black plumes gushed up from the deep recesses of its fanged metallic jaws.

Toadus grabbed the Masamune, still steaming with the release of such tremendous power, and twirled the massive broadsword about him as he ran up along the disabled beast`s spine. He was humming his battle hymn to himself and making ready to go in for the kill.

Rather unfortunately, to say nothing of being unexpected, the mech got its second wind at that very moment. It reared up and roared, catching Toadus off balance and sending him tumbling backward down along the Dracoform`s back as it came up to stand on its hind legs. Toadus fell off the beast`s back and landed on his ass with a thud, his dark green cape draped over his head so he couldn`t see.

This was when Derik made his move. Sprinting with all the speed he had in him, his sword clutched tightly in his hands, he surged toward the legs of the Dracoform.

Spying the King, the Dracoform roared and brought its Demolisher cannons to bear, spraying gattling bullets at Derik`s approach. Agile as the King was, he managed to avoid being blown full of holes and came up between the beast`s legs.

The Rainbow Sword`s infinitely sharp blade sunk easily into the mech`s ankle, cutting a deep gash along the inside of its foot as Derik ran past. As the katana exited on the other side, Derik sheathed it and quickly helped Sir Toadus to his feet.

A flare of sparks and a small explosion followed moments after Derik`s passing. Then a larger explosion, which removed part of the outer plating on the Dracoform`s heel. Fire, sparks and smoke poured from the slash wound the King had inflicted, and another small explosion resounded from inside the beast`s ankle. The mech turned, now walking with a limp, to face the Knight and the King. The pilot did not look especially pleased.

"Err... that... didn`t do nearly as much damage as I`d hoped..." Derik observed.

"Hold onto me, Majesty!!"
Before Derik could protest, Toadus grabbed up the King and leapt high into the air, taking them well away from what would have been a rather fatal rocket blast. Arcing toward the ground safely a few yards away, Derik ordered: "Scatter. Head for the camp and find Thames and Barry. We are leaving."

"But --"

"No arguments!! Go!!"

The two hit the ground and began running. Demolisher fire followed them, but they were each cunning enough to adopt a serpentine pattern of flight and avoid taking any hits.

The Dracoform followed. Its Demolisher guns retracted, and out came the Supervolt coils. The immense weapons hummed ominously as they powered up, the pilot waiting to discharge them until he had the perfect shot. Despite the injuries it had taken, the mech was still in very good condition and was more than capable of smiting the King and Sir Toadus -- if they made the mistake of standing still long enough.

The Dracoform surely would have chased them down, had not another warrior arrived on scene. A missile blast struck the side of the Dracoform`s cockpit, and the mech reeled a bit as it took stock of this new opposition.

The newcomer was flying some manner of power armor, and it was circling the Dracoform at a speed that the larger mech`s pilot was having difficulty reckoning with.

Derik and Toadus stopped to watch.

"Is that one of ours??"

Toadus shook his head. "It`s Esperian... an Ifrit suit..." the Knight marvelled for a moment. "Amazing. I`ve never seen one of them maneuver so well before..."

Something shot out from the side of the Ifrit and caught the Dracoform`s good leg; a cable of some sort was attached. The mech roared and flailed its claws at the power suit, but simply could not catch it; it was too fast and too small. The Ifrit made a few passes, weaving the cable around the Dracoform`s legs. Then it spun around and passed once between the legs, shot up behind the mech and yanked.

The cable tightened.

The legs drew together.

The Ifrit released its end of the cable.

The Dracoform, caught off-balance, fell forward. The earth shook and the whole mech simply exploded in a ball of hellfire. Derik and Toadus stumbled at the force of the blast and the tremor of the fall. Debris from the destroyed Dracoform began to rain down, and Toadus had enough presence of mind to roll over toward Derik and cover the prostrate King, shielding him from the raining metal and plastic with his own body.

As Derik and Toadus were coming to their feet, the Ifrit suit landed before them. Opening, the suit produced its pilot, much to the astonishment of the King and the Knight.

"Barry!?" They both exclaimed at once.

The boy seemed a touch embarrassed.

"You are a marvelous pilot, young man!!" Toadus stepped forward and patted the boy`s head.

Before Barry could respond to the unwanted compliments, commotion in the camp took the three Guardians` attentions. Shouts came from the camp as the Guardian soldiers began to regroup.

"What`s going on?" Derik asked.

Toadus looked off in the distance. "Ticonderan infantry." He swallowed hard. "Very bad. We leave now. A Dracoform is enough fun for one day."

Derik nodded. "Right... where`s Thames?"

"I left him over there..." Barry pointed.

Behind the companions there was a humming sound. They turned to find a JetTank approaching them rather rapidly. It stopped in front of them, and Admiral Thames poked his head out of the hatch.

"Are we done now?" he said, "While you were out playing at heroics, I was requisitioning us some transportation... now that one thinks of it, it was rather convenient of Rajaat`s memories to have provided us with a well-stocked Guardian motor pool. No?"

Derik hefted Barry up and handed him to Thames. "Let`s get out of here."

Once they were all aboard the tank, Thames sped off.
"Do you even know which way we`re supposed to be going?" Derik asked.

Thames smiled. "A Grand Admiral does not get so easily lost," he retorted. "We were heading in this direction when we first came upon the camp. Unless Rajaat intends to be especially cruel in his application of this place`s dimensionlessness, heading in the same direction should get us back on track for this `mountain`s summit. And, if not, I suppose we have all the time in the world to find the right way out of this illusion."

Overhead, a flight of Archons could be seen heading toward the formation of incoming Ticonderan infantry fighters. Toadus peered out and pointed to the Archon at the head of the formation.

"That`s him," he said, "Rajaat... before his Fall."

Ariel watched from the shadows as the JetTank put distance between itself and the Guardian camp. She smiled, and followed invisibly at a measured walk. Her command of Sargasso`s dimensions allowed her to easily keep pace with the vehicle.

The ride was smooth and rather uneventful. Turning to glance out the viewport every now and again revealed that the group had passed out of the first monument`s range of influence, and that they were now back on the lifeless, flat expanse that the Mountain of Remembrance had been when they first began their ascent.

Perhaps it was just the effects of this place`s lack of temporal flow... but in Derik`s mind the beginning of their journey seemed so far away now. He knew that no time had actually passed since they were face to face with the Gate Dimension`s sun... but he wondered, for curiosity`s sake, what a stopwatch might read if he`d brought one along and timed their journey up the Mountain.

Looking at his own watch, whose hands alternated between spinning out of control and stopping dead still, he doubted it would have done him much good anyway.

Barry slept. Toadus meditated. Thames kept his eyes on the road, ever attentive to piloting the tank.

Derik was left more or less alone to his thoughts. Inevitably, they strayed to Elayne. He was powerless to keep his mind off of her, even since discovering the death of his wife and father. Still the unanswered question: did Elayne yet live? And what of the child, his child, that she had given birth to?

The Key in his satchel now felt as a heavy weight on him. During the battle it remained light as a feather, but now it seemed to pull at him, pull downward, toward the ground.

"Hey you."

Derik looked up.

"... Elayne?"

The girl nodded and smiled coyly. "... Rudra wanted to keep me in today... but I snuck off. She won`t notice..." Elayne slid over closer to Derik.

Behind them the Glory Tower still stood, but Derik hardly noticed the inaccuracy. Children played in a fountain before them. And Derik and Elayne sat alone on a white-painted park bench.

She leaned forward to kiss him. If this was an illusion, Derik would not have minded staying fooled by it forever. Whatever devilry produced this false Elayne, it had her taste, her technique... her smell... the feel of her hands. It was perfect... it was real. Warmth rushed over Derik`s entire being. He fell completely into the kiss and kissed Elayne back with all the passion he had in him, telling her with his whole body, wordlessly, how much he missed and loved her.

"-- Hey!?" Derik exclaimed as Elayne snatched off his satchel. "Come on, give it back."

Elayne giggled impishly. "What`s wrong?... something... *secret* in here?"

"I said give it back." Derik tried to snatch it away, but Elayne was too quick. The King couldn`t help but laugh. "I said give it!!"

"Oh, I`ll give you back your *man-purse*... all in due time..."

Derik arched his brows and sneered. "... Don`t make me resort to tickling you... I still remember all the right spots..."

"You do and I`ll turn you into a rat!!" She shrieked as Derik reached for her ribs, and darted toward the fountain. Feeling alive for the first time since he`d left Aryth, Derik chased after her.

"What the hell are you doing??"

Both Derik and Elayne stopped. A third party had arrived on the scene. She wasn`t pleased.

"... Naraya?"

"So this is what you`ve been doing since you `died,` Derik?" She folded her arms and leveled her glare at the two lovers.

"Alex... who`s that?" Elayne said, edging closer and dropping her voice to a whisper.

"Yeah, `Alex,` who am I?"

Derik was confused. "Naraya... they... they told me you were..."

"Dead?" the Queen interjected. She laughed. "Yeah, I`ve heard the same about you. But after *I* died, I had the decency to stay in my box under the soil and not CHEAT ON MY HUSBAND. You didn`t see me trapsing around paradise with some floozy of a farmer`s daughter!"

Elayne narrowed her eyes. "Floozy!?" She screamed.

"You heard me, whore. Get your goddamned hands off my husband."

"Beat it, you uptight royal bitch. Alex`s mine."

Derik laughed nervously. "... ladies... please, ladies, please!..." Jokingly, he added something he might have regretted if this weren`t an illusion: "There`s enough of the King to go around!"

Elayne pushed Derik aside.

"Stay there, babe. This won`t take a minute." She leveled her gaze at Naraya. "You`re looking at the Verund of Aryth, tramp. I don`t think you want none of what I got for you."

Naraya rolled up her sleeves.

"Undine, be my strength. Help me smack that home-wrecking bitch down!"
Responding to Naraya`s call, an enormous shimmering blue mermaid emerged from the nearby fountain. Fully twelve feet long from head to tail tip, and possessed of fangs and other rather bestial features, the mermaid gave an ear-splitting cry and lunged forward, slithering along the ground on her fishy belly. With another monstrous bellow, she lashed out with her gigantic trident, turning up the earth where Elayne had been standing. Elayne, springing deftly out of the way, retorted with a blast of fire, which the mermaid deflected away with her polished clam-shell shield.

Spellfire coursed and ignited the air between Elayne and the manifestation of Undine. Derik watched helplessly as his wife and his lover engaged in a sorcerous battle over his affections --

No. Wait. Naraya wasn`t anywhere to be seen. Undine was doing all the fighting. Where had Naraya gone?...

Derik`s satchel. The Key. Derik cursed himself... he had been sucked into an illusion and lost the one thing he was supposed to be protecting. The King glanced around, searching desperately for his missing luggage; it wasn`t where Elayne had dropped it.

Derik stood and, as he did, caught sight of Naraya`s golden hair trailing behind her as she moved around the Glory Tower. Dodging a stray blast of Undine`s ice magic, Derik charged after her.

"Naraya!"

The Queen turned. She clutched the stachel in her delicate hands. Her icy blue eyes fell on the king; her countenance was especially cold.

"How could you, Derik?... I mourned you night and day, but you lived... you lived and shared your life with her..."

"Naraya, you need to give me back that bag."

"No, Derik... YOU need to give ME some answers!!"

"... Naraya... it`s... complicated..."
Derik knew this was an illusion... on one level. But just as he let himself fall into the trap that was baited with Elayne`s arms... he saw this as an opportunity to make ammends with his dead wife. For himself... he believed it really was his wife, so that he could have a second chance, and apologize to her.

But in believing, he gave the illusion power over him.

"Complicated!? COMPLICATED!?"

"... I didn`t remember anything, Naraya... I was confused..."

It was understandable, a thoroughly human desire. To say you`re sorry one last time. To say good bye. To beg for a second chance and say you love someone who`s not there anymore.

"You remembered NOW, in the COURTYARD, where you were TONGUE FENCING with *her*!!!!"

Tears were beginning to form in Naraya`s eyes. Derik, as well, couldn`t keep his eyes from watering up. "... give me the bag. I`ll explain... I promise... Naraya, you need to give me that bag..."

"... why, Derik? Hmm?" Naraya sobbed. "Something precious to *her* in here?"

"If I`d remembered everything, she and I wouldn`t have even..." Derik couldn`t go on; the very thought that, as special as Elayne was to him, there was a chance they wouldn`t have ever had what they had... "Naraya..." now Derik was sobbing.

"I gave you two children, Derik... I gave up my home, ran off to marry you and become your Queen... meanwhile my father died and the Tasnicans have destroyed everything our family used to have... my sister was killed by those New Wraith goons... I gave up my LIFE to be with you, and this is how you repay me!? You ASSHOLE, Derik, you fucking ASSHOLE. Why should I give you your stupid bag!? Why should I give you anything else!?!? Why don`t YOU give ME something for a change??"

Derik drew his sword.

"Naraya..." he wiped away the tears from his face. "That bag is important. If it falls into the wrong hands, its contents..."

"If your little bitch wants her contraceptives, or whatever you`re hiding in here, she`ll have to take a dive off this gorge to get them."
Naraya held the bag out over the cliff`s ledge (cliff ledge?... where did that cliff ledge come from?... it wasn`t there before...).

Derik edged closer.
"Please, Naraya... I don`t want to have to harm you... I want a... second chance with you... but I need that bag..." Derik held out his free hand. "Come with me, Naraya... I`ll take you out of this place... you`ll be alive again... and I`ll have something to live for..."

Naraya spat in Derik`s face.
"Fuck you." She drew her arm back to throw the bag over the cliff.

"No!!!" Derik lunged forward. The rest was a blur. He stood there long moments, his sword in one hand and the satchel clung firmly to his chest in the other. His breathing was heavy, and he was still crying.

There was blood on his sword.

He dared himself to look down.

There she was. Dead at his feet. Blood trailed from the corners of her mouth as she moved her last.

It burned itself into his mind, the image of her there, lifeless. He could see where the sword ripped into her, cutting through fabric and flesh. She had been wearing her favorite silk pants and blouse. They were green. Now they were stained red. And her skin, the perfect milky skin that he`d so often carressed and touched and kissed, it was broken by the razor fine edge of the Rainbow Sword. It was as if, standing where he was, he could gaze microscopically into the cut and examine it from all angles. He watched her at once from both the inside and the outside, saw the aura of life in her go from a glow to a dim glow and then to nothing at all as she went cold. Pain shot through him, tore away at his insides, and it was like the news that she`d died had been delivered to him fresh. Only this time, he had killed her. It was his hand, his sword. On top of all the other sins he`d committed against her, this time, he was the one who spilled out her blood and extinguished that life force.

She was right. She had given him everything. Everything she had and some things she hadn`t. And he had never given her *anything.*

His face flushed, the tears streamed, and he wailed and doubled over.

"I`m so sorry," he managed to get out between sobs. "Naraya... oh gods... damn me, damn me to hell I`m sorry... no... no..."

Derik lifted the Queen`s head and cradled it close to his chest.

"Come back... please..." he pressed his face close to hers and kissed her. Her lips were wet, but cold. The tangy taste of blood filled his mouth and he drank it in, filled himself with her essence`s metallic taste. His eyes squeezed, and out came another salty rivulet of sadness. He ran his fingers through her lifeless, blood-matted hair. When they`d met it was her hair that had caught his eye. "Rajaat... whoever`s out there... give her back to me!!... I need... another chance... you can have your stupid key, I don`t care... please... she needs to know how sorry I am..."

"Highness!!"

Derik turned slowly. Toadus was running up to him; behind them on the flat landscape the JetTank was stopped. Barry and Thames peered anxiously at the King from the tank`s hatch.

"Your Majesty, where are you going?"

Derik stood, and looked back to the ground. Naraya was gone.

"... Nowhere. I`m going nowhere, Toadus."

"Sire... are you crying?"

"No. ... let`s just... move on..."

Derik chose to sleep from that point on. He was bereft of energy, and so fell easily into torpor. His tears sealed his eyes closed, and he simply stopped functioning; it was the only way he could deal with what happened.

The others had no idea of the ordeal Derik underwent; he did not speak of what he had seen and done. They simply noticed Derik wasn`t there anymore, stopped the tank and backtracked looking for him. Toadus kept vigil now, making sure that Sargasso did not spirit away any more of their number.

Thames, likewise, kept his eyes open. But he was on the lookout for the next monument.

Prometheus had neglected to mention how many of them there were... how many trials they would have to endure on their journey. Already Thames was beginning to feel fatigued. He had been driving for what seemed like hours, days even, who could say? His ass was sore, his eyes were dry. If not for his high level of discipline he might have begun to fall asleep at the wheel.

Thames had to force himself to recall how the four of them had gotten here. The mission into Gate`s sun seemed a distant memory now. Even the battle in the Esper Dimension seemed as if it had been years ago... and Thames grew even more tired realizing that he had not taken rest since he came on duty when the Crownguard neared the sun.

"Range, helmsman?"

Thames blinked. Was Toadus talking to him?

"What was that?"

"I said : RANGE, helmsman?"

Thames turned, to find himself staring into the medal-laden chest of Captain Ardore -- the first officer he`d ever served under.

Thames was now, somehow, aboard a transport ship in the Sea of Lavos, off Medina`s coast.

"... range..." Thames stopped. "Oh no."

He knew where he was. Or, more importantly, he knew *when* he was.

"Move then, Malvo, I`ll check it myself." Ardore shoved Thames roughly out of the way. "You need to be quicker on the console than that, my boy, if you ever expect to be anything above an Enisgn." The Captain laughed, then checked the readouts. He looked up and pressed his hand to his brow as he scanned the Medinan shoreline. "Bastards." The Captain picked up the radio. "This is Ardore to Blackbird command. We cannot make our landing; there`s an enemy installation on the shore. Could you clean it up for us?"

"Captain..." Thames was uncharacteristically timid. Frightened, even. He clenched his jaw.

Overhead the thrum of engines could be heard.
A pair of Blackbirds, the older kind, the smaller kind, the ones that were once invincible airborne fortresses, streaked by overhead. They dropped something indistinguishable from the distance of Thames` vantage point, and moments later part of the Medinan shoreline errupted in fire.

The Blackbirds turned and disappeared again into the clouds, higher than Thames` eyes could follow, unaided by instruments.

The Admiral knew what was coming.
The Arris Syndicate was at war with Ozzie`s Medina. The corporate armies had mustered together a band of commandos. Their mission was to free a detention camp of imprisoned minority Medinan humans, and earn their cooperation in overthrowing Ozzie`s corrupt government (which had resisted the Syndicates for decades).

"Tell the boys downstairs to prepare to debark," Ardore commanded, "We`ll be killing Mystics in no time."

It all happened so fast...

The landing...

The gung-ho soldier talk...

And then... the surprise.
In Thames` mind the memory rushed through to its meat.

"Captain!!"

That first shriek Thames would never forget. Its timbre, its volume. It had frightened young Ensign Thames so that he actually choked on his own breath, as he did again in the reliving of it.

"God, he`s been..."

"Gnashers, look --!!"

Then more cries, gunfire, futile gunfire, and death.
From the safety of the cockpit, Thames watched. He had been a boy when these images had been burned into his mind, but even as a man and one of the most stoic figures in modern Guardia, he could not help but look on with mortal terror.

An ambush. His crew, beset by Mystics. Eaten alive by the snake-like Gnashers and their Naga-ette mates.

The rage that Thames had felt back then began to swell, rage fueled by fear; his muscles were adrenalized and soon the Admiral found his actions were not his own.

"Bastards!!" he cried, hefting up one of the slain Guardians` rifles and strafing the frenzied Gnashers and Nagas; spraying them with laserfire.

The entire commando team had been immobilized; either slain or wounded. They lay bleeding on the beach. With their medic`s head bitten off by a Naga-ette, there was no hope for the wounded.

They would all soon die, or had already died, terrible deaths that day. But Ardore, the man who had taught Thames how to pilot a ship... he had suffered the worst mauling of all. The sight of him flayed on the beach pushed everything real from his mind. He belonged to the illusion.

All that would comfort him now, the only thing he could do for his fallen comrades, was to take revenge.

A small Mystic village lay just over the ridge, nestled in the forested valleys of the foothills of Mount Heckran.

A young Malvo Thames visited this village shortly after the ill-fated beach landing.
None but Malvo Thames would walk away from that village after his passing.

Dirty Mystic bastards...

Filthy non-humans...

Savage cannibalistic monsters...

The death he doled out that day was too good for them. But he didn`t do it for the Mystics -- heavens know he owed them no favors -- he did it for his massacred companions.

He killed them all. Men, women, children... who could tell which was which? A Gnasher looked just as ugly no matter what age, and a Naga-ette was far too dangerous and beguiling to be left alive, no matter how its woman-like torso might play on a young man`s fancy. Imps were just as bad; they played at pacifism, but were just as riled up in Ozzie`s war-mongering as any Hench or Diablos.
Henches and Diablos? Not a thing about them made them redeemable. They were as demonic as their appearances made them seem. Brutes and thugs all, deserving of little more than extermination. Like vermin.

He slew them all, blew them to pieces with the arms of his comrades, and when he ran out of rifle shot he lopped them to pieces with his sabre or blasted them open with his pistol.

Four hours he spent rounding up every last Mystic. Most were non-combatant; he killed them anyway. This was for his honor, which had been besmirched. They had killed and devoured his Captain, and for that every last one of them would pay...

Thames burst into the last of the homes. His uniform, still that of an Admiral despite the inconsistency, was stained with Mystic blood. He held a bloody sword in his hand, and his drawn pistol in the other. He breathed in heaving, panting breaths and took heavy foot-falls into the room.

This was odd. A cat-man stood in the center of the room. He was elderly, leaning on a cane. Thames had never seen this brand of Mystic before... he looked rather like a feline Demi-human...

But then, they were all alike, non-humans. This may have been a more familiar Mystic wearing a disguise, but even if it weren`t the beast could not have been up to any good if it lived in this village.

Thames leveled his gun with the monster`s head. The cat-man`s eyes widened, it opened its mouth. Then it died as the blast of Wondershot energy tore through its skull and painted the wall behind it with its brains.

There was a wail from the next room; a child`s wail. The beast`s offspring were crying.

Good, Thames thought. I`ll kill one of them while it`s still young, before it has a chance to do any damage. Filthy monsters... slayers of the weak, devourers of the innocent!

"Be purged by my sword!!" Thames cried, bursting into the room.

On the bed there lay a child. A feline child. It sat up, tears matting the fur beneath its eyes.

It was Barry.

"... Barry?"

Barry hopped down from the bed. "Why did you stop, Admiral? Doesn`t the filthy monster have to die?" Barry took a step toward Thames.

Thames backed away.

"Barry... my boy..."

"Boy? You mean beast."

"No!... Barry, you don`t understand."

"I understand. I understand all about your `honor` now, Admiral. You have nothing left to teach me."

Barry kept walking. Thames kept backing away. The boy slowly drove the Admiral back into the common room where the cat-man`s corpse lay bleeding.

"Son! That`s enough, I say!!"

"Bite me, Malvo."

Thames` lips quivered. His jaw clenched.
"You watch your tongue with me, child. I will have my rank from you."

"You would have killed me back then, wouldn`t you Malvo? And it would have been all the same to you, wouldn`t it? I would have been just another filthy non-human... a savage cannibal... isn`t that right, Malvo?"

"Do not call me familiar!! You will show me the proper respect you owe to your guardian... your father--"

"This might have been my father you killed, Malvo."

"Stop calling me by my name, you flea-bitten mongrel!!!"

Barry stopped advancing.
"All right. Racist."

Thames backed into the door. It was now shut.

"Hypocrite."

"That`s enough!!"
Thames leveled his gun at the boy.

"Murdere --"

A shot.

"Thames!!"

"BARRY!!!"

With a start, Thames awoke. Toadus was shaking his shoulder.

"Admiral... wake up."

Thames rubbed his eyes. He glanced quickly back into the cabin and found Barry sound asleep on Derik`s lap.

"Are you all right, sir?... Do you want me to drive for a while?"

Thames shook his head.

"No... Sir Toadus... I... I`m fine. Go have a seat. I`m fine. Just fine. Fine."

Thames was still tired. But like before, his discipline kept his attentions focused on the road. Only now, his hands were shaking, and withheld tears had formed themselves on the fringes of his eyes.

The flat monotony of the Mountain faded once more. Rolling fields of grass soon replaced them. The green and lush nature of the land was familiar to Derik; he looked out the viewport and smiled, comforted, despite knowing he was still within a realm that was controlled by the most wicked of demons, and that this beauty he beheld could only be fleeting.

The tank came to a stop. Derik emerged from the hatch and looked around. He turned and took in the whole view.

"Acacia," he said. He smiled. Then he extended an arm and pointed away ahead northward. "Beyond that ridge of mountain there, through Fossil Valley, is Termina, where I spent three years in schooling as a boy." Derik turned around and pointed behind the tank, to the south. "And over there is Arni... *great* fishing there... and a *lot* of cute fisherman`s daughters..."

Derik smiled, remembering fondly his wasted youth. But then he stopped. Something caught his eye, something flashing in the water in the distance, beyond Arni Bay.

"Sire?" Thames called up from the cockpit. "Everything all right, my Lord?"

"Take us closer to Arni," Derik ordered. "Hurry!"

The JetTank roared back to life and came about. It rolled down the hillside toward the tiny fishing village. As it did, Derik saw more clearly what it was arriving on the horizon.

Ships.

Ships of all kinds, transport and disused or stolen military vessels. Filled with people.

The Defilers.

Thames, Toadus and Derik clambered out of the tank.

"... the Xenos landed on Acacia," Thames said. "It was where they began their conquest. Their first victory."

Derik frowned. "Rajaat`s first victory."

"The hill, look!" Toadus pointed in the direction from which they`d come. North of Arni, on the hill, waited an army of Acacian Dragoons.

Derik smiled. "Perfect. We have backup... Let`s hurry and make contact with them."

"I wouldn`t do that, your Highness." Barry poked his head out of the JetTank`s hatch.

"What do you mean, Barry?"

Barry looked uneasily in the direction of the Dragoons. He was counting their numbers.
"This is Rajaat`s memory. I don`t think they`re on our side."

Derik`s eyes widened. His head whipped back around to look in the Dragoons` direction. Four riders, one of which was General Viper himself, were separating from the main force and riding down towards Derik and his companions.

"By the powers, I think the boy`s right..." Thames drew his pistol. "If it`s a fight they want, we`ll give it to them then. Show them what Guardian soldiers are made of." He attached a sighting scope to the barrel of his gun, then drew his sabre into his free hand.

"No!" Toadus whirled angrily on the Admiral. "The Acacians are our allies! I will not be tricked by Rajaat into slaying them!"

"Fool Knight. Those aren`t Acacians! They are shadows. And if you don`t kill them I`ve no doubt that they are quite lethal shadows at that." Thames tapped the side of the tank with the pommel of his sword. Barry, nodding, closed the hatch and took up the tank`s control console. "Barry will man the tank and bombard the main force. We must cover him and keep the Devas at a safe distance."

Derik drew his sword. Toadus glared at him.

"Majesty... we cannot --"

"Toadus, the Admiral`s right. Look at them. They aren`t coming down here to talk."

Toadus sighed. He cast a glance in the direction of the approaching riders. "May the powers forgive me," he said to himself, bringing the Masamune out of its sheath.

The King, the Knight and the Admiral stood there as the four Devas charged toward them on their snarling Draconic mounts. The JetTank`s smaller weapons arrayed themselves and made ready to fire.

"... if memory serves," Thames said, "Rajaat only faced the Devas and the General here. The rest of the force should flee after our battle with them begins. I would say that, in order to proceed, we will have to follow their retreat north through Fossil Valley before we can continue."

The riders came within range. Barry mowed them down with the tank`s weaponry; the Dragoons toppled harmlessly off their laser-pulverized mounts. A blast of energy arced from the JetTank`s main gun and soared in the direction of the army waiting on the hill. The explosion sent many soldiers fleeing (or flying); but the main force held firm. Barry began to power up for a second blast.

Meanwhile, the four riders had recovered and were now continuing their charge on foot. Derik and his friends charged to meet them.

The enemy detachment was comprised of three of the Devas and General Viper. The remaining Deva, a feline demi-human wearing an eyepatch over his left eye, remained on the hill with the army. He watched and then departed as the two forces met, heading away northward toward Termina.

A Mermaid armed with a trident, a Dwarf armed with a massive machete, and an unassuming Fairy wielding a spiked wand were the opposition that the Guardians now faced.

The two bands fell into each other and the melee began.

Derik found himself at the business end of the Mermaid`s war fork. For being a creature native to the sea, and thus having no legs, she did well enough in the balance department (standing, with the aid of innate floatation magic, on the tip of her tail) to give the King a run for his treasury. One mis-timed parry resulted in incontrovertible proof that Thames` theory of the shadows being deadly was correct; attempting to glance a downward thrust away from him so that he could quickly retort, Derik found himself unwittingly caught in the thigh by one of the trident`s outer prongs. The King screamed and, relfexively, let a small burst of Lightning magic burst from his fingertips. It arced out and pulsed into the scaly side of the Mermaid, giving the two combatants a bit of breathing room between them, and scarcely enough time to account for their injuries.

Thames found himself most appropriately squared off with General Viper. The two men were exceptionably capable, and proved they held their ranks for so long not simply on the basis of bureaucratic seniority. Even though Thames did not, by the very nature of his position, see much personal combat, and Viper hadn`t been to the field in years, they were both soldiers and trained extensively in the use of a sword.
The two officers` sabers crossed and they found themselves face to face. Thames could not help but offer Viper a smile.

"Pity you aren`t the real Viper," he said, "I feel I would be enjoying this more if it were mere gentleman`s sport and not so life-and-death."

Viper snarled. "I`ll not allow you to do what you`ve come here for, Defiler!"

Thames pushed off and offered the General a thrust, which Viper politely denied before sending out his own counter-thrust.
"Yes, right. I forgot, we`re the badguys now," Thames sighed as he parried and returned the General`s courtesy with an overly extravagant manuever of his own. "Of course you`ve got some defiant remark waiting to throw at me."

Out of the corner of his eye, Thames noted how poorly Derik was faring against his own opponent. Seeing the Mermaid approach with what surely would have been a death-thrust upon the wounded King, the Admiral made sure he had the General at sword`s-length, extended his gun-arm and fired off a shot at the Mermaid.

Seeing the shot, but too late to avoid it entirely, the Mermaid ducked down and reeled as white-hot Wondershot blast caught her in the arm. She spun in the air lengthwise and landed with a fishy plop on the ground. Dazed, she flopped about and struggled to regain her composure, as Derik turned and offered a nod of thanks to the Admiral.

Toadus was left to face the Dwarf, who despite his size showed incredible tenacity and strength. The Knight did not remember fighting a foe so hardy and skillful in quite some time. Sir Toadus, who was quite large, found that any advantage of amphibian agility was removed from him in combat with this much smaller opponent. In fact, the Dwarf seemed well-practised in ducking, weaving and darting away from the blows of a larger combatant. The Knight Captain expended half his energy simply trying to keep up with the energetic Dwarf -- and it was in a moment of fatigue that Toadus was caught off-guard and swept by the dull side of the Dwarf`s large single-edged weapon.

Toadus crashed down onto his back - hard. And the Dwarf raised up for the kill, which Toadus could only thwart with a quick (and rather clumsy) blast of water magic.

Coming to his feet as the Dwarf shook off the spell`s effect, Toadus noticed a small patch of browned grass around where he`d fallen. He had only a second or two to observe this; the Dwarf did not relent any longer and charged forward with a dizzying series of sword slashes and thrusts which Toadus and the Masamune could barely keep ahead of. Fearing he would be caught again by the crafty dwarf, the Knight quickly unleashed another spell, creating a bubble of water that snapped and sent the small Dwarf rolling across the grass.

Toadus noticed it more pronounced this time. This time, he *felt* it. When he cast his spell the grass beneath his feet withered and died, and Toadus felt the grass` life force being sucked up from the earth and pumped into his magic. It was a strange sensation of ecstasy; he had never felt such pleasure when casting a spell before.

Was this Defiling?... had Rajaat`s memory given them all the ability to Defile with their spells?

No. Derik had cast a spell. He had not defiled the earth. This was Toadus` gift. Only Toadus`; a great power had been bestowed onto the Knight, and it summarily corrupted him. His mind was clouded with the pleasure he derived from casting that spell. It unleashed in the Knight something of a cruel streak; a twisted mutation of his former virtue. With his cape flapping behind him, Toadus edged closer to the still prostrate Dwarf.

He sneered.

"Die," the Knight hissed, gathering up his mana, killing the land. When he had turned the grass five-feet out from him into a circle of lifeless ash, Toadus unleashed a surge of high-pressure water. It sank into the Dwarf and pressed him into the ground. His arms flailed for a moment, but the movement soon became sluggish, and then ceased entirely.

As the spell faded, Toadus drew up the Masamune and let its blade drink of his   helpless opponent`s blood.

The Fairy had broken from the main group and was heading for the tank. She landed near the hatch and had begun to attempt to pry it open with her wand while the others were busy with their respective bouts.

Barry, inside the tank, had watched helplessly as the Fairy fluttered over the lines and approached him. He had trusted in his allies to give him adequate cover. When he realized such cover was not forthcoming, he cursed (to the extent that young Barry was familiar with cursing) and backed the tank away, swerving and twisting to get the Fairy off of him. He was reminded of the advantages of size and speed that he`d had over the wounded Dracoform in his Ifrit, and how the tables had now been turned as he dealt with this Fairy.

He silently wished he`d had the forethought to bring the Ifrit suit with him; it could easily have been strapped to the top of the JetTank, or the back.

The Fairy was using magic now, using lightning and fire to batter the armor around the hatch.

The young Tigran considered his options. He couldn`t rightly open the hatch to take a shot at her, because despite her size the Fairy was a Dragoon Deva and thus was most likely fairly competent in melee. The close quarters he was dealing with gave Barry very little chance of defending himself against such a foe. And judging from the state of the combat his fellows were engaged in, he couldn`t rely on help from them. He would have to find a way to defeat her himself without opening the hatch...

Derik was mired in the fight for his very life. He had taken another cut from the Mermaid`s trident, a shallower wound to his left arm; but he had also delivered several potent wounds to his fishy foe, and she still seemed somewhat hindered by the lightning to her side and the Wondershot blast to her arm.

Still, the Mermaid was apparently possessed of near infinite strength reserves. She was better than Derik. The Guardian King had no way of knowing whether Rajaat`s memory had accurately recreated the Devas and their respective levels of strength and skill, but if it had then the world of Gate had lost what may have been some of its best champions for good in the dark days of the Cleansing Wars.

It was not the time for such laments, however. The King of Guardia was on the verge of being slain by the shadow of a long dead Deva. That is, until some backup arrived.

The Masamune intercepted a thrust that would have been the death of Derik. The King sighed.

"Toadus... thank the powers..."

"Stand aside, weakling," the Knight barked, shoving the King away. "Spekkio only knows where you`d be if I wasn`t hanging about to save you all the time."

Derik, still suffering from his wounded leg, lost his balance and tumbled to the ground. Shocked by the behavior of his friend, and pained by the fall, he collapsed and succumbed to the mounting fatigue. He watched helplessly as Toadus fought what Derik suspected was the least chivalrous fight he had ever engaged in.

Toadus seemed to have gained unearthly strength and speed. From whence he drew this strength, Derik could only venture a random (and incorrect) guess. The Mermaid was equally at a loss. She could do nothing but parry as Toadus lunged again, and again, and again, each time with unfettered speed and vigor. He extended himself to foolish lengths, baiting the Mermaid to counter-strike. And when she did as expected, the Knight greeted her with an unexpected feint and, in one instance, a gauntleted fist to the jaw.

The Mermaid became so desperate in her fight against the Knight Captain that she resorted to her own element magic. She unleashed a stream of magic fire, which Toadus deflected with the flat of the Masamune`s blade.

The Knight smiled.

"You will regret bringing enchantment into this bout, fish-woman."

Toadus held out his open hand, gathering into it a small sphere of glowing blue mana. Strands of light from the very air poured into this ball of gathering power, and as the sphere grew the earth at Toadus` feet became dead and grey.

Derik`s eyes widened. His mouth went dry.

"... Toadus!!.."

When the power had gathered to the Knight`s satisfaction, he hurled it in the form of a wave of elemental water. The water crashed down on the Mermaid with enough power to break bones. Shattered, she slid and rolled down the grassy hillside and then stopped, unmoving and wet.

Barry sped the JetTank toward a hilly incline. He had to time this just right.

A small spout of fire emerged from a tiny hole that the Fairy had punched into the tank`s armor. The young Tigran didn`t have much time left.

He secured his safety restraints, and and steeled his brows over his eyes. Then he smiled ever so slightly, with satisfaction at a well-laid plan. This was going to be a fun ride.

As he came upon the incline, at the fastest speed the JetTank could manage, he spun into a turn and shifted his altitude, skidding against the ground. With his tank parallel to the incline. Still skidding along at a very high speed, the JetTank hit the hill like a ramp and spun over, rolling top over bottom. The tank`s top smashed the ground on the first rollover, and Barry heard a muted scream. He cackled gleefully, gave himself a quick pat on the back, and waited for the tank to right itself before he moved back to check on his friends.

General Viper stood at the mercy of Admiral Thames. Toadus had dispatched his foe and that of the King, and was now scowling from over Thames` shoulder at the lone General. Derik, managing to stand, also limped up to Thames` side. And behind General Viper, Barry and the JetTank hovered to a silent stop.

"It is over, General," Thames said. He holstered his gun and extended his now free hand. "Turn over your sword and surrender."

"No," Toadus scowled. "Kill him."

Derik looked uneasily at the Knight.

"We will not," Thames said levelly. "His army is defeated. As an officer and a knight he is entitled the honor of surrendering."

Viper, confused by this show of formality from his foe, turned the hilt of his weapon to face the Admiral. He then fell onto his knees and offered up his weapon.

"Stand aside," Toadus snarled. He pushed Thames roughly out of the way and drew up the Masamune to strike down Viper. "Deadly shadows only, remember? Deserving only of death..."

This was when the Knight`s keen amphibian senses picked up on the JetTank`s main cannon being aimed in his direction. Toadus faltered.

"... I do not know what`s come over you, Captain," Thames said, righting himself, "But I would suggest you control yourself and remember your place."

The Knight placed a hand to his head and took a step back.
"I`m... sorry, Admiral..."

General Viper looked carefully at his opponents.

"Who the devil are you people?... you are not the Xenos, I think I know that much."

Derik limped forward. "We aren`t. We`re... well... I`m not sure if you recognize me, but I`m..."

"King Derik!" Viper was overcome with sudden realization. "Yes! I do recognize you now!!... strange that I could not before..." The old General closed his eyes and pressed his hand to his head.

Thames sheathed his sabre, and said rather nonchalantly: "Sorry about your friends, by the way. You know, killing them and all I mean. But you did charge us   and we expected trying to negociate with you would have simply been a waste of valuable seconds in which we could have been actively preventing our own deaths. You know how it is, I`m sure."

General Viper stood. "No," he said at last, "No... it wasn`t you... I remember now. It was Rajaat... Rajaat we fought here. Rajaat who killed my Devas... and then me." He looked up at Derik and the others. "Am I... are we in the Afterlife?"

Thames and the others exchanged glances.

"Well. I sure hope not," Thames huffed.

"We need to get through Fossil Valley and leave this place," Derik said, stepping forward. "Where we are now is a place constructed by Rajaat... built from his memories through magic..."

Viper sighed. "I... see..." he laughed. "So I`m not real?" He shook his head. "Devilish, and cruel... that Rajaat... Even in death he pushes me around as his pawn."

Thames edged closer. "By the powers... you *are* Viper, aren`t you?..."

The General nodded. "After our defeat in the Battle of Arni, the Warbringer took me back to my mansion looking for my daughter, Clarice. But I had sent Cartreo, my First Deva, wielder of Einlanzer, away from the battle to spirit her away from Acacia when I knew the day was lost. In his rage, Rajaat killed me there, and took from me the one thing I had left... my soul. I do not know how long I have been here, or if that can even be measured. All I know, now that I am collected, is that I and my companions must fight here again and again and again, fight and die each time someone approaches this way on the Mountain."

Derik extended his hand. "Come with us, General. It`s possible that, if we take you out of here with us... you can return to El Nido. The islands need leadership now more than ever... Gate needs leadership now more than ever."

"It`s too late for me, lads," the old soldier smiled. "An ambitious plan, but I`m just a ghost, a shade, and I`m most likely bound to this place. With your passing along on your way up toward the summit, I`m sure I`ll forget again and thoughtlessly charge the next hapless fools to come my way. Powers only know when the I`ll again be afforded this level of clarity..." The others regarded Viper sadly, not the least of all Toadus, who was beginning to realize and feel guilty for his earlier conduct in battle. "Do not look so glum. I am dead already; your tears shouldn`t be wasted for me. You must think on the battle to come... you have the rest of us trapped souls to fight for now! Defeat Rajaat, destroy the one thing that can make him whole, and give us some measure of peace."

The General removed his cape.

"This cloak," he said, holding the golden banner high, "Bears the Viper crest, the emblem of Acacian command. Fly it from your tank`s barrel as you go through the Fossil Valley and you will be unmolested by the shadows of my Dragoons. If I remember correctly, my fleeing army had laid ambushes and traps for the pursuing Defilers as they pressed north into Termina. By yourselves these traps would surely spell your deaths."

Thames graciously accepted the cape. He nodded his thanks, and moved to string it from the cannon.

Derik took the General`s hand.

"... I only wish we`d had a chance to meet while you still lived, sir," the King intoned.

Viper smiled.

"Just go, boy. And please... don`t look back as you do." The General picked up his sword and slid it into its sheath. "If you`ll excuse me... this ghost must return to his spirits."

And he walked, slowly, toward Arni. The old General decided that, if he was going to have his memory wiped yet again by this cursed place, he might as well be drunk when it happened.

Toadus came up behind the King, and helped him into the tank.
"Let me tend those wounds your Majesty --"

Derik stopped him.
"Wait until we have left this memory," he said. "Do not use your magic again..."

The Knight frowned. "Highness, what I did and said..."

"Is forgotten. It was this place, and not yourself."

"... I was weaker than this place..."

Derik remembered the encounter with Naraya.
"We are all weaker than this place, Toadus," he said. "Let us be strong enough to first realize that much."

And so they did as the General asked. They left, flying the Viper`s crest, and they did not look back.

The tank rolled for what seemed like days without hitting another memory.

Then the party of Guardians noticed something. It was subtle at first, but soon became more pronounced.
The Horizon was getting closer. The Mountain was curving.

Finally, after what felt like mounting eternities of waiting, the JetTank crested the curve of the Mountain... and came out onto a plateau.

Moving ever forward, the landscape again began to change in that familiar way. The group knew they were coming upon another monument; the ground beneath them began to shift into a rugged landscape rather than a flat, blank canvas. It took on dark qualities; ashen gray grass, dying trees, husks of slain animals left out to decompose. Ahead of them lay the litter from a battlefield, and in the distance a great spired building loomed over it all.

As the tank came closer, those inside came to know what building it was.

"... oh... my..."  

No one really knew who said this, least of all the speaker himself. But the words were forced out, pressed like air from a bellows, by the horrors that lay before them.

Derik sprang out of the hatch as the tank hummed into a stop. He sprinted forward, toward the decaying entrance to Guardia Forest. He stood and wept at the transformation that had come over Guardia Castle, the twisted ruin it had been warped into by Rajaat`s memory. The sight was as potent as an image in a nightmare; despite its lack of substance, its lack of existence, its evocation on the emotions remained in defiance of all common sense and logic.

Toadus, Thames and Barry emerged. The Admiral and the Knight were, like their King, moved to tears. Barry, who had only been to the Castle once in his life, was a little disturbed, but not much moreso than by anything else he`d seen on this oddyssey.

Derik stood.
"Leave the tank," he said. "I think we`re meant to go the last stretch on foot."

Now, this made Barry sad. He sighed and patted the side of the JetTank.
"You know," he said, "For a vehicle that doesn`t really fly that high... I kinda liked it..."

Thames patted him on the head; he scrubbed away his tears and forced a smile intended as a reassurance (to himself and his ward). "I`ll requisition one for you to play with on your next shore-leave when we get home, Barry."

Barry looked up at the Admiral, confused. The word "home" stirred in him some waking memories... had there been a time when he`d had a "home" outside the JetTank? A time before he and the King and the Knight and the Admiral had come to this place where all it seemed they did was travel and fight?

"Home?" He repeated the word, more to himself than as a question he wanted an answer to. The sound of it, the way he formed the word in his mouth, seemed at once familiar and foreign. He knew its meaning, as if by instinct, and yet any memories he had of a "home" were so far away and clouded over as though they were a dream that had slipped away before being recalled upon waking...

The Admiral nodded. "Yes, Barry. Home. We`ll be there again soon. Now come."

He himself wasn`t clear if he believed what he`d just said, or if he`d said it by way of trying to convince himself.

Toadus took point as the party trudged through the twisted remains of Guardia Forest. This place was haunted; both by the shadows and tricks-o-the-light that played in the paranoid peripheral, but also by the memories of the Guardians who now walked through it.

"I used to play in that clearing over there..." Derik said. As he looked on he saw the phantom of his youth, ephemeral and eternally young, with the children of various nobles and a pair of watchful Syndicate soldiers in attendance. His eyes wandered on. "... and I had my first kiss in that tree over there..." The phantoms again recreated the scene before Derik`s eyes. He was only telling half of the truth to his fellows; that bough had been the site of more than a simple first kiss. The King blushed and turned away, hoping only he could see the images.

A sadder procession of phantoms entertained the Admiral`s eye.

"We bore Captain Ardore`s pall through this wood on our way to Guardia Castle," Thames said. "It was the last time I ever ventured into these woods..." A younger, sadder Admiral Thames, wearing a Syndicate uniform with Lieutenant`s stripes and a medal of honor, was one of a few officers marching on either side of a ghostly coffin, suspended on their shoulders.
He spoke no more of it; the wounds sustained by the twisting of his memories of the slaughter in Medina were still too fresh.

Toadus spoke not at all of what he saw. It was a younger Sir Toadus, in the company of a charismatic Syndicate leader who would one day be King. They met in secret in these woods and hatched together their plans to restore the Kingdom`s glory. Seeing the image of that old friend who was no longer there brought the Knight very close to tears.

They had all come to hate this place, the Mountain of Remembrance, because it was stripping them of the human ability to forget and move on.

The dark forest path twisted round and eventually spat the group out at the foot of Guardia Castle.
At the base of the path was a sight that pained Derik to behold. Prometheus, known to Derik as Robo, lay sprawled and dismembered. It was just as Derik remembered seeing him at the Tomb of Zeal, where Rajaat had mortally wounded him.

"Robo..." Derik rushed forward.

The robot`s eyes turned and met Derik`s.

"... your Majesty..."

"What happened?" The king examined the Archon`s wounds. It was a familiar situation; Derik had done the same after Rajaat was dead and Prometheus lay on the floor of the Tomb bleeding. The memory played out exactly, from the movements of Derik`s hands over the Archon`s shredded insides, to the sinking sensation in the gut and chest; the burning in the eyes of naiscent tears.

Prometheus paused. Then he sighed. "... Derik... I have been used."

"Used?"

"I was used... you were meant to come the way you did. This was Rajaat`s game. And now you have brought him the very thing he wants. Though I sought to avoid becoming his pawn... I have played my part in his game to the hilt. I am... sorry..."

There was silence.

"Then we`ll go back the way we came." Derik started to stand, lifting the remains of Robo with him.

"No," Prometheus grasped Derik by the collar of his shirt. "This is... the only way to escape. I did not lie when I said Epoch was here... but it is at the top of the highest tower of the Castle. This is... the last monument. Enter in, but be prepared... to see the horrors that Rajaat had *planned* for the Kingdom."

"Planned?"

"Yes. This place differs from the rest in that Rajaat has taken some liberties with what happened. What lies here now is a monument to the victory that never was, the victory he was robbed of. Be warned that this time... in this scenario... you are on the side that is supposed to lose."

Derik shook his head. "... We have all the time in the world, here in this place. Toadus!... He needs your help!"

Derik began to lift the Archon again, but Prometheus coughed. He grasped at Derik`s shirt harder. "... U... Unity..."

"What?" Derik edged closer. "Unity?? What does it mean, why did you say `unity`?"

"Unity?..." Prometheus coughed again. "Oh, I don`t know. I just say that sometimes..." The lights in the robot`s eyes flickered, and he began to mumble.

There was a pause. "No!" the wounded Archon said suddenly, "Now I remember!!... Derik... it`s... not what you think... the key... the true key is UNITY... the joining of the two... two, not three... two, not three... Rajaat..." his voice began to crackle with static. "... does not really need --*"

The light faded from Prometheus` eyes. His grip on Derik`s shirt slackened. Then all at once he collapsed and ceased moving.

Derik heaved a sigh. He wrapped his arms around the pile of scrap that was his friend Robo, and wept.

Thames removed his cap. "... So he was dead," the Admiral observed, "Dead all along. Another trapped soul, like that poor General Viper."

"And what he said?" Toadus asked. "Unity? Two, not three? What does it mean?"

"There are three tokens," Barry observed. "Maybe he really only needed two of them after all..."

Derik looked up.

"Which means we`ll be facing a fully restored Rajaat..."

Barry shook his head. "Fully restored? Then why go to all this trouble? He got something that we can`t perceive out of all we`ve been through. He had to have. Otherwise this whole trip makes no sense at all."

"Petty revenge?" Thames offered. "It`s a thought. Which means, in any case, that all he really wants is you, my Liege." the Admiral laughed. "Maybe if we turn you in the rest of us can go home!"

Both Barry and Toadus shot the Admiral a piercing glance.

"I see. And that would be a `no` then," Thames smiled.

Moments (to her perception) after she had left, Scorn returned to Rajaat`s Cell with her brother, Iyana, in tow.

As had been drilled into the poor lad, he fell onto his knees before the idol of his father.

"My ugly, stupid son," Rajaat cackled. "And my beautiful, brilliant daughter. No better representation of what I was in the flesh could be represented than it is by my spawn, you who are born of my blood and my lust."

"... Father," the two both chanted in unison, not without some hint of deep seeded resent.

"Come now, my children; best-loved of the Warbringer," the disembodied voice chuckled. "If I have too austerely punished you, your compensation makes amends; for I have given you here each a half of mine own life, or that for which I live; which once again I tender to your hands. All your vexations were but my trials of your love, and you have strangely stood the test. Here, afore heaven, and perhaps hell, I ratify my rich gift. O children, my heirs and dearest sucklings, do not smile at me that I boast her off, for you shall find she will outstrip all praise and make it halt behind her."

Scorn wrinkled her nose at this. "`Her?`" she asked. "`She?`"

"Aye," Rajaat answered, "Her. My power, most divine; as power often is rightly ascribed the feminine gender with our language, both for poetry and proper metaphor. It is, and has always been, my intent that you two should inherit it... along with everything it entails."

The two children exchanged glances.

"Your power, father?" Iyana declared, standing up. "Then we are to be as gods, as you were??"

Rajaat bristled at his son`s clumsy use of the word "were." Feeling benificent, he decided he would not flay his only son just yet.

"... Fairly spoke," Rajaat said, his words forced through the ethereal equivalent of clenched teeth. There was then a rustling in the air; as the one thing that could make air rustle in this place did so at that moment. "What, Ariel!" Rajaat called out, "My industrious servant, Ariel, approach!"

Approach she did, materializing out of the very fabric of Sargasso`s non-time. "My lord, tis done. The Guardians are now at the last monument."

Rajaat sighed, pleased with himself and his machinations.
"Thou and thy meaner shadows your last service did worthily perform," he said, and then telepathically to Ariel alone: "Yet I must use you in such another trick. Carry us here, persons, Cell and all, into the highest chamber of the monument`s Castle. Incite this aim to quick motion, for I must bestow upon the eyes of these infants some vanity of mine art. It is my promise, and they expect it from me."

Ariel narrowed her eyes.
"Presently?"

The idol made no sign it registered the Time Mage`s rising anger, but such tone was carried in its next mental message: "Ay, with a twink... and best somatic concealment."

"I am still hid from all eyes but yours, my lord," Ariel reassured. And with a thought, the Cell warped across hundreds of miles and came to rest within the sanctuary at the top of Guardia Castle`s highest tower, within the confines of the final monument on the Mountain of Remembrance.

The idol then did something none expected it to.

It moved.

Hovering an inch off the floor, it moved toward the Cell`s entrance and swung the door open. The children of Rajaat uneasily followed the idol, and came behind it as it set down outside the tiny shack.

The shack now rested within a large hangar. Shadowy creatures hung from racks on the ceiling, like bats sleeping through the diurnal cycle. Crews of misshapen creatures, obviously Lavos-spawned mutations even uglier than Iyana, moved between consoles doing who knows what manner of task for their bodiless master.

Near a large reinforced hangar door sat two craft: Thames` Dactyl fighter and the Epoch.

"Your duty now is clear," Rajaat said, "Take you this power I have given you, the seeds of which you may not even yet feel till they have been called upon in battle, and defend the life and realm of your illustrious father. Go now, at once, the two of you! Your enemies shall not be given quarter, for they`ll none knowing and hating what you are for its simple sake alone."

Scorn and Iyana bowed.

"Where will we find these enemies of yours?"

"Not where," Rajaat said, "When. And when you shall fight them is a variable of which I am fully in control. Begone and make your descent; you shall encounter them when it is right to."

Not daring to question their father, the pair walked off and headed for what they took for the stairs downward.

"And me, Rajaat?" Ariel asked, returning to full visibility.

Rajaat groaned.

"Oh now what??"

"Your promise, master. Your gift to me..." she paused. "Your PAYMENT for services RENDERED and RENDERED and --"

"It seems to me you have, of late, been more inclined to rendering supplication than service."

"Don`t you dare avoid the issue. I have been faithful to the letter of our bargain... even loyal to you, and loyalty a thing I was once called incapable of. Yet despite all of this, you have continually denied me the one thing I have asked in exchange for being a party to your plot. Now you declare you shall pass on your great power to your demonic children, who are anything but faithful to you, and on the Mountain`s ascent you allowed one of your hated enemies to be briefly *touched* by the gift that I would kill for!! All I ask is what you have promised to be fulfilled!!"

"Oh, be silent, wench!!" the Warbringer whined. "Have I not said to you before you shall have what is yours when my vengeance`s complete?? Does it yet resemble something like completion to you, Archmage??"

Ariel was silent. "So I must wait then."

"Yes. WAIT... one would think the former Grandmaster of Time Magic should be a welcome acquaintance of such a word`s meaning."

Ariel nodded her head. "... then I shall return when your... vengeance... is complete, my lord."

And with that she vanished.

Had he lips, Rajaat would be smiling.

"Yes," he said, "I do believe you shall. I do believe you shall."

It was the throne room of Guardia Castle.

Bodies lay strewn about, so that it was all but unfamiliar to the King who would call this place home. Most were in the skeletal phases of decomposition, but some few corpses were fresh and showed evidence of mastication.

Strapped to the Guardian crest above the King`s throne, on the far northern wall, was a skeletal body wearing tattered blue velvet robes. A tarnished crown sat on his brow. This could only have been one person.

"... my Lord..." Toadus knelt.

Thames removed his cap. Derik`s brow and lips tightened and he clenched his fists.

"Who`s that?... Barry hestitated in asking.

"You would not have been old enough to remember him," the Admiral said, "But this was Guardia`s greatest modern King. Doan, King Derik`s father."

"It`s not my father," Derik said, his eyes filling with fire, "Just a shadow. He`s toying with us and I won`t be used in this game any longer. Thames, shoot that *thing* down."

The Admiral balked. "My Lord?"

"Do it."

"No, Derik," Toadus said, standing. "Even if it is only a shadow, it is a shadow in the image of a man whom we all owe love beyond human capacity. So long as it does not harm us, let us leave it be... and not dessicrate it."

Derik took a step toward Toadus, still angry. "Now is not the time to call my judgement into question. I am far too moved to be rational."

"And as such, if now is not the time, when better?" Toadus returned. "Destroying your father`s husk would bring immeasurable pleasure to Rajaat. Think of it as denying him that and let us figure out what we must do here to end our nightmare... that was the reason we began this mission, was it not?"

Derik nodded.

"No."

The voice was Doan`s. All eyes were immediately fixed on the skeleton strapped to the crest. His head was lifted, a faint blue flame lit in his vacant sockets.

"... you should... must destroy me... I beg of you..."

Thames shrugged and drew his pistol. Derik`s hand flew out to intercept Thames` gun arm before it could aim.

"... father?"

It was the power of this place again, Derik knew... but it stung him and wrestled with his better sense. Like an irresistable itch, it soon controlled him and he could do nothing but play along.

After all, it was his father.

"Derik, please... Rajaat will... force me to... he has a message," Doan struggled with each word, as if fighting something within him. "He says... to seek him out in the tower... but that you first must bypass his children, the devilish Scorn, and the ugliness known as Iyana. Once they are bested... he will face you, Derik, one last time." Doan`s skeletal head shook. "Now please, Derik, destroy me... before it`s too late!!"

"Father, no!!" Derik ran toward the high-backed throne and kicked it over. It tipped and hit the wall, standing like a ramp with just enough room for a single person to reach the decaying former King. "Toadus!" Derik cried as he moved to brace the makeshift ladder, "Cut my father down!!"

Toadus paused, unsure of whether it was acceptable for him to so much as think of touching the Guardian Throne, but then bowed and charged up the ramp at his Lord`s behest. His bulk and the weight of his armor caused the wood to groan in protest, but as it had withstood the test of time (and the asses of countless Kings) it held firm. When he reached Doan he drew a knife from his belt.

"I shall have you down in a moment, old friend," Toadus whispered as he began to cut at the lashes that held the skeleton aloft.

Doan shook his head and wailed. "Too late... too late... please, too late..."

Doan`s body began to twitch, subtly at first, then uncontrollably. When Toadus had finished cutting Doan`s arms free, the old King`s head jerked back and he howled.

Thames held onto his gun, and kept his free hand on the hilt of his sabre. Barry likewise had his own pistol drawn; but the Admiral and his ward had their eyes locked in entirely different places. Thames was watching Toadus and Doan. Barry was scanning the room, because his sharp feline eyes had detected   movement that his human companions had missed.

And that was when Doan`s skeletal hands found their grip around the startled Toadus` throat. Toadus sputtered and dropped his knife, reaching up to try and break the skeleton`s grip with his own hands. For all the Knight Captain`s vaunted strength, Doan`s corpse seemed just strong enough to hold on. Desperate, Toadus kicked with his powerful frog-legs, bucking about and shaking the throne.

Venturing to look up, Derik swore. "Thames!! Help!!" Derik cried.

"One step ahead of you, Highness..." Thames said, his arm leveled and his eye intent on his pistol`s scope. When he`d lined up the shot he wanted he fired.

Doan`s head reeled at the Wondershot blast. The skeleton released its grip and Toadus fell back onto the throne; snapping the wood beneath him. Toadus toppled down to the ground with a great crash, turning up the floortiles, and Derik fell backward with the throne on top of him as the ladder was destroyed.

"Admiral!" Barry called out.

Thames turned. "Oh damn," he swore.

From every corner of the room, dead were rising. Skeletons mostly, but some of the dead still had flesh clinging to their now animate bones. They moved slowly at first, but soon quickened their pace as they ambled toward the center of the room.

Thames, with Barry at his heels, rushed to aid the fallen Derik and Toadus to their feet. Curiously, the corpses did not seem to be chasing them. They seemed to be gathering at the center of the throne room.

Doan`s skeleton was now shaking violently. It pulled against the lashes binding its legs, which Toadus had not yet cut, and wailed angrily as it clawed at the rope that bound its throat and waist. With one great bestial howl, it shattered the last of its bonds and flew -- yes, flew -- toward the gathering point of the walking dead.

What happened next was nearly as disturbing. The dead began to swirl about one another in a whirlwind of bones. It became so that one corpse was not distinguishable from the next, least of all Doan, who was in the eye of the bone storm. This lasted only a brief moment; then there was a flash of light and in place of the gathered dead there stood one gigantic skeleton, made from the bones of all the other skeletons. Its head, however, was clearly that of the old Guardian King (the burn mark and hole from Thames` wondershot blast was plainly evident in Doan`s temple).

The creature took a lumbering step forward. A snarl issued from the jaws that once belonged to one of the Web`s most beloved leaders. The thing must have been nine feet tall! Its arms were huge and nearly as thick as a man, and its shoulders and other joints were nastily spiked and flanged.

Toadus was still dazed from his fall. Frantically, Derik and Thames tried to get him to his feet, but it looked like the huge skeleton would close the distance between them in the time it took to do that.

Derik drew the Rainbow Sword, and stood ready. He would die facing that thing before he let it take Toadus while he was down!

The beast took another earth-shaking step forward and then... it stopped. Not just stopped walking, it stopped entirely: stopped moving, stopped snarling. It simply froze there.

"Well what are you waiting for," came a sourceless voice. "Kill it."

It wasn`t Rajaat`s voice; the voice was female and one that Derik hadn`t heard before. The King searched the room, but found no trace of the speaker.

"Who are you?"

A pause.

"A friend," the voice responded. "Are you going to kill it or not?"

"Not if we don`t have to." Derik sheathed his sword. "I`m tired of this game."

The voice laughed.
"So am I, your Majesty. So am I."

Beside Derik, a figure materialized. She was tall, white-haired, green eyed and utterly beautiful. The length of her was covered in a dark cloak; beneath it she wore clothes in a brilliant shade of purple.

Derik wasn`t sure whether or not to put away his sword.
"Who are you?"

"My name is Ariel," she said, "Once known as Grandmaster Ariel of the Clock, the mighty Chronomancer; the greatest Time Mage the Merge Dimension has ever known. And presently, Rajaat`s Archmage."

"Merge Dimension?" Derik scratched his head. "The Merge Mages and Rajaat working together?..."

Ariel laughed. "I am no longer affiliated with my fellow wizards," she corrected. "There was a time, before the Merge League`s founding, when my Order waged an ill-fated war against the Order of Black Mages. It was nothing more than an extension of my rivalry with Grandmaster Alkar the Black. Since that time, I`ve been on my own, in exile, branded a traitor by my own bretheren."

"And now you serve Rajaat." Derik clutched his sword.

Ariel smiled at the King`s wariness. "For the moment. But his games vex me, as I am sure they vex you, your Highness. I think we might be able to help one another out."

Derik considered this for a moment. "I`m listening."

"Your Epoch lies at the top of this castle`s highest tower," Ariel said. "To make the ascent you willl have to get past Rajaat`s two snot-nosed children, which will be no small task because t