Time Screwed Part 1: Strange World
by James L. Aevermann

Kid kicked the carcass of Lavos. It had finally ceased to move, they had finally done it, put an end to that evil creature. The Chrono Cross had worked; it had freed Schala from the greenish bubble she was trapped in by Lavos. Schala was slowly waking now. She stood herself on wobbly legs. Kid went to her side to help her.

“Oi, it looks like you’re gonna be alright.”

She glanced over at Serge, who was firmly holding his arm in an attempt to staunch the blood trickling from his wound. Leena was already by his side dressing the wound. Schala began walking toward Serge and Leena, her hands reaching for them, speaking in a slow, monotonous tone.

“Must…destroy…the…flaw…must…fix…time…kill…Serge.”

Serge looked up to see a bright light forming at the tips of Schala’s fingers. It looked as if tiny rays of light were drawing in and concentrating on the tips of her fingers, making a crackling, sparkling ball of pure white energy. Serge stepped back, away from Schala.

“What…what the heck are you doing? We just freed you from that thing.”

She didn’t hear him, “Must…kill…Serge.”

“Oi, not if I can help it!” Kid yelled as she ran up behind Schala.

She took out her dagger and slit her throat, blood spraying out onto her white dress. Schala fell, but released the ball of energy nonetheless. It flew toward Serge. Time seemed to slow for them, Serge remaining painfully still as the white ball flew toward him.

He wanted to move, tried to move, but his legs weren’t responding. They held him in place, directly in the path of the oncoming ball. He braced himself for what seemed the inevitable, then remembered, he still had the Time Egg. He quickly took it out and held it forward, trying to activate it. It began to work, but too late.

The ball struck the Egg and destroyed it. The blast flung Serge back a good twenty feet. He stood up, dazed and with little white lights floating around in his vision, but seemingly in one piece. Kid and Leena rushed to him.

“Serge, are you okay?”

“Oi, you hurt badly?”

“No, I don’t think so. But the Time Egg is gone. It absorbed the blast from Schala and shattered.”

“Oi, now you’ve gone and done it. Destroyed the only way we have to get back home. Now we’re stuck here with no hope of returning, stuck with this dead thing.” Kid spat toward Lavos, “If I didn’t take you for an ally, I’d have kicked yer arse so hard you’d have been kissing the moons.”

“I’m sorry. I’m sure we’ll think of a way to get home.” Serge said.

“Well, whatever we do, do it fast. I don’t like this empty place at all.” Leena said.

Off in the distance, they heard the deep rumbling sound of thunder. The sound became louder, until it engulfed everything around them and became deafening. They covered their ears, trying to keep the noise out. Then, the ground began shaking violently; the three were thrown to the ground.

Lavos’ body was beginning to dissipate into nothing. From seemingly random points on the ground, thick beams of light shot up into where the sky should be. These beams of light stayed constant, some in close groups, others far apart from each other.

These beams of light grew in intensity until it was unbearable to look at them. Suddenly, the entire void was filled with a blinding light. The three closed their eyes, curling up as tight as they could. Then, they passed out, and the shaking stopped. The thunderous sound died down, and the light began to dim. They were still in the void, at the end of time, but it wasn’t the same void that they had entered.

The void had changed into a world of its own, a new world, yet unseen by any. From where Lavos had lain, life began in the new world. Time sped up, forcing grass to grow and seasons to pass. After a while, time returned to its somewhat normal pace, although certain small points in caves were at different rates than others.

Town already inhabited by people and other creatures had appeared. Cities and Castles were seen in the distance. This new world looked dramatically different from anything the three had seen, not that they saw anything for they were still unconscious. But it was as if pieces of different times and worlds had been meshed together into one.

Slowly, the three regained consciousness. What they saw astonished them, for the world was different. Off to the right, on a low hill, a town made of stone and wood stood. Off in the distance, they could see a tall city built of metal. Smoke rose from towers around the city and one central building stood taller than the rest. Serge, Kid, and Leena stood, puzzled.

“Where the hell are we, oi?” Kid asked first.

“I don’t know, but I don’t think we’re back home.” Serge said.

“Well, wherever it is, at least it isn’t in that terrible void.” Leena added.

“We should go ask around at that town, maybe they know something.” Serge suggested.

“Finally, you say something smart.” Kid retorted.

“You two stop fighting. Lets just find out where we are.” Leena said, frustrated.

They agreed and made for the town on the hill.

“Where the heck is this place?” said a man holding a strange weapon that looked like a sword blade attached to an overly large revolver.

“Beats me. Do you know what happened, Zell?” asked a man dressed in a tan colored trench coat and holding a rifle.

“All I remember is that we beat the crap out of Ultimecia, her castle thing began to shake and then everything went black. Hey, am I the only one, or do you guys notice something different?” the one named Zell asked.

“Hey, um, Irvine, do you have any GF’s junctioned?” asked the one with the strange weapon.

“Hey! Where in hell did they go? Hey Squall, what are these strange orbs?” Irvine asked holding up various small green and red orbs.

“You have those too, I was wondering what they were. Do you have any idea?” Squall asked.

Zell shrugged, “Nope. Didn’t even notice them until now. What’s up with this place?”

“I guess we should ask the people in this town.” Irvine suggested.

Just then, three people turned a corner and almost ran into them. A young boy with blue hair spoke first.

“Excuse me, do any of you three know where this is?”

Zell, Irvine, and Squall looked at each other. Zell answered for them.

“Actually, we haven’t the slightest idea of where we are or how we got here. Hey, who are you anyway?”

The blue-haired boy answered, “I’m Serge, this is Kid and Leena. We don’t know what happened either. We beat this thing called Lavos, and then everything began to fall apart. We woke up here.”

“Hmm, sounds a lot like what happened to us. Hey, do you guys have these things too?” Irvine asked pulling out one of the orbs.

Serge checked his pockets, “Um, yeah, it looks like we do. What are they?”

“I was hoping you knew. Lets find someone here who knows what’s going on.” Irvine said.

The group of six walked through the town; they stopped the first group they saw, a man with a cigarette in his mouth and a lance by his side, a strange man in a blood red cape and a gold arm holding a sniper rifle in his normal one, and a red animal that looked like a dog. They were speaking with a group of five others, a young man dressed as a knight, a female knight in blue with her hair braided, a man in a brown hood, a female in a red and white dress, and a spiky-haired individual carrying an extremely large sword.

Lets just forget the introductions, as they will take about a page to make. You can probably guess who the new guys are, and if you can’t, you just don’t play Final Fantasy enough. Well, the group after introductions and explanations consisted of the following: Serge, Kid, Leena, Squall, Irvine, Zell, Cid, Vincent, Red XIII, Cloud, Ramza, Alma, Agrias, and Orlandu.

Irvine asked the same question about the orbs. Thankfully, someone knew. Cloud explained to them that it was materia. He tried to give a demonstration, but ended up making a fool of himself, as it didn’t work. Apparently, the materia didn’t work in this place. Frustrated at the kid’s bumbling, Cid tried to Summon Bahamut, unfortunately, nothing happened and he just ended up looking funny.

“Damn stupid materia. Can’t even work the bloody stupid thing. Shi…”

“Cid, we all tried, it doesn’t work. Never mind.” Cloud said as he tossed the materia away.

They all followed suit and the little orbs rolled down the stone streets and into a gutter. They decided to find out where they were and rounded another corner. They saw corpses lying everywhere, blood spilled all over the ground. In the middle of it all, they saw a black caped man, with long silver hair and a really long sword. The houses around him were set ablaze as he laughed.

“Dammit, Sephiroth. How the hell did he get here? I though we killed the friggin’ bastard. Cloud, did you finish him off or did he get away like Rufus?” Cid asked.

“How the hell did you know about Rufus? You weren’t there.” Cloud retorted.

“Ha! Barret told be while he was drunk. Said he had to keep on saving your ass.” Cid laughed.

“Shut up. How did Sephiroth get here?” Cloud shouted.

“Whoa, who the hell is this Sephiroth, besides some psycho pyromaniac?” Zell asked.

“Who cares, he killed all of them, why don’t we just kill him.” Squall suggested.

Cloud and Cid looked at him and laughed, “Why don’t you try? We’ve had enough of fighting him.”

The rest of the group, minus Cloud and Cid, who just didn’t feel like fighting, and Vincent and Irvine, who couldn’t be found, attacked Sephiroth. It was like watching a massacre. Squall attacked first, with Zell next to him. Sephiroth locked blades with Squall as Zell began pummeling him with every move he knew. Sephiroth didn’t even flinch.

He flicked his wrist and Squall’s gunblade went flying into Ramza. He turned his blade and sliced right through Zell. Agrias and Serge charged him straight on as Leena and Kid attacked his back. Sephiroth tried to fend them off, but they just kept on coming. He went down under Kid’s dagger.

Cloud and Cid just stood there staring, jaws on the ground. Off in the distance, they heard two gunshots right after each other. They all ran to see what it was and found Ultimecia, lying dead with two bullets wounds to her head.

Then, they heard a shriek in the distance, what sounded like a cross between a bird and a demon. When they got there, they weren’t too far off. St. Ajora floated above the ground, flapping her wings slowly. Not caring who or what she was, they attacked. They killed her, only losing Leena in battle.

After all that, they were left with Serge, Kid, Irvine, Vincent, Red XIII, Cid, Cloud, Agrias, Orlandu, and Alma. They decided to head for the city in the distance, the one with smoke rising from towers around the city. They ran, seeing that it wasn’t that far away, and reached the place not long after.

“Wait, isn’t this Midgar?” Cloud asked.

“No, there are no walls around it and no slums on the ground, not to mention the plate.” Red XIII answered.

“Oh, yeah, you’re right.” Cloud muttered.

They entered nonetheless and made their way around buildings to the central building. Getting there, Cloud thought that it looked a lot like the Shinra building. They all walked in and took an elevator to the top floor. When the elevator stopped, they simply took the stairs until they reached a large room with a single desk and a chair.

A strange figure sat in the chair, which was turned so that they couldn’t see who it was. The figure began to clap a slow, sarcastic clap, and then spun the chair around, revealing who it was, they didn’t know. None of them had ever seen the man before.

“Hahahaha, I am Loki, and from the look on your faces, you have no idea who the hell I am. Well, lets put it like this, I am a very bored god and you are my entertainment. And you have done well to make me laugh. I apologize about your friends. But hey, look at it this way; this place is a lot better than where you all came from. Don’t ask me how this place got created, I didn’t do that. All I did was create three enemies for you. You created this world, now live in it and with it.”

They looked at him as if he were crazy. Loki just laughed again and faded away. They were left in an empty room, which to Cloud still looked a lot like President Shinra’s office. They sat themselves on the floor, all hope of returning home gone.

Cid finally broke the silence, “Damn, I guess we might as well make do with this crappy ass place and go exploring tomorrow, its getting friggin’ dark and I’m tired as hell.”

They agreed to explore the next day, and went to sleep.

*Sleep music*

~FIN to part 1~ Part 2

Maintained by:

d Galloway (Insert Image Here)