A Melting of a Heart Chapter 12

Lavos

By Key Mima

Sunev knelt on the floor of the Ocean Palace, morbidly watching Crono and Frog fight a mage. How long had this been going on? Minutes? Hours? ...Years? She didn't know. It was all too horrible and confusing.

Frog cast heal on the party and Sunev rose to her feet again, lashing out mercilessly at a scout. Before this day, she had never killed anything besides bugs. And now she was killing. And she kept killing, but only because of the urgency of the situation. It made her nauseous.

It was sickening to hear the thuds of their bodies hitting the floor. In the game, they just neatly disappeared after they died. Sunev looked behind her momentarily at the trail of deceased things she, Crono, and Frog had left.

She hated hearing the cries of her enemies as they collasped in agony, shuddering violently as they met their final ends. If they could feel the pain, and hear the pleading of their enemies for mercy, would anyone back on Earth still play this game?

But they moved on. Sunev cried as she walked, Crono's arms draped around her shoulders. Frog led the way. Being a true warrior, he knew how to act the part of a leader in this sick play.

"Sunev," Crono whispered, looking at her. "I know how you feel, but you need to be strong. We need to get to the queen so she won't summon Lavos." Sunev only began to cry harder, mumbling incoherently about the uselessness of their mission. And then she noticed the door, and the Jinn and Barghest guarding it. This was the fight before they got on the elevator and reached the last part of their journey. She shivered, but stopped crying. Crono unsheathed his sword, and she put a mental shield around all of them.


Magus watched his sister as she was nearly pushed to the breaking point by their mother. It was almost unbearable, but since it wasn't wholly unbearable, he made no move to help her. After Lavos was summoned he would reveal himself, not now.

But when most of the people surrounding the insane queen looked up, Magus followed their gazes, and saw, to his surprise,what he had been expecting.

Sunev, Crono, and Glenn. They had clearly used tonics to heal themselves, since their eyes showed the pain that each of their bodies didn't.

Sunev had killed. He knew just by her manner. She was standing behind Crono, shaking, and her eyes told a story of absolute horror. Magus felt a sickening pang of sympathy, and almost felt like running to her and whisking her away. Almost.

Before his mother could say a single word, as her mouth was opened to do so, the young boy threw a knife at the Mammon Machine, and the front of the machine cracked, glowing white. The knife disappeared and turned into... the Masamune. Magus felt a shiver of anxiety course through his body.

"No!" the queen screamed, her hands instantly rising to claw at her hair. "It's too late to stop us! We'll have what we deserve!" Schala shrieked and dropped to the ground, and Magus took a quick step towards her.

A blinding light fill the room before he could reach her, though, and he covered his eyes. When the light faded, he nearly swallowed his heart.

Before him was the most massive, repulsive creature he had ever seen.

Its one eye stared out blankly at the people in the room, but Magus knew that it was actually much more intelligent than it seemed.

He heard his mother cackle as she scrambled up onto Lavos's shoulder, raising her arms as if she were some sort of avatar. "See the power of Lavos!" she exclaimed violently.

It was then that Magus threw off his prophet clothes, stepping forward.

"You!" Zeal cried, looking down at him from her perch. "You're an impostor? Fine, then! Take your apprentice and Lavos will send you cretins to hell!"

"I'm sorry, but I can't let that happen, your majesty," he calmly told her. "I survived the darkness for a chance to face him!" He then jumped toward Lavos, his scythe materializing in his hands, and lashed out at him.
 
It didn't affect him, Magus realized before he landed unsteadily on the ground, which swirled blue and white below him. He gaped up at the creature, which seemed to stare mockingly down at him.

"You thought that would defeat the almighty Lavos, you fool?" Zeal asked, laughing to herself. "Lavos, how about you show him some real power?"

A multicolored light descended on Magus, touching him gently, but then seemingly piercing his skin, draining his blood. He cried out, a choked sound, and this only made his mother more amused. He heard Sunev and his sister scream, but neither of them came to him.

Once Lavos felt he had had enough, he discarded Magus like finished food. Magus hit the ground, the world swirling around him, blood and bile mixing in his mouth. He lay sprawled out on the ground for a moment, listening to the cry of Lavos, before he pushed himself to a kneeling position.

 

Sunev, Glenn, and Crono moved forward. Sunev looked frightened out of her skull; the veins in her neck were clearly visible. But she still followed the example of the two other seasoned fighters.

They were each able to get one attack in. The creature seemed unphased, and it let out a high pitched, earth-shaking roar as molten rock fell from the sky, landing on the three teenagers.

Magus let himself fall, face-first, into the ground, watching the pulsing colors of the ground underneath him. It was somewhat peaceful, his defeat. The rippling colors were very merciful. He closed his eyes... and waited for his mother and her Lavos to bring death upon him.


Sunev was blasted back, the searing heat burning her skin and the ends of her hair. The rock didn't hit her, luckily, for Crono fell on top of her, and took the brunt of the attack. She heard him moan, and felt his hot tears drip down her neck. Panic tore at her senses and nerves, and then she felt an invisible force begin to pull her toward Lavos, the video game monster that didn't exist. And she saw that she had neverknown true fear until that moment.

She looked to her left at Schala and Frog. Schala was crying, sobbing even more uncontrollably when her mother told them that they could all become a part of Lavos. Frog was speaking to himself with his fingers crossed.

Sunev didn't want to, but she turned her head, her cheek touching Crono's, to look at Magus. He lay on the ground, his pink eyes open, watching the undulating ground beneath him. He was completely calm, and Sunev smiled at him. He didn't see her, of course, but she smiled with all her heart shining through her glimmering blue eyes.

The tugging force of Lavos's power began to pull her shoes off, and she noticed Crono shift his weight on her. He rose to his knees.

No, Crono... He looked at her, his cheeks dirty and singed, and smiled.
 
"Don't worry, Sunev," he whispered. He was much too weak to fight him... But that wasn't what he was facing Lavos to do. He was sacrificing his life for them. How heroic, Crono...

Sunev began to tear up as she studied him, with his singed and dirty cheeks. He was obviously too weak to fight. Why did it always have to be this way? The young man with everything dies for his cause. Crono did have everything. He had a family here, a girlfriend, caring friends...

Sunev didn't have any of these. Her family was in some other dimension, or perhaps millions of light years away in another galaxy. She didn't have a lover, since Magus didn't love her. The only really caring friends she had were Schala and Janus, and both of them would be lost in time, soon.

 

Crono made a move to stand. He looked down at Sunev when she grabbed his hand.

"No..." she said, bringing herself to her knees and pushing him back

down. "It's not your time." A vision filled her mind of dying and returning to her world. Was that the way to get home? She smiled as she rose to her feet.

"Oh, come on," the queen laughed, waving a hand at her. "You can't be serious! You may be in better shape than your friends, but you have no power! Certainly none that could compare to Lavos's."

"I don't care," Sunev replied. She glanced again to Magus, whose gaze was now steadily fixed on her. He shook his head when their eyes met.

Her vision blurred, and she looked away.  

"Well, then! Bring it on!"

Although her head already ached, Sunev felt her energy like a warm mist around her. She composed it into a small cube, and then pushed it toward the insect-like alien. He didn't respond at first, as though he were analyzing the power. Then he began to push on it with a little bit of his. His energy crackled and sparked on contact with the cube of barely visible light, and Sunev realized that she couldn't compete. She nearly gave up then like Crono did in the game. It would be easy to accept her fate and die.

But... If only she could...
 
She started to mold the power like clay. Lavos watched this carefully, although it was impossible to tell from that one eye. She pushed the sides in, and made banana-like extensions on it. A hand. It reached out at him, curling its fingers, then extending them to grasp at that one eye. Sunev moved her hand along with it, pulling at the air, and she felt something solid in it. Lavos jerked back quickly, but Sunev only increased her hold.

It felt like holding a spiny sea urchin, and it was almost as easy to grasp. Lavos shook his body from side to side, and Zeal toppled to the ground. Sunev heard her curse, and she jumped back so as not to be absorbed. Sunev started digging her nails into the invisible force in her hand, and Lavos screeched once more, yellow liquid which Sunev guessed to be blood dripping from his eye.

Sunev teetered on the balls of her feet, and she fell to her knees. Her mind was just too weary to go on... She tried to keep up the power, but her strength wavered, and Lavos took charge of the situation instantly. He knocked her back, crushing her body underneath his power. Her head felt like it would explode, and she started coughing up blood. Lavos let out a cry, which would be the last sound Sunev ever heard.

I love you... Goodbye...


Oh, my poopies! Did Sunev just die? I think she did, folks. Now, if you're thinking that she's dead for good, you're clearly not in the A/B range at school. Sunev is DEFINITELY coming back, so don't worry. It wasn't for shock value or anything, it's just the way my imagination told me it should go. Now, on to chapter 13....

Oh, and sorry for all the screwed up text. I just got a new computer capable of handling AOL 4.0 (my old one wasn't, imagine that? :o), and I just discovered that AOL's new personal publisher SUCKS. So, I'm moving to Fortunecity for the next chapter. :D

.

Go To Chapter 13

Return To CT Fanfic