Chrono Trigger: Twins of Destiny Chapter 19
The Past
By Mox Jet
Later that day, after the buzz had died down, Tyrion had found his way to someplace where he could be alone with his thoughts. He certainly felt the need to meditate. If what Tristan had told him had any truth, then it seemed that everything in his life up until this point was a lie. His past, his home, his memories…what did they all really mean if he himself was not who he thought he was? It was true: he had always been plagued with being good at everything, if that can be considered a plague. It had always made him envied by others, but he had never been happy being the object of envy. Even back then, it had made him feel isolated. Could it be that part of him knew the truth –that he was fundamentally different from everyone else- all along?
He had found his way outside of the compound, discovering that it was located in the middle of nowhere, or rather, the middle of the desert. Dunes stretched around him for many miles, shadowed only in the distance by a large rock formation to the west. He could guess where he was. The formation was probably an extension of the Urboloa Ridge, a mountainous region in the southern part of Denegrad that walled off the southeastern portion of the desert from the rest of the land. These Saidair were apparently desert dwellers by nature, clearly knowing the desert and its dangers well; he had noticed seals on the doors that were undoubtedly designed to seal in liquid.
Currently, it looked to be about 5:30 in the afternoon, and the sun was beginning to set. Oranges and reds were beginning to appear in the western sky as the light from the setting sun was diffracted more sharply. Tyrion gazed at in longingly, knowing the Lyons was that way, far off in the west. He wasn’t sure if he was feeling a desire to be home, per say, but he knew he was feeling a desire to be more comfortable. Everything now seemed so convoluted and unfamiliar.
A dry breeze blew across his face and through his hair. Something on that breeze was calling him. He looked up to the heavens and into the cloudless sky, halfway expecting to see an Ithilmarian city there, but they were cloaked from normal vision. Two small black birds flew across his field of view, over towards the Urboloa mountains. His stare followed them as they flew over the mountain. Then, the question of the afternoon managed to form itself on his lips.
“I have a brother?” he asked the birds, half expecting an answer. “Does that means there’s more of my past out there…?”
He stood in silence, leaning against the wall of the building. It was colored to blend in with the sand so most of it was actually just covered in the stuff. Only the door and area on which he leaned were visible. Most of the compound was underground. That was why there had been no windows.
The door behind him slid open with a slurping hiss as the liquid seals disengaged. He didn’t turn, but he could already feel Lina’s presence there. Again, it was that emanation that she flaunted. She never had fear of entering anywhere. There was a confidence about her that he admired, in truth. She hadn’t even demonstrated any of her power yet he could feel it was there.
“What’s up?” he asked her as she walked up next to him, sharing his gaze towards the west.
“Not much,” she responded. “They just about finished wrapping things up in there when I got back from my dinner and shower.”
“What did you eat?”
“Hmm?”
“What did you eat?” he repeated. She seemed oddly puzzled by his caring about what food she had consumed.
“Some sort of desert boar,” she said.
“Probably a yuncta boar,” he said. “What part did they give you?”
“Umm…all of it. It was pretty good.”
“Damn, Lina. How do you eat so much?”
“I’m not sure. I told you what I thought, though. It’s my metabolic rate that extremely heightened due to my psychic powers. That might just be an excuse for me always being hungry, but why did you want to know?”
“Eh, haven’t you ever just made conversation with someone?” he asked honestly. “Or maybe just genuinely cared for a mundane aspect of someone’s life?” She thought about it for a bit.
“Not particularly. Why worry about it, right?”
“Well, that’s one way of looking at it,” he said with a shrug. She didn’t respond. She looked off into the direction he was gazing.
“Your home…” she said. “It’s back there, isn’t it?”
“Yeah,” he said. “I live in Garden City. It’s in Lyons. That’s where this all started, I guess.”
“Kallar...” she muttered, clenching her fist. “He would have screwed me despite my distinguished service. Bastard…”
“Yeah, he played on just the right emotions to get me to come with him,” Tyrion reflected. “I totally bought right into his plan. I should have known that he had ulterior motives. Why else would I have suddenly come under the scope of that so called recruitment.” He looked down to her. “Is your home that way, too?”
“I’m not sure I have much of a home, Tyrion,” she said, lowering her eyes. “But yeah, what you’d call my home is that way.”
“In Ithilmar?”
“Yup.”
“So what happened?”
“Excuse me?”
“What happened,” he asked again. “It’s my turn, if I recall. I want to know what happened and why you don’t live there anymore.” She took in a deep breath and sighed.
“I was sent away…” she said. “My so-called father is...well, a very important business man. See, my parents are what they call Class IA Citizens. That is, their blood is pure Ithilmarian in ancestry. Having a little girl that had psychic powers wasn’t too…well accepted by their peers. So, they sent me to M-1. The military was always looking for new recruits, especially ones with my…gifts. I was twelve years old at the time. I never even looked back after that. They…didn’t want me, so I decided I didn’t want them either.” Tyrion didn’t respond for a moment.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “That sounds….pretty shitty of your parents.”
“I’d say,” she mumbled, somewhat morose.
“At least you knew who they were, though,” Tyrion said, looking back to the sky. “I don’t even know who my parents are.”
“We’re gonna find out,” Lina said, looking up at him. “And…I had a bit of a change of heart.”
“How’s that?”
“I want to get back at them.”
“M-1?”
“You were right,” Lina said. “They hung me out to dry. I guess I was…blinded by confusion. I’m…not gonna let them get away with screwing me.”
“Good,” Tyrion said. “That little stunt to get me to fight provided me with enough information about M-1 to gauge what kind of an organization they are. I’ll have nothing to do with people who take lives for granted like that. It’s that kind of shit that allowed Rachel to be killed in the first place.”
“You…really loved her, huh?” Lina asked. Tyrion was silent. His gaze shifted back to the west, almost hoping to see her image in the clouds, smiling at him.
“Yeah…” Tyrion said. Then, he looked at her. “No one else made me feel like that, you know? Like I really mattered? Like I was special? See, I guess all my life I’ve wanted that kind of affirmation. She never shied away from giving it. She was just what I needed to complete myself, I think.”
“Deep stuff,” Lina said in half-awe. “I’m sure I’ve never had that effect on anyone.”
“Probably because you’ve never let yourself get into that kind of a relationship before.” He raised an eyebrow at her. “I’m just guessing, but something tells me you’ve been lacking in the boyfriend department.”
“Hey, shut the hell up.” she shot back. “What makes you say that?” she asked defensively.
“Because you give off a bad vibe,” he said. “You don’t seem the kind of person that allows people to get close to you.”
“How do you…know that?” she asked.
“Lifestream reading,” he answered, looking back the other way. “It’s a Nisai Ryu trick. We can read the emanations that people put out. With that information, you can judge a lot about a person.”
“So what would I do to…well, I guess not be so….whatever you said I was?”
“Well, you could start by not being so nasty all the time,” Tyrion said, the left side of his mouth curling up in a slight grin. She frowned and let out a quiet growl. Then, serenity momentarily came to her.
“You really think I’m…nasty?” she asked him, looking up with almost pleading eyes. There she went again with that on and off switch for the innocent act.
“Well, not like nasty to look at,” he said. “It's nothing like that. You’re mannerisms, though. They’re just so mean, sometimes.” She frowned. Then, throwing her arms across her chest, she shot her head forward again, standing stiff.
“Well, what do you know, anyway!” she shouted.
“Maybe more than you give me credit for,” Tyrion said, still looking at her. “Not so much about military politics, no. Dealing with people, though? That I know a bit about.” She slowly turned her neck back towards him.
“Then…assuming I wanted you advice…what might you…suggest?” she asked with heavy defensive tones.
“I’d just suggest that you don’t speak to everyone like they’re worse than you all the time. I mean, the first thing you did when we met was talk down to me. I can deal with that, but a lot of people don’t want to have to. You’ll get along better with people if you just think about what your saying and how it’ll affect them. Also, that whole making conversation thing. You could try to just show a little more compassion and interest in people.”
“I think…” she started to say, then trailed off. She took a moment to gather her thoughts together. Then, with a tone of admitted defeat, “I think it’s a defense mechanism.”
“How so?”
“Well, it’s a thing you use to protect yourself, moron,” she said.
“There you go again.”
“…Sorry…” she said, looking to the ground.
“I meant to ask what you were defending against.”
“Inferiority, I guess. I mean…well, look at me. I’m short…thin….I certainly don’t have a knockout figure…and I guess I always knew it. That, and there’s that whole psychic thing. See, you might have just been ‘the blue haired boy’ in school, but I was the ‘the freak girl.’ So that power sort of became an excuse, and I guess that led to my temperament.” Tyrion laughed.
“It’s not funny!” she said in shock.
“No, it is,” he said, still laughing. “But not for reasons you think.” His laughter ceased and he composed himself. “It’s because I was never just the ‘blue haired boy.’ I often had the word freak added on there, too. It’s an easy one to add for some one like me.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, you remember what Kallar mentioned to you. That night they came after me, there was a man who startled me when I was behind some bushes. I reacted by smashing the guy’s jaw open, probably sterilizing him, and then proceeded to out run a car. Earlier that night, even, I had gotten into a fight with a big guy that was picking on a freshman at a keg party.”
“What’s a keg party?”
“Well, never mind that,” he said. “The point is that for no real reason other than the fact that the situation didn’t seem right, I took it upon myself to save that poor freshman’s ass and ended up having to thrash that bully. When I was done, I knew he’d have a few bruised ribs to show for it and with the way I broke his wrist, he’ll never be able to use it properly again.”
“And?”
“No one was surprised as to any of this. They had come to expect this bizarre, rather outstanding behavior out of me. I mean, For Adrekel’s sake, I broke nearly every school record in track and field and was leading the league in goals on the hockey team by nearly six hat tricks. I can drink faster than anyone I’ve ever known and I never get drunk. I can fall off of a roof and not break any bones, then go on to win a wrestling match with someone one hundred pounds heavier than me. I’ve never been what’d you’d call normal, you see?”
“I guess that is a lot like me,” she said, feeling a little better. She grinned. “ I guess people like us are just too awesome for our own good.”
“Well, I’m not so sure about that, but I guess you can know that you’re not alone, Lina. I think you’ve grown up far more similarly to me than you realize.”
They both were silent and stood for a few more minutes as they watched the sun go down. The last vestiges of blue faded from the sky in a mosaic of reds and oranges. The sun, giant and red, began to sink over the horizon and night began to fall on Celes. An odd sense of relief washed over the two teenagers. For the first time in a while, Lina grinned for reasons that didn’t involve someone being made fun of or hurt.
“Tyrion?” she asked as she leaned back to open the door. It slid open with a hiss.
“Yeah?” he answered, turning at the neck to follow her motions.
“Thanks,” she said, walking into the entrance and disappearing into the compound. When she was far out of earshot, Tyrion mumbled to himself.
“No, Lina. Thank you.”
.
Tristan sat in a small meeting room with Grev, though it was not quite what he was accustomed too. The LEA normally had rather elaborate rooms in which planning was discussed. This room was contrastingly rather simple. The chairs that surrounded the plan wooden table were cheap wheelers. There were no pictures (or even windows) on the dull walls and the light was provided by the same simple fluorescent bulbs. Of course he wouldn’t mention anything, though; that would be rude.
Tristan reached into his coat and produced a disk roughly four inches in diameter. Placing it on the table, he leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms.
“My superior is extremely pleased that our organizations are so alike in their goals,” Tristan said. “We are grateful for your cooperation.”
“If you can do what you say and destroy the…Lavoid…that is giving Ithilmar their power, we will be grateful for your cooperation, as well,” Grev said, pausing on the word Lavoid as he recalled the name that Tristan had given to the being. “We have been trying to free the surface from Ithilmar’s bonds for centuries, Tristan,” he continued. “We will take any help we can get.”
“And we can give it,” Tristan said. He reached over and hit a switch on the small disk. “And as a further token of faith, my superior would like to speak with you.”
“He’s coming here?” Grev asked.
“Oh, no,” Tristan said, somewhat surprised. “He’ll be talking through that,” he pointed to the device on the table which was now sparking to life. “It’s a standard holographic projector. Pretty common off of Celes, actually,” he said.
“I…see,” Grev nodded, slightly trepid about the new technology. “How does it work?”
“You…well, you don’t really want to know,” Tristan said. “It’s complicated.” As he said this, an ten inch tall image of Jack appeared on top of the hologram projector. He wore his white officer’s jacket and his hair was tied tightly back.
“Good evening, Grev of the Saidiar,” the image said in Jack’s voice. “My name is Jack McKlane. I am the Commander of the Lavoid Exterminatorum Adeptus.”
“Good…evening,” Grev responded, a little hesitant at first, but quickly getting the hang of it. “What can I do for you, Mr. McKlane?”
“Please,” Jack said with a laugh. “First off, call me Jack and stop making me feel old. Secondly, it’s also what I can do for you,” he said. “Because Tristan here tells me that you’d like a certain Lavoid removed from existence down there.”
“Yes,” Grev agreed. “Very much so. I’m quite happy that your organization is willing to help us our crusade.”
“We have a certain respect for those who crusade for freedom,” Jack said. “It is a crusade of our own that brought us here, even. But yes, we will be looking to resolve the situation as soon as possible.”
“Most excellent,” Grev said. “But, I must ask…what do you want from us?”
“In addition to information on how to get at the Lavoid?” Jack asked. Grev nodded. “All we ask is that you give us an opportunity to speak with Tyrion and, should the situation arise, Teclis.”
“That seems incredibly reasonable,” Grev said, almost not believing it.
“I personally feel that they will come with us of their own will when given the proper opportunity. Tristan has explained to you what the boys are, I assume.”
“Yes,” Grev said. “While it is hard to comprehend, your man did indeed explain the situation as best he could.”
“Can you understand why I would want them as allies?”
“Of course,” Grev said. “I’ve seen what these boys can do. I’d want them as allies of my own if I could have them. Their powers are already beyond what I have witnessed in both the Grand Masters of the Nisai Ryu and the High Elders of the mage guilds. Both have a sense of battle is hard to come by, and to be so young yet have so much strength and potential, it is utterly mind boggling to consider the fact that they can only get stronger from where they already are.”
“Ideally, you won’t need allies when I leave,” Jack said. “Because it goes with the domain of eliminating the Lavoid, I fully intend to remove Ithilmar from its current reign of power. There is no other way that I can conceive of to topple the Lavoid from power. He's using many people in the kingdom as his pawns, the Queen being the first, but also he seems to be working with one Darius Godessaire, the commander of the M-1 forces.”
"Darius..." Grev mumbled. "I've dealt with him before. He's a particularly nasty fellow. He gave me this:" Grev pulled up his right sleeve and indicated a long scar on his forearm. "I know that in single combat, I'm certainly not able to fight him. As far as Tyrion, Tristan and Lina, know not if they possess the strength to take him on, either."
"Should it come to that, you may be meeting me in person sooner than I would otherwise hope. Regardless, the Queen, Darius, and Ithilmar will be destroyed. By my honor as a soldier I swear on that."
“You believe you have the power to do so?”
“It’s been done in the past,” Jack said simply, not mentioning the fact that he had never actually done battle with another Planeswalker before.. “The existence of a nation that uses the power of a Lavoid is actually quite common on planets in which the beasts engage in long-term infestation. Again, for the most part, all we ask of you is information. Your knowledge of the workings would provide us with the ideal intelligence from which to enact our attack.”
“Truthfully, this sounds all too good for us,” Grev said honestly. “You’ll excuse me if I find such a one sided deal so difficult to accept.”
“Grev, my friend,” Jack said solemnly. “The deal may as well be one sided in our direction. I swear on the grave of my mother that I do not seek anything more than the death of this Lavoid.” Grev didn’t respond for a moment while he considered the situation. Then, he stood up and held his hand to his chest.
“You have the allegiance of the Saidiar, Jack,” he said. “You can count on that.”
“I am eternally grateful,” Jack said, bowing. “And I shall be in touch.” Jack’s image looked at Tristan and nodded. Tristan nodded back, reached over, and switched off the projector.”
“Are you satisfied?” Tristan asked.
“As best I can be,” Grev said. “Though we will know better as we find more information about the boy.”
“I agree,” Tristan said. “And you realize now that they are the key.”
“It is as I had suspected when I first saw Teclis and sensed his energies,” Grev said. “Yes, these boys are the key.”
“As it happens, we have reason to believe that Teclis is actually in Ithilmar right now,” Tristan said. “And I believe it is both of our organizations best interest to begin to plan a mission there in search of both Teclis as well as information about Geminus.”
“That seems sound,” Grev agreed. “How quickly would you like to assemble a squad?”
“Probably as soon as possible. I have a ship that can get here in a few hours and we can use that to actually get up to Ithilmar. From there, I won’t be much help in the information department. Where would one go at that point?”
“Renektent…” Grev said, clenching a fist. “That’s the only place that would have what we need.”
“Then it’s settled….” Tristan said. “The Capital of Ithilmar is our next destination.”
.
“Okay, okay, I’ll admit I was impressed with how Tristan handled the next few incidents. I never said he was useless. I just said he was risky.” -Sarah Inverse McKlane