Chain 137: Chrono Trigger

Chain 137: Chrono Trigger

Location: Guardia Forest, 1000 A.D.
Age: 16
Identity: Human, Traveler (Drop-In)
Drawbacks: [+600] Lavos Beckons, Conservation of Time, The Trial, But The Future Refused To Change

[Free]      Element: Water
[Free]      Jumper's Theme
[400/1600]  Lathe of Heaven
[Free]      Many Days Ahead of Tomorrow
[500/1600]  Leave It To Me
[1100/1600] Guru
[1300/1600] How Human You've Become
[1500/1600] Dreams Are For Sleepers
[1600/1600] To Good Friends: Demona, Conspiracy

Things not to expect: seeing some spiky-haired kid get chased through the forest into a portal. Also unexpected: the knights who were chasing him immediately tried to clap me in chains for aiding him. This... I did not exactly approve of, and instead I elected to visit the portal. The next thing I did not expect was to hear Demona telepathically ripping me a new one for the fact that she was quasi-pressganged into a war by dint of her default appearance as a gargoyle, though at least she got along well enough with Magus, their leader. That, and the fact that the other side of the gate was some four hundred years in the past of where I'd been standing was more than a bit annoying. While I can travel time... my window is rather more limited. A half dozen hours on the outside per jump with my innate chronoportation.

And so, while the main cast crisscrossed dozens of timelines and had more or less locked themselves into a semi-stable time loop, Demona and I travelled the centuries. We witnessed them battle the monster Lavos dozens of times in different eras with different groups, watched the changes in the timeline ripple out (and dodge them as needed, never have I been so glad for my time in Achron as I am right now, even if it wiped out the timeline I'd originated it). Eventually we were able to locate the Conspiracy where they'd landed - in a distant future, ruined by Lavos three hundred years prior. No matter what they did, no matter what degree of subtle help we provided, this was always the conclusion. Sometimes the world's ruin came sooner, sometimes later, but always we were met by the shattered landscapes and Lavos' runt offspring trying to consume any remaining life they could find.

There was only one opportunity where things could really be changed for the best, Demona and I agreed, and that was before I'd appeared. The gates' nature, only letting a handful through at a time, was an impediment - in time, the Conspiracy was brought to where they were needed, even if it necessitated more than three hundred trips, at least they were brief. Fortunately, building a more... robust method of time travel, even if it was limited to a matter of hours and its use would ensure it never came about, was very possible, and it placed us precisely when we needed to be.

Thirteen thousand years prior to my arrival, my followers, Demona, and I made our entry. The so-called Enlightened Ones balked at the clearly achronistic invading army, but no harm was given to anyone; by the time they could inform Queen Zeal that outsiders were invading, Lavos was making his presence known at her behest. While the loop ensured that Crono and his compatriots at the time - Lucca and Marle - were equipped with armament and armor that should have rendered them a match, Lavos as he was summoned in this era was always at his strongest. Fortunately, the islands occupants were already evacuating to the surface.

What wasn't expected was for the field of combatants to warp and twist as space expansion charms took effect, while the Conspiracy's subordinate armors began raining hellfire onto Lavos with the weapons of the distant future. The Conspiracy proper took more of a support role, but Lavos' attack was always meant to take his opponents by surprise. Lavos never expected an army to meet him when he arrived. And while Crono, Lucca and Marle were worth an army of firepower on their own, lending them more fire support was certainly welcome, by all appearances.

Especially when Demona and I handled the defense, juggling shields across the battlefield to prevent anyone from being obliterated at an inopportune time. S̶t̶i̶l̶l̶,̶ ̶i̶t̶ ̶w̶a̶s̶ ̶a̶ ̶d̶o̶o̶m̶e̶d̶ ̶f̶i̶g̶h̶t̶-

I crossed my own timeline, with a wounded Demona and three quarters of the conspiracy, joining the battle in its earliest stages. Lavos had proven to be formidible, even when our attacks were destroying the Ocean Palace around us. S̶t̶i̶l̶l̶,̶ ̶i̶t̶ ̶w̶a̶s̶ ̶a̶ ̶d̶o̶o̶m̶e̶d̶ ̶f̶i̶g̶h̶t̶-

Again I crossed my own timeline, appearing slightly later, Demona trading regeneration spells with herself as the other iterations of myself saw me and realized there was a Major Problem. We all broke out the heavy artillery, and yet even that seemed not to be enough to stop Lavos, even as the island around us began to disintegrate, i̶t̶ ̶w̶a̶s̶ ̶a̶ ̶d̶o̶o̶m̶e̶d̶ ̶f̶i̶g̶h̶t̶-

An alpha strike from Hyperion against the Black Omen in 1000 AD and i̶t̶ ̶w̶a̶s̶ ̶s̶t̶i̶l̶l̶ ̶a̶ ̶d̶o̶o̶m̶e̶d̶ ̶f̶i̶g̶h̶t̶-

Somewhere in a distant past era, in a backwater system, in a backwater sector of a backwater galaxy, a metal extractor and energy generator were built on an asteroid in the backwater system.

Sixty-five million years and dozens of timelines later, it came to pass that Lavos appeared in the Ocean Palace.

The Conspiracy evacuated every living soul off of the islands except for Queen Zeal, Crono, and his compatriots.

Demona and I fixed the issue of Crono, Lucca, and Marle being present by grabbing them and teleporting away from the fight.

When they began to protest, I pointed upward.

In the intervening time, an aperture had been constructed. A gossamer, delicate and impossible to notice by any current level of technology, had englobed the sun while capturing almost none of its light. But now, on the surface of the planet, everyone watched the Ocean Palace as it began to glow, while the sun darkened in the sky. Further refinement left everything dark except for a single beam of light from the near-invisible setting sun, tracing its way through the sky, illuminating the Ocean Palace in blinding light.

The beam of light grew in harshness to the point that everyone was forced to look away, as the sunlight scoured through the atmosphere and heated a thin layer to plasma for an instant.

When it faded and the light reappeared, bits of the island were raining back down on the ground, including the shattered pieces of Lavos.

At that, I felt the tension release, and cast detection spells to verify that Lavos was indeed dead.

It may have took turning the whole of the sun into a giant laser...

...right, that would be the deafening boom from the sky being effectively turned into a very large explosion...

...but the monster was slain without any collateral damage.

Well.

Aside from Queen Zeal's civilization. But they should get along just fine with everyone on the surface, really.