Amor Vincit Omnia Chapter 22
Feeling Blue
By Minmei
“It’s a good thing Robo gave back your gate key before he…you know,” Schala told Lucca.
“Yeah…”
They stepped away from the gate and observed the surroundings. “This entire planet is a sight for sore eyes,” Gaspar commented softly. “It is amazing Robo made it through here,” murmured Atropos. Lucca turned to face Atropos. “Are you sure you want to go through with this?” Lucca asked her. “I mean, you did kind of join us at the last minute.” Lucca was silent for just a second and she added, “Really last minute, when I think about it. You practically jumped us when we were about to enter the forest, hehe.” Lucca then stopped to let out a sigh. “It’s quite all right,” Atropos responded. “I’m just glad you took the trouble in letting me come along.” “Anytime, Atropos,” Lucca told her.
They took another look at the world, or at least the world from where they were standing, which was in the forest, or what was left of it. Clouds of the most dismal, somber grey blanketed the skies. A weary wind glided gently through the blackened, bare branches of the beaten trees. The group cautiously moved their feet through the a carpet of ash as they made their way out of what used to resemble Guardia Forest. As soon as they exited, a foul stench invaded their nostrils, and they crinkled their noses.
“Ugh,” groaned Lucca, making a face. “What’s that nasty odor? I knew Lavos smelled, but I didn’t think—oh, oh my GOSH! OH!” Lucca was now staring at something, and she realized why the entire planet smelled like rot. The others followed her gaze. “Ooohh!” gasped Schala, covering her mouth with both hands. “My God,” Gaspar cried out. Even Atropos reacted with horror, her eyes flashing in panic.
There, all around them, were the burnt, decomposing human bodies of the Lavos’ claimed victims. In Robo’s words: as far as the eye could see. They tried not to gag as they witnessed a group of survived birds pecking away at one of the bodies, the ribcage of the person poking through. Even the birds seemed as diseased as the planet. Two sickly vultures appeared to be fighting over a half-eaten organ.
Schala uttered a loud sob, covering her mouth. She closed her eyes, dropped her hands and let out a tiny moan. “Look…we have to concentrate on why we’re really here. Yes, this is a very gruesome sight, but we have to keep moving…for…for Robo’s sake.”
“Schala’s right,” agreed Lucca, letting out a cough. “We’ve got to rescue him. After all, if it weren’t for him, we wouldn’t know about this new monster. So…” Lucca swallowed hard. “…o-o-on to Death Peak.”
“Wait,” said Schala, turning to Gaspar. “Why Death Peak? If it rose from Denadoro, wouldn’t it reign from there?”
Gaspar shook his head. “No matter from where it arises, it will always take its not-so-rightful place upon Death Peak,” he answered.
Schala lowered her gaze, remained still for a moment, and then looked back up. “All right, then, let’s go.”
As they walked along, they viewed body after blackened, putrid body. It was difficult to grow used to the nauseating smell. As they were about to pass Truce, Atropos suddenly stopped. “Wait,” she said. The others also stopped and turned around to face her. “What is it, Atropos?” Lucca asked her. “We can’t do this!” Atropos stated. Lucca shook her head and sighed. She muttered something under her breath in exasperation. “No, wait, you don’t understand. Hear me out,” Atropos said. “Go ahead, already,” Lucca told her, raising an eyebrow.
“Well…Robo once told me that in order to have saved Crono, you needed a clone. Don’t we need a clone to save Robo?”
“Oh,” Lucca said, letting out what sounded like a gasp. “I can’t believe I forgot about that!” She looked at Atropos, an apologetic expression on her face. “Um…Atropos, do you know where Robo stashed his clone?”
The rose-colored robot nodded. “Shortly after he returned, he moved his clone to one of the domes in Truce,” explained Atropos. She lowered her eyes to the ground. “I…I remember h-he used to…play jokes on me with the clone,” she reminisced as her eyes lit up. “He’d—he’d pretend that was him, and…and…” The somewhat happy tone in her voice quickly turned melancholy. Her eyes seemed to dim as the cold reality hit her. Robo was dead. “I miss him very much,” she suddenly said, a hint of sorrow now lurking in her monotone.
Lucca’s mouth fell open. She didn’t know what to say. She realized that she had had quite an impact on Robo…but…Atropos too? Was it possible that Lucca’s influence was so strong that Atropos had also been affected?
Lucca put a hand on the robot’s shoulder. “Uh…Atropos, I’m…sorry about Robo,” she told Atropos. “I miss him too. Him and my parents…” Lucca trailed off, momentarily turning her head to blink back her tears. “But…but we won’t bring him back like this. We’ve got to go through with this.” She dropped her arm. “So…uh…which of these domes—er…areas has Robo’s clone?”
Atropos slowly stepped forward and pointed out what resembled one of the domes.
***
“What a dump.” Lucca cautiously moved through the debris in the tiny dome. She inched around the split pieces of wood, the twisted metal, and the bits of broken glass. Lucca suddenly stopped, looked up, and shivered. “Goodness, it’s cold even in here,” she remarked, a puff of steam rising from her mouth. She observed the “ceiling” of the dome, and even though she was well aware of Lavos’ power, was shocked to see what was there, or rather, what wasn’t there. The fire shower had done so much damage that the ceiling, which was three feet of solid glass, was busted, with large chunks of the shattered glass barely hanging by a thread over their heads.
Lucca lowered her head, and caught a glimpse of something. She looked straight ahead at that thing that had caught her eye. What was that? Could it be…? She squinted harder at the object mocking her not-so-perfect vision. Yes…it was exactly what they had come there for. There, trapped between the metal wall and a large, slanted board, was the amazingly well preserved clone of Robo. She sighed contently as she walked over to her metallic friend’s lookalike. “Oh Robo…”
She bent down next to the clone to see how much work she would have to do retrieving it. “Hey, guys,” she called to the group, “I could use some help here! Someone hold this board up while I get the clone out of here.” Gaspar and Atropos hurried over to Lucca, and they took a hold of the board. Schala also came over, and for some reason, lifted her gaze to the ceiling above. She let out a weak gasp. Hanging right above them, was an enormous, jagged piece of glass. As if the hazard of being directly under it wasn’t enough, the wind started to pick up. All could hear the remnant cracking as it swayed dangerously back and forth.
Schala faced her friends. “Um…could we possibly speed this up a little faster? That chunk of glass isn’t going to hold out any longer,” she warned them in a frightened voice. “Yeah, we kind of got that,” Lucca answered her, trying to pull the clone out. “How bad does it look, Schala?” Schala looked back up at the glass fragment threatening them. “I think we’d better get out—and now,” replied Schala.
“Hurrying,” Lucca told her. She grunted. “Come on! Lift!” she ordered her two friends. Gaspar and Atropos struggled to elevate the board, and successfully raised it high enough for Lucca to almost jerk it back. “Whoa!” cried Lucca, flying back with the clone. She slowly stood up, lifting the clone. Then she, Gaspar, Atropos, and Schala quickly left the dome. As soon as they exited, Atropos glanced behind her. She gasped as the thick piece of glass broke from the ceiling and landed where they had been, just barely a moment ago.
***
“Man, if those sewers remained that intact, they should have put the people in there instead of the domes,” remarked Lucca as she climbed up the ladder of the sewer exit. She hoisted herself up, and then turned around and knelt down, facing Gaspar and Schala back in the sewer. “You guys need any help with that clone?” she asked. “I can get it,” the pink robot behind Lucca offered. Lucca turned to Atropos. “Hmm…all right,” she agreed. “I think I’ll see what the mountain has in store for us.” “Be careful, Lucca!” called Schala.
A while later, which seemed like an eternity to the scientist, Lucca found herself approaching the mountain. As she walked up to the entrance, her heart began to flutter. She paused to observe Death Peak, which was identical in appearance to the mountain in the old future.
‘Old future’? thought Lucca, scoffing. That’s got to be an oxymoron.
She kept her gaze on mountain as she realized something strange. Even though the mountains looked the same, something definitely wasn’t. What was it? Weird, she thought, finally seeing the difference, or rather, feeling it, or in actuality, not feeling it. How strange. The wind had died down…or actually, had never started up in the mountain as far as Lucca was concerned.
She shook her head and continued on her way. Entering the area, she lifted her head and—
“You!” she cried, her eyes widened in shock. “H-how—what—what are you doing here?!”
The round figure stepped out from behind the trees and narrowed its eyes.
“Nu…”
Lucca continued her stare. “What are you doing here?” she asked again.
The blue creature took a few steps forward, then stopped. “You just don’t get it,” it sighed. “I thought I told you and your little friends to get lost. You just couldn’t leave it alone, could you?”
Confusion covered Lucca’s face. “Wh-what do you mean?” she stammered.
“Don’t you recognize me?” the Nu demanded of her. Lucca shook her head slowly. “The Cursed Woods?” it reminded her. “I thought I told you to leave, but you just kept going. I didn’t want to have to tell you why you couldn’t keep on going, so that’s why I fought you and your friend, to try to scare you off. I didn’t intend for it to go that far, but when I was defeated, I knew I had to take off.”
“Oh my God,” whispered Lucca. “You’re that same Nu from 600 AD? W-well, why were you trying to stop us from getting to Glenn?”
“You were trying to stop this new evil…I couldn’t stand by and let you do so.”
Lucca’s jaw dropped. “What?!” She was outraged. “Why would you do that?! Why would you deliberately try to stop us while the world’s fate was to—”
“It would NOT have happened that way if you had just left things alone!” yelled the Nu.
“Wh—what?” Lucca was now completely confused. “Are you saying that…we’re the reason the world is stripped of life? I…I don’t…I can’t see how…”
“When you people woke up the creature in your time, you disturbed the series of events that was to have happened after that. The creature was going to die eventually. But you allowed the creature to take over the world, to once again ruin the future!” The Nu was now glaring at Lucca accusingly.
“That can’t be true! You lie!” she shouted angrily. “My friends and I are NOT responsible for the world’s fate!”
“Maybe not intentionally,” the Nu told her, “but it DID happen. Just think about it. Had you not planned to go to Denadoro, none of this would have happened. But there is a way of reversing the process. If you’ll just listen—”
“Listen to what?!” exploded Lucca. “How DARE you?! And how do you explain this creature taking over the world after Robo came to us?!”
“Robo had nothing to do with it.”
Lucca just stared at the creature in disbelief. “What kind of trick are you pulling on me now?”
“No trick. Robo knew that the creature existed. What he didn’t know was that it would have died anyway. That scream he heard was actually a dying scream, only he didn’t know it. True, he sent Atropos to warn you, but it wasn’t Robo who woke up the creature. It was your friend with the eye patch.”
Lucca frowned. “D-Dalton? That doesn’t make sense. He only woke up the creature after we entered the cave. He didn’t know about Lavos’ son.”
“You fool,” snorted the Nu. “What Dalton didn’t tell you was that he had been in the cave days before you arrived. Had he not spotted you near the forest, he would never had taken refuge in the cave to keep an eye on you. He woke up the monster the first night there, but the stupid dolt didn’t realize it because he didn’t see it. When that happened, history was altered, and the creature was allowed to live, to destroy this world.”
“Is that so? Then why didn’t it go off then like it did with my parents?!”
“Like you and I, this creature does have a mind of its own, and therefore is capable of making its own choices. Perhaps it was awaiting revenge for what you had done to his father.”
Lucca let out an uncomfortable noise. “Well, what does all of this mean anyway?” she asked. “What are you doing here? What is your part in this? You said that there was a way to reverse the process…? What were you talking about?”
The Nu suddenly showed a hint of a smile. “Good,” he said, sounding somewhat pleased. “I have you listening to me for once.” He paused. “Since he is on his guard, he has built up an overwhelmingly stronger barrier to any type of attack, physical or magical. This is why we cannot defeat him. As for you, there is only one thing for you to do. You see, you literally hold the power to undermine the strength of this creature in your hands. You must use the power of the pendants to weaken Lavos. The rest shall be left up to me. Just remember that. And now I must be going. Do not fail me.”
“But wait!” Lucca suddenly said. “What do you mean, ‘pendants’?”
“Use the pendants to weaken the monster, and I shall take over,” the Nu said as it faded away. “Just use the pendants. I shall take care of the rest. Nu…”
Lucca was about to protest, but was interrupted by Schala. “Hey, Lucca!” called the blue-haired princess. “Who are you talking to?”
Lucca whirled around to face Schala, then turned back to the Nu, who had already disappeared. “I…I don’t know,” she said, feeling dazed. “Maybe I was hallucinating?”
“Er…okay,” said Schala. “I’m not sure I understand. Um, why don’t you tell us about that on the way? Right now, we’ve got a friend to revive.”
Lucca nodded, and Gaspar and Atropos arrived with the clone. Together, they began to go up the mountain. Schala looked around herself, noticing the stillness of the air. “Lucca, what happened here?”
Lucca continued walking, her eyes set to the ground. So many things were now going through her mind, but she found she was only able to say one word.
“Nu…”
La la la…huh? What are YOU looking at? Sigh…okay, so it isn’t really a “revival” chapter, but you already know what’s gonna happen with Robo. I would never let a member die! Phew, it’s been a while, hasn’t it? Chapter 23 next!…oh, and keep on the lookout for some weird surprises in store for our friends…yeah, as if you couldn’t see that coming, huh?
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