Chapter 11: The First Strike

In the village of Burg, Alex stood staring at Dyne's Monument, as he usually did. His "pet", Nall, had said that it was not necessary now that he and his friends knew the truth about the famous Dragonmaster, but the young man went anyway.

"Dyne," he said quietly, "It's been a month since that winged woman appeared and took Luna, and we haven't found any clues as to her hideout, much less her existance. Believe me, we've even checked the Frontier. Even Phacia doesn't know...all we have to go by is her name, Ultimecia...that and the statement that she came from somwehere called Gardenia or something like that. If you were here, where would you look?"

There was no reply other than the breeze and trees rustling.

"Jessica and Kyle came to Burg after the incident...Nash and Mia will be here in a couple of days," he continued, "We're gonna use the airship to look all over the planet again...maybe we'll find some forgotten niche that the woman is hiding in--"

At this, the ground started to shake, causing Alex to fall on his rear.

"What's going on?" he asked.

After a couple of minutes, the shaking subsided, replaced by a small vibration.

He got up and quickly ran to the village.

As soon as he arrived, he checked the buildings, worried that they might have collapsed as a result of the earthquake.

Strangely enough, none of them were harmed.

"This is odd...an earthquake, and nothing gets wrecked," he said and then saw a small, white creature flying towards him.

"Nall? What's happening? What was that earthquake?"

Nall replied, "A strange ship landed just outside the village. It flew like an airship, but it doesn't look like one. Look, there's a door opening!"

Indeed, there was a medium sized hole appearing in the side of the strange, silver ship.

Alex and Nall quickly went towards it, seeing the Elder also going in that direction.

Out of the ship came five women and three men, all in different outfits that nobody had ever seen before.

"At the point of being blunt, May I ask who you people are and where you're from?" the Elder asked.

One of the strange people, a man with long, black hair, stepped forward and adjusted a pair of three-lens glasses before saying, "I am Citan Uzuki, captain of the spaceship Conductor."

"Spaceship?" Nall asked, "Are you all from the Blue Star?"

"Nall, quiet!" Alex hissed.

Citan shook his head, saying, "That is all right."

The woman with short blonde hair that was wearing pants shook her head and said, "No...we're from different worlds that are a lot further than that."

"Different worlds? Interesting," the Elder remarked, "If it is all right, I would like for us to go in my house to discuss your business here, Captain Uzuki."

"That would be fine, sir. Would it be all right if some of my people explore Burg while we talk?"

"Of course, but they'll need an escort, to make sure they don't inadvertantly cause trouble."

"Understood," Citan agreed.

The Elder turned to the young man beside him and asked, "Alex, would you mind being the escort?"

"That would be a good idea...maybe I can ask them about that woman." he answered.

"Alex, really! Do you really think that a bunch of aliens is going to know about that winged freak?" Nall blurted out.

"Nobody outside of Burg has even heard of her, we're out of clues...I know it sounds crazy but what do we have to lose by asking?"

The small, winged creature grumbled and flew off in a different direction.

At this, three young women and a little girl came forward. One of them, a girl with long blond hair said, nodding to each person, "Hi, Alex. I'm Ellen, she's Mary, the little girl is Midori and the other one is Alana."

Each of the other girls nodded and smiled at him.

As the five people walked away from Citan's group, Ellen asked, "So...you said you wanted to ask us something?"

"Yeah...a month ago a...friend of mine was kidnapped. A woman with pointed wings took her. She looked really...evil. I think she said her name was Ul--"

Alana inserted, "Was it Ultimecia?"

Alex looked at her incredulously and said, "That's exactly it! You know her?"

"We're looking for her too. She and her partner kidnapped some women in other places, including our home world, Persona," Mary explained.

"So it's not just Luna...then would you know of a place that woman mentioned? She said she was from somewhere called Gardenia. We've looked through all of Lunar and nobody can find it," the young man asked.

"I don't doubt you wouldn't be able to find it. Gardenia is another world, far from here," Ellen replied.

"I...I see," he answered.

"Hey, are you the Alex that was said to be a Dragonmaster kind of thingie?" Alana asked.

"Uh, that's me...but that was a few years ago. I gave up being a Dragonmaster so I could be...with Luna. Mary, was it? You mentioned that Ultimecia had a partner. Would you happen to know who it is?"

Mary nodded and said, "According to what we saw on Earth and what Cit-I mean Captain Uzuki explained, his name is Ghaleon."

That name made Alex's eyes go wide as he asked, "Did you say Ghaleon?"

The girls nodded.

"Is it--What did he look like?"

"He had pale skin, white hair and was clothed in black robes. His eyes were pretty narrow with red pupils," Ellen stated..

Alex nodded after a moment and said, "That's Ghaleon all right. How he was revived, I don't know. Ladies...can you come with me? There's a couple of people I want you to meet."

"Who are they?" Mary asked.

"They're friends of mine...and they've also been looking for Luna," he answered then turned to one of the villagers.

"Hey Marina, if someone asks where we went, tell them we we're at my house, okay?" he added.

"Sure Alex," the young woman replied.

"Thanks," was the reply as the small group took off.

***************

As soon as Alex opened the door that lead into his house, he was treated to an argument between a blonde haired woman that wore white and blue robes and a guy that looked like he might be a warrior...or at least a bandit.

"You wouldn't have been hungry if you had cooked the meal properly last night," the man grumbled.

"And who was the one that was goggling at the women that were passing by here? I thought that people that are engaged don't do things like that!" the woman retorted.

"I wasn't goggling...I was checking to see if any new people had come by. Who knows, maybe one of them knows about this Ulty gal--"

"Hah, likely story!"

Alex quickly knocked on the door to get their attention.

Both people turned to see him and the female group that was behind him.

"Uh...hey Alex! How'd you wind up with a group of chicks?" the man asked.

"These ladies are off limits, Kyle. Didn't you feel that earthquake?" the young ex-Dragonmaster asked him.

"Sure did," the robed woman replied, "What happened?"

"These ladies are part of the crew of a spaceship that landed just outside of town."

The man, Kyle, looked at them with wide eyes and asked, "Did you come from the Blue Star?"

Ellen shook her head and asked, "Why do we get asked that a lot?"

"It doesn't matter where they come from. What does matter is that they're looking for Ultimecia too," Alex explained.

"Are you serious?" the woman asked, "Would you happen to know where a place called Gardenia is?"

"How do we put this...it's a lot farther than the Blue Star," Mary answered.

"No wonder we weren't able to find it. By the way, I'm Jessica and that big lazy oaf is Kyle," the woman said to the group.

"Hey, I'm not lazy," Kyle grumbled, "I'm just relaxed right now, that's all."

"Any more relaxed and you'll fall asleep! There is such a thing as a bed, you know."

"Hey, hey, guys, knock it off!" Alex inserted, "If you're going to fight, save it for Ultimecia and her partner."

"Her partner?" Kyle asked.

"Yeah, and it's someone from our world...but how he was revived, I have no idea."

Jessica and the large swordsman looked at each other and the young woman said, "No..."

"You got to be kidding me!" he exclaimed.

Both of them asked at the same time, "Ghaleon?"

Ellen nodded and said, "I'm afraid so."

Midori looked around her as the other people in the room talked.

"If Ghaleon's alive, it might explain why Luna's involved," Kyle said quietly, "Why are you guys looking for Ultimecia?"

"It might be a good idea if we sit down first," Alex inserted before anything could be said, "I believe these ladies need to get off their feet."

The others nodded and walked towards the tables in the kitchen that Alex had gestured towards.

***************

"Aw, man! Why couldn't I have gone with Ellen's group? At least I'd be seeing what the town's like," Mark grumbled from his seat on the ship.

"Quit whinin'," Brad snapped at him, "We've got the important job of keeping an eye out for trouble. But seriously, if anyone should be complaining about this, it should be me. I mean, I'm one of the leaders of this bunch; I should be with Citan and his group!"

"Cut it out, you two," Andrea said to them, "He had a good reason for splitting the groups up as he did."

"In the meantime, we have these math problems to do. Man, maybe we should go out and get Aya..." Mark groaned.

Nate rolled his eyes and looked towards the comunications panel, which the Earth woman was manning.

Suddenly, a light on the panel appeared.

"Andrea, what's wrong?" he asked her.

"Give me a minute and I'll find out," she nearly barked at him as she flipped switches, "I'm not as familiar with this as Mary."

After a couple of minutes, a message came up on the small screen that was in front of Andrea.

She turned pale and said in a low voice, "Oh, my God..."

"What's wrong?" Nate asked.

"Someone named Yuki from Persona sent this message: 'Found a demon on our streets that I had never seen before. I managed to get some information...and according to the demon...its masters, named Ghaleon and Ultimecia, have made their first strike already....' "

"Did the message say which world has been hit?" Brad asked.

"Yeah...but right now, I have to go find Citan. He's not going to like this one bit," she replied, got up and ran out the door without shutting the screen off.

The others got up and gathered around the little screen and read the message.

"Will chu let me see the screen?" Chu-chu demanded, bouncing up and down.

"If it's coming from Yuki, it can be trusted," Nate remarked, "But what are demons doing on Persona in the first place?"

"You don't think both Persona and--" Brad started to ask.

"Man, Andrea's right; Citan's gonna have a fit when he hears about this..." Mark said in a low voice.

***************

Andrea ran out of the ship and looked around her, trying to guess which building the Elder's house was.

One of the townspeople looked at her and asked, "Um...may I help you, miss?"

"Can you take me to the Elder's house?" she asked.

The young man nodded and said, "Sure, follow me."

The houses went by in what seemed to be a blur to Andrea as the townsman led her to a medium sized house.

"Thanks a lot," the Earth woman said to him and then walked up to the door and knocked.

A middle aged woman answered the door, looked at Andrea and said, "Such odd clothing...you must be from the spaceship."

"Yes, I am."

"Well if you're wanting to speak to the Elder, he's busy talking to the ship's captain," the woman replied.

"I need to speak with Captain Uzuki immediately. It's urgent."

"I'll see what I can do. What's your name?" the woman asked.

"It's Andrea."

The woman nodded and closed the door again.

***************

Atlus, Chris, Aya, and Citan took turns telling their stories to the village Elder as they stood on the second floor of the house.

"Well," Aya concluded, "That's all of it. It was pretty shocking to each of us when we learned about all this, but--"

"Pretty shocking is an understatement," the Elder stated, "Worlds other than our own and the Blue Star...much less a race of people with amazing powers...and that Althena was--is one of them...it's a lot to think about."

Right then, the middle aged woman came upstairs, her face flustered.

"Dear, what is it? We're still in the middle of a meeting," he asked.

"Sorry, but there's a strange woman downstairs that insists on seeing Captain Uzuki immediately," the woman answered.

"What is her name?" Citan asked.

"She said it was Andrea."

Andrea, he thought, it must be bad for her to leave the ship and find me.

The Elder looked at Citan with a questioning glance on his face.

The Zenogias native nodded.

"Let her in," the first man ordered.

The woman nodded and quickly went downstairs.

A couple of minutes later, the young Earth lady ran up the stairs into the Elder's room.

"Andrea, what is wrong?" Citan asked her, "You would not have come out of the ship unless it was serious."

"Oh it's serious all right," she said, "We just received a transmission from one of Atlus' comrades on Persona. She found one of Ultimecia and Ghaleon's demons on the streets and got some information out of it. To make a long story short...Those two have made their first strike."

Atlus asked, "Where? Persona?"

"It's possible, but the world they definitely struck...I'm sorry, Ca--Citan," Andrea continued, "Those bas--Zenogias is under attack!"