The Lord of Doom

By Bryan Peterson AKA Gades

My story takes place five years after the second Battle of Doom Island, and things are pretty much back to normal in Alekia. The hero has been reunited with Lufia and his other friends and they decide to take a vacation to our world, where they meet good versions of the three remaining Sinistrals. Since the hero has no default name in the game I'm choosing to call him Wedge. Besides, that's what I named him.

Prologue

Arek, master of the Sinistrals, sat upon his black throne in his dark fortress, brooding over his humiliating defeat five years ago. His children had failed again. Arek lived on an Island much like Doom Island, but it was invisible. Arek had named it Chaos Island, and once you were there you could never leave without his permition.There were no others in the castle save one, a human whom Amon, Sinistral of Terror, had saved so that Arek might have an apprentice. The man's name was Zemus, and he had enough evil in his soul to go willingly to Arek's service. Zemus was a mystery to Arek though, he always seemed to be doing something which, in the vocabulary of humans was called, "Eating." This involved putting items of what was called Food into his mouth and Chewing them. Since Arek had never had to eat he couldn't understand why humans had to, but he didn't forbid Zemus to eat. Apparently, humans needed to do this to stay alive, and while Zemus would live forever on Chaos Island, his health was necessary for Arek to get his revenge. If eating would keep Zemus healthy, then Zemus could continue to eat. Spotting something called a Candy Bar on the table by his throne, Arek decided to give Eating a try himself. Maybe it would help him think. He did however, ask Zemus's permition before taking the candy. "Feel free, master." Zemus said, "I believe food does allow one to think better." Arek picked up the candy and removed the wrapping. The smell of the candy in his hands made his mouth water, which it had never done. He bit into it and realized that there was another reason to eat. "Do humans eat for pleasure as well as to keep healthy?" he asked. "We do." Zemus said. Arek finished his candy and then asked, "You know humans, Zemus, so what kinds of things could an enraged immortal do to get revenge on them?" Zemus had no feelings for humankind, so he said, "Why not destroy the world they live in?" "No," Arek said, "I want to rule the world. I just want to punish the humans for killing Gades, Amon, Erim and Daos." "Ah," Zemus said, "why not use the Television to monitor them and think of a way to get them back?" "Television? What's that?" Zemus approached the strange square box directly across from the throne. He pushed some things called Buttons and the glass screen came alive. At first it showed a man leaning against a metallic thing, (presumably some form of conveyance), with a distinctly uncomfortable expression on his face. "What's his problem, gotta take a piss?" Arek asked. Zemus changed channels for quite a while, cursing at the Television to just show him what he wanted. Then Arek made a gesture and the scene switched to Alekia. Arek watched and listened. He smiled. "Soon," he breathed, "You will all pay for your impertinence."

Part One:

Alekia

Wedge got up from the table after breakfast that morning with a powerful urge to go someplace very far away from Alekia. The king was not a bad man but sometimes Wedge wanted to strangle him nonetheless. He went in search of his friends. Lufia, he found sitting in a chair in one of the sitting rooms, her expression rather bored. "Hello." He said. She smiled. "You don't seem to be hung over this morning." "It's Aguro's turn." Wedge said, "He celebrated a little too much last night." "Will you shut the hell up? An irritated voice demanded from the chair across the room, "I've got enough problems without you two yelling over there." "We're not yelling." Lufia said. "This is yelling!" Wedge yelled, "There's a difference!" Aguro ground his teeth and reached for a tankard on the table next to him. "That's not going to help any." Wedge warned. Lufia, ignoring the murderous glare Aguro gave her, firmly took the tankard from him. She took a tentative sip, then spit it out in disgust. "That crap? She demanded, "What made you choose that stuff?" The stuff in question was an ale from the kingdom of Medan, which was quite a ways from Alekia. Medan was known for many things, but not for its alcaholic beverages.

"What was I supposed to do? I was in Medan after all." Aguro sounded indignant. Lufia looked at him for a moment, then she relented and cast Stronger on him. It wasn't long before he was himself again. "So what was I thinking?" he asked himself.

Jerin the half-elf was to the other citizens of Alekia, no more than a child, but that was only because of her size. She was smaller than most girls her age, but she was wise beyond her years. She was also extremely bored. So, like Wedge, she went in search of her friends. She found them in a sitting room just as Lufia was casting Stronger on Aguro to cure his hangover. "What's going on here?" she asked. "Well," Wedge said, "I was thinking that maybe the four of us might want to take a vacation somewhere." "I've got an idea if anyone wants to here it." Jerin said. "Name it." Lufia said. "Well, I've always heard stories about a world called Earth, and I wanted to see it." Wedge grinned. "We've got the means to do it." He said. "Let's do and say we didn't." Lufia said, "About one more command from His High Exaltedness right now and I'll probably wring his neck regardless of whether I get thrown in jail."

The king of Alekia however, had no problems with the four companions' taking a trip to Earth. "Just don't get yourselves killed." He said, "I'd sorta like to make Wedge a true knight for saving the world, and it's a little hard to knight a dead man or give rewards to his friends." He smiled and added, "I know palace life isn't easy. I'd go with you if I could." So it was. The friends boarded the Falcon and set off for Earth.

Part Two:

Earth

Gades, Sinistral of destruction, leaned against the inside of the door of the car, his mind and body in agony. Why the hell had he drunk so much Root Beer? Now he had to piss like a race horse and he wasn't supposed to leave his place. "Dammit Amon," he growled, "Hurry up or you'll be cleaning the seat." Amon, Sinistral of Terror, was in the restaurant outside which the car was parked, (and probably having one hell of a good time too,) and he'd been in there for over an hour. Gades, who had stuffed himself earlier, had chosen to wait in the car and play the portable video game he'd bought with Earth money. Now however, the Gameboy was under the seat, with its owner wishing desperately that the car had a privy in it. For all he knew the Restaurant probably did. Just when Gades was getting out of the car, finally unable to stand it anymore, Amon appeared. "I'll be right back." Gades said through teeth that were clenched tightly together with strain. Then he positively bolted for the restaurant.

Amon got into the car, (which was a really neat conveyance that needed no horses to pull it along), and turned on the CD player. This device played small discs which contained music. Amon was listening to one called Nimrod, by someone called Green Day. He found it to be much to his liking, as did Gades. Amon sat with a puzzled look on his face. Why hadn't Gades come in earlier if he'd had to take a leak? Probably because Amon had told him to wait for him. Well, that hadn't meant that Gades couldn't go to the privy if he'd needed to. The reason why Gades and his two brothers, Amon and Daos, were on Earth, was that Daos had decided that if he kept trying to conquer and rule a world he might actually be destroyed and not merely banished. That had aroused in him and his brothers an incredible need to experience what it was like to live among mortals as much like their equals as possible. That had made them find this world and settle there. All in all it was pretty damn good for a world where no one believed in magic. Gades returned a moment later, looking extremely satisfied. "You can't know what a relief that is." He said. "So what made you stay here?" Amon asked. "I didn't know when you'd be back. I didn't want you to have to look for me." "Oh." Amon said, "You missed a great pizza though." "I'll have to try it." Amon started the car's engine and they were just pulling out of the parking lot when Gades drew in a sharp breath. "Hey, look over there, towards the pizza place." Amon looked. "Impossible." He breathed, "It's that boy." "And Erim as well." Gades muttered, "or Lufia."

Wedge looked around him in wonder. All around were strange metallic boxes or things like them. They had wheels and there were no horses tethered to them. He pondered, then remembered that these were called Cars, and people drove them wherever they had to go. They were parked outside a place called Locomotion Pizza. Aguro was looking longingly at the sign, his mouth watering. Jerin was looking at all the cars, wondering how you drove them. The metal plates on most of the cars indicated that they were in a place called Oregon. The city, (Wedge remembered this from a story about Earth in which there was a pizza place with the exact same name as this one), was called Salem. Lufia peered into one of the cars, trying to see how it was driven. Apparently the people sat in the padded seats and turned the wheel whichever direction they needed to go. It was Wedge who saw the occupants of one of the cars just as it was pulling out of the parking lot. His eyes widened. "Look." He breathed, his blood running cold. "Impossible!" Aguro exclaimed in horror. But it wasn't. They were there all right. The car contained none other than Gades and Amon, two of the Sinistrals. The two immortals stopped their vehicle and got out, there faces taking on expressions of rage and hatred that were only revealed as feigned when the two were right in front of the four friends. "Would you like a ride?" Gades demanded in menacing tones that were just as false as his expression had been. "How?" Lufia asked, "We defeated you." "You didn't kill us." Gades said, "We've actually got lives now. Even Daos is here, and he's probably on his way here now." Sure enough, the Sinistral of Chaos appeared on a two-wheeled vehicle which he parked, and approached, his face menacing. "You!" he growled, then he smiled. "We three actually have lives now, you'll notice." He said. Then he grabbed Amon by the shoulders with one arm and thwacked him smartly across the face with his free fist. "You still owe me money, dammit!" he said, "and that's for the time you set the fire alarm off at the Willamette university and blamed me. I got fined five-hundred bucks and you still owe me three-hundred." "here, dammit!" Amon yanked his wallet out of his pocket and thrust something called a Check into his brother's hand. "About damn time, too." Daos said.

Daos took the friends back to the house where he and his brothers were staying. They watched TV and ate pizza, (Amon had not only put away an entire large pizza by himself but had bought several to go), and since the shows the Sinistrals watched had a fair amount of what could only be called, "Adult content," The friends soon became rather roudy. After everyone had had a few beers they began chanting, "Dirty! Dirty! Dirty! Dirty!" whenever they felt that what was on TV was even remotely considered nasty, or if they wanted to see a character in a show do something dirty. Right in the middle of this they all felt a tremor in the atmosphere. That made everyone sober up real fast. "WE've got a problem in your world." Amon said. "Yes," Daos said, ""We must return to Alekia to warn its people of our father's impending return." "Arek?" Amon asked, his face paling. "No," Daos said, "it's Darth Maxim. Of course it's Arek. Who else would it be?" "Who's this Arek fellow?" Aguro asked, "I don't believe I've met him." "Aguro my friend, you don't want to." Gades said, "Believe me, you don't want to! We'll talk about it when you take us back."

Part Three:

The Sinistral of Doom

"Arek is an absolute bastard." Daos said gravely, "Unlike us, he has no conception of human love, and he can never understand it the way we came to do." "Can we do anything about him?" asked the king of Alekia. "You and your army can't," Gades said, "But we can, with the help of Wedge and his friends. We must go to Chaos Island. This is the final battle, and if we win the peace will last forever. If not then you are all doomed to a life of unimaginable agonies. Arek wants revenge for what you did to us, although I must admit I've come to like living like a mortal. I still have my powers though, and that'll be the deciding factor."

The next day the companions boarded Falcon again, but this time it was Daos at the helm. Wedge noticed that Daos, Gades, Amon, and even Lufia were white with fear. "He could take control of me again." Amon said to Aguro, "He's probably going to take away our will to think for ourselves. We'll be his puppets." "Even worse," Gades said, "He could cause us to keep going even when we're far beyond the level of exhaustion and fatigue. You know what happens to a person when they push themselves too far. They die, as we would if Arek stole our ability to know when we needed rest. He doesn't care about health and well-being. He wants his servants to work. He let us act independantly before, but now that we've changed he'll not allow us that luxury." Daos muttered, "I never thought I'd be looking for support from mortals but now we all need it."

Arek had been watching the Television for quite a while and had learned with some surprise that his children were alive. Of course now they were his enemies. Arek also knew that they were on their way to Chaos Island to fight him. Well, they were going to get their wish. Arek had no more use for them now that they were honest beings. "Zemus," Arek called, "Get in here." Zemus did. "I must send you back to your people." Arek said, "My children seem to have developed a thirst for my blood. I may need you again after this if I win, and they will kill you if they find you here." "I will stay, master." Zemus said, "I would be killed were I to return home." Arek considered this. "All right, but find a safe place and stay there." Suddenly, Zemus's eyes glowed red and he shimmered. The next instant, Maxim had his hands about Arek's throat. "You bastard!" he growled, "You fool! You thought I was your humble servant. Now you've lowered your guard and sealed your fate." "Gades!" Arek bellowed, "Get your ass in here quick!" But then Maxim's wife Selan was there, and she drove a dagger into Arek's back. Arek screamed, and then Gades was there. "Well well well," he said, "If it isn't my old friends Maxim and Selan, and my hated father." Gades drove his huge sword into Arek's neck. The god swung a huge fist and sent Gades flying. Blood poured from the younger Sinistral's nose, which was busted. "Brother!" Daos called from the door, "Get back!" Daos rushed forward and introduced Arek to a whole new meaning of the word agony. The Chaos Wave burned into Arek with agonizing slowness. Then Erim and the others, Gades included, joined their powers with Daos and sent a wave of energy towards Arek. Arek rose to his full height and called forth his powers. The dragon was abslutely huge. So large was Arek's other form that he shattered his palace with his body. But the other Sinistrals and the mortals didn't back off. Dual Blade appeared in Wedge's hand, and Maxim was beside him. Selan was on his other side and pelting Arek with ice crystals that hurt like hell. Arek swiped at her with a huge paw but Selan grabbed it and squeezed it until the bones broke. Arek screamed in fresh pain. "Damn you!" he cried. Then Selan was on his back and ramming a dagger between his shoulder blades. She kept it up, and with each jab came a scream of agony from Arek. But the worst agony yet came when Erim joined her hand with Wedge, took up Dual Blade and drove it with tremendous force into Arek's brain. The brain exploded, but it was not gobs of gray matter that flew everywhere, but jagged chunks of lightning. "Down!" Daos bellowed, Generating an explosive earthquake just to make sure they all did as he told. Arek lay upon the ground, back in human form again. "You traitors! You bastards!" he growled, "You'll pay for this when I recover." "I hate to bring bad news to my dear old daddy," Daos said sarcastically, "but I think we're going to take your servants and leave you here to die." "But why have you joined these humans?" Arek demanded incredulously. "Because we wanted to." Daos said, "Now if you'll excuse me, Maxim and the rest of us have better things to do." They vanished. Arek bellowed curses after them, but it didn't bring them back. Arek was alone, and he knew that soon he would be gone forever. His energy was rapidly draining. "My energy fades." He said, "I was outsmarted by my own servants." With those words, Arek, the last Sinistral, died.

Epilogue

Gades lay in his bed in Alekia castle and for the first time in his entire existence, he knew what it was like to fit into a group. He had fit in when he and Daos and the others had ruled Doom Island, but that was different. This time he fit into a group of friends who would be there for each other in times of need. Gades had never experienced that feeling before, but he liked it. It was a kind of warm feeling, like the cat that nestled down right next to Gades's face with it's long soft fur. Gades reached out a hand and let his fingers run through the silky strands of fur. This was something power and conquest could never have given him, and he made a decision at that very moment. Forget conquering worlds. Gades was happy right where he was.

Amon also experienced similar thoughts as he lay in bed. A cat nestled down in the crook of one of the immortal's arms, and Amon thought about his long existence. Five years he had spent on Earth, and after last night's savage battle he knew what human love meant. The feeling was knew to him but he liked it. Fitting into a group of caring friends was especially wonderful if you had spent an eternity set in evil ways and then turned aside from them. Amon resolved to stay in Alekia and enjoy the peace. He hoped his brothers were doing the same.

As for Daos, he didn't sleep for a very long while. For one thing, he was installing a computer in Alekia castle and now he was exalting in the fact that it was operational. There was something else to be happy about also. He was part of a group now. This time is was different. The people around him had shown him without meaning to, that human loyalty could pay off in time of need. Daos, like his brothers, enjoyed the warm feeling of being secure in the knowledge that he had friends who would be there if he needed them. Daos reached over and scratched the ears of a small cat that lay on the chair near him. This was a joy he had never experienced. And he decided to ask the king if he could have the animal for his own. Since he was going to be living here, he reasoned that he should find a special friend like a kitten. The others had all done so, and Daos, (though he was knew to all of this), wanted to fit in. Thus he had cast aside his evil ways to thwart the plans of his father, who could quite easily have killed him if not for Wedge. It all came back to that. Though an immortal had almost infinite power, that power was increased when the immortal accepted help when it was offered. That was what true friends did for one. They would always ty to be there for you when you needed them, and Daos loved it.