Chapter Twenty-Seven: Male Bonding In Ruins

"Hey," said the old man.  "You wish to fight Lavos, correct?"

It looks like I'm stuck with these people until Lavos is dead, so yes, I do.

"Many paths lay open to you," said the Old Man.  "You may use that bucket.  Or fly the Wings of Time to The Day of Lavos."

You mean this whole time I could have just jumped in that bucket to go see Lavos?

He rattled off a bunch of stuff we could do in order to get stronger and make our world a better place.  I really wasn't listening.  I've made it this far by not paying attention and I think I'll just stick with it.

Frog seemed to be concerned about the wandering knight spirit, so me, Magus and him went to check it out back in the present.  It was odd, but the wandering spirit seemed pretty far away from Guardia.  If it was his old buddy Cyrus, you'd think he would be haunting Guardia Castle or Guardia Forest.  Frog said that this was where his grave was, but even then, why didn't they put his grave somewhere more meaningful?

We found Cyrus at some ruins North of a town called Choras.  We tried fighting him to put him to rest, but his defenses were impenetrable.

"...len......Gl.e.nn?"

We stopped fighting as Cyrus was recognizing his friend turned amphibian.  Then he just freaked back out and wanted to fight again. Maybe I shouldn't have brought Magus.

Obviously, we needed to put Cyrus' soul to rest back in his time.  We jumped into the time machine and went back to 600 AD only to find that we couldn't get to his gravestone.  The ruins were exactly that.  If the greatest knight of his time gets this sort of burial, I guess the best I can hope for is to have some cow dung thrown on top of my dead face.

We found a guy to fix the paths in the ruins for us, but he said his tools had been stolen.  Great!  We'll just go find you a new set of tools!  We left and went to the future, where we took the tools from his descendants.  We told the guy's wife that he said we could have them.  Ha!  Women are so stupid!  Speaking of which......

I transported Ayla in and sent Frog away.  I winked at Magus.

"Crono need Ayla," said Ayla.  "Ayla fight hard!.......................Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrooooowrrrrr!  Ayla's top fall off AGAIN!  Ayla is going crazy!"

I transported her away and brought Frog back.  Magus sure comes in handy when you're down.  Magus tapped me on the shoulder and pointed at the ground.  Her top was still lying there.

Oops!

I picked it up and kept it as a memento.  We transported back to 600 AD and gave the tools to the lazy bastard who we hired to fix the ruins.  Him and his four boyfriends left to go fix the Northern Ruins.

When we got up there we found him at the entrance saying that we had to beat the monsters so he could go further into the ruins and fix the holes.  We went back and forth a few times like that.  We would eliminate all the monsters until we couldn't go further into the ruins because of the holes, he would fix the holes until he couldn't go further because of the monsters.

Eventually, we came to a gravestone that said, "Cyrus, the fool who challenged Magus resides here."

My gosh.  I hope Frog didn't write that.

"T'was very drunk and angry when I requesteth that to be put upon Cyrus gravestone," said Frog, quite ashamed of himself.

I was about to say.  What a dick of a best friend.

"Cyrus," said Frog.  "I hath returned."

Um, Frog.  You do know that he's dead, right?

I shall honor my promise to thee," said Frog.

Before my extremely amazed eyeballs, a ghost floated up out of the grave.

"Cyrus," said Frog.

"Glenn," said Cyrus.

"Crono," said Magus.

Magus.

O.K.  That's it for the roll call.

"Thank you...for making the journey here," said Cyrus.

And the good news is that not only has Frog failed to avenge your death, but he's actually joined up with your killer!  In case you hadn't noticed.  Perhaps the fool who challenged Magus isn't very observant.  If he had been, he might not have challenged Magus.  Although, Magus is a creep who has sex with purple cats.

"I said I never had sex with Alfador!" shouted Magus.

Frog and Cyrus glanced at Magus nervously and then looked back at each other.

"Dear Cyrus," said Frog.  "Thou must think ill of me,"

"On the contrary," said Cyrus.  "You have come far, my friend.  When Magus defeated me, I thought of all those whom I had left behind.  King Guardia, Queen Leene, and of course, you."

Uh-oh.  Lookin' like a little ghost on frog action in these ruins.

"I hath failed you, Cyrus," said Frog.  "Your death was as much my fault as anyone's."

I started sniffling and tears rolled down my cheeks.  I looked over at Magus and he was crying as well.  Magus, you butthead!  Why did you have to kill Cyrus!

"I don't know!" said Magus.  "If only I had known!  Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahh!  Boo hoo!"

I walked over to Magus and we began crying on each other's shoulders.

"I hate myself," said Magus.

"Pardon me for a moment, Cyrus," said Frog.  "Will thee two fairies kindly shut the hell up?"

I stopped and looked at Magus and we both fell on the ground laughing.

"Grrribbit," said Frog.  "'Tis a sad state of affairs when I am bound by honor to keep from ending both of your lives."

Frog looked back at the ghost, while Magus and I continued rolling on the floor laughing.

"Your skill and dedication are superior," said Cyrus.  "I can rest now, knowing that everyone is in good hands.  Goodbye, my friend."

I didn't have the heart to tell Frog that Cyrus was talking to me with that last part.

"Cyrus, wait," said Frog.  "I...I...."

"The Queen," said Cyrus as the ghost faded away.  "Look after Queen Leene.  Alas, and...farewell...G...le...n...n..."

Hmmmmm........Queen Leene, huh.  She was pretty hot in her own way.  I never even though about her as a potential lady friend.

"Cyyyruuus," yelled Frog.  "I'm so sorry, Cyrus...............the Masamune?!"

The sword jumped from Frog's hands and split into those two stupid talking hamsters that we seemed to keep running into.

"That was special," said Mune.

"Quite," said Masa.  I guess it means that a Hero's power comes from within."

"Mucho metaphysical, man," said Mune.

"Like, MIND over matter, Mune," said Masa.

I hate these two.

"My...mind?" asked Frog.

"Now for a ymmmy, full-on test," said Mune.

Oh, God.  Not another battle to test our strength.  Wonderful.

"It's thrashin' time," said Masa.

I got ready to fight the stupid sword again, but instead it just landed in Frog's hands.

"'Tis flowing with strength and vigor," said Frog.  "Ahhh!  'Tis the true identity of the Masamune!!  Cyrus, I promise to fulfill your wishes!  "Tis a sad farewell.  Onward, all!"

Sooooo, I guess we're not fighting the sword again.  Then what the hell were they just talking about?  Hey, you know what?  I don't care.  I really don't care.  Let's go back to the present and check to make sure Cyrus isn't haunting anyone now.

Back in my time, the angry Cyrus ghost was gone and now we could finally go back to the end of time and see what's next.

When we got there we found everyone huddled around the Old Man, who was lying on the ground and he looked like he was dead.

"What hath happened to him," said Frog.

Lucca stood up and said, "He had a heart attack, but I think he's going to be ok."

A heart attack?  Phew!  He should be taking better care of himself.  It's not like the excitement of the bleak end of time is enough to get to someone.  I looked at Marle and her right pant leg had a huge tear in it.  I was about to ask what happened to her, but then I noticed that Ayla was wearing a makeshift top that was the same color as Marle's pants.  I handed Ayla her top and smiled at her.  She snatched it out of my hands.

"So, what do you think caused his heart attack, Lucca?" asked Magus.