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PART II - REQUIEM FOR ALGO

ONE THOUSAND YEARS LATER

PASEO, CAPITOL CITY OF MOTA

I had the dream again.

The same dream I’ve been having every night for a week. Every time I have the dream, I wake with a start, practically bolting out of bed, a sense of sadness and fear enveloping my very being.

The dream is always the same. A young girl is fighting a giant blue demon. I’m nearby, but I can’t move or speak. Then the demon strikes at the girl, and I wake up.

The first rays of daylight filter into my room. I get out of bed and into my clothes. My name is Rolf. I’m an agent of the Commander who runs the Central Tower in Paseo. It’s my job to deal with some of the strange things that happen around Mota.

I leave the house, being careful not to wake Nei. I had found Nei seven months ago, being attacked by a man named Darum. Because she was a mixture of human and monster cells, she was an outcast. I rescued her and brought her home with me. She’s been with me ever since.

I walk through the streets for a while, clearing my head. Then I head to the Central Tower. The Commander greets me as I walk in.

“Good morning, Rolf,” he says.

“Morning, sir,” I reply.

“How are you?”

“Alright, I guess. I had a pretty restless night.”

“The dream again?”

“Yes. It seems so real sometime.”

“Well, I have a mission for you. Maybe it will take your mind off of the dream.”

“A mission?”

The commander nodded, then continued.

“Almost two years have passed since you started working for me. What I am going to ask you to do will be the toughest job that you have ever done, but it is vital to the future of Mota.”

I listen closer, intrigued.

“As you know, Algo has been brought up by Mother Brain. My work as a commander has been to smoothly promote the plans of Mother Brain.”

Mother Brain is the controlling system of Algo. She regulates the environment and safeguards the entire Algo system. Long ago, Mota was a desert world, until Mother Brain created Climatrol and turned Mota into the lush paradise that it is today. Mother Brain had been created close to a thousand years ago. No one knows who created her, or why. Lately, though, she’s been acting strange. The shutdown of Climatrol was the most recent event to happen. I wonder, though - what’s this have to do with me?

“I had believed that Mother Brain never makes mistakes,” the Commander continued, “but those monsters all over Mota are just too much!”

Over the past year or so, monsters had been sighted roaming the fields and forests of Mota. Not many people are sure where they came from, but the Commander believes that Mother Brain’s apparent malfunction is the cause, and that the Biosystems lab on the western part of the continent is their birthplace.

“We must find out for ourselves why these monsters were born, and how to bring them under control.”

“This is where I come in, right?” I asked.

“Correct. Rolf, your mission is to go to the Biosystems lab and get the recorder. If we look into the data, we can figure out how the Biosystems lab ended up making these monsters.”

The Commander looked closely at me.

“Rolf, I hope from the bottom of my heart that you will come back safely with the recorder. We’ll see each other again!”

“Yes sir!”

“Very well, then. You’re dismissed.”

I leave the Tower and head home. Nei is awake when I arrive.

“Nei, I have to leave for awhile...”

She just looks at me, eyes wide with worry. I realize with a start that the last time she looked at me that way was seven months ago, after I had rescued her from Darum. Uneasily, I start packing.

I start to go out the door, but Nei blocks my way.

“Nei,” I begin to say.

“Rolf, let me go with you!” she says.

“Nei, you were still small when we first met, but now you can take care of yourself. I’m going on a dangerous journey; much too dangerous for you. I worry about you like you were my sister.”

I try to move past her, but she won’t let me go.

“Please, Rolf!” she exclaims. “Take me with you! I’ll do anything for you!”

Finally I sigh in exasperation.

“Alright, alright,” I say. “You can come.”

Together the two of us leave.

“Where are we going, Rolf?” Nei asks.

“To the Biosystems lab. It’s not far.”

* * *

Two months passed.

Rolf and Nei first went to the neighboring town of Arima to get information on the Biosystems lab. When they reached Arima, however, they discovered that it had been attacked and nearly destroyed by a gang of thieves. The surviving townspeople told them that the thieves had taken the town’s information database back to their hideout in Nido Tower. They said that the thieves had taken a girl captive as well. Rolf and Nei immediately set out to find the thieves.

On their way to Nido Tower, Rolf and Nei met a hunter by the name of Rudo. Rudo had lost his wife and daughter in the thieves’ attack, and he was now hunting the thieves. Rolf asked him to accompany them on their journey, and Rudo agreed to join them.

Soon they reached Nido Tower. The thieves attacked them, but the group was able to destroy them all. Inside the tower, Rolf found the information database and the kidnapped girl, Tiem. Tiem told them that she had been orphaned when she was ten, but there were rumors that her father was still alive somewhere. Tiem then asked to accompany them on their journey. After retrieving the information on the Biosystems lab, the group returned to Paseo, but they first made a quick stop in Arima to return the database to the townspeople.

When they reached Rolf’s home in Paseo, there were three people waiting to meet them - Amy, Hugh, and Kain. They were operatives that the Commander had called in from some of the different towns to assist Rolf in his quest. Amy was a powerful healer, Hugh was Mota’s leading biology expert, and Kain was a “wrecker” - he had wanted to be a mechanic, but ended up wrecking whatever he tried to fix, so he decided to make that his job.

Together the group set out towards the Biosystems lab, but to reach that part of the continent, they had to cross the North Bridge. It was there that the man who had tried to kill Nei, Darum, lived. He prevented anyone from crossing the bridge.

When they confronted Darum, he attacked them. With one swift stroke, he ran Tiem through with his sword. However, as she lay there dying, she recognized Darum - he was her long-lost father. With her dying breath, she called out to him.

Darum stopped his attack in astonishment. When he realized that he had killed his daughter, whom he had believed was dead, he turned his sword on himself, rather than live with the guilt of what he had done. With his dying breath, he apologized to Nei, and then he was gone.

After burying Tiem and Darum, the group continued their journey to the Biosystems lab. After a brief stop in Oputa for supplies, they reached the Biosystems lab. The Commander had been right - Biosystems was the home of the monsters. The group fought their way to the information center of Biosystems and retrieved the recorder. Then they teleported back to Paseo.

The Commander was delighted that Rolf had returned safely. He immediately sent the recorder in for analysis. However, the climate situation was getting out of hand. The Commander immediately ordered Rolf to travel to Climatrol and try to reactivate it so that the ecological balance could be restored.

The group returned to Rolf’s house, only to find that there were two more people waiting for them. One was Anna, a protector who had come at the Commander’s request to assist Rolf. The other was an old friend of Rolf’s, Shir. Shir was from a wealthy family, but enjoyed stealing for kicks. She had decided to offer her skills as a cat burglar to Rolf.

Finally, the group set off for Climatrol. Upon reaching Climatrol and going inside, they found out what had caused the shutdown. It was a creature, a creature that Nei immediately recognized, because she had been created from it - a creature that was pure evil. It was called Neifirst.

Neifirst used her powers to ensnare everyone in the group except Nei. Neifirst then attacked Nei, and although Nei fought bravely, she was overwhelmed. Rolf managed to free himself just as Neifirst struck Nei down. Rolf caught her as she fell, and with her dying breath, she told him that she loved him. Then she was gone. Overcome with rage and grief, Rolf attacked Neifirst and destroyed her.

With Neifirst dead, the bonds holding everyone prisoner vanished. Then Neifirst’s parting gift - a bomb - exploded! The explosion ripped through Climatrol as the group teleported back to Paseo - just as they finished fading out, Climatrol sank into the ocean.

The Commander greeted them upon their return, but before they had a chance to catch their breath, the Algo Irrigator suddenly started to pump water out at an alarming rate. Now that Climatrol was gone, the Irrigator couldn’t be controlled. The only way to save the continent from being flooded was to open the four dams. The group immediately set off to open the dams.

One by one the dams were opened. But, as the last dam was opened, the Army Eyes, the vicious sentinels of the Mother Brain, attacked the group. The Army Eyes encased them all in plasma rings, and teleported them to the prison satellite Gaila.

There on Gaila, the group was informed that they were being held responsible for the Mother Brain’s malfunctions, and that they would be held there until their sentence was carried out. However, Rolf had other plans. He led everyone towards the control center of Gaila. On the way there, though, they felt an explosion rock Gaila. When they reached the control center, they discovered that an object had smashed into Gaila and knocked the satellite out of its orbit. Gaila was now on a collision course with the planet Palm.

Suddenly a force wave sliced through Gaila, knocking everyone unconscious.

The next thing Rolf saw was his dream, but this time it was different. The girl in the dream looked over at him and cried “Help!”

Rolf awoke with a start. As his vision came back, he saw a man standing in front of him. The man introduced himself as Tyler, a Palman who had left Palm years ago and become a space pirate. He had been on his way back to Palm when the accident had happened. When he had detected the group’s life signs coming from Gaila, he had teleported them onto his ship. Sadly he turned on his ship’s main viewer and showed Rolf what had happened when Gaila had hit Palm. The planet had been completely destroyed.

Tyler teleported the group back to Paseo. Upon meeting the Commander once again, he told them that the government on Mota had declared Rolf and his group criminals, responsible for the destruction of Palm. In fact, the robot security forces were even now actively searching for them.

The Commander told Rolf that the only safe place for them now would be on Dezo. He then gave Rolf the last spacecraft on Mota, the Central Tower’s own shuttle.

Upon reaching Dezo, the hunt continued. The government of Mota had informed the government of Dezo that the criminals were there. The only place that the group could find refuge was in a place called Esper Mansion.

Their arrival there, however, caused a prophesied event to take place. Almost a thousand years ago, the ancient Esper Noah had arrived on the planet and had built Esper Mansion. He had then taken the name Lutz and entered a cryogenic sleep, leaving a prophecy that said when Algo is threatened again, a group of heroes would arrive and awaken him from his long slumber.

Lutz greeted Rolf and the others. But then, he felt a wave of evil wash over him. He knew what was coming, and he felt certain that he knew why Rolf was here - he was here to destroy Dark Force. He instructed Rolf and the others to go find the sacred weapons from the past that would be used in their final battle.

They found all of the ancient weapons and returned to Esper Mansion. From there Lutz used his powers to send them to what he was certain was the source of the evil. However, Lutz told them that his powers were not up to full strength yet, after all those years, and he only had enough power to send four of them. Rolf, Amy, Anna, and Rudo volunteered to be the ones to go. Shir, Kain and Hugh wished them luck, and Lutz teleported them away.

The group found themselves on board a giant spacecraft called Noah. After working their way to the center of the ship, they encountered Dark Force, who, as it turns out, had not been killed all those years before, but had been driven back to its home dimension to recuperate. Using all the skill they could muster, Rolf and the others defeated Dark Force. However, the last challenge still awaited them. As Dark Force vanished from sight, the Mother Brain itself emerged from it’s home in the center of the ship and attacked. Rolf and the others found themselves fighting for their lives. . . and the very future of the Algo Star System.

* * *

TWO MONTHS LATER

ONBOARD THE SPACESHIP NOAH

With a crash that shakes the entire ship, Mother Brain falls.

“It’s over,” Amy says. “Finally.”

Wearily I lean up against the wall. I let out an exhausted sigh and close my eyes. Algo is finally free of Mother Brain forever. The people can start living their lives the way that they are supposed to from now on.

But at what cost?

So much has happened since the Commander gave me my mission. I met six people who would become good friends and comrades - Rudo, Anna, Kain, Amy, Hugh, and Shir. I did retrieve the recorder from the Biosystems lab. But then the government claimed that my companions and I were the cause of Mother Brain’s malfunction, and we were branded as criminals. We revived the ancient Esper, Lutz, from his cryogenic sleep on Dezo. We witnessed firsthand the destruction of Palm - ninety percent of Algo’s population died when the prison satellite Gaila, that we had been imprisoned on, smashed into the planet - destroying it. A space pirate named Tyler rescued us almost at the last minute - we owe him our lives. We fought and defeated a demon - in fact, the same demon from my dream, an entity known as Dark Force. We have now destroyed Mother Brain.

And Nei...

Nei...

In my mind, I can still see her fighting the being that she had been created from - Neifirst. Then Neifirst lashes out and Nei is struck down. I can hear myself screaming her name, feel the tears welling up in my eyes as I cradle her limp form in my arms. And I can still feel the unbridled fury that I attacked Neifirst with.

“Rolf?”

I open my eyes. There was Anna, with Rudo and Amy.

“Let’s get back to Mota,” Rudo says, shouldering his cannon. “This is only the beginning!”

We turned to leave. Suddenly Lutz’s voice echoes though the ship.

“Rolf!”

“Lutz?”

“There’s still someone in the ship! You can’t leave yet!”

“Where?” I yell.

“Here!” came a new voice.

We all spun around. In the space where Mother Brain once stood, there is now a giant hole in the wall. The voice came from there. Cautiously we stepped through the hole into the next room. There, in a massive chamber, were several hundred people.

Who are these people? I wondered.

We walked up to the person who appeared to be their leader.

“Welcome to the spaceship Noah,” he said. “We are the creators of Mother Brain.”

“Not quite what we were expecting,” muttered Rudo.

“I don’t like your tone of voice,” the man said. “Are you here because you think we are enemies?”

“The thought had crossed my mind,” I said.

“Who are you, anyway?” Amy ventured. “Where are you from?”

“We are not from Algo. We are from a place called Earth. We had a very highly advanced civilization.”

We stood there in silence.

“We are also the last of our race.”

“The last?” Amy asked.

“Yes, the last. We destroyed our planet through our own arrogance. We thought that we could control nature and do as we pleased to our world. The death rattle of our planet told us otherwise.”

I stared skeptically at him.

“With the time we had left, we constructed this spaceship. We then set out to wander the galaxy in search of a new home. Finally we found Algo. We decided that we wanted to rule this system. That is why we built Mother Brain - to bring your people under our control.”

“What!” I exclaimed.

“Do you think that you four can stop us? We will take over this system. You have already seen what we can do. We caused Palm’s destruction - we were the ones who set Gaila on a collision course with Palm!”

With a look of pure fury on his face, Rudo leveled his cannon at the Earthmen.

“You will die!” he shouted.

Suddenly Hugh, Shir and Kain appeared next to us. Then, with a lurch, we felt the ship start to move.

“Lutz sent us!” Shir yelled.

“This Lutz. . . he is very clever,” the Earthman said. "But it is only a matter of time before we rule the Algo System!”

“Silence! Be quiet!” shouted Amy.

Then the Earthmen attacked us.

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