Lich was not in the best of spirits as he walked along a dim passageway of the Genesis, flanked on his left by Ark, and on the right by Tob. He was angry. The recent memories, like gas in a Bunsen burner, were the fuel for his anger: always flowing and with a blue flame.
There had been the argument as to who should do the fourth tower, whose infect held the precious last card before they could get into the centre spire and overwhelm the Time Bender, Havering.
It was that Protoss cyborg, Sirocco, who had said, "I'm not in the mood, someone else do it. Like whoever hasn't done anything yet."
Everybody's eyes had turned to Lich at that moment. He knew that the fourth spire was the fallen one, the one on fire, and, undoubtedly, what would be the toughest of them. After getting little sleep the night before from worry over Dragon, flying through an airbattle and being involved in a Mana Fortress-style vessel crashing through the ground into the Underworld since he had last slept, he was in no mood to do anything else.
"I'm not doing it, I've been through enough for one day," he said, shaking his head.
"We all have, Lich," Prism replied.
"Too bad."
"Dy, get your tail with us, we're going," Ark called as he picked up the Spear of Darkness and started walking.
"I'm not doing it, Ark!"
Before he realised it, Ark had run back and was pressing the point of the Spear into his throat.
His Pandoran words came out slowly, in a level tone, "Yes, you are."
"Ark, you wouldn't kill your own brother, now, would you?" Lich laughed nervously, with a sheepish grin.
He looked into Ark's cold, green eyes.
"You are coming, like it or not," was his reply.
A few clicks near his ear and the end of a small cold cylinder pressed to the side of his head reinforced Tob's opinion.
Lich gulped, before he smiled nervously again.
"Come now, let's all be civilised people, and respect the wishes of a poor, orange Yoshi."
"We'll respect them if you come along," Tob snapped.
Lich looked up and saw the unsympathetic faces of everyone gathered around him. He threw his hands upwards as he rolled his eyes.
"Fine. I'll do it."
Ark and Tob dropped their weapons. As Lich got up, Ark whispered something to Markior.
Lich snarled, "I don't like it, but I'll do it. See? I'm doing it."
Laced with expletives in many languages, his words continued as he walked down the hallway until "Shut up" could be heard Tob's voice.

His thoughts were dispelled as he realised he was suddenly very, very alone. He stopped walking and looked ahead, then looked behind, seeing nothing but wall in the distance either way.
"Ark? Tob?" he called out.
No reply came.
He called their names once more, but, again, there was no reply, except a beeping noise behind him, from the way he came.
Turning, he saw a small robot, no higher than his knee. Instantly, he brought out the Boomerang and aimed its laser point at it.
At that moment, it turned around and started to travel away from him. An appendage in its upper sections spun around so it pointed at the sky. Its tip moved so that it gave the entire robot the appearance of beckoning him to follow.
Lich lowered the Boomerang slightly, confused by the robot's sudden about-face. He followed it warily, still clutching his weapon. It twisted its way along many corridors, until it turned into one last passageway where Lich bumped into Ark.
"Oh good, you're here," he said, picking up the robot and flicking a switch on its back.
"Wish I wasn't," Lich muttered.
Ark held the robot out to him, and said in Pandoran, "I call it the A-ETTh-3: Etasa Tasan lo Thoros, or," he looked at Tob, "the Search, Find and Beckon. Can climb or descend stairs and activate elevators. It'll get us back to the others."
He concentrated a moment and the robot simply disappeared, as it went into Ark's Mana Storage.
"That's nice. Why don't you use it to get me back to the others now, then?" Lich growled.
"Because you're still coming with us," Tob replied, patting the laser pistol at his side as his threat. "Come on, or we'll leave you here."
Lich grudgingly followed them once more.

A flame flickered mysteriously into life.
"Good, they come."

Turning into a new corridor, they were greeted with a blast of hot air. As they looked, the corridor twisted to the right, so that the floor became the wall on the left. Smoke filled the area, its grey tendrils caressing them, unable to be felt, as it passed.
"Must be the fallen spire," Ark muttered.
"Judging by what the others have told me," Tob reckoned, "the robot-android-whatever would have taken for itself a reasonably large room. In a structure such as a spire, these will either be at the geometric centre or at the apex. That means, once we're inside, we turn right, and will probably have to do some climbing and leaping."
"And, with all the fires going on, we're going to need your Undine spells, Lich."
"That's why you're so desperate to have me," Lich sighed. "You realise I can pull the plug on this right now?"
"True," Ark said.
"Then I will."
Lich turned on his heels and was about to walk away if it wasn't for the sharp pain in his legs - they simply refused to move.
"What, by Undine, is going on here, Ark?" Lich growled, turning his head to face his brother.
"Had Markior whip up a little Left Path technique," Ark gloated.
The pain in his legs subsided, and Lich turned back towards them.
"I want to tear every muscle off each of your bones, Ark," Lich snarled, through clenched teeth.
Ark chuckled.
"You always liked saying that when we were children, didn't you?" he smiled as he taunted. "Never carried it out though. Besides, it's Markior who you should really do something like that to. Bit hard to, though."
Lich yelled and lunged himself onto Ark, both falling onto the floor. Lich started driving his fists into Ark's nose as Ark prepared to shove him away with his feet.
Tob pointed his gun at the ceiling, set to bullet mode. With a pull of the trigger, a small explosion filled the air, its noise stopping the two.
"This is no time for blood feuds, we have a job to do, remember?" he chided both of them, rolling his eyes. "Little Koyoshies. Come on."
The two Yoshies got up, an evil eye to each other as they followed the Koopa.

They crossed the transition made by the twist, then sidled the narrow space between what was the ceiling and another corridor's, before making a right turn.
Until where the ceiling caved in, further along the passageway, flames burned along its entire length.
"I guess this is where I step in?" Lich asked sarcastically, before he closed his eyes, and held out his arms.
With two graceful vertical sweeps of them, a blue light encircled his feet. Lich then threw his arm back behind him, as if to throw the Boomerang, before stepping forward and bringing his arm with it.
A wave of water grew at Lich's feet to fill the entire space of the corridor, sweeping itself along it and crashing at the blockage. A sudden darkness encompassed them, before Lich rubbed a facet of the Cyan Arc's jewel. An eerie cyan light shone from the now glowing, equally cyan Boomerang in his belt.
And this was the pattern many times as they went through the spire: turn, extinguish, and move on. They passed many things - the burnt out shells of what must have been robotic droids (Ark was saddened by "the waste of technology"), flights of stairs leading along the walls, the remains of consoles either in the now floor or fallen from the ceiling…it was devastation.
Eventually, though, they had come to what would have been a long, high vaulted room. In the toppling of the spire, its length became its tremendous height. Its contents now lay as a pile of wreckage at the bottom of the void, burning furiously.
"We have to get across to there," Tob said, pointing at the corridor on the other side. "Easy enough for me."
He pulled out another gun from within his shell, and fired a metal rope, ending with a grappling hook that unfolded as it was shot through the air. It circled around a pipe, before Tob took a run up. He leaped, and sailed across to the other side.
"It's not strong enough for Yoshies, I'm afraid!" he yelled back.
Ark looked at Lich nervously. The elder brother looked calm as he judged the ceiling's height. He then held plucked the orange Pokéball from his chest, and pressed the button. With a flash of white light, Nessie stood before them.
"Just to the other side," he told the Dragonite as he climbed it, before beckoning Ark to sit with him.
"Oh, no, no, no…" Ark recoiled in horror, taking a step back.
"Get on," Lich snapped.
"How can I trust you after you tried to kill me just before?"
There was a groan of metal overhead, followed by an echoing crashing noise.
"You'd better, or you'll get left behind to die," Lich said, an ever so sweet, yet overly sarcastic smile on his face. "Come on."
Ark climbed onto the Dragonite, wrapped his arms tightly around Lich's chest and buried his head into his brother's back.
"I hate heights, I hate heights, I hate heights," he murmured.
After a conciliatory pat from his hand on Ark's arm, Lich took Nessie's antennae into both of them and gently pulled.
The Dragonite flapped his wings before launching himself into the void. He descended a moment before his wings caught the thermals that pushed him upwards, and over to the other side.
As soon as his legs touched the floor, Ark had leapt off onto it.
"I don't want to do that again for quite some time," he shuddered.

After more walking through the passageways, for what seemed like three hours, they had reached a fork.
"Well, we probably missed the centre of the spire," Tob said. "We must surely be near the apex by now."
"But which way would have been up?" Lich asked.
"Let's see then…" Ark said, crouching.
He began to draw lines in the ash, soon creating a rectangular prism.
A noise behind them grabbed Lich's attention.
"Did you hear that?" he snapped.
"Shh. I'm trying to work this out! Now, the up corridor would go this way…"
Tob nodded.
"There it is again!"
"Shh, Dy!"
"It's coming closer!"
"Shh, I said! So, rotated, an up corridor would go to the…right."
"The side of the spire is caving in!" Tob announced suddenly.
"Hegeratu!" Lich swore.
"Come on! This way!"
Tob led the two brothers along a corridor that tilted to the right. At the end, a set of swinging doors greeted them, their hinges in the floor and ceiling respectively. Ark ran ahead, kicked the bottom door down with his foot and held it, before lifting the other with his arms. Tob and Lich ran past him as he saw a cloud of dust scream towards him. He jumped backwards, and with a snap and a click, the door kept the cloud at bay, but had locked itself in the process.
"Gulto," Ark winced, both to relieve his tension from the potential horror, but also at the door's locking.
But that was nothing against the horror that was yet to come.

<hr>

The room, like every other room in the fallen spire, was rotated. Originally, it would have had a very high vaulted ceiling, with its top corners bent in to accommodate the spire's exterior. It now had a lengthy floor, wide as it was long. Pieces of rubble littered the floor - part of the ceiling had caved in, revealing the brilliant crystal blue sky. At the room's farthest end, flames were burning brightly.
As Lich watched them, the flames seemed to bend as a bigger flame appeared with them.
"Eh…what's that?" he asked Ark, grabbing his forearms and shaking them, pointing at the flames.
"What?" Tob asked.
"I swear I saw some of the flames move around."
A deep, gruff voice filled the ruined chamber: "Welcome to my pressure cooker."
The flames moulded together to make the shape of a thin, red robot, its sleek arms and legs at its side, and its metal, vaguely half-cylindrical wings extending from its back. A gem rested in its chest. Steam escaped in small clouds from its joints as its yellow eyes flashed. It appeared to be the epitome of a metallic demon.
Lich swore as Ark pointed his spear, saying, "And you might be?"
The robot took a step forward.
"I am the rejuvenated," it proclaimed, stepping forward further. "I am the Master of Fire. Name's Pyrak. I'll be your executioner. If you don't try hard, I'll break your bones. If you take too long, the inferno shall engulf the room and you'll be fried corpses. Who wants to test their skill?"
Apart from the monotonous crackle of flames, everything was silent, until Lich started a slow, sarcastic applause.
"Yeah, yeah, nice talk," he sneered. "It's funny that all your type are the same: so confident. Why don't you test your skill?"
The Infect's response was a stony glare, followed by raising his arm and pointing at the wall above the trio's heads. A red fireball shot from his finger and exploded on contact with the wall. The result was a neat pile of rubble that blocked escape through the tilted door.
Tob swore the Koopan equivalent for "@#%$" as he noted the door and pointed his laser rifle at Pyrak's neck. He squeezed the trigger.
The beam of light hit its mark, but with a tilt of his head, Pyrak absorbed the laser. He then moved it back and walked forward.
"Fry me? No thanks," he taunted. "But, you might enjoy being my sacrifices…you first, traitor!"
With that, he lunged for Ark, grabbing him with one hand and squeezing his throat. He began to choke while he pointed the Spear of Darkness with a finger in a notch along its shaft. As it fired a "daser" beam, Lich threw the Cyan Arc at the Infect's arm.
Both hit at the same time - Pyrak released the younger von Kippo as he was forced back a few steps, stunned. His senses regained, he leapt to the side. Anticipating this move, Tob threw a grenade and yelled for everyone to duck. On contact with him, it exploded, sending him backwards, yet he was still on his feet.
"Fools!" he yelled.
He raised his hands, showing a flame ablaze in each of them. He then looked to the sky.
"Py-ro!" he yelled the name of his attack.
Instinctively, Lich clutched the Boomerang in his right arm and began to spin it at an incredibly fast rate, soon having an impenetrable cyan shield from head to toe.
"Stand behind me!" he yelled.
A wave of fire started to sheer towards them.
Ark stood behind his older brother and ducked slightly - he had not seen the shield performed before, his impression evident in a "wow" escaping his lips - while Tob, too far away to reach Lich in time, withdrew into his shell. The fire washed over them, but like a rock in a stream, it parted as it hit the shield. Tob's shell, though, was scalded, a few flakes peeling off and evaporating in the blast. A second wave followed soon after the first, then a third, before an explosion flung them all against the wall.
"Pyrokinesis!" Pyrak yelled as he pointed at Lich.
A fiery explosion surrounded him, searing his flesh. A second later, the same fate happened to Ark, followed by Tob.
"Come on, this is pathetic!" Pyrak taunted, folding his arms as his fiery aura flared up and burned harder.
With a shout of pain, Lich brought out his arms and summoned the powers of Undine. An answer of a circle of blue light later, he crouched, his hands outstretched and extended to the sky. Then, he rose until he was fully outstretched, before a quick twist of the right hand so it pointed at Ark and Tob in turn, and his left hand placed carefully on his heart. He then clenched his fist.
A blue circle of light appeared around the trio's feet, with star-like objects shooting skywards out of them. The burns disappeared.
Pyrak then raised his own set of hands, to which Lich responded, "You wanna play?"
"Come and get me, reptile," the Infect snarled.
More flames sprung up, sending the temperature of the room higher a fair number of degrees.
Lich summoned Undine again, before performing two diagonal karate-chop motions across the front of his body. In the same movement as the second strike, he brought his hand up and pointed his fingers at Pyrak, before snapping his hand closed.
Colour seemed to wash out from all around them. Then, as if copying his gesture, large boulders of ice smashed into the Infect - about six or seven of them. Ready for the retaliation, Ark had pointed the Spear at him.
It came swiftly. With each hit, the robot rocked backwards and forwards. Then, an explosion of red light filled the room, sending the temperature up the scale another leap. Pyrak was on his knees.
"Not bad," he panted.
Noting the state he was in, Lich laughed and said, "By Undine, this is too easy."
He brought his hands forward to call Undine again, for what he hoped would be the finishing blow, but Pyrak had other ideas.
"You're right."
In the blink of an eye, he was on his feet, clutching the gem that resided in his chest at arm's length. It began to glow brightly.
"Let's take this up!" he yelled.
Lich desperately began to summon the Water Elemental, but before he could complete his gesturing, the gem's light became blinding, forcing Lich to dive to the ground and shield his eyes.
The Koopa turned away. However, Ark had, with one simple rotation of the Spear before his body, cloaked himself in darkness.
The gem exploded, revealing a new form where Pyrak stood: one with increased armour plating, a more ornate helmet, the wings shaped even more oddly, and, overall, half a foot taller. The form had existed once before, known as the Pyrak-ZERO Project.
"I may not be an infect like this," he said, "but power is from skill in a body, and I know this one well."
Looking back, Tob was taken aback, causing him to say, "I don't like the look of this…"
With a leap into the air, he began to hover. Clenching his fists, he cried, "Fret not, tiny turtle, for your reckoning is upon you!"
Already, Lich was beginning to cast another spell, his hands gracefully yet quickly moving in their alternate directions.
As Pyrak closed his eyes, the temperature increased even further. The air began to ripple around them.
The blue light answered.
Ark wiped the sweat off his brow and flicked his hand along the Spear. Droplets of perspiration dripped from his arm.
"Home, sweet home," Tob muttered.
Taking a step back, Lich brought his right arm behind him, as if he were to throw the Boomerang upwards. His hand cupped, he stepped forward and threw his arm.
An arcane wave of water rose from the space before Lich's feet, and quickly grew to tower over Pyrak. Gravity took control, and soon it crashed down onto the robot.
He winced, before straightening himself out and disappearing in a blast of fire.
"Stay on guard…" Lich warned everyone, looking around fervently.
Of course, he could not look behind him. With a yell from Tob, Pyrak had appeared where he could not see, his fists aflame.
One right cross and left cross later, Pyrak sent a knee hurtling into the Yoshi's stomach, followed by a sweeping roundhouse kick that sent Lich flying a few yards.
"Dy!" Ark cried out, seeing his brother.
Before he could even move, Pyrak had turned to him, held a hand out, and let a wave of fire sweep over him and the agent.
"Suffer, traitor!" he yelled.
Tob hid in his shell once more, a few more flakes peeling off, while all that Ark could do was duck and scream as the flames seared his flesh.
Pyrak stopped, then took to the air once more and hovered next to a wall, crossing his arms and surveying the scene.
Ark looked up, sections of his arms melted into his thighs, and saw Lich stagger to his feet and wipe some blood from his mouth, a red herb in his hand.
"Dy…me too…" he called weakly.
Lich wrung out the Puipui Grass above his head, as if it were a wet rag. Droplets of curative water rained down onto him, before it collapsed on itself and became useless. Hearing his younger brother's plea, he ran over and did the same for him.
Ark's arms freed themselves and the wounds healed themselves while Tob came out from his shell.
Satisfied that the trio had finished, Pyrak spoke with a grin, "When they made me, I was the final product; they wanted the ultimate fire based weapon, and discovered it. Hellfire, they called it - the flames that nothing but blessed holy water does quench. I was given the ability to use Hellfire."
The grin became a sneer, and Pyrak quickly descended.
Lich returned it and said, "Holy, eh?"
As he brought out his arms, Pyrak pulled the two wings off his back, their unusual shape becoming frightfully clear as to their design as he snapped them together, forming a long rifle with a large barrel.
"Burn," he sneered.
Ark was a step ahead already. With a mutter of "Must not let fear win," he brought out his own arms. A white circle of light answered Lich's summons while a green one answered his. Unsure what to do, Tob began to back away as Pyrak's rifle began to draw red and white lights towards its opening.
Lich began to draw a large circle with his two forefingers, separating at the top and rejoining at the bottom. In the corner of his eye, he noted Ark doing the same gesture. With the green light, he knew what spell he was about to cast, and his would get done first.
"No!" he cried, turning his head to Ark, still gesturing.
"Die, Lich," Pyrak sneered, pointing the rifle.

Many things happened in the next few seconds. Firstly, Ark clenched his fist and cast Wall, the spell that reflects all others, on the three of them. With the orb of pulsating viridian light around them, Lich clenched his own fist, unable to back out of the spell, casting Lucid Barrier.
There was a quick succession of pinging noises as the spell bounced from Tob to Ark to himself. The end result was a saffron orb of light around Pyrak and his rifle, now pulsating with red light.
A split second later, Pyrak pulled the trigger, and a torrent of arcane blue and white flame rushed from the barrel. It covered Lich for a moment before, unable to get through the Wall, it bounced back to its originator.
"It's getting hotter in here…" Tob muttered.
Pyrak released growls in pain, before they turned into laughter.
"The unceasing fire…eternally burns me now," Pyrak sneered. "Fire is my life's blood. You have given me the eternal regenerate! Yes…I feel it…my powers all flooding back!"
"Oh he-ge-ra-tu!" Ark winced, cowering.
"Ark!" Lich snarled, scowling, turning to his brother. "You…you…"
There was a click emanating from the rifle that seemed to silence everyone, save Tob with: "No time for brotherly love, you two."
Pyrak had changed its setting so that, when he did pull the trigger, a tremendous vacuum ensued.
As the three began to slide across the floor towards the gun, Ark rammed the butt of the Spear onto the ground and called for the others to hold on to him. Lich grabbed Ark's shoulders, followed by the Koopa grabbing his leg.
All around them, the walls and ceiling bowed, buckled, and collapsed. In pieces, they began to fly in towards the gun and dissipate within its barrel. The three stood ground as a scene of destruction appeared around them: the bulk of the collapsed spire behind them, and the impact zone of its crash in the other directions. Above them was the Underworld night sky, the pulsating crystal blue dimmed, yet still brilliant.
"Not so fast," Pyrak called, resetting the gun with a click.
He aimed it at Ark, the red and white lights beginning to gather. The gun quickly became overloaded and shook. Fending for himself, Ark shook off the other Yoshi and the Koopa, pointed the Spear at the gun and fired a beam of darkness. Pyrak pulled the trigger, the overload reaching a critical state as the rifle jammed.
"No! Fool!" he cried in shock.
The gun shook one last time before it discharged, washing the entire area with Hellfire, followed by applause in the form of explosions - the gun was no more. A long "pling" noise filled the area as the Walls protected the trio. Pyrak was blown backwards by its force, shuddering on his knees after he landed.
Seeing the enemy in a vulnerable state, Lich brought out his arms and was greeted by a blue light.
"My gun…" Pyrak moaned.
His eyes flashed, and he vanished.
In morbid dread, the three knew what was about to happen, and started to get ready. Their efforts were in vain as Pyrak appeared behind Ark, his fiercely glowing blue and white hands locking around his throat in a fiery vice grip - the Hellfire had returned his strength.
"The hellfire lives within me, not some weapon," he snarled in a manic grin. "It was my outlet...now I scorch you like an insect on a bug zapper!"
Ark struggled to move as the hands around his neck becoming extremely hot.
Knowing the Walls were in place, Lich seemed to double over, his fists clenched and drawn as close as he possibly could to his chest. Then after yelling "Tuma…go…undi!" (contrary to his belief of not yelling his attack to keep the element of surprise), he shot his outstretched hands towards the sky as a sheet of ice spread out from his feet. It bypassed Tob and Ark with a "pling", however, as it hit Pyrak, it evaporated in clouds of steam. In seemingly immediate response, the palms of his hands became burning hot, and the yelling magenta Yoshi was soon enveloped in the Hellfire's aura, the unholy flame nearing activation.
"Ha!" Pyrak yelled. "I'm too hot for your little cold!"
Tob's sudden laserfire hit the robot's left arm, damaging it slightly, but it still remained gripped around Ark's throat, getting tighter and tighter.
"Now, learn the error of your ways, traitor," Pyrak growled. "Dare not cross our master, nor the minions of him."
A sudden "pling" noise and the briefest flash of cyan made him look up and laugh at Lich, as the reflected Lucid Barrier stopped Lich's Speed Five throw.
"Nice try, but your kin dies," he maliciously grinned.
With an ungodly scream from Ark, the smell of burning flesh filled their nostrils as the Hellfire began to come into being.
There's nothing I can do, Lich thought, absolutely nothing.
Are you deaf?! the Spirit of Mana echoed around his head. 'The flames that only blessed holy water does quench'! Blessed holy water! The rains of Undine!
Lich glared at the Pyrak-ZERO Project, meeting his gaze head on as he brought forth his arms and summoned a blue light around him.
"Another trick, boy?" the robot taunted, quirking a brow. "I hope it works better than the toy!"
Lich's stare became even more intense in synchronisation with Ark's screams. With a prayer to the Elementals in his mind, he raised his arms to a point above and out from his head, before bringing them down slowly, with his fingers making a pitter-patter motion.
Pyrak's eyes flashed and seemed to widen as he growled, "You son of a…"
His sentence was abruptly cut off by the sudden downpour of a shower of holy curing water, onto everyone in the ruined room. While Ark fell forward onto his front, Pyrak was racked by spasms of intense pain as Undine's rain quenched the Hellfire. With a scream including the prolonged use of the word "no", electricity began to course its way over his body as he was forced onto his knees.
Ark, too, cried out in pain as he rolled over. Lich rushed over towards his brother, and knowing the waters would restore his health, but not rid him of his burns, another bulb of Puipui was retrieved and wrung out of his body.
Tob, in what he hoped would be a finishing stroke, steadied his rifle and began to fire at Pyrak's head. But it seemed to do nothing as the demon robbed of his fire began to rise saying, "Y-you…don't realise the i-irony-ny…"
With a clatter, and a Koopan swear word from Tob, Pyrak's blackened breastplate fell to the floor, revealing a badly cracked, black box sporting a symbol in the form of a small yellow circle surrounded by three portions of a larger yellow disc: a nuclear reactor.
"I die, you all die," he chuckled. "Quickly, or over years of poisoning. Quite tragic," he shook his head sadly, "you heroic boys die."
As Pyrak began to glow a lucid green, Tob shouted, "Get the hell out of here!"
"Where?!" Lich cried.
"Anywhere!"
With that, the Koopa began to run towards the wreckage of the spire as the room began to shake violently, and beams of light began to pour out from the maniacally laughing Pyrak.
Lich opened his Dragonite's Pokéball and leapt on board, beckoning Ark to hop on. He had no reluctance whatsoever as he clambered on behind Lich and wrapped his arms around his brother's chest.
"Ta…ta…" Pyrak uttered, before his legs exploded.
Lich pulled Nessie's antennae and the three were off through an open wall, watching Tob clamber over the wreckage.
I have to leave him, he thought, Nessie can only take two.
"Faster!" he commanded, as the Dragonite began to fly his fastest.
Tob ran as fast as he could, leaping from one piece of wreckage to another - and failing, falling onto his front. He looked up at the retreating Yoshies, his sorrowful gaze meeting Lich's.
"No!" Lich cried, before the blinding flash of light and the heat wave from Pyrak's fiery explosion shot out.
Telg Rak'potot "Tob" B'ralku, KBT Agent 49248, was no more, save bubbling pools of molten metal and his imprinted shadow where he had evaporated.

The inevitable, poisonous gamma radiation sped through the three of them as the mushroom cloud began to billow behind them. They were far away enough now only to be burnt by the heat, but the fire and debris were still screaming towards them.
With a sudden twanging noise, they hit the barrier that had grown around the Genesis. They were shaken slightly before Lich turned Nessie towards a distant spire. He knew this was all futile, that the explosion would consume him, his brother and his friend…unless…
"Get ready, Ark, this will probably sting!" he yelled, before he clutched the Boomerang in his right hand.
He shut his already half-closed eyes and began to draw energy from it.
"Lumina, please be right," he mouthed in prayer.
The three of them began to glow a pulsating cyan, the cycles getting faster and faster. Suddenly, the beats of Nessie's wings became a flashing blur, and the three of them were being propelled at a velocity equivalent to Speed 0.01 - it was Lich's experimental technique he called Fleetfoot. With an enormous sonic boom, they landed on a walkway behind the spire that had been opposite to Pyrak's, as the nuclear explosion consumed an entire quarter of the Genesis. They lost their cyan glow and they returned to a normal speed.
It was then that the pain set in. The three of them cried out and bent over, their stomachs cramped. Lich sat down, wincing as he hit the ground - the pair of shorts that he had been wearing was now nothing but a few pieces of blue thread around his waist. He withdrew a second pair from his Mana Storage, and put it on. With a sob, the tears began to flow for his Koopa friend - he remembered how his company in the hardship of Tullabanariga had kept him from ending his life, the advice he had given…he had a wife and two children, and he would have to break the news.
He could picture it in his head: "I'm sorry to say this, Mrs. B'ralku, but your husband has been killed in a nuclear explosion."
He started to cry even harder - the other two didn't comfort him, having problems of their own. Or, it might have been what he saw when he looked up at what was making a "tsk tsk" sound.
"Oh no, not you," he sniffed, wiping some tears out of his eyes.
Sir Pseudo Havering crossed his arms.
"Well, congrats," he said nonchalantly, "My infects…all of them…dead."
He shrugged and walked towards a nearby pole, leaning his back against it when he arrived.
"Hmm…how can such filth beat my perfection," he purposefully wondered aloud, before glaring at Lich and throwing a plastic card at him. "In the blast, you left your prize."
Lich glanced briefly at it, before looking at a point beside Havering, who smiled at him as a demon would, his sharp, pointy teeth evident.
"You seem to be ailing from something," he smirked. "Radiation poisoning, perhaps?"
Lich nodded sourly and muttered, "What does it mean to you? You'd be happy seeing me dead."
Havering chuckled, "True, but makes it all the more fun to me."
From his belt, he lifted up a vial containing a red liquid, removed the cork, and flicked the side of it with his clawed hand, creating a "ting" noise.
"A 'panacea', if you will," he said. "Cures every known ailment, even HIV and Cancer."
Nessie groaned while Ark watched on limply.
"How do I know it's a cure, not a killer?" Lich asked, suspicious, yet interested.
Havering disappeared, then reappeared the briefest of moments later next to Nessie. While the Dragonite was caught off guard, he held his mouth open, pouring the contents down his throat. He then let go.
"I'm feeling better, I think," his voice chimed from Lich's PLT.
A vial appeared in each of the Yoshi's laps.
"Try to stay alive for the end," he smiled. "Farewell."
With that, he bowed, and vanished in a burst of blue flame.
"Do we trust him?" Ark asked, a moment later.
Lich gazed at the contents, holding the vial up to a nearby light.
"I don't feel anything anymore," Nessie said, giving as best as a shrug as he could. "I think it's safe."
"How do we know it's safe though?" Lich looked at both of them.
Ark moaned in pain, and clutched his stomach.
"If anything, I'm game," he said, wincing.
He pulled off the cork, threw back his head and poured the contents in with a single gulp - the vial was completely empty. His eyes then widened before he stood erect.
"Yep, I think I'm better," he smiled.
Lich eyed the contents again. Havering himself - or at least a clone of him - had given it to him, grounds enough to reject it. However, if Nessie was now well, and Ark was suddenly chipper…though, what if it killed them all later?
"I don't trust it, but looking at you two…"
He opened it and began to drink the red liquid, until it was half full. He lowered it, and suddenly, like the others, felt much better.
"…that's all I'll have," he said, putting it in his pocket, and finding something already there.
He withdrew three medals, and a letter in Tob's handwriting, in Koopan.

To my friend, D'krim, a.k.a. Dyluck von Kippo,
As we promised, I am about to travel to Ulrezaj's lair to rescue your love, Riu. Although I have seen classified KBT information regarding Ulrezaj, which should raise my confidence levels, I am frightened. After reading the files on him, it awoke a fear in me that I cannot conquer. I do not know if I will return. Coupled in with this is the fear of Vatari, Garat and Kroko's safety from the Gr'tokoru family, if I do not.
That is why I ask of you to restore my family to governance of Ket'nalkok in return. You will find them at my house: Bauzur Udab'tek 38, B'kirik, Arez'ku (we had to flee from Ket'nalkok). Take them to either Yoshiville, or the Koopa Village east of Toad Town in the Mushroom Kingdom - they will be safe there. Give them these medals - they will know you come on my behalf. I have left this letter and the medals in the pocket of a pair of your shorts as it came back from being cleaned.
Even if I do not make it off this accursed planet, I know you will, someday at least. I have read of you in KBT information, and to have actually met you is an honour I will never forget. I put my faith in you, Guardian of the Cyan Arc.
The shuttle will be ready soon, I cannot write anymore. Good luck, my friend, I hope you will find your brother someday soon.

Telg B'ralku, a.k.a. Tob, KBT Agent 49248

The other two stopped trying to read over his shoulder as he folded up the note.
"What is it?" Nessie asked.
"A present from Tob, so I can fulfill a promise I made to him."
He held up the orange Pokéball to Nessie, who nodded before Lich pressed the button that returned him in a flash of red light. He then stood up and saw the A-ETTh-3 on the ground before him.
"While you were reading that letter, I set it up to find Markior," Ark said, looking at it anxiously. "It's still searching."
At that moment, it suddenly beeped, a light at its base switched from red to green, before it began to roll on its caterpillar threads. It made a U-turn and began to head towards some descending stairs at the end of the walkway.
"Follow that robot," he sighed in relief, Lich picking up the card as they went.

The A-ETTh-3 took them down many flights of stairs - its arms lowered and it hauled itself down from step to step in the process.
"How does it find people?" Lich asked, wanting to talk about something to get his mind off Tob.
"That part I'm particularly proud of," his brother answered. "It sends out about a thousand microscopic robots - they can fly. Each one is no bigger than a grain of rice - they can hide very easily and get under doors and in and out elevator wells. They each have an aerial linked up to the main unit. At a junction, the group of robots divide until they get to another junction, where they divide again - soon, a place is infested with the things. When they find the target, it sends out a signal to the main unit, displaying its path of travel. The signal also tells the other units to return to the main unit by waiting along the path. The main unit decides which path is the shortest, and then it goes. Nanotechnology at its best."
Ark then sighed, as they finished descending a flight of stairs and began to take a corridor. "When we go back, I'm not going to have access to that lab, am I? I won't be able to make all these wonderful creations."
"I have heaps and heaps of money, Ark," Lich replied. "I can build you a new one, get the equipment, everything."
"But Yamauchi doesn't have that sort of technology…does it?"
"I think so. I mean, there's an orbiting Gundam factory - Yamauchi has it."
"Gundam?"
"Big, towering, robotic machines that are used as fighters in battle - the metal can only be refined in space."
Ark's eyes sparkled.
"I want to see those machines, when we get home," Ark said.
"You will. Especially if you're around Sixtyfourhundred - he revels in them."
"Excellent. Wish I could go home now."
"So d-"
Lich stopped in his tracks and looked into a door beside them.
"Why, the lying cheat!" he shouted gleefully.
"Wha-"
"Pause that robot, and take a look at this."
Ark raced ahead, pressed a button on the robot, and ran back again to find Lich standing in the middle of a small room, filled wall to wall with racks of bottles filled with alcoholic liquid - a wine cellar.
"This isn't just an ordinary wine cellar," Lich grinned. "Take a look at this bottle. Quick."
Ark walked speedily towards where Lich was standing and looked at the bottle he indicated. Although the bottle was sealed up, which he checked, it was draining itself of its red liquid.
"Ark, this is Havering's wine cellar."
"If it is, we should get out o-"
"No," Lich smirked. "It's time to get one-up on him."
"What do you mean?"
"Multehx was drunk the other night, and there's only one substance that does that to him: caffeine. If I'm right, Havering should be the same."
"So…you put…caffeine in each of these bottles…but we don't have any ca- Salamando's Tail, Dy, you could warn me next time."
Lich had withdrawn from his Mana Storage and opened a metal tin under Ark's nose containing the most caffienated substance known to sentient life in the universe - Kakkaran coffee. Just to breathe the fumes given off was equivalent to drinking a can of Coca-Cola. To sniff it, as Ark had, was four times as bad. Those in Kakkara and some other parts of Fa'diel had grown accustomed to the coffee.
"Now, all we have to do is decide what we want, before putting it in the remainder."
"You're going to st-"
"Shh, Ark. Don't think of it that way. Think of it more as our victory trophies."
Lich began to patrol the racks, taking a bottle of butterscotch schnaps.
"Why do you have that on you anyway?"
"A whiff of this tends to get people going," Lich replied, reading the labels. "I hardly ever have to make a cup."
"I'm not game to ask what for."
Lich looked at his younger brother.
"Well, don't just stand there, take some things."
"But what if those things we take is what Havering is drinking right n…oh, we use the bottle he's already taken stuff from?"
Lich nodded and continued reading the labels.
After making themselves a nice collection of bottles - about half of the cellar - Lich took the bottle they had seen empty itself, righted it, and opened the cork.
"I don't know what planet it's from, but it seems like such a nice thing to waste," he said, then shrugged. "Oh well."
He produced a funnel - he reckoned they were always handy, so he kept one continually in Storage - and poured the entire contents of the tin into the bottle, as Ark's eyes widened.
"Dy…that's…"
"I don't reckon it's enough. For Tob, Ark, for Tob."
After shaking the last granules from the tin, and seeing the red liquid darken slightly, he removed the funnel, spirited it and the tin back in Storage, forced the cork back into the mouth of the bottle, and put it back in its position.
"Let's go."

The robot took them back to the others, who cheered and clapped their arrival, Lich holding the card in his hand. Markior stood still, and just simply watched.
"Where's Tob?" Vector asked, as Multehx was given the card.
"I did feel a big explosion," Sixtyfourhundred added.
"He didn't make it," Lich muttered, his eyes downcast. "Please, don't ask why."
The smiles faded from everybody. Ark solemnly picked up the robot and put it in his Storage.
"En Taro Telg B'ralku," Markior muttered.
"That's the only thing you've said for a long time, Smokey," Multehx said.
Markior glared at him for a moment, his eyes flashing, before turning to Lich.
"I hate to be the bearer of further bad news," he said, his voice just audible. "While you were gone, Dragon received a calling from her home world."
"But, Rendra-" Lich started
"I do not wish to know how come it came from there or how the world came to be again, but Dragon…well, she answered it. She left you a message to say that she loves you. Apart from that, she's gone, Lich. She's gone."
Lich's legs buckled beneath him, and he was soon a sobbing mass of orange and white lying on the floor. He knew all to well how this feeling of loss felt - it seemed to be a curse of Recugrian. And now that he had been given a double dosage of it, he was growing sure of it. With the fight with Havering looming just ahead of them all, Tob's death and Dragon's disappearance were truly a farewell at the gates of Hell.