"Where are we going, Master Wren?"  Celes walked about twenty yards ahead
of her old teacher, carrying the torch to light the dark dungeon they had
entered from a mountainside.

"I told you I would explain everything when we got there..." was his
reply.

"Are these caves... inhabited, if you know what I mean?"

"Ha, you haven't changed a bit, Celes, and yes, there are two guardians
along our path."

"I love wasting guardians."  She smiled, and remembered back to the time
they had thrashed the Guardian and the Poltergeist atop Kekfa's tower.

"It's a good thing, because the first is about thirty yards ahead," Wren
replied is his calm, controlled voice.

Wren was proven right as a huge green dragon blocked their path.  It had
its eyes closed, but opened them and reared its head up as soon as Celes
neared.  She drew her sword.  "Here I come."  She ran in and slashed at
its throat.  It dodged around the side and tried to take a bite out of her
arm.

Wren moved in a little closer.  "You have still not learned the most
important lesson, child," he said as he watched Celes and the dragon take
turns at swiping at each other.  "Your follow-up attacks are very strong,
but you still haven't learned."

"Forget teaching me and help me deal with this thing."  Celes huffed.

"Why attack only one monster when you can kill two with one swipe?" he
said.  "Watch, and learn.  You still haven't learned the 'Eye of the
Eagle.'  You must look for your enemy's weak point.  You must be able to
feel it so strongly that you can close your eyes and know where to
strike."

"If I closed my eyes, I'd be dead before I could do anything."  Celes
grunted, now tiring.  Fighting by herself was hard work.

"Watch," said Wren.  He stood motionless for a few seconds, and then drew
two daggers and leapt at the monster.  He let one fly halfway through his
jump, but it was apparently going to miss its intended target, the
dragon's eye.

"You must be getting old, Poppa.  You missed."

Wren landed right in front of the monster just as the dagger landed on the
dragon's snout.  "You see, Celes, you still haven't learned." he said.
The dagger had distracted the dragon to give Wren time to stab it in the
eye with his other one.  "Now, Celes!"

Celes ran up and stabbed the dragon four times while the dragon was
struggling to get away from Wren's dagger.  Three more hits from Celes'
sword, and the dragon dropped dead.  Wren explained, "If you would have
watched the Dragon's movements, you would see that an attack such as the
one I did was unstoppable.  The dragon could not move its head, lest the
first dagger hit its eye.  This left its head an open target.  Since it
was paralyzed, it was quite easy to stab it in its other eye, to give you
time to attack without mercy."

"'Eye of the Eagle.'  I'll remember that..." Celes said.

Wren motioned for her to follow, as his torch now provided the only light
for the two.  Suddenly, they turned a corner and light poured out on them.
A huge room was lit up by many mechanical things.  "Do you know what this
is, Celes?"

"Sorry, Edgar was our resident techno-person.  You'll have to clue me in."

Wren stepped further into the room. "This is mankind's greastest weapon:
Time. The items in this room are all connected, one way or another, to
time travel."

"Time travel?"

"Yes.  These machines, when activated, will produce a portal, a hole if
you will, to any time or any place."

"Why is mankind in danger then, if it has been guarded by this dragon all
this time?  How did it get here anyway?  I've never seen machinery like
this before."

"As they say, 'Time flows like a river, and history repeats.'  What you
have done in your quest, in essence, is much like the War of the Magi a
thousand years ago.  This is not the first time magic has died out and
technology has taken form.  This machine was built long ago by an ancient
civilization, but they were distroyed by magic..."

"How do you know all this?"

"The other caverns in this cave lead to inscriptions, which I have
decoded, to tell me the story.  Now as I was saying before I was so rudely
interrupted, was that this machine controls all time and space.  You see,
a very powerful man has escaped into the past, and if we do not find him,
humanity may have no future."

"But we're still alive now, so doesn't that mean that the person obviously
didn't do anything?"

"No, it doesn't work like that.  You see, every year he spends in the past
is a year we spend in the present.  So if he goes to the past, and then
does something to alter humanity in a year, then one year from the time he
transported back, those changes will take effect."

"So where do we come in?"

"The person that escaped into the past was an old friend of mine, and it
is my duty to stop him.  You're tagging along because I'm letting you."

"I resent that."

Wren smiled.  "Well, we now face the second guardian, these 'computers'."

"'Computers?'"

"These things around us require an access code to get them to work.  My
'old friend' figured them out.  Now we must do the same."

*****

"Well, it's humming now, is that a good sign?" Celes asked.

"It is ready now.  I have set the date and place accordingly.  I must set
a few more things and prepare it for some verbal commands.  Step inside
that chamber, and I will be joining you soon."

Five minutes later, Wren stepped in next to Celes.  "Prepare to be one of
the first time travelers ever, Celes..."

"Computers: Energize."