It was not long before the noise in the room began to degrade to a cacophony of panicked voices. While Red had heard some of the shouting, he'd not had a chance to interject before the voices reached that fever pitch. He couldn't help but cover his ears in pain. [i]Dammit, what's going on here?[/i] He thought to himself, staring up at the giant stone floating before them. He still couldn't shake the sinister feeling coming from it, and he very soon realized that it was completely justified in that feeling.

The light from the red stone suddenly started to glow brighter, reaching an almost white color. Many of those in the crowd stared up at it in response. The bright glow was soon followed by a strange humming noise. Before anyone could say anything in response, however, a tendril of red light snaked out from the crystal, striking the young girl in Tyme's arms. Within an instant, her entire form seemed to turn to that same red light, then dissipated into particles which floated around the crystal. This process started to repeat itself, causing mass panic. Voices suddenly shouted out in fear, but were swiftly cut short. Nobody seemed to be spared from the lightning, and it wasn't long before the crowd of over [s]nine[/s] a thousand was soon cut down to under a hundred, though something odd was happening...

Red was no exception to the strikes, however, he hadn't faded like some of the others, rather, the light seemed to have wrapped around his left wrist. He didn't feel any pain, but rather, he somehow felt energized.