Ileyna blinked as the booming voice echoed throughout the chamber, and she looked around, searching for the source.

"Funny!" she said. "The ancient magical castle can speak perfect English. I do so love the translation convention here!"

-YOU HAVE NOT BEEN DEEMED WORTHY TO ENTER.-

"Oh, I haven't heard THAT before!" Max said. He glanced about, looking for the source. It seemed to thunder everywhere about them. Near him, Roland carefully drew one of his pistols from its holster. "Why don't you come out and tell me I can't enter to my face?"

"Dude, don't PISS HIM OFF!" Brendan shouted, hands clenched into white-knuckled fists.

-ENTRY IS FORBIDDEN TO ALL BUT THE GIRL.- The gemstone on the golden statue flashed, and it moved, like unthawing, turning about on its pedestal and raising its claws. -YOU WILL LEAVE OR MEET YOUR DEMISE.-

"Well, they do say ladies first!" Ileyna remarked as she turned in mid-air from her sitting position until she faced the now-active defense system. She raised her voice to the entity before them.

"Before you start going on a rampage, may I make a few queries?" she asked. "Like maybe a name for this place, or an exception or two to your whole "kill the unworthy" protocol?"

-ENTRY IS FORBIDDEN TO ALL BUT THE GIRL.- it repeated. -YOU WILL LEAVE OR MEET YOUR DEMISE.-

"Of course," Silver said. "We'll leave right away." And the host spun around and slashed Silver across the pillar's front. Where the blade had cut, a shimmering line remained, swirling with multicolored light. Slowly, it began to open.

-STOP.- The segments that made up the golden creature's arm each spun in opposite directions, whirring at high speeds to make a high-power drill. It stabbed the floor, narrowly avoiding Silver's host as it bounded out of the way.

"Damn it, Silver!" Max shouted, and his Stand manifested. "Didn't you hear the brat? Don't PISS IT OFF!"

Ileyna yelped as the drill fist crashed down on them all, causing her to take the safety of the air. "Silver, come on! Don't be like Lilarcor!" she shouted over the din of combat, cupping her hands around her mouth. "Just get clear while I sort things out!"

"I'm afraid this is where we depart!" Silver shouted, as the golden creature pulled back its whirling claw, and the intensity of the spatial gap grew. "Good luck to you!"

Max shook his fist as Silver's host bounded into the Gateway, Roland dragging Brendan after him. "Silver, I will SNAP YOU IN HALF!" He turned around, as the golden creature began to rotate its entire segmented form. "Damn it!"

Max's vision was suddenly filled with the blue light emanating from Ileyna's back and wings, as she maneuvered herself between him and the construct. Her right hand flexed into a sign, which she aimed right at the construct.

"He's my friend," she declared to the tower's guardian. "Anything you can say in front of me can be said in front of him."

The guardian kept its steady mono-eye on Ileyna for a few moments. Gradually, its middle segments stopped spinning. -THIS REQUEST WILL BE GRANTED. SPEAK.-

Max glanced at Ileyna, then cautiously towards the Gateway. "What about the others?"

-THEY WILL BE MANAGED.-

Ileyna dismissed the others with a wave of her hand. "We're not with them, so it doesn't matter what the tower's sentry does them," she said. She looked back up at the guardian, lowering her hand and bringing herself back to the floor. The aura and wings disappeared once more as she relaxed.

"We're not the only ones interested in this tower," she told the guardian. "Even before the other visitors showed up, there was another looking for this place. What is this tower for? And why are you so interested in me?"

The statue lowered its arms stiffly. -YOU AND YOUR PAST COMPANIONS ARE THE ONLY ONES ALLOWED TO CROSS DIMENSIONS AS DECREED BY CORE GENESIS. THE TRUE SECRET OF THIS TOWER IS INTENDED TO HOLD A WAYPOINT FOR A DIMENSIONAL GATEWAY. THE PRIMARY INTEREST OF THE SCION SEEKING THIS TOWER WAS FOR THE TREASURES HIDDEN WITHIN.-

"A diversion from the waypoint, I'm guessing," Max said.

-DIVERSIONS ARE NOT REQUIRED. FEW KNOW OF THE EXISTENCE OF THE WAYPOINTS.-

Ileyna's mouth fell open in complete and undisguised shock. Core Genesis? Core Genesis!? This place was related to...!?

She almost missed the rest of what the guardian said as she stumbled backwards.

"No wonder I couldn't place the architecture," she exclaimed. "The only other place I know of like this was destroyed..." She'd eventually pulled the story out of Matt. It wasn't something he or Helena had liked discussing all that much.

Wait. He said this place was a Waypoint. She blinked at that. "But Silver and the others knew there was a Gateway here," she told the guardian. "I think your secret's out of the bag. If someone knows the full scope of what this place is..."

Oh, that could be bad on so many levels. If anyone was seeking that thing out...

Max folded his arms. "I'm a bit in the dark here, but let me guess. Ileyna stumbled on something man wasn't meant to know about and now you're trying to make sure nobody else can find it."

-YES.-

"And you want to stop people from crossing dimensions to do so. Where does that leave me?"

-YOU MUST REMAIN IN THIS DIMENSION. YOU CANNOT BE ALLOWED TO FOLLOW THEM.-

Max raised a finger, paused, then rubbed his chin as he started to pace. "But that doesn't make sense. I've crossed dimensions before. One time, I went to a mirror universe and I barely got out alive. How come I was able to do so then but not now?"

-IT WAS AN ILLUSION.-

"What the hell do you mean, it was an illusion? The scientist who trapped me there said he was banishing me to another plane entirely!"

All the while, the guardian wasn't budging. -IT WAS AN ILLUSION.-

"You can be sure that Silver and them won't stick around," Ileyna said, glancing at Max. "In fact I bet the moment we're gone, they're going to either raid this place... or go back to whatever they used to get here."

She frowned, turning her gaze to the ground as she pondered. "And if they're looking for what I think they're looking for, well... someone's gotta stop them. Right?"

Max pocketed the blade - it had stopped shimmering so brightly, as the tear within reality started to close. "What are they looking for exactly, Ileyna? What did you find?"

Ileyna looked up at Max, then worriedly looked back at the gigantic mole towering over them. Her head whipped back to Max and again the construct, and finally grinned at it nervously, shrugging as if to say "Sorry".

She turned back to Max, looking for all the world like an embarrassed high school girl. "If my guess is right--and I'm pretty sure I'm right--then there's only one thing that anyone would risk crossing entire dimensions for," she told him. She raised her arms out in a grand gesture.

"The Omega Core."

"Give me the rundown."

"It's basically a sentient artifact that can warp reality to any degree," Ileyna told him. She clasped her hands together behind her back and kicked the ground a bit. "Said sentient artifact being charged with protecting the balance between the Multiverse, protecting its central origin point to ensure something can't remake all of creation, and acting as a reference point for when it has to destroy the Multiverse in the event that balance can't be maintained."

"Wonderful," Max deadpanned. He sighed, ran his hand over his hair. "Let me guess. This is where I'm needed."

-YOU ARE NOT NEEDED.- said the guardian.

The older man scoffed. "Well, I don't have much choice, do I? I'm not keen to live the rest of my life in some backwater dimension like this. I need to get home. And if that means butting heads against Silver, then so be it. I know the score."

-THE GIRL'S PROTECTION WILL NOT FOLLOW YOU. IF YOU LEAVE THIS DIMENSION THEN YOU WILL BE TARGETED FOR DESTRUCTION ALONG WITH THE OTHERS.-

"Who cares. That wouldn't be the first time. I'll take my chances."

Ileyna kept silent for a time, merely giving her companion a concerned look from the side. He claimed experience, but she knew all too well just how far the hand of Core Genesis could reach, and just what kind of cost its agents had to pay. Some gave up their lives, others, their humanity.

She sighed and turned back to the guardian, and bowed respectfully to it. "I understand. I'll take the appropriate steps and see to dealing with the crisis," she said to it in an uncharacteristically solemn tone. "Hopefully those fools won't piss Core Genesis off too badly."

She stood back up and gave Max a curious glance. She had a pretty good idea how to go about dealing with the crisis, too...

Max looked down at her. "Don't worry," he said, not nearly as gruffly. "I've been around the block. I know what I'm doing. Though I do need to make preparations first."

"Hmm."

Ileyna examined the older man for a bit before smiling in satisfaction. "Well, we'll see about that," she said, turning back to the guardian unit.

"Is there any way we can return this place to stasis?" she asked of it. "Because, well... there's a town right outside. I imagine quite a few people are panicking at seeing this place looming over it."

-IT WILL BE DONE.-

"It's not like it won't make it on the news," Max remarked. "But I doubt there's some kind of masquerade going on." He tugged at his collar. "In any case, I need to get out of this monkey suit. Let's go."

Ileyna nodded and they made their way out. "News or not, we do not need people running around something built by Core Genesis," she said. She sighed. "Man, why'd Core Genesis have to be involved? Nothing good comes from trying to find the Omega Core."

As they stepped out of the Waypoint tower, Ileyna looked out over Silverton from the edge of the building. It was dark now, with the sun settling over the horizon. It must've made the tower quite foreboding for anyone looking this way.

"I'll take us a little ways outside of the town, so we're not swarmed by the townsfolk," she told Max as she once more became alight in blue. Lifting him up via her telekinesis, they took to the air.