The woman in chains became
her brother once more, the throne became the barren
wasteland, and Tala slumped over, as the other three
crystals went back to their proper places. Before everything
went black for her though, she grabbed her brother's crystal
before it hit the ground.
Reality 5
"Good morning, Entropy. Glad you finally made it."
Entropy heard as he awoke. Looking up, he saw one of the
new faces from the roster he'd seen on the Dragonstar.
"Ariah?" He asked. "What am I doing here? Where's
Tala?"
"She's fine. She asked me to take a look at you, You'd
taken a pretty bad beating at Nokomis's hands and were
ranting and raving about some other dimension. I checked
you out, you're fine. Even so..." Ariah suddenly pointed
at Entropy, firing a blue blast of energy at him. Thinking
quickly, Entropy morphed a hole in his chest, which the
shining missile sailed harmlessly through. Getting up off
the table, Entropy grabbed his sword, charging and preparing
to defend himself. As Ariah advanced, Entropy took a swing
at him. Ariah leaped up, stopping in mid-air and grabbing his
sword from him.
"Guess I was right." He said to himself. "You almost
always win our sparring matches. You and I spar every
Saturday, remember? Oh yeah," He adds on sarcastically. "I
mean, the you from THIS dimension and I do, anyway."
Entropy held his bluff.
"What're you talking about? I've known you for 3 years,
even before we got lost."
"Then why'd you lose?"
"You caught me off-guard, that's all."
"Bull. I've seen what's happening in your dimension."
"How's that?"
"I have a device which lets me see a blurry picture of
other dimensions. In yours, an Angammon was thrown into
your dimension instead of me."
"Sounds nice. What the hell's an An-whatever, though?"
Entropy says, finally giving it up.
"Pure evil, and very powerful." He punches up a hologram
of a strange, spider-centaur style creature, sporting a
variety of cybernetic weaponry and looking about as tall as
any human.
"There's only one there now, but in a week there could be
thousands. They reproduce like rabbits to get a good
conquering force in an area." Ariah then gives him a look
that could easily frighten Satan. "And they could kill you
all in an instant."
"I think you're underestimating the CFs..."
"You IDIOT!" Ariah snaps. "I've lived with the CFs for 3
YEARS. I know exactly what you're all capable of. Sure,
one Angammon probably wouldn't be much of a problem, but a
shipfull could wipe out your Crystal Fighters without so much
as breaking a sweat."
"Okay, okay, you made your point. So what am I supposed
to do? It's not like I can make a direct translation to my
universe."
"That may be, but my machinery can help. Now get back to
your dimension." Ariah suddenly throws a switch, revealing
a huge laser-like device. "Before everyone you know and
care about is dead." The device fires, and Entropy
disappears in a flash of blue light. Another Entropy lands
nearby. "What the-Ariah, what's going on? How'd I get
here? And where's the Dragonstar? And Tala? And Null
space?"
Ariah grabs his forehead.
"It's a long story..."
Reality 0
Entropy lands, albeit awkwardly, in a good-sized room.
"The Omicron?" He says, looking around. "It worked." He
gets up, heading out into the hallway. ~I'm back!~ He
thinks, praying the others are all right as he heads for the
bridge.
Reality 6
The man who WASN'T Krakken's other glanced around the room, glaring at
the startled guards with scorn in his eyes. "Is THIS how
you treat YOUR PRINCE? By shooting him? You should be
bowing!"
The captain of the guards stepped forward with obvious
fear and reverence in his eyes, "Forgive me, Lord Ferris!"
"Do not beg for MY forgiveness! I have not been so
grievously wronged at your hands!"
The archers near Krakken bowed down near him, "Forgive
us, Prin-- King Krakken! We--" Krakken wasn't answering.
Lying there with his lifeblood spilling out onto the
balcony, he wasn't breathing, either.
Reality 14
UA looks around. No sign of life. It's pure desert. He
looks up at the glaring sun and looks down to find a piece
of paper. He reads it. A warrant for the arrest of the
Crystal Fighters and Eme. Under the reason was high
treason. UA stares at it. Whatever it was, wouldn't help
him now. He's stuck...really! He looks down to find
himself sinking into quicksand.
"Oh, for crying out loud!"
Reality 0
Entropy looks up for a second, swearing he could hear
something, even on the bridge of the ship. He turns to
Dhaens. "Old man, you have the bridge." He rushes out, and
down the hallway to a nearby room. Opening the door, he
gets a quite priceless expression on his face. "I'm hoping
this is the real Tala?" He asks.
"Entropy?"
Tala studies him for a moment, as if deciding. He asked if she
was real, so she supposed he had to be too. Everything else
so far seemed to be right.
She moves through the doorway, and gives him the longest hug
she has ever given anyone in her whole life, probably
surprising him just a bit. Is silent while she does this,
just glad to be back home. Tilts her head back to look up at
him. "Where is everyone else?"
Entropy recovers, albeit a bit awkwardly. "Well, I'm not
sure, though I think they're all scattered across the
different universes." Entropy winced a bit at thinking
about the other Tala there, but she wasn't the one standing
before him. Even so, she couldn't know about this. It'd
put both of them in the targeting sights. All hunters were
expected to turn in their license when they got into a
permanent relationship, and that let every planet they'd
ever done a job against press charges. "Even so, we've got
bigger problems, but I can explain those on the bridge.
Where were you, anyway?"
"I was.. in a different one too. It was odd. Nokomis had
been defeated, my brother was alive, and I was Queen.
However, Nokomis had stolen the me there, and I guess..I
took her place. I had to defeat her again, and the, that
Tala, and Alec..my brother, were able to get me here."
Pauses for a moment, stepping back, to study him once more.
"But you seem like you've been through something..more
emotional.."
Suddenly Ziyaluah's brow furrowed, "They've moved..." then
excitedly she said, "two of the Crystal Fighters have
figured out a way to get back!" Before saying another word
she whisked them off without a flash or any other visible
sign of magical energy use.
Reality 14
UA glared around him and morphed his hand into a rope with a sticky substance on the end. He
threw it out and stuck it on the warrant, "Guess it's good for something." he muttered literally reeling
himself in.
Reality 0
"Tala, Entropy!" Ziyaluah said, recognizing them immediately
"HOW did you get back here? We need to get everyone back to
their rightful realities..where are the other reality Tala
and Entropy? Were you able to send them back?"
Tala turns, hearing the question. Blinks, then shrugs
mentally, and repeats her answer.
"My brother sent me here. His crystal has teleporting
abilites..I suppose he can only jump realities once though.
And I think Tala helped him..she was more powerful.
As for mine being back in her rightful place..she is."
Ganthet nods approvingly. This was home. "You would not
believe the nightmare of a reality I was in. It was like
our world, but blended with something
else....~super-heroes~. It was as UA would say, "A horribly
mixed up comic crossover."
Entropy tries to mask his emotion again, switching back to
the steely look that most seem to expect of him. He looks
at Tala, then the other girl. "I was given a direct
translation back here by another Crystal fighter, one called
Ariah, who doesn't exist in this universe. He used some
kind of high-powered transportation beam to get me back. I
suppose he made me switch places with my double. Only one
question, though. Who are you, and what are you doing on my
ship?"
Before the girl can answer, Entropy starts getting
impatient. "Well?" Still no answer. "Hmph. Like I said,
Tala we've got bigger problems than the others being stuck
in those different dimensions. There's a race of beings
called the Angammon, who have one of their people here.
It's immensely powerful, and it's assimilating more of its
kind every second. But the worst part..."
"What?"
"It's landed on your homeworld."
Finally Ziyaluah regained her composure, it had taken her
quite a lot to get them here and she knew that she wouldn't
be able to shift realities again for at least a few months,
"You don't seem to understand..yes that is a threat..to a
few realities..but there are 14 realities that could
become eternally disrupted if the Crystal Fighters from this
world stay there. Work on your other problem as you wish,
but we ~must~ return the others, and quickly. Before..ah
this language is so limiting!" she looked like her world was
crashing in to smother her as she quickly ran through an
explanation, " I'm Ziyaluah. Rydia Lunaris," Tala and Ganthet were too confused to notice the
familiar name. "the leader of
our Circle whose purpose is to stop violence. I'm not at
liberty to discuss much, but I can tell you that we caused
this." she neglected to mention that she was the only Circle
member that had come to try and fix things, "We must bring
the rest of this reality's CFs back to this reality. I can
sense them and 'where' they are. I can no longer 'port
across realities and I can't travel through time," +Without
the help of the others.+ she added silently. It was hard
for her to ask for help like this, of the 'lesser' beings
that she protected, "I can't do this alone and we need to get
the others back here before they 'mess up' (for lack of
better term in this language) the realities that they're in.
This Angammon you said it was.. go after it if you wish, but
I ~must~ have help or not only with this reality collapse,
but so will all the others that have been disrupted."
She hated this language none of the words were exact enough
for what she wanted to say and it took so long to explain
these connects that required only a word of syllable in her
own language.
Reality 13
"Tala!" her brother exclaimed. The ship was gone, the people she had been talking to were gone.
Where was she? "I can't believe you finally killed Nokomis!" he exclaimed. Tala smiled, whatever
had happened it looked like things were getting better.
Reality 0
Tala's eyes open wide at Entropy's words. And then her gaze swings
back to the other, as she speaks. What to do? Save her
homeworld, or her friends? The way she was speaking, it
could be a lot worse if her friends weren't helped.
As it was, she now wished she had stayed back in that other
time, everything had seemed.. she gave herself a mental
shake. If all the realities could collapse, that was more
important that what was going on back home.
"I..I'll stay and help. Hopefully..there will be some of my
home to return to.." The last ended on a choked sob.
Entropy looks at Tala, worried. He then glares back at
Ziyaluah. He
hits a small button on his sleeve, and speaks into it.
"Dhaens, have every member of the science personnel report
to the main lab. There will be a girl waiting there to tell
them what to do. They are to accept her orders as if they
were my own. Got me?"
"Yes, sir!" Came the old hunter's voice.
Ganthet just held his head in his hands. Science made his
head hurt, magic made his head hurt. "I can help the
science team. With a little practice, I can adjust the
vibrations and bring the real CFs home. First, he should
gather their replacements here though. Perhaps, with
assistance, I can even prevent the realities from doing this
again."
"You've got all the resources you need, and all the brain
power too. It's 3 decks down from the lift, first hallway
to the left. Go." As the girl rushes off, a little
concerned, Entropy turns back to Tala, looking at her for a
moment, watching her bite her lip to hold back her tears.
~What the hell.~ he thinks, then pulls her close to him,
holding her in his arms. "I'm sorry, Tala. Honest to god,
I am. If you want me to let go, I will, just please don't
cry."
Reality 84
THE MINES
Ganthet steps over the severely beaten Nity, "It is a good
day for you to die honorless one." a blow from Ganthets
crystalline fists would surely finish Nity.
"No!!" Maia yells and swings her pick axe into Ganthets
chest and crystal explodes around them. A large dent is left
in Ganthet's chest.
"What is wrong with you?" Ganthet grabs Maia by the arm.
"Why do you protect that turncoat?" asks Zelda, giving her a look, as if Maia had just lost all and
any respect Zelda had had for her.
"I wont let you kill him."
"Restrain her till we finish this." says UA. Tala and Zealen
grab her by the arms and pull her way. "Now continue
Ganthet."
"My pleasure." he pulls back his fist and then he explodes
from laser fire, they look up and see Lavaz with a rifle in
his hands.
Reality 0
Tala composes herself after a few minutes, but stays next to him,
still somewhat in shock that those.. things.. are on her
planet. Why had Nokomis allowed them through? Unless she was
planning to do something with them, but that couldn't be the
case. Nokomis was a loner. Always had been, always would be.
She glances up at him, then wipes away the one tear that had
managed to escape.
"Hey..it's not your fault. Don't be sorry. These..things
happen, even to the best of us, I guess. And I'm not going
to cry now." Even though she still wanted to, but that could
wait. There'd be time enough for that later, this was more
important.
Before she left Ziyaluah turned back watching Entropy and
Tala for a few minutes, finally she spoke up, "Actually we
need not stay anywhere. We can work just as well from here
as from near your home planet or wherever it is you need to
go." she said, then quickly she left.
Entropy suddenly lets go, regaining his own composure. "The
science crew's is the main lab. We'll go to get that Angammon..don't worry about it Tala. And
Ziyaluah'll have all the resources she needs." He then quickly turns around,
heading for the Dragonstar. "I'll wait for you at the
docking port. You'd better get ready." As he rounds the
corner, he grabs his forehead, then turns toward the wall
and starts banging his head on it. "You IDIOT!" He
whispers to himself. "What the hell is wrong with you?
Any hunter worth his own a$$'d never do something this
stupid!" He puts it out of his mind, then continues down
towards the docking ports.
Reality -3
Pyro searches through the rubble for some clue how he got
there. He finds a vacant building and reaches the top. He
looks around when his reprieve is shattered by gun fire.
"What th'?" He dives next to a rock as the plane buzzes
him. It turns around for another pass.
"I don't think so" his arm suddenly opens up, revealing his
crystal surrounded by red energy, "KRIMSON BLAST" He points
his hand then releases a energy blast of ultra-hot energy,
lighting up the sky as it destroys the plane on contact.
Isle of Myst
Zaria cursed, this was harder than she thought and the
potion was wearing off. She had finally discerned what had
happened to the Crystal Fighters. She wished she had been
able to spend time on figuring it out in a timeless place so
that little damage would have been done, but it was too late
to think of that now, she needed to speak with what she
and..another had termed 'Kirka' the one that should never
have existed. She hoped desperately that she would not have
to destroy the one who held the same face as the one who she
had felt like a sister to when they had gone through the
training together.
Reality 0
Entropy looks back to the girl, thinking for a second.
After that whole thing with Tala, the last thing he needed
was to be in a small ship like the Dragonstar with her.
"All right, we'll all go. We might need the Omicron's extra
firepower." He then thinks again. Hmm, stuck with Tala or
stuck with Tala and 178 other people? "Even so, the
Dragonstar's much faster than the Omicron, Tala and I will
go ahead and keep them busy until the rest of you arrive.
Look, I know you must hate how I'm treating this whole
matter, but I have to help her people. If we do fix the
other realities, then the people killed on her world are
still dead. I can't play god and have that on my shoulders.
Understand?"
Ziyaluah nodded in understanding.
"Just whatever 'we'.. decide to do, don't get to close to my
planet. Nokomis will love to foul things up. She always
has."
Tala then turns to follow the girl, but glances to Entropy
for a moment.
"I think you and I will need to speak after all this is
said and done. I know something's bothering you."
Tala steps into the room where the other two are, and waits for
her to finish before speaking up. "One of the ones I wear
has some magical powers..if that will be of any help?"
"It
is possible that they might be of some use.." she said.
Then she closed her eyes to scan them. Her brow furrowed
and she opened her eyes, "Strange..I can't read
them..they're there yes, but I can't determine the scope of
their powers.."
Reality 1
Zelda, after conversing with Zealen a bit with neither
learning much more than they had before, Rupay decided
they might as well go back to the cabin, hoping they could
keep up the pretense long enough to figure something out.
They were hoping that they could get Nity..or whoever..to
help. Shasta ran out to greet
them, happy that they had returned. "Mother..you're still
not feeling well are you? Why are you so confused?" +How
does she know?+ Zelda thought, trying not to look to
strangely at her, "I-I'm not sure..what else can you tell?"
Shasta was used to these games with her mother, they
didn't play them as much anymore though, her mother was
confident of the scope of her psi powers. "Silly mom..how
can you feel like you don't belong here?" Zelda gave her a
half smile, "My memory isn't as good as it used to be I
guess..so refresh me please..where's your father?" "But
Zelda, you hate remembering that.." Nity said. They had
been walking as they talked and made it back into the cabin.
"Please?" He sighed wondering why she was acting so strangely
as he recounted the story, "After that #@$! McTorn found
that you were with child..Shasta" he remembered that if it
weren't for Shasta McTorn would never have let Zelda go, "He
left you on that star base..."
Zelda and Rupay exchanged a glance at the familiar name of
McTorn. "since you weren't of use to him anymore as
a..whore" he practically spat the word, "or psychic to aid him and increase his own psi
strength..(he didn't know that you had just passed most of
the psi powers you had to the child, to save you both) he
left you at that starbase. After that, well, Rupay and I
were at the star base, Rupay shielded my movements from
McTorns psi senses and we were able to sabotage McTorn's
ship..so we thought. McTorn found out and" his voice was
still full of suppressed fury, "We were slaves on his ship
until we met up with the Armagans..they blew the ship apart
except for the slave cell section which was a lucky break
Rupay hid our vital signs from them until they left and then
we took an escape pod which just got us as far as here..."
Rupay looked to Zelda and then back to Nity. "I remember
now." She nods.
Zelda's face was white, how did her other survive this? She didn't think she could have stood up to
that kind of thing..
Rya'u'sa
Rydia shook her head as she looked into her personal scrying
mirror, he daughter was trying to 'fix' things, she didn't
seem to understand why the Circle had done so much to stop
these Crystal Fighters. She loved her daughter, but a
lesson might have to be learned here.
Isle of Myst
Zaria sighed, she would have to intervene with Rydia..the
one that was never meant to be. Though they weren't of
the same reality, they both shared many characteristics..too
many.
Reality -3
Pyro relaxes in a gutted building, trying to sort out what
happened. "This can't be good. I've got to find a way to
get home." He suddenly feels the building shake, then a
section of the roof comes in. Three guys jump in with guns
blazing away. He uses his arm as a shield then releases a
jet of flame, obscuring their vision. He dives for his
battlemaster and releases a spray of fire, nailing all three of
them.
"I can't last long like this." He starts setting up some
defenses.
Reality 84
"Naughty naughty, you Crystal Fighters have been bad." they
scatter as Lavaz opens fire on them.
Maia is loose and runs over to Nity and pulls him up "Come
on we got to get out of here!" Nity leans on Maia as the run
from the laser fire.
Entropy and Krakken are the first to fall to Lavaz's hail of
death. Next is Rupay, Zealen, and Zelda.
Then Lavaz drops to the floor unconscious, or rather stunned
by a laser blast from Kisutsu who stands behind him.
Everything goes silent until Tala yells "Nity is getting
away, Maia is helping him!!" they, those that were left, give chase.
Reality 0
"You can't tell how powerful they are? My father came from
mages..that may.." Tala asked in surprise. Ziyaluah shook her head, my mother probably could,
but I don't have that kind of power yet."
A ship returns. Ganthet had left for about an hour, but
he'd returned. (Insert Ganthet's Sidestory) He
quickly rejoins the others. Sadly, none of the others had
returned. ~Are they the other Crystal Fighters?~ Solara
asks. ~Some of them, yes.~ replies Ganthet.
"Where were you?" asks Tala.
"Vile alarm went off, but I handled it. And, we have a new
CF," replies Ganthet.
"Well, where?" asks Tala again.
Ganthet pauses, then speaks. "Solara switch!" He
disappears and is replaced with Solara. "I'm Solara," she
says. "I can't hold my form for long, so Ganthet is
keeping me in his body. Something about his crystalline
nature and my light one allow this. I can switch places
with him for a time too. But...uhg. Ganthet switch!"
Ganthet reappears. "As of now, she can't do so for long."
There was a dramatic flash of light and a very
familiar figure stood before Tala. Rydia.
Entropy suddenly enters, carrying a few extra guns and null
grenades in addition to his normal sword. "Tala, the
Dragonstar's all ready, what's the hold-" He stops when he
notices Rydia. "Hey, glad you made it back. We need all
the help we can get to get rid of those Angammon." He then
turns back to Tala. "You ready?"
"Uhmm... Sure, I'm ready.I guess, as I'll ever be."
For a moment Rydia looked confused, "
"Back..? Oh...you mean Zelda, no she's still in another
reality. I'm an alternate version of the Crystal Fighter
you know." "Mother?" Ziyaluah whispered faintly, finally
regaining the ability to speak. Rydia turned a steel cold
glance at Ziyaluah, "You went ~directly~ against the Circle
and not only that but am I right in assuming that you are
~helping~ to reverse what we so painstakingly achieved?"
Ziyaluah turned her eyes down, her first reaction to admit
that she was wrong..but she wasn't..was she? She took a
breath and looked directly into her mother's eyes, "Yes. I
am helping them." Rydia sighed, "Don't you understand what
we've been trying to accomplish?"
" Wait a second." Entropy says, overhearing their
conversation. "YOU did this? YOU put us through all that
and then left us there to help along the collapse of all the
realities you sent us to?" Rydia, as casually as if someone
had asked her what time it was, looked up at him and nodded.
That did it.
"Ok, that's it!" Entropy snaps, grabbing his wristcom.
"Security to my position, I want Rydia Lunaris detained and
I want it done now. Bring a capture node, and use the
utmost caution."
Main Island
Previous StoryCF#18: Dissintion Within
NextPart V
Next StoryCF#12: Darkest Hour