"A Blast From the Past" Part Two AD 1989, that is 2364 Galactic Year [Daggoth Zedka (continued)] "Just great.. hmm.. peasant, get word out to the far reaches, contact the domains of those crazy people the Commodore users, and get me word out to those big guys, the PC users... we must mobilize and warn them..." "Ok sir, but even Excalibur Prem. and all the BCS board are overwhelmed with losses.." "Aw heck!" was all a despondent King-for-now could say.. [The Flip] [Title: Editor's Note: ] OH? I'M the KING? I want fascism! Kill all peasants! [Daggoth Zedka] Now that King-for-now Flip has decreed he wants fascism and to kill all peasants, a revolt must take place to overthrows him.. but he is supreme, as their are hardly any important people left... Meanwhile, back on the ship.. "Self destruct in 4 minutes..." "Guys, lets do SOMETHING" Spidey said "I ain't just going to die..." Then, Caldon got his phasers working, and fired a massive barrage at the "enemy" ship, destroyed it... then Caldon set to work on the auxilary power, shutting down the main engine, and preventing its self-destruction.. "As you see, fools, I am invincible.. I have enough power on this ship to destroy your Earth, and the Kroolons who dared to attack me.." Caldon said mightfully.. "I will crushed you planet, with its few remaining people, then I will conquer Kroolos, which is suffering the same fate as Earth is." "DORK!" Dr D yelled, "You'll never get Earth... heck we are too big for you to conquer, besides, look how many Chinese people there are.." "Fools... I have decimated all the races, at least 400 million on you planet have been taken... (which in esence, the 400 million must be divided down because of the duplicates.." "Well.. we're getting out of here," murmured several of the Joe's. "We have to.." "I'm scared, " said an Ophelia.. [Nomad of Norad] Meanwhile, down at Nomad's house, the three mages, Verilox, Pladgah, and the alien lad Pla'anuk sat around an electronic display. "Are you sure they went to this ship?" Verilox asked Joshua, the sentient computer that ran things in Nomad's house. There was an orbit trace on the screen, showing longitude, latitude, altitude and direction of orbit. "There is a battle going on... correction, the battle just ended." "Well," said the young boy, leaning on his Staff of the Ancients, "my spaceship is repaired now except for... for..." "Cosmetic repairs?" suggested Pladgah. "Yeah," said the lad, "cosmetic repairs." "So we can go up there and try to rescue them?" said Verilox. "Yeah, sure!" said Pladgah. "After they just demolished a whole fleet of battlecruisers!" "Yes," said Verilox, "but *we* are Mages! They'll never know what hit them!" He paused, looked towards the boy. "Especially if we go up cloaked!" "Cloaked?" said the lad. "But my ship doesn't have a cloaking device..." "We can cloak ourselves using the Staffs," said Verilox, holding up his Staff. "You don't need to use the Staffs to cloak the RED 417," said Joshua, "I have a cloaking device in storage." "You do?" asked Pladgah. "Are you sure it is compatible with a Ydnaatian starship?" "Yes," said Joshua. "I will teleport it aboard the RED 417 and you can install it when you board. It is very simple to install, it comes with instructions." The Three Mages exchanged glances, each nodded. "Ok," said Verilox, "let's go!" He went towards the door and the others filed after him. * * Sometime later, the cloaked ship arrived at the alien ship. They flew through the force curtain into the docking bay and landed, uncloaking. The main lock opened and Verilox stepped out, followed by Pladgah. Verilox glanced over the large group and whistled in disbelief. The group was huge! "Well," said Verilox, "let's get aboard. We can restore you to normal on our way home." "One of the Daggoth duplicates is gone!" said a Nomad. "Gone?" said Pladgah. "Dead, and washed down the drain," said a Captain R/C. "Drain?" said Verilox. "A drain in a docking bay?" "Yes," said a King Powell, "and it was written that the body was never recovered. "Hmmm," said Verilox, "I have an idea. Will the remaining Daggoths step forward?" They did. "Ok," said Verilox. He held up his Staff and it glowed, the glow spread to cover the eleven Daggoths. Suddenly a blob of goop appeared next to them, and a flask appeared around it. The glow faded and Verilox picked up the flask. "How did you do that?" asked five of the Daggoths. "Oh I just got your DNA pattern and used it to locate and bring back your missing self." Verilox gathered up everyone in a power globe and took them into the ship. "But... but... but..." sputtered Spidey. "It said in a previous entry that the body would never be retrieved!" "So?" said Verilox. "Dr Depraved wrote that segment, didn't he?" "Well, yeah," said Spidey. "So?" "Well, he seems to kill characters in the stories alot, doesn't he?" "Yeah, I guess so" "And Nomad doesn't care for that. And he's writing this segment!" The airlock closed and the ship left the docking bay, having cloaked again. "Is the story over now?" asked a Daggoth. "No," said a Nomad, "we still have to find out why he took us. I suspect there's something near where we live that he wants and he took us out of the wa so he could get it without us interfering." Sometime later the starship RED 417 landed near CommHex and let off its passengers. Everyone had been restored to one-ness. The three mages remained aboard, thinking they might be needed later but wanting to get out of the story for now because the no-one else was posting on the story board while he was in the story... Nomad and several other Dukes and such walked off to the Keep to discuss what it could possably be that the aliens wanted. * * * * * * * [Daggoth Zedka] "D*mn those humanoids..." Caldon screeched angrily. "I was so close to obtaining my objective of recovering the Transmutor Device.... all I needed to do was get rid of the remaining hierachy at the place called Castle Hex.. and then dig beside to retrieve the device." Meanwhile "Hmm.... yeah I wondered what that slimy alien wanted," said Daggy, "but it's good to be home.." "And we owe thanks to the mages for getting us home... but you realize our encounter with Caldon wasn't our last... there's something he must want on Earth very badly to take out our leaders," Nomad surmised. "Maybe we wanted to stop Tour de Trump," suggested Spidey. [Captain R/C] The group was relieved when they finally crossed the drawbridge of Castle Hex. It was good to be in familiar territory. It was good to see the eternal peace that dwelled inside the walls of Cast... But wait! When the grouped entered the courtyard, they saw Flip, standing on top of a wooden crate delivering what appeared to be a speach. Only about four people were listening. Some were playing quarter football. Some were thumb wrestling. And others were in the back with a sack of tomatoes and an evil grin on their faces. It was apparent to any moron that Flip did not make a good King Emporer Overlord and when Flip recieved the first tomato on his face, it was apparent that he could not govern the world, much less a single castle. "FLIP!!!" yelled Joe. "WHAT HAVE YOU DONE HERE!?" "J-joe!? H-how nice to see you again.."said Flip with both an element of suprise and shock in his voice. The citizens were commanded to go back to their normal chores. Joe took Flip off to some quiet corner of the castle where they could 'discuss' things in a rational manner. ".....and to think I made you Grand Duke!" concluded Joe. "Don't feel bad, Joe. Making me Grand Duke wasn't one of your worst mistake. Your worst one was giving Dr. Depraved Arch Duke,"said Flip. ..it would be days before total normalcy would return to the Hex, but, meanwhile, the Aliens were still out there lurking.. waiting... praying.... * * * * * [Doctor Depraved] "What do you mean making Dr. Depraved an Arch-Duke was a mistake!" yelled King Joe. "I ought to make you a PEASANT! don't EVER make that remark again!" screamed Shammy. "Aww...look. You've made Dr. D cry," said Joe. "Get out of here PEASANT R/C..and DON'T come back!" ...and...to please Nomad...Dr. D. found and killed someone. [The Flip] "Hehehehe....HAHAHAAHAHAHAH...heheheheheeeheee...nyuknyuk," laughed Flip insanely. "Well, here come the men in the white coats," noticed Nomad. [Doctor Depraved] "Whoops...Flip's Gone mad..." "Well...what do we do?" "I don't know..." "Maybe we could get a moose as a substitue?" "What kinda stupid idea is that?" "I don't know...same mentality..." "Cluck!" [Nomad of Norad] Aboard Koala Bear's starship, in orbit above the Hex, Captain Koala arrived at the bridge and settled into the captain's chair. "Welcome back," said Sarteel, his first officer. "Put the alien ship on the main screen," said K-Bear. "Done," said the ensign, who then suddenly turned back to his captain and said "Sir! They've just launched those mini-ships again!" Koala Bear smiled impishly. "Do you get any life readings from them?" he asked of the ensign. "Uh... no sir." Koala Bear smiled wider. "Good. Shoot them down!" "Yes sir!" The ensign armed the secondary guns and fired off eleven shots. "Done," he said. "Good," said K-Bear. "That should force Caldon out of his hole in the ground!" He was of course speaking figuratively. Meanwhile, back down at the Castle Hex... [Captain R/C] Meanwhile, back down at Castle Hex, Flip was locked in his room, but not by his own doing, mind you... 17.3 peasants carried him to his quarters (in this case, the olde hayloft) while Joe locked the door and hung the key on the opposite wall for Flip to see and go crazy over. Flip started thinking to himself.. Hmm, maybe I shouldn't have made everyone eat Pastrommi on Rie every night.. Maybe I shouldn't have made everyone take one bath a day.. And maybe making all the little villagers of Castle Hex wash my Porsche every day.. Oh well.. It's to late for that now.. Flip still thought.. If only I could get thay key and get out of here and lead an army on an attack against Caldon... `Yeah, that would be a great idea!' Thought Flip's skitzophrenic alter-ego. (not the REAL Skitzophrenic Alter Ego!) Great, a re-lapse. I wonder if Hood is still perverted....... So were the hours of sitting in the hayloft... BUT, deep in space aboard Caldon's ship: "...he did what?!"stormed Caldon. "He shot down the last of our reconnosance probes! How are we ever going to get the DNA samples now?!" "Great.. The high wizard back on Kryptonus (Caldon's home planet) isn't going to be happy.." "Well, he could always post pone his Super-human project," said the first officer. "He would never hear of it. I guess we'll have to just go down there and take them by force.. stupid Earthling-shmucks! If only the one they call Flip were in charge, it'd be SOO easy!" "But sir, what about those wizards, there?" "Which ones?" "The ones that always hang around with that bear and shoot down reconnosance probes!" "Oh, them.... well... uhh.. have we used our secret weapon yet?"asked Caldon. "Not...(gasp)..not the....."gasped the officere. "Yes... Ready the.. PAST BLASTER!"barked Caldon. The officer got an evil grin on his face. "Hey, geeks! How about a blast from the past!! Bua-hahaha!!" He pushed several buttons which opened up a secret panel that read 'Past Blaster' and had a single red button. "I'm gonna enjoy this! HAHAHAHA!!!"said the officer maniacally. "Number One, you're all right," grinned Caldon as he looked over his shoulder. Back in the hay loft: "I wonder if there's a good Far Side book laying around..." said Flip. Boredom sucks. [Nomad of Norad] [Title: Past blaster?!?! ] Meanwhile, in another part of the Hex: the Doc, that guy who created all the giant mutant cockroaches and sundry other uglies and who runs the torture chamber (and not to be confused with The Fourth Doctor or Doctor Depraved), finished his report on the crashed mini-ship. He left his lab and went to find K.E.O. Joe. "Ah! Joe, I was just going to look for you!" he said upon turning the corner. "Doc? You finished the examination of the mini-ship?" "Yeah, a bit late I suppose... but better late than never." He shrugged indifferently. "Anything interesting?" "Well, not only do they capture people and split them into twelve tiny duplicates, they *also* function as unmanned probe ships!" "Hmmmm..." Meanwhile, aboard Koala Bear's starship: "Sir!" yelled the ensign. "They're bringing out some kind of... giant gun!" On the screen, a large panel had just finished folding open on top of the alien ship. A gun was lifting out the ship, a gun the size of a house. It turned and aimed towards Koala's ship! "Sheilds to full power!" yelled K-Bear. "Take evasive action!" Even as the ship rushed away, the huge gun fired. The blast, a bright flickering crimson, missed them by a BEARest smidgeon. (Ooops! Escuse the pun! -Ed) Koala's ship danced a snake's dance, heading for the other side of the planet. Another blast flashed by them on the other side. It was large enough to envelope the whole ship! Suddenly, just as they reached the point where the planet was coming between them and Caldon's ship, the gun scored a direct hit! All the bridge was flickering crimson and all the bridge crew felt a strange sensation, a sensation like falling mingled with a strong tingling sensation. The effect lasted for less than a second as the ship rushed past the horizon. Suddenly K-Bear found he was literaly on the edge of his seat, his legs no longer reaching the floor. He glanced at his hands and then at his now-small body, and then around him. He saw that the ensign could no longer function as an ensign. "Sarteel!" yelled Koala in a small-boy voice. "Take over helm! Slow us down!" A two-year-old Sarteel threw off the adult-sized shirt that covered him completely and ran to the helm, reaching up onto the controls surface and frantically entering the commands. The ship slowed to orbital speed. Five-year-old Koala slipped down from his chair and started forward. "Is the ensign... still there?" He shuddered at the thought of the poor young man being regressed right out of existance. "He's here," responded the first officer, lifting clothes off the helm seat. "He's a newborn now." He glanced up. "We're lucky, he's the youngest one aboard. If HE'S still here, then the whole crew is still with us." [Nomad of Norad] [Title: Hmmm... and a bit more. ] "Whew!" said the captain. "What would have happened had they hit us with a full blow?" He shuddered more strongly, the ship would have been empty! "Damage reports!" The officer at the comms station, standing atop his chair, turned to peer over the back of his chair. "No damage, sir." "Good," said the captain. It suddenly came to Sarteel that he wasn't wearing a thing. He quickly grabbed at the ensign's shirt where it lay on the floor and lifted a part up to cover himself. Several other crew members were performing similar actions or had already done so, though a few of them just ignored the problem as being unimportant. "I suppose," said Koala, "that we had best have the computer fabricate us a lot of children's sized uniforms." At least HE didn't need clothes, his fur provided covering. He turned to the comms station. "Jontath, call ship's stores and have them make new uniforms... uh... make six or seven different sizes, skipping a few sizes at a time. We'll each pick sizes that come closest to fitting. There's no need for an exact fit..." He then added, "Oh yes, and call a second helmsman up here." He turned to his first officer. "Sarteel, watch for the alien ship, if you spot it... no, on second thought, take us out of orbit and move us behind the moon. I don't want them to find us again." Meanwhile, back at the Hex... The Doc had just finished telling everyone in the Parapet about his findings. "DNA?" said Nomad. "The ships send DNA patterns up? I wonder why..." "I can't figure it out," confided The Doc. He shrugged indifferently. At that point Nomad's communicator started to beep. He pulled it out and flipped it open. "Nomad here." "Nomad," said Joshua, the computer at Nomad's house, "Caldon has launched a landing craft from his ship. It has gone to cloak though, so I can't track it." "Well," said Nomad, "he is likely coming down here, which is what we've been waiting for. When he lands and leaves his ship, it should be possible to find him. You CAN detect an alien like him, can't you? Start scanning all around you for miles and miles, scanning in a steady sweep. He's bound to show up before long. As soon as you find him, tell us where he is." "Okay," said Joshua. "Talk to you later. Out." "Out," said Nomad, and flipped closed his communicator. "Well," he said to the others, "it is now a waiting game. I just wish we knew what he was looking for." [Daggoth Zedka] "We need those DNA samples.....at least that Koala Bear's ship will not bother us again," said Caldon. "Sir, we missed!" said a lieutenant.. "Froid-nyeb!" screamed Caldon.. "Sir, if we don't get the DNA back to Kryptonus in two earth days, our people will die," said the lieutenant. "Prepare a full scale attack, and get a report from the spy we sent down!" screeched Caldon. [Nomad of Norad] "Sir," said the lieutenant, "we may not need to attack to get the DNA patterns." "Oh?" said Caldon. "One of our probe ships is still down there, the one that crashed, remember? I am still getting a weak remote-linking signal from it." He punched some buttons. "I am running a diagnosis program." He stared at a small screen at his station for a moment. "Yes, we can get our DNA scans from it, though the probe can do little else now." He punched more buttons. "It will now scan and record the DNA of anyone that gets near it. I suggest we have our spy arrange for the right people to go there." "Excellent!" excaimed Caldon. "And now," said the lieutenant, "we still need to go down and retreive the transmuter device." "I have already sent down a team for that," said Caldon, "in a cloaked ship." * * * * * * * An hour or so later Nomad was sitting at a game console playing half-board chess with Cappy. The hologram of the white queen moved across the board and took the place of one of the black knights. "Gotcha!" said Cappy. Nomad just stared ahead. "I gather your mind isn't on the game," said Cappy, "you are playing worse than usual." Nomad finally turned his eyes to the board, and then laughed and shook his head. "I don't even know why I play this game. I never win." He stared at the chessboard a moment, noticed that R/C's queen endangered his one bishop, and then moved the bishop back to its original square. "What's eating you?" asked the Captain. "It's been over an hour now, shouldn't the aliens have landed and left their ship by now?" asked Nomad. "Well," said Cappy, "maybe they were just performing surveillance. K-Bear DID shoot down their mini-ships, didn't he?" "Yes... still, I suppose I aught to call Joshua and get a status report...." He pulled out his communicator, flipped it open, and checked to be sure the scrambler was on. "Nomad to Joshua," he said. He waited. "Nomad to Joshua!" he said more emphatically. "Joshua! Respond! RESPOND!" He jumped up from the console and tried one last desperate call. "Joshua! Do you read me!" Finally, hearing no response, he changed frequencies. "Nomad to RED 417, emergency!" "RED 417, Verilox speaking. What's the emergency?" "Tell Pla'anuk to prepair to launch, I think my house may be under attack or even captured! I can't raise Joshua! D*mnit I should have known they'd detect the scans and triangulate!" "I'll tell him immediately," said Verilox. "I'll go get the other Intrepid Group members," said Captain R/C, getting up from the games console. "Have them go put on the powered armor and then meet me at the ship," said Nomad to Cappy. He said into the communicator, "I'll join you in a bit, out." "Understood," said Verilox, "out." The cloaked RED 417 hovered over Nomad's house, Nomad and the three mages studied the view on the main screen. The house was rectangular with rounded corners, the concrete walls angled upwards at a shallow slant (or could the walls be called a roof?) and then stopped to frame a rectangular section of glass vaulted ceilings that was sunk a tad below the top. Under the glass section was a kind of mini-park, with an artificial stream that had a small clearsteal bridge running across it. There were a couple of fountains in and near the stream and a couple of tables around the stream. Behind the walls around the indoor park, where it was not possible to put rooms because of the slant of the concrete roof, were installed all the scanning equipment, communications aerials, teleport machinery and so forth. The alien ship had landed to one side of the house, and the force dome covered the whole house AND the invading ship. Scanners showed that the main entrance had been blown wide open, and the ship was transmitting a jamming signal. Several aliens of Caldon's race milled about OUTside the force dome, however. "Hmmmm," said Nomad, "looks like Joshua took care of the problem." "How?" asked Pla'anuk, the alien boy whose ship they were riding in. "Well," said Nomad, "they obviously forced their way in, and Joshua teleported them right back out again!" He smiled impishly. "That was one of our little defense systems, he used to test it out on me every April Fools Day." The boy giggled. Nomad could imagine how it must have happened. The invading ship had suddenly emerged from cloak already landed next to the house, the aliens had then started jamming all signals and had then come swarming out of the ship. But when they tried to get inside the house they suddenly found themselves teleported a mile away from it, and upon coming back they found the house and their ship surrounded by the force dome. Served them right. "You sure they're ALL outside the force dome?" asked Nomad. "Yes," said the kid. "Good," said Nomad, smiling very wide. "Stun them all! We can drag them inside and take them back to the Castle. It's time we got some answers!" "Why don't we just teleport them aboard?" suggested Pla'anuk. "Yes, of course," said Nomad, "teleport them aboard!" The alien boy turned and brought the teleport control up onto his console and was about to commense beaming when Nomad said "Wait! Scan them first, make sure they aren't wearing any booby traps." "Scanning," said Verilox. After a moment, he said "No booby traps." "Good," said Nomad. He turned and pressed the intercom dot beside him. "Ok guys, we are about to bring the enemy agents aboard, stunned and waiting to be taken back to the Hex. I want you to put manacles on them all as soon as they materialize." He motioned to the boy. "Beaming," said Pla'anuk. A couple of seconds later he said "They are aboard." "Scan the immediate area," said Nomad, "make sure there aren't any other aliens hiding somewhere a ways off." Verilox widened the area of the scan to a two-mile radius. Nomad looked at the main screen a moment. The force dome, in all its purplish-red glory, was still up. Nomad wondered about that. Wouldn't Joshua have noticed the aliens had been dealt with? There was no way to contact him, the now-empty hostile ship was still jamming any signals going in or out, but that wouldn't prevent Joshua from seeing what had happened. He had external video. "Why hasn't Joshua dropped the force dome?" he asked, more than a bit of uneasiness in his voice. Verilox said "I detect no-one outside the force dome. I cannot determine whether there isn't someone withIN it, however. Something in that ship is blocking our scans." "But... but... Joshua would have teleported ALL intruders out!" explained Nomad. "Unless... unless...." Some color drained from Nomad's face. He turned and pressed the intercomm dot again. "Guys, it looks like we may NOT have all of them. At least one alien may have been wearing a personal force field. Joshua could not have teleported him out like he did the others."