31 March, 2001

11:54 PM

Advanced Technology and Research Laboratory, Jump City, California.

"I… I think we've made a breakthrough!" One young scientist called out. "The chronitons… they're displacing!" She beckoned her coworkers with a slim hand and a flick of long, black hair.

A quick shuffling of feet, and countless faces surrounded the one seated man. They scrunched their eyes up at the screen and read the display. The first reaction was a gasp. "But they're not being destroyed… time isn't stopping in the test area."

As the scientists collectively rose and looked ahead, they saw a canister. It was a thin, cylindrical apparatus, hanging from the middle of the white ceiling to the bottom of the equally stainless tile floor. The room it was in contained nothing but a single, multi-lock door. The scientist input a keystroke, and within the canister, something stirred. It was a nigh-invisible pulse, known only to those watching the screen.

"However, it may be because the time displacement isn't significant enough to report anything. The wristwatch we placed in the canister isn't showing any side effects either," a bearded scientist droned.

"What should we do? Increase chromium concentration?" the young scientist piped up.

The bearded scientist stroked his white whiskers. "No… increase the canister's temperature. If we want to destroy the chronitons, then we may as well break scientific law—we will annihilate them."

The young scientist seemed worried. "B-but sir…"

"Do it," the old man glared.

Gulping, she pushed a lever forward, and the room ahead of her took on a red hue.

"A discovery will be made tonight…"

0=0

A figure in orange armor landed on a rocky outcropping. It rained across the gray sky, pelting the figure's green visor with tiny droplets. She raised her right arm—a dark green cannon—and surveyed her surroundings. She walked forward, stepping down and away from her similarly-armored spacecraft. As she walked, she pressed a number of buttons that flipped out on the cannon's side.

Blip. Bl-blip.

A map appeared on the visor displaying a limited view of her surroundings. Peering off to the side, there was a small cave. Walking through it was not a hassle, but the next visible opening was a small hole, about twice the size of a soccer ball. The armored figure curled up into a ball, converted into blue energy, and encased herself in an orange armored ball. She rolled through the opening and converted back to her previous humanoid shape in a flash of bright blue light. To the left was a waterfall with various rocky outcroppings. It was a sight of serenity. Out there the rain continued to fall, and the figure walked towards what appeared to be a carved-out hallway.

Blip, blip.

The visor displayed a screening of the very next area beyond the hallway—there was high-energy reading coming from there. Its pace quickened, but slowed once in the immediate area. It was sandy, but there were four stone pillars, ancient and hardly recognizable as artistic. There was a certain stillness in the area, yet there was a disturbance. Something felt off. Sand-covered birds flew overhead in the clear sky.

The walls were adorned with statues of humanoid birds. Long, gangly limbs, piercing eyes, thin beaks, wide shoulders.

The figure raised her arm cannon. Nothing stirred. An airborne ripple. Was it a threat? Was it a living thing? She seemingly couldn't tell, and cautiously walked towards the center of the ripple. A small but incessant beeping alerted her to the aggregate amount of danger in a given radius. The beeping decreased the closer the figure got to the source, and thus surmised there was no threat—she lowered her weapon.

She walked closer.

The ripple shuddered again. The figure reached out her armored left hand to touch the ripple, and her fingers partially disappeared. In surprise she recoiled, pulling her fingers back. Surprisingly, those digits were still intact. Relieved, the figure seemed to confidently walk towards the ripple, immersing herself in it.

Warbling could be heard across the planet.

She was gone.

0=0

He hopped on top of one floating block, jumped off with hard, brown work shoes, and plummeted down to stomp on a brown mushroom-like entity with large, cartoonish eyes and a toothy grin. It flattened in an instant. He bounced off, flipping over himself and landing gracefully. He adjusted his red cap and rugged overalls with spotless white gloves, wiggled his black mustache, and dashed towards a tall mountain. To his left was a giant flail attached to a wooden post. It was over three times the size of the capped man, and its chain wriggled behind it. The flail had eyes and a gigantic mouth, like Pacman's hellish twin. It appeared to have a bite much worse than its bark, and it gnashed its teeth together in unblinking watchfulness.

It guarded a golden star, kept captive in a wrought iron cage in the side of a marble-white hill. It shone in its captivity, spinning about as if it were free. Mysteriously, though it could freely twirl about itself, it would not slip itself through the thick, spaced bars.

The monster kept its googly eyes on the mustachioed man, all the while gnashing its teeth. As the man slowed his approach, the monster slid in order to remain in front of him. The man suddenly dashed. The monster charged with surprising speed, knocking the man back quite a distance. "Doh!"

"RUFF! RUFF!" The monster loudly barked.

He stood up, wheezed, and brushed himself off. "Mama mia," he sighed in a thick Italian accent. He immediately sprinted, jumped once, jumped closer again, and jumped a third time—flipping forwards acrobatically over the monstrous ball-and-chain. As the metallic creature slammed back to the ground, the man planted his feet atop it, vaulted off, and pounded his shoes into the wooden post, shoving it into the ground. "Yah!"

The monster's chain snapped.

It hesitated, gnashed its teeth, and stared into nothing. The monster rushed back and forth, avoiding the mustached man, and rammed its seemingly indestructible self into the iron cage.

The cage was smashed apart. The monster barked again, and leapt up and over the hill, leaving the Italian with the spoils. Not wasting any time, he rushed up and jumped towards the golden prize. "Here we go!" he shouted exuberantly. A ripple shimmered ahead of the star, but the glowing object neither saw nor could tell.

The mustached Italian was denied.

0=0

The two-edged sword glinted as it was twirled and sheathed. As the blue hilt clicked with the sheath, a pair of green-skinned, horned orc-like creatures exploded into magic, black dust. He was the last one standing. He himself was dressed in a green tunic and elfin hat, a leather belt, brown boots and gauntlets, white leggings, and chain mail. Well armed and armored, he placed his shield behind him. He ran a rough hand through his dirty blonde hair, avoiding the points of his ears, and sighed. He walked through the forest, content that he had slain the last of them for a while. Golden light softly cut through the leaves, warming him. The forest opened up to a clearing, a wide, green field below a pleasant blue sky. A castle lay in the distance. His lips curved as he started towards the stone walls.

From behind the trees, at least a dozen more of the orc-like creatures peered at the complacent warrior. They looked at each other. A number nodded. The creatures slinked back behind the trees.

The warrior was alone. Without a care, he was distinctly unguarded and off-guard. The creatures could have struck at any time, and he would be oblivious and vulnerable.

He thought of his home, found in another nearby forest. His childhood friends, the youngsters that wanted to be just like him, and the rampaging goats. He laughed at the thought.

"Mr. Link! WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIT!" came a voice in the distance. Link cringed. The source of the voice drew closer and closer, revealing a lanky man in a fit white tunic and a tall red hat. A flag was on his back, vaguely spelling out the words 'Postman' in some nondistinct script. "Huh-hoo, huh-hoo, huh-hoo!" He reached the warrior. "Greetings, Mr. Link! I have come to deliver a letter."

Link looked confused, and rubbed his capped head.

"There is a letter for you, Link. Two letters, in fact!" The Postman reached into a space behind him and pulled out a pair of red envelopes. He hummed a tune.

Apprehensively, Link reached out to grab the letters.

The Postman saluted, and proudly stated, "Well, my business is concluded. Onward to mail!" He turned about and jogged in the direction from which he came. "Huh-hoo, huh-hoo, huh-hoo!" His voice disappeared into the distance.

Link rubbed his face. He put the letters into a small pouch behind him… with six more crumpled, unread letters. The sky above was a ominous, hazy yellow above the castle.

A grunt. The green-clad warrior turned.

An empty field.

A grunt. Closer. Link fingered his sword's hilt. He shifted his eyes left, then right. Empty field.

Behind!

As Link twirled, he brought both hands down, sword in tow. Three of the creatures were severed in two while the remainder swarmed about on Link's rear, armed with clubs and brutish blades. Link brandished his blade and shield and positioned the sharper of the two horizontally behind him. He held the shield close by as he crouched low. The creatures did not hesitate—and immediately charged him from all sides. Something glinted in Link's eyes as he began to spin on one foot, slashing his sword in a violent pirouette of pain. Not expecting this, the orc-like beings were all slashed away, grunting in midair. They all landed flat on their backs, unmoving in the slightest… except for one.

Link flourished his sword, hung his shield on his back, and sheathed it. In like manner as before, the creatures dissipated in a puff of black smoke. The warrior continued towards the castle, where the sky became increasingly dark. Link averted his gaze upward, where dark particles hovered in the air like falling ash.

The atmosphere seemed unnerving. Shimmering waves of air appeared across the castle walls and in front of Link. He looked to that castle in horror.

The one remaining creature charged into Link, crude blade gnarled yet ready. Unaware, the warrior was shoved forward, into nothing.

Bewildered, the creature took cautious steps towards where just a few seconds ago, his prey lingered. It rubbed its leather-clad skull, and slashed at the air ahead of him. His sword disappeared and reappeared. "Ehh?" It slashed again. The sword was gone and there again.

The creature pulled out a bullhorn and blew into it, sending a cacophony of a trumpet sound across the empty plain.

It hobbled away from the ripple as a torrent of angry hooves pounded the green earth from afar.

0=0

"Split up and take it to 'em!" the leader spoke into the communicator. His aircraft was sleek, shaped like an arrowhead. Its one thruster surged, and it soared through the air towards a lone building among snowy hills. His wingmen, each flying the same craft, trained their sights on the numerous square-shaped ships swarming out and around the base. "This is the base?"

"Seems like it," came an aged voice.

One enemy ship was shot down. "Scratch one bogey," came another. This voice sounded like it belonged in New York.

A pair of square ships took aim on the leader. Smirking vulpine lips, he maintained cruising speed for barely a second before looping up and over the paired craft as they began a steady stream of red laser fire. "Wait, what happened?" One of the pilots shouted.

"We lost visual!" the other reported. The two banked right, steering their craft back towards the base. In an instant, the arrow-like craft was behind them, firing blue lasers at their exhaust. One stream hit home. "Behind?! Evasive maneuvers!"

"No chance!" the leader confidently shouted. He pulled the trigger, showering the slower craft with powerful plasma. It wobbled, it weaved, but it wouldn't take the punishment. The target's engines cut. Trailing red fire and smoke, the craft fell from the sky.

"Jimmy!" the other called out to his fallen wingmate. "You'll pay for this, Star Fox!"

The leader laughed. "Haha, we're just mercenaries." He pulled the trigger again, ending the remaining ship's days.

"Good going, Fox!" the aged voice came over the comlink.

"Thanks, Peppy. There should be a few more to go, let's take 'em out!" Fox said.

Ripples shimmered in the air of the planet. Some wrinkled over the air above the base, others stationed closer to the mountains. The Star Fox members paid no mind to it, shutting down square spacecraft left and right. Fox and the ace pilot Falco shot down a fairly large amount of rogue craft, while the other two picked off the stragglers.

The most sluggish of the four team members was a young, sprightly frog with a red cap named Slippy. He frequently was chased by enemy craft, requiring saving by the other members. Despite this, he served well as a keen analyst. Falco and Peppy often picked on Slippy for incompetent flying. The team was rounded out by a robot on board their mothership, the Great Fox.

A mechanical voice buzzed over the comlink. "Anomalies detected on planet's surface."

Fox had a quizzical look on his face. "What kind of anomalies, ROB?" His lasers struck home with an aircraft, exploding the engine from within. The craft was obliterated in midair.

"Scanners indicate temporal-spatial rifts in numerous locations across this planet," it replied. "Flying in this airspace would be ill-advised, Fox."

"We'll have to chance it. We have to defend the base. Can you send down coordinates?" A square fell from the sky, scraping away at the ground instead. A number of fighters began to head on an evacuation route.

ROB buzzed. "Affirmative. Sending coordinates now."

"Fox, come in!" Slippy's high voice squeaked across the airwaves. "I have a question for you!"

Suspiciously, Fox uttered, "Go ahead, Slippy." He shot down another aircraft.

"If we're supposed to be defending this, why are the ships running away?"

"Because we're… winning?" Fox hesitantly said as another ship was blown apart.

"Even then, they have us severely outnumbered."

Fox rolled his eyes and sighed. "Geez, can anyone take care of it?" He swerved to avoid a ripple. Each rift began to grow larger and larger, overtaking some part of the base and the mountains. Pieces of the landscape began disappearing. Gritting his teeth, he pulled the controls hard to the right to steer away from another ripple. "There're too many! I can't avoid them all!"

"Keep it together, Fox!" Peppy encouraged. His aircraft rolled in the air, narrowly avoiding a ripple himself. Another appeared beside him. "They're everywhere!" Peppy guided his craft to and fro, dodging rifts like they were solid pillars. There was a large beeping on Peppy's radar. A giant rift lay ahead, and it was growing at an alarming rate. It swallowed a tower, a mountain, and a large patch of the earth below that. Peppy pulled hard at his controls, braking and flying up. Performing a quick u-turn, he jetted off in the opposite direction.

And into a rift. "Oh… no."

Peppy disappeared.

"Peppy?" Fox called into the speaker. "Peppy? Report!"

"He's gone!" Falco said, incredulous. He shot down a ship and gunned his engines towards the rift Peppy disappeared in. "I'm goin' after him!"

Slippy pulled at his joysticks and jetted in that direction as well. "Don't count me out!"

Determined, Fox took one look towards the sky. "Sorry, General." Fox pushed his thruster to maximum.

The three followed their friend into the unknown.

ROB was still there in space, within the hull of the giant spacecraft. It crossed its arms, giving off a mechanical smirk. "Fleshlings."

0=0

1 April, 2001

12:34 AM

Advanced Technology and Research Laboratory, Jump City, California.

The lab was quiet. Lights flickered on and off. Scientists were strewn across the darkened floor and broken apparatuses. Sparks flew from half-functional devices. The glass separating the control room and the room with the canister was shattered. The canister itself lay in broken pieces on the cold tile floor. Smoke filtered up from the ruins, and four giant holes could be seen in the once-pristine walls. Long, trench-like gashes were seen in the tile, the ceiling, and the walls. The holes and gashes led out into the cold spring night, where smoke continued to rise from four craters. There was no ripple to be seen or sensed.

Robin planted his steel-toed boots on the laboratory rooftop. His eyemask narrowed at the sight of the rising smoke. Starfire hovered next to him, followed by a squawking Beast Boy. He shook off a few green feathers from his arm. Below, a blue-and-white vehicle screeched to a stop next to the craters. Cyborg and Raven stepped out of the T-Car. Under the light of the moon, the Teen Titans stood ready.

Robin called out into the smoke cloud. "We know you're there! Come out!"

A large popping sound urged from the cloud, followed by a clanking sound. In a brief second, there was a straight line of transparent blue between the top of the smoke cloud and Robin. He crossed his arms to guard himself, but there was no impact. Robin stood for a moment, holding his pose. "What happened?" He was answered with a harsh blow to the small of his back. In the midst of the Teen Titans, an anthropomorphic fox crouched. He wore a helmet that covered very little of his head, as his vulpine ears were largely in the way. He dashed and sent a flying red-and-black boot towards Robin. Seeing this, the Boy Wonder dodged to the side and fired off a steel-toed boot of his own at the passing fox. The animal growled and backflipped up and over it, hooking a gloved fist at the masked face.

Cyborg blocked the blow with his palm, gripped it, and flung the fox into the sky. "You gotta do better than that!" His right arm formed a sonic cannon, and zapped a bright blue beam towards the airborne foe. "RAAAUGH!" The fox gasped, and hastily pulled out a small, hexagonal device and angled it towards the ground. A blue field formed in front of him, reflecting the beam down towards the android's feet.

Cyborg was knocked to the ground, and Starfire swooped in with a starbolt-charged fist. "HAA!" Not reacting in time, the fox uttered a curse as he plummeted towards the ground.

Raven meditated. "Azarath Metrion Zinthos!" Some of the rubble from the broken lab wall was coated in black energy and hurled in the fox' direction. The blue field rose again, reversing the momentum of the rocks and hurtling them down and away. Beast Boy charged in from behind as a ram and plowed his horns into the fox's gray-jacketed back. He flew back into the building side, trashing more of the battered wall. He groaned, out for the count.

Eyemask thin, Robin walked over to the fallen animal. Cyborg performed a quick scan, noting, "He's still alive. We just got him good."

"What would he have wanted around here? As far as I remember, they hardly did anything in this lab."

"They don't publish their findings, Robin," Cyborg remarked.

"Check the wreckage. There might be something there that could have been stolen from the lab," Robin ordered. As they began pacing towards the wreckage…

An orange blur. A trail of sparks.

Beast Boy widened his eyes. "Dude! Was that the Flash?!"

Raven frowned. "What would he be doing on the West Coast? Alone?"

"If it was the Flash," Robin began, "he would have said something. He's not the strong, silent type. Titans, after it!"

"What of the anthropomorphic vulpine?" Starfire inquired.

"He's down, Star. If he gets back up, we can take him back down later," Cyborg replied as he pressed a few buttons on his arm. Blip. "Huh? Yo, Robin!"

The Boy Wonder skidded to a stop. "What is it?"

"My sensors show two more life forms over there."

"I don't suppose you can determine whether or not they're hostile."

Cyborg shook his head. "'Fraid not, Rob."

As if on cue, the smoke cleared in a small gust, revealing a red cap with an emblazoned M on the front. "Hmm!" In the light of the moon, the figure wore white gloves, overalls, a red shirt, and dark work shoes. A little pudgy and somewhat short, he wiggled his mustache… which was just a little more than a stubble. A yellow cape twirled in his hand, and disappeared in an instant. He raised his gloved fists, expecting the worst.

Robin struck a fighting stance. "Who are you?"

"My name's-a Mario!" he replied in a thick, Italian accent. "Who are you?"

"I'm Robin, and we're the Teen Titans. We're investigating an attack on these laboratory grounds. Were you responsible for it?"

Mario dropped his pose. "Attack? No. I was-a searching for stars…"

Robin furrowed his brows. "Stars?"

Beast Boy looked up to the sky and piped in, "You know, if you're looking for those, you're not really going about it the right way, dude."

Mario rubbed his face. "No, I was-a right there, about to grab it… and then I-a ended… up… here." Something flashed in his moonlit blue eyes. "Where am I?"

Quizzically, Cyborg responded, "Uh, we're in Jump City, man."

"No," Mario defiantly said. "Where am I?"

0=0

Panting.

A metal armored hand on concrete. Orange armor heaving. Electricity sparked in a line far behind her. In the moonlit street, she crawled her way into a darkened alley. She leaned up against a wall, pressing her hand to her red helmet. "This… is Samus Aran. Galactic Federation… do you copy?" She was met with harsh static. "Federation, do you copy?"

"Ssssnnnkt." Still nothing.

Sighing, Samus removed her red helmet. Her scraggly platinum blonde hair shimmered in the moonlight. "What's… going on here?" She trained her blue eyes on a somewhat distant newspaper stand.

31 March, 2001.

Death of Clifford Shull.

"That… was ages ago…" She narrowed her vision at the twinkling lights. "What happened?"

0=0

"Earth?" Mario blinked. "Where in the world is Earth?"

Starfire wrung her hands. "Then… where is it that you hail from?"

"Mushroom Kingdom," he proudly declared.

Silence.

"Which is currently in danger…"

Narrowing his one human eye, Cyborg asked, "So where is this… 'Mushroom Kingdom' of yours?"

"On the Mushroom World."

Silence.

…Broken by Beast Boy and his laughter. "Haha! Dude, is there an 'Heroin World' too?" Swiftly, Raven callously slapped him upside the head. "Duuuude! Not cool!"

Raven said nothing.

Frowning, Mario thanked her. "I have to get-a back. Bowser already has-a control over the Kingdom."

"There were other crashes here," Robin began. "Maybe all of you are connected somehow, and they'll need to get back to where they came from, too."

"It's-a possible," Mario nodded.

0=0

"Well, this is… unexpected," a cold, methodical voice uttered from a shadowed throne. He watched several screens ahead of him, each of which portraying a different angle of the scene at the laboratory. Surrounding his throne were gigantic gears, clicking and clacking away to some unknown rhythm. He folded his hands in front of him, calculating.

His one emblazoned eye gazed upon each, focusing on the screens that showed the newcomers. Another figure had emerged from the smoke, this one wielding a sword and a shield. He looked ready to impale, yet something held him back. The Teen Titans approached him with the red-capped figure, and they began to talk. The one with the weapons put the metal away, crossing his arms. Robin seemed to explain something to him.

His eye narrowed. His voice grew seething. "I have had two failures with apprentices in the past, but there's an old saying… that the third time's the charm." Slade casually glanced behind his throne, where three wrought-iron cages surrounded three shadowed figures. He then glared at one screen ahead of him.

The one with the unconscious fox.