Ranma belongs to Rumiko Takahashi. Contact belongs to Carl Sagan. The
Adventures of Pip and Flinx belong to Alan Dean Foster. The
Deathstalker series belongs to Simon R. Green. Mahou Senshi Riui (Louie
the Rune Soldier) licensed by ADV.
Back on Earth: Prologue
By Thermopyle
Visit my page at thermopyle.anifics.com/index.html or email me at
thermopyle@tds.net.
*****
For the first time in centuries, the Madness Maze was given people to
work with. Alien energies scarcely understood by those who built it
focused on their task, examining the humans who had entered it and
bringing about their change...their evolution.
There were no sudden differences in physical attributes or looks, there
wasn't a huge boost of intellect to those adjusted, but the change was
there nonetheless. Each person's potential to grow was greatly
increased upon, to a point where no real limit existed except the need
for challenges to be surpassed, to make the subject rise to each
occasion, becoming stronger as it was met and previous levels of ability
exceeded.
Those who received this treatment, while still human, wouldn't be
restricted to such fragile limitations for long.
Elsewhere, an earlier creation was going about its own, similar work.
It was a simpler version of the Madness Maze, intended more for
replication of advanced specimens rather than making improvements upon
existing life forms.
Jusenkyou was thousands of years old, and since the time when it had
been built it had made patterns for over a hundred different life forms,
many of which had seen frequent use over the centuries. The most
prominent of these springs was that of the drowned girl.
Which was currently being used.
As somebody fell into it, the mechanics of the 'cursed' springs came to
life. A stored template was manufactured alongside the most recent
victim, and where before there had been one body in the water, now there
were two. One was of a black-haired boy with a pigtail, the other was a
red-haired girl with a longer, more feminine looking braid.
The process of bonding the two forms to each other and linking them with
a water-based trigger, which only took the merest fractions of a second,
began.
Two forms materialized suddenly within the Madness Maze, and it reacted
instantly, bringing its energies to bear upon the two new specimens
despite the fact that they had been there before. This time, however,
they were much greater, both mentally and physically, than they had been
during the previous visit. The other visitors, combined with these
stronger two, was too much for it to handle all at once. More power was
required in order to advance the two's potential further than it
currently was.
And so the Maze reached out to the nearest source of similar power,
found Jusenkyou, and pulled the energy the cursed springs was using to
itself.
In the process, two seemingly identical pairs of people were switched,
and a cycle was completed.
Adventures of Pip and Flinx belong to Alan Dean Foster. The
Deathstalker series belongs to Simon R. Green. Mahou Senshi Riui (Louie
the Rune Soldier) licensed by ADV.
Back on Earth: Prologue
By Thermopyle
Visit my page at thermopyle.anifics.com/index.html or email me at
thermopyle@tds.net.
*****
For the first time in centuries, the Madness Maze was given people to
work with. Alien energies scarcely understood by those who built it
focused on their task, examining the humans who had entered it and
bringing about their change...their evolution.
There were no sudden differences in physical attributes or looks, there
wasn't a huge boost of intellect to those adjusted, but the change was
there nonetheless. Each person's potential to grow was greatly
increased upon, to a point where no real limit existed except the need
for challenges to be surpassed, to make the subject rise to each
occasion, becoming stronger as it was met and previous levels of ability
exceeded.
Those who received this treatment, while still human, wouldn't be
restricted to such fragile limitations for long.
Elsewhere, an earlier creation was going about its own, similar work.
It was a simpler version of the Madness Maze, intended more for
replication of advanced specimens rather than making improvements upon
existing life forms.
Jusenkyou was thousands of years old, and since the time when it had
been built it had made patterns for over a hundred different life forms,
many of which had seen frequent use over the centuries. The most
prominent of these springs was that of the drowned girl.
Which was currently being used.
As somebody fell into it, the mechanics of the 'cursed' springs came to
life. A stored template was manufactured alongside the most recent
victim, and where before there had been one body in the water, now there
were two. One was of a black-haired boy with a pigtail, the other was a
red-haired girl with a longer, more feminine looking braid.
The process of bonding the two forms to each other and linking them with
a water-based trigger, which only took the merest fractions of a second,
began.
Two forms materialized suddenly within the Madness Maze, and it reacted
instantly, bringing its energies to bear upon the two new specimens
despite the fact that they had been there before. This time, however,
they were much greater, both mentally and physically, than they had been
during the previous visit. The other visitors, combined with these
stronger two, was too much for it to handle all at once. More power was
required in order to advance the two's potential further than it
currently was.
And so the Maze reached out to the nearest source of similar power,
found Jusenkyou, and pulled the energy the cursed springs was using to
itself.
In the process, two seemingly identical pairs of people were switched,
and a cycle was completed.