"Good news, everyone. I've invented a time machine."
"Where is this time machine you speak of?" Fry asks the professor. He scans the office with his eyes. "What does it look like?"
"It's not in here, you dope. To the hanger, everyone. I left it next to the Planet Express ship."
"I was just in there, I didn't see jack. I'm taking bets on the Professor's bluff."
"Bender, you don't gamble on a bluff," scolds Leela, "You'll just pawn the money for booze and hookerbots."
In the hanger, the co-workers gather around Farnsworth. He's standing next to a sheet of cloth that appears to be covering up a hover-car. "Behold, everyone." He unveils the cloth.
"Professor, that's just a hover-car. You didn't invent that."
"No, Fry, but it's in the car. See in the dashboard, it's a flux-capacitor. I saw it in a movie once. It allows you to travel through time itself."
"Wouldn't time traveling tear holds in the space-time continuum?" Leela questions.
"I don't know. What does it matter though, right?"
"Can I drive it, Professor?" asks Fry.
"Good news, I'm giving it to you. Now you can go home. Back to the 21st century."
"Whoo-hoo, I'm so there. I can see mom and dad again. I'll see Seymour again. I miss him. As soon as I get my stuff, I'll be ready to go."
Farnsworth smiles, "You don't need to. Everything you need is in the glove compartment. A laser gun, translator glasses, a jet pack; you're good to go."
"Hey Fry, do you mind if I take your car out for a spin?"
"Sure, Leela, you can test it first. Is that alright?"
"Yes, but be careful, if the car goes to exactly 90 mph, then the capacitor will switch on, and you'll be hurled through time instead."
Leela slips into the car and starts the engine. She notices the dashboard counter reading 5-1-2007. "What's this weird language on the panel next to the counter?"
"Oh that's just Japanese. I got the car from Tokyo. The Japanese gave it to me after I helped them defeat Godzilla's great grandson a hundred years ago."
Leela pulls the steering wheel and the car lifts straight up through the uncovered hanger. She flies the car through the streets.
"Wow, this car handles nicely. Fry shouldn't have any trouble getting home."
She flies the car around New New York, when she notices the speed of the car increasing. "Hey wait, I'm not trying to make you fly this fast, car. Please drop your speed."
"Why's that, Leela?" says a feminine voice from the car.
"You can't go any faster than 90."
"Oh yes I can."
The car speeds to the 90-mile mark. "Don't go this fast, car. Please stop."
The car refuses to obey Leela and flies to 90. Suddenly a blue light engulfs the hover-car and Leela is blasted through an instant wormhole. The car juts foreword through, flying erratically. Then just as quickly as the blue light engulfed, it quickly disintegrates. She finds the car crashing through a dense forest with a crimson sky looming overhead. All she can do at this point is hold onto the steering wheel and scream.
"Car, slow down. You're going too fast. We're going to crash into the ground. Car, are you awake?" She looks at the dashboard to find it blank. Looking out the window, she catches a black flash dashing through the trees around her. Finally the car comes to stop and lands harshly on the ground.
"Oh thank goodness, I thought I was going to die." She reaches for the door handle, when a strange figure appears instantly in front of the car. He glances at her, looking into her eye. His hair was black and sleeked back. He gazes at her through the shatterproof glass.
"Who are you, Miss?" he asks.
At first she doesn't say anything, just studies his appearance. Suddenly her eye opens wide. "Hey you look familiar, have we met somewhere?"
"Dunno. Maybe we did; though I've never seen you before."
She studies his face and notices three eyes on it. "Hey yeah, oh my goodness it is you."
"Uh, you know me? Did you see me at a tournament?"
"I guess that's what you can call it. It was last year at the Space Olympics. Yeah, you came in second place at the track meet. McLark Trilo it was, from the planet, Triclopicous 9."
"Lady, how dare you speak to Master like that, show some…" blurts an angry toad mutant.
"Kaeru! You'd better shut that mouth of yours before I shut it. She doesn't know who I really am or who you are."
Leela climbs out of the car and opens the glove compartment. She removes the items, intended for Fry, and carries them on her back.
"That bag is small, but it's got so much stuff," observes McLark, "Let's get going, before low-class demons show up." Leela straps the jetpack across her back and turns on the power. "What about your vessel?"
"No worries." She opens her wrist jack-lo-mater and presses a button. "The car has camouflage and now it looks like a bush." With that she follows McLark through the trees with her jetpack.
"Yeah, where am I anyways? Is this still Earth? I've never seen a sky colored like this. And these tree leaves are brown. It looks like Triclopicous. Fry, Bender, and I were there not too long ago either. The professor sent us there to bring triple eye glasses."
"No, this is Earth, it's just this is Demon World," remarks McLark.
"What, you mean the old theme park in New Jersey? Damn, that's where Beazobot lives."
"Who is Beazo…huh?"
"You know, the robot devil."
"We aren't devils, lady. We're demons. Get it straight," scolds Kaeru.
"Hey, McLark, I need to ax you."
"What do you mean ax me? You want to fight me?"
"No, I just want to ax you something. I notice you flying without a jetpack. How are you doing that?"
"By the way, it's not McLark. I'm not an alien, just a demon like you."
"I'm a mutant, not a demon. I'm Leela."
"You look like a demon, and you stink like a human. But I've never seen a human with one eye in the middle of their forehead. Why are you in these woods anyways? You half-demons are so stupid. Bet you taste good though. I have a good mind to… "
"Kaeru! What did I tell you about running your stupid mouth? See, this is why I hesitate on having you tag along on human rescues. Last time you did that, you scared the poor man so bad he went into shock and now is in a psychiatric ward at the Tokyo hospital for life."
"Why would a human be scared of you? You don't look that frightening to me."
"Leela, most humans fear the unknown. You for instance might be thought of as a demon because you have that huge eye. Most cyclopes are demons in this world."
"Where are we going anyways? We've been traveling for a few hours now."
"We're almost at Mukuro's tower. See that city over yonder, in the mountains to the east. We should reach it within the hour."
"Within the hour? My jack-lo-mater says the mountains are 100 miles away."
"Leela, we've traveled nearly 400 miles from the car, and it's only been two hours. We're making good time." The leader watches her fly as fast him. "Do you know, of all the humans we've rescued, you don't need to be carried? How do you keep up with us?
"Well McLark…"
"It's not McLark. My name is Hiei."
"Ok, well, this is a jetpack. It uses fuel cells that have a 5000-year lifespan. I can travel as fast as 100 mph, maybe more. The professor made them himself. It was meant for Fry. That car was a gift for him to travel back in time to go home. His era was the 21st century."
"Yeah, well that's where you are now. Wait did you say back in time? Where are you from?"
"I'm from New New York in the 31st century. The reason I'm not scared of you is there is a guy that looks like you. McLark is from the planet Triclopicous 9. I axed him about his eyes; he said the two eyes on either side of his nose were for diurnal purposes, for seeing during the day. The eye in his forehead was for nocturnal use, for night vision. Tell me, is that what your third eye is for, night vision?"
"No, it doesn't see in the conventional sense. That eye is a spirit eye. That's how I knew where you were, Leela. It sensed the crash and saw you, long before you even saw me. It senses spirit energy coming off of someone, even if the energy is very faint."
"That's just like what my jack-lo-mater can do. It senses the presence of a person approaching. It sensed you and that toad guy. It shows you as a little yellow dot and Kaeru a little green dot. It has GPS tracking. That's how it senses where your tower is."
The group reaches the grounds outside the city. "You've got a huge city. I think it's bigger than back at home."
"It's 1000 kilometers. At the center is her tower. She used to be a king and this was her domain."
"A female king? I like that. No offense but men can be denser than mud. You put a man in charge and they add more problems and don't solve the ones they started out with."
"I know men can be dumb. One of my best friends is like that. He's a human like you. In his younger days, he lived with his sister and she'd set him straight."
"Did she hurt him?"
"Sometimes, she'd beat him so bad that he had welts on his face as big as my fist."
"Ooh, I like that," Leela smiles, just imagining how to torture Zapp Branaggan the next time he tried to make his moves on her.
"We're here at the tower."
"Wow, that's a huge place, like the size of the Empire State Building. I'm impressed. You live here though?"
"This is Mukuro's Tower. She allows me to stay here. I don't own this place. The main floor is where we take humans like you to be examined and have their memories erased. We won't erase yours since you don't fear us."
"Is there any place to freshen up? I'm tired from the trip and I have to go to the bathroom."
"Sure, there's a lounge area through the foyer and on the right. It's just like a human bathroom complete with a shower."
As she walks off and shuts the door, the demons talk among themselves. "That's a strange human. I don't think I've seen one that brave of us. It's like she's comfortable around here. Maybe she just stinks of human because she's been around them too long."
A lizard demon peers up at Hiei with distrust in his eyes. "What are you going to do with her? Can I eat her if you don't want her?"
"Tokage, no, she's not food. She's just not from this era. I don't know how to get her home, since it's 1000 years in the future on the human side. Besides you know someone in the human world who'd be all over you if you harmed any humans. All he'd have to do is point his finger and fry your ass."
"Can't help it, Master, she looks so juicy. He doesn't even know about her at all. Just one taste, please."
"Tokage, your little 'tastes' make you eat the human. If he doesn't know about her, I already do and I'd kill you before you even get one of your slimy claws on her."
Leela opens the door again and walks into the middle of the conversation. "Are you talking about food or something?"
"Food, yeah just about it."
"I've got 50 Earth dollars with me. Maybe we can eat somewhere."
"Well, Miss Leela, how do you feel about Ramen?" Hiei offers.
"Aren't you a nice triclops? I barely know you and you want to eat out with me. Not even Sean, when we first met, asked me out. He was put off by my eye."
She notices just the two of them walking to the Ramen Shop. "Where are your friends? They were saying they were hungry too."
"They aren't my friends, they just work for me. Besides their idea of food was you. They eat humans. There's a shop for their needs too. They are stocked with soulless humans. Zombies if you want to get technical."
"You're world isn't that dissimilar than mine. New New York has humans like that for food. We've got to serve customers from other planets."
"We're here. Do you know how to read Japanese?"
"No, but I've got glasses that can." She pulls the pair of specially made cycloptic glasses made for translating, from the pocket on her pants and places them on her face. "This allows me to translate alien text easily." "Glasses, set mode for translating Japanese into English now."
"Confirmed and ready."
"Hiei, I see you've got a lovely lady with you," smiles an old woman.
'She looks like Mom from Mom's Friendly Robot Co. but has a sweeter sense about her,' thinks Leela, to herself. "Ma'am, how's the beef Ramen here?"
"The best, my dear. Tell me, are you from Demon World?"
"No, I'm not from here. My hover-car crashed here about 500 miles away."
"Hover-car? What's that? Never heard of one of those. I know what cars are. Three of Master Hiei's friends own them. But they don't hover."
"Anita-chan, she's not from this time period. She's got gadgets I've never seen before. When Kaeru and I picked her up on today's human rescue, she came fully stocked with that thing on her wrist and this jetpack. Normally we have to carry humans, but she flew all by herself."
"I've had practice with the jetpack, which by the way, ma'am, do you have any alcohol with you, like beer or malt liquor?"
"Yes, but why do you need it? Are you a heavy drinker?"
"The alcohol isn't for me, the fuel cells in my jack-lo-mater wristband and the jetpacks need the alcohol to function. The cells have a 5000-year lifespan, but the fuel needs to be replenished every once in awhile."
"Sure thing, dear. By the way, your food is ready. Hiei, your usual."
"I didn't say anything for me."
"I know, but you always order the same thing, especially when you have a guest with you."
Leela snaps a pair of chopsticks in half and blows the steam off the food. "Wow, you're from New York, right? That's a city in America."
"New New York, and yeah it's in the United States of Earth."
"Here in the 21st century, we call that America. From what I know about Americans is they don't use chopsticks to eat, but a fork."
"That's true, but when Planet Express has to deliver a package to Topar 11, and their king insists you eat with him, you'd better know how to use chopsticks. Fry kept poking himself in the eye and Bender threw them into the king's portrait like darts. The king forced all three of us to do serious chopsticks training for five months. Fry still pokes himself in the eye and Bender gives up and eats the sticks."
"Oh gosh," Hiei laughs at her story, "you've got human friends who do that stuff?"
"Fry's human but Bender isn't. He's a robot. The 31st century is filled with robots, and they live and work among us humans. Also living on Earth are aliens from other worlds. When I first saw Hiei, I thought he was either a sewer mutant like me, or an alien from another planet. They just live here on Earth, just like some Earthicans live in space on other planets."
"Jack-lo-mater full," the wristband announces.
"Jetpack full and ready," the jetpack also announces.
"You're ready to leave already, Leela, but we just got here."
"That's just my devices talking," she chuckles, "I'm in no rush to head home or anything. They are just telling me they are ready. Robots say that when their fuel tanks are full. Robots have to drink to keep functioning. Professor Farnsworth made them that way."
"One type of robots he made was a bending robot. One of my co-workers is one. Bender loves drinking too much. He's also a lazy, good-for-nothing machine. He loves to gamble and sleep with fembots. He loves to cook, but like any robot, he lacks a sense of taste. He loves to cheat, steal, and extort for money."
"He sounds like a fun robot, this Bender. I'd like to meet him someday. I'm starting to like your world already, Leela. Maybe we wouldn't have to be isolated here in Demon World."
"You're not isolated, Hiei. You can come and go as you please. Besides isn't the barrier down?"
"I've got other reasons for staying."
"Right, how is Lady Mukuro these days? I never see her anymore, not since Hiro's birth."
A sad glaze comes over Hiei's face, "Not good. I think the birth has put such a strain on her body that she's probably not going to last much longer."
"Who is this Mukuro you speak of?"
"She's another demon. She used to be one of the three kings here. Ten years ago, the barrier dividing this world and the human world was brought down due to a martial arts tournament. One of these king's heirs pushed for an agreement for bringing it down and for a king to be decided every three years in a battle. You're in luck, Leela, because this term I won the title."
"Who's Hiro?"
"He's our son. He was born five weeks ago."
"Ah, how cute," Leela chimes with delight, "Can I see him?"
"He's in human world right now with my sister. Mukuro is having enough trouble as it is just getting around. I think the birth was too much for her." His eyes start to droop the more he talks about the woman.
"It's okay, I don't need to know everything. I still want to see that baby. I love looking at babies."
"If you want, I can take you to see him. I'm crossing over there anyways, got to meet a friend there for lunch tomorrow. He's really a good guy to meet, if you don't mind meeting at a hospital cafeteria."
"I've met people in worse places. How about meeting a client for dinner on a worm planet. They served me live worms in my salad, calling it a delicacy."
"Eww," Anita says, scrunching her face.
"Yeah," Hiei sticks his tongue out, "we don't do that here. Some demons like worms, but not me. This ramen was good, thanks Anita-chan." He bows in her direction. "Leela, do you want to stay at my place tonight?"
"Thank you. I thought you said you don't have a place. Don't you stay at that tower?"
"I've got my own place. I stay at the tower sometimes but I do have a cave not to far from here. It's got room and is very comfortable. The inside is all furnished and has cable and plumbing."
"That sounds like a nice place. Is it close by because I'm beat?"
"Do you see that cave on the ledge of that western plateau, just past the tower?" he points to the area past the tower.
"Yes, but I was hoping for it to be closer." "Jetpack, can you get me up there?"
"Get up there yourself. What do I look like, your slave?"
"Ugh, that's the one thing I hate about robots. They are lazy and don't want to work. I gave you booze, what more do you need?"
"Do you need a lift up there?"
"I think I can manage. I guess I'll just climb up to your place here." She starts to walk from the ramen shop and stumbles with every other step.
"Here, let me carry you up there. That distance is no big deal for me. Hey think of it as a gesture of a gentleman helping a beautiful damsel in distress." He scoops down and picks her up off her feet. He cradles her gently in his arms. "You know for your size, you're light as a feather."
"Wow thanks, what a nice triclops you are. Nobody from the first time they met me has said that. Not even Fry." She feels her eye become heavy like lead. "I just wha… want to…" Finally her eye closes and she falls asleep in his arms.
Swiftly, he leaps and carries her to the ledge and enters the cave. Inside, he walks through quietly, carrying her body to a bedroom near the back of the cave. He lays her on a soft down bed. He pulls her boots off her feet and sets them against a wall. She slips her wristband off and sets it on a nightstand beside the bed, with her eye still closed.
"Thank you, Fry," she whispers, mistaking Hiei in her sleep for him. He says nothing as he covers her up in a nice warm blanket.