Chapter III: Viva Las Vegas

Erda slowly opened her eyes and blinked away tears as bright beams of light sharded into the buses interior. It took her a few moments to get her bearings. Slowly, she propped herself up causing a poorly knit afghan to topple off her bare chest. She was naked underneath and her armor was missing, gone, Emperor knows whe...?

"The Emperor!" she yelled out loud, reflecting upon the previous night.

The door to the bus suddenly opened. Erda covered her eyes as the sharp daylight masked her body. Leaning into the bus was the same towering man as before. Except now, he wore a button down shit underneath his leather vest.

"You might want to cover up..." he said. Erda nervouslly pulled the afghan back up her pale body and blushed. It was one thing for the servents of the Adebta Sororitas to be openly barren in the barracks, and quite another to unmask ones body before the Emperor of Mankind. Of course, at the moment, he wasn't so much the Emperor but rather than just another roaming hippi in the Majove Dessert.

The man chuckled and motioned towards a nearby suitcase, "You'll find some things in there that will probably fit you. Once you're dressed come outside and we can talk about your armor."

He closed the door to the bus and Erda heard him walk away. As soon as she was sure that it was safe she tossed the Afghan away, nude, she opened the briefcase. Her eyes narrowed as she browsed the clothing. These were things hardly suitable for a warrior, but what choice did she have?

Erda opened the door to the van and stepped outside. She wore sandals, a pair of cut-off demin shorts, and a tidi tank top. The Emperor was leaning against a nearby car and whistled at her white albino skin as she masked her eyes from the intense sun rays.

"What's wrong? Earth doesn't have a sun in the future? Keep in mind that future me just sends along enough information in that Pysker Imprint for us to do this thing."

She looked at him, nervous, and a little awkward in these embarrasing clothes, "we have a sun, it just looks a little different."

Erda took in her surroundings. This was a city, a town, really a city by current human standards, and they were along a main street. Neon lights glowed along buildings and billboards. The closest one read, 'Frontier.' There were a decent amount of people wondering about. Most wore cowboy hats, suits, denim clothes, shorts, etc. The Emperor pushed himself off the nearby car and dusted off his shirt and vest.

"This way," he motioned with his head. Erda, still slightly embarresed to be wearing such low class demeaning clothing followed the towering man into a car shop. They had evidently been parked in front of this structure for hours. The sounds of grinding, wrenches, the normal odds and ends associated with a future Imperial Guard Motorpool echoed throughout the shop.

The Emperor lowered the doors behind them, and an elderly man with leather like skin, dressed in a blue jumpsuit with the name ‚Phil,' stenciled on it, walked up to them while wipping away dirt and oil from his hands with a rag. "AH! Luther! Its good to see you again my friend."

The Emperor, nodded his head. "Phil, about that favor you owe me... you know that thing I dropped off last night?"

The elderly man smiled fondly, and looked at Erda. He scanned her body from head to toe, and nodded approvingly. "You must be the one that was wearing it?"

Erda felt her heart race. She watched as the old man sweapt back his grey hair and motioned towards a doorway near the back of the office. As a group they walked towards the door and entered a side garage. Old odds and ends lined the walls, but Erda could easily make out some of the more important items. Bolters, but different, older less complex, prototypes? Machine guns, older but beefed up to be more powerful. Flamethrowers? And, her armor, it lay strewn across a table, disassembled. The machine spirit was probably not very pleased.

"Luther? You bring me the most interseting things," started the mechnanic, "And, as for you my dear warrior from the future, it looks like you haven't aged a day..."

"Do we... know each other?" she asked.

The old mechanic unleased a drumming laugh that made his side hurt. He looked at her kindly and raised a single finger in pointing jest as he poked her sternum in a mocking jab, "My dear warriores we meet on Omaha Beach, saved me from a rip old pickle you did, but from your perspective that has yet to happen. Speaking of..."

The old man reached in his pocket and pulled a set of metal dog tags. He looked at her with a wide grin and tossed them to her chest. Erda caught them easily enough and looked at the old mans full name stenciled upon the metal plates, Phil O'Reily.

"In the pas,t when we first meet, you are going to need these. It helps to convince somebody that you are time traveler with something from the future. Oh, and since the old me is something of a sinic the answers are: 32, 17, never, and Sally; also... choose rock."

The old man smiled again and turned back towards the disassembled armor. He nodded at Luther, the Emperor, and started to explain the situation.

"Easily repaired. Two days tops. As for that thing you had me check up on... I have some bad news."

"You mean you found the crash site?"

The old man nodded approvingly, but also glowered, "The US Army sent a large compliment of men to recover the crashed Ork ship. It slamed into a field at a place called Roswell. The good news is that all the Orks are dead so we don't have to worry about a repeat of Stalingrad. The bad news is that the US Army recovered everything, and have taken it to that little research base of theres at Groom Lake. Getting in won't be easy. The US has had Groom Lake under heavy guard ever since they captured those German scientists working on Orks back in World War II."

"Don't worry, I already have it covered. Just focus on repairing that armor. Next time she moves through time it will likely send her to you know where... and we both know that she is going to need it..."

"Ha!" laughed the old man as he eyed Erda, "Yes, we wouldn't want her dealing with Strothman without some heavy duty armor of her own now do we?"

"By the way, do you have any news on the others?" asked the Emperor, his hands on his hips.

Phil nodded approvingly and continued, "Last time I picked up Surtur in our timeline she was at Thermopylae helping the Spartans win against the Persians. Her friend, that giant man in the blue power armor was lending a helping hand. Kind of hard to believe that they both ended up in the same place from two totally different warp phenonmenon. As for the other version of this young woman, her last sighting was at the Battle of Stalingrad, where they both helped us deal with the accursed German Orks."

The Emperor nodded in approval and motioned towards the door, "Thanks for keeping me posted. I know its not easy sifting through Earth's history lessons to find all these people, but it's a big help Phil."

Erda started to follow humanities champion towards the door as Phil went back to working on her armor, sodering electrical cables with delicate care. Together, the Emperor and his servant exited the shop walking towards the parked van, "We're heading to a top secret military base out in the Majove Desert. We need to find our way inside and deal with whatever the United States found from the crash site that's going to screw with our timelines."

"United States? Timeline? I don't understand any of this." Said Erda.

The Emperor looked at her and sighed deeply, "Your future, the one where the Necrons have all but overrun the galaxy, is a byproduct of several key moments in human history. By altering these key moments we can alter the future. From your perspective, humanity has been reduced from a mighty Empire to a mere dozen worlds under constant siege from all sides. The last, literal, bastion of humanity under threat of being eradicated. But, from my perspective non of this has even happened. Every action we correct in the past alters the future in some way. Unfortunatly, we have failed in all of our previous efforts to correct the timeline. This time, there are two you's in the past. Surtur and her traveling companion are also aiding us. As for the United States, is are a nation state that fancies itself a superpower in this part of ancient Earths history."

"And Area 51?"

"Area 51 is a top secret research base controlled by the United States. It was founded during World War II to help with the development of atomic weapons. After World War II it was converted into a top secret Xenos research facility. The German scientists that used Orks during World War II were brought there to continue there research. I don't know what happens there at this moment in history, but I do know that it makes a big splash. If I had to guess, I think that the United States finds a way to weaponize ork spores to some greater end. And that... cannot be allowed to happen."

"So, the United States is some sort of evil empire?"

"That's..." he paused, "Only under President Dick Chenny."