Disclaimer: All right, this will really only be necessary in later chapters, but for the last time until then, all these characters except Darby belong to me.
Note: The story will pick up a little once we get past all the technical details. Our heroes' first appearance will be in Rivendell, Lord of the Rings.
Total Apocalypse
Air, there wasn't nearly enough air and there was a hand on her face, stealing her air! Reflexes took over and, in an age-old defense move, she bit the offending hand.
"Do you think Zondo lied?" an impatient female voice asked.
"No, I think they're too smart. Wait, listen!"
Kade let out an echoing shriek that was cut short as Chalupa, Psycho, and Ants tackled her and clapped hands over her mouth. But the damage was done.
"They're in the vents," the woman said. "Brilliant." She must have made a motion to her partner because their footsteps retreated.
'What now?' Sith mouthed to them, clutching the clothing rope.
"They're gone," Chalupa spoke up. "No need for lip-reading."
"I say we see where this goes," Ants said. "Maybe it'll lead us to the outside."
"And maybe those of us in our underthings could get our clothes back?" Kade asked a trifle irritably.
A sudden blaring alarm gave them all pause. "That doesn't sound promising…" someone muttered right as a rushing sound reached their ears.
-+-+
"Mike, how long has it been since we flushed the vents?" Tiffany asked idly as the lieutenant punched a couple of buttons on a little-used panel marked 'Spring Cleaning.'
"Never," he replied amiably, hitting the last switch with a flourish and grinning as a new sound blared through the halls. "And there's the warning alarms to any technicians hanging around up there…" He grinned suddenly. "This should be fun. Should we go to the Basement and watch?"
"Without a doubt. Lead the way," the commander replied.
-+-+
"Is anybody else worried about that noise?" Sith asked slowly. Kade was far too busy leveling Darby with the Mother-of-All-Death-Glares to respond, massaging her bitten hand.
"Which noise, the alarm or the rushing liquid?" Twink asked, picking at one of the knots in their rope.
HD suddenly held up a hand. "Did anybody else feel rain?"
There was a brief silence. Then, "Dude, we're in an air shaft," Psychadelio said flatly.
"No, I felt something too," Chalupa said, brushing her ebony hair out of her face. Her eyes narrowed. "Is the rushing sound getting louder?" The shaft suddenly began to shake beneath them and drops of water flew from the end closest to HD.
"Quick, grab the rope and hang on!" Ants jerked free the bonds holding Darby so she could fend for herself seconds before a rushing river of water descended upon them all.
"Zees will be fun!" Wonky cried seconds before their world dissolved into cold wetness, yelps, bubbles, and rushing gray walls. The ten authors were propelled by the current, being washed who knew where. There was precious little air, and the metal walls were none too comfortable to those who collided with them repeatedly. Which was everybody. Twink lost her grip on the rope once, twice, and at last was forced to grab Chalupa around the waist in a crushing grip.
All of a sudden—vertical. Their horizontal momentum was abruptly stolen and all ten fell heavily a good six or seven feet into a gigantic draining chamber. The result was a large sodden mass of ten groaning people, most of them in their skivvies.
"Well, this isn't the way I would have chosen for us to meet, but you lot were quicker than I gave you credit for," the feminine voice they had heard from the air vent greeted. Kade peeled herself off the top of the heap and then assisted Ants to his feet, one hand still gripping the clothing rope.
"And you are…?" Sith demanded calmly, dressed only in his Spongebob boxers. He hauled Chalupa upright while waiting for an answer. He ended up hauling Twink too, as she was still hanging onto the Latino girl with both arms, eyes tightly closed.
"Commander Tiffany Walton. Commander to you," the woman replied, straightening her gray uniform jacket. "This is my second-in-command, Lieutenant Michael Venningsworth."
"Call me Mike, because I hate it when people butcher my last name," the lieutenant said.
"Did you bring us here?" HD demanded, wringing water out of his shirt. "Look, I demand to be released at once, if I'm not at my desk by the time my boss comes in, he'll fire me."
Commander Walton looked at him for a long moment, and then burst out laughing. "Your job? The end of the world is happening, and you're worried about your job."
Ignoring everyone, Darby was concentrating on not falling to pieces. That trip through the ducts had to be the combination of at least three of her worst nightmares: small spaces, being immobile and no breathable air. Her hands were shaking so badly she couldn't wring the water from her hair, her head was swimming (no pun intended), and her lungs refused to fill up properly. Did someone mention the end of the world? Thanks for the news flash, but she'd already lived through it.
"Woah, woah. 'End of the world?'" Masked Lorcan repeated incredulously. "You must be on something. The world looked fine the last time I was there." She was trying in vain to pull on her waterlogged jeans, wet strands of hair obscuring her vision.
"Trust me," the commander cut off all argument. "Come with me and I'll give you the whole story in a nutshell." And off she stalked, leaving the ten soggy writers to untie their rope and wriggle into their wet clothes on the way to…wherever they were going.
"It's quite simple, really. There are four of us here on this station. Three of us are officers and we monitor the different worlds or spheres of fanfiction. None of you need an explanation of those. We are here to make sure that all universes run smoothly apart from one another and that true authors can write without problems." The commander paused for a breath.
"True authors?" Sith broke in, his eyebrows raised in confusion.
Commander Walton nodded. "Authors that for the most part respect canon and characters as they were meant to be written and do a fairly good job of writing. Good spelling, grammar, etcetera. Unfortunately, as I'm sure you all know, these days any half-wit with a keyboard can simply regurgitate their malformed thoughts and put it up on the Internet. Up to a point that was all right; what were a few Mary Sues, slash stories, and crossovers to our system? But then movies such as Harry Potter and the Lord of the Rings came out, and we've had no end to the drivel!"
"You can say that again," Lor and Twink chorused. Psychadelio and Wonky nodded their agreement, along with a quiet 'amen' from Ants.
"Our fourth member here, who is strictly civilian, understands the inner workings of the fanfiction universes and creates much of the technology used to check up on the fandoms and take precautionary measures. However, he has always had a theory: that the fanfiction continuum is finite, and you can only stretch it so much before there are problems."
"Big problems," Lieutenant Venningsworth put in. "We've suffered a complete collision of the fanfiction worlds, much like bubbles on the surface of water coming together and fusing. Characters are missing, there are plot holes big enough to admit the Death Star, and—"
"Thank you, Lieutenant," Commander Walton cut him off sharply. "The point is, we kept the worlds running without understanding them very much. All of you are knowledgeable about two or more fandoms, and will probably be able to fake your way through the ones you don't understand. Working as a team, we feel you'll be able to assist us in solving this problem." The entire entourage screeched to a halt in front of the Core's doors, and the commander led them inside. Hochi's eyes bugged out at the bedraggled group that trooped in, some still half-dressed.
"This is Ensign Hochi Min," the commander said. "And that over there is Zondo, our resident civilian."
Zondo had already sprung to his feet and was enthusiastically shaking hands with all of the authors. "Such a fantastic pleasure to have you all along. Everybody take a seat and we'll get started with the debriefing."
"Wait, wait, wait." HD crossed his arms firmly over his chest and refused to move. "Just why did you pick us? And who says that we agree to do this? What's in it for us?"
"Isn't it enough that you save your favorite pastime from complete annihilation?" Zondo asked calmly, taking a seat.
"It's only a hobby," HD protested. "It's not as if the world is ending."
"Ah!" Zondo shouted, laughing. "That's where you're wrong! There is a very good possibility that if we do not deal with these problems by terminating some of the more worthless authors that write self-insertion and time-traveling fics, there could be dire consequences in our world such as—"
"Hold it!" HD commanded. "Did you say terminate Mary Sues?"
Zondo blinked his beady eyes. "I believe I did."
HD abruptly plunked himself in the nearest hard chair and crossed his legs, attentive. "I'm listening."
"Anybody else wish to raise objections?" Zondo asked, looking around at the others.
Darby looked up, having given up trying to find a dry spot on her shirt with which to dry her glasses. Replacing them on top of her head, she regarded Zondo with an eyebrow raised. Wordlessly, she sat on the nearest chair and waited for the chaos to be explained.
"No?" Zondo shrugged, took a deep breath and then launched into his spiel. "You all have been told how these problems occurred, and now I will expand upon why you are here. You are here because we think you can succeed in restoring balance to the fanfiction continuum. We believe that because of your knowledge and obsession with different spheres of fanfiction you all know best what you are up against. You know the tells of a Mary Sue, the signs of an out-of-canon character, and the ravings of a rabid reviewer. So you see why we need you." He paused, but no one interrupted. Even the three officers were listening raptly.
"You would be able to navigate, as much as possible with plotholes and all, within the fanfiction spheres. And this brings me to the final part of my speech: your equipment and procedures." Zondo casually flipped a small switch and an entire wall panel abruptly parted, turned itself around, and became whole again. There were ten utility belts displayed, along with rows of unidentifiable objects. "Voila!" Zondo said enthusiastically. "This is all you will ever need to save characters, fry rabid reviewers, terminate Mary Sues, and uncross pointless crossovers. Now then, one thing at a time.
"These," Zondo pointed to something resembling a cross between a handgun and a phaser, "are a combination isolinear tag unit and shock bullet gun. You must never confuse the two functions, however. One returns an in-character character to their proper sphere, and the other kills reviewers. In theory nothing should happen if you accidentally hit a character with a shock bullet, but I would prefer not to have to test it. You toggle between the two options using this button here. The isolinear tag function will instantaneously transport the character to the coordinates you specify, using voice specification. The coordinates will be listed in your CIAPDs. All as clear as mud so far?"
"Whoa, wait a second," Sith interrupted. "So you're saying we use those things to zap real characters to where they belong or to take out reviewers who might try to stop us?"
"Essentially, yes," Zondo said.
"Couldn't you have distilled that into just once sentence then?"
Zondo smiled in superiority. "That's the benefit of my position. I get to complicate things unnecessarily. Now these," and he indicated a line of silver tubes, "are direct descendants of the hypospray. They come loaded with several different types of serums. These serums are for out-of-canon characters who need to be put straight before sending them back to their universe. The serums are color-coded for your convenience, and again your CIAPD will tell you which serum to use with which species. Klingons do not get the same dosage as humans, for example."
"And if it acts as an aphrodisiac we're all in trouble," someone muttered under their breath. There were a few stifled snorts, but Zondo restored attentiveness quickly.
"Focus, people! I'm only giving this explanation once, because the longer we sit here and dally, the more the fanfiction spheres become interlinked. Moving on now, these little devices are designed to establish a jamming field. We use electricity to wreak havoc with authors' Internet connections. The shock bullets use jolts of electricity, you see. Well, these I like to call hoverers, and they deploy into three parts, hover around a target you specify, i.e. a Mary Sue or self-insert, immobilizing them so they can't use magical powers or whatnot to evade you. The hoverers then sever the author's connection with the Mary Sue, hopefully crashing their hard drive in the process, and you are free to kill the Mary Sue in whatever way you deem necessary. Shock bullets are still bullets. A word of warning: there may be some kind of plothole backlash when destroying some of these types of characters. This can be damaging to you. Know who your doctors and medics are in the fandoms you're going in. Once we put you in the system, we can't get you out until balance has been restored. There's so much chaotic activity that to attempt to do so prematurely might kill you and disrupt the continuum."
At that news, several of the authors erupted into disbelieving shouts. "You mean we're going in there as ourselves?" HD asked, disbelieving. "I'm not showing up in Gotham city looking like this!"
"Dude, zip it," Psychadelio broke in. "We can't possibly hope to survive with only this equipment, groovy as it is."
Twink, for the first time, sounded fearful. "We could die in there. Without anybody knowing what happened to us."
"Look," Darby spoke up, "I fail to see the connection. So the fanfic world is collapsing. Big deal. How does that affect my real life? I have a meeting with my thesis advisor in half an hour. How does my dying in some messed up Harry Potter fic help the world at large?"
Zondo screwed up his beady eyes and squinted at her as if he was trying to determine if she were making some sort of joke. When he at last decided she wasn't, he said in a very calm tone of voice belying simmering frustration, "The connection? Ah, that's the problem. There is a connection. Or there could be in the very near future. You surely are acquainted with the stories where characters are pulled into our world?"
The brunette merely nodded, looking slightly bored.
"Well, we have always been able to quarantine these types of stories to keep them from affecting our true reality. Otherwise we would have Legolas, Haldir, and dozens of other men and women alike running through our streets, pursued madly by fangirls and Mary Sues. Suffice it to say that containment here is rapidly failing, and unless you agree to help us, you could very well look forward to having to pry some sort of fairy-unicorn girl with purple hair off of your thesis advisor. Do you get the picture?"
Darby nodded, still looking unimpressed. "Do we at least get the benefit of false time while we're in the fanfic world? I really can't afford to miss that meeting."
"We'll do our best," Zondo promised. "As long as the mechanism that brought you here is still working, I can guarantee it. We just have to hope we ourselves aren't overrun by this catastrophe. Nowhere is safe," he emphasized to them all. Then he turned back to the equipment he'd been explaining, pointing to the last small object, the only thing they could really identify: a palm pilot. "This is you CIAPD. Character Identification and Plothole Device. This is how you recognize, find, and transport characters, all in one. They can also be used to communicate with each other. Just be careful about batteries. It looks and operates much like a modern-day palm pilot, except it will respond to your voice, should you have your hands full." Zondo looked around at the somewhat confused crowd of people in wet clothes. "Right, let's get this stuff equipped and get you in there!"
As the group rose and was assigned tools, someone sounding an awful lot like Darby muttered cynically, "And when the batteries die?"
Zondo shrugged. "Find a modern world and hold up a convenience store for all I care." He started handing out the different equipment as one by one the ten authors stepped forward, some with determination, most with reluctance. The three officers watched silently from the sidelines, knowing next to nothing about Zondo's methods.
"And now to answer your question, sir," Zondo addressed HD, "you will not be entering the fanfiction continuum in your real form. We need to have a way to identify you from the Mary Sues, for you safety as much as anything. We don't need you attempting to electrify each other, and if complications arise and we should need to put in more authors that you haven't met yet, we can't afford to take chances. You must choose a form not likely to be utilized by teenage authors. This means nonhuman, no elves, fairies, etc. And as a sidenote, choose something that has semi-permeable skin."
"Um…why?" asked Twink after a moment of confused silence.
"Because of the stasis serum. As you move around and interact within these worlds, there's a chance it could affect your minds adversely. You will experience rabid urges like a fan and perhaps go so far as to pursue a character. Should that happen, you need to find a locked room and administer the stasis serum to yourself. It should keep you unconscious for as long as it takes for the others to set things right." Zondo paused for a very deep breath. "All right, if there are no further complaints or questions, let's go to the Imaging Chamber."
