Author's note: the problem with being one of the newest authors on the blog is that not many people know about your work, let alone the contests I set up. It seems that I'll have to cancel the one in the previous chapter, and makes sure that in this fan-fiction, the Hyperforce's first stop on planet earth is Angel Grove, California (a referance to the Power Rangers, which seemed to inspire this show).
Disclaimer: I do not own SRMTHFG! (at least not yet, but changing that'll take a miracle.)
Chapter 11
The Hyperforce had managed to arrive on planet Earth. They figured it is best to land on a certain sector of that planet, the one locally known as the "United States of America" at best. There is a reason why those who come from outer space choose to land in that sector most often: it is rightfully nicknamed the Land of Opportunity, as foriegners from the other areas of the planet transfer there all the time, and that alone lets space aliens hide in plain sight.
After picking up a few stray satelite signals, mostly consisting video documentries on Earth's history, they tried aiming the Super Robot at either Sector 21 or New York City, but they've indured some major turbulance entering the atmosphere, and crash-landed elsewhere.
What's more, upon arrival, the Super Robot ejected the Hyperforce, and split itself into vehicle mode.
"Guess the Super Robot doesn't want to draw too much attention," sighed Chiro, "not that I could blame that sort of thing. The technology here so limited, I'll never understand why my parents were so into this planet that they'd hide half their notes here!"
"Regardless," Gibson exclaimed, "with the Robot outside of machindar mode, we'll have to take shelter somewhere else, and what's worse, our translator system got damaged in the turbulance so the chances we'll get much local assistance are at a disturbing minimum."
"Bright side!" said Otto, pointing to a pile not to far where they were, "At least most of our stuff were ejected with us, and even though it might take awhile to upload in the rest of us, I've been working for months on a GPS program in whatever spare time the war allowed."
Antauri shook his head and moaned in agony as said feature started to kick in, "Otto! Did you use my conditon to test it?!"After a few seconds, the silver monkey's pain was gone, and he was soon able to regain his barings in more ways then ever as the local GPS uploaded.
"You okay, Antauri?" asked Sparx, as he and Nova helped their fully-robotic friend back on his own two feet.
"I believe so," answered the silver monkey, "just as soon as I can will this new map away from my visual receptors. According to that, we are in an area of Planet Earth known as California, and the nearest civilization, a town called Angel Grove, is a few miles west. Unfortunately, I'm not sure what direction 'west' is, as each planet lables their compasses diferently from each other."
"Looks like your experiment failed, Otto." Nova said.
"It pains me to admit this," responded Gibson,"but Nova is right. Not only is the installation too painful for the silver monkey's system, let alone those of us who still have an organic structor, but in addition to that; it lacks directional turn receptors and is therefore useless."
Soon enough, however, the sound of screaming got their attention, and in a matter of minutes, just before bad could get to worse, the Hyperforce managed to get to Angel Grove, where a horde of formless was attacking. After a fierce battle, the sound of the Skeleton King screaming in anger filled the air, and all was quiet again.
"Looks like the Skeleton King doesn't want to wait," said Chiro, "the lunar eclipse of Ranger 7 is one year away Inter-galactic time, and I'll bet this planet has enough corpses to expand his army in less then a week!"
"Not to mention this 'Rod of Resolve' thing and those journal pages!" said Sparx, "I'll bet he's looking for them too, so we can't use them against him!"
Before anything more can be said between the hyperforce, the sound of a shrill whistle got their attention. They all turned around, and they see a little boy about half Chiro's age poking his head out from under a sewer lid, whistling and signaling for them to follow him.
"Quick! This way!" the boy said, just barely above a whisper, "Hurry up, before anyone else notices you are here!"
Deciding it is a waste of time to argue, the hyperforce followed the boy into the sewers. Gibson practically upchucked.
"Egad! These smell worse then the sewage systems back in Shuggazoom City!"
"You'll get used to it," said the boy, "I did when I ran away from home. I had to; my parents thought I was crazy when I discovered I can talk to animals, and were about to lock me up forever, so I ran off!"
"No!" said Otto, "They were going to do that to you, just because you have a gift? That's just not fair!"
"Welcome to Planet Earth, space aliens," the boy responded, "rule number one around here: Life isn't fair! Now, follow me, I know someplace were you can be safe and get cleaned up."
"And how did you know we came from outer space?" asked Antauri, as the team followed their young ally, "And who are you?"
"Oh! Come on!" answered the seven-year-old, "Even without all those metal parts, monkeys on this planet wouldn't look like you guys... you'll see what I mean soon. My name is Pike, by the way, but I don't want to know your names until we get where we are going."
"That sounds fair enough to me," said Nova, turning towards Sparx,"you coming, 'doofus'?"
"Ladies first," Sparx answered with a smile... not his usual smirk, and yet, it wasn't a normal smile either. In fact, he looked nervous! Rolling her eyes at that, Nova, let him hold her tail the whole walk.
Soon enough, they resurfaced at the front door of an old abandoned mansion. To put it bluntly, it was the Season of the Skull all over again, but upon noticing the Super Robot is there and still in vehicle mode, it was clear that they had no choice but to enter the place.
Once inside, Pike rushed into the main room, where a woman in an elaborate dress sat at a table with a crystal ball.
"Madam! I'm home," shouted Pike"and I found the visitors, just where you forseen I would!"
"Oh, thank the stars!" the woman said, hugging the young man, "I was worried that I lost my gift of foresight and put you in serious danger."
"Everyone, this is Madam Esimia," said Pike, pulling out of the hug, "she's the best fortuneteller in a thousand miles in a thousand years, and these are-"
"Antauri, Sparx, Gibson, Nova, Otto, and of course, Chiro," Madam Esimia said, pointing to each said member of the team correctly, "welcome, Super Robot Monkey Team Hyperforce."
After an akward silance, Pike had burst into laughter.
"Creepy, isn't she?" he told his guests, "You guys arrive on a planet that has no idea who you are, and she is able to predict the right answer right off the bat!"
"Oh, it wasn't all prediction this time, Pike," the gypsy explained, "I was a friend of the Chosen One's parents before he was born, in fact, I was a Maid of Honor at their wedding."
Pike looked disgusted upon hearing that, and rushed upstairs (to his room, on doubt,) yelling: "JUST WHEN YOU THINK YOU THINK YOU KNOW SOMEBODY! JIMINY CRICKET!"
"You'll have to excuse him," said Madam Esimia, "he's been away from home centuries longer then he's lead the rest of this planet to believe, let alone you. Truth is, Chiro, inspite being friends with them, your parents rarely ever told anyone about the rest of the team, let alone yours trully. I had to use several of my psychic abillies just to probe the details, before, during, and after the day you came to be."
The entire monkey team wondered weither or not they were seeing things as the events of their lives seemed to flash across the glowing crystal ball in a matter of seconds. They were about to ask about that when another voice filled the air.
"Madam, what's going on here?"
At that moment, a female Earth monkey (specifically, a beautiful cross-breed between a howler and a capachin) came into the room with a tray with the gypsy's dinner.
"I heard Pike came home, " the local monkey said,"but he didn't start bothering me in the kitchen like he usually does at this hour! Did you let him eavesdrop on you telling customers about their love-lives again?! You know that child doesn't have the stomach to handle tha-"
She was unable to continue her lecture, as her eyes strayed towards the Hyperforce, and locked with the eyes of Mister Hal Gibson... soon enough, though, she pulled her gaze away, looked at the calander, and dropped the tray as she gasped. Madam Esimia smiled, knowing what this was about.
"Everyone," said the gypsy, gestering towards the startled female, "this is Cassia; you might say she's like a daughter to me. Cassia, these are our guests; they have a long journey ahead of them, so do us the small kindness of showing them around you know. The bathrooms, the kitchen, the guest apartments... the attic."
"Yes Ma'am."
Cassia was surprised to find color-coded tags hanging on the doorknobs of each guest bedrooms, and each member of the hyperforce was surprised to find their luggage, which they had forgotten in the forest when they rushed to Angel Cove, were in the correct rooms.
"Let me know when you've made yourself comfortable," said Cassia, as she headed back downstairs, "with more mouths to feed, dinner might take awhile longer, and in addition to that, I hope to accompany you when you explore the attic. I've never been allowed up there before tonight."
Sparx and Otto rushed downstairs to help their young hostess with the meal. Despite having a robotic body, Antauri's appitite actually started to restore itself; it's clear that the silver monkey program wasn't all science. Maybe, just maybe, it contained a small amount of the Alchemist's good magic, so small that it went unnoticed like seed in a valley, unwittingly nurchered by the unleashed Power Primate essance, until at last, some of Antauri's organic traints restored. Of all the members of the team, it was Chiro who noticed this before the silver monkey could figure it out himself.
"You go ahead, Antauri," the team's leader said, leaning against the doorway, "you've been running on nothing but water and energy packs far too long. You practically deserve to have a salad or two."
After watching half the team head to the kitchen, Chiro went down the hallway to check on the remaining two members. He noticed the door to Nova's room was open just a crack, and had to stifle a giggle when he saw her playing tea-party with her stuffed animals. He knows how much the yellow monkey hated to have her sensitive, more feminine side exposed... too many stereotypes in the universe labling woman against the warrior lifestyle. The door to Gibson's room, however, was wide open, practically inviting the boy-hero to come in, but he couldn't bring himself up to that, as he noticed the team's scientist was enjoying a view of his own. Already, it was nightfall, and of all the windows in the mansion, the one in the blue monkey's room seemed to have the best view of the sea-side town, and the Earth's moon over the water. Deciding it was best not to disturb him, Chiro attempted to close the door, but the rusty hinges gave him away!
Gibson heard the moaning door, and almost overreacted, drills at the ready, but upon seeing it was only Chiro, he put his weapons away. "Don't scare me like that!" the blue monkey screached, "You could've given me a heart attack!"
"Sorry, Gibson," said Chiro, "I was trying to close this the door so you won't be disturbed, but I guess the hinges are rusty or something."
"Hmm. Yes, it seems thet are past due for lubrication. However, it seems to be the windows that hold my interest...well, that, and the female who opened the curtains for me. Pike cutainly was right: Earth monkeys are curtainly different from us, even if we were uniformally colored."
"Yeah, that Cassia sure is something alright... in fact, I noticed that you seem to have some kind of attraction to her, Gibson."
"WHAT?! Ugh, don't be rediculous, Chiro! Only an absolute lunatic would fall for the mere idea of love at first sight! Odds are, it just might not work out anyhow."
"Uh, right. Hey! How about we change the subject and get a head start in the attic, you know, just to change to see what's up there."
Gibson was about to tell Chiro how foolish that idea might be without the rest of the teamm when the sound of someone clearing her throat caught their attention. Turning around, they saw Nova lurking at the doorway. "I'm game." she said with a smile.
Meanwhile, while the rest of the team was having an arguement as to what to make for the main course (it was a leftover night, and too much in the fridge was rotten), Cassia was having a private meeting with Madam Esimia.
"Well, Madam, you were right yet again," the native monkey said, "it seems that I met my future husband on a Tuesday and knew him by his eyes. What you failed to tell me, however, was that he would be a blue-furred know-it-all from outer space!"
"Even the most skilled soothsayer cannot get into all the details Cassia," Madam Esimia explained, "the future has too many twists and turns to get everything right. I can only forsee the inevitable, and it could've been anyone on any Tuesday. The real question here is weither or not you are sure that Gibson is the right one for you, and I fear there's only one way to find out for sure: you'll have to get to know him, not just for his head and eyes, but also for his heart."
"Bah! I don't have to do that, Madam, I seen his type before, and human Earthlings have a term for it: 'stick-in-the-mud'! I would be bored out of my mind with him as a fiance, and it just might not work out anyhow!"
Before anything more can be said, an odd, monkey like scream filled the mansion, and Antauri, Sparx, and Otto recognized it right away.
"CHIRO!"
The team wasted no time getting into the attic, where a bunch of bats swarmed. The battle to ward them off was fierce, but the Hyperforce was prepared for anything via the war... well, almost anything. Upon noticing what's going on upstairs, and inspite the terror that filled her when she saw the largest, ugliest bat darting towards Gibson, Cassia managed to take the blow for him, which roused the blue scientists temper.
"That is no way to treat a lady!" he shouted, drills at the ready, "Photon Scalpel!"
Once the largest bat in the group had one of it's wings sliced off, the other bats, confused, flew right out the attic window and into the moonlight sky. Otto went over to get a closer look at the monster, but in a matter of seconds it morphed into... Pike with a broken arm?!
"Okay! Okay! You got me!" Pike said, annoyed, "I got my abillity to talk to animals a thousand years ago, when I somehow got myself turned into a vampire! I ran away from my village and moved into a cave until this mansion was built close by it, and I had to scare the owners out so that I could move in, and practiced my powers. That gypsy who moved in with me after the Pollution Age was over said that the sheets that floated here from the sky the night I moved in are for you, so if you could reach them on the top shelf of the book case; take them! I am going back to my room to tend to my wounds before the light of sunrise make them worse."
Everyone else was confused, even Cassia, who had more understanding of the situation then the visiting monkey team. "Well, that explains why his allergy to garlic is worse then my allergy to bananas," she told Gibson, "but in spite of his condition, the batty little twerp is quite harmless. If he wasn't, he would've spread his curse to me by biting me, instead of attacking me with his claws like he did. I'll be fine, really."
After tending to both the wounded, Gibson regrouped with the rest of the hyperforce hust as Nova had grabbed onto the enchanted journal pages.
Sometime during the summer, when the climate of Suggazoom City was at its hottest, Carrington Manor had some new naighbors: the Sheenko family. Ma and Pa Sheenko claimed to have traveled several lightyears across the universe all the way from Planet Necrotus to finally retire from their old jobs at the astroid mines and open their own business. Their ten-year-old daughter, Valeena, claimed to have come because she's stuck with her parents.
Ace was excited to have a new kid in town to play with, until he noticed during the "Welcome to the Naighborhood" party his Uncle Clayton threw together that she spends most of her time in her bedroom pretending to be a witch. She wore dark makeup and a black dress, make up spells in gibberish (which thankfully didn't work) and used her stuffed animals as "sacrificial offerings"... she even have several dolls on the bookshelves that were still beheaded!
Zoey shook her head when Ace told her all about Valeena during his next visit.
"I am not surprised to hear that," she said, "for the Alchemist warned me more then once about Planet Necrotus. Second only to the Archaic Witches of Spheria, those on Necrotus are the most imfamous users of dark magic! There used to be a a book, 'The Grimwar of Narcotus', which was full of magic, good and bad, but it was mostly used for the bad spells. It was passed on from one enchanter to the other for generations, until most of it was sent to another dimention by some happy accident involving one of it's own incantations."
"Most of it?" asked Ace.
"Believe it or not," explained Zoey, looking around to make sure nobody is listening before she pulled a piece of paper out of her apprentice robe, "the last person to use the Grimwar was one of the Alchemist's ancestors. The poor sap wasn't evil, but he was hopelessly stupid compared to my beloved teacher himself; couldn't tell a love spell apart from a curse of the undead. As a matter of fact, the only reason they let him have it was that, oddly enough, the most powerful users of that book, no matter what the purpose, were all once blood related to him! Since he was the only child of that generation, the book was stuck with him. You could imagine the chaos caused by the Stupidest Sorceror before he accidently summoned a vortex in an attempt to turn himself invisible; a vortex that could only be closed by tossing the book itself into it. Upon that moment, the stupidest thing he did was tear out a page from the Grimwar before tossing it into the vortex, and what added insult to injury was that said page was from the last chapter in the book, said to be labled: 'Do Not Use Under Any Circumstances'! Take a look."
Nodding solumnly, Ace took the paper and noticed the sinster border around an incantion he dare not read outloud, unlike the title of the dangerous curse: "'To Summonith Minions for an Evil Army'."
Wasting no time, Zoey snatched the page back, folded it, and tucked it away in her robe.
"I'm not supposed to have it," she confessed, "the Alchemist is so worried it'll fall into the wrong hands that he kept it tight in a box, but what does he expect after teaching a changeling how to trick locks? I tell you, he might be a grown man, but if he's only take baby-steps against evil instead of using this rediculous plan to get rid of all of it at once, biting off more then he could chew, he would have no need to be so paranoid."
"Yah, a portal to the Neitherworld is an ironic and stupid idea," said Ace, "but he has a point to keep that under lock-and-key. By what I seen on that page alone, finding a counter-spell for that one won't be easy, but if the Alchemist's crazy idea leads to the worst, I'll at least try to think of something before Valeena of all people gets involved."
"You are so sweet, Ace," Zoey said with a smile, "I knew their was something I liked about you."
Before anything more can be said between them, Zoey kissed Ace with a passion, and the essance of the Power Primate surrounded them both until she pulled away.
"Oh! I'm sorry," she said guilt all over her face, "I don't know what came over me."
Ace was in stasis for half a minute, and when he snapped out of it, he couldn't help laughing. "Don't worry about it , Zoey. Just try to save the next one for a special occasion, okay?"
Recieving a nod from her before she returned to the lab for another alchemy lesson, Ace's attention turned towards the firmiliar voices of Sparx, Otto and Mandarin, who appearently had watched the entire thing, as they seemed to be laughing as they rolled over each other.
"Laugh while you can, boys," Ace said, waving his arms sarcastically while preparing to leave the secret garden, "your time will come soon enough, weither Nova is involved or not!"
Before long, however, the sounds that reached his ears slowly but surely changed from what all humans would recognize as monkey screaches to the most monkey-like human laughter he ever heard! After that, new yet strangely firmiliar voices started to mock him.
"Did you see that? He thinks he got it made in the shade, but he only got lucky that time. If it were me, I would make every day a 'special occasion' just for that! What an amatur!"(That was Sparx.)
"I don't know! I thought it was kind of gross! Gives me a warm, tickly feeling inside just watching that, sure, but it's still gross!" (That was Otto.)
"Oh, act your age, you two! He isn't the one who is making this humorous, oh no! It is the female who expects us to call her our 'mother'! After all, she probably thinks this idiot boy would make a better 'father' for us then the man who actually created us to be different then the rest of our ever-fading species, weither she herself knows it or not! Worry not, however, for I've thought of a plan to make sure she never forgets that she will never be anything less then a monkey, and all I ask of you is to make sure you and everyone else stays out of my way." (That was Mandarin.)
Upon realizing who those voices were coming from, Ace turned around quickly, but upon actually looking at the monkeys, the language barrier quickly restored itself.
"Must be a retrograde in our Solar System," Ace said (recalling something he learned in science class last school-year), "that sort of illusion causes confusion in several solar systems of many galaxies of the universe! I wonder if the fabled Earthlings of the Milky Way Galaxy ever have this problem, if the place really exists."
Ace pondered this for the rest of the summer, and it seems that the only time he didn't have the whole "talking monkey" scenario on the brain was when his Uncle Clayton was actually paying attention to him between industrial work, playboy dates, and his acts of "charity". Such moments were few and far between, yet were quite memorable. They played slingshot-alley and kick-the-can in the limosine's garage,"tested" everything at the Sheeko Family Archade, and even flew kites on occasion upon the roof of Carrington Manor. One time the sun set before they could get up there, so they did some star-gazing instead. During that time, Ace struck an odd conversation.
"Uncle Clayton. Do you think Planet Earth is real?" asked Ace, "Everyone else says that planet is just a myth, but I met someone I really like and she thinks otherwise. Who's telling the truth."
"Well, believe it or not," Clayton answers, "several planets in the universe have some of Earth in its history, an maybe even more. In fact, why do you think we call our moon 'Ranger 7' when other planets don't bother to name their moons unless there's more then one? According to what was written, Planet Earth sent a series of at least nine satellites in the Ranger Program to get a closer look at their own moon, and the seventh model was the first to do just that."
"I thought they named it like that because the crator look like a lower case 'r' and a large number '7' put close together."
"Well, that might've helped , Toby! Come on out! The weather's fine!"
With some reluctance, the butler joined in. "I see you and Master Henry are enjoying the stars, sir." Tobias Burgas said with a sigh.
"Uncle Clayton and I had just set up the telescope," said Ace, "and how many times have I told you to call me 'Ace Ranger'?"
"You'll have to excuse him," Clayton whispered to the butler (unaware that Ace could hear him), "my nephew had just started to grow out of the whole 'girls-have cooties' phase."
Tobias nodded in assurance, "Hmm. Yes, I see."
"Anyhow," the playboy continued outloud, pointing to the sky, "I'm aware that you dabble in star-lore, and I was wondering if you have any ineresting stories to go with tonight's set-up, that bunch of twinklers seem rather interesting."
"That constellation, sir, is called 'Sceptrum et Corona Simia Regius' or in English, 'The Staff and Crown of the Monkey Ruler'. It is said that over two-thousand years ago, their were two tribes that lived where Shuggazoom City had eventually been built: the People of the Trees, and the People of the Ocean. For a long time, those tribes were the closest friends, and were about to seal their unity in the marriage between the royal offspring, but all that changed when a third tribe, the People of the Stars, invaided the area. The People of the Trees fought bravely to keep what was theirs, but the People of the Ocean were cowards, and almost ended their own lives in the waters that supported their livelihood for generations. Horrified at the the trouble both the native tribes endured from the People of the Stars, Heng-Shi Kunsuizan, heiress to the trees, used her magic to allow her fiance and his tribe to live to see another day inspite their foolish choice. Unfortunately, the magic worked a little too well, and the salt water turned all the People of the Ocean into fish except for one: her fiance, Prince Protesis Posidonius, himself; despite the fact he remained human, that same curse touched him and made him immortal. Some used to say that he spends his eternity planning his revenge for the apparent 'treatory' of his almost-wife, and he had refused to listen to her when she tried to explain the mistake. Guilt ridden, she ran off into the Garden of Pandora, too upset to notice her entire tribe followed her there and witnessed her final enchantment. As they saw her imprison her own soul into a boulder, and send her own staff and crown into the heavens in her place, half of the tribe was exposed to a strange essance that turned them into monkeys. The first Pandoran Howlers, in fact. The other half of the People of the Trees remained human, and unified with the People of the Stars to create a new colony that is ment to unify the forces of the land, the water, and the sky, in memory and honor of what the war had caused them to lose."
Ace was wide-eyed after hearing that story. After all, "Heng-Shi Kunshuizan" was the former name of his friend Zoey Sulfur, and while she did say she had a complicated past, he didn't expect all that! Such information got him too excided to sleep, yet Ace willed himself to fake a yawn just to be alone in his room with his thoughts. He had just about drifted to sleep pondering what he heard, when the firmiliar sound of the kitchen window creaking downstairs woke him up.
'Tobias Burgas must be trying to cheat his diet again,' Ace thought, stiffling a laugh as he grabbed a camera from his photography-class supplies, 'little does he know I booby-trapped the snack stashes in my spare time while Uncle Clayton was taking a few dozen dates to the casinos. I just got to get a shot of this... Toby will never know what hit him!'
With that in mind, Ace slid down the banister and dashed into the kitchen just in time to hear a sharp "SNAP!", to which he angled the camera purfectly for a flash photo.
"Thought you could have a midnight snack, huh Toby?" Ace chuckled, as he took hold of the developing photo (which happened to have glow-in-the-dark negatives) "Caught you with your hand in the cookie-jar, did I? Maybe now you'll think twice before cheating your diet again Tob-What the-? GIBSON?!"
Ace raised and lowered the glowing photo several times, comparing the image to the moonlit sillouette before him; the blue monkey was indeed trying to pull his hand out of a crude but effective mouse-trap.
"Uno momento." Ace said, going to the other side of the kitchen and coming back with a first-aid kit. Wasting no time, Ace pryed the mousetrap open, and applied some ointment on the poor monkey's hand to reduce the swealling (it wasn't infected) before bandaging it. "Why in the universe would you come all this way for a cookie, Gibson? Don't you guys have plenty of food and water in Pandora?"
No sooner had Ace asked those questions did he notice the blue monkey was limping on his way back to the window. On top of that, the poor thing's tail was bent out of shape! Taking a closer look, Ace recognized the teeth-marks on it from a simular mishap years ago.
"MANDARIN! GRRR! Zoey assured me he quit that habit years ago, why would he... wait a nano-second. About two, maybe three weeks ago, Zoey kissed me, and as I was leaving, I started to hear things. I could've sworn I heard Mandarin's voice, speaking in human words of some plan he had to get rid of me; he was telling Sparx and Otto to stay out of the way. Ugh! That's just stupid! There's no way I could have heard that just because I was kissed by a changeling, let alone a manic-pixie-love-interest like Zoey; that's just an Old Wives Tale!"
Gibson didn't bother to test what he heard by saying anything, as Ace nailed what was going on right in the head. After all the injuries were tended to, Ace disabled the booby-traps so that his blue-furred friend could have a decent snack, and then made a spare bed out of a laundry basket to make the wayfaring monkey comfortable.
"I'll have to sneak you back home myself, first thing in the morning," said Ace, "before Toby takes me shopping for school-supplies. I don't get why everyone is in such a hurry to prepare me for that; Summer Vacation is only half-over, so there should be plenty of time to just goof around and be a kid, right Gibson?"
Ace noticed that Gibson had fallen asleep in the basket half-way up the stairs... or at least, he appeared to be asleep! At that moment, Ace's new abillity to understand monkeys kicked in yet again, as the blue monkey was having a "nightmare" while curled up in fetile position.
"Mandarin, please! Don't hurt me! I done nothing wrong! Leave me alone! HELP!"
Not sure if what he's hearing is real or not, Ace decided to humor what was going on by attempting to calm down his unusual guest the very moment he returned to his own bedroom, and all he could think of to do that was rub Gibson's back while singing softly to him:
"All around the Alchemist's desk, the monkey chased the weasel, the monkey thought the weasel a dunce, pop goes the weasel. Ten credit-coins for ginger-ale, two mega-bucks a pickle, know the price and build the trap, pop the weasel."
Suddenly, Ace felt a tap on his shoulder. He turned around quicky, and saw that Zoey, Antauri, and Nova were lingering at his bedroom window.
"What a silly song." said Zoey, "Did you make it up?"
"Sigh! Zoey, you scared me for a second." Ace responded, "Oh! That song? It's just an old children's song from the planet my mom came from, though she never told me which planet that one was, but I did change the lyrics a little bit, to make them more fitting for the ordeal."
"I know about that," Zoey said, shaking her head, "I caught Mandarin in the act; he said that you had a demonic dog-whistle in your possestion that effects all sorts of non-human species, and you used it to hypnotize him into attacking his own brothern. Bah! Honestly, do I look like I was born yesterday?"
"No, but you don't look over two-thousand years old either. My uncle and I did some star-gazing earlier tonight, and one constellation had got his attention... one with your birth-name written all over it."
"So, you know my complicated past now, huh?"
"Every last detail. I don't know what is harder to believe: you being a princess back then, or that you turned your prince-charming's entire village into fish!"
"I did that to keep them from drowning, and just so you know, Protesis wasn't all that charming at all. True, he was a looker in his youth, but that counts for naught when you want someone who would love me no matter what; he had a 'my way or no way' attitude as big as his brain, and listening skills as small as his heart. He was, how it's said now, A real gazort! If he had only forgiven me, I would've told him how to counteract my accidental curse so his people could easilly morph between two basic forms just like the People of the Trees. Which reminds me: what has become of my tribe anyway? I asked the Alchemist, but he either won't tell or doesn't know."
Zoey's heart sank when Ace told her what he had heard, and an ackward silance filled the room, which was quickly filled by the conversation of the tree monkeys in the room.
"Nova? Antauri? What are you doing here?!"asked Gibson, "Did by chance Mandarin follow you here?"
"Don't worry about him, Gibson," Nova said, "I gave him a black eye before the Alchemist put him in the box. My turn is next because of that, but trust me, after what he did to you, it was so worth it!"
"Bruised eye or no, even Madarin doesn't deserve the box," added Antauri, "for in spite of the wisdom I know he has, such violance is little more then a force of habit for him. It would be more merciful to wash his mouth out with soap and vinegar for lying about it."
Ace wanted to ask about the box, but he decided to keep himself until morning. It was just that late at night.
The Hyperforce was confused when the flashback ended, but they knew that while time stood virtually still until now, it was practically late at night in their own time period too, and with the Super Robot in vehicle-mode outside, they'll have to sleep in the manor.
As they left the attic, they took turns using the shower before meeting with Cassia in the banquet hall, seeing she cleared out all the rotten food and still managed to come up with a decent meal... with garlic-bread (just in case Pike gets fiesty). "While you were getting cleaned up," Cassia explained, "Madam Asimia and I also added vampire-proof markings on your bedroom doors. She told me to tell you that such a charm to keep Pike out is sadly unstable... he could still enter at night, but only if he is invited."
"Duly noted, Cassia." said Gibson.
"She also foresaw two different outcomes of your war," she continued, "one is the Skeleton King getting his kingdom, and the other is you guys winning over him. Unless her abillity to predict the inevitable is finally dying down in her old age, it seems that both visions are bound to come true, though it is all a 'chicken-and-egg' feasco if you ask me."
"You mean, you have no idea what'll happen first?" gasped Otto.
"Well, whatever happens first," said Chiro, "we are going to find out the hard way, and no matter what happens, we'll give it all we got from beginning to end, starting tomarrow, after we've gotten some rest."
Author's note: Yes, I used a term from "Galaxy High" in the flashback (consider it an Easter Egg). I figured it might make sense considering how lingo changes with each generation, and Zoey was attempting to update it from her no-longer-secret 2000 year absense before she hatched out of the boulder, in toddler form, and so became the Alchemist's apprentice.
Speaking of High School, that is the theme for the next flashback: Zoey's first day in a public school, in which the Alchemist takes a part time job as the science teacher to keep his successor our of trouble, but goodness what kind of "monkey-business" the team could cause secretly tagging along... will Ace be able to keep Gyrus Krinkle and Valeena Sheeko from noticing them? Stay tuned for the next chapter to find out.
P.S.: I put a lot of thought in adding a special monkey into the mix. I made her part howler so she could use her tail to hold things, but she is part capachin because I want her to have most resemblance to a famous ancestor from her mother's side of the family... Crystal the Capachin (you know, the one who played "Pet Monkey Jack" in "Pirates of the Caribbean", the "Very-Social Drinker" in "Doctor DooLittle", and "Dexter" in both the "Night at the Museum" films... she even got to play herself in the documentry movie "We Bought a Zoo")!
Even the name needed inseperation, and I got it at random once at . When I clicked on the bottle, I got the one labled "Cassia", which came with the story of how an exotic dancer won the heart of someone who needed to loosen up, and I thought: "Maybe this would be a nice little surprise for Gibson, since the only 'lady' he bothers to be smitten for is science itself."(The character I resulted with is bound to play hard to get, though, so I might need a little help with ideas of how play out their growing relationship.)