XANDER HARRIS: THE IRON TAU'RI
By:"Gunsmith3000"
Started 5-19-08
Completed: ?
Disclaimers: Nothing belongs to me other than this insane idea I have that just won't let go. Iron Man belongs to Marvel, Stargate SG1 belongs to Paramount. Buffy belongs to Joss Whedon.
Summary: Xander goes as one of his favorite marvel comic characters, but gets more than he's bargained for.
-0-0-0-0-0-
-0-0-0-0-0-
"The Voyage Home (part1)"
-0-0-0-0-0-
The figure, half-bathed in moonlight and shadow looked out at the unending expanse, a million thoughts coming to the forefront of his mind. Each single thought, given careful consideration from his Stark gestalt, became part of a bigger puzzle.
"Start." The figure said.
At certain points on his semi naked body, microscopic dots opened up as he recalled what led to this moment in time.
-0-0-0-0-0-
The holographic avatar's left eyebrow arched up considerably, unsure if that was a term of greeting. She studied the young man before her and tried to frame a suitable reply in recently learned English.
"I'm sorry?" She asked, confused.
"Nothing." Xander replied. "You just look like some one I knew. Sorry, my name is Xander."
"I bid you greetings, Xander." She said, doing a half bow. "Welcome to the ARK."
Xander goggled at that, but inwardly, the peanut gallery inside his overcrowded mindscape had but one thought: "For a Noah, she looks way too hot to be a guy."
Xander blinked and shook his head, now was not the time for one of Stark's vices to start acting up. "Uh, Ark?" He asked.
"I find that term in your language as the closest description as to what I actually represent." The holographic woman replied. "I was designed to house all of the combined knowledge and achievements of my creators. I am to stand as an eternal living testament of all they have been, all they could be, and forever was. In their native tongue, they are the Kaldralunarae'Aerienishi'dar. They are the voices of the wind."
"Shi'ar." Xander breathed.
"I beg your pardon?" The avatar asked, confused, wondering if it heard the human right.
"Nothing." Xander said. "Tell me, did your creators have avian ancestry in their evolutionary chain?"
The observer searched for the term, translated it and uploaded the information to the holographic avatar.
"In a way, they did." The avatar replied. "However, their evolution is a long a convoluted one, and Avian origin is but one of them. You shall learn more in due time, the most important thing to do now is help you recover from you ordeal from your own genetic restructuring to the Ghuls's technological virus. So with that in mind, how do you feel?"
"Like total shit." Xander replied, he shut his eyes as the aches and pains of his more recent brush with death came back to him. Suddenly, his eyes snapped open as he literally felt his body react to the symptoms. He could feel something inside of him respond to the nerves affected in conjunction with his burgeoning healing factor. After less than a full minute, the aches and pain were gone!
-0-0-0-0-0-
The microscopic dots began to secrete a golden-like substance that solidified once it made skin contact, taking on the consistency of liquid steel and then worked its way up and around his body, encasing it.
-0-0-0-0-0-
"What the hell was that?" He exclaimed in fear.
"After you were brought to me by my drones, we found out that the techno-virus as you call it; had started eating through your suit as well as a good portion of your body." The avatar explained as she summoned a few floating holographic screens and pointed out several key points around the human representation on the screens. "It helped a little that your healing ability was slowing it down, but not by much. In my effort to aid you, I stumbled upon a tremendous amount of anomalies within your systems, specifically within your own DNA."
"What happened?" Xander studied the screens, half-relieved that there were some texts in English for his benefit. "And how the hell did you get all this data on me anyhow?"
"Like you, I am not native to this world. I have been traveling space for ages past and settled into this torn and war-ravaged world. It took some fixing, but I now control a very large percentage of this planet, especially its ecosystem. After I made sure my drones are able to safely control both of the planet's gravity and its seasons, I settled for a long semi-permanent nap. As time passed, I stayed dormant, only to rise for a short while and go back to sleep after doing self-diagnostics and launching exploration probes to learn of the universe in while I slept." She explained. "Your crash awoke me from my eons-old slumber. Since then I have been monitoring you, studying you, trying to learn all that I can to either welcome a potential first contact with an intelligent species or ignore you in favor of going back to my slumber. After finding your Technites, I chose to favor the first contact option."
"That still doesn't answer how you were able to get this much medical data on my species." Xander asked suspiciously. "I recognize some that data on the screens show very good copies of what the most recent medical journals in my world contain."
"The probe you have currently in orbit to scan this world had the data and coordinates to your home system and of your world as part of its primitive first encounter program." She answered. "Armed with that data, I sent a non-contact temporal information gathering probe to study and collect data."
"A what?" Xander stared, if he heard that right, then the applications of such a probe was frightening.
"Do not be concerned." The avatar said, watching the stress graphs rise slightly. "That class of probe was designed to study and collect intelligence on worlds being prepared for peaceful first contact scenarios. The obvious military capability is there but is frowned upon and considered only as a last resort. If detected, the probe would erase itself from the existing timeline of its discovery, pull itself out of the planet and then note the world as undesirable or too volatile for contact. It does not even carry any weapons as its primary objectives are only for observation."
"But that doesn't mean that there are other classes of probes built with military applications in mind, right?" Xander asked. It made sense; it sounded something like one of the Starks in his mindscape would actually build. The people at S.H.I.E.L.D. would just LOVE to get their hands on something like that.
"True." The observer replied. "But since I rarely need it or use them, they have been locked under cold storage since I originally first came online. Back to the topic at hand; since your almost fatal encounter with the technological virus, I have discovered that the data concerning normal human biology does not apply to you. While it is true that you have the base form appearance of what a typical human should be like at the prime of his or her young life right down to the internal general makeup, the genetic data you possess do not match at all."
"Basic human mutation shouldn't make that much of a drastic change." Xander thought aloud. "A chaos spell sort of changed me a bit during one of our more popular Earth holidays, but the last time I checked, they should still stay within the acceptable parameters I projected. What else did you find?"
The observer directed one of the floating screens to project her own findings. "This is the data I acquired when I first sent a probe to scan you while you were sleeping under the downed Asgard vessel." She said as she pointed at the data in question.
Xander felt a slight chill go up and down his spine when he saw that the data on the screen had changed from the data Loki showed him. Did that midget psychopath do something to him and didn't tell him? Even though the gray alien said that he was unable to map or alter Xander's DNA. The evidence on the screen said otherwise.
-0-0-0-0-0-
The golden substance took great care as it sped up the process and covered any exposed pores as well, covered, but not blocking out the host's need to survive.
-0-0-0-0-0-
As if reading his mind, the observer spoke. "My scans did not detect any Asgard re-engineering, over time they might, but not with the tools available within that downed ship." Then the observer showed him another screen full of data. "This is what your DNA looked like the moment your system was attacked by the technological virus when it ate through your suit."
Xander paled at what he saw. He just gaped as he stared back and forth from the screen and the observer's holographic avatar.
"Scaled analysis of the data would suggest a total of ten of your Earth months before genetic cascade failure will eventually occur before you even realize it." She said as she confirmed what the young man was thinking. "Your limited healing factor was slowing it down, however it will be overrun unless you get help. Fortunately for you, I helped."
"How did you help?" His face was still devoid of normal color.
-0-0-0-0-0-
He could feel his body responding to the change, a hidden knee-jerk instinctive need to jump out of his own skin as a claustrophobic sensation filled him for a brief instant certain pores on his skin closed for a fraction of a second, then started to breath again.
"Not bad." He thought. "This is going to take some time to get used to."
-0-0-0-0-0-
A new screen popped up and it showed most of what she did. "To stop your immediate degradation, I used the remains of your micro-mechanized under-sheath to create a series of nanocell stabilizers. After that, I injected a miniscule DNA strand preserved by my creators to help augment your healing as theirs was far superior to your own." The observer said as she pointed at each screen, showing him the progress.
One particular screen showed some specific points on his body, Xander looked from the screen to some of the points that were barely visible on his actual flesh and he asked what they were.
"Those are stasis nodes, currently in activation mode." She replied. "Think of them as control surfaces to allow you to summon the now reconstructed under-sheath to cover your body and prime it for armor usage. The under-sheath, when dormant, will split apart, some of them will stay between the hollows of your bones as part of the marrow. The others become fluidic and surround the muscles overlaying the bones themselves. They are totally safe and they help protect against damage. The nanocells themselves are active at all times to help you stay alive, literally. Without them, not even the DNA I gave you as a stopgap measure will save you from total biological cascade failure before your body has acclimatized itself to the new DNA re-sequencing. Maybe in the future, they will be removed, but for now, you need them inside of you to stay alive."
"So I am no longer human then." Xander said softly, a note of disgust entering the tones of his voice.
"No, I am sorry to say that because of whatever happened to set you on this path, your changes are permanent." The observer said. "However, the nanocells will help a great deal in that regard."
"Like how?" Xander snarled. "You already said it yourself, I'm no longer human."
"You still have the general outline of one." She replied. "Though your DNA has been altered right down to the sub-cellular level, your general shape and appearance did not change. I sent another temporal probe back to your homeworld to look for your records specifically while I kept you in stasis. With a little unknowing help from your Earth-based AI, I was able to get enough data in regards to your original DNA to program them into the nanocells. While I may not be able to reverse your change, I programmed the nanocells to mimic the data output for any scans or tests on your person to reflect that of a normal healthy human in his active prime even down to any hemoglobin samples taken from your body. Those that know the truth are the only ones here unless you decide to tell someone else. I've even managed to shield you from any Asgardian biological detection that can differentiate you from a normal human based on the data I pulled from the downed Asgard vessel."
"How long did all this take?" Xander asked.
-0-0-0-0-0-
The liquid feeling of the pseudo-metal persisted as it ran over his skin and started solidifying into a protective flexible, hard shell.
-0-0-0-0-0-
"You were treated for a little over a week by human temporal standards." She replied.
"Thanks I guess." The young genius said with a rueful grin. "I owe you big time then. By the way, I never heard your name when you've already known mine."
The observer's avatar blinked, unsure of how to proceed with that question.
"I've never had a personal designation even since I was first activated." She said. "I've always been simply known as the caretaker and observer of this place. Though I was designed to be among organic sentient beings in mind, you and your Technites are the first to have ever set foot within the ship with having clear knowledge of me."
"Oh." Xander said, humbled by the honor bestowed to him and to his Technites.
"You are most welcome." The avatar replied.
"No offense, but do you classify yourself as male or female?" Xander asked out of idiot curiosity, the Stark gestalt in his mindscape had pushed the question out despite his protests.
"Hmmm..." The observer gave it some thought. "The race that created me had a society based on equals with no discrimination based on either sexual or racial stereotypes. My direct creator-slash-designer was female; however, as you can see by how the holographic avatar closely resembled her."
"Oh." Xander said again, this time wondering at what cosmic joke led the humans to create a comic book race that closely mirrored a for real long-dead one that hadn't been heard in so long that they were forgotten to have existed.
"What was her name?" He asked.
The avatar gave an unintelligible stream of words that it could not translate. When the avatar saw that Xander was having trouble as the translation matrix was unsuccessful, she apologized. "I am sorry; their names elude the translation matrix's ability to convert the correct vowels into your language. They are partly lyrical and musical in their intonations. Even their race's name was hard enough that I simplified it for you. As a whole, they can be called the 'Aerie', and I am the testament of a race that stretched across the universe in their quest for knowledge."
"Do you mind if I called you Lilandra, though?" Xander asked.
"That is acceptable." She said with a smile after she thought about it and made a mental note to research why the young man settled on that one.
Especially since it was the first word he said aloud when he woke up and saw her.
-0-0-0-0-0-
He spied a reflection of himself on one of the floor to ceiling windows that led to the vast underwater universe beyond them.
He stared at it for a full minute as the last of the protection closed up on his face.
He gaped in stupefaction. In spite of the connecting lines that ran around his new undersheath, the resemblance to something familiar was unmistakable.
"I look like a freaking academy award statue!"
-0-0-0-0-0-
"Lilandra." Xander tentatively asked. "Was there anything left of my armor prior to my being in your care?"
"No" The avatar replied. "The technological virus rendered your armor into metallic crystal dust, there was nothing left. I have examined your armor during your first night here and I believe I can machine a reasonable facsimile for you."
Xander mulled over this bit of information. As much as he wanted to have his old armor back without all the stuff Loki added in without his permission, he never got around to finding out what the rest of the new stuff was thanks to the damned virus.
"You can copy the technology my armor had?" The young genius asked.
-0-0-0-0-0-
His body lifted a few feet off the ground once the full body sheath was completely in place, and then various shimmering gravitational fields appeared around him as pieces of his new armor coalesced and flew to their respective places on his body.
-0-0-0-0-0-
"It is not at all that difficult." Lilandra replied as she brought up the schematics of Xander's short-lived Mark 1 armor. "The second temporal probe I sent to look for your specific data also took the time to download your own armor designs stored inside your Earth-based AI designated 'JARVIS'. Why, do you have some changes in mind?"
"I'm thinking about it." Xander said as the Starks ran some theoretical designs inside his head. "Did your creators ever create power armors in the past?"
"Yes, they did." She answered as she brought up a few of the premier armors the Aerie had amongst its military and research branches and displayed the more recent ones to the young man that was prior to her own activation. "Although, I should let you know that they were rather fond of incorporating their designs with bird-like motifs. Everything they created showed a passion for freedom without limits and of flight."
Figures, Xander thought as he looked at the designs the avatar called up on the screens. One of their designs even vaguely resembled an armored Archangel from Marvel Comics, once again prompting the question of how some of the comic book artists were able to tap into this sort of imagery. It was as if they had unconsciously accessed a window into the past or into alternate realities for their inspirations.
Xander involuntarily winced when he came upon an armor that utilized feather-like metallic wings for propulsion; they looked too flimsy and showy in his opinion, even though Lilandra assured him that their metallurgy was eons beyond his own re-modified Adamantium formula. The helmet looked a bit art deco, but simple enough to be practical and reminded him a bit of a variation of the Mithril-Hawks that he used to watch as a kid that belonged to the lead character named Speed Mercury.
"Just how accurate can you replicate my armor with some slight modifications to the frame and structural integrity?" He asked as he studied the image.
"Accurate enough to a frightening degree, I would wager." She replied as she went through the list of needed to be done. "I can also easily fix the micro-flaws in the chemical formula that you overlooked when you made your Adamantium. I can tell you that your current type of micro-circuitry design with your existing nanites is just a few steps away from my creators' own earlier bio-cellular circuitry that they developed at the start of their ultimate advancements. I've noticed that your FTL designs also need a little further push as well, as it stands now, without the proper guidance controls, you could very well end up inside a sun or a black hole. You'll never go home that way intact. And lastly, your ingenious power plant, wastes at least five percent of total power maintained when it should be completely at zero percent."
Xander made a face, a little indignant at the mention of the flaws in his designs that Lilandra ticked off one by one, but he had to swallow his pride and admit that the ancient AI would indeed know better just because of what she was and where she came from.
"Ok, let's get to work and see what we can come up with then." Xander sighed, partially thankful that an ancient, but very advanced AI was willing to help him literally iron out the kinks in his designs. It was sort of surprising really, that he got this far with his Earth's tech. The technology portrayed in the comic books, even in its twentieth century timeline, was more advanced than its real world counterpart was. He was lucky enough to be able to recreate most of it by making sure he got JARVIS up and running first.
Then he thought about the "Ted" android and had a feeling that his Earth may not be that far behind with the comic books if one knew where to look. After all, humanity made incredible leaps in the field of technology at the start of the twentieth century, outside influence may very well be a possible answer to some of the questions some theorists posed.
"Lilandra?" Xander called to the avatar, to which she replied with a nod.
"Can you tell me about yourself and of your creators while we work?" He asked with a grin.
"It would be my pleasure." She answered.
-0-0-0-0-0-
The leg pieces and boots were the first to adhere itself over his body that suspended in mid-air.
-0-0-0-0-0-
"Whew." Xander said, breathed a sigh of relief. It had taken a lot of time and effort, and a lot of wasted designs, and a lot more false starts, but they were able to refine and machine a new one from scratch with the new improved Adamantium formula the avatar so graciously helped him fix.
"This is as good as its going to get." He grinned at it his latest handiwork.
Lilandra nodded as she reviewed all the data Xander placed into her systems. The armor seemed to be a major upgrade from his previous model, but it was not a high enough an upgrade to surpass his machine shop back home on Earth.
In fact, the only thing supremely advanced was the undersheath she developed to help keep him alive. She made sure to slightly alter the sheathing inconspicuously so it can auto repair itself and tied it to the young genius's healing factor.
"It is still a bit primitive for my taste." She said aloud. "Are you sure that these are the changes you wish to make on your new armor?"
Xander punched in a few more safety measures into the armor before he replied in the affirmative.
-0-0-0-0-0-
The groin armor connected to the leg pieces, he floated back to the ground as the rest of his armor caught up.
-0-0-0-0-0-
"Yep." Xander replied. "The undersheath you made for me is a lot more important now than the armor. In fact, it outstrips it. While my undersheath must be protected at all times once active, I still need to leave a few things out so I can easily tinker with the rest of the armor with my own tools back on Earth until I get most of my tech up to par with my new undersheath. The interface we made will allow me to use any of my past and future armor that I may make as the need arises. This way, I won't be locked onto one single armor set with this undersheath."
"I see." Lilandra nodded. "A very sensible approach."
-0-0-0-0-0-
The gauntlets and the rest of the arm pieces attached themselves to him, docking into the connectors underneath the shoulder mounts. He flexed them, satisfied that they had a wide range of motion.
-0-0-0-0-0-
"Yeah, I know." Xander reasoned. "I can't very well maintain whatever you can manufacture right out of your proverbial box on Earth without your help. I'm just being practical, that's all. Besides, you already told me that the undersheath is self-sustaining and can easily upgrade itself just like my Technites with me as the controlling AI. Too bad you can't come with me yet."
"Indeed." Lilandra said. "While it is true that I may not accompany you on your first journey back, I will follow soon as I am finished with this planet's star system. It's time is nearing its end and I will indeed, have to move soon."
"Huh." The young genius shook his head. "Nothing like a star dying to get you to move. Wish I could be here to see that one."
The avatar nodded. "But you are needed back home because of the constant threat to your world both from within and without that you told me about. And that is why we are doing this."
Standing side by side with the new Mark 2 design on the holographic screen, was a modeled mock up of the refit they did to the now, bigger, Halcyon with a working FTL drive based on the same principles that drove the temporal probes.
Quite similar to Xander's Space Fold System, which was the basic framework for his own original FTL designs which, ironically, was also based on the Shi'ar of one of his Stark gestalt's universe.
That fact puzzled the ancient avatar, so she asked Xander how it had so closely mirrored the first alternative FTL step her creators took.
"When you finally come to my world, then you'll see." Xander replied, cryptically.
-0-0-0-0-0-
The abdominal and upper torso armor then snapped into place once the shoulder mounts were secure. A crackle of energy lit up the room for a second as the suit's main systems came online. A passive, tightly knit, force field wrapped itself around the entire suit, strengthening the exposed portions of the undersheath that peeked out from some places on the armor and gave it the same consistency as the metal on top of it, turning it into one single holistic unit.
-0-0-0-0-0-
Outside of normal space/time, beyond what even the mighty observer now dubbed "Lilandra" could detect, Eternity was laughing his head off at the name that Xander chose for the ancient sentient AI. He even smiled and approved of the conversations that followed. The name Xander chose for the AI would throw a few things out of place because he knew that one of the SG1 teammates was a bit of a comic geek, especially when it comes to fantastical technology.
That would convince anyone on Earth if he even used the excuse that he was from another dimension.
Eternity grinned as he sent a subliminal suggestion to the captain of a certain Asgard cruiser a few star systems away to make a slight detour as it chased down a runaway replicator-infested ship that just showed up on his sensors.
-0-0-0-0-0-
The helmet closed up and a thrum of power filled his senses when the last major connection fell into place. The visor readouts ticked off a standard (for him) preflight checklist that turned green as the markers passed each one and corresponded with the neural impulses in his brain in confirmation at the speed of thought.
He took a deep breath. With the last of the armor pieces now in place, the weight evenly distributed itself and gave him a sense of weightlessness on top of his undersheath as the secondary passive force fields activated, closing off any holes left on his armor that the first shields missed.
"OK, now that's a nice surprise." He said, amazed at the results. "I can practically wear this indefinitely if I had to even if the power runs out."
He looked back at the reflection on the glasslike window and approved at what he saw.
"Are you sure about this?" Lilandra asked the moment she appeared beside him.
"I've been gone too long, Lil." Xander said as he clambered aboard the refitted Halcyon. Most of the Technites were already within specially designed compartments made just for them from the refit. A few of them under the double command of Bitz and Wetz's "cousins - Hanz and Franz, however, chose to remain with Lilandra to help oversee the final stages that the gigantic ship started in order to leave the world it had come to briefly call home.
"I'm worried about my friends." Xander continued. "Aside from you and my new Technites, they are all I have."
"I've uploaded a few data files that are safe for you to look through with your knowledge-base." Lilandra said. "And since only you can read my language, it should be safe. So please be very careful with those."
The young genius smiled. "Always…"
To Lilandra's surprise, Xander straightened and gave her a passable Shi'arian salute.
"My creators would have been proud to have you as one of them own, Xander." She declared in admiration. "As a matter of fact, you already are with that minute strand of DNA within you. Now, prepare for teleport launch sequence."
Running through the final pre-flight checklists on the Halcyon itself, Xander gave he the thumb's up gesture.
"I'll see you soon." Xander called out from the Halcyon as it lifted off the ground and started to hover over to the teleportation launch circle.
-0-0-0-0-0-
The ancient AI kept track of the silvery-blue shape as it pushed through the Ghul's planetary atmosphere moments later and vanished in a rainbow of lights.
-0-0-0-0-0-
A few star systems away, a spatial anomaly appeared nearby as a large pyramid-shape vessel was forcibly ejected from hyperspace.
"What happened?" Samantha Carter stared at the controls.
"We must have caught the tail end of the blast wave." Her father, Jacob Carter, said as he studied the main control console with apprehension clearly written on his face. "It blew us off course."
A noise behind them signaled the appearance of Jack and Daniel on the bridge. It took her a second to realize that it was only them.
"Sir?" She asked. "Where's Teal'c?"
"I'm not sure." Jack replied as he and Daniel shared a quick glance. "I think he may be dead."
Sam stared, feeling as though a cold hand had wrapped around her insides.
"That's assuming Apophis has him." Jacob said from his place on the console.
"We have to go back!" Sam cried, her face a mirror to the one on both of the other men's faces.
"That may not be possible Sam." Jacob said, frustrated at the lack of a good response from the navigation system. "The navigational computer isn't recognising any of the star patterns." Then the half human, half Tok'ra paled when the navigation system confirmed his worst fear. "According to these readings, we've traveled over 4 million light years."
They all stared at him, shock wiping the worry they felt for their comrade from their face at the news.
"That's impossible!" Sam exclaimed.
Jacob just pointed at the machine and replied. "If I'm reading this right, we aren't in our own galaxy anymore."
His daughter studied the readings herself as she spoke her thoughts aloud. "The explosion must have somehow affected the subspace window created by the hyperdrive. That's the only explanation I can think of."
"Wait a minute." Jack said; his voice slightly higher than normal. "Can we even get back?"
"I don't know." Jacob replied beside his daughter. "The ship isn't normally capable of going so fast."
"Well, DUH!" Jack bit out. "It only took us a few seconds to get here!"
"Given our current position, and maximum hyperdrive speed, it's gonna take us 125 years to get back." Jacob bit back.
"This is NOT happening." Jack thought aloud. "This is NOT the delta quadrant. We're not on the Starship Voyager."
Then Jack pointed at Jacob. "Gender aside, you are NOWHERE even close to being Captain Janeway."
The human Tok'ra didn't even bother to dignify that comment with a response as he spotted something on the console readouts the same time his daughter did.
"Long range sensors are picking up another ship." He announced and blanched when their ship recognized the incoming spacecraft.
"It's Apophis..."
-0-0-0-0-0-
-TO BE CONTINUED—
-0-0-0-0-0-
A/N: Terribly sorry for the long wait, I really had no time because a lot of things are going on in my RL. In any case, I have some mixed feelings in regards to this chapter. A friend of mine read my story and tried to do some sort of comic book storyboard for it…. I liked it and tried to implement his style into this chapter…. The italicized paragraphs up to the time he left showed glimpses of the new armor…. I can only hope it translated well.
Also, I know some of you have some thoughts that I may have wandered off of focus with the story the last chapter…
Well, in my own defense; you try writing while you go through the stresses of working through a car accident and having to deal with the insane insurance company of the maroon who hit me and see how you like it. Once this is over, then I'll be back on track.
That's the good news…. The bad news is that it will take me a bit longer now to update my stories as we get closer to this year's end. I'll probably be working my butt off to save up for Xmas presents for the family and that means less time to concentrate on myself and my own needs. I promise though that I will NEVER abandon this story. I'm treating each chapter as if they were one whole comic book per chapter… that's how I originally envisioned them. The chapter length goes by how much I "see" them unfold in my mind's eye (and that includes my way of writing them down like a jigsaw puzzle and put them together that way).
Until then, any changes to this chapter and the others will come and go as my heavy schedule permits.
-0-