Source Material: Ben 10 Alien Force Episode 10- Paradox
It had been close to an hour and the viewers were starting to get somewhat stir crazy. Raven had enough and decided to explore the Phoenix Roost in its entirety. Qrow elected to tail her so she wouldn't do something to piss off their host. Phoenix was mild mannered and all but consider this was his domain, he didn't want to think what would happen if she pushed him too far.
Meanwhile, the younger viewers were checking in on a certain heiress, "Are you sure you are alright, Weiss?" Ruby asked her partner yet again. She had never seen her breakdown like that before.
"I'm fine, Ruby." She answered. "Honestly, I feel a lot better than I thought I would." She had a tiny grin, "I was very neutral towards Phoenix but he is a nice guy all in all."
Pyrrha and Yang just shared a side glance, having had known this since he took them to the side and try to set them straight. Although Yang couldn't stop herself from teasing her teammate, "Are you sure it's just that and not that version of Jaune trying to save you? Like a knight in shining armor."
She just rolled her eyes, "It's not like that. Besides, my opinion on Jaune has changed since the dance. Although things between me and Neptune aren't going the way I hoped, I still appreciate what he had done for me." She had a small smile with that, "And I do wish to talk to him when we return. It would be nice to be proper friends with each other."
Pyrrha smiled at that, "Well, I'm sure he already sees you as a friend but I think he'd appreciate the sentiment."
"And are you sure its friendship you want?" Nora asked with a teasing tone. "I mean, Jaune may still have feelings for you. If you really wanted, I think he would still go out with you."
Weiss just stared at the energetic ginger wide eyed at that. And despite herself, she could stop the blush from overtaking her cheek. "I-it's not like that!" she said in a near squeak. 'Wait, why am I reacting like this?' she then mentally questioned herself.
"Nora." Ren sighed out as he placed his hand over his face.
That just made Nora laugh. Well until she felt two shadows cover her. She looked to see a very annoyed Mistalian champion and a very angry blonde brawler looking down at her with their arms crossed. "Uh oh…" she said weakly.
"I think we need to have a conversation, Nora." Pyrrha said in a stern tone. "Don't you think, Yang?"
"I agree with you, Pyrrha." Yang answered in a heated tone. "A very long conversation."
Ruby leant over to whisper to Blake, "I think she pushed too far this time."
Blake just nodded, "I worry for anyone that messes with Jaune when we get back." That made Ruby stifle a laugh.
Before that conversation could happen, a large orange flame erupted in the room. All the people turned to it in unison as the flames died down and Phoenix was standing in its place. He stretched his arms over his head with a groan, "Sorry for the delay. Starting to record a new world always takes a bit longer to do."
He saw the two women standing over the very nervous third. He just grinned, "I would suggest not doing that here, you three. You can easily go to the sparring rooms during your next break." Pyrrha and Yang conceded and retook their seats as Nora just sighed, being saved for now.
He then looked over everyone, seeing who was missing. He placed his hand on his throat before he spoke, his vice being amplified to sound like a PA system throughout the manor but normal in the viewing room. "Qrow, Raven, can you please return to the theater? We are ready to start the next world."
Phoenix then turned to his chair and pulled out his red tome, looking through it for the appropriate world. As everyone returned to their seats and gabbing their snacks or beverages. Seeing this, he snapped his fingers and a teacup full of hot tea appeared at Raven seat in a flash of violet fire.
The Branwen twins walked in not too long after that. Qrow took his seat next to his brother-in-law while Raven took her seat in the back. She gave the cup a scrutinizing look before picking it up. She smelled it at first to try to see if anything was off about it. But after not smelling anything, she took a tentative sip. She didn't let it show on her face but it was one of the better cups of tea she had in quite a while. She looked up to see that Phoenix was looking at her. She held his gaze for a bit before she nodded her thanks to him.
"Alright, with everyone here, we can now begin." Their host smiled to them all. "This world will be very different since humanity is not alone in this universe. It is one of the millions of intelligent species in their universe."
"Are you talking about aliens?!" Ruby said in awe.
"Indeed." Phoenix replied. "And the greatest invention in this universe is the Omnitrix. I device that can allow anyone to transform into any other that it has access to. And with it, a hero like no other has risen."
"So… Jaune has this Omnitrix?" Yang speculated, having seen a theme with the other words.
That just made Phoenix chuckle as the fireball arose from his tome. "I guess you'll wait and see." The fireball slammed into the screen, bringing it to life.
The world opened up to showing a military base but strangely, it was just in black and white.
"Is there something wrong with the screen?" Ruby asked with a tilt of her head.
Blake shook her head, "I think it's supposed to show that it is from the past."
"Got it in one." Phoenix said before drinking his coffee.
The screen began to zoom in on a particular building as the familiar voice of General Ironwood spoke, "Sure this thing is going to work?" he asked. It then showed the general speaking into an older microphone, "Your Time Machine has cost the US government quite a pretty penny, Doctor."
"Time machine?" question the General.
"Don't even think about it." Phoenix spoke up. "Manipulating time rarely ever works out. Trust me, it'll do more harm than good."
"Talking from experience?" Raven asked. Tea or not, she still didn't like him.
"Personally, no. I've stuck to only pausing or accelerating it slightly, never backwards. But I've seen it bite people in the ass across multiple worlds." The Writer answered with a sigh. "It's one of those things that is just better off being left alone."
The screen showed inside the lab. First was a younger man dressed nicely along with a lab coat. unkempt brown fair, a darker complexion with freckles and green eyes.
"Who is that?" Nora asked.
"I've never seen him before." Pyrrha added.
All the other viewers agreed with them so Phoenix decided to answer the question for them, "You haven't met him yet. His name is Oscar Pine and in most future timelines you meet him. Whether that'll happen in yours is up in the air right now though. My… interference may or may not change that."
The screen continued to move as another familiar voice was talking, "The Chronologger is hardly a time machine in the sense of a vehicle and more of a subatomic drill designed to bore a tunnel in the fabric of space time." The man turned around to show an older Jaune.
"Jaune invented the time machine?" Weiss asked in awe.
"He does have a good head on his shoulders." Ozpin pointed out. "But then again, this version of him is most likely a genius."
He turned to the glass window that separated the lab from the viewing area, "As for cost, I think the alleviation of untold human suffering throughout history is ample justification, General." He said neutrally as he walked towards the glass, hands in his pockets.
Ironwood turned to one of the other people watching with him as he whispered, "It'll also give our Red buddies overseas a thing or two to think about." He then put on a pair of green lensed goggles over his eyes.
"But to answer your first question…" Jaune continued as he prepared to put his own goggles on. "There is only one way to find out." He said with a smile. He pulled a switch and then turned to a large ring made of quartz crystals. It had pieces of machinery in it as it started to hum with power. A portal beginning to form in the center.
It started to pull air into it but Jaune just stood there with his hands in his pockets, watching. Oscar was on the other side of the room and asked, "You're certain we're safe, Doctor?"
He just spoke over his shoulder, "I'm not certain of anything, Oscar. But the chrono-magnetic field we've generated should protect us." That didn't make the younger man any less nervous.
Yang snorted, "Well that was reassuring."
"He's literally trying to make a portal through time, I don't think anyone has any real idea about what may happen." Blake pointed out.
"Good point." Yang conceded.
The portal began to grow stronger and the room began to shake. Oscar walked up behind the doctor, "Doctor, I'm frightened."
Without looking away, Jaune held up a paper bag to him, "Have a gumball. It'll calm your nerves."
"A stiff drink would probably work better." Qrow gave his suggestion as he drank some coffee from the mug he got for himself; it wasn't like Ozpin's that would refill itself though. He didn't have terribly much left in his flask and the coffee would help him sober up a bit easier. At least that's what he was telling himself.
"I don't think this would be the best time to drink, Qrow." Goodwitch pointed out.
He pointed to the screen, "Even the doc doesn't know what is gonna happen. When would be a better time to drink?"
"He does have a point." Tai had to agree with his old teammate. Much to Goodwitch's chagrin.
The portal grew stronger, making him smile as Oscar backed up. The room started to shake more and the portal started to pull things into it. Jaune started to slowly slide towards it as well. He tried to get away but it was too late. Jaune was sucked into the portal and gone.
"Jaune!" All of his friends shouted at once.
"What's going to happen to him?" Pyrrha asked in a panic. Phoenix didn't say a word, he didn't even look over to her. He just drank form his coffee and that didn't make anyone feel any better.
The General and the other's looked on in shock as a massive shadow blocked out the light from the portal. They heard a roar as the screen pulled away before temporarily going black.
"What just happened, sir?" Winter asked her commanding officer.
"I honestly, have no clue, Winter." He responded. "But I'm guessing it was nothing good."
The screen was now back in color and showing a green and black muscle car running down a road. "You didn't need to come." Said the voice of Mercury Black. "Yang and I coulda handed this alone." It showed he was driving and looking into the rear view mirror to whoever was in the back seat. "It's nothing really."
The car stopped by a stone wall as the person in the back seat spoke up, "Doesn't sound like nothing." Ruby answered. "Weird noises. Unearthly lights. Rumors of weird creatures out here." Mercury, Ruby and Yang all exited the car before walking away.
"So Yang, me and Emerald's partner are the heroes here?" Ruby asked.
"Looks like it." Yang smiled. "We sisters gotta stick together. Even in other worlds."
"Actually, you two aren't sisters here." Phoenix spoke up. "You are actually cousins and share the same birthday."
"Really?" Yang asked. "How?"
"Well your other self is still the daughter of Raven and Tai but Ruby…" He gained a mischievous smirk, "Is the daughter of Summer and Qrow."
That gained shocked looks from the entire family and Qrow was forced to spit take from the shock. As he was coughing on the water, Ruby asked, "Uncle Qrow's my dad?"
"It's actually pretty common in the multiverse." He chuckled, "Fifty-fifty really." That made a lot of people just sit down and process what they had just heard.
Mercury turned back to her, "Yeah, the dudes I heard it from aren't totally reliable."
Yang grinned, "Isn't that a big bad boy thing to do? Come out here to the ghost town to drag race." She teased.
He grinned and placed his hands on his chest, "How should I know? I just know them from auto shop." He lied but Ruby and Yang just looked to the side to see 'Mercury rules!' spray painted there.
"Busted!" Nora giggled.
Ruby ignored that and continued, "Grandpa said Los Soledad used to be a big military base back in the 50s. Some kind of research facility."
"Yeah. Must've been some pretty serious research, check out these walls. Fifty years later and there's still no way in." Mercury told them. They looked at the other side to see two massive holes in the walls.
Weiss deadpanned at the screen, "He's not the most perceptive, is he?"
Ruby shrugged, "I don't know. I've only spoken to him a handful of times. I mostly hangout with Emerald."
"No way." Mercury said in shock as he placed his hands on his head. "These weren't here." Ruby and Yang just walked to the hole as he said that.
Not long after that, they were driving through the abandoned base before coming to another stop. As they were getting out of the vehicle, Yang was asking, "Did anyone notice that some of those holes were strangely person shaped?"
Ruby was looking around, "Weird. Maybe something burned through the walls?"
"Like what?" Mercury added.
"The same thing that burned these trails everywhere." And sure enough massive and random trails were all throughout the dirt and concrete.
"Why there though?" Blake asked.
"What do you mean?" Pyrrha asked.
"Well if this were something nefarious, why would they be doing it at an abandoned military base? Anything worth stealing would've been taken long ago and it's not like destroying it sends some sort of message. It just seems… odd." The Faunus pointed out.
"Miss Belladonna does have a point." Winter added. "Unless someone is testing something. An already disheveled location would be perfect to hide the result in plain sight."
Yang walked up beside her cousin and pointed down. "Look." she said in shock.
They did and saw a bird skeleton but something was off. "A bird." Ruby dropped to a knee and picked up another skeleton. "And these are lizard bones. They've ben fossilized."
"So not fire then." Yang pointed out.
"But much more dangerous." Ren pointed out. "What could instantly fossilize something?"
"I'm worried to find out." Ruby said nervously.
"That's not the only thing." Yang added as she walked over to an old phonebooth that one of the trails lead to. "It's like someone turned the slate into sand just by standing on it."
"He was probably on hold." Mercury tried to joke and make light of everything.
Ruby walked past the booth and kept looking. "The trail goes to the police station… then to those, I guess they're apartments."
"Barracks actually." Winter spoke up.
"You do know they can't hear you, yes?" Raven said with a smirk as she drank from her tea. It was similar to Ozpin's mug as it kept refilling when it got low. She was sorely tempted to steal it when this was all said and done with.
The Specialist glared at her, "Oh I'm well aware, I was just informing the students. But maybe being a bandit makes it hard to understand just complicated topics."
She just gave her a glare, "Oh, the lap dog thinks she has a bite, huh?" She stood up, "Would you like to test that against someone who is really your superior."
Winter stood, "I would enjoy putting you in your place." A Glyph formed in her hand, "Unlike you, I don't need a weapon."
"Do I need to start locking your auras?" They turned to Phoenix giving them a glare, he raised his hand and a blue flame manifested in it. "I didn't do it before because I was being polite but I will do it if you won't behave."
The two looked at each other for one last glare before they took their seats. Phoenix just looked at them before he snuffed out the fire and returned his focus to the screen.
"Just to review." Mercury spoke up. "Someone stood here a million years ago and then walked to those building that were built fifty years ago?"
"You are not helping." Ruby told him. "These could be signs of serious DNAlien activity and it's up to us-"
Yang cut her off, "DNAliens are not doing this." She then pointed into the distance. "Does that look like a DNAlien to you?" They all turned to see a creature moving toward them it was a dark multicolored, humanlike creature. It seemed to have numerous exact copies of itself moving immediately behind it. And it was leaving the same trails they had seen before.
"What is that!?" Nora shouted in shock.
"Whatever it is, I doubt it's anything good." Pyrrha pointed out.
Mercury knelt down and placed his hand on the stone. "Finally." He said as his body started to absorb the stone and travel up his arm. Soon covering his entire body in the same stone. "Something worth the gas." He said with a grin as he looked over to this creature.
"What did he do?" Tai asked. "Did he absorbed the stone?"
"Yes." The Writer answered. "He can absorb whatever solid material he can touch. If there is enough of it, it'll cover his entire body. It adds protection and give him increased strength. And depending on what he absorbs, it could give him other benefits."
"Wow." Yang spoke up. "That could be very handy."
He stepped forward as Yang created an orb or purple energy in her hand. Ruby raised her arm, revealing a high tech watch on her left wrist. It was displaying a hologram of creature before she slammed her hand on to it. With a flash of green, Ruby was gone and an alien in her place.
The alien looked to be made of crystal. Its body was overall indigo, with several dark lines and spots. Their hands and face were magenta, and also sported six magenta shards on its back, two on its chest, and one on the top of the head that resembled a horn. The face consisted of a mouth and one large silver eye at the center. On the chest was a black circle with a green hourglass like symbol in the center, a silver ring encompassing all of it. "Chromastone!" it shouted in feminine voice.
"What happened to me!?" Ruby shouted in shock.
"Remember the device I mentioned? The Omnitrix?" Phoenix asked.
"Yeah." She said as she nodded then realization hit her, "Wait, I'm the hero!?"
"Yup." He grinned. "This alien you have named Chromastone. Very durable, high strength, can absorb and redirect energy. It is a very powerful form."
"Why does she name them?" Weiss asked.
He shrugged and Yang sighed, "Because it's Ruby and she would totally do that." That was enough of an answer for everyone. That just made the younger girl stick her tongue out at her sister.
The three charged the creature but it just avoided them. Swinging out to their left before cutting back behind them. It kept moving and got too close to the side of one of the barracks. The wood started to disintegrate and the whole building started to tip towards them. "Look out!" Ruby/Chromastone shouted as it began to fall. They managed to jump out of the way. But as the alien stood up, the creature was nowhere to be seen. "Gone."
With another flash of green, Ruby was back to her human form. Yang stood up and Mercury was reverting to his usual form too. "At least the building it destroyed wasn't the library."
"You really love the books." Mercury said in just confusion.
"She's saying we need to research." Ruby explained. "Find out what that thing is. All we know is that it's looking for something here at the base."
"Yang is the studious one?" Weiss asked in disbelief. "Now I've seen everything."
"What is that supposed to mean?" the blonde asked.
"You're not exactly the studying or reading type, Yang." Blake added.
She looked annoyed at that comment. "I may not read a lot but I do take my schoolwork serious. Otherwise there would be no way Miss Goodwitch wouldn't be hounding me all the time."
"That is true." Glynda said as she pushed her glasses into place, "I thought I'd have to keep an eye on you but you are more responsible with your schoolwork than I gave you credit for." She seemed to glow at the praise. "You do need to work on your temper still." And that made her deflate.
They quickly moved to the library and Yang was going through their archives. "These films are really corroded. But it looks like this base was built for some kind of time experiment called Project Paradox."
Mercury couldn't resist being snarky, "You wouldn't pick the desert outside of Bellwood to do top secret research."
"They built it here because of the huge quartz deposits." Ruby answered.
"Quartz. Time. Maybe they were trying to build the world's biggest wristwatch." He joked but just earned deadpanned expressions from the two.
"Was he dropped on his head?" Weiss glared. "I don't understand why your two work with him."
"He has his uses." Phoenix answered. "But honestly, despite how he's acting, he is a pivotal part of their group."
They looked at the picture of Jaune, "His name's been censored." Ruby pointed out. "Whoever he was, his Paradox Theory was the basis of some kind of experimental tunnel through time."
They managed to get down to the testing area. The same quartz portal was there but now the items that were pulled into it were now stretched unnaturally long into the center before just disappearing. And seemed to be now anchored in their place in space. "Looks like my place after that big party I threw last weekend." Mercury joked.
Yang looked down, "Look." There was the same trail leading from the portal. "That things been here too."
Ruby walked forward, "Only one trail. It either came in here and vanished."
"Or it was born here." Yang finished for her.
"I'm betting on the latter." Ruby said.
"It is interesting though." Ozpin scratched his chin. "If it was created here, why are the sightings just starting? It has been a few decades by now."
They then heard another unnatural sound coming from the viewing area as a chair was moved. Ruby quickly activated the Omnitrix before slamming her hand on it once again. This time she was a humanoid, plant-like alien that had an overall green and black colored body, with a red flame-patterned head and root-like feet. Her eyes were oval-shaped with points at each end with pupils copying the shape but are smaller, still silver. Also, her shoulders and head had red petals and her elbows and legs had green frills sticking out. The same symbol was still on her chest, "Swampfire!" she shouted.
"Another one?!" Ruby said in excitement.
"How many does she have?" Nora asked.
"Ten, currently." Phoenix answered. "This one has enhanced strength, regeneration, plant manipulation and flame creation."
"How are you supposed to beat her if she has ten different forms?" Qrow asked with a tilt of his head.
"Each one does have a weakness, it's just a matter of finding it." The host said with a grin. "Plus she can only be in a form for a set amount of time and overuse will make it so the Omnitrix will have to recharge before she can use it again.
She went around and grabbed the thing making the noise. "Gotcha!"
It was revealed to be none other than Jaune Arc, looking exactly how he did when he disappeared: he wore a white lab coat over a white shirt with a brown vest and black tie, black pants, and black shoes. The green lensed goggles were also hanging from around his neck.
"Jaune!?" Ruby , Nora, Yang and Pyrrha said in shock.
"He's alright!" The reaper and ginger shouted in joy.
"He hasn't aged a day…" Pyrrha said in shock.
"What the hell?" Yang added on.
He just grinned up to the alien, "Swampfire, that brings me back." He looked to the side, "Or is it forward?" He questioned out loud. He looked back to her, "It's so hard to tell, Ruby. Have we met?" He asked with another smile.
After a second, she put him back down. "How do you know my name?"
"That is a very good question." The General spoke up. "Is it just me or does he seem to be not all there?"
"There does seem to be something off about him." Glynda added.
He fixed his lab coat, "Have we met, yet I suppose the question was?" He said cheerfully with a finger pointed up.
Yang and Mercury weren't too far behind, the latter covered in stone again. "Hey, it's that dork from the photo. The Paradox guy."
Yang started to walk towards him, "You haven't changed at all. In fifty years."
He was still just smiling at the three of them, "Oh, considerably longer than that." He pulled out his bag of gumballs again, "Gumball?" he offered as he pulled one out and towards the alien Ruby.
"What does that mean?" Ruby asked. No one had an answer besides Phoenix, but he was enjoying this too much to spoil it.
"No thanks." She answered, still confused. He lowered his arm. "Who are you? What's your name?"
"You just read my file; I was rather hoping you could tell me. It slipped my mind several hundred years ago." he said casually.
"Did he just say, 'several hundred years'?" Mercury asked.
"How is that possible?" Weiss brought it up.
"He doesn't know his own name?" Pyrrha said sadly.
"And with his file being edited and anyone who knew him most likely gone, I don't think he will ever find out about it now." Ironwood added with a forlorn undertone to it.
"That isn't right." Nora added sadly. Ren gently rubbed her back but it did little to help her.
Ruby turned back to him, "Did you just say-" But he was no longer there. It was like he vanished. "Hey."
"Where'd he go?" Blake looked over every inch of the screen to see if he was hiding. "They turned away for a second."
"By the way…" Jaune asked, this time being right next to the exit. Hands in his pockets once again, "You didn't happen to see a space-time anomaly around here, did you?" He raised his hand, "About yay big, incredibly destructive, virtually unstoppable?" The trio just stared at him in utter shock.
"How did he get over there?!" Yang asked this time.
"No?" he asked before he looked down and started to tap his cheek with his finger. "I must've been thinking of another moment. Ta-ta!" he said cheerfully as he left through the exit.
Mercury chased after him but as he turned the corner, he was gone yet again. "Where'd he..?"
Yang walked over before looking towards a window and walking towards it, "He's out there." True enough, he was across the street and leaning one arm on an electric pole. Just looking at them.
"How!?" Nora shouted. "Just… How?!"
"He's obviously connected to that creature." Ruby/Swampfire pointed out. "We need to talk to him."
"Oh yeah." They turned around to see Mercury just glaring. "We'll talk." He said as he ran towards the wall. He yelled as he smashed the wall down. "Right after the pounding!"
"Oh great." Weiss rolled her eyes, "A male Yang."
"Hey!" Yang said in indignation.
Weiss looked at her with a grin, "Now you know how it feels."
Jaune just had his eyebrow raised before getting off the pole. He just looked ta Mercury as he walked behind it and disappeared again. Mercury went around the pole but was just as shocked as everyone else with his disappearance. He then turned to see that he was in the doorway of the building right next to it. He just smiled and waved as the door closed on them.
Mercury ran through the door before wreaking havoc on the inside. One of the things to stick out was a chair being thrown out of the roof and into the distance. But that was when Jaune walked down the street and back to the front of the building. He turned to Ruby and Yang with that same smile, "Was I in there?" he asked. He then sprinted away.
"This is getting ridiculous." Qrow spoke up. "What is he doing? It's not speed. Teleportation?"
"Possibly." Ozpin nodded, "But something is telling me there is a bit more to all this."
"But what, Oz?" Qrow asked but did not receive an answer.
He rounded a building as he kept running. Swampfire erupted from the building behind him as all three chased him down. But they stopped when they heard his voice. "That was public property, you know?" They turned to see him right behind them with his hands in his pockets. Right in front of the hole they just made.
"How does he move so fast?" Ruby asked in just utter bewilderment.
"That's what we would like to know." Ruby said, agreeing with her other self.
"You mean…" They turned to the right to see him leaning against another building, "How do I move so quickly. It's called walking." He then got off the building and turned his back to them, walking away. He then appeared right next to Mercury, "Strolling really."
The stone covered young man didn't hesitate to grab the blonde by the collar, "That's better." He said, clearly annoyed.
"Easy on the jacket, it's twelve-hundred years old." He told him and Mercury let go with one hand. "Anyway, thanks." He said cheerfully.
"Thanks? For what?" Ruby questioned.
He shrugged, "Well I had a feeling if we made a loud enough racket, he'd show up." Indicate the creature from before, running towards them.
"He was using you all as bait." Raven said with a nod. "Clever."
Qrow rolled your eyes, "Of course you would agree with his tactic."
She shrugged her shoulders, "Sometimes you need proper bait when you are hunting a certain quarry. It's a natural step to take."
Mercury turned to it as he kept ahold of the blonde, "Finally! Something we can hit!"
That made Jaune lose his smile and have a panicked expression, "Oh, I really don't think that's a good idea."
As it was moving closer, Yang noticed something. "Those trails. They're not burn marks, they're age. The creature accelerates time!"
Mercury ran forward as Jaune just looked at Yang, "Very good!" he complimented.
"Why is he so calm. This is serious." Nora asked.
"Either he is just that confident in himself…" Pyrrha started.
"Or he is just insane." Blake finished her thought.
"Not so fast, ugly!" Mercury shouted as he tried to punch it. As soon as he touched it, the stone disappeared from his body. The hand aging before he groaned in pain and collapsed to the ground. Jaune took off towards the creature as it ran down the street while Yang and Ruby went to check on friend.
"Mercury?" Ruby asked as she turned him over, revealing he was now an elderly man.
"Mercury!" Yang shouted in worry.
Ruby reverted back to her human form, "Just touching that thing aged him sixty, eighty years." She helped him back to his feet. "We gotta get him to a hospital."
"What is a hospital going to do about that?" Yang asked.
"That's a fair point." Weiss agreed after a second. "They can't really help with old age."
That was when Mercury started to wake up, "What're you doing?" He pulled away from her. "Get your hands off me!"
"Come on, Mercury." He turned to Yang. "We're gonna get you some help."
"What do you mean help? I'm gonna kick that thing's keester." He kicked the ground and a slight cracking sound came from him. He made a pained sound as his hand settled on his lower back.
"Are you okay?" Yang asked.
"My back is killing me, my legs ache and what's up with these shoes? Is it too much to ask for some support?"
Nora started to laugh, "I'm sure it'll be really afraid of him."
"Nora this is serious." Ren tried to reprimand her but she was laughing too hard to hear him.
"He's like a real, irritable, short tempered, crotchety old man." Yang said in awe.
"Why are you whispering?!" He asked as he placed his hand by his ear.
"In other words, besides the male pattern baldness, he's pretty much the same as always." Ruby joked. "Come on, old man."
That made Yang snort, "Wow. This Ruby can be really mean. I like it." She then wrapped her arm around her sister, "But I still love this one though." Ruby just returned the side hug with a grin.
Mercury had his car keys in hand but Ruby quickly took them from him, "I'll take those."
He turned to her, "What do you think you're doing?"
"Driving." She said obviously.
"Don't even think about it, you don't have a license." He pointed to her.
"Grandpa taught me and it's an emergency." She told him. "You're nearsighted, arthritic, your reflexes are shot and…" She motioned to the side, "You're trying to unlock a cactus." She motioned to the cactus and Mercury turned to it in shock. That just made Yang facepalm.
That made Nora laugh even more with Yang and Ruby right behind her. "Are you serious?" Weiss asked them.
"I'm sorry but that was too good." Yang added.
"Yeah!" Was all she could add through her laughter.
Pyrrha and Blake were trying to hide their own laughter. And even Tai and Qrow were laughing at the absurdity of all of that.
Ruby started up the car and Mercury leant forward to speak to Yang, "You shoulda gone out with me when I was young and handsome."
"You were too immature." She told him.
"What about now?" he asked.
"Too old." She told him. That depressed him.
"Yang!" Blake tried to say but was still giggling. "That's so mean." Yang was still just laughing so she only shrugged.
Ruby shifted gears and backed up into some trash cans. Shocking all three of the rides. "Whoops." She said sheepishly.
"It's not a bumper car!" Mercury shouted.
"Oh no." Yang managed to say now that she had calmed down. "I'm getting flashbacks to when I tried to teach Ruby how to drive Bumblebee."
"It is complicated, okay?" she said in embarrassment.
That was when the creature crashed through the wall of a nearby building and turned towards them. "Back up, back up, back up!" Yang shouted.
Ruby floored it and the car sped off in reverse. The creature kept up with them without much issue as the car rounded a corner. Yang looked behind them to see another wall explode, "Ruby!" she shouted. "On the right!"
Ruby looked into the side mirror and saw the creature racing towards them. She hit the brake and turned the car to face forward. She kicked it back into gear before racing down one of the side alleys. The creature still giving chase, crashing through building as it went.
"She's actually doing pretty well." Qrow pointed out.
"That thing keeping up with them isn't good though." Tai pointed out. "And we still have no clue on what exactly that thing even is."
"Wait a minute." Yang spoke up, "Jaune was chasing after that thing last time we saw him. What happened to him?"
Raven shrugged, "Maybe it got to him." That earned her a lot of glares but she didn't seem to care in the slightest.
They couldn't out race it and the creature stretched a tendril forward and touched the car. A wave of energy spread over the car, aging it rapidly. "No!" Mercury shouted as he held his head, "No! Not the car! Not the car!"
"That Is not the priority right now!" Weiss aid in annoyance.
"Weiss, chill." Yang told her. "What's got you wound up so much?"
She sighed as she massaged her forehead, "I don't know. He's just so infuriating."
The car rounded another corner and Ruby saw some debris in front of them. "Hang on!" he told them all as she raced toward sit. She used it as an impromptu ramp and the car managed to land on a roof of a building.
"Good idea." Qrow complimented. "It'll buy them some time."
"Is that before or after it starts aging the first floor so it collapses in on itself?" Winter asked.
Qrow shrugged, "What else did you want them to do? That car was not going much further."
Yang and Ruby helped Mercury out of the car and away from it. The old man was just glaring at brunette, "You are never driving my car again!"
That was when two of the wheels popped and an entire door fell off. Ruby turned to it, "True."
"Where have you been?' Ruby turned forward to see Jaune standing there with a pocket watch in his hand. "You were supposed to get here six seconds ago." He then looked back down to the watch, "Or is this thing running fast?"
"He's back!" Nora cheered.
"He's okay." Pyrrha said in relief.
"How does he keep showing up like that?" Weiss asked.
"Who are you anyway? What're you doing here?" Ruby questioned.
"What is that creature?" Yang added.
"Can you fix my car?" Mercury added as well.
Weiss' eyebrow was twitching like crazy but she just took a deep breath before she had another outburst.
Jaune walked over to them, "There's something different about you, is it your hair?" He asked as he leant forward.
"Yeah." Mercury answered. "I'm parting it down the middle now. And I also got real old!"
That made Jaune look annoyed for the first time since seeing him, "Don't talk to me about old, I walk in eternity." He said ominously.
"What is that supposed to mean?" Blake asked. "What is going on with him?"
Mercury started to shake his fist at him, "Well you better start running in eternity, smart guy."
"Hmmm, you might slow us down." Jaune said. "I need to fix that." He pointed over to the side with his thumb, "We'll come back right over there." He pointed to a corner of the roof where a door would lead to the stairs to go inside. Jaune walked around it with someone a few feet behind him. He stepped to the side and outstepped a seventeen year old Mercury, looking just like he did before the aging.
"How is he doing all of this?" Winter asked. "How is any of this possible?"
"Hopefully, we'll find out soon." Ironwood spoke up. "I agree with you, it's starting to get frustrating."
Ruby and Yang both looked on in shock, with the former looking between them to see that Mercury was indeed gone. "Mercury." Yang said happily as she ran over to him. "I can't believe it. Your good as new!" she said in excitement as she hugged him.
"Does this Yang have a crush on him?" Ruby asked.
Yang rolled her eyes, "I doubt it. He isn't my type."
"Actually, the two of you have mutual feelings for each other." Phoenix informed them. "You two just haven't talk about it yet."
"Remind you of someone?" Nora questioned as she gently elbowed Pyrrha. That caused the girl to blush and turn to the side in embarrassment.
He looked down at her with a grin, "Well my back still hurts a little. If I could just lean on you…" She just looked back up to him with a grin before she pushed him away. "Alright, Professor." Mercury said as he turned back to Jaune. "If you wouldn't mind fixing my car…"
He just raised an eyebrow, "How exactly do you expect me to do that?" He raised a hand, "I'm a time traveler, not a body shop. Regressing a car would break all the chrono-laws of space-time and-"
"Okay, enough!" Ruby said in annoyance. "I want answers, now!"
"Same!" Yang, Ruby and Nora agreed, loudly.
He didn't look offended, he just smiled again, "Same old Ruby Branwen. You're even more like yourself now than you were in the future. Which for obvious reasons, I can't really tell you about."
Mercury took a step towards him, punching his fist into his other palm, "You want me to hurt him?"
"What can you tell us, Mister…" Yang started. "Paradox?"
"Paradox!" he said excitedly, "Oh, yes, that'll do. That'll do very nicely."
"I'll tell you my story in a way you can understand with a beginning middle and end." He pulled out his pocket watch and it released a blue light, "We'll start in the middle…"
"How is the middle a good place to start?" Goodwitch said in annoyance.
"Just go with it." Phoenix said as he drank more of his coffee. "It'll all make sense, trust me."
"Los Soledad was built entirely because of my ingenious theory: a time tunnel utilizing the properties I discovered in quartz crystals which would allow us access to past and future events." It showed the opening scenes again, but this time in color.
"Yeah, well for a genius, it looks like you blew it." Mercury snarked.
"You don't know the half of it." Jaune added. "Some tiny miscalculation on my part destabilize the experiment and ripped a hole in the fabric of reality. I was hurled into the event horizon… I must've spent one hundred-thousand years there. I didn't age or need to eat or sleep. Just exist."
"That sounds horrifying." Ozpin said out loud. And he though his reincarnation could get bad. But just existing like that without a purpose, that was a whole different beast.
"I feel so bad for him," Ruby added just staring at the other version of her best friend.
"Sounds pretty boring." Mercury observed.
"At first, I went mad, of course." Jaune continued. "But after a few millennia, I got bored with that too and went sane. Very sane. I began to learn… I now have total understanding of the space-time continuum." He said happily as he closed his watch and putting it away. "Allowing me to travel anywhere and any when I want. Within reason."
There was a long pause as all the viewers just took all that in, "Well…" Goodwitch started, "That certainly explains everything."
Mercury just gave him a scrutinizing look, "So where's your time machine?"
"He doesn't have a time machine…" Ruby started before she had a realization. "He has a map. In his head."
"Exactly." He pointed at her with a wink. "I know where all the shortcuts are. I've spent a dozen lifetimes crisscrossing the timestream making it a better place."
"And how does that pay?" Mercury added.
"At the moment, not even in job satisfaction." Jaune told them as he turned his back and started to walk away. Next thing they knew, they were all in a room with a chalkboard in one of the many abandoned buildings on the base, "You see I recently discovered that some kind of extradimensional creature is going to wreak havoc across the universe."
"Is that what that thing is?" Yang questioned.
"Apparently." Blake added, still trying to wrap her own head around everything she had heard.
"So?" Ruby asked. "The way you talk, you take on monsters like this all the time. Why's this one so bad?"
Jaune picked up a piece of chalk and started to draw something on the board. "Because unlike the thousands of foes I've faced before…" He drew a circle before an arrow going into the center of it, "This extra dimensional creature came into our plane of reality the moment my experiment went awry."
"Oh. So just to be clear, it's your fault." Mercury pointed out.
Yang took a step or two forward. "This creature hasn't been lurking around here for fifty years. We would know about it."
"Time is like a river…" Jaune said as he started to draw a curving line on the board. "It moves, flows and bends. Fifty years ago, I accidentally set off a depth charge in that river. The creature I had released was blasted fifty years in time to your present. Doing this to you future." He said as he drew a much more chaotic and aggressive line over the one he drew before.
"Is anyone else starting to get a headache?" Nora asked while clutching her head.
"A slight one." Weiss answered. "But that might be from Mercury being how he is."
"I agree with you two." Qrow added. "I get it but it's a lot to take in all at once."
Yang was thoroughly confused, "But all it's doing is messing up an old army base. Why is that a problem at all? Why not just leave it alone?"
"I do have a point there." Yang pointed out.
"That's a better question for the man on the moon." Jaune replied with a smile.
"What?" Ruby asked. "Who's the man on the moon?"
"I am." He said pointing to himself with a thumb. His voice was echoing and it was revealed that the four of them were now on the surface of the moon.
"What?!" everyone shouted. "How? And Why?" Ozpin adding afterwards.
"We're on the moon…" Ruby said in awe.
"No. We're on the moon in your distant future." He clarified.
"What?" Mercury asked. "How are we not suffocating?" he asked in a mild panic.
"Good question." Jaune complimented. "Not remotely the point though." That got him an annoyed look from the teen.
"How is that not a point?' Raven asked with a hint of an indignant tone. "That seems like a major point that needs to be addressed."
"Imagine what Remnant would look like in two-hundred years say, with that time monster wandering all over it, aging everything that crossed its path to dust. For those that you that have no imagination, Remnant is up there." He say as he turned around and looked up. And there was Remnant but with no greenery or oceans. It was just brown and grey. And most of all, dead.
None of them said a word for a while, just taking in what they saw. Remnant was a tough place to live at times but seeing it like that was a sad sight to see. And the reality of there being nothing on it: Human, Faunus, animals, or even Grimm. It gave the reality just a bit more gravity to it.
"You brought us to the worst possible version of the future." Ruby said shakily as she looked back down to the Professor.
"No." Jaune corrected. "Should I fail to stop that creature…" He turned back to them, "This is your best possible future." He said gravely, shocking all three of them.
"How could it get worse?" Ruby asked in fear and just sadness.
She turned to Phoenix who just looked at her before shaking his head. Simply saying, "You're better off not knowing."
"Not a pretty sight, is it?" he asked sadly.
They all look in front of them and Jaune asked, "What are you doing here?"
There was another identical version of this Jaune looking up at the planet as well, "I'm allowing myself to feel the full impact of my failure."
"There's two of him!?" Yang and Pyrrha asked at the same time.
"It'll be explained." Phoenix said. They were not really getting this whole time travel thing and he was thinking this may've been a mistake.
Nora had a pensive look, "Two Jaunes may be the best chance…"
Ren nodded, "Maybe two of them could better the odds of stopping the creature."
"Oh, yeah. That too." Nora shrugged. "I meant that then Yang and Pyrrha don't have to share our Jaune then. They would each have one." That made the two women mentioned to blush profusely.
"Okay, who's he?" Mercury asked, just about done with all of this.
"He's a parallel Paradox" Ruby quickly understood.
This new version looked over his shoulder, "Young Ruby has an innate sense of transtemporal metaphysics." He turned to face them all properly. "Which will serve her well in her future. Or should I say past?" He asked out loud.
"Okay, now I'm getting a headache." Ruby said. She definitely wasn't like her other self. This was all too much.
"Yeah, same." Blake said, massaging her temples to try to ease the tension.
Ruby looked over to Mercury with a smirk, "And I drive good too."
"We can breathe on the moon in the future but can't fix my car?" The silver haired teen asked.
"What should I do?" The first Jaune asked himself, literally.
"Well, obviously not what I did." The second Jaune answered himself. "But whatever you do, you better do it quickly." He snapped open his pocket watch. "Time is running out." He said as the clock began to glow blue again.
When the light died down, the four were back at the military base in the present. Yang was looking around, "Why come back here? Why don't we travel back in time and stop the time experiment from ever happening?"
"I have to agree." Pyrrha nodded. "Wouldn't that be the best solution."
"There are reasons why it wouldn't be a good idea." Phoenix answered. "Mostly you creating a literally paradox that may tear reality at the seams." Everyone looked at him as he said that. He just shrugged, "This is why you don't start messing with the past. You just open a can of worms."
"Isn't it just like an energy being to think outside temporal convention?" Jaune asked.
"Energy being?" Tai asked.
"In this world, Qrow and Raven's mother was a powerful species of alien that are comprised of pure energy. They didn't gain her abilities but Yang was lucky enough to manifest them. That's her power here."
"Wow." Yang said. "That sounds pretty cool."
He nodded, "It does but you are still pretty weak in comparison to your grandmother. You turned down her offer to learn from her. You prefer to be human."
Yang grinned as Ruby hugged her. Meanwhile Raven rolled her eyes with a scoff, "What a waste."
She looked angrily at him, "I am not an energy-"
He cut her off, "The experiment that releases the creature, also unsticks me in time. And that must happen because…" He gave a brief chuckle, "In all modesty-"
"You've save the world dozens of times." Ruby finished for him.
"Hundreds, actually." He corrected. "In fact on one occasion, you and I work together to save the entire univer-" He quickly cut himself off at Ruby's shellshocked expression. "Never mind."
"We did what now!?" Ruby said in shock.
He then looked down at his pocket watch, "It should be here any-" He was cut off when they heard an explosion. They all looked up, "You could set your watch by it." He said with a smile.
The building across from them started to collapse and Ruby quickly transformed into yet another alien. This one appeared as a red, humanoid manta ray-like alien with silver eyes, black outlines on her face, yellow horns extending from her nose, gills underneath her arms, yellow patagia and two black lightning bolt-like stripes coming down from her shoulders to the symbol on her chest. "Jetray!" she shouted as she took off into the sky.
"What about this one?" Ruby asked excitedly.
Phoenix counted off on his fingers, "Flight, amphibious, can shoot lasers from the eyes and tail. Couple other things."
Once the building collapsed fully, the creature started to make its way towards the group. From the air, Jetray fired lasers from its eyes at it but it had no effect whatsoever on it. She didn't give up and fired more from her tail but they had a similar effect.
Jaune reached into his bag and pulled out a handful of gumballs before throwing them at it.
Raven just rolled her eyes, "Yeah. That's gonna work." She said sarcastically as she took a sip from her tea.
They actually hit and the creature came to a slow stop ten feet or so from them all.
That made her start to choke on her tea and a bit even shot out of her nose. As she was coughing, she grabbed a napkin to clean her face but still manage dot get out through her coughs, "How?"
In response, everyone that new Raven was starting to smile or hide giggles at seeing her usual stoic act go out teh window. Phoenix had devolved into just belly laughing.
"They hit it?" Ruby asked, still in alien form, as she landed between the creature and the rest of her group. She turned to the Professor, "Doesn't everything age to oblivion as soon as they touch it?"
Jaune smiled, "Gumballs last a really long time. Look under your desk at school." He then became very serious, "Now, get back!"
The creature started to move forward and Jetray took off into the sky once again. Yang narrowed her eyes before crossing her arms over her chest, palms in front of her. As she pulled them back and into a martial arts stance, her hands now held transparent, purple energy orbs. But before she could do anything, Jaune lunged forward and wrapped his arms around its chest. He managed to slow it down to a stop before it could reach Yang or Mercury.
"What is the dolt doing?!" Weiss said in worry.
"He'll be killed!" Ruby said in a panic.
"Let go!" Yang shouted in concern. "He'll age you into dust!"
He was still wrestling with it to keep it in place, "I exist outside of time." He said as he was struggling. "But I can still feel the eons passing!"
Jetray flew back down but quickly shifted back into Ruby, "Paradox, take us back to the accident, now!"
"But I told you-"
"Just do it!" she shouted back.
"Looks like Miss Rose has a plan." Ozpin said with a smirk. "Let's see how this will play out."
With another blue light, they were all back in the fifties. Ruby turned to her friends, "Mercury, Yang, the lab, quick!" They nodded and took off running. She turned back to Jaune, "You just keep that thing occupied!" She then chased after the two.
As he was still struggling with the creature, he just managed to say, "K-keep it occupied?! I'm a time traveling hero, I don't keep things occupied!"
The trio managed to quietly sneak into the lab and hide just under the viewing window, so the General couldn't see them. The Professor from the past had his back to them, so they went unnoticed. Ruby looked down, "Why would it use the phone?" she asked.
"What?" Yang asked as she looked at her cousin.
"The creature." She clarified. "It tried to use the payphone. Then it went to the police station, then the dorms. It didn't act like some unfathomable transdimensional creature, it did everything a normal person would do-"
"If they suddenly found themselves in an abandoned military base." Yang finished when she saw where she was going with this.
"So, it's someone then?" Ruby asked, seeing where her other self was going with this.
"But who could it be though?" Pyrrha asked.
That was when the Chronologger started up. Ruby looked around and saw Oscar backing up in fear, until he tripped and hit a set of consoles, causing them to malfunction and explode. "Look right there. The assistant." Ruby pointed out.
They watched as Jaune was pulled into the portal. Then they saw Oscar fly towards it while screaming. He just managed to grab onto the elongated control panel to stop himself from being pulled in. But for how long was unknown.
Ruby moved into a kneeling position and started to fight against the pull of the portal. "Ruby!" Yang shouted. "You'll get sucked in along with him!"
"Let's not do that, okay?" Nora asked. "We don't need two running around."
"I need to put on a little weight." Was her only reply. She started to toy with the Omnitrix as she was pulled in but she didn't make it far before she transformed into a new alien. This one was a somewhat humanoid dinosaur standing about twelve feet tall with hard skin that was colored brown on her outer side and beige on her inner side. Like the others, she had silver eyes and the symbol on her chest, "Humungousaur!"
"Well that explains what we heard at the beginning then." Ironwood pointed out.
"And why your other self-started to freak out." Qrow pointed out. "Who wouldn't if that thing just showed up.
Her massive form started to crawl towards Oscar but as soon as he saw the massive creature, he screamed and let go of the only thing keeping him from being sucked in. But before he could get far, the massive hand wrapped around him, "Trust me, this beats the alternative."
She pulled him away from the portal as she jumped away from it. When they were clear, Yang stood up and fired orbs of the same energy at the portal. The energy damaged the quartz enough that it started to fall apart and being sucked onto the portal, making it implode on itself.
"Did it work? Did they stop it?" Pyrrha asked.
"We'll see soon." Blake said, "One way or the other."
Back to Jaune, the creature was racing as fast as it could towards a building. Jaune braced himself, expecting to be slammed through the wall. But he stopped and the creature seemed to disappear as well. He opened his eyes and looked down to see that Oscar was now on his arms instead of the creature. His old assistant was just looking at him in confusion, "Oscar! Of course!" he said in excitement and realization. He then smacked his own forehead, "If it were a snake, it would've bit me!"
"It was him!" Nora said excitedly.
"They stopped it from happening!" Ruby said just as happily.
"Yeah, you saved the day, Rubes." Yang said as she started to mess with her hair again, much to her chagrin.
He looked up to see the trio walking towards him. He settled his gaze on Ruby. "Well don't look so smug, I would've figured it out eventually."
"You had a hundred-thousand years!" Ruby said in indignantly as they disappeared in a flash of blue light, leaving a very confused Oscar still standing there.
She does have a point, "Weiss pointed out."
Pyrrha said with a tiny grin, "Genius time traveler or not, Jaune is still Jaune."
"I'm okay with that." Yang said with a similar smile.
Back in the present, Jaune was speaking, "Well I have to admit it, I'm impressed. All those centuries trapped in the event horizon and it never occurred to me that the accident wasn't my fault." He grinned at Ruby, "You're much smarter than you were when I met you later."
"Thanks, I guess?" Ruby said in confusion.
"Yeah, was that an insult or a compliment?" Ruby asked.
"What happened to him?" Yang asked. "Your assistant?"
"I lived my life." They turned around to see an elderly Oscar walking towards them, using a cane.
"Oscar!" Jaune said happily, "How are you?" He raced over to shake his hand.
"Well you look the same." The older man joked. "And I haven't seen you in fifty years."
"Well I haven't seen you in a hundred-thousand years. But you don't look bad. How was your life?" he asked.
"Good. A good life." Oscar answered before he looked down, "But I'm sorry about the experiment. I ruined everything. I never got to time travel."
Jaune grinned, "Would you still like to?"
Oscar looked back up, "Yes." He said excitedly, "I'm not afraid anymore."
"Glad to hear it." Jaune raised his pocket watch, "How about I give you a behind the scenes look at eternity." A blue portal formed in front of them. Jaune put his arm around Oscar's shoulders before helping him walk towards the portal that snapped closed behind them.
All the students smiled at the reunion. "I'm glad they got to see each other again." Pyrrha spoke up. "It's good for both of them."
"At least he's got company now." Yang said out loud.
"Oh!" Mercury shouted, "And thanks for stranding us out her in the middle of nowhere!"
Ruby rolled her eyes, "Come on. We've got along walk home."
"That sucks." Nora said out loud.
Ren shrugged, "At least they are alive. And Mercury isn't old."
"That is a fair point." Pyrrha agreed with her teammate.
As they turned the corner, they were shocked to see Mercury's car back and looking brand new. Mercury laughed, "Stoked!" He then ran to his car.
"It looks like new." Yang observed as she and her cousin walked toward it as well.
"It doesn't just look like new; it is new." He looked into the car through the window, "It's factory new from thirty years ago! Paradox, I take back everything I was about to say about you."
Mercury and Yang got into the car but Ruby stopped when she was a sheet of paper under the wiper. She took it and read it out loud, "Mercury, try to keep in mind that if this car comes into contact with anything else from 1976, it will explode like antimatter. Enjoy! Paradox."
"He's kidding, right?" he asked as they all got in the car. He started it, "That's some kind of time travel joke, right? Isn't it? Guys?"
With that the screen died down, "So, what did you all think?" Phoenix asked.
"I was definitely different." Weiss said.
"It was awesome!" Nora added. "Although it would've been cool his our Fearless Leader had the watch thing!"
Phoenix chuckled, "I'll keep that in mind." He then gained a serious expression. "But now we are going to revisit a world we've already seen." He then pulled two black cards from his hoodie pocket. "And I know you're not going to like it."
They all looked ta the cards and slowly realized what he was talking about. They were about to revisit Deck of Heroes.