Personality Split 2021

by Marc C

This story is set 5 years after the finale of Land of the Lost, and 5 years before the events of Exodus, another LOTL fan fic. In this story, we learn a little more about the parallel universe Marshalls from the episode Split Personality, and their over the top nemesis, the Black Sleestak. NOTE: In 2021, I rewrote the story, changing the beginning, & solving another LOTL mystery.

6. Chapter 6

PART II

Chapter 6

Rich never wavered on his decision to not tell Enik about the missing temporal regulator. Though he trusted Enik, he felt that the knowledge of the regulator would only serve to upset the black Sleestak. As time passed, Rich's desperation to get his children back to their mother only grew, and the last thing he wanted to do was to potentially alienate someone that could help make that reunion a reality.

From Enik's point of view, he had no memory of helping Rich enter the pylon with the temporal regulator. Because Rich changed the timeline, from the point Enik learned of the Beige Universe until the point this other Holly was saved, Enik felt a constant déjà vu and some extra anger toward the humans, though he was unclear as to why. However, he still knew of the Beige Universe and he still desired to send the Marshalls to that universe's Earth.

To figure out exactly how to implement his plan, the black Sleestak retreated to the Library of Skulls to research more about the Beige Universe. He learned that although the beige Altrusians were quite different than the black ones, the two sets of Marshalls, while not identical, were very similar. He noted that while both families were stranded in their respective Lands of the Lost and had many similar experiences, certain events did not happen to them in the same order. The black Sleestak asked the Library of Skulls to display certain adventures of the Marshalls of the Beige Universe that did not happen to the family in the Black Universe. One example in particular caught his eye.

A few months before the incident with the Moongiver Pylon, in the Beige Universe, Enik was puzzled. For some reason, the time doorway in the Lost City was fixated on the events that led to the Marshalls' arrival in the Land of the Lost. The doorway displayed the family's accident in a repeating loop. Due to the nature of the time doorway, Enik was actually watching the earthquake in real time. It was not a filmed replay. The Marshalls of the past that the doorway displayed were the same people as the Marshalls of the present that were currently in the Land of the Lost, just at different points in their lives. Enik wished he could interact with the Marshalls of the past, but the loop was only about 27 seconds long. When the humans were halfway down the waterfall, the display abruptly stopped and repeated from the beginning.

Enik noticed a paradox. Despite the Marshalls' presence in the Land, the family did not appear to fall through a time doorway. Without an open portal, the humans should have been killed. Yet they were alive and in the Land of the Lost. Enik could not explain that contradiction, nor could he get the doorway to function properly until the problem was resolved.

At the same time, Will discovered a previously unknown entrance into the Lost City. After a brief encounter with the Sleestak, he found himself in Enik's cave, watching his family's accident repeat in the endless loop. Shortly thereafter, Rick and Holly arrived, and all four individuals were faced with the puzzle. Enik's first suggestion was to simply prevent the family from entering the Land of the Lost, but naturally, the Marshalls protested vehemently, since that would mean they would crash into the rocks at the bottom of the waterfall and die. The humans brainstormed as to how to solve the problem. Rick proposed throwing a rope through the doorway and getting home that way, but Enik noted that when the cycle moved from the end to the beginning, the rope would be cut.

The Altrusian also revealed one of the more intriguing secrets of the Land of the Lost. Because the Land is a closed universe, it constantly had to remain in balance. For someone to leave, another person had to enter or vice versa. Therefore, in order for the Marshalls to return home, three humans would have to take their place. Rick asked Enik if their past selves, the people being displayed in the time doorway, could be used to replace his family. Enik replied that such an idea was indeed possible, but it was against the Altrusian code for him to perform the task. But as Rick quickly found out, it was not against the code for Enik to provide the information to make Rick's idea a reality.

However, Enik was not being entirely honest with the Marshalls. Rick's idea would not work. The Altrusian knew that Holly Marshall was not destined to return home at that time. Had she done so, another paradox would have occurred. Yet Enik desired to resolve the predicament without killing the Marshalls. He made an intricate plan to implement his solution.

Basically, he set up a situation where a time doorway opened over the waterfall just as the Marshalls of the past were falling. The Marshalls of the past entered the portal, which put them in a state of limbo and caused the loop to finally stop. A second time doorway opened in Enik's chamber. That second time doorway led to Earth. The Marshalls of the past would remain trapped between worlds until the Marshalls of the present entered that second time doorway.

What Enik did not tell Rick was that once the Marshalls of the present entered the portal, they would instantly be morphed into their past selves. The doorway would then drop the family off in the Land of the Lost, and they would relive everything from the moment they entered the Land up until the current day, with one exception. The events of the current day would not be experienced again, since there would be no issue with the time doorway to be solved. The Altrusian believed that his plan was the logical solution, since it would both resolve his problem and it would save the Marshalls' lives. Plus, Enik would be practicing the art of compassion, something that Rick had shown him to be an essential element to the survival of his people.

Enik had Rick place a white crystal on the center of the matrix table and his plan worked. Though he violated his code that Altrusians should never lie, he figured that Rick would not go along with his plan without protest, and Enik's desire to practice compassion allowed him to stretch the truth. He chose the lesser of two evils and sacrificed his need to follow Altrusian codes to the letter. The Marshalls stepped into the doorway thinking they were going home and although that's not what happened, they were saved, but they remained clueless as to what Enik had done.

In the Black Universe, Enik watched his counterpart's solution with disgust. Compassion? Sacrifice? "What a fool!" he thought, wondering how someone so similar to him could be so different. Compassion would not help save his people. Conquest was the key. Only someone of Enik's intellect could possibly find a way to change his people's fate and destroy the Marshalls at the same time.

Suddenly Enik had a brilliant idea. "Genius!" he said out loud to no one in particular. "I will use my time doorway to create a similar paradox. My counterpart may have saved his Marshalls, but I will not make that mistake. Instead of merging the two versions of the humans, I will send the Marshalls of the present to the other Earth, destroying them at their happiest moment!" He laughed and then he put his plan into motion.

After one more visit to the Library of Skulls, Enik taught himself just how to cause the paradox in his chamber and to get it to focus on the Marshalls' accident. The skulls showed him how to control the paradox, which would enable him to make sure that the Marshalls of the past ended up exactly where they belonged, while allowing him to seal the fate of the Marshalls of the present. With the loop started, Enik ventured to the Marshalls' cave.