Team Lightyear and Commander Nebula had as though changed into wooden dolls, being able only to stand rigid and fix their gazes on the flaming orb. Since its opening, the portal had stood quiet... had it gotten fed up with the apathy and decided to start a war? But this device was not supposed to be a living creature... consequently a sudden nodus waited for a solution.

Zeb was thrown violently back to the reality, as he heard his comlink snapping. A mayday-plea moaned in the panicky atmosphere, telling that several space rangers tried to get in Star Command, but the main airlocks refused to work. Those particular poor ones were the guardians from the hexagon's foreyard. They were forced to leave their vessels after the engines had died, and fly with jetpacks back to the headquarters.

"Come on! I need your help!" the Commander grunted, beginning to hobble burdensomely towards the manual spare exits. He had ordered the jumpy aliens out there to approach those emergency entrances, so that he and his companion could crank the locks open from inside. Nevertheless, Nebula's one-leg wandering was so toilsome that Mira suggested they would use their jets for inside-traveling. And by that means, the distances were cut away.

"But who's keeping an eye on the portal, now?" Buzz became anxious in the middle of the flight.

"Craters, that stinky bucket-brain Ämpäri can himself guard it for eternities!" the old man roared, "He caused this all, and it's his responsibility. We need to get those rangers in now, before that dratted bagel decides to explode, or something! And, by the way, put your visors on."

At the airlocks, Booster took a good grip of the steering-wheel-looking manual openers. With a loud creak, the hefty doors were pulled aside, and those outside shivering were helped in. Those aliens in various-sized ranger uniforms explained in unison something messy that how B.L.U.F.F. X-1014 had began its devilish behavior.

"You go in and have some rest. We're trying to figure out the happ..." Zeb began, but came to cast his eyes on the half-aperture door. It was situated so that it allowed a sideways-view to the near Capital space, right towards the mentioned oddity. As previously, Zeb abruptly resembled that kind of puppet-show dummy again.

"What's the matt..." Buzz tapped to him, facing right the equal janet. Namely, the dimension opener did not just abide by flashing Zurg's favorite color, but evidently, there was something coming out of it. Slowly, irritatingly creeping, something white-grayish thrusted its way outwards, at the same time pushing aside the alone-floating Star Command vessels like abandoned shoes. In addition, the magnitude of this invasion was not quite petite. The spook that was now halfway inside The Alliance, was as large as the Headquarters dam ship itself. As said, the organic hoop had broadened when it had sucked in more energy. And as this cocoon-shaped opaque phantasm had crammed itself out, there was already the snout of the next one peeping out from the purple turbulence.

Minutes passed, and the aghast rangers still jutted in the open airlock like kids listening to ghost stories. As if they had grown roots, they could not shift their legs, nor turn their gawps away. More and more those lumps, that were apparently space ships, were hurled out. Five, six, seven... soon the numbers would end. They shortly filled the whole near space with their deterrent silhouettes, the purple flow gleaming in their surfaces, revealing the complex carvings and decorations on them. They were the siblings of the Gate, from the same distant universe. And their multiplying forces did not appear very appealing.

Enough was this not at all. A split appeared to four of those pupae, under their bellies. They clicked open like giant jaws, barfing an immense amount of smaller, alike beans, out of them. Now at least the digits ended. They minor ones arranged themselves into two formations, the other one directing its course towards Capital Planet, and the second one... heading straight to surround Star Command.

At this instant Team Lightyear revived from its jolt. Yet, they were somewhat slumbering still, as they stumbled to each other's legs, while attempting to set up a drill. From the floor, where Buzz had fallen on his stomach, he hollered to Munchapper, "Quick! Close the door and NOW!"

"Alarm, space rangers of Star Command! An unknown invasion through the dimension portal has started! Put your defenses ready, what you still can do! There is no evidence whether the phenomenon is hostile or not", Zeb yapped to the common multichannel of his wrist communicator. Every life form in the base hearkened, and understood that this was a real red alert.   

But the arcane had its own means to propagate. Gliding on, an army of those smaller cocoons was soon playing a ring game with the Universe Protection ship. The uncanny climate endured, as their behavior was scrutinized. Those capsules had no visible doors, no windows, nothing but that white, opaque outlining. No jet fire was coming out of them, as they slid themselves forwards. Somehow they then again found their steps to the real doorways of Star Command, those entrances that were supposed to be out of life. While a flock of them were left to besiege their target, some others shot a purple energy shower towards the main access. Like pulled by magnets, the heavy star cruiser air locks were pried open, twisting themselves towards the pupae. And so ten gremlins sleeked in, closing the metallic hatches furthermore behind them. They were bigger than common star cruisers, so whatever was in them, could be a lot of something...

At the launch bay the skies were dark and tensed. Landing on the deck, those naves occupied the whole floor available. And if the Headquarters was blockaded, so did the vastly puzzled space rangers beleaguer those cans as a crowd. Also Team Lightyear was present in one corner. Booster shook with fear, XR stretched his extendable legs to see over the taller population. Lightyear slammed nervously the lid of his wrist communicator back and forth, whereas Mira somehow associated the talk about her living-room curtains to this occasion.

"Umm Buzz, what's happening?" the Jo-Adian pointed at the cocoons. They had rest on the deck for a few minutes absolutely immovable, but now they had begun to unfold. Into the main ends, that were aiming at the space police, grew a split dividing into six parts. And so the opening process went on, like a real de-pupating. Nonetheless, beautiful butterflies did not glitter forth, but something far else. At first, squashing splashes were heard. A loud murmur went through the gathering.

"Blurbarah pulputi pulpsis grmbloff Blorrff umppahpah uffaffaa grrlaabatryyt!"  a hollow gargle was shouted from the opening organic vessel. Something that looked like a horse-sized, paunchy, grayish jelly lob wriggled out along an elastic ramp that had been tossed out of the slit. The creature was partly transparent, partly there were big soft scales growing on it. Its form was quite unsteady, it seemed to widen from the other side and then again reduce its size from the other side while it walked -or crept- forwards. It had no visible eyes, and instead of a mouth it had some kind of slimyish trunk. It also had some kind of extensions that looked distantly like hands, at least it was seemingly holding some kind of harder object in the other one.

"Now was that a welcome speech? It sounded moreover like someone had taken mud baths among a pack of pigs." XR raised an amazed brow.

"Shht now, XR!" Buzz commanded. "Let's see what happens. Although... I don't like this at all. Something tells me that they're not putting up a white flag."

Tens of more of those slime blobs appeared out of their transports. Commander Nebula carefully stomped to the middle floor. As the leader of Star Command he needed to be the first one either to shake hands, or to receive a war threat.

"Grrlp!" one of those aliens gurgled again. From a nearby ship appeared two more, who brought along some kind of trembling, perspiring ball. It had lobes, and soft button-like appendages in it. After a tentacle had pushed it, the next sentences of the leading blob echoed out in clear and loud English. This widget was a universal translator that came indeed in handy.

"Greetings, citizens of glaa-barf  bbb-wzz! You have indicated certain kind of intelligence level since you have been able to activate our blubbff. But, seemingly you are millions of years lacking our capacities and productivity. However, a solution will be found for you."

The crowd back there began whispering to each other. This did not really sound a warm assignment of cooperation and peace. Zeb, who stood now surrounded by several of those unknown aliens, was hard deliberating what to answer.

"Greetings. My only question this far is, that do you come in peace or not?"  he slowly and unsurely uttered.

Something that sounded like crippled laughter, swarmed among the invaders. "Peace for us, and for you... as we said, we can find a solution. We haven't in ages found new living quarters, and the habitats we have used, have began to ebb in the means of natural resources. We need new areas for our population. And although you shine with your primitivism, I think you are potential slaves."

A mere shock struck Star Command. Had those jelly hunches mentioned the word slaves? So they had not come with nice thoughts and flowers in their hands at all. Taking defense poses, some rangers were full in action to tune their lasers to stun. But as the aliens perceived this with their hidden eye organs, they took a counterblow. With those gadgets some of them carried, they shot liquidized rays towards the gathering. The beams hit one part of the multitude, obviously sucking humidity from the air or relevant, since the liquid became solid, sticky, elastic material. It was thrown upon the rangers like a soap bubble, burying them inside it, and thus capturing them. There the frightened men and women writhed, endeavoring to break the 'walls' of that transparent blister. But they only bent under their touches, whereas laser had no effect on this elastic matter at all.

"We don't want to harm our future servants, do we? They'll got time enough to suffer and wither away in their upcoming works", the translator wheezed.

Commander Nebula clenched his fists anteriorly to this scene. Fury broiled his chest, his eyes blazing frenzy. No one would come to boss around him in his own base! Rushing towards the obvious leader of the intruders -this someone who was known as Lieutenant Blorrff- he yelled, "You won't come here to enslave anyone! Get back to that dratted hole where you crawled from and craters, STAY THERE!" His outraged knuckles got buried in the jellyish head of Blorrff, trying to give him a black eye. But... the slimers were vigilant, too. A purple ray was aimed at Nebula from behind, soon hitting his back, and dumping him on the floor. His conscious was taken away, his limbs cramping hysterically. The missile had affected his nerve system so that he after a few seconds turned completely paralyzed. And there was no sense visible in him at all.

"Oh my goodness, did they kill Commander Nebula?" Mira panted in the corner where the confused Team Lightyear still stood.

"We must stop this madness, now!" Buzz grated his teeth and aimed a deathly frown at the stage. He was about to tap forth, but Mira gripped his arm, whispering, "Buzz, don't! We... We have to find our way out of here while we still can!"

"But... but the whole Star Command is in jeopardy! A diabolic plan has been put up and Zeb may be dead!" he fulminated. But Nova kept pulling him back, while they all caught the next alien slur translated to English.

"May this be a warning to you all. You apes are turning under a new authority starting from this second on!" As a conclusion, the bubble-arresting rays began to sing. The flabbergasted space rangers were one by one finding themselves inside those nasty organic prisons. At this point, even Buzz understood that it was better to chicken out and retreat, although it was a galaxy-sized shame for him.

Team Lightyear took a bolt away from the arena, spurting at the moment in the Headquarters' corridors. There was no aim; it all was sheer improvisation. The Captain would have still wanted to turn back, regretting that he was marathoning away like a wimp absconder.

"Buzz, would you once listen to your team members?" Nova crumpled and pointed at her Captain with a finger. "We can't do precisely anything here. None of us has a plan. We can't defend ourselves, we can't help Nebula, we can't get the powers back here. I suggest we try to get out and... umm..." the blue woman quit shaking his finger and instead brought it on her chin. "Umm... I think we'd need to get to Capital Planet."

"But you just said no one of us has a plan! Are you eating your words, Princess?" XR commented.

"And now, you little sardine jar jar, will you shut your big mouth?" Obviously Mira had lost her temper since she yelled her cake hole wide as the open sky. "Okay, I don't have a plan. But I'm trying to figure out one, if you'd just once give me a change!"

"Okay, so what's the plan?" the robot continued "Are we gonna disguise ourselves as giant pot plants and slither little by little down towards the flight deck, or do we get a lot of jelly from kitchen, plunge in it and pretend to be one of those slime blobs, or are we gonna put all llama suits on, imitate lost llamas and get a free lift to Capital Planet's giant Zoo? Or..."

"Grnrgnrgghh..." Nova clenched her fists, foaming then with 120 decibel's intensity level, "Plan number one: WE MUST BE QUIET! THEY MAY HEAR US!" Next all the present picked their ears to get the tinnitus away.

"Hmm... on the other hand, Ranger Nova, I think you're right. Good thinking, ranger. Then again ranger XR here has not indicated good thinking, because the launch deck is the most dangerous part of Star Command Headquarters right at the moment. Hmph. The Space Ranger manual..."

"There's no TIME to wonder what the manual keeps inside itself!" she threw her arms in the air. "Craters, why do I feel I'm the only one equipped with brains today?" This statement was left to be the secret of her mind, it did not reach Buzz' or anyone else's hearing organs. "Let's face it! The next target those mucus invaders are going to hit their claws... um... slimes on, is Capital Planet. We saw their pods heading there already. We should get out of here, because... umh..." nervousness began to creep along Nova's spine, too. And if she would start to play a stress ball, the last ray of intelligence would vanish.

The bitter truth was, that no reliable plan was in sight. Although Buzz had had his ranger instinct-cricket chirping twenty-four hours in row, even he could not have forecasted such quick stranger invasion. Thus, the irresolution was the main guest of the day. Either did not Mira know, what sense would there be going to the Alliance Core. This idea ant had just randomly breezed in her mind with a little straw on its back. Indeed, what could a puny pack of space rangers do in an occasion alike? Ditto, no plot, no layout. If they had barely fled those superior and more forceful aliens, what could Buzz and his company do? With ninety-nine percent odds, nothing. Then again, what would they fuss on Capital Planet? Warn Madame President? Go home and hide under the bed? Wait for the end of the world?

"Alright, troops. So we're going to find our way out of here, whatever it then... um... profits", Lightyear announced as irresolute. The cluster had taken an adventitious direction where they had started to retreat. "Craters, I need to find my Dad. Maybe he'd know what to do in a situation like this", he muttered half in the world of ideas. Poor Buzzy Boy had begun to be ill with homesickness?

"Good idea, Buzz!" the female panted while they whizzed forwards, "Maybe we could um... try to gather our friends around us and umm... oh, nutbunnies! What is this, a bad cliché? Every time when someone is in a difficult distress, not a soul around has an idea how to act!"

"Um... Buzz?" Booster piped, "Why do you think Z-Zurg would know what to do?"

"Ehum... yhhee... I don't know. Humm..." Lightyear replied. "Umh, by the way, where are we going? We're just running without a destination. Ranger Nova, you suggested we are going to flee. But how? Are we going to fly with our jetpacks all the way to Capital Planet?"

"Thh..."

"Thr..."

"What's the matter with you folks? Is the alien ray devolving you too 'cause the intelligibility of your sayings has reduced fifty-one comma seventy-eight percents? Only I hear those 'umm' and 'erm' coming out of your throats." XR sneered in the middle of all the hassle.

"Well, we're all waiting for your brilliant, award-winning save-the-universe-plan!" Nova barked, "Just put your CPU rolling and produce something more waterproof than disguising into a giant yucca palm! Then we follow your directions."

"Erm... umm... ahem..." the mecha pouted, and after all could not come up with anything sensible.

Suddenly a woodpecker began knocking inside Mira's scull. The team had just rushed by a wide refuge chute hatch. She stopped her ongoing, and gesticulated the others to pay attention to her notice.

"I think this might help us out." She pointed at the metallic lid on the wall. The rangers had arrived in some kind of large storage room, where jutted unopened boxes with all kinds of other junk on the floor.

"What? You want us to go and get crunched in the trash compacter? And come out as nice compressed cubes? No way, no way, no way, I rather choose the alien reign than that!" XR nattered.

"Grmghhh..." Steam began coming out of the blue alien's ears. "Look, this chute is not leading to the waste mill. This is some kind of hatch where they throw bigger junk, like broken-gone machines, and pests like you, XR. We might get away unnoticed trough that straight chute! It'll drop us right under Star Command's belly, as you know very well. Usually there's this big recycling ship collecting the stuff that is thrown through this, but of course it won't be there now."

"Yes. Actually, that might work well. Only we need to do, is to take some kind of coverage for us. There are assumingly several hostile ships scanning the environment, and watching for movement", Buzz deliberated, glancing around.

"Turtle..." Nova fingered her chin.

"Umm... I don't think this is the time to think about expensive restaurant food." The Captain looked at her baffled.

"No, no, no. I mean we could use that abandoned big tub as our cover", she brought her finger to present the corner of the room, where was some kind of abandoned LGM invention. It was a green-white bathtub-looking vat, with the cubic meter capacity of a swimming pool. "We could drop it to the refuge chute while we get there too, and then as we have arrived to space, we could travel under it. Like... umm... a turtle with the shelter of its... erm... shell. See, it's so big that even Booster fits under it with us."

"Right... I think we can use small jetpack power under it. So it would only seem that this object has gotten an unusual acceleration when the chute spits it out... We might get to Capital Planet's gravitational field easily with it. Once we have got there, we can abandon it."

"Abandon? And cause it to hit someone's house as an odd meteorite? There has been stupid enough headlines already in the newspapers lately. The newest addition: 'A True Story Told by an Innocent Citizen: "A Bathtub from the Sky Fell down and Crushed My House'."" The android had again his line.

"XR!" both the humanoid rangers interjected in unison.

"Sniff... I'm never allowed to talk. Fine, I'll be quiet then. The freedom of speech has been declined from me. So after all, the French Revolution was done in vain, since its virtuous results shall be buried in the graveyard of oblivion..." the ludicrous robot snuffled.

Rolling their eyes, the rest of the team members went to grab the spacious cistern. Regardless the size, it was a feather for Booster to carry. The rest set themselves under the object, while Buzz tore up the hatch open. There was just width enough in the gap to fit the basin in. Munchapper supported it from inside, so that it would not collapse on the heads of the smaller beings. And once they had gotten on the threshold of the refuge chute, Lightyear commanded them to jump in.

"Waaas thiiis suuuch a gooood iiideaaa aaafter aaaall?" Mira's squeal echoed in the long pipe, as the space rangers speeded down. It was a complete free fall; the gravitational simulators in Star Command's belly accelerated all the objects to be dropped towards them (and they worked still). So with 9,81 meters per square-second was Team Lightyear's inrush agitated.

"Weee'll beee dooow sooon, nooo wooorryyyy, weeee wooon't craaaash!" Buzz shouted back.

But, they did crash. The two, out-spitting hatches right under them did not open since the movement-observing sensors had gone black. The hit was hard, but gradually the dizzy rangers crawled out from under the tub, lying now on the inner shutter.

"Uh-uh... now what?" Buzz tried to get the little whippoorwills away from spinning around his head.

"Can we cut those doors with lasers and then weld them back again? Haven't we done that before?" Booster suggested.

"Right, ranger. But... we can't solder the outmost one back. Blast, it's dangerous to do it like this, but we can't step back any more", Lightyear nodded.

So the lasers whizzed. With a higher frequency, the alloy was easy to slice. Once the first hatch was loose, the team stepped in to the small airlock space between it and the hindmost one. With rapid movements, the separate scuttle was fastened back to its position.

"Okay, now it goes. Once the second door is loose, we'll get a good acceleration. So let's saw!" Susurrus went on, and snap; the vacuum began to suck the vat and the rangers out. Quite much a whim of luck it was, that the foreigners did not pay attention to the loose lid, and the fleers, which were thrown out with their turtle shell like... well, like litter. The tub ended up flying in space its bottom up (if there can be determined directions in space) against the guarding enemy ships. But, a slight problem was encountered. Someone might see Team Lightyear 'from beneath'.

"Blazars! Why no one came to think about a bedding for this transport?" Buzz cursed. "XR, can you do anything?"

No answer.

"XR! What's the problem with you?" Lightyear was to explode.

"Hmph! I was told to shut up! So I'm staying quiet", a protest was stated.

"XR, don't be stupid. You know right ahead WHAT the situation is! Now obey your commanding officer and cover the bottom! Or you'll end up to the incinerators of those invaders!"

"A-Okay, A-Okay, I'll cover, alrighto, gotcha", the metallic ranger gave up, and took a collapsible dance floor out of his inners. It was just big enough to shade the base, turning the tub into a firm box. Buzz had drilled a little peep hole to the one wall, so that they would not find themselves flying around Planet Z, but would end up to Capital Planet. Activating their jetpacks, the rangers got the peculiar bustle to swoop faster.

However... always there were obstacles along the kilometers. Two pupae patrolling around Star Command had started to speculate what that junk-UFO was.

"Hey, there's a flying trash!" the other ship spoke to the other one via their comlink.

"What a shooting star! Let's play with it a bit! I've been keen on battering something, but the Superior denied it."

"Ha-ha! I guess you can write your own rulebook regarding this one. It's just some dirt that that monkey house just puked out."

"Let's see who hits first!"

Dangerous enough, the two foes were on a playful mood. Strange it was, that they had not studied the tub with their scanners, since that would immediately have revealed the carbon-based life forms cringing inside it. But, sometimes even over-intelligent aliens were careless and stupid. With fast pace, the garbage was approaching Capital Planet's ionosphere, but now the villains' energy rays were striving to blast it to preons.

...To be continued...