Seeds of Time The Reboot
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters and universes that I am about to mangle around and mash together for my own demented author amusement - sadly all Buffy and Robotech characters and concepts remain the property of Mutant Enemy Productions and Harmony Gold respectively - I am merely borrowing them and make absolutely no profit from there use. As a result, please keep the legal attack dogs - also known as lawyers - firmly muzzled and on a leash as I have no money to give to anyone.
Chapter Two
Reflex Point
That Same Time
The complex known to the humans of the Robotech Expeditionary Force as reflex point was vast, sprawling across nearly a hundred miles to the immediate south of two of the Great Lakes of North America, specifically Lake Huron and Lake Michigan. It was not one single massive complex but a series of them with the outermost ring consisting of a series of towers, some were tall slender stalks others had an appearance more like a stereotypical mushroom. Each tower served a specific function with the slender towers serving as perimeter sensors while the thicker towers were generators and emitters for the powerful force field that protected the whole area from harm and which was strong enough to withstand hours of bombardment with even the most powerful weapons robotechnology could produce.
Behind the outer ring fields filled with growing, fertile Flowers of Life bathed in the bright warm light of Sol. Drinking in the energies of the star and using them in the way of all plants to grow and bloom to produce the pollen and spore-laden seed pods that the Invid required both to feed upon and to convert into protoculture to power their technology - a technology that, unlike the technology of any other know spacefaring race, was entirely organic. Non-sentient crab and slug-like Invid worker drones tended tirelessly to the fields, ensuring that the all important flowers had everything they needed and were free of any form of pest - the Invid had been surprised unpleasantly a few times since coming to Earth as their flowers had a tendency to attract the attention of a particular voracious species of aphid that could be annoyingly difficult to get rid of - as they matured. It was a role that they had always played in Invid hive complexes as it was their function though reflex point was the only place on Earth where they could freely work the fields as they were neither that smart or that well armoured with even the crab-like form being relatively easy prey for even the simplest of weapons to say nothing of modern energy-based weapons.
Beyond the ring of fields was spaced at equal distances from one another the domes of the upper portions of landed Invid hiveships. Each had been linked to its neighbours by a series of passageways both above and below the surface of the planets as well as being linked to the vast dome of the central hive. Between the ring of hiveships was a large number of squat buildings and launch pads - upon which sat numerous examples of the clamshell-like Mollusk-class carriers that carried most Invid battle mecha into battle especially if it was in orbit, as well ready to launch mecha should reflex point ever come under attack from inside the atmosphere as well as short range defensive energy weapons.
In all reflex point was a fortress, a fortress whose primary purpose was to protect the being who inhabited the central hive with her attendants.
A being who currently was standing in the central chamber of the great main hive. In appearance she would resemble a hairless Terran or Tirolian though blown up to the size of a macronized Zentraedi. She was dressed in a simple red flowing dress with a high collar with four odd green human-face looking ornaments spaced equally around its perimeter. But appearances aside she was no Terran, Tirolian or indeed any other of the human stock species. A fact emphasised by the continuous cocoon of psionic energy that shimmered flame like around her without hurting her in any way. She was the Regess, Queen and Mother of all the Invid currently on Earth and with the death of her male counterpart the Regent now the sole ruler of her entire species.
And right now she was extremely puzzled.
The reason being that a few moments ago sensors on the satellites that she'd had deployed into orbit had detected an anomaly deep in the southern wastelands of the continental landmass that Terrans would have referred to as South America. The anomaly was unlike anything she had ever seen - and that was saying something given she had access to the sum total of all the knowledge of her kind, everything they'd ever known and experienced she could recall with a simple thought - in her life before. If she didn't know any better she would have thought the anomaly was a wormhole of some kind - though that was impossible as wormholes couldn't exist in planetary gravity wells, the graviton interference would collapse them instantaneously if they did try to form - especially as it was giving off tachyons as well as numerous other energies that she had never seen before.
Unfortunately interrogation of the satellite sensors wasn't revealing much about the anomaly beyond its existence and tachyon emissions. The satellites were after all primarily there to give a warning of ships existing space fold within range of the planet, thus most of there sensors were focused outwards - constantly watching for any incoming hostile warships, which was sure to happen again eventually as she didn't doubt that those Terrans off planet in their Robotech Expeditionary Force would continue to attempt to drive her and her people from this planet as they had so many others across the galaxy - to give a scant few seconds warning of a warp between normal space and hyperspace forming. Only a few were pointed at the planet and most of those were there for the purpose of tracking and predicting this world's notoriously unpredictable weather.
There was only one thing to do.
She focused her thoughts on the nearest hive. "Dispatch a patrol to sector twenty-seven beta thirteen," she ordered telepathically. "Have them sweep the area for anything unusual."
Feeling the acknowledgement of her children, who immediately began preparing a squad of scout troopers for launch, she turned her attention to some of the other matters that required her attention. There were several reports from the more urban areas of strange creatures that though they appeared Terran were obviously not given they were way too strong and fast and which paradoxically never seemed to appear during the day only at night. Her interest peaked, she began to read the reports, while keeping a part of her awareness on the anomaly noting it was getting weaker and would probably close very soon. Hopefully her children would get there in time to record some meaningful data but if they didn't while it would be regrettable it would be nothing to worry about.
Southern Wastelands
That Same Time
Randall 'Rand' O'Keeffe hummed a Yellow Dancer song softly to himself as his trusty motorcycle carried him across the desert that had once been a fertile plain, at least during his grandfather's time. Like much of the planet, this region had been hit hard during the Rain of Death, the incalculable quantum energies of the reflex beams burning away huge chunks of topsoil, burning all the way down to the bedrock itself and sterilising everything and in some places turning the ground briefly into molten lava. These wastelands were the result, as even decades later, the region had yet to fully recover, the amount of energy and fine particulate debris blown into the atmosphere having altered weather patterns all over the planet. Something that had only increased in the weeks and months after the bombardment ended as numerous volcanoes around the world erupted as well as numerous massive quakes that had completely changed the topography of the Earth's surface in numerous areas.
He had been crossing these wastes for the better part of two days now and was getting somewhat tired of seeing nothing but sand and rock, with only the occasional cactus and patch of yellowed, scrubby grassland to break the monotony. Thankfully the wastelands would soon be behind him. Another day, and he'd be out of it and into a lush temperate forest fed by numerous rivers carrying rainwater and snowmelt on its journey from the distant Andes to the Atlantic Ocean. Another few days down the road, he would reach the settlement known as Lake Town due to its position on the shore of a lake created in the very same bombardment that had turned the grasslands into this desert waste.
A loud crash from somewhere up ahead of him caught his attention. A moment later, there came a whump and a cloud of white steam abruptly shot up into the atmosphere, glittering strangely in the bright midday sun. What the hell was that? he thought, turning the throttle on his bike to pick up speed. Skirting around the base of a very large formation of rocks, he came upon the source of the noise and came to a dead halt, gazing across the cracked, sun blasted ground in a combination of shock and disbelief.
For sitting there, on what had long ago been a roadway across the grasslands, was a kind of vehicle that hadn't really existed for decades. A canvas-topped car, one of a design he'd only glimpsed in a handful of old books and magazines from the pre-Rain days - a time that he was honestly deeply envious of as life had to have been quite a bit easier then, then they didn't have to worry about bandits, opportunists and occasionally the thrice damned Invid showing up to really ruin a person's day. Steam was rising from the engine compartment at the front, and from the distribution of debris around it, the vehicle looked like it had fallen right out of the sky.
Confused but curious he stopped his engine, deployed the kickstand and climbed off the bike. Deciding that caution would be the best approach, this could after all be some kind of Invid trap though it would be a very odd one even by the standards of those foul creatures if it was, he drew his SAL-9 laser pistol from its concealed holster and thumbed the button on the side to activate it. Immediately he felt it vibrate in his hand for a moment as the energy cell came to life and primed the weapon for use.
Then satisfied that he was appropriately armed he cautiously began approaching the wrecked vehicle. As he got closer he noticed a faint but increasing odour, one that he vaguely remembered from his childhood. The odour of leaking petrol, before their death during the Invid Invasion his parents had used an old Global Civil War era petrol fuelled generator to provide power to the small hutt that had been there home - had been as the Invid had demolished it the third year after their invasion to make room for an expanding Flower of Life plantation - thus he knew that odour spelt trouble, with a capital T.
Especially as it meant he, in the event of trouble, wouldn't be able to use his laser pistol without burning himself alive as the heat of the beam would instantly ignite the highly flammable petroleum vapours. It also meant that the wrecked vehicle, wherever it had come from was a ticking time bomb as even the slightest of sparks would trigger an explosion and a fierce fire. Meaning he really should get out of here.
He was about to turn around to return to his bike, intending to get away before the inevitable happened and the car turned into a lump of flambed metal, when he noticed something that stopped him in his tracks. Slumped in the driver's seat, face buried in the bright white-pillow of a crash bag, was a man.
Knowing he couldn't leave whoever he was here to die if he was still alive just unconscious as nobody deserved the horrific fate of burning to death. He had seen that once before and it was something that he would never, ever forget. The scent of burning human flesh and the sight of a torch that had once been a human being were things that to this day haunted his nightmares. Which was why he quickly powered off the laser pistol, returned it to its holster before racing to the drivers side door.
Thankfully it wasn't difficult to get the door open, as amazingly it hadn't been warped in its frame by the force of the impact. Soon he found himself looking at a young man about his age, if not a year or two older than him and a hell of a lot bigger as he could clearly see where some serious muscles were pressing against his clothing. He was held in his seat by a belt and his face was buried in the crash bag though thankfully he still seemed to be breathing.
He was just completely out for the count.
"Okay my friend let's get you out of here," he said as he awkwardly reached around the unconscious man to hit the seatbelt control, causing it to release and whip back into its stored position. Doing so quickly enough that the metal docking pin slapped him on the wrist making him yelp slightly in pained surprise.
Mentally swearing up a storm Rand began to pull the other man out of the car. It wasn't easy as the guy was very heavy, if he had to guess he would say that he weighed around two hundred pounds with the vast majority of it being solid muscle. And since he was currently unconscious that was all deadweight and that wasn't exactly easy to move. Still he kept at it and his motivation only increased when he heard the tell-tale whumph of igniting fuel. A quick glance to the side showed smoke and flames starting to billow from the engine compartment, there were only moments left before the car went up in a titanic fireball. With adrenaline pumping through his system he pulled the guy out of the car and began dragging him clear.
He made it just in time.
Literally seconds after he had pulled the stranger clear the entire vehicle exploded, all enveloping flames covering it completely and sending a plume of toxic black smoke high into the heat bleached sky. Man that was close, Rand thought, gazing upon the burning vehicle shivering slightly - despite the radiant heat of the flames against his face - with reaction and realisation and just how close to death they had both just come.
He was brought out of his shock by a soft groan from the guy he had just saved. Looking over at him he could see him moving, the kind of movements someone made just as they were returning to consciousness. Slowly he observed the guy's eyes open revealing brown eyes that seemed to momentarily flash green though he was sure it was a trick of the light.
"Oh my head," the man said, speaking in an accent that he vaguely recognised as being from somewhere in North America, putting a hand to his head, closing his eyes again and groaning. "Oh tell the guy with the jackhammer to lay off will ya."
Rand chuckled at the humour in that statement. He had a feeling like he and whoever this guy was, they were going to get along fine. After all they would be together for a few days at least, until they reached Lake Town if nothing else as he wasn't about to leave him here at the mercy of the desert sun and the vultures.
"I would suggest you take it easy for a few minutes," he said to the stranger. "You took quite a nasty blow when your car crashed. What the hell happened by the way? It looks like you just fell straight out of the sky."
"What the hell happened by the way? It looks like you just fell straight out of the sky."
As the words of the stranger registered on his still somewhat fuzzy awareness Xander groaned in annoyance as he remembered exactly what had happened. He remembered the transit through the spatial-temporal wormhole to this time, how he had appeared three metres above the ground and come crashing to Earth hard enough that he had instantly been robbed of consciousness by a sudden violent encounter with a crash airbag.
"Goddammit Whistler," he said, wondering if the balance demon had known that that was going to happen. Somehow he didn't think so, given what Whistler had said about, and why the Powers That Be were sending him here in the first place. And why they had given him both full access to the knowledge and skills of the soldier he'd been turned into that halloween but the enhanced strength and senses of the hyena spirit he'd been briefly possessed by. Just my bad luck with the mojo strikes again, he thought.
"Whose Whistler," the stranger, whose face he still hadn't seen, asked. Since he still wasn't completely with it - despite what was frequently shown on movie and television screens you did not just get up from being knocked unconscious, the idea of getting up, shaking your head to clear any residual dizziness and then leaping back into action instantly was very much a hollywood fallacy for anyone who wasn't the vampire slayer anyway - Xander found himself answering without thinking.
"He's a balance demon," he said. A second later he inwardly winced and groaned as he belatedly realised what he had just said. Great, now my rescuer, whoever he is is going to think I'm nuts or concussed or something, he thought knowing that modern humans were conditioned not to think of the supernatural world as anything other than fiction.
The response he got was not what he had expected.
"Wait, you know about demons," the young male voice asked. Forcing his eyes open, and banishing the dizziness through sheer determination if nothing else, Xander looked up to see a young redheaded man about his age, in functional brown clothing and with a pair of riding goggles on his forehead staring down at him. A shocked look on his face.
"You know about them," he asked.
"I have encountered the supernatural a few times," Rand replied, "many of those of us who live out here, wandering the wastes, know about what goes bump in the night. I have encountered vampires a few times, had to dodge a werewolf once and had a few encounters with these odd demons with retractable bone spikes on their arms who wanted me for dinner."
"You mean Polgara demons," Xander said, identifying the species easily. They had encountered them enough times in Sunnydale, next to vampires they were the most common demon they'd encountered. Though he realised that over the last few months sightings of the perennially hungry for human flesh, reptilian demons had dropped off. They'd assumed that the Polgara had finally, after three years of getting their numbers decimated, twigged that the Slayer was fully capable of kicking their scaly asses and had chosen safer - for them - hunting grounds.
"Is that what they're called?"
"Yes. Like most demons they're fast and strong, but not the smartest."
"You can say that again," Rand admitted recalling his last encounter with a pair of Polgara demons. They'd kept coming at him, even when he'd taken out his laser pistol, intent on making him their dinner and paying for it with their lives as he'd lasered both of them. It was a huge difference to how vampires usually behaved, they usually tended to run at the sight of the SAL-9 knowing that - due to their highly flammable nature - even a nick by the beam would easily immolate them. "But where's my manners? My name's Rand, Rand O'Keefe."
"Xander Harris," Xander replied, his headache fading away completely now. Surprisingly quickly and he wondered if he now had some supernatural healing ability due to the hyena power. "I guess I should say thanks for pulling me out of the car when you did."
"Your welcome," Rand answered, "I'm just glad I got here when I did. Had I been a few minutes later you'd have burned to death."
Xander winced at that even as images from the soldier flashed across his mind. The soldier had seen that happen before, especially during the Vietnam War when the US military had made liberal use of flamethrowers and napalm bombs. It was something that he had never forgotten, the images haunting his nightmares to the end of his days. And these days they tend to haunt his dreams, as if he didn't have enough nightmares courtesy of the vampires and demons that frequented Sunnydale due to the Hellmouth.
"Where did you get that car anyway," Rand asked, honestly curious and actually quite eager to steer the conversation away from the supernatural. "As far as I know nothing like that has existed since the Rain of Death."
Xander blinked. "The what?" he asked.
Rand gaped at him in shock. "You don't know," he exclaimed both confused and incredulous, "how can you not know? Every human being in existence knows about it, much as we wish we didn't. Many of the older people actually remember it."
Xander scowled at that. Something told him that this Rain of Death was something well and truly terrible, and might even be the event that had severed the Slayer line. "It's a very long and complicated story Rand," he said, "and you are sure to think I am crazy."
Rand frowned and was about to open his mouth to say that they had time when the distant rumbling of fusion turbine engines caught his attention. Very familiar fusion turbine engines. "Shit," he said, "as much as I would like for us to stay here and chat, we can't, we need to move and move now."
"Why?" Xander asked both curious and concerned. He could hear the aircraft engines - though they sounded different to any aircraft engines he had heard before, which really wasn't surprising as this was the future after all - approaching but he had no idea why his rescuer seemed so afraid of them.
"Because the Invid are coming," Rand explained and somehow wasn't surprised at the fact that from his expression, Xander didn't recognise the name or realise the danger. It made him wonder just where the hell Xander had come from if he didn't know about the Rain of Death or the Invid. "Okay quick history the Invid are an alien race that have annexed this planet. If they find us here, they will take both of us prisoner and transport us to one of their protoculture farms. Trust me when I say that that is the last place we want to be."
What the hell is protoculture, Xander thought even as his mind was awhirl with the knowledge that there had been an alien invasion. An honest to god alien invasion. And from what Rand was saying they were not someone he wanted to be captured by. Though he also had to wonder if their presence here on Earth would have something to do with the Hellmouth beneath Cleveland rupturing and allowing the Old Ones to return.
"Okay I'll follow your lead," he said. "But how are we going to get out of here? From what you said my car is kind of incinerated."
"I have the means it will be tight with the two of us but it will get us out of here and to safety," Rand explained, "come on."
Without another word he turned and began walking quickly away. Xander followed hot on his heels, noting as he did so the burning wreckage of his car. Oh man I really liked that car, he thought, but I am so glad Rand showed up when he did. I really dodged the bullet thanks to this guy.
After a moment they came upon a rugged, powerful looking motorbike. It wasn't a model that he could place which again was not really that surprising, this being the future and all. Rand immediately hopped on the bike, reached into a side bag and pulled out a pair of goggles like his own that he handed to Xander. Xander immediately put them on and climbed onto the bike behind Rand, wrapping his arms around the smaller man so he would not be thrown off.
"Okay hold on tight," Rand said before, without waiting for a reply, flicking up the kickstand and starting the bike. Immediately the hydrogen fuel cell came to life with a muffled humm. He immediately started them moving, the sudden acceleration catching Xander by surprise and nearly throwing him off.
"Whoa careful there tiger," Xander commented, as he adjusted his balance to stay on.
"Sorry," Rand answered before taking the bike off the crumbling old roadway and heading towards a large rocky outcrop. He had crossed this desert enough times in his travels to know that there were a number of quite deep caves in that outcrop and if they could reach it in time they would be home free. There were a number of ferrous metals in the overlying rock that would completely shield them from detection by the Invid sensors. They would just have to sit in one of the caves for a few hours until the Invid flew away. In fact the caves would be a good place for them to pass the night now that he thought about it and he knew that desert nights could get as cold as the day got hot.
It would also give him and his new traveling companion plenty of time to get to know each other and hear each other's stories. Of course neither of them were aware of an event that was about to take place in orbit, which in another day would rock their world in a completely new direction.
Author's Note: Well the second chapter of the reboot bites the dust. I hope you all enjoyed it. Next time we will have the introduction of Scott and I have a few ideas in mind for a slightly different take on the orbital battle between the Mars Division forces and the Invid as the battle in the show has always struck me as kind of underwhelming, especially given the massive amount of firepower robotech warships have. So that gives you all something to look forward to. Until next time.
