**********************************************

Author's Note: Congratulations, some people correctly guessed what artifact Giles is looking for in the MASK world. I won't tell you which of you guessed right, though, as I want to keep the suspense going a little longer, at least until I get around to actually continuing that subplot. For now, though, two new cartoon universes for the remaining two Scoobies to visit.

To answer some questions: No, no Thundercats or Voltron in the planning for now, but the Silverhawks will be appearing in this very chapter. No chance of seeing the Smurfs, though. Thanks for all the reviews, guys!

And now, on with the show!

**********************************************

Solo Missions 3: Snakes and Hawks

#

US Government Security Lab
Kansas, USA
September 7, 1986

Parallel 125

#

Your name is Brigadier General Clayton Abernathy, codename Tomahawk (or just Hawk for short), and you are the commanding officer of GI Joe, a special mission force whose members are drawn from all lines of service of the United States military. For the last several years it has been your primary mission to defend your home country against Cobra, a global terrorist organization possessing financial and military resources the equal of just about any country in the world.

As the alarm signals ring through the building you wonder whether you have somehow grown complacent lately. Yes, Cobra has repeatedly managed to surprise you by turning up over and over again and hatching all sorts of schemes that no one in their right mind would ever have anticipated, but in the end you always beat them. At times it almost seemed like a bad action serial. Cobra attacks, draws some blood, you retaliate, the bad guys run away, the world is safe once more.

Only this time things seem a lot more serious than that. It's just a gut feeling, but your instincts have always led you right.

"What's going on?" you ask, storming into the base's command center. Duke is already there, no surprise. You might be GI Joe's commander, but First Sergeant Conrad Hauser, codenamed Duke, is the team's field leader and heart. He's been there from the start and kicked more reptile ass than anyone else you know, including yourself.

The fact that he also seems worried doesn't do much to calm you down.

"Cobra is attacking the base. They're after the B.E.T."

You nod, having expected as much. Well, you hadn't expected Cobra to find out about the B.E.T.'s new location so quickly, but you would have bet good money on them trying to get their scaly hands on it again.

The B.E.T., short for Broadcast Energy Transmitter, is a quantum leap forward in regards to energy distribution. Able to gather ambient energy from just about any source that is handy, the sun, background radiation, heat emissions, it can redirect this energy wirelessly towards any kind of machinery with the right receiving unit. No more power lines, no more pollution, no more strip mining entire regions, the B.E.T. is potentially the answer to the world's energy problems.

Unless Cobra gets its hands on it first.

"You rally the ground troops," you tell Duke. "I'll scramble the airborne assault team."

Duke doesn't need any further orders. Moments later both of you are scrambling down the corridors. You split at a junction, Duke heading for the vehicles bay, you toward the airfield. The sound of weapons' fire can already be heard in the distance. It sounds like Cobra pulled out all the stops for this one.

You are about to climb into your fighter when, from the corner of your eye, you see a black-clad shape slip past the sentries and into the building. One of Cobra's men? Why would they sneak in here? The B.E.T. is at the other end of the compound. A moment later the figure is gone. Quickly calling over a security officer you tell him to check out the building, then you fire off into the sky to engage Cobra's air force.

For the first few minutes everything goes just fine. Cobra is attacking in force, but your people are dedicated and the best there are at what they do. Just when you think you've successfully turned the tide, though, the bad guys get reinforcements. Reinforcements that don't turn up on your radar screen.

"What in damnation are those?" you hear someone yell across the airwaves.

The newly arrived planes look like giant dragonflies and their speed and maneuverability allow them to fly rings around your own planes. They are shooting ... something. Not bullets or missiles, but some kind of seeds that quickly grow into some form of tentacles and wrap themselves around their targets. Within a few moments you see almost half your air force decimated.

"Shoot them down! Whatever they are!"

Your forces manage to score some hits, but the battle begins to turn against you, especially when more Cobra planes start turning up. Though conventional aircraft, they are highly advanced designs and the pilots are experts. As you can attest but moments later when your own plane takes a critical hit and you have no choice but to eject.

By the time you have solid ground underneath your feet once more the battle has turned from a brawl the likes of which you have seen a hundred times before into some kind of horror show. Giant worms have burst forth from the ground, easily crushing tanks and buildings as if they were but toys. Cobra troops are advancing rapidly, your men forced to retreat before the horrors unleashed against them. For a moment you see Duke, trying to rally the men by taking out one of the worms with a bazooka shot to the belly, but things look bleak. Everything is descending into Chaos.

Grabbing your side arm you run towards the hangar where the B.E.T. is stored. The place seems to be crawling with Cobra troopers and two of the giant worms have smashed through the armored gates, barely slowing down. You can see the Dreadnoks, Cobra's mercenaries-for-hire, as well as Destro and the Baroness. No trace of Cobra Commander or Serpentor, but you wouldn't be surprised if one or both are nearby as well.

The Dreadnoks and some Cobra agents are laying down covering fire, preventing you and the other Joes who are not busy fighting these giant nightmares running amok on the airfield from getting inside. You can see Destro and some people working on the protective dome that locks away the B.E.T. and, by the looks of things, having little luck so far. You might yet be able to turn this one around.

That's when you see something else. Something that seems earmarked to complete this horror picture this battle has already become.

"What in God's name is that?" you hear a soldier beside you whisper.

A hulking shape has just appeared out of nowhere and the Cobra agents seem to be just as shocked as you are. Whatever it is, it is big, its skin white as chalk, its black clothing torn in too many places to count. It towers over Destro, whom you know to be about six foot six or bigger, making it at least seven feet and a half, if not more. Where did that thing come from?

Moments later that question becomes secondary as the beast begins to rip into everything that moves. Cobra agents are scattered like dolls. The ground is torn open where it slams down. The titanium steel dome that protects the B.E.T. crumbles like paper beneath its hands. You see some of the Cobra agents fire at it, but the bullets just bounce off its chest. The bullets just bounced off it!

One of the giant worms makes for the white brute, but he seems unimpressed. You are too far away to hear, but you are sure it's mumbling something before it attacks the monster. The worm slams down on him, but he just catches its crushing weight and flings it around as if it weighs nothing. Hands big enough to hide a basketball in them rip the monster's flesh apart, the worm's death scream filling the air. Cobras and Joes alike are running in fear, the B.E.T. completely forgotten.

"What in damnation is that?" you repeat the question.

"His name is Solomon Grundy," someone beside you says, startling you. You look and see that a young man is standing by your side, dressed all in black. He's not one of the Joes, that much is for sure. You know all the men under your command. You waste no time aiming your sidearm at his face.

"Who are you? And how do you know ...?"

Before you can finish the question his hand shoots out in a blur and snatches your gun from you before you can even think about pulling the trigger. You watch in amazement as he crumbles it into scrap metal without apparent effort.

"As I was saying," he goes on as if nothing happened, "the big guy is called Solomon Grundy. Not really sure what he is myself, but he has knocked heads with the best of them and always walked away from it to cause more carnage down the line. Some say he is some kind of demon, others that he is the living embodiment of rage or something. A lot of guys would even say he is downright evil."

He chuckles as if contemplating a private joke and that sound sends a cold chill down your spine.

"You stay here, chief!" He pats you on the back. "I'll just go over there and say hi!"

And with that he leaves you gaping and walks directly toward the hangar that is quickly coming apart before the rage of that creature, Grundy.

#

Outlaw Planet Gandor
Limbo Galaxy
October 3, 2893

Parallel 038

#

Your name is Emily Heart, but you have almost stopped thinking of yourself by that name. Emily was a human being, just flesh and blood. You are much more than that. You are a cyborg, specifically modified to withstand the rigors of space, to skydive through the void with nothing but your own skin, now made of metal, to protect you. Emily Heart is gone. Your name is Steelhart now.

As Steelhart you are a member of an elite peacekeeping force called the Silverhawks, sent from Earth to the Limbo Galaxy to uphold law, order, and justice in this untamed part of the universe. It's not a job for those faint of heart. Many of Limbo's denizens resent the order you have brought to this place and are doing their very best to put an end to it, preferably by shipping you and your teammates back to Earth in very small boxes.

Looking around the establishment you have just walked into, a bar as seedy as any you've ever seen, makes you long for the open reaches of space. Being in cold vacuum with nothing but your own skin to keep you safe feels a lot better than to walk in a place like this. Well, some things can't be helped.

Usually on a mission like this you'd be paired off with your brother Will, codenamed Steelwill, but he is currently recovering from injuries sustained during an earlier mission. Will and you are twins and, due to an as yet unexplained accident of birth, are telepathically linked. It makes your teamwork flawless, but there are times when you feel that most people think of you as just one half of a team instead of a person of your own. So you really don't mind going on the occasional solo mission.

A lot of the patrons present glance at you with hostility in their eyes, but all of them quickly look away again when you meet their eyes. Even though you've only been here for less than a year the Silverhawks have already managed to garner quite the reputation and only very few people are stupid enough to mess with you.

Your eyes scanning the room you think back to the briefing given by Stargazer, your commanding officer, just hours ago. Apparently MonStar, the primary bad guy in this part of space, is looking for a very rare artifact that somehow turned up here on Gandor. No one knows quite what it is, exactly, but apparently it's some kind of gem with a moon-themed history. That alone would be quite enough to attract MonStar's attention all by itself, given that his own considerable power stems from the light of Limbo's near-mystical Moonstar.

The rest of your team, Quicksilver, Bluegrass, and Copperkid, are checking out other places on Gandor, hoping to find some trace of this gem before MonStar gets his hands on it. Maybe when you find it you can use it to lay a trap for the fiend and finally get him back behind bars where he belongs.

Suddenly your eyes come to rest on an unassuming young man sitting at a table in the back of the bar. There is nothing outwardly that could attract your attention, but being a cyborg you have other senses to rely on. The young man is not as human as he appears. You can detect quite a few cybernetic enhancements hidden beneath his skin. Apart from the members of your own team you know of only one organization in this part of space that can afford to outfit its members with advanced cybernetics: MonStar's.

Walking up to the man's table makes him look up at you. He can't be older than twenty, short blond hair, a face as stoic as that of Stargazer himself. There is something in those eyes, though. Something that tells you to be on your guard.

"What's up?" he asks, his voice neutral to the point of blandness.

"I've never seen you around these parts before. Mind telling me who you are?"

He shrugs. "Name's Oz."

You wait for him to say more, but he doesn't. He just looks at you with a look that implies mild interest, but no more than that.

"And what's your business here on Gandor, Mr. Oz?"

"Just here to pick something up."

This is starting to get frustrating. You wonder whether this guy is always this tightlipped or just when facing officers of the law.

"I couldn't help but notice that you've got some expensive hardware, Mr. Oz."

Now his face actually does show an expression, one considerably darker than his earlier, neutral one.

"That a crime?" he asks, sounding almost hostile now.

"Not as such. I'm just interested where you got it. Can't have come cheap."

"It certainly didn't," he says, almost a whisper.

This guy confuses you. He doesn't feel like a bad guy to you, but something about him is off, very much so. Before you can inquire further, though, a commotion at the door draws your attention.

Instincts take over, moving your body aside so you can look at the door while still keeping this Oz person in sight. Someone just stepped inside, someone almost too big for the door to this place. You can't quite keep your heart from skipping a beat.

MonStar towers over the patrons, his crimson armored form dwarfing anyone else present. The local rabble, weary of you, cowers back in fear from him. They have good reason to. In his normal, unarmored form MonStar is formidable. When he is like this, though, jacked up with the power of the Moonstar, he is almost unbeatable. The whole team together usually manages to match him. One Silverhawk all by her lonesome, though? This doesn't look good.

He doesn't even look at you, though. His blazing eyes fix on a man sitting off somewhere to the side. You know that man. Can't quite remember his name, but he's some kind of low-level smuggler. The Silverhawks apprehended him once during a raid, but he was barely important enough to round up afterwards. The men sitting at the table with him quickly scramble away, leaving him alone.

You notice Oz standing up, but your attention is fixed on MonStar as he marches toward the lone smuggler. There is fear on the man's face, but also some kind of desperate determination.

"Give me the gem," MonStar thunders, "and I might spare your miserable life."

With trembling hands the man reaches beneath his jacket, taking something out.

"This is not good," you hear Oz mutter. Moments later everything happens at once.

From the corner of your eye you see Oz begin to change, his body shivering as he expands in size and turns ... furry? You have no time to think about that, though, as you see the object the smuggler has taken from his jacket. A gem, black as night, seemingly glowing with some kind of inner radiance. Even as he touches it the blackness seems to seep out of the gem and onto his arm, quickly covering his body. There is a scream, inhuman and maddening, and where the smuggler stood a moment ago something else now faces MonStar. Something just as big as he is, its distorted face half hidden by a shadow with nothing to cast it.

"You might not know it yet," the creature growls at MonStar, "but you are in a lot of trouble!"

TO BE CONTINUED

NOTE: Anyone guess the origin of that black gem by now?