When we last left some of our heroes, they were facing a triple threat in a deserted New York City on a strange alien world...
The golden suits, pumpkin-faced Mr. Keema stood behind a bar in a restaurant and pointed a laser gun at Betty Hamilton and Valerie Scott. "Do not move or you will be destroyed. In fact, even if you don't move, I am going to destroy you!"
"Why?" Val hoped the defiance in her voice would distract from her moving back toward a dining table, "...what harm have we done to you?"
Betty inched sideways away from Val slowly, to give him two targets further apart, "Yes, we don't even know you!"
Keema's horrid eyes followed Betty, "That does not matter. All repulsive Earthlings are my enemies!"
"Oh," Betty gulped.
Just then the door from outside opened, throwing blinding light inside. It was the Robot, "Miss Judy?"
Keema turned and fired the laser at the doorway but couldn't see exactly where he was shooting. Betty dashed behind a partition, "Robot, lookout!"
Valerie turned and grabbed a vase behind her off the table as Robot made a hasty exit, sliding outside. The door received nasty blast. Valerie flung the vase at Keema's arm and the gun fell. She sprang behind a table and pushed it over as Keema found his gun quickly. He started shooting all over the room. Betty ducked as a lamp exploded and fell near her. Keema continued to fire but then noticed the table Val was hiding behind. He started to fire at it. It was heavy oak. A fire erupted on the table. Val ran to another table not far from it and a blast followed her. Keema was tracking her with the laser as she moved from table to table under each one, keeping her head above so it was blocked by the under edges. Table after table was being blown apart. Val screamed and ran behind a small frame of a corner. Laser beams passed by her and the corner. She cringed as a few tore away pieces of fragile wood on this corner.
Betty picked up her head to see Keema firing shots away from her area. She crawled over to a cabinet and opened it, finding empty wine bottles. Carefully reaching up to a table behind her and the partition, she pulled off a table cloth. She soon stuffed part of it in the bottle, tearing at it. Betty also found a burning candle from a table--an ornament. She used it to light her Molotov cocktail on fire. Betty peeked up and saw splinters of beams raining on Valerie who was trapped in her corner. Val moved sideways but had no where else to go. Betty stood up and threw the cocktail at the bar, "Val, run!" The bottle broke apart onto the bar, spreading the flame onto it and causing Keema to fall, himself on fire. Val dashed out and jumped headfirst behind another divider. Keema had put himself out and ran out as Val had tried to move. He started lasering this new divider away from Val. He started walking toward it, now more sure where the red head was hiding. "You see, there is no escape!"
Betty, wide eyed, crawled along another partition, hoping it was away from this madman. A piece of it cracked off near her head and she rolled away from it. "Beautiful ladies," he said sarcastically, "...prepare to die!"
Just then, the dark glass window toward the front of the restaurant cracked inward! The Robot stood on the other side. Keema turned, "You!" Robot fired a quick far ranging jolt of electricity and Keema, hit by it, fell. Robot called, "Miss Betty! Miss Valerie! Are you all right? Are you!"
Valerie helped Betty up, "Okay?"
"Stunned a bit. Val, the gun," Betty nodded.
Valerie ran over to it and avoiding Keema's fallen body, picked it up. The alien was face down and his face turned golden. Val too a closer look at it, "He looks normal."
"It is a disguise. Be careful," Robot explained.
The two girls ran to the door and dashed outside to the Robot. Valerie pointed, "Look!" In the distance they could see two giant cyclops creatures tearing away at the Empire State Building, giant monolithic beings, towering far above the smaller buildings. Val took out her radio, "I'm going to call the Jupiter for help."
Betty knew something else was wrong. She called to the Robot, "Robot, where's Judy?"
Judy was in a department store running for her life---again. She stopped at a door and opened it, viewing a staircase behind. She moved toward it but from her left a bald female mannequin grabbed at her arm! Judy let out a scream as it grabbed her other arm. A lot of good screaming does. She twisted her hands on top of the fake arms and grabbed them. She swung it toward a wall near the door, "I've had enough of you!" As she made the dummy make contact with the wall, one of the arms fell off in Judy's hands. Good, she needed it. For as she moved into the stairwell, that dog mutant monster-man thing came from the floor and followed. Judy tossed the arm at the thing's face as hard as she could and ran up the first flight of stairs. The hairy thing threw the arm and also the moving mannequin which was trying to retrieve it. Had Judy watched, she would have thought it bizarrely funny. She wasn't watching. The monster sprang up the steps after her.
In the Space Pod which was still inside the Jupiter's belly, Don was ignoring Dr. Smith with Fitzhugh watching on. As Don started the engines, Smith babbled, more about how he shouldn't be going and how he was needed at the spaceship. "Major, you'll regret this, I know you will. How can we launch the Space Pod while on the Jupiter is on the ground?"
Don spurted, "Those rocks we're on top of will give us enough clearance to fly the Pod out."
"Rocks indeed!" Smith gulped, "One wrong hit and..."
The Pod shook as Don piloted it outside. In front of the saucer shaped Jupiter II, Maureen watched the Pod fly out and move overhead. She waved. As it took off further on into the sky, Maureen was about to turn and go into the Jupiter II when faint trickles began to fall. "Snow," she said with bewilderment. She looked up some more, her chin feeling the speckles, "Snow...it is...snow in the desert." Feeling cold and alone, she turned and moved up to the hatch and inside the spaceship. She let the door slid closed on the odd domain out beyond.
Judy ran up a third flight of stairs and the dog-man jumped up a railing and landed in front of her! She screamed and backed down a few steps, slowly as to not cause it to spring. Then she turned fully to make a lifelong dash down. She made it to another few steps when three dark figures were blocking her way. All three wore armor and helmets---all three were dressed like Medieval Knights. Two wore only black capes and gowns, seemingly floating but with boots on also. The one in the middle, obviously the leader and closer, wore a full suit of armor. A Medieval Knight. "Oh no! It can't be!"
"Yes, you. You are here. My beauty queen. You shall now take your rightful place as my bride---or face the consequences! Take my hand!" The alien removes a gray glove and a stream of fires shoot out. Judy ducked backward just as the fire sprang at her. The fire hit the mutant dog-man behind her just as it was bearing down on her from behind. The creature's chest caught on fire. It growled as it tried to stamp out the fire with its arms and hands. Judy took this chance to move past it upward.
Outside, Steve Burton ran up to John Robinson in front of a subway entrance, "Maybe we'd be safer down there."
John looked down, "I highly doubt it!"
Tracing up the steps was a 7 foot hairy monster who had one eye; the eye was sprung out on a stalk in front of it. John had seen this thing before. Behind it was a leaf life humanoid, green and menacing! The two men ran off. Steve put his arm out to stop John. From spending two years on the land of the giants, Steve had obtained the habit of looking up as he ran.
From the windows of an apartment building all manner of shapes were moving--trying to break out. A few forms smashed the windows. Hideous creatures of all shapes and sizes. Glass shattered. Strange unearthly sounds began to fill the air. Some forms were more human shaped than others but all the more frightening for it.
"I'd hate to admit this to any of the others but I'll tell you," admitted John, "I'm scared."
"You took the words out of my..." Steve couldn't finish for a louder crash tore the air. A huge mutant bat came crashing out of a window, rushed at them through the air. It was screaming wildly! They ran around a corner, away from it. The monster bat, spewing poison, swiped a wing at a fire hydrant near where the two men were standing. It fell over and water splashed out onto the black street pavement.
In the Chariot, Valerie and Betty sat at the controls with Robot near the open door. The two girls saw large reaching vines springing up from cracks in the ground. They also saw vines climbing up the buildings. A few vines crept around the Robot and the Chariot. Val looked up toward the city skyline, "Where are they? We have to get out of here!"
Judy reached the top of the staircase and found all the other doors locked but one. She ran out of it onto the dismal roof of the store. Judy walked toward the edge and looked over. In hazy sunlight, she could make out humanoid forms lumbering up a fire escape as if in some horrific parade. The horror of it all was enhanced by the blinding sunlight. A nightmare in the day time.
Below, vines reached upward the Robot's body. Robot pulled out his arms and started waving, "Danger! Danger! I need help!" The vines reached his upper torso and started to hold his arms down to his side.
Val scampered across the seats and tried to pull the vines off, reaching out from the glass car, "Won't budge! What can get them..." A stalk landed on her arm, making her scream, a scream which amplified as masses of weeds piled up from drains on the streets.
"Warning! Warning! Trying to invade my system! Frost guns in back pack!" Robot told them. Betty turned around.
A vine twisted around Valerie's neck. She pulled at it to hold it from choking her, "Betty, do something!"
Betty moved to the back of the Chariot and pulled the frost guns out. She fired a blast at the plants which moved off Valerie. Betty pulled her inside the car more than she was, "Val?"
"Okay," she pushed a remainder of vine off her neck, "Robot, get in here and let's go!" The robot obeyed, moving his legs apart and climbing up the treads into the car.
On the roof of the department building, Judy looked at the exit door which was being hit by the hairy mutant on the other side. It would soon give way. She had managed to bolt it shut from up here. Judy looked about and from the left side of the roof, vines began to creep over the side and onto the flat top. Soon there vast numbers of vines moving onto the surface. Judy had nowhere to run. The hideous bumpy face of a creature rose up from the right side. She saw it and ran to a weather vane. Just then a dark shadow filled the area. "Now what?" She looked up to see a large black cloud rolling across the sky with slight traces of lightning beginning inside it. The suns were no place to be seen and the city grew gray and dark.
Several creatures climbed up---one was all red with four horn like antennas and black pupils inset in a red eye. Another was hairy with two horns and a snout for features. One was stringy in body and featureless on its face, almost like a swamp monster. A two headed thing, looking more like a crab grass or swamp monster than the previous one, rose up behind all of these, kind of waddling as it walked. Following them was a mummified alien and yet another, a blueish creature with spikes all over its body.
Judy tried to resign herself to keep calm but couldn't. "Somebody help! Help! Help!" The army started at her and the door broke down, revealing the foam mouthed dog-man creature, fangs showing through bubbles. All of these monsters and the vines started for Judy!
Below in the street, Betty had opened the Chariot's bubble hatch and was firing frost at some of the plants in front of the Chariot. She then eyed something flying above, "Valerie look!"
The Space Pod swooped across the sky. Don looked down at Judy's predicament on the rooftop. Judy laughed as the Pod came down between her and the monsters. Don threw open the door, "Get inside!" Smith and Fitzhugh screamed at the monsters, who began to bang on the front of the Space Pod.
Judy ran to Don on the side of the Pod, "Don! You don't have to tell me twice!" A slimy tentacle grabbed her arm. She turned to see a rearing up worm-like thing holding her. Don pulled his laser pistol and shot the tentacle off. He then turned it on the dog thing which was running for the door of the Pod. Smith and Fitzhugh's screams had caught his attention. The mummy and the spike man started at them all. Judy ran past Don into the Pod and Don shot both monsters, who stumbled back. He then ran inside without turning his back on them. Once inside, it was up to Smith to slam the door shut. He did this job well.
Don started to take off and the Pod began to rise. Smith gulped, "Doomed! We're doomed!"
"Smith! If you keep saying that..." Don snapped.
Judy gasped, "Don, we're not rising."
Don fired the rockets, "We're not out of it yet! Something's got us and trying to pull us back down!"
Fitzhugh raised an eyebrow, "You mean we really are doomed?"
Outside, six of the monsters were holding the legs of the Space Pod. Three raisin shaped red blobs came screaming and screeching up from the doorway and rolled over to the area of the Space Pod. The monster men backed away as the blobs touched the lower Pod.
The Flying Sub flew toward New York City. Inside, Admiral Harrimin Nelson and Doug Phillips sat in the pilot seats, looking out at the expanding cloud of darkness which sported full fledged lightning inside it now. Nelson looked around, "This is where Sparks thinks that radio message came from."
"Thinks?" Doug sighed, "Anyway, Admiral, this Flying Sub gives as good a ride as you promised."
"Let's move in closer, shall we?" Nelson shot the Flying Sub toward the city.
Doug pointed, "Look at the radarscope, Admiral."
In the Chariot, Val drove off, "Where are the others? We have to get out of here now!"
In the Space Pod, Don grit his teeth "We'll soon be out of power if this keeps up!"
The trio of blobs held the Pod still. Judy calmed down more and now that she could be heard above the monstrous growls, she expressed herself, "Oh Don, I'm so glad to see you." She put an arm on his shoulder.
"Me too," he smiled but didn't turn around to look at her.
Suddenly, three explosions hit the blobs and shook the Pod. Smith gasped, "We're being torn asunder!"
The Flying Sub passed the roof. Nelson hit a lever. Doug looked down, "Some more heat bombs ought to do the job, Admiral Nelson."
Nelson squinted out of the windows, "NOW what are THOSE things?" He asked this not expecting an answer and fully knowing any explanation wouldn't make much sense anyway. He just thought he should say something.
Bombs blasted against two of the blobs off the Pod. The Pod tilted sideways and up. Don fell into Fitzhugh while Judy bumped into Smith. One blob held one of the legs of the Pod. The Flying Sub zipped down for another pass, blasted this last blob and caused the Pod to spiral free. Don was able to catch its motion.
A lightning bolt hit the roof and more bolts crashed apart some of the buildings. Grabbing a mike, Don called to their rescuers, "Whoever you are, thank you! But we have two more men in this city. I can't leave them."
"We understand," Nelson called back via radio, "...and, ahh, we'll follow." The Flying Sub and the Pod flew on.
Far below, the Chariot pulled away from the area, treads wheeling over a mass of dying plants. Betty closed the hatch and plopped down in the seat next to Val's. Lightning blasts passed the Space Pod and the Flying Sub higher up in the darkening sky. Flight was a little shaky. Blasts began to rain around the Chariot as it made its way.
Steve and John ran from under a piece of falling metal, it having been dislodged from a bolt that hit it. They ran down a shadowy road, coated by gray clouds moving overhead. Papers blew down the wide street. Groups of computer, shaped like large up sided rectangles with reel to reel tapes on their chests, bubble shaped heads on top the upper side, and clawed segmented arms dangling on their sides were reeling across a street that connected this one. Suddenly, they detected the two men and made their way, turning onto the street John and Steve were on. John noted, "There must be hundreds of them!"
"This way!" Steve pulled John's arm and they ran by a camera shop. A Roman soldier came crashing out of the display photo--with the effect of crashing out of a giant camera for the display was a large poster of a camera. This soldier was only a skeleton in the dress of a Roman soldier. With his broadsword, he moved after Steve and John.
The two men stopped in front of the stairway to Penn Station. Before going down, they listened. Footsteps. Strange gurgles. They run away from it. Green faced men wearing safari gear--camouflage outfits, green like leaves off plants, came running up the steps. They had rifles and started shooting in the direction of Steve and John but the two ran down the steps of a business building's outside plaza, all red brick. John puffed, "I wonder where those guys' train came from." From between two buildings adjacent to this one, a giant Gila Monster slithered out and stopped in front of them. Its head was as big as a house and its body, largely unseen from between the two buildings, must have been as big as a train itself. The two stopped their dash short. Behind them, the army men were gaining. The tongue of the creature in front of them whisked past their heads.
"Don't run," Steve whispered, "It'll have us in a second."
"Besides that..." John hissed, "We're running out of places to run."
"The story of our lives," Steve said.
A giant cyclops was pushing a skyscraper down and this towering, stretching structure just happened to topple onto the giant lizard, smashing itself through one of the smaller business buildings. The lizard reared up toward the thing on top of it. John and Steve took this as a chance to race behind a brick wall just as bullets of the plant-safari-army men hit. The two were at a wall of a small alley between business buildings and a hotel. The 50 foot cyclops tossed his hand into the top of one of the apartment buildings and the bricks came flying. Some hit the wall above Steve and John, nicking it. They backed against the wall as bricks fell. The plant army men were trying to run for the two humans and weren't as lucky. They caught the force of all the bricks and three of six were completely buried in bricks. More buildings went down as the cyclops came nearer to the Giant Gila Monster. It sprang up at the cyclops' chest, biting onto the cyclops' neck, not even slowed by some of the debris on top of its body. More pieces of buildings fell. John and Steve high tailed it out of the area as the wall they were behind toppled, hit by glass, brick, metal, and stone. A metal gate of a nearby small green park, between the business buildings, fell forward, crushed. In pain, the cyclops monster pulled the giant lizard off itself, scooped it up by its tail and swung it around. After a few circular motions, the thing let the reptile go. It flung into the side wall of the Madison Square Garden building, caving the side of it in.
Steve and John stopped running, puffing. They were in a seemingly quiet area between an industrial building and a parking lot, the lot devoid of any cars. From one of the windows of the industrial buildings, a green faced army soldier pointed a rifle. He was ready to pull the trigger but the Flying Sub flew past him as he did so. The Flying Sub landed between this building and the two men. Seeing it, Steve was ready to run off from it, "What is that now?"
Lightning hit the building and the army man, a plant alien, fell out the window as a blast hit the floor above him. His body flew down near the Flying Sub. Nelson saw it turn from army man into a pile of roots and weeds. Blasts began more frequently and started to bombard the city. A skyscraper fell over and smashed not far from the area. John and Steve shook.
Doug ran through the small area to the back door of the Flying Sub and flung it open. He ran out and waved, "Come on! We're with you!"
"I don't..." John nodded but saw the Space Pod flying overhead, "...why not!" Steve and John rushed to the Flying Sub.
The Chariot treaded out of the city. A giant octopus had pulled itself up out of the water onto the UN Building and began to destroy it. As Doug seat belted himself back into his chair, Nelson took off again. John and Steve held onto the crossbeams on the ceiling, just behind Doug and Nelson. The Flying Sub shot up beyond the lightning blasts while the Chariot pulled onto the desert sands and blasts exploded the city, raising up a huge sandstorm. The Space Pod flew out from under a black cloud. A massive explosion engulfed the entire city.
Nelson nodded to Doug, "I'll call your friends and we'll rendezvous with Seaview."
Before Nelson reached for the radio, John asked, "Seaview?" He looked upward as if trying to figure something out that he once knew, "You...you're, uhm, Admiral Harrimin Nelson, aren't you?"
"Why, yes," Nelson lowered his hand and turned partially, "Yes I am. And, just who are you and your people?"
"I'm Professor John Robinson. We're from the Earth ship Jupiter II."
"Jupiter II?" Nelson frowned, a confused look on his face, "I know that project but it was just taking off on the drawing boards in 1988 and...it...the ship I mean, was the Jupiter I."
John affirmed this, "1988. That's the year the project started."
"Is that what time you're from, Admiral?" Steve asked.
"Yes and you?" Nelson wondered as he flew the Flying Sub.
"1985," Steve answered.
"I'm from 1999, though," John said.
Doug laughed, "I'm just confused." He rubbed the back of his neck.
"And what time are you from, sir?" John asked.
"1968," Doug laughed, "Through the Time Tunnel."
John was astonished, "You know about that?"
"Of course, I'm one of the men who...wait a minute...what do you know about it?" Doug went serious.
Nelson took his turn to laugh, "Gentlemen, we'll continue this rather confusing discussion back on Seaview, uh, that's my submarine," he turned to Steve and John slightly, "So relax and..."
"Admiral!" Doug yelled as a giant Pterodactyl, a winged dinosaur flew right at the nose of the Flying Sub, "A dinosaur!" He could see right down the fanged beak.
Nelson quickly changed course, pulled away from it as it veered away from them, squawking. Nelson puffed, "And our conversation can start with this rather weird place we're in."
Back inside the Jupiter II control room, Maureen paused from reading a novel to check on the sight of the weather outside. Looking out the viewport she saw heavy snow accumulations. It didn't surprise her since it had been snowing hard for hours. She was about to put her eyes back into her book, which was about the Pilgrims on Earth in the past, when outside movement caught her attention. Something outside had ducked behind an ice drift. Something dark and sinister.
The trek across the colder desert didn't take long. The Chariot, the Space Pod, and the Flying Sub kept up with each other, monitoring each other's progress. As they crossed the desert, they noticed the temperature was dropping and that it began to rain. In the Chariot, Betty grew tired, "I think when we return to Earth, I'll ask for a major raise."
"Oh, why?" Valerie asked as she watched outside.
"Because the role of stewardess now has increased to protecting the lives of the passengers from man eating plants and ray gun happy space aliens," Betty yawned as Valerie laughed. Snow began to come down on the front window. Betty curled up in her seat and feel asleep. The Pod and the Flying Sub glided through the thin flakes.
At the Jupiter II, Maureen finished her Pilgrim trek book. Getting off the small black chair, she rose up to the window. A blurry movement once again caught her eye. Even though the force field was on, she found herself taking a laser pistol from the gun rack to the right of the viewport. An electric spark occurred across the force field and Maureen looked out. Vivid shapes squeezed into the field through the open hole, electric outlining the forms. Then silence. She felt a presence and backed up toward the area of the freezing tubes to the left of the viewport. Suddenly a black robed Saticon appeared in front of her. It had their traditional cape, glittery derby with a star on the center of the front, and long black robes. It bobbed as it walked.
Wobbling, the shadowy black face seemed to move but without a mouth, "Do not ressss-I-ssstt ussssssss."
"Us?" Maureen tried to fire the gun at it but it would not shoot. She turned from the thing at the viewport and looked at the elevator glide tube. The lift rose up and opened after it stopped. Another Saticon appeared inside it and he lumbered out toward her from the other side. She tossed the gun at him but with a wave of his black gloved hand, he exploded it. "No!" Maureen backed up some more, "Stay away from me. I warn you!"
Maureen backed up at a tube so close it practically touched her back. The tube opened and a black mass quietly arose from the bottom of it and turned into another caped Saticon, all in black and with a black face, non-descript eyes--actually no eyes. It stood behind her and she didn't realize it. Maureen was still talking to the other two, "Don't you come near me!" She backed up some more and into the one in the tube. The Saticon there waved his cape over her head and she vanished as it flowed. The three Saticons laughed and their laughed lingered a moment after the trio vanished in a puff of black smoke. The Jupiter II was completely empty of life.
John and the others found this out when they stopped there. Maureen was no where to be found. Steve had helped John back into the Chariot, hoping familiar gear and surroundings would snap him out of his apparent shock of the loss. There were no signs of her anywhere and she didn't answer any radio calls.
Soon the Chariot was brought alongside the Seaview, which had surfaced above the ice through a hole before Nelson and Doug left her. The Chariot was tied down by crewmen who also put a walkway from the Chariot to the Seaview hull. Captain Lee Crane had to stop a number of whistles from his men toward Valerie, Betty, and Judy. Stu Riley and Kowalski still made Os with their mouths, silently, in reverence to the ladies' beauty. Riley, who had been on leave for two years from Seaview had only just returned after that second encounter with Mr. Pem and that time travel business with Benedict Arnold and Major Andre.
The Space Pod had settled down in front of the Seaview conning tower and everyone crowded into the Seaview control room and nose. John was preoccupied because of the disappearance of Maureen, Will, and Penny. Barry, Dan, and Mark were also among the missing. The group had also passed by the Spindrift to pick the children, their pets, and the two men up but they, too, were not to be found. Worried about his wife and children, John was not thinking clearly.
Admiral Nelson lead the proceedings and with testimonies from Steve Burton, Tony Newman, Doug Phillips, and some of the others, they began to piece together the little facts they had. Nelson topped the meeting with, "So what we seem to have is that we were the only survivors of some cloud that, I know it sounds incredible, that literally unraveled the universe, made it vanish to who knows where, and somehow brought bits and pieces of it here. Who is behind it we have no idea of," Nelson paced the length of the nose and the control room as he spoke. He stopped to lean on the map table.
In Tic Toc Lab, Anne, Ray, Jerry, and General Kirk watched the meeting on the Time Tunnel screen. Tony said, "Admiral, the Time Tunnel is trying to locate and help us, I'm sure of it."
"Yes, from what you said, they do seem to be unaffected by this thing but what I can't understand is why? Why? I don't know. It also seems to me that this is all some part of a deliberate plan." Nelson looked up and leaned off the table, waving his hand as he spoke, "...that this phenomena is a part of the universe, a normal part is absurd. Don't you think so, Professor Robinson?"
John was staring out at the ice through the Seaview nose window, sitting at the nose's coffee table. Don was nearby and nudged him from a standing position. Nelson cleared his throat. Don nudges John again, "John?"
John stood up, "Yes Admiral Nelson, whatever you say, I'll agree with."
Nelson smiled warmly, "We'll find the rest of your family. I believe them to be safe."
"Thank you, Admiral. I think I'll go looking with the parapets for them," John stammered and sat back down.
Nelson moved toward the screen in the nose, "I believe our most likely way of finding out what is going on is to split into assigned groups and head out..." He put the screen on with the turn of a knob and an exact copy of the map on it was transmitted to the control room screen which Chip Morton had turned on. The map was a rough one of this planet's areas---it was clear and without details but was as good as the Seaview's radar and sonar could establish, "...toward this area..." Nelson tapped an area at the top of the map..
Tony, leaning against Seaview's driving mechanism where two crewmen--Frank and Pete sat, looked up and unfolded his arms, "Why, Admiral, what's there?"
"Well, we've tried to scan most of this planet," Crane put in, coming from the scope island and getting off it, "...and all we've found is a constantly changing series of landscapes."
"Like a, oh, a patchwork planet," Betty murmured.
"That's not exactly how I would have put it but yes," Nelson shook his head in a bemused manner and said. He moved to the map on the screen again and tapped the top area several times, "Except for this one area." It was the top pole of the map, "Our scans could not penetrate it."
Don stood up from sitting against the Seaview nose ledge and walked to the map on the nose screen, "And this is why you think the devils that are doing all this are here?"
"I do, Major West," Nelson turned to the whole group once more---it, ahh, also seems to be the only place that doesn't change."
Don pouted and put his left fist into his right hand, "Then let's go get them."
John took Judy aside, "Judy, I'm sure you will be safe here."
"No, dad," Judy was sitting at the table near him, "If I can help find mom and the kids---I'm going."
Valerie heard this and pushed past Kowalski and Chief Petty Officer Francis Ethelbert Sharkey, "Which brings me to my point, Admiral. Females are included on this, this exodus, right?"
Nelson wanted to choose his next words very carefully. He pondered a moment, "Well...Miss Scott, is it?"
"We won't take no for an answer," Val put forth.
"As I've told Captain Crane many a time, never try to argue with a woman. And Seaview had one too many on board now to put up a fight against."
When the laughs died down, Valerie blinked her eyes and walked up to the Admiral, "Good. Good, good, Admiral. Glad you feel that way. Then I'll come with you." Nelson frowned as Valerie walked up the spiral ladder out of the nose to go get ready.
"Let's get going then," Nelson said, "We have many a preparation to make."
As Crane, Kowalski, Sharkey, Riley, and Chip guided the movements of the strangers and allies, Don West walked closer to Nelson, "You really are Admiral Nelson, aren't you. You wouldn't know this but...you were my childhood hero." Before Nelson could interrupt with downcast eyes, Don looked at him, "Since my father was a marine biologist in the employ of Nelson Institute, I kind of heard all about you."
Nelson smiled, "West, West. My goodness, yes but he was so young when he...the time thing again." Nelson patted Don on the arm, "Thank you for your kind words, Major West. I think, we should, uhm, get going now though."
Stu Riley went out onto deck to check on two new crewmen, who stood watch near the Space Pod. All three had on parkas against the colder elements. "Anything unusual?"
"Not that we could see, Stu."
"Okay, we'll be moving out soon," Riley submitted, "This is some far out gadget, huh?" He walked to the Pod and patted it. Then he moved to the Conning Tower.
From the sea between Seaview and the solid ice, came blue faced ice men with blue down vests and blue outfits, a few had long, white icy beards or goatees. They sprang up and landed on the deck, after a high jump out of the ocean. All had white frosty hair embedded with ice crystals and combed to a point on the center of their foreheads. Five of these landed near the Space Pod. "Joel, Flint! Lookout!" These frostmen shot strange looking pistols which had huge nozzles. Snowballs exited the nozzles and fired onto the two men's chests. Joel and Flint looked at their own chests but had no time to react. Suddenly, each man's body had turned to snow to be driven off the deck by the winds.
"Skipper!" Riley shouted as he ran inside the Conning Tower door, slamming it shut behind him. As he did, a snowball hit it. Riley locked it from inside.
More ice men rose up and landed on the deck of the long Seaview hull. Puffing and out of breath, Riley threw himself through the back door of the control room in. "Skipper! Skipper, icemen up on deck!"
"What?" Crane, in a parka, turned from Tony Newman at the computer and started to climb up the ladder.
Riley followed Crane, "No, Skipper, don't! They killed Joel and Flint."
Crane tapped Riley's shoulder reassuringly and went up. Riley followed, cautiously. Lee looked down and saw some ice men firing odd guns. Snow balls whizzed past the conning tower top and just missed their heads. Crane pushed Riley, "Get back down there!" Riley jumped down the ladder so Crane could climb. Crane was about to shut the hatch after them. He heard Riley shout from below, "I told you Skipper!"
Chip had turned the control room screen to monitor what was outside, "He's right, Lee! Be careful up there!" On the screen they saw dozens of icemen climbing out of the water onto the deck of Seaview.
Crane was trying to shut the hatch but frost men had jumped from the hull with quick spring action and landed in the Conning Tower highest level. One pulled the hatch open and pointed a gun. Crane jumped down, following Riley's move. The frost man followed him and pointed a gun at Tony, Steve, and Crane. This man turned to see Nelson near the scope island.. Nelson moved to the computer near the others. He tried to remain calm. The frost man covered him with the gun. The alien seemed to talk to someone not in the room, "Leader, the way is made clear."
A steamy cold sprouted up and a larger frost man, larger but also older, appeared after it. He had a longer frosty beard than the gun toting alien warrior of ice. He also sported one of those snow ball guns. Nelson moved toward the leader, "I...I know you."
"Yes, Admiral. I escaped your inferno, Admiral Nelson," Gelid pointed his frost gun at Nelson, "Come no closer."
Nelson remembered, also, "Gelid."
Crane puffed and moved on the balls of his feet, "Well, now what do you want?"
Dressed in parkas, Valerie and Judy stopped from entering via the rear curtain area in the control room. Val put an arm up, Judy behind her, stopping the blond girl, "Wait."
"The present conditions here must stabilize for my people to rise up," Gelid said, snapping coldly. When he spoke cold air shot out of his mouth, icy blue and misty white all at once.
Steve looked from one alien to the other, "You look like you've done pretty good to me."
"Ahh, but we want the whole planet," Gelid pointed at Nelson, "You, Admiral, over there." Sharkey, impatient, slowly, came down the nose ladder, unseen. He moved to the map table, crouching low at its side. He was waiting for the right moment.
Tony shook his head, "You maniacs are all the same in every time. Hitler, Napoleon, Genghis Khan, you never change. Only your toys do."
"Ahh, maybe, perhaps. I do not know of those whom you speak. But the toys, as you put it, make us the winners, now don't they?" Gelid pointed his at Nelson, "Now, Admiral, I do not expect you to understand this but it is not for revenge but I will now eliminate this tiny band's authority figure." He moves the gun closer to Nelson as the other alien covers the others, "Then my men will safely board the Seaview."
"Flattered that you remember its name," Nelson stirred, a bit uneasily.
Smith and Fitzhugh, arguing again, came down the ladder noisily and quickly, making more clanging and screeching than forty porpoises at play. At least it sounded that way to Sharkey, who looked up and rolled his eyes. Both Smith and Fitzhugh screamed as they saw the frost leader Gelid aiming his gun up at them, the iceman startled by this sudden ruckus. Nelson acted quickly and put his hand on the arm of Gelid. Gelid puffed up into a steam of smoke and was gone, melted. The aide alien turned on Nelson and fired a snowball! Nelson ducked aside and the snowball froze a number of plates on the wall behind Nelson and on the computer consoles. Crane made his move and the aide turned at him. Another alien jumped down from the open Conning Tower hatch but Sharkey made his move---punching him and thus deflecting the arm and hand holding this new one's gun! The alien, as he was punched, vanished, turning into a melted snowpile on the floor. Crane looked at the remaining alien, "You can't kill us all!"
"Taking you first will do!"
Nelson rushed forward to save Lee, grabbing this last alien and the alien misted away. Nelson didn't blink, "Close that hatch!"
Sharkey jolted up the ladder and grabbed the door handle but the nozzle of a frost gun pointed at his face but he slammed the hatch on it anyway. The gun fell and Sharkey locked the door. He could more frost men banging on it, landing on the conning tower floor outside. Sharkey went back down, taking in air and only now letting himself be nervous, "Sir, they're all over the sub!"
Kowalski, from the sonar board, looked, "The nose window!"
Aliens were out there, firing frost at the nose from outside. They had some oxygen masks on, alien in design but were not wearing any diving gear other than those. They were swimming in frozen icy sea. Smith came down the ladder as the Robot wheeled in from the Radio Shack, "Do something, you cowardly clod!"
The Robot rolled across the Seaview deck past the driver controls, catching the attention of the two men there. "What do you suggest, Dr. Smith?"
Nelson grabbed Lee's arm, "Electric charge!"
Lee grabbed a mike from the scope island, "Now here this. Reactor Room, Circuitry Room, send an electric shock through the hull! Fast!"
The Seaview illuminated outside. The frost army atop her, melted and turned to steam. Ski stood up and went over to the window with Smith and Fitzhugh. Patterson took over for Ski and sat at the sonar. It was his duty term now. Smith, Fitzhugh, and Ski watched the few out there vaporize in the water, turning into a part of it now. Nervous, Smith put his hands to his mouth. Chip watched the control room screen, "They're still out there on the hull, Lee."
"What?" Crane turned around to Chip, unbelieving.
"But you can push them aside with your boot," Chip smiled, "Nothing but snow." Crane relaxed.
Nelson leaned on the map table, "Now can we get on with this..."
Smith turned, putting on his brave front again, "On with it, indeed!" He walked toward Nelson by the table but more toward the conning tower ladder, "We'll very probably all be killed! AHHHHHH!" As he walked, he didn't realize he was stepping in a pile of snow that was once the ice men. "Oh dear!" He ran off toward the exit door, past Valerie and Judy, screaming. Val rolled her eyes but Judy merely smiled and then laughed.
Will and Penny Robinson with Barry Lockridge walked down a grassy field onto an out of place sandy, pebbled beach. To Penny the water looked crystal blue and very refreshing. "Look at those two." Debbie was at the foot of the beach and as the water rolled in with the tide, splashed some up at Chipper. It was sunny in this area and the sky was clear blue. Penny picked up Chipper as the three teens went to the animals. The slight spray air hit her and exhilarated her. The smell of salt water was in her nostrils. Her hair was whipped by a slight warm breeze. She tilted her head up to take it all in.
Will spied some bubbles rising out from the shore, "Penny, let's go back to the Spindrift now."
Barry joined him, "You see something?"
Penny puffed in and out, "Oh, it's so nice here. I could stay forever."
From the sea, the bubbles rose and grew larger. Shapes filled those bubbles. Nine figures shaped like men rose up and their rising wet, slimy bodies were covered in green and brown scales. Their faces were that of snout nosed reptiles not unlike a turtle's face. The creatures had yellow fish net clothes over their bodies and each held a small round gun. These are known to 1970s Earth people as the Sea Devils, ancient beings who once held sway over Earth with their allies, the Silurians.
Penny ran closer to Will and Barry with Debbie nervously clinging to her back, holding her shoulders, "What are they?"
Barry was wide eyed as the Sea Devils arose from the water and began to walk onto land, "Whatever they are, they're coming this way!"
"They haven't spotted us, so come on," Will ordered. The trio ran off just as the Sea Devils spotted them.
One hissed, "Follow them and question. If they do not answer, they will die. We have our orders."
The slimy reptile men marched onto the beach. Penny, Will, and Barry ran over a dune, passing bramble brush. Chipper and Debbie were far ahead, out of the sand onto a grass knoll. The two animals had gone down over a misty hill. Penny glanced back and spotted the Sea Devils tramping over a yellowish hill. "They're following us, Will." The trio ran over another yellow hill.
"We have to find..." Will stopped short his sentence. Looking at Chipper and Debbie, he saw they found someone laying at the bottom of the grassy hill on a jagged rock near a large pond. This was a boy, somewhat older than any of the three, perhaps 16 or 17, Will thought. "Just what we need..."
Barry was first to the new boy, feeling the throb on his neck, "What funny clothes." They were green at the sleeves and the baggy pants were also green. The boy wore a yellow vest with a red patch on his left side near his chest. He had an elf like pug nosed face and long black hair to his shoulders. Barry noticed a group of vines tied around his waist. Will went up the hill again to check on the Sea Devils.
Penny shook this older teenager, "Wake up, come on."
Will turned around on top of the hill and saw the Sea Devils marching closer to them. He ran back to the others, "Leave him. Those sea creatures are coming closer."
"What? We can't." Barry protested.
"No, he's coming to," Penny sat the boy up, "What's your name? Do you know? I'm, ahh, Penny Robinson."
The boy, groggy, winced, "My name is...ohhh...ahhh...Adric...Adric, that's my name."
"Well, Adric," Penny said quickly, "Listen, we're being chased by some sea creatures, can you move on?"
"I can," Adric stood up, wobbled, and began to stumble.
Will and Barry ran to catch him before he fell. With their arms around his shoulders and his around their necks, they moved off. Penny looked back up the hill and what she saw made her throw herself against it. On the other side a Sea Devil man-monster rose up and began to march down. Spotting the three boys, the Sea Devil raised a sucker gun up at them.
Penny had grabbed a long branch with many smaller endings on it as the Sea Devil proceeded down. The thing didn't look down, luckily for her. This gave her the opportunity to smash the branch into the gun, making the gun fall. The monster rushes at her but she scrambled up the gun and ran off before its lumbering form could catch her. The turtle like eyes of the Sea Devil followed her. Soon, hundreds more Sea Devils rose up from the shore and began to march across the dunes. Some held larger cannon like guns.
Penny ran behind the three boys, "They've spotted us again. Where can we go?"
They had moved to a grassy but mountain filled area. In front of them was a cliff which hung low. A few trees were scattered about. "You're not going anywhere, young Earthlings." The four looked up and on the cliff edge were eleven aliens which Penny recognized as the Klingons. The one who spoke was Kordar, "We need to know from you what is going on. What you are doing to this universe. And to perhaps other universes. "
Penny dropped the Sea Devil gun, meaningfully. Barry frowned, "You aliens are all alike. Worse than the giants. Always pointing guns at someone."
Will groaned as Adric passed out, "This guy should go on a diet. We don't know what's going on," Will called out to the Klingon leader.
"Commander," another Klingon reported, "Those the humans call Sea Devils approach."
"Go down and get them, then call in the others."
"Will!" Penny saw hundreds of Klingons soon lining the cliff side on the mountain to their left, "They're going to have a war!"
Will looked up at the craggy faced Klingons and then back at the hundreds of arriving Sea Devils, "And we're smack in the middle..." was all Will could say.