"Fireside Diaries"
Story Written by Freedom Fighter
Two bookkeeping items to deal with first...
One, a couple weeks ago this story hit a very big landmark. It is now my most read story ever! In the stats era of this website, that is. The story that originally held the record started before began providing view statistics and the like to users, so the number of actual hits the previous holder had will never actually be known. Still, this is a great accomplishment and I have only all of you loyal readers to thank! Thanks for all your support.
Two, if you don't have me on Author Alert and/or you don't check my profile page, which I update on Mondays, you're probably unaware that I started my first "Gravity Falls" fanfic a couple weeks ago. It's called "13 Wishes," and the third chapter of that is being posted tonight. If you're a fan of that Disney toon, check it out!
Now, onto this week's episode, the second entry of 'Fireside Fantasy Month.' Remember at the end of the last season when I asked for ideas for future episodes? This episode is the first of two submitted by you guys that I decided to use. The idea for tonight's episode is from Coltar Mortel - and his idea is the reason I'm doing this themed month. Coltar, I loved your idea, but there was absolutely no way I could mold it in a way without completely throwing certain canon bits of the series storyline out the window. So I decided to spin this as an alternate universe (or AU) stand-alone tale. If you're reading this, I hope this is acceptable to you.
This episode is also Gretchen's solo entry for this season. It also features the only appearance this season for one of my created characters. Hope you all enjoy!
Disclaimer: The characters of 'Phineas and Ferb' belong to Disney.
Entry #416 - Written by Gretchen
It is true when they say that "In space, no one can you hear you scream."
But I bet those people never said anything about what happens in a space station...
Gretchen was sitting down in a chair positioned next to a bed in the station's sick bay. She had tears streaming down from eyes as her hands were clasped over the left hand of the humanoid alien male lying before her.
"It is the only way," he said to Gretchen.
"But... it's not fair!" Gretchen cried.
"To save... the galaxy... I... must..."
Before she could object any further, she felt his hand go limp. The alien's chest also stopped moving, insinuating that his heart had also stopped.
"No," Gretchen said, shaking her head in denial. "No, you can't! No... NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"
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Entry #416 [FSD310] - The Emperor of the Cosmos (02.04.03)
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You're probably wondering, what was with the space station, and the alien, and me mourning him? Well, to tell you all that, I'd have to first start from about four bicupids ago...
In layman's terms, that means 48 hours...
Aboard a large alien space cruiser, roughly 5,000,000 km away from Earth, a platoon of Earth soldiers was making its way towards the ship's docking bay. They were under heavy fire from the occupants of the ship. One of the soldiers waved with their arm, motioning the others to keep moving. Eventually, they reached the bay. Now they just had to wait for their ride to get there.
"Keep firing!" barked Isabella, who was commanding the squad.
Her lackeys complied, firing away as their enemy started rushing into the docking area. The opposition consisted of humanoid aliens with yellow skin and whose head resembled that of a squid.
"If we live through this," shouted a random girl in the platoon, "I'm never eating seafood again!"
Isabella's squad kept firing away, keeping the enemy at bay. Meanwhile, she stopped and hunkered down behind a crate-like object. Raising her hand up to her ear, she activated the communications headset built into her space helmet.
"Gretchen, where's that evac?"
She immediately heard Gretchen's voice in her ear. "Arriving now, Chief!"
Isabella looked towards the open bay doors. Sure enough, a medium-sized transport ship was pulling in. As it came in for a landing, Isabella started signaling her troops to make a break for it. She, along with another soldier, provided cover fire.
"Eat this, Corruptor!"
Isabella fired off a shot from her rifle, one of pink laser beams, and hit an enemy in the helmet, knocking him off of his feet.
"YES! Have a nice nap!"
By this point, the transport ship was now hovering in place. As it spun around so that it was facing the exit once more, the platoon started climbing aboard. The process continued until only Isabella and her cover companion were left. The latter kept blasting away as the enemy soldiers rushed to their position, while Isabella was helped up by her troops.
Once safely on board, the squad turned their attention to their comrade. But before Isabella and a couple others could pull her into the ship, the soldier was dealt a critical blow, as a blue laser pulse shot hit her right between the eyes. The soldier's helmet shattered instantaneously, as did her head, which exploded into dozens and dozens of gears and sprockets. Isabella and her troop watched as their fellow soldier fell lifelessly to the ground.
"Wait!" exclaimed Ginger, who was among those in the squadron. "Becky was a robot? No wonder I could never beat her at chess!"
"Holly!" Isabella yelled towards the front. "Get us out of here!"
"Aye aye, Chief!"
Holly lifted off and flew the transport ship out of the enemy cruiser. They tried to cut off their escape by closing the bay doors, but using some expert piloting, Holly managed to squeeze their ship through the opening and pilot them to safety.
Half an hour later, the transport ship arrived at its home base, codenamed Station Delta. Once Holly had safely landed in the station's hangar, Isabella's troop immediately began to disembark.
"Another day, another Sailoid Corruptor cruiser disabled!" Isabella bellowed in relief.
The Sailoid Corruptors are an alien race that entered the Milky Way Galaxy roughly one Earth year ago. They started eradicating planets, one by one. First came, Jupiter, then Neptune, and, most recently, Mars! They thought about destroying Pluto, but decided against it when they learned it wasn't actually a planet.
The Corruptors were originally created many years ago by an ancient sorcerer who goes by the name of Skall-Lore. He was of the evil persuasion, at least, that's what we've been led to believe, and he employed the Corruptors as his henchmen. Unfortunately for him, they thought that doing menial tasks for one who did not care much for the scientific method. They decided to erase their master from existence.
And by erase, I mean they launched him into the deep reaches of space in a non-powered space capsule, and he was never seen again.
Hearing of this act of treachery and fearing their power, the ruler of their home planet tried to force the Corruptors to become part of his own personal army. Their response? Well, let's just say the reason I'm not telling you the name of their home planet... is because it no longer exists.
What we've come to learn is that the galaxy in which that planet used to reside in, designated as Xenos, also no longer exists. We've been led to believe that the Corruptors will never be treated fairly, and thus, they're taking out their anger on the universe, taking it apart galaxy by galaxy.
And now they're in ours, and their next target is Earth.
"Just a few more to take down, and our job is done! Then we can let the Earth's combined military forces take care of the rest!"
Holly ran up next to Isabella with a concern on her mind.
"But don't you question the strategy of drafting two-thirds of the members of the world's Fireside Girl troops into the dangerous job of sneaking onto the military space-travelling vessels of creatures not from our world, whose physiology and technological strength we are completely in the dark on, and installing electromagnetic pulse time bombs that we vaguely grasp how they work on board, while, need I remind you, risking our lives against a group of aliens who have no intention of settling for peace, and want to wipe out the entire universe?"
Isabella stopped, then turned to her friend to give her a response.
"It helps if you really don't think about it."
As they reached the end of the platform and actually stepped onto the ship floor, they were greeted by Elizabeth, a fellow Fireside Girl troop and platoon leader.
"This is poppycock!" she shouted in displeasure.
Isabella groaned. "What's got your knickers in a bunch this time, Elizabeth?"
"I cannot believe you're treating one of those heathens in our sick bay! Ye think he's gonna be grateful after we nurse him back to health? Nay!"
"He's harmless," Isabella said, walking past her.
"Are ye protecting him 'cause ye daft? Or 'cause that communications officer of yours, Gretchen, is smitten with him!"
"How dare you make such accusations! Gretchen is NOT smitten with him!"
Isabella seemed sure of her declaration. Still, she had to lean over to Holly and ask...
"Gretchen's not smitten with him, right?"
"Why you askin' me?" Holly fired back, as she shrugged her shoulders. "I dunno!"
In the station's sick bay...
Gretchen was sitting by the bedside of the man, er, alien in question. Minus the humanlike head and a different skin coloring, the creature receiving treatment looked like he was a Sailoid Corruptor.
If you're wondering how I know so much about the Sailoid Corruptors, it's because of this guy. His name is Grandahl Trekkias Viety III, and he is an emperor of a distant planet named Giramass. Or, so he says.
Gretchen reached over and softly touched Grandahl's forehead. She slowly ran her hand up and down it, as if she was giving it a gentle massage. The alien did not seem to be bothered by this, but it helped that he was unconscious at the moment.
"You've been through a lot, you poor thing. If what you've told me is true, then..."
Gretchen did not get to finish her thought, as the door into the room slid open. Isabella and Elizabeth entered the room; the former had a look of concern on her face, while the latter one of distrust. The two were now out of their space suits and in militia-style Fireside uniforms. A look at Gretchen showed that she was wearing similar garb.
"Gretchen, a word, please?"
The Chief's request was innocent enough, but I figured something was up when I was brought to the station's interrogation room. And left sitting quietly there, alone, for ten minutes.
Did I do something wrong? And if I did, why didn't the Chief tell me and allow me to explain myself? Or maybe she is. If she thought I didn't deserve that opportunity, I would've been thrown right into the brig.
Safe to say, I had no idea what this was all about.
Gretchen sat silently at a table with only one chair, the one she was sitting in. She had never once been in that particular room of the station, but she knew she had positioned such that she could look directly into a one-way window. She could not see who was on the other side, but whoever was on the other side could see her.
"Chief?" Gretchen spoke up, breaking the eerie silence. "Are you there? What's this about?"
She waited for a response. At first, there was nothing. Then, Gretchen heard a buzzing sound. That was followed by the opening of a secure door to the left of the aforementioned one-way window. Isabella walked in, closing the door behind her.
"Did I do something?" Gretchen asked, as Isabella came over to her. "I know being in this chair is not a good thing! What did I do?"
Isabella knew Gretchen well enough to have to 'beat around the bush.' If she wanted to ask her something, she knew Gretchen would give her a truthful answer.
"Rumor has it that you've been spending pretty much all of your off-time watching over that Corruptor we picked up in that abandoned capsule a week ago."
"Uh huh. Is... is that a problem?"
"You shouldn't be hanging around him. He's one of them."
"No, he's not!"
Isabella was taken aback by Gretchen's declaration. "Excuse me?"
"He's not! Chief, he's not one of them!"
"We found him on a capsule with their army's insignia on it. He was dressed in a space suit similar to what they wear! He even had on him a rifle that fires blue laser beams. Just. Like. Them!"
"Chief, look at him! His face... it isn't the same!"
"He may not be of the same species, but he could've been hired by the Corruptors as a mercenary."
Suddenly, the room's loudspeaker came on. Elizabeth's voice started coming through it.
"What the hay is wrong with you? How are you sidin' with that atrocity? ARE YOU SMITTEN WITH HIM?"
Isabella turned towards the one-way mirror.
"Elizabeth, back off!"
She complied, as the PA system could be heard clicked off. Isabella then turned back to face Gretchen, who was appalled after what Elizabeth had just insinuated.
"I'm not in love with Grandahl!"
"Grandahl?"
"That's his name, Chief."
Elizabeth came on over the PA again. "You're on a first-name basis with 'im?"
Isabella turned around again. "Elizabeth! You're pushing it right now!"
The PA clicked off once more. Isabella prodded further.
"He... actually spoke to you? In... our language?"
Gretchen nodded.
"How? Everyone we've sent in to interrogate him, he's refused to speak to! I was already preparing to ask him myself the next time he's conscious! Gretchen, why would he speak to you?"
I hesitated. I knew why, but I wasn't sure if the Chief would believe me.
"I dunno."
She wasn't going to accept that as an answer, though, given she got up close to me and repeated the question.
"Why would he speak to you?"
"I... dunno."
Elizabeth cut in over the loudspeaker a third time. "ANSWER THE QUESTION, YOU WANK-"
She was then cut off. There was dead silence for a few seconds. Isabella waited. Finally, the PA came back on, and a different girl's voice spoke out of it.
"She won't cut in anymore, Izzy!"
Isabella smiled. "Thanks, Addy!"
Adyson shut off the intercom. Isabella looked at Gretchen again.
I was happy to not have to worry about Elizabeth grilling me. But the Chief wanted me to talk, and she knew she'd have to do more to get me to do so.
Isabella twisted her left hip towards Gretchen, in order to show her the recording device clipped to it. She then proceeded to turn the volume knob all the way down, which, on this device, turned it off. She was turned this way to show Gretchen the green power light, which subsequently faded away.
"Okay, off the record, Gretch. Please... I want to know why he will only speak to you. Will you tell me?"
I knew Isabella would have to tell everyone eventually. But at the present moment, I knew that I could trust her with that information, and she would disclose it when the time was right.
"Okay, Chief. The reason he will only speak to me is..."
"Yes?"
"Grandahl... he says that he's my brother."
Isabella did not know how to react to Gretchen's revelation. She struggled to come up with a response. And then...
"Are... are you sure?"
"Not completely. But, for some reason... I feel like he's telling the truth."
"And why do you say that?"
"Because he has no intention of leaving this space station. His injuries... he will succumb to them in 48 hours."
Isabella gasped. Gretchen nodded in acknowledgement.
"Maybe we should..."
Isabella was ready to end the interrogation, but Gretchen reached over the table, grabbed a hold of the volume knob on Isabella's recording device, and turned it back on. Gretchen then leaned back in her chair, and motioned for her friend to keep going.
"Can I ask... what has he told you?"
Gretchen nodded, then started talking.
I told the Chief, word-for-word, what Grandahl had told me. As I said before, he was an emperor. The ruler of the planet Giramass, a desolate world in what was then known as the Xenos Galaxy. At the time he was leader, the planet was on the verge of an economic collapse. Without financial help from the other worlds in the galaxy, his people would surely turn against him and revolt, in order to survive. But only one species was willing to help.
The Sailoid Corruptors.
Immediately, they provided a quick cash infusion by descending upon Giramass and buying up a large portion of their wares. But that was a temporary stopgap. It would only delay the economy's collapse by a few weeks. Not that the Corruptors were going to wait for that crash.
A mere three days after their arrival, the Corruptors enacted their plan. Like on many of the other planets in the Xenos Galaxy at nearly the exact same time as them, they had one of their own use their powers to take full body possession of Emperor Grandahl.
Isabella was seen just nodding in amazement as Gretchen told Grandahl's story. On the other side of the one-way mirror, Adyson was doing the same, aside from the occasional look down at soundboard in front of her to make sure the whole thing was being recorded or a glance to her rate, where an irate Elizabeth sat with her mouth gagged and her wrists tied to the seat itself so she could not get up.
The Corruptor in control of Grandahl's body declared war on the Corruptors, giving them free reign to do what they wanted with the planet's inhabitants and all of their goods. And because the Corruptors were already on the ground and mobilized, Giramass' own armies had no time to organize, and were easily routed. It took literally hours, not months, weeks, or even days, for the Corruptors to take control.
The inhabitants of Giramass thought they would be enslaved for the rest of their lives. Two days later, the Corruptors need for them ran out. With no control over his own body, Grandahl could only watch as, in the blink of an eye, he became the last living Giramassian in the universe.
The next day, the now-conscious Grandahl Trekkias Viety III was sitting in the interrogation room, repeating the same story to Isabella. He had nodes connected to him and hooked up to a lie detector, which Holly was monitoring. Gretchen was sitting next to him to keep him calm during the process.
Grandahl was one of many leaders grabbed from their own homes in the Xenos Galaxy and forced to not only participate in the end of their home planets, but also in the end of numerous other planets in other galaxies across the universe.
A week ago, on their way to the Milky Way Galaxy, the Corruptors made a stopover in the nearby Little Orion Galaxy. They were planning to mine some energy resources in the small, out-of-the-way planetoids there. Unfortunately, they ended up stumbling on Marose. The largely uninhabited, yet gaseous planet turned out to be poisonous to the Corruptors. A third of the Corruptors' fleet landed on the planet before they realized the dangers there, and only a very scant few managed to get off the planet and take refuge elsewhere in the fleet before the gases became too much.
Grandahl was among those who was aboard the landed ships, and was among the lucky few to escape. But even then, that did not guarantee his survival. In fact, escaping from Marose just prolonged the suffering.
At some point soon after, the Corruptors realized that all of the 'survivors' had inhaled too much of Marose's gases for them to be able to recover from. Upon hearing this, Grandahl formulated a plan. As he was not a pure Corruptor like the other infectees, his possessor could decide to separate from him, in order to save his own life.
Sure enough, six Earth hours later, the Corruptor than had possessed the former emperor of Giramass left his body. Grandahl decided to use the joy of his captor's separation to his advantage, and he escaped from the fleet. They let him go without incident. They had no reason to try to recapture him. He did not have long to live.
The following morning, both Gretchen and Grandahl were back in the latter's hospital room, giving up DNA samples to see if they really were related.
The next thing he recalled after that escape was waking up here. The pod he had used to liberate himself ran out fuel near Mars. It ended up drifting right into Station Delta.
During a tour of the facility, Gretchen dropped off from the group as she watched an unconscious Grandahl pass by her, strapped onto a gurney as he was transported to the sick bay.
That was our first day there after learning about the Corruptors and their declaration to destroy Earth and then, the rest of the universe.
Later that afternoon, I walked into his room, not aware of the possible danger I was putting myself into.
Gretchen entered Grandahl's room and pulled up a chair next to the bed so that she could sit next to him.
"You look so peaceful lying there," Gretchen said aloud, staring at the creature lying in front of her. "There's no way you could be one of them."
"I'm not."
Grandahl had heard her statement, and he had woken to respond to it.
"You... you can understand me?"
He nodded.
And it was then that he told me his story...
That was almost 48 hours ago...
Tears streamed down Gretchen's face as Grandahl weakly handed her a ring that had gone unnoticed on his right hand.
"There is one thing I failed to mention. This... is yours..."
He pulled the ring off and slipped it onto Gretchen's right ring finger.
"W-w-w-what?"
"Use this... to save... the galaxy."
"But... does this mean!"
She grabbed his left hand and clasped her own two over it.
"It is the only way," he said to Gretchen.
"But... it's not fair!" Gretchen cried.
"To save... the galaxy... I... must..."
Before she could object any further, she felt his hand go limp. The alien's chest also stopped moving, insinuating that his heart had also stopped.
"No," Gretchen said, shaking her head in denial. "No, you can't! No... NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"
She sat there, bent over the creature that was her brother, and cried her heart out. She would have stayed there and sobbed for hours if the phone in the room had not decided to ring right there and then. She answered it, as the light designating that the call was coming from the bridge. Adyson shouted at her from the other end.
"Code Red, Gretchen! We need you up here to run comm!"
Gretchen sniffled, then responded. "Yes."
She hung up the phone, then headed out of the room. Upon leaving, Gretchen spun around to say one last goodbye to Grandahl. But, to her surprise, his body had completely dissolved in the last 30 seconds, leaving nothing but a pile of dust on the bed. At the same exact moment, the ring that he had given to her was now glowing a bright orange. At first, the light only enveloped the ring itself. But then it enveloped her finger, then her hand, and, eventually, her entire body. Whatever was happening, it was instilling energy beyond anything she had felt before.
"I... I think I understand what you mean now. Brother."
Isabella was among those in the hangar helping prepare space fighters in the station for launch. So imagine her surprise when Gretchen ran past her in a blur. She was heading for the bay doors, and, to Isabella's horror, she was not wearing a spacesuit.
"Gretchen! You can't go out there!"
But she ignored Isabella's cries to stop. Gretchen stepped into the launch area. Using the power of the ring, she used it to launch herself out of the ship. The ring provided her breathable air and protection from the cold temperatures of space, as she flew in the direction of the incoming Sailoid Corruptor fleet.
"Time to save the galaxy!"
She charged up the ring to full power, and then used a focused blast, aimed at the lead ship in the fleet...
At the Fireside Girls' lodge...
"Whoa, whoa, WHOA!" Isabella interrupted. "Gretchen, stop."
"Why, Chief?" questioned Gretchen, as she looked up from the computer screen.
"No one's going to get this! It's too... out there! Right, Holly?"
Isabella was hoping that Holly would back her up. But Holly had fallen asleep, with her head tilted slightly towards the ceiling, and saliva hanging from the left side of her mouth.
"Also, Gretchen, there's too much exposition! If you wanna really get our readers into it, you've got to keep it simple! May I demonstrate?"
Gretchen willingly gave up her seat in front of the computer, allowing Isabella to sit down and show the girls the proper way to write a good fantasy story.
End Entry
Author's Notes:
So, Gretchen really got a little too into her science fiction tale. So much so that you probably understand how hard of an episode this was to write, given my self-imposed time, space, and canon restraints. I still think it turned alright for what it was, but the willingness of myself to take such a challenging idea just shows how tough it is to come up for entries for Gretchen, as opposed to some of the others.
Hopefully the third entry of 'Fireside Fantasy Month' will not delve so deep into pure fantasy. Isabella's served well as the mentor of Melissa, a member of the Lil' Sparks. Seeing this, some of the others try taking on a Lil' Spark of their own. Good idea? Bad idea? Be here next week to find out!