Season 3 Episode 18: RESCUE FORCE AND THE TWIST IN TIME PART TWO

Co-written by PVZBrony and RodentRacer

March 3rd, 1880

The sounds of waves crashing against something and the smell of seawater woke up Rubble as he came back to consciousness. He remembered getting torn away from Gizmo as they traveled through time. Looking down at the ground he was standing on, he saw that it was wooden. Looking up, he saw that he was on a ship… not just any ship, but a PIRATE ship! He then quickly realized that he was surrounded by pirates, who had their swords leveled at him! "YAR! Who be you!? What gives ye the right to drop out of the sky and land on our ship?!" One pirate snarled.

"He's just a stupid mutt, he can't talk, Morrow." Another pirate scoffed, dropping his sword.

Rubble read once that pirates would eat anything they could get their hands on, and quickly realized that if he was going to avoid becoming their meal, he had to do some smooth talking. Ben said that he should never lie unless his life depended on it… and now, his life DEFINITELY depended on it.

"ARRRRRGH! I CAN CERTAINLY TALK, AND MY NAME BE… BLACKFUR!" Rubble exclaimed, saying the first pirate-y name that popped into his head. Then he gasped internally. Suddenly, everything clicked. He had wondered why the painting of Captain Blackfur looked almost EXACTLY like him, except for the black beard. Glancing downwards, he saw that there was a bit of black stubble on his chin. He remembered one of the lightning bolts striking particularly close. It must have burnt that bit of his fur, turning it black! Whatever the case, now he knew what his role was. Even if this was an accident, he had to make sure that history went the way it did in their timeline until Gizmo and the rest of the Rescue Force could save him. Besides, he had always wanted to be a pirate! "THE NAME IS BLACKFUR! CAPTAIN BLACKFUR! GREATEST PIRATE TO EVER SAIL THE SEAS! I'M TAKING CONTROL OF THIS SHIP! FROM NOW ON, YOU WILL FOLLOW MY ORDERS!" Rubble shouted.

The pirates became very fearful at the sheer tone of strength and conviction in Rubble's voice. In all their travels, they had never encountered such a strong-willed soul, much less coming from a dog. A talking dog, no less. Fear instilled their souls as they realized this must be a sign from some sort of higher power, especially seeing that he had appeared out of nowhere. "Y-Yes, Captain Blackfur, sir! What are your orders!?" The pirate that seemed to be their leader asked.

"FETCH ME A PIRATE HAT! MELT SOME GOLD DOWN INTO A DOG BOWL AND GOLDEN BONE! SET SAIL FOR ADVENTURE BAY! WE HAVE PLUNDERING TO DO AND TREASURE TO HIDE!" Rubble commanded.

"UNDERSTOOD!" The crew yelped as they ran to their positions on the ship.

May 25th, 2030

"YOU WHAT!?" Ryder yelled as Gizmo revealed that Rubble was now stranded somewhere in time.

"Gizmo, I don't care that you have a force field or nanomachines or what. YOU WILL HELP US BRING RUBBLE BACK, AND IF YOU CAN'T, I WILL TURN YOU INTO A PELT!" Ben snarled, picking up Gizmo and looking him directly in the eyes with pure anger.

Unfortunately that did it. Gizmo was already on the verge of hyperventilating, and Ben's intensity pushed him over the edge. The Labrador fainted, hanging limp in Ben's arms. "Ben, calm down! I'm sure Gizmo can bring Rubble back!" Rocky exclaimed.

"Gizmo, GIZMO! Wake up!" Chase shouted, but the black dog stayed unconscious.

"Ben, you didn't… KILL him, did you?!" Zuma asked worriedly.

"Nope, he's still breathing. I must have frightened him… sorry. You know how protective I am of you guys…" Ben apologized.

Another minute passed by as Ben set Gizmo down on the ground. "I got this, I know the perfect way to wake him up! Arf arf, water cannons!" Marshall suggested, and sprayed Gizmo in the face with some water, bringing the labrador back to consciousness.

"Augh!" Gizmo yelped, holding his paws up to block the stream of water from his mouth.

"Gizmo, you're back! Before Ben frightened you, you were going to tell us what year Rubble got stranded in?" Marshall prompted.

"Or your best guess?!" Skye chimed in, hope in her voice.

Gizmo deactivated his helmet to wipe the water out of his eyes. "I already told you! The log is shot! When I look at it, instead of giving the time travel history, it gives a list of every single day from 3000 BC to 5000 AD! That's 2,921,940 days!" Gizmo explained.

"Can we get the log un-shot?!" Ben inquired.

Gizmo simply shook his head in response. "Why not? I mean, shouldn't it be possible?" Rocky mused.

Gizmo closed his eyes. "My time machine, instead of opening a single link between times, opened a link to every single day for 8000 years. There's absolutely no way to tell which link Rubble was sent through. I- I'm sorry… I can't find him using anything I have." Gizmo sighed, a singular tear dropping from his eye. Then he opened his eyes. "Wait a minute… If we- No, but that could- But there's a chance… It's unlikely, but possible…" Gizmo mused.

"What's your idea, Gizmo?" Rocky wondered.

"I may not be able to figure out where he went using my time machine, but that doesn't mean we can't figure out where he went by using other means, such as research." Gizmo explained.

"...Wait. So are you saying that if Rubble has been in the past… then his actions in the past would have affected our current timeline, before you sent him back?" Ben asked. Gizmo nodded his head in response.

"Let's search the internet for Rubble showing up in any historic events! We know that he couldn't have landed in prehistoric times, so we look through recorded history! It's more likely that he landed in the past than the future, and I don't want to have to go to the future if necessary!" Ryder suggested.

"Dogs only started talking after the year 2001 in our universe due to scientific experiments by SPD. So any mention of talking dogs before then could be a lead to Rubble!" Ben pointed out.

"2001? Oh wow. For us it was back in 1698. That would explain why you guys don't have me or any of this tech… Quite the butterfly effect." Gizmo mused.

"Dudes, this is totally awesome and all, but we gotta stop talking, and focus on finding Rubble!" Zuma reminded the group.

"Right!" Ryder agreed.

"Actually, we really don't need to. If we go to the day he appeared on, it won't make a difference if we leave now or a month from now. He wouldn't know the difference and would be perfectly fine." Gizmo pointed out.

Ben glared at him. "Sure he might be fine, but I won't be fine not knowing how he's doing for an entire month. Let's go." Ben stated.

Ryder, Chase, Skye, and Tracker split into one group, scouring the historical books in the library while Ben, Rocky, Zuma, Marshall, and Everest split into another group to scour the internet for any myths or mentions of talking dogs before 2001. Gizmo stayed behind to fix his time machine, joining the library group after 10 minutes of work. Both groups searched for over an hour without any avail or success. Meeting back up, they all reported their progress, or rather, lack thereof. "I can't believe we can't find anything about Rubble. Surely he'd have tried to make some sort of impact on history so we can find him." Ryder groaned.

"You know, sometimes the most blatant of impacts can go unnoticed because we're already familiar with them. You're sure you guys have never heard any mention of a talking pup before the turn of the century?" Gizmo prompted them.

Suddenly it hit Ben. He realized that they had heard of a talking pup from back in the past. "I THINK I HAVE A GENERAL IDEA OF WHERE RUBBLE LANDED!" Ben shouted in glee.

Quickly running to the garage, he got on his Dragon Cycle and revved it up. "I'll be right back. I have to go and borrow something from city hall." Ben told the pups before speeding off to the town square.

Ben drove up to the city hall, accidentally running over Mayor Goodway's tulips as he parked his motorcycle and dismounted it. Running inside Town Hall, he tore the painting of Captain Blackfur off of the hinges of the museum wall, and ran out of the museum, tripping the alarms in the process. Getting back on his Dragon Cycle, he drove back, answering a call from Mayor Goodway, Dwayne, and Gasket.

"Ben, this is terrible! Someone just ruined Mayor Momway's tulip garden!" Dwayne wailed.

"And that's not all! The same person broke into City Hall and stole the prized painting of Captain Blackfur!" Gasket added.

"Sorry, that was me." Ben apologized.

Mayor Goodway blinked and then her eyes widened. "W-WHAT?!" Genevieve shrieked.

"Rescue Force emergency. I don't have time to explain! Just disable the alarm and go through with your day like nothing happened! I'll return the painting and explain everything later!" Ben told the mayor before cutting the call off.

Arriving back at the Lookout, he showed the group the painting. "Captain Blackfur? OH! OH MY GOSH! THAT MAKES SO MUCH SENSE! Did you just find that painting?" Gizmo asked.

Ben shook his head no. "It's been here this whole time. We've been looking for new changes in the timeline. What if those changes were already present this whole time and we didn't know it!?" Ben suggested.

Gizmo froze. "Wait, so all of you guys were looking for new changes in the timeline?" The labrador asked.

"Uh, that's what we were supposed to do, right?" Rocky asked.

"No… You were just looking for any evidence of him at all; Novikov and such. Sorry if I wasn't clear." Gizmo answered.

Delicately removing the painting from its frame, they discovered a message written on the back of it. "Ben, Ryder, Gizmo, Chase, Marshall, Skye, Rocky, Zuma, Everest, and Tracker, if you're reading this, then you've figured it out. I was Captain Blackfur all along! You can't come and grab me from the moment that I showed up, otherwise you'll cause a temporal paradox! Come and grab me from Ernest's Juice Saloon in Angel Grove on the day of March 3rd, 1881!" The message read.

"Temporal paradox? Yeah, right. But thank goodness that's after 1752. If he had left a date before then it'd be a lot more complicated." Gizmo sighed.

"What's in 1752?" Rocky wondered.

"That's when the Gregorian Calendar replaced the Julian Calendar in the United States, so anything happening before then in Maine would have been offset by an indeterminate number of days, depending on the date." Gizmo explained.

"Ohhh…" Ryder replied.

"Wait a second, Maine? Ernest's Juice Saloon is in California. WE'RE in California." Ben pointed out.

"California? Huh! My Paw Patrol is in Maine!" Gizmo laughed.

"Maine? Huh. Do you happen to live by Griffin Rock?" Ben inquired.

"Griffin Rock?" Gizmo tilted his head to the side in confusion.

"Griffin Rock?! Hey, I take a class there! A really brilliant guy named Doc Greene teaches my online advanced physics course! He's shown me some super cool inventions he's whipped up! There are these cool water walkers and…" Rocky mentioned.

"Can we stop yapping and go get Rubble?!" Chase growled, interrupting them.

"Sure, but first we need to do some research. We shouldn't just show up and snag him. I don't know if your universe follows the same 'rules' as mine, so we need to figure out exactly what happened to Captain Blackfur before going to get him. Everyone ready to split back into the library and internet teams?" Gizmo asked.

At a nod from everyone else, they broke back into the same research groups they had formed a couple hours earlier, heading back to the Library. Within two minutes, Rocky found a hit. "Hey, guys! I found a wikipedia page for Captain Blackfur, and it tells about his life story!" The mixed breed exclaimed.

"Awesome job, Rocky! What does it say happened to him?" Everest asked.

"I'm reading. Give me a second…" Rocky said as the others gathered around him. "Oh yikes. This is horribly inaccurate, assuming it is Rubble. It says he lost his eye in a sword fight." Rocky exclaimed.

"Oh no! That's terrible! But how is that inaccurate?" Marshall asked.

"Because it says it happened when he was two years old. I'll let you know what I find from here, but you should keep looking for things that are more credible." Rocky sighed.

Meanwhile Chase and Skye had found something themselves. "Not much is known about Captain Blackfur, but diary entries from his crew state that he vanished from the world in the beginning of March of 1881." Chase read out loud from a library book that was a local history of Adventure Bay.

"WE DID IT!" Skye squealed.

Closing the book, the German shepherd and cockapoo sprinted to the computer section of the library where the internet search group resided. "The date in the local history book lines up with the message Rubble left for us!" Skye yipped excitedly.

"We've got a lock on Rubble's location and the date we need to pick him up from. Who wants to go back in time?" Ben asked.

"I don't see why not. I think we have enough information now." Gizmo replied.

Tracker walked up with a tattered book he had discovered. It was the journal of Captain Blackfur's first mate. "Oh, so I guess we don't need this, then." The potcake stated.

"We can bring it just in case." Ben said, picking up the book and putting it in a vest pocket. "I think I'll stay behind. I don't want to go on a time traveling adventure." Chase declined.

"¡Si! Me either. Pirates are muy aterrador, I don't want to meet one! My great grandpappy had the misfortune of encountering Jack Scallywag!" Tracker told them.

"I'm gonna stay behind with Tracker and Chase." Everest decided.

"I'm coming with you dudes! No way am I missing out on this!" Zuma exclaimed.

"So am I! Rubble is counting on us!" Marshall agreed.

"Getting to see history up close and personal!? I'm in!" Skye cheered.

"Same! Time traveling has been one of my biggest dreams, I'm not gonna pass up on this opportunity!" Rocky agreed.

"And you guys need a responsible adult to come with you. I'm tagging along for this little venture." Ben chuckled.

"Alright, good to hear. Everyone gather around, and stay close." Gizmo instructed. Following his advice, Ben, Skye, Marshall, Rocky, and Zuma all stood next to him. "I can't promise the time machine won't overload again, but I think I got it fixed." Gizmo warned. Everyone that wanted to grouped close to Gizmo as his pup pack started glowing again. This time there weren't any lightning bolts blitzing around, and they soon vanished in a flash of light.

Ernest's Juice Saloon, Angel Grove, California

March 3rd, 1881

They arrived and soon found the juice bar. Gizmo deactivated his nanomachine helmet and boots, attempting to minimize the futuristic look that the crew was putting off. They stepped into the juice bar, looking around but seeing no sign of Rubble. "Howdy there, boy. Can I offer you and yer pets somethin' to drink? We don't sell alcohol, only the finest of squeezed juices. First time visitors get one drink free of charge." The barkeeper greeted him.

"Just water will do for us, thank you." Ben replied. The barkeeper poured some water into a glass and some dog bowls, which the pups drank from. They waited for several hours, but Rubble didn't show up.

After realizing that something was wrong, Gizmo turned to Ben and started blinking erratically. "Are you okay, Gizmo? Is there something in your eye?" Ben worriedly asked.

Gizmo rolled his eyes. "Okay, forget it. I don't know why I even try using Morse code anymore anyway." The black pup sighed.

A glass shattering broke the silence as the bartender gawked at the talking dog in front of him. Gizmo jumped up onto the chair next to Ben and faced the barkeeper. "Sorry for startling you, but have you seen an English bulldog about yea high with a eyepatch, a tuft of black fur under his chin, and possibly even the ability to talk?" The canine asked.

Thankfully the bartender was still able to answer. "Aye, every once in a while, the mighty Captain Blackfur comes here. He's a talking dog just as yourself, but I ain't never seen any others like you. Near scared me half to death the first time he came in." He replied.

"Okay, well have you seen him today? Can you tell us where he is?" Gizmo demanded.

"Oh, so you haven't heard?" The bartender asked softly.

"Heard? Heard what?" Ben pushed.

"There was a great battle yesterday, and Captain Blackfur… died." The barkeeper revealed.

Everyone gasped in horror. Ben stood up. "Thanks for letting us know. If that's the case, then we should be going." The boy replied.

"Wait, one last thing I need to take care of before we go." Gizmo said, stopping them.

He turned to the barkeeper, staring at him with a sudden fearsome intensity. "As far as you're concerned, we don't exist. The only dog that can talk is Captain Blackfur." The black Lab reactivated his hover shoes and helmet as he talked, making him look even more dangerous. "If you ever tell anyone about this, then I will know, and I will find you." By now, Gizmo had started using his boots to hover above the stool he was on. His pup pack was emitting a bright purple glow, and something strange started happening. He started… flickering, it seemed, losing his opacity intermittently. Even the other members of the Paw Patrol were frightened. If they didn't know better, they could have sworn he was a specter coming to haunt them. "Do. You. Understand?" The pup growled.

"Yes! I understand!" The bartender sobbed, cowering.

Gizmo stopped the light show, dropping back down to his paws, deactivating his shoes and helmet, and returning to his normal look. "Okay, great! Have a good day!" As Gizmo walked to the door, he looked up at Ben. "Do you think I was too harsh on him?" He whispered. "Nah, desperate times call for desperate measures." Ben answered.

The group left the saloon and went behind the building. "What do we do?! Rubble is dead!" Marshall cried.

"Hold up. Ben, do you still have that journal Tracker gave you?" Rocky asked.

Ben pulled out the worn journal of Blackfur's first mate, flipping to the last page. "We won a great battle today on the shores of Adventure Bay, but it doesn't feel like it. Our captain, Blackfur, passed away. We almost lost our ship and our glory. Rival pirates attacked our ship and soundly crippled us in battle. Only the twists of fate let us prevail. With his dying breath, Blackfur commanded us to return to a normal lifestyle. In his honor I'm ending this chapter of my life, and settling in Adventure Bay. I will guard his ship until my dying day, keeping my promise to my dear friend, and I will re-swear this oath with the last breath that I take. -Michael Foxington" The diary read.

"So it's true, then… Rubble is gone." Everest whimpered.

IS RUBBLE TRULY GONE!? CAN THE RESCUE FORCE SAVE HIM AND HIS SHIP!? EVEN IF THEY DO SUCCESSFULLY SAVE HIM, WHAT WILL THE CONSEQUENCES OF CHANGING HISTORY SPELL OUT FOR OUR HEROES? FIND OUT IN THE NEXT CHAPTER OF RESCUE FORCE AND THE TWIST IN TIME! COMING SOON TO A FANFICTION WEBSITE NEAR YOU!