Ship of the Line: An Unusual Couple in Sunnydale
(Need to Find a Better Name for this)
A Mass Effect and Buffy the Vampire Slayer Crossover Short
Written by,
William R. Woods
"Deathzealot" or,
"deathzealotzero"
Foreword:
Well here is another idea that I had which answers that old Ship of the Line challenge on Twisting the Hellmouth. It won't really be a full answer to the challenge since there isn't going to be a third crossover in this small short, but it still follows everything else about the challenge though I am focusing this short on another character then Xander though he is the secondary character in this short.
That said I shall let you folks get to the main event again. So enjoy!
-o-o-o-
Put the Normandy in my hands, and I'll make her dance for you, just don't tell me to get up and dance, unless, you know, you like the sound of snapping shinbones.
Flight Lieutenant Jeff "Joker" Moreau
-o-o-o-
Rodeo Lane
Sunnydale, California
19:09 Local Time
October 31, 1997AD
At exactly Seven PM, Pacific Time a massive wave of invisible energy passed over the small city of Sunnydale California which turned many of the tricks and treating kids into their costumes they wore for Halloween. Within seconds the streets of the city were filled with a variety of different types of Halloween Costumes like werewolves, pixies, pirates, and zombies. However, a couple of the costumed kids took longer to turn like one young, a short black-haired woman in a skin-tight uniform of some sort and an advanced looking pistol in a hostler on one hip. The woman shook her head as she got up from being sprawled on the ground. A few minutes went by silently as the woman looked around at her surroundings which made her blink in some shock before she suddenly jolted slightly and started to inspect her body which drew a dark frown from the woman.
"What is going on here?" the woman said in a sort of electronic like voice as she eyed the skin that covered one of her arms. She then noticed her reflection in a nearby window which made her at herself once more in surprise for this was different. Suddenly movement at the corner of her eye drew her attention to some sort of monster that was racing towards her on four sturdy legs and a mouth full of teeth. The woman frowned at this before drawing her weapon and calmly shooting the monster sending crashing into the ground with a pained whimper. The woman eyed the monster before holding a hand to the side of her head.
"To any Citadel Alliance Personal this is Combat Support AI Platform EDI, please respond," she said over her built-in radio and after several moments of static before finally, a male voice answered.
"EDI? Thank god I thought I was all alone in this nightmare," the voice mentioned making the woman, or rather EDI sighed in relief.
"I entirely agree with that Jeff with this being a nightmare since my platform once again sports the organic covering from when it was under the control of the Eva Core AI at Mars, and I cannot find any member of the Normandy Crew or even Citadel Alliance personal," she reported a moment later to the man Flight Lieutenant Jeff Moreau her sort-of organic boyfriend.
"Woah! That is freaky. What about our location do you know where we are?" he replied a second later making the synthetic life form that is EDI, or Enhanced Defense Intelligence, frown as she looked over the area once more with both the electronic eyes of the platform itself along with numerous built-in sensors and such before she looked upwards towards the sky which made blink in surprise as she quickly identified the various star formations.
"Jeff, I believe we are on Earth," she replied with some surprise leaking into her electronic like voice.
"What! This cannot be Earth! It is to clean and intact to be Earth not to mention nothing that resembles Mass Effect technology anywhere I can see or the sensors in my Omni-tool can detect," came the reply a moment later. EDI shook her head as she found the same with her own sensors before suddenly stopping as her far-more powerful sensors picked up something quickly approaching her along with detecting another presence trying to get her attention.
"Wait I am detecting a Kodiak Drop Shuttle approaching my position. I am also picking up my ship-self in orbit, which means the Normandy is here as well," she reported making the man many on her crew known as Joker hiss in some slight surprise.
"Okay EDI can you detect anyone on board that shuttle at all," Joker quickly ordered making the AI turn her platform's sensors onto the fast approaching shuttle before getting a response from the entity controlling the shuttle which made her frown in some concern.
"No Jeff there is no one onboard since it is under an auto-pilot sequence set by my ship-self when she detected my platform and yourself here," she replied making Joker hum thoughtfully over the radio before he spoke up.
"Alright then let's get out of here and see if we could find out what the hell happened to us," before he finally logged out from the radio making EDI nod and turn her attention to the now landing shuttle.
-o-o-o-
Cockpit
SSV Normandy SR-2
Geostationary Orbit
19:33 Pacific Time
About fifteen minutes later found EDI following the figure of her organic boyfriend one Flight Lieutenant Jeff "Joker" Moreau into the small cockpit of the SSV Normandy SR-2 that is orbiting the planet that looks so much like Earth that they both know. Of course, the changes made to her platform and Joker no longer having vrolick syndrome were not the only changes they found once they boarded the ship from the Kodiak Shuttle sent down to the planet by her shipboard AI-self. For one the hanger sported a second Kodiak Shuttle plus a pair of M-44 Hammerhead Hover Tanks which was troubling since previously the ship only sported a single example of the M-44 several months before. During their time under the control of Cerberus which had been sent somewhere else to be examined after the ship was turned over to the Human's System Alliance. Then to their shock, while there was no crew anywhere on the ship there were several further Mobile Platforms so similar to her own before somehow getting a new organic covering walking everywhere on the ship. All of which according to her ship-self where controlled by low-level Combat VI Programs.
So far those were the only real changes they could find with the ship but the two of them figured that was only the tip of the iceberg since there were some clues to some other changes like a series of emitters the two of them never had seen before built into the sides of the ship along with a slight difference in the ship's engines. Also, the ship's main cargo bay somewhat smaller than they remember it to be. Therefore, after a brief inspection of the Engineering and Crew Deck, they made their way to the cockpit to find what else was different with the ship.
A few moments found the two taking their usual seats and dived into the task of trying to find out what in the world was going here to the two of them. After some minutes of exploring the ship's systems via their stations before the two leaned back in some surprise for there were indeed many other changes made to the ship.
"Let's see first the emitters we saw on the way in are some sort of new shield system entirely different from our usual Kinetic Barriers though we still have the barriers as a kind of secondary shield system," Joker reported as he studied a holographic screen in front of him. EDI nodded at this before studying her own holo-screen.
"We also have some sort of secondary core system next to the Mass Effect Core which powers a new FTL system I really don't know anything about," she called out a moment later making Joker look at her in some surprise.
"What type of FTL?" he asked making his synthetic girlfriend shake her head sending her newly gained hair flying around her head slightly.
"According to this it is some sort of hyperdrive which is quite superior to our original FTL Drives, and more importantly it doesn't need to discharge or anything at all," she mentioned reading something from the holo-screen in front of her. Joker blinked at this for that was something else, and he briefly wondered about the Mass Relays before he turned back to his own displays to see what else had changed with his ship. However, before he could an unknown energy wave passed through the ship, and therefore through the two seating in the cockpit before leaving a pair of baffled and surprised people behind. This was the spell which had changed them into their Halloween costumes had been removed.
"Ugh what the heck just happened," the figure once known as Jeff "Joker" Moreau said rubbing his head. The second figure could only groan in response before the first figure raised his head and looked around before noticing the second figure.
"Yeah you alright over there?" he asked with a frown making the second figure look over at him before blinking in surprise.
"Xander?" the female figure asked in confusion making the first figure one Alexander "Xander" Harris look in confusion at the stunning figure sitting next to him.
"Yes, do I know you?" he asked with a frown eying the woman trying to figure who it could be.
"It's me Amy Madison, Willow's Friend," the woman responded a moment later making Xander's jaw drop in surprise for he clearly remembered the young brunette girl that was one of Willow's few female friends during their early childhood in Sunnydale. However, what he saw now was completely different with short black-hair and glowing blue eyes not to mentioning wearing a skintight uniform of some sort.
"Amy!" Xander yelped in surprise before suddenly turning his attention to something in front of him which froze him in shock. For starting back at him was something only a small percentage of people had ever seen, Earth, his home planet from near-orbit. Seeing this Amy turned her attention to what attracted his attention before her jaw dropped in surprise.
"Well Amy it looks like we are not in Kansas anymore," Xander managed to whisper a few minutes later making Amy nod in response to his comment. The two unlikely companions remained for several minutes staring out at the view of their home planet from space. This was the only the start of their surprises, but that is another story.
-o-End-o-
Well, there is another short done! /buffs nails/
Anyways, this short basically takes the SR-2 Normandy from Mass Effect 3 and drops it into the world of Buffy the Vampire Slayer while Xander Harris dressed as Jeff "Joker" Moreau and the little used Amy Madison dressed as EDI with the original platform of Doctor Eva Core before it got beat up by the crashing of a shuttle at Mars. Of course, since this is 1997 Mass Effect hasn't been released yet. Therefore, this costume had been completely original made out of several different pieces from other costumes. Xander we can kind of figure was due to not having the money for a complete outfit while Amy I am sure had some trouble trying to wear a costume due to her mother being so mean to her.
Now I know this isn't really a response to the popular Ship of the Line Challenge, but I believe it is somewhat connected to it. Since I made some changes to the ship, after all, adding some sort of new shields and a hyperdrive to the design. There is also the addition of the Normandy being crewed by several VI-Controlled Platforms similar to EDI's original Platform. Which I think would be better than trying to have Geth Platforms crewing the ship like my original plan for this idea. This was mainly due to some future plans I have for this story which once again adds the Stargate SG-1 as the third crossover which makes things a bit interesting in my humble opinion.
Anyhow folks that are about it! Again, I hope you all enjoyed it for it was fun to write.