Lucky for TorGal the atmosphere inside the Macedonia 2 was breathable, for otherwise he would've died immediately after leaping out of the blown airlock, chased by the two Predators. His timing was excellent, as he roled and hit the hull of a Star Destroyer that his damaged Klingon troop carrier was flying low over after he shoved the hunters aside long enough to turn the ship to his right. He felt a slight shudder as the Klingon ship sloammed against the hull of the U.S.S. Cairo. Grey, if and when he got out of the astral plane would not be pleased. TorGal winced slightly, then covered his ears as the boom of the two ships exploding knocked him over and sent him flying into one of the destroyer's powered down turbolasers. The shockwave sent several small B5U and WCU ships coliding with each other. The ships could be repalced though, easily the troll thought. Besides, he didn't see or hear or feel the Predators coming out after him, and even if they had jumped he would have heard the clang of their armor against the hull. Wouldn't he? He began looking around in a panic. He could hear nothing but the remaining ships respective engine hums, and the fading noise of the last of the explosions.

-

Greymoran heard the noise before he saw it. Know Grey was flying at the speed of sound, or at least his astral form was. The sonic boom gave the wizard enough time to dive to the side, throuhg a wall in his astral imagings, before Grey plowed through, and causing a small office building to topple in his wake. "••••," the wizard groaned. He was losing, and he knew it. He had to find the trap door to get out of the plane. Problem was only the initiator of astral contact knows exactly where it is, and he doubted that Jake Grey would tell him. He had to try something though. And direct combat wasn't working. He stood up, safe behind the wall that hid him from Grey's sight, and shouted. "Is that the best you can do Jake? The hero of STU29? The scourge of the Pirate Cartels? You're pathetic! No wonder you went bad Jake. You wnated to go down in history as soemthing other than just another briefly famous captain. What's the old Earth phrase? Yeah, you want to prolong your 15 minutes of fame!"

-

Jackson and Hudzen re-enter the bridge. The turbolifts began working again after Carrie was assured that the ship was now clear of intruders. Carrie's face on the screen had been replaced by an image of a gas giant. Hudzen stopped walking towards his console. Jackson looks at him. "What is it?" "Avalon 6. This system's only gas giant. twice as large as your home system's largest. Jupiter. And the rings of that palnet are notorious for causing dimensional instabilites for any ship unfortunate enough to enter them. And if Carrie is showing us what I beleive she is, Jake Grey is taking us right for them." "OH figured thta out for yourself did you?" Carrie said, no longer trying to hide her panic and attempting to use humour to break the tension, failing miserably.

Jackson looks down at Greymoran, who is still on the floor of the bridge
How's he doing, Carrie?
Also, do we have any more Predators aboard?

Carrie pauses for a moment and her face reappears on the screen. "OK, in that order, I don't know. He hasn't gotten any new injuries, but his heart rate has accelerated a few times. As for the Predators, it seesm they all took off in escpae pods, several of which were shot down but the others got through a small unfinished section of this station. And before you ask, it's not big enough for us to fit through. And one of those troop transports collided with one of Grey's SW ships. I have no idea why but it set off a chain reaction and Grey's short about a half-dozen more ships." She seemed to smile as she reported that last bit of news.

Jackson now looks at the viewscreen and regards the planet on it.
I assume that we're still being pulled toward the planet?
What sort of dimensional instabilities are we talking about, and is there any way to protect us from them?

Carrie frowned. "Um, well, the sheer randomness of it all makes protection •••• near impossible. It could send the whole ship to another unibverse, or just parts of it. It could throw us into the same unvierse we're in right now, only thousnds of years earlier. Whoever is in charge of the bridge up there is, as you Earth humans would say, ••••••• insane."

Carrie, you mentioned that the station has been breached. Can we create a hole large enough for the ship to pass through? Can our weapons get through the hull of Grey's station?

"There are still too many well armed ships surrounding us Hudzen. I wouldn't try it." The turbolift doors open and out steps Keith, wearing a Predator's arm weapon, the extening claws. The arm mount seems incredibly stripped down, looking as though someone, probably Keith himself, had removed most the aparatus' heavier equipment. "We have only one choice guys. We have to get on that primary structure somehow." He hits a buton on a console and an image of a large central globe inside the Macedonia 2 is visible between two to the surrounding ships. It's connected by four diagonal struts to the outer hull. Carrie's face superimposes over the image. "You're obviously nutters yourself Mr. Yeager. How exactly do you suggest we do this?" Keith shrugs.

-

Aboard the bridge structure, one of Grey's minions, a human male with a missing ear and eye, growls at his console as Grey's vampires hover over him, literally. "Must you be so damned close?" he mutters to himself. "Any news on wether lord TorGal was aboard the ship that crashed?" one of them hissed. "No. I detected no lifesigns on that ship whatsoever. I'm sure he's on one of the ones that connected to our outer docking ports. He'll be here soon. I'm sur eof it. Then we can clean up the mess that crash made and finally rid ourselves of the Archangel." A female vampire starts to gently rub the human's back. Grey had warned them about their seductive nature, but despite all his mental preperations, her mock affection had him aroused. "Why won't master Grye allow us to simply destroy them?" "Ask him yourself when he returns from his astral trip."

-

TorGal had found an airlock door on the outer hull of the Star Destoryer. The problem was it was on the bottom side of the hull and he had no gravity locks to keep from tumbling to the bottom, which was a good 75 miles away. He had in the mean realized whta must have happened. He recognized one of the Predators who'd grabbed him as one he'd ent after the scientist, Keith Yeager. Somehow, that puny human must've killed the troop leader. That's the only thing that would've made those others turn on him. He suddenly got the feeling he was being followed. He opened his ears (a natural defense against loud noises his species had developed) as wide as he could and listened intently. He thought he heard a faint thumping, but it seemd to be in tune with the hum of the ship's engines. He grabbed a small outcroping on the hull and begin to climb downward. There had to be another airlock along the side of the ship he could get to. It would just take some time. "If I make it back in time, I will ask Lord Grey to let me murder that human Yeager myself," he grumbled.

The turbolift doors open and Ahz steps out. He appears to be a little fuzzy, but otherwise unharmed.

I've had all those nanites purged from my system, and as well as can be expected, all things considered.

~Yeah! So don't push yourself too hard.~

The new voice came from Ahz's mouth, but it didn't sound like him. That, and his mouth didn't move.

Suit, I told you to keep your comments to yourself. And if you must speak, do it through the interface.

~Ok, ok. But who are all these people?~

Suit, standby mode.

Ahz's features blured for a second, as if a clear liquid was pulling itself away from him, and indeed, there was. A thin film detached itself from his body and formed a sphere, which sat on the floor next to him.

It's a gelfield suit. It acts as a sensor/full spacesuit/pressuresuit/universal translator. Normally only a few millimeters thick too. Unfortunatly, the computer control required is just above sentient level. And that particular suit isn't very intelligent at all.

Jackson looks over at Ahz
Nice. Could you get that for the rest of us?
Carrie, what if we were to use personal holographic systems and/or small cloaking devices attached to either space suits or suits like Ahz has? Would that allow us to get inside the primary structure?

These suits are extremely rare and hard to duplicate. This is the only one that I know of.

Ahz touched the sphere, which flowed over him. Ahz's head twiched to the side for a moment and his voice came over the comm system without his lips moving.

Check... Test... Ok, the comm systems seem to be working. The universal translator is also functional.

~Of course they're fully functional. They haven't been under any stress.~

Shut up, suit.

Not that I would need a suit as I am equipped with all of those functions.
He turns to Jackson
Personal cloaking devices might work but the Archangel does not carry any. Perhaps you could check your Cybertech catalogue, although you probably will not be able to get service inside Grey's station. As for the personal holographic systems: It is possible that those may work until we are scanned. Grey's sensors would easily be able to pick up any holographic signals, even the one from your suit.
At that point, Hudzen notices that one of his guns on his arm has popped out and armed itself. This is slightly disturbing since he did not activate it and had no memory of its activation. He quickly pushes it back and deactivates it as he hears a familiar voice in his head, mocking him.
You're losing control...

Keith noticed this. He walks over to Ahz. "Grey did something to him. I suggest you do something before he hurts us and/or himself."

Hudzen picked up what Keith had said.
Greyvirus: You see Hudzen? They're turning against you. They don't trust you.
They're just concerned for all of us. They know about what you've done. They shouldn't-
Greyvirus: They'll deactivate you and disassemble you. Stop them Hudzen before they can do that. You could kill them all in the blink of an eye. I know you can. You were my officer for years. You served me well. And now you will again...
"No..." His shipmates were ready to move against him and the program was taking over. He had to do something. Now.

Jackson picks up the Cybertec catalogue that he happens to have with him and flips through it.
Well, they do guarantee delivery anywhere and anyplace. For them, local conditions don't matter.
Ok.. I've found the personal holographic systems, spaceship storming equipment, and anti-virus software...

Keith nods. "The question is, where is the 'bridge' on that thing, and how can we get to it, AND what kind of critters does Grey have over there defending it. If we're going to pull a raid, we need to do it right."

Well, let's find out...
Carrie, does the ship out there have a traditional bridge or other control center of any kind? Also, what sorts of lifeforms can you detect?

Carrie sighs. "Too much sensor jamming. He's using every type known to the XDCA, adn some that aren't. It could hours or even days to cut throguh it all. All I can positively say is that there are about a dozen external docking ports. But we can't get the Archangel over there beucase we're still surrounded."

Could we cloak a shuttle and use that to get over there?

We could just use one of Ryo-O's Modules to take us over. It is small, and speedy, and hard to detect.

Seconds later, a Module appeared below the Archangel. The only active signal it gave off was an image of what was directly on the other side, rendering it virtually undetectable.

Ryo-O, can you please get everyone's location from the suit and displace them onto the Module?

Ryo-O's voice came from the part of the suit over Ahz's mouth.

Ryo-O: "Ok. I'm trying to extract that data from what passes for that suit's brain."

~I heard that, you overgrown houseplant!~

Ahz and Ryo-O: "SHUT UP, SUIT!!!"

Hold on, let me do something first...
So we have... Keith, Hudzen, Ahz, and me heading for the enemy ship, right?
Jackson searches his Cybertec Catalog PADD, stops at a page, and touches the screen. After a few minutes, a small wormhole opens on the bridge, and a few boxes emerge from it. Jackson opens them, revealing that they contain a custom spaceship invasion kit. The kit includes a personal cloaking system, weapons, and various other items. Inside Jackson's kit is a new Cybersuit.
Ok people, get your stuff. We've got a ship to invade.

Hudzen walks over to a nearby console and starts to punch in commands.
You know what? That's okay.
Carrie: Hudzen, what are you-
Hudzen fires a stun grenade just as a transporter beam envelopes him. The grenade flies into the air and explodes, knocking everone on the bridge unconcious for a few minutes. Hudzen materializes in a pod that has been launched from the Archangel. He only stays there for a few seconds before the pod crashes into the side of the station. Just as the pod breaks apart, he beams himself onto the station.
Greyvirus: A servant once again...

Jackson is the first to become conscious again.
Carrie, what just happened? Let me guess... the Jake Grey virus finally got the best of him, right?

Sorik helps Keith off the ground. Keith rubs at his temples. "What the hell just happened? Did OUR secuirty chief just shoot at us?" Sorik nodded. Carrie had comepeltely abandoned all pretense of calm and the lights began flashing as her personality matrix went into full blown panic. Jackson had to shut off her vocal receptors to avoid the screaming and incoherent babbling. The only phrase he was able to make out of it was "So this is it, we're going to die!" Jackson lowered his head. "Either that or he wants to kill Grey so badly he doesn't wnat us to get any credit, but I doubt it." he mutters.

Ahz was sitting on the ceiling. When the stun gernade went off, the suit dragged him up there and attached itself to keep him out of the way. The suit seemed rather ticked off at the attack.

~That good-for-nothing tin can! When I get your hands on him I'll...~

Are you quite finished?

~Ummm.... yes.~

Good. Now put me down.

The suit pulled a spiderman impression, and let him down on a thin strand. Once Ahz touched the floor, the strand disconnected itself from the ceiling and merged back with the suit.

Well, lets get going.

Three silvery spheres appeared, one appeared around Jackson, one around Keith, and one around Ahz. They vanished with a popping sound.

They appeared inside the Module. The walls appeared to be undecorated wood, until Ahz sat in the only seat at one end. The walls and floor all vanished, leaving Jackson and Keith apparently standing in empty space, just below the Archangel.

Keith initlaly panicked, but his analytical mind kicked in quickly enough to keep him from vomiting. Obviously Ryo-Os illusion had to be this way in order for it to work. Still, it was a bit disorienting. "So, any plans on what we should do once we're aboard?" Ahz lokked straight ahead. "Find Grey of course. And remove him from the astral plane to save the captain." Jackson also stared ahead. "Of course we'll probably have to fight an army or two of all sorts of nasty critters to get close."

Ryo-O, can you produce some large hand weapons?
Jackson touches a button on his bracelet, and it begins to glow. The glow slowly envelopes him, and it subsides, Jackson wearing something over his regular Cybersuit.
It's an Exoskeletal bracelet. The original Jackson was given one by either Rocket Ranger or Adon, and this one was part of the things that came with me.

Hudzen materializes a few decks away from the Macedonia 2's operations center. Immediately intruder alarms go off and several security systems activate. Several weapons pop out of the surrounding bulkheads in the corridor and point at Hudzen. In about 10 seconds, Hudzen is surrounded by 20 of Grey's security troops. One of them recognizes the robot.
Man: Hudzen. What are you doing here you traitor?
Hudzen: Durante. I would have thought that Grey would have killed a useless being like you by now. An invasive program that Grey installed into me before I mutinied has taken over my systems. I am his servant again. I can verify this information.
Durante: How?
Hudzen: Grey designed it to transmit a code when it had taken over my systems. This way I would be able to rejoin Grey without being labeled an enemy and being vaporized. It is also what is used to grant me access to this station. I am transmitting the code to you now.
Seconds later, the code is confirmed.
Durante: I'd say welcome back Hudzen but I still don't entirely trust this story. Unfortunately, our master is occupied at the moment and TorGal has not returned yet. We're going to take you to hold you outside of ops with this nice large escort until we get this story confirmed. Maybe the vampires or someone else up there will know.

Hudzen hears a loud thumping. He suddenly realizes that it's coming from his temporary 'escort.' A Clay Golem. Immune to all but the ehaviest of blunt weapons. A mindless creature, it would do only what's it master told it to do, and Durante gave it very specific instructions concerning Hudzen. In other words, it was told that if the robot left it's sight, it was to kill him.

-

Greymoran was running again. His comments had angered Grye to the point where he'd lost much of his control over the plane. Now Greymoran had the edge and was using to apepar to be running at the speed of light through the returned blackness of the astral plane, with and angry Grey tripping over himself, running out of breath. Suddenly he sees soemthing out the corner of his eye and he comes to a compelte halt. A small, barely noticeable white line in the blackness. And near it, was Jake Grey's initials. He could hear the madman scream "NOOOOOOO!" as Gryemoran touched it. He awoke, on the bridge of the Archangel, with Sorik standing over him. Had he been anything other than a Vulcan Gryemoran might've mistaken the look on his face as one of concern. "Wha-what, where-" It all came back to him. He tried to stand up but hislimbs had fallen asleep. Sorik helped him up. "Yeager, Dupree, and Ahz are en route to the central command structure of this battle station. Carrie's program is," he pauses, looking for a diplomatic way of saying it. "is indisposed at the moment. Perhaps you shpould go to sickbay?" Sorik decided to wait for the time ebing before telling him about Hudzen.

Ryo-O: "There should be a small supply of weapons in the small arms locker. I'll open it for you."

A rectangular piece of space seemed to depress, and then slide into a recess, revealing a small weapons locker, apparently hanging in empty space.

Ahz: "It would probably easier if I disabled the external view. Module, standard interior. Limit the exterior view to the forward quadrant only."

The module's walls appeared everywhere exept in the front where Ahz sat. Soft lighting illuminated the wood-lined interior.

Jackson taps his foot. "Any particular reason we're moving so slowly? We could've gotten to that station in a matter of seconds at full impulse." Keith cut in before Ahz could reply. "Simple. If we went too fast they would be able to detect. One of the first rules of stealth." Keith turns to Ahz, obviously looking for confirmation. "Right?"

Jackson looks through the locker and pulls out a large weapon.
A Benniter Horck X-45 Slayanator! According to Cybertec, that's from one of the more obscure universes! How did you come across it?

You would be supprised what you can find if you look hard enough. Module, show them the drone.

Inside the weapons locker, a light illuminated a small metal object, about the size of a baseball.

It is a Culture combat drone, dead but intact The sentient AI program has long since expired. It is armed with a manipulator field capable of slicing atoms or moving over 500 tons, laser weaponry with enough power to obliterate most starships, an Effector, which is basicaly a device that can take control of either electronic componets or humanoid brains, a small supply of knife missiles, which are a terrible weapon in and of themselves, and a full mirror shield. You could toss it into a warp core and it wouldn't notice.

Unfortunatly, the only system I can access and successfully interface with is the knife missiles. They are about 5 mm long and have the intelligence of a dog. They are also capable of supersonic flight in a humanoid atmosphere. A very nasty piece of work. I don't like to use them because this drone only has 5 left and I can't make any more.

Too bad the Culture don't like to share their advanced technology.

Get a few of these, and a person could take over a few planets...
Anyway... I noticed that Cybertec carries a small number of AI programs...if we reactivate this thing, would we be able to deactivate it again?

Keith shuddered. "I wouldn't risk it. Hyper-intelligent war machines worry me. At least with Carrie you know that the worst case scenario you'll face is she'll insult you a lot."

Good point, Keith. In several science fiction stories one reads, AIs turn out to be...nonpleasent entities.
In fact... If you checked our records, I bet you'll find a Voyager universe in which the Voyager crew discovered a hypoer-intelligent war machine...

Yes, but most of these are friendly.

In any case, the AI core itself is farely trashed. The systems will accept input, but the core itself can't hold a program. I input commands through my little computer. In any case, the drone will guard the Module, via commands from Ryo-O. Think of her as a puppetmaster.

Sounds good.
Everybody get a weapon. There's a party in that ship, and we're about to crash it, big time.

Stand by, I'm going to disengage the gravity and coast in.

Everyone suddenly found themselves weightless.

The Module floated up to the station. A quick burst of thrusters, and it attached itself to the station, and began to carefully cut it's way into the station, trying to avoid setting off any alarms.

While waiting, Jackson sees what his Slayanator can do.
This thing has settings for just about anything in the multiverse...
Hey, vampire setting! Let's see what it produces...Wooden stake projectiles...holy water balloons...cross-shaped holograms...

After the EMH has treated Greymoran, Sorik fills him in on the current situation.

So as you see, we are the only people left on the ship. How do you intend us to proceed, Captain? Shall we attempt to recover Hudzen?

Greymoran was shaking his head in shock when Sorik asked him that question. He looked up. "No. He's lost. Grey has him now. Find out how we can get over there. We're abandoning the Archangel for the time being. Keith, Jackson, and Ahz can't do this alone."

Jake Grey awoke in his chmabers, surrounded by wtahcful golems, loyal, but too •••••• to show any concern over the state of their master's body. His joints cracked as he slowly rose to his feet. When he exited the room, he saw something that almost sent him tumbling back to the floor in shock. Guarded very closely by a Clay Golem, was the robot Hudzen. He shut the door again, qucikly, before the robot could see him. It wouyld be a few minutes before he remembered about the virus he'd implanted in Hudzen when the robot betrayed him. He snuck out the rear exit, and came into the main secuirty room. "Sir," one of the secuirty men told him. "I'm glad to see you've returned from the astral plane." Grey waved him off. "Yes, yes, just tell me about Archangel. Is she still where we left her?" "Yes sir, completely blockaded. Although," he coughed slightly, and Grey looked at him angrily. "Well, what?" "Sir, we're not sure why but at some point the lifes ign count on that ship dropped to 2, and that was after the Predators betrayed us." "What?!?" "Sir, TorGal took them there, as ordered, but many of them left in escaped pods, and some, I don't know how, but they detroyed lord TorGal's transport." The young man was shaking now. Grey punched him in the jaw, knocking him to the ground. It made him feel a little better, but he was still too angry about the loss of TorGal for anything else the man had said to register with him. He was also too angry to notice that a small series of hall lights near one of the emergency airlocks had blinked out.

Here he was. In the middle of Grey's stronghold. He stood in a hallway outside a very secure looking door. A quick scan showed it to be guarded by several different variations of locks and defense/security devices designed to terminate anyone not authorized to enter the door. Hudzen also scanned his surrounding escort. Apparently Grey's men had a lot of confidence in the Golem that escorted him since the number of armed troops had been reduced to five. No doubt the simple beast could destroy him in an instant. The Golem probably wouldn't be needed anyway thanks to Grey's program. Then the door that they had been waiting for for several minutes opened. Hudzen was not facing the door but was able to scan the life form that had caused the doors to open before retreating into the room. Jakob Grey. At that second something happened that Hudzen did not anticipate. His emotion chip activated. He no longer felt the intense loyalty for Grey that he had felt seconds before. Every emotion he was feeling was completely overtaken by one thing. Hatred. Hatred for Jake Grey and everything the man stood for. Everything he had done since the beginning of the war. He slowly turned to the Golem, and look into the creature's dumb, incomprehending eyes, Less than a decimeter away from the large beast.

You know, you'd think that Grey would teach his troops to put something better than a clay golem and five troops to guard one of his most feared enemies in the Multiverse.

In one swift movement Hudzen had grabbed the blaster of the nearest guard, put it on its highest setting, and pulled the trigger. The Golem was blasted back about two meters, unhurt but very angry. That gave Hudzen the time to hit the guard directly behind him and the one to his left before jumping behind the one to his right. Grabbing the guards arm, he aimed the guard's blaster at the other two guards and shot them down as they brought up their blaster rifles. Hudzen then picked up the guard he was holding and threw it at the golem. The golem just batted the guard like a rag doll into the nearby bulkhead. The collapsed heap that was the guard did not look like it was in good condition. As the golem charged, security alarms went off and the systems surrounding them activated. The golem lunged for Hudzen. The robot ducked and the golem grabbed him as he was pushed overhead. The golem, still holding onto Hudzen, landed against the forcefield protecting the door. Luckily for Hudzen, Grey liked to make sure that most of his security devices were lethal. The golem began to vaporize and Hudzen was able to pull mostly free from its grip. However, the golem was able to hold on to Hudzen's left arm and completely crushed it before he was destroyed. Hudzen fell to the ground but was quick to his feet and began to pick up the dropped weapons.

Meanwhile, in another part of the ship, Jackson and crew are progressing down another corridor, leaving a trail of Grey's creatures. Jackson looks around a corner and fires at an approaching vampire. The stakes and water balloons hit the vampire, destroying it.
Ok, which way do we go now?

Keith pulled out his Tricorder. "I'm getting all sorts of energy readings here." He turns to his left. "Down there, about, say 30-40 feet away, I'm picking up what looks to be some kind of storage area. It looks like it contains mostly SWU technology. It also seems to be ungaurded." He starts walking in that direction.

The others used pods created by Ahz, but that would be obviously out of the question. However, before they left Mr Dupree suggested cloaking a shutle and flying in. Perhaps that would be an advisable course of action?

Our heroes approach the storage area, noticing the gradual change to a STU look in the corridors. Soon, they are standing at the door to the storage area.
It certainly looks ungaurded from this side... It looks like the door is locked, though...

Greymoran smiled. "No need. I can se the command structure from here through a gap in those ships." He begins to chant. Less than a minute later a lightning bolt seems to drop from the ceiling, stop in midair, and begins to encircle nothing in particular, crisscrssoing with it self as well. Through the hole now created in the center of the bridge, the wizard and the Vulcan could see a blackened hallway, and in the distance, the vauge but familiar shapes of their three comapnions, turning around the look at a noise that distracted them. "I suggest ducking as soon as we jump throguh so we don't get shot." Greymoran leaps through, and motions for SOrik to come quickly beore the portal closes.

Hearing the noise, Jackson and crew turn around, weapons raised. They notice a strange shimmering in the air, in which Sorik and Greymoran jump out. Relieved, Jackson and friends lower their weapons and look releaved.
Captain! Nice to see you up and about again. We havn't found Grey or Hudzen yet, but we've found a SWU storage area. We were just about to break the lock when you arrived... By the way, who's in charge of the ship?

Greymoran frowned. He began to turn around, but the 'doorway' he'd created had faded away. "Um, Carrie will probably fake up some lifesigns so they won't realize we're he-" Alarms start blaring all over the place. Sorik and Ahz, with their superior vision, find hiding spaces for everyone. A small army of odd looking creatures, humans, and robots run by in formation, adn go right past them in a hurry. Greymoran frowned as he climbed out the shadowy corner he'd slipped into, Sorik stepping out behind him. "Now what in the seven hells was that about?" Jackson could abrely contain the grin on his face. "The command center, if Keith's tricorder is right, is in that direction. Which could really mean one thing." Hiis smirk tunrs into a ful blown smile, and Greymoran and Ahz begin to chcukle slightly. Keith tilts his head like a dog when you change his food bowl on him, while Sorik merely raised an eyebrow. Ahz said what he, the wizard, and the clone were thinking. "Hudzen."

So a Wanderer, a wizard, and a clone walk into a bar...

A massive fist hit Hudzen square in the middle, knocking him back to the ground and sneding his weapons flying down the hall where their clatter echoed off the hull, now glowing slightly red from the alarm lights at full brightness. Jake Grey, with a small contingent of heavily armed huamns, menacing vampyres, and golems backing him, stood over the mangled Hudzen as the robot tried to push himself up. The Stone Golem that had hit him grabbed his neck and picked him up. Although mostly human in appearence, this did nothing to the robot but cause minor dicomfort, but he found himself sturggling to free his neck anyway. Grey growled at him, still obviosuly upset over the loss of his other arm, a temporary cybernetic replacement over the hand that Ahz had taken from him just the day before. "Did I hoenslty I would let you rejoin me robot, after your betrayal? That virus I gave you had a kill-switch inside. It died the moment you stepped onto this command structure. While it would've been nice to have you back, your treachery was unforgiveable. I also knew you'd attempt something •••••• and heroic. That's why I made sure there were always some heavy golems withing fifty feet of you at all times. Stoney!" he shouted at the Golem holding Hudzen. "Throw him agaisnt the wall a few times, then take him to the brig. I'm going to find TorGal. He'll want to witness this." "Yes master" the golem chocked out, sounding like a throat cancer riddled man with gravel in his voice-box. He began to pound the robot against the bulkhead. Pieces of the armor flew away, bent beyond recongition, and some of Hudzen's parts were exposed. Although he resembled an armored human, the robot's head and hands were the only parts of his body that bore the synthetic, authentic looking human skin, hair, and blood. Parts of this were tearing away revealing the technology underneath. Luckily for Hudzen, he felt no pain, although his emotion chip was going ballistic.

Meanwhile, several decks down and over a hudnred feet away, Jackson was looking at Gryemoran, astonished. "So, if you could, just portal over here-" "Most XDCA ships have special sensor for detecting magic. I don't doubt that Grey has many, but I had to take the risk. I couldn't let you three do this alone. I dragged you into this mess after all. Besides, I owe that man a debt of pain."

TorGal was not pleased in the slightest. He heard way off in the distance the sound of his personal communicator chirping. He'd assumed it too damaged to use after his fall and had thrown it away, where it landed on the nacelle of a nearby STU cargo ship. The echo carried through, and the nosie was annoying the giant troll, partly becuase he always hated the chriping, but also becuase he couldn't get to it to answer it, and thusly turn the noise off. But, he supposed, this meant someone would come looking for him soon. He reached another airlock on the Star Destroyer, and this time he was able to find a panel that he could pry open. Apparently it had ben used recently. He noticed the markings of magnetic boots and repair-droid welders on the bottom hull, and surmised that something had broken, possibly as a result of the shockwave from the explosion earlier. He started to work the wires that would allow him to open it from the outside. Then he noticed the blood, and the piece sof space suit floating below him, drifting slowly towards the bottom of the station. He heard a clank, like magnetic boots that were connecting, but not entirely, as though perhaps the shoes were either too big or too small for the waerer, and were slipping on and off. He saw a blur, and then a Predator came into shape, wearing the blood stained boots of a repair technician, and holding a welder torn out of a droid. He fired it up and it tocuhed TorGal's arm. Fire adn acid are the only two things that can kill a troll, and as such TorGal's entire left arm, and it's burned like dry grass. He howled in pain, a how that echoed throughout the massive battlestation. he lost his grip, and began to make the long, long decent towards the bottom, a good 3 or 4 miles down. His thoguhts coalesced around a single image. The thoguht of him wrapping his masisve hands around Keith Yeager's head and twisting it clean off. That human, by killing the RPedator troops leader, had set into effect a chain of event that put TorGal where he was now. His last thought before losing consciousness was, at least the wind from the fall put the fire out.

The Golem picked Hudzen up and slammed him against the wall, holding him there for a few seconds. At this point Hudzen begins to laugh, a rusty, mechanical laugh. He watched as Grey walked away.
"Heroics Grey? Do you really think that I came to this place to be heroic? I have never tried to be heroic. I'm a robot, an android. I wasn't programmed to seek heroics. I was programmed to follow orders. I would have followed Greymoran's and never beamed onto this station if it wasn't for your (expletive deleted) handiwork. By the time I got here I could no longer resist . You succeeded, whether that program shut down or not. I was you servant. Do really you think that terminating the virus did anything? It wasn't the virus Jake, it was you. You caused me to turn against you. There are no worse enemy than betrayed friends. I hope you remember that when Greymoran comes and kicks your-
His next word is muffled when the Golem throws him into the wall again.

When you destroyed that planet, I stopped following yours. I mutinied and I was almost destroyed. Do you think that I would try it again without figuring out a way to defeat you? Goodbye, old friend.
Hudzen, and the Golem, disappear in a transporter beam.

Jackson looks at his tricorder
Sir, I'm reading a transport signal from a couple of floors below us! I had a beacon lock on Hudzen, right until the transport happened... Hold on, I think they might be in space now, I can't be sure.
Also, right around the area Hudzen was, is Jake Grey's biosign...

Greymoran's face went into a determined scowl, and he broke out into a full blown sprint towards the nearest turbolift. He runs nearly smack into a large creature blocking the corridor. Keith's face goes white, and he suddenlys eems to be strugglign to raise his phaser. The creature is floating in midair, is an intimidating shade of brown and has a good dozen bright blue eyes on small stalks, and one really big green eye just above it's many fnaged mouth. Greymoran dives just a burst of white energy flies out of it's mouth. He turns to the others. "A Beholder! Run!" The groups turns and bolts as more white objects fly out at random directions. Greymoran casts some small speels that seem to scratch the Beholder, and even manages to poke one of it's eyes, but it keeps levitating forward. Luckily for the crew, it can't fly much faster than a human can jog, but it's inhuman noises are more than enough to send chills down everyone's spine, except perhaps Sorik. Suddenly, a burst of the Beholder's energy shots bounces off a reflective surface and strikes Sorik, and the Vulcan freezes in place. He has been stunned, and won't be able to do anything for at least an hour. Keith sees this, and turns around. The shadow of the Beholder has starte dto appear roud the corner they just came from. "Sorik!" He yells and begins firing his phaser at the edge of the corridor. The shadow seems to stop moving for a moment. Ahz and Jackson turn around and see Sorik. Then Jackson frowns. "Where's my father?"

Unfortunately, the transporter did not work the way Hudzen expected it to. Instead of beaming the golem and him away the signal only locked onto the golem, beaming it out into Grey's space station. Hudzen dropped to the ground.
Whoops.
Hudzen sprints through the army surrounding him as weapons fire erupts. He breaks through but Grey calmly brings up a blaster set for stun and fires it. Hudzen falls to the ground.
Take him to the brig. NOW!!
Two golems grab Hudzen's immobile form and drag him to the brig.

Grey shook his head. "Good thing we came back when we did. Quite an interesting site, opening a door and watching a golem disappear." He looks at the weapon in his artifical hand. "I'm also glad we had these within easy reach. A stunning device for robots. Wish I'd thought of that."

Back abaord the Archangel, Carrie was finally beginning to calm down. She had managed to throw up some fake lifesigns. They would only fool the ships out there for a few minutes, but ti was time that was desperately needed. She began seraching for a plan, somethign she could do to help, when she noticed something odd. Although she could detect that the use of magic had thrown several alarms throughout the station, not one ship seemed to be preparing to open fire on the Archangel. In fatc it seemed as nothing, at least nothing obvious, was being done about it by Grey's people. She wondered baout for a moment, but set it aside. There really wasn't anything she could do, and even if there was, it might reverse this good fortune. She then noticed there was someone still on the ship. Someone who didn't go over to the battlestation's control center with the others. "Ryo-O? Is that you?"

Jackson peeks around the corner and sees something.
Keith, look! It's my father! Either the Beholder got him, or one of your shots did...
Now, what are we going to do about Sorik?

The Beholder was floating towards them, drooling with anticipation for the kill. Greymoran was kncoked out cold on the floor, having been sturk full in the upper body by the massive ball of eyes and scaly skin. He awakened briefly, groaned and tried to move, but then passe dout again. Keith and Jackson looked around. They couldn't see Ahz. The Beholder came around the corner, and glared fiercley at the two huamns. It's eyes began to glow. Suddenly it screeched an indescribable sound, and fell to the floor, all of it's many eye stalks going limp as smoke rose from a hole on top of it. Ahz stood over the carcass, sweating heavily. "I had to use all the strength I had to just to get the weapon through," he manages to say through heavy deep breaths. "That skin is, quite thick."

Thanks, Ahz! Keith, next time set the phaser to it's highest level.. maybe we can dissapate the sucker!

A noise startles the group, and they all look up. A hidden compartment opens down the corridor, and another Beholder exits from it. Jackson picks up his Slayanator and says
This one's mine.
Jackson sets his weapon to a high setting and fires. When the dust clears, the Beholder and much of the section is gone.
Do you think I used to much power?

"Probably," Keith coughs out, the acird stench of the brunt Beholder making his nauseous. Greymoran comes aroudn the corner rubbing his head with one hand and gripping his side with the other. He looks at the Beholder, and then at Ahz, keith, then jackson. He turns around. Still frozen in place, and looking awfully gray is Sorik. Gryemoran's eyes go wide. "Oh no, the Beholder was using his paralytic 'Flesh to Stone' blast! Dammit! We have to get him back to the ship." "What's wrong?" Jackson asked. "Sorik's beent ruend to stone. There's a spell can fix him, but I, I don't have it memorized right now. Ahz, can you take him back to the Archangel? He's vulnerable now. All it'll take is a placed pick-ax and our engineer will literally go to pieces."

Carrie was just finally starting to get everythign under control when it happened. A whole chunk of the station seemed to fade in and out of existence for several minutes. The station shuddered, and if Carrie had a body, she would've too. "Oh no, we've entered the rings! Ryo-O, are you healed yet? I'm goign to need your help."

Aboard the station, Greymoran, Keith, and Jackson lost their balance as the station shuddered violently. Ahz gripped tightly on the statue that used to be the Vulcan engineer Sorik, keeping it from falling over. "I'll return him to the ship immediately."

In the command center Grey was not happy. "I TOLD YOU TO PUT US BETWEEN THE RINGS AND THE PLANET, NOT GO THROUGH THEM! WE COULD LOSE THE STATION!" In his frustration he squezzed tightly the red gem on his amulet with his other new artifical hand. Any vampyre unfortunate enough to be in the room disintigrated instantly. The hcyborg at the helm cowered. "I lost control of the ship's direction after the explosion. I tried to correct with thrusters and impulse engines but the station is simply too large. The bottom half is in dimensional limbo, and according to the sensors seems to be existing in at least 17 different unvierses in seventeen different locations as we speak. The course I've got us on we'll keep the command center safe my lord, but any ships in the bottom quadrants could be lost or damaged." Grey frowned and looked at a display. "Have those ships blocking Archangel tractor her upwards. If this trajectory is right, and I hope it is for your sake, the ships beneath her could be lost and Greymoran would have an escape route. I'll let you live for now, but do not disturb me again, for anything. The traitor Hudzen is providing too much entertainment at the moment." Grey walked past an internal security monitor, not noticing that several small sensors were down, and not even regsitering that on one sensor, the distant shape of three huamnoid figures were marching cautiously forward.

Ahz appeared in the corridor outside his lab, just long enough for the door to open, and he vanished again. He appeared next to a large tank with several hoses on the inside, and several large pipes on the outside. He placed Sorik in the tank and placed a face mask over Sorik's mouth. He stepped back and sealed the tank, which quickly filled with a clear fluid.

There, that should keep you from being damaged during any movements that the ship might make. Don't go to pieces on us.

With that, Ahz vanished again.

Ryo-O's image appeared on the bridge of the Archangel.

I'm healed enough to go out. What do you need me to do?

As the three move along, Jackson looks at the various doors as they go by.
Grey has just about everything, doesn't he? Battle droids, Cylons, Critters from Dr. Who, Spare Borg, Monster insect room... He definitly has quite an army assembled.
Jackson puts his hand against a wall, which fades, allowing his hand to pass through. Jackson pulls his hand back just in time, as the wall returns to normality.
That was weird... All part of the rings out there, right?

Greymoran shook his head. "I've only ever met one man who got tocuhed by the dimensional rips in the Rings and managed to come back to talk about it. Or part of him did. One of his arms ended up in XFU9, his ship in B5U5, and the rest of him woke up somewhere in WCU42. If the ring energy had gotten this far we wouldn't be talking to each other right now. This may just be a holographic wall, designed to hide or portect something."

-

Carrie, if she'd had lungs, would've breathed a sigh of relief. "OK, Ryo-O, what we got is a big problem. Those ships surrounding us are tracotring us at an upward angle. We've just entered the rings of this planet in the Avalon system that aqre dimensionally unstable. Also, when Ahz came back with that hunk of rock that resembles our chief engineer, we suddenly had two extra life signs because of the fake signs I'd thrown up to fool the enemy's sensors." Ryo-O chimed in. "But the enemry vessels haven't acted yet. Interesting. I'll link up with Ahz. Perhaps we can use this to find a way out of here." Carrie was shcoked. "But what about the others?" "Ahz can stay with them of course. But we will need help to attack this station. It should be done quickly before they leave these rings. I know where Rita Yeager and the rest of the fleet are. Plus I have access to the most recetn locations of the Space Marshalls, an organization the XDCA has loose ties to."

Jackson glances at Greymoran.
If it is holographic, should we see what it's hiding?
Say, I havn't seen any trace of Hudzen lately on my tricorder.

Greymoran closes his eyes, and chants a spell. This is was longer than most of the spells Jackson was accustomed to hearing, so he and Keith became anxious. When Ahz reappeared through another portal, they shushed him when he attempted to ask them what was happening. Suddenly, the holographic wall disappeared, revealing an airlock, and several raised hull plates. Jackson leaned down and looked at them. "Yipes. Just yipes. If we'd passed through here and stepped on these, we would've been blown out into space." Greymoran stood up. "That took a lot out of me, but if I did it right most if not all traps betwen here and the command center will be exposed to us." He wiped sweat from his brow, and took a moment to catch his breath.

If you were to chant the spell into the comm system, would that reveal the traps?

Greymoran inhaled deeply, then leaned aginst a solid wall. "Magic doesn't really work like that. You mostly need line of sight. I cast a smaller spell first called Farsight. It let me see further ahead in all directions, which is why I unveiled as many hidden traps as I did. Other wise, this would've been the only one exposed. This seems to be the first trap we've come across. We must be getting close. Come on, we haven't much time if we're inside the rings."

Jackson checks his tricorder
According to the readings, the Command Deck should be right ahead and two floors up of us.
I've also been able to locate Hudzen. It would seem that he's clinging onto the hull of the station. In fact, the tricorder's showing him fairly close.
Jackson walks to a nearby window and looks out. He immediatly jumps backwards in suprise as Hudzen crawls by and looks inside.
Sir, look!

Ahz's computer appeared before him, and he began to type away on the keyboard. The screen showed a bewildering assortment of graphs and images.

Amazing! Absolutly amazing! It seems that the entire multiverse is overlapping and breaking down in a very small area. Of course! This is a focal point.

If I can figure out how to manipulate this, then the alteration of the very fabric of the universe could be possible. The only known race that had this ability were the D'ni, but they are all but extinct now. I could revive their ways with this, given the time to study it.

Hudzen sees himself. Standing. Just standing. Far away. He's surrounded by several people. Hudzen recognizes them. It's the Archangel crew. Keith and Rita Yeager, Ahz, Jackson Dupree, Sorik, and Greymoran. All standing around him. They appeared to be smiling at him, except for Sorik. The Hudzen in the circle of people stares ahead, through his colleagues. Hudzen watches as his "twin" activates one of the guns on his arm. His eyes widen as the other Hudzen raises its weapon and points it at Keith. He opens fire. Keith falls. He moves the gun to Rita. She doesn't seem to notice. He fires again. Hudzen watches in horror as the robot continues to fire at his friends. Jackson falls to the ground. Then Sorik. Then Ahz. Finally, the gun is pointed at Greymoran. Greymoran continues to smile at Hudzen. He says something, but Hudzen is unable to pick up what it is. A shot rings out. Hudzen sees himself standing, surrounded by the bodies the Archangel crew. His fellow patriots. Hudzen can feel the rage build. He tries to run at the figure. He can't move. He yells, but the other Hudzen doesn't appear to her him. Hudzen sees someone move. Rita. She's still alive. A terrified look is on her face. And she's holding her stomach. Hudzen gasps as he realizes why. The other Hudzen raises his weapon again. He fires. Shot after shot. Hudzen still can't move. Soon the sound of the gunfire dissolves into laughter. Very familiar laughter. Hudzen spins to see Jakob Grey.
Hudzen: What are you doing here? Grey said you were terminated!
Greyvirus: Come now Hudzen, do you really expect Jakob Grey of all people to admit that he failed in something?
Hudzen: Oh, I don't know. He sure as h*ll has failed enough times since this d**n war began.
Greyvirus: Yes, but you're different. You betrayed him. And those who betray Jake Grey suffer for it. Horribly. As you have.
Hudzen: You still haven't answered my question. Why are you still here? Why were you not terminated as Grey said?
Greyvirus: Grey never expected this program to be suppressed at any time. When you did, it was a surprise. Somehow, your hatred for Grey was so intense, that you pushed me away. But now I'm back, and too strong for you to sup-
The Grey image is cut off in mid-sentence as Hudzen delivers a right cross to his jaw. Grey falls to the ground, stunned by the blow. Hudzen picks him up and throws him into a conveniently nearby wall. Grey slowly looks up at Hudzen.
Greyvirus: What is this?
Hudzen: Oh, come on Grey. You know your dimensions. Remember the Farscape universe?
Greyvirus: Farscape?
Hudzen: Yes. I figured that I had tried everything else so why not the direct route? I'll just beat the cr*p out of you.
Grey: That'll never work.
Hudzen: We'll see.

Everything was black. Perhaps his sensors were inoperable. A voice cut through the darkness. It sounded like...
The EMH: Welcome back Mr. Hudzen.
Hudzen was now standing in a different room. He immeadiately recognized it. The Archangel bridge.
Hudzen: What's...?
EMH: You are still running your defense program. You're not actually on the bridge. You're still in your, or our I should say, head. he motions around the bridge. Hudzen now realizes that the two of them are not alone. In fact, they are surrounded by several robots. Hudzen instantly recognizes them. His different bodies. They represented his different components. Data, IG-88, A cart with HAL on it, Servo, Bender. They were all here.
Hudzen: The program?
EMH: It's dormant. You have found the way to defeat it. However, I wouldn't count on it staying that way forever. You're still going to need to find a way to purge it from your systems.
Hudzen nodded.
So now?
EMH: Now, you are you again. You are once again in control. We are one again.
Data: Now, we must help our crew end this conflict.
Robinson Robot: We must end the great danger to the multiverse.
Bender: Yeah! It's time to kick Grey's a**!!
EMH: Will you do it Hudzen.
Hudzen nods. Yes. The bridge fades. Hudzen opens his eyes. He's in one of the brigs of the Macedonia 2. Now it was time to escape...

In the control center of Macedonia 2, Durante notices a blinking light on a nearby console. He walks over and hits the control. A display comes to life. He smiles at what he sees.
Durante to Helenka. It appears that our guests have run into one of our decoys. They're on Deck 3. Make sure they don't get out. I'm activating our security systems down there.
He hears Helenka confirm before he begins typing. As the crew look out the window, Hudzen disappears. The main lights go out and the red emergency lights illuminate the corridor. Forcefields activate around the Archangel crew and several of Grey's troops quickly make their way to their location...

Greymoran simply gives an annoyed grunt. And begins to chant another spell. A massive blue, opaque globe surrounds the group, adn expands outward, bending the hull beneath, above, and to the sides. The generator for the evnergy cage crack, and fall apart, and the energy explodes outward in a wave that badly schorches the ceiling. When the globe dissipates, Greymoran is on his knees, breathing heavily, his eyes bloodshot, and one ear bleeding. "Christ that took a lot out of him." Keith mutters. Jackson moves his hands over Greymoran's ear, and the blood stops flowing. Jackson exhales sharply. "A minor healing spell I picked up. I stopped the bleeding, but that's all I could do. Ahz, take him back to the Ar-" "No, no I'm all right son. That was just an enhanced version of a basic spell, that's why it took a lot out of me. Assuming we only need basic spells like magic missile from here on out, I'll be fine." Jackson gets ready to argue, but the sound of marching footsteps comign from both directions down the corridor stops him cold.

From the direction they came, several Borg from the Spare Borg room appear. Jackson begins firing his weapon, changing the setting every few seconds. First phaser, then energy pulse, then throwing knives, and finally projectiles, the Borg have no way to adapt to the quickly changing weaponary, and are soon dead. Unfortunatly, while all this is happening, a troop of winged monkeys appear from the other direction, wait until Jackson is done firing, and capture the group.
Any way out of this one, sir?

Greymoran just groans. "Flying monkeys. •••••• flying monkeys. Grey has sunk to an all new low. I'm gonna raise him from the dead after I kill him, JUST SO I CAN KILL HIM AGAIN!" Keith kicks at his captros but doesn't hit a single one. Ahz closes his eyes, and appears to go into a trance like state of meditation. He is propmtly dropped by his flying monkey captors, who also fall down, quite asleep. "Shall I rescue you sir?" he asks sardonically.

Jackson raises an eyebrow
That was easy. I brought along a few personal cloaking devices....stuff I found in the Cybertec catalog. May I suggest that we make use of them?
Jackson touches his wrist, and his clothes are replaced by his cybersuit. He touches another button on his gauntlet, and a small wormhole opens. Reaching inside, Jackson pulls out what look like an arm patch with a clear spot on them.
Just touch the clear spot, and the device will activate. I'll be alright. I can just use my cybersuit to blend in with our surroundings.

Greymoran nods. "Although I should warn you, I'm a bit uncomfortable with being invisible. The first time I ever cast an invisisbilty spell while I was an apprentice to Elminster, I vomited, rather loudly. My brother always handled it better than I could." Jackson frowns. "Invisibility nauseua? That's a new one. I wonder if we could get that published in a medical journal."

Well, this invisibility is technological and not magical, so you may not be so sick this time...

Keith shakes his head. Greymoran shoots him an odd look. "I'm sorry," Keith says. "I guess it's just easy to forget that wizards are only human. I mean, allergic to suspended animation, invisibilty nauseua; don't feel too bad though. I have a phobia of Brown Dwarf stars." Greymoran is almost unable to supress a chuckle. "My brother has the same thing," he says. Greymoran turns around to face the direction the heroes are going to head. "ALlright Jackson. Do it. We need to stop Grey and we need to do it today."

I've always been afraid of chainsaw weilding clowns...
The others stop and look at Jackson in oonfusion.
Well, there was one circus in the 21st century that featured them, and they always gave me the willies and heebie-jeebies.
Anyway, here's your armbands.
Jackson pulls out a few more patches and tosses them to the group. He also touches his gauntlet and disappears except for his head.
This thing also can mimic lifeforms... for instance, I could imitate one of the flying monkeys that attacked us so it would seem that you were captured...

Greymoran sighs. "Part of the ship must be in a Monty Python universe, becuase things are just getting silly," he mutters under his breath. "Allright Jackson. Sounds like a plan."

This had to work. The modifications had taken some time, especially since he had to do it without his captors noticing. But it was finally done. His possible ticket out of the cell. It wouldn't take much time for Grey's forces to pick up his transmission. Hopefully, he'd be out of his cell by then. He closed his eyes and sent the message, hoping that it would be received...

Carrie. Hudzen. In holding cell. Repaired. Trust me. Beam me out. Please.

Hudzen opened his eyes and waited.

Jackson presses several buttons on his suit, which shimmers. When things calm down, a flying monkey is in his place. It speaks in a similar voice that the real flying monkey squad spoke in.
See how easy it is? Now, where do we go from here?
Maybe the bridge, to inform Grey of the results of the mission?
Jackson stands behind the group and points his weapon.
Ok, let's go! We've got a Grey guy to see.

Greymoran just looks at Keith, who shrugs his shoulders and sighs. "It no dumber than stuff I've seen in my home universe." Greymoran nods. "I've been the unfortunate receiver of a Polymorph Others spell. Spending time as a squirrel certainly prepares fro things like this I guess. Let's roll."

I just hope this works...if nothing else, it'll get us on the bridge so we can fight Grey.

The group makes their way to Grey's bridge, and the holographic flying monkey steps up to Grey and says
Prisoners for you, sir. My squad managed to capture all of them, but that Dupree character managed to get away, so I ordered the rest of the squad to go after him.

Grey frowns. "Awfully articulate for a flying monkey. Computer, activate holopulse." A wave of holographic images fills the bridge. Jakcson's device struggles to compensate with the input of images as the wave pumps image after image into every image generating device in the room, including the viewscreens. Eventually, after a massive contortions of images causes Jackson to become dizzy and nauseous, the holo-generator on his wrist finally peters out, and Jackson Dupree finds himself, Ahz, Keith, and Greymoran surrounded by hevaily armed robots, massive stone golems, and vampyres. Greymoran just smiles though. Grey looks at him confused. Greymoran gleefully points to his throat, which suddenly seems to have a slight blue tint. Before Grey can do anything, Gryemoran rasies his hands, and bright light fills the room. Ahz recognizes it immediately. Greymoran casta Vocalize spell so he could cast futher spells for the next hour without their vocal components. And the spell he had just cast was an excellent choice indeed. Sunray. The few vampyres that weren't burnt to a crisp ran like panicked rats towards the exits. Grey screamed at them to return but none would listen. He used his amulet to disentegrate the rest, and turned to see Gryemoran's fist flying right into his nose. Through the black spots appearing over his vision, Grey saw Ahz and Jackson locked in combat with the Golems, and Keith using his phaser to punch holes in the armor of some of the robots. The battle for the command center had begun.

Hudzen frowned. No response. Perhaps Carrie hadn't picked up the message that he sent. He'd have to risk a longer message. So he did.
Carrie, it is Hudzen. Do you read? I'm in one of Grey's holding cells. Can you get me out? Take whatever precautions you feel necessary. I do not believe that I have lied yet. Trust me. Please. Are you receiving?
Was she offline? It didn't matter. Security alarms went off. It appeared that his crewmates were causing more chaos. With their diversions, Grey might not pick up his transmission. They could win this yet...

Jackson punches one of the Golems, and then shakes his hand in pain.
That wasn't very smart...but...
He sets his Slayanator to "jackhammer" mode and begins going after a Golem. Soon, nothing is left except for a large pile of rocks. Jackson happens to be close to a monitor showing the holding cells and notices Hudzen sitting there. With a few deft motions, he reaches the bridge's emergency transporter, sets the coordinates, and manages to beam a suprised Hudezn to the bridge.
Welcome to the party. Grey is right over there.
With that, Jackson reenters the fray.

Hudzen holds back and decides instead to turn and land a swift punch to the neck of a human with a pulse rifle. The punch crushes his windpipe and drops him, to the floor. Hudzen picks up the rifle and starts denting the magically protected golems. Without the protections the moving statues would've blown apart but as it was they were merely chipping away.

Greymoran punched Grey yet again, and Grey fell to the floor. Grey swing out his legs, and thoguh Greymoran jumped over one leg, but the second leg connected with his ankle and the wizard dropped. He summoned a Spirtual Hammer with a quick spell and swung it from his precarious position on the ground, causing Grey to roll away instead of gewtting off the ground. Greymoran lept back to his feet. He was thankful for the years he spent in Tae Kwon Do classes during his first retirement. He swung about the greenish hammer. It's spirtual nature would do double damage against someone whose heart was pure evil like Grey's. Grey knew this and backed up quickly. He hit a button on his left artificial arm, and the lights all through out the battlestation went black.

Carrie and Ryo-O had timed it perfectly. Once the bottom half of the station was completely in dimensional flux, they'd begin a suden downward dive to confuse those few ships that still surrounded them. A few ships had recklessly tried to escape, only to be tron apart in the dimensional chaos of the rings. But Carrie had worked out a path in the mess just large enough for the Archangel, and she and Ryo-O wer emore than fast enough to get through it without losing any of the ship. But suddenly, the lights in the station's interiro went dark. "Do you think it has anythign to do with Hudzen? Perhaps his call wasn't a trap." Ryo-O asked. Carrie gave the electronic equivalent of a shurg. "Maybe. But it's going to take a lot for me to trust him again. Let's just find Cpatain Durgin and the fleet." "I hate leaving Ahz and the others behind." "We're going to need all the help we can get to take this big boy down Ryo-O. Greymoran and the others can take care of themselves."

At first, Jackson looks startled when the lights extinguish, but soon enough, his eyes start glowing green, as his helmet's night vision acitvates.
Now, if I was a surviving Vampyre, now would be a good time...
And indeed, at that moment, a pair of Vampyres swoop down towards Jackson. In a moment of quick thinking, he sets his Slaynator to a double threat...holy water and stakes. Within moments, the Vampyres are dead...again. Jackson regards their staked figures and says
Now do you get the point?
Jackson glances at a nearby door as it opens, revealing Battle Droids from several of the more popular Star Wars Universes. Jackson, of course, makes short work of them.
What next?

Jackson soon regrets that comment as an arm from a blinded (by way of Hudzen's new wepaon) Stoen Golem flails into the small of Jackson's back, his armor keeping him from being killed, but it regardless kncosk the wind out of him. He looks up in time to see a battle droid impale a damaged blaster arm through Keith's leg. Keith's scream of pain and terror brings Jackson to his feet, and using his wepaons decimates the droid. He turns to Keith who is trying to stop the bleeding in his wounded leg. "You over did it a bit," he mutters, looking at the smoking pile of melted robot. Jackson turns around and finds that Hudzen is now pinned against the far wall by an advancing and menacing mixture of robots and golems. "Stay here," he says to Keith. "You're kidding right?" Keith groans, still holding his leg.

Grey ran down a darkened hall, bumping into walls several times but only slowing down long enough to take corners. He was headed for the 'Big Room' a subdimensional room that from the outside only appeared to be no larger than a broom closet, but in fact contaiend the deadliest of Grey's creature.s One so deadly in fact Grey almost considering not using it, until he turned and saw the glow of Greymoran's hammer come from around the corner he'd just past. "If I get eaten at least we'll both be digested," Grey mutters as he runs for the door.

Jackson rushes over to help Hudzen, but along the way is pushed into a nearby console. Getting to his feet, he accidently presses a button. Movement catches his attention as a panel opens in a nearby wall. Inside the panel and encased, is what appears to be a simple wooden mask. Jackson is about to turn away when an attached plaque catches his attention.
Mask of Loki...Wait... Wasn't the mask from the movie "The Mask" called the Mask of Loki?
Jackson reads on
...powers include bringing out the inner self of the wearer... I thought this was it!
My god... if a magic user or general bad guy ever got their hands on this thing...but that gives me an idea...
Jackson searches the panel and discovers a switch to open the case. He does so and gingerly removes the mask and looks around to attempt to locate Greymoran. Not able to find him, Jackson activates his communicator and says
Jackson to Greymoran, I have found what appears to be the Mask of Loki...the one that allows one's inner self to appear. What should I do with it, and who should wear it?

Blaster fire erupts around Hudzen. He's pinned down near one of the control center's console. He notices the human he incapacitated struggling to breathe. Hudzen grabbed the human's pistol and quickly put him out of his misery before returning fire at the group attacking him. Two droids fall and a golem flinches. He sets the pistol for overload and prepares to throw it. Just as he does, an someone throws an EMP grenade at him. Hudzen dives away as both explode. Running to Keith, he fires along the way. As he dives to Keith's location, he's hit in the shoulder. A big chunk comes out, but luckily, it's the shoulder of his crushed and useless arm.
Keith, are you still able to shoot?

Waiting for a response, Jackson rushes to where Hudzen and Keith are fighting.
Hudzen, look at that door over there! I think it leads to a conference room of some sort! If we can get Keith in there, maybe you and I can fight in the doorway while Keith rests!
To emphasize the point, Jackson fires at a group of advancing battle droids.

Greymoran curses himself for leaving his communicator on. He ducks as Jake Grey fires a phaser blast in his direction. Through the residual light of the blast, the wziard saw the captain dive open a door and then run away full speed down another corridor. Greymoran pulls out his commlink. "Hide it! It's too dangerous. Back when he was still one of the good guys Grey accidnetlaly got it on his head once. It wasn't pleasent." He opens his mouth to let Jackson know not to call him again unless it was a serious emergency so he could continue his pursuit, but a loud snarl distracts him. He looks up, and casts an infravision spell. He does so just before the Vocalize spell finally fades. He sees a solid wall of white. No, not solid he realizes. It's moving. He then notices that the hull on all sides seems to be creaking under massive amounts of pressure. It's coming from the wall where that door was opened. He the wall of white suddenly turns and Greymoran a pair of evil, white eyes, and suddenly he realizes what he's seeing, and promptly runs back where he came from, dropping the communicator.

Jackson drops his phaser. The EMP grenades pulse made it useless. he also groans when he relaizes all controls are dead. He then notices Hudzen still moving. He shoves aside a dead battle robot, and decides to take advantage of the confused and temporarily motionless Golems to check on Keith. "Yes, let's get him in there. By the way, how come the blast didn't affect you? The EMP has knocked out everything in here, including most of my armor's equipment. Are you made out of lead?" Keith groans as Jackson and Hudzen help him up. "Aw geez, I think it pierced bone." He shouts with pain when his foot touches the ground again. "Definately. If I survive this I'll be in recovery for weeks." "Let's just hurry up and get you safe before these stup!d creatures figure out why they're robot buddies stopped moving. I hate golems, I've just decided."

Agreed.
My backup systems have prevented me from shutting down completely. That, and I was able to escape most of the grenade's blast radius. They didn't want to completely shut this entire control center and all of the droids we were fighting down when they activated it. And they didn't.
Hudzen motions to a small number of consoles that are still active.
I doubt that they will be of any use to us. Let's find Greymoran.

Jackson presses a button on his wrist and a small wormhole opens. Reaching inside, Jackson retrives another Cybersuit. In a few moments, he has the new suit on, has put the useless suit into the portable wormhole, and closes the hole. With another button press, another wormhole opens, and Jackson sticks the mask of Loki inside.
My suit had just enough power to get another suit. The mask is now in a secure place... a small pocket universe.
Keith, if we survive this, we deserve a vacation! Don't worry, Keith. You should be relatively safe here. Here's another working weapon. I have a feeling you might need it.
At least the Slayanator was EMP protected. Come on Hudzen, we have a good wizard to find!
looking at a map on his wrist gauntlet, Jackson points to the nearby corridor There he is!
The robot and the superhero make their way to the corridor, where they see Greymoran confronted by and fighting...something...
What the heck is that?

Greymoran wasn't really fighting the deadly White Dragon. He was just taking advntage of the creatures one weakness. It's dislike of fire. It wasn't actually afraid of it, and only a fire as hot as a nuclear explosion could ever pierce it's ice-cold white skin, it just didn't care for the stuff, and stared angrily at the flaming sword the wizard it was chasing and planning to eat had thrown at him. It took a deep breath, a motion that Greymoran noticed, and lowered it's neck to exhale at the sword. "RUN!" Gryemoran shouted at Hudzen and Jackson. Jackson simply stood there, impressed by the surprising beauty in the dragon's evil glare, while Hudzen, had he been human anyway, considered shivering in his boots. He knew all too well what was about to happen and started to duck back into the control room well before the blast of icy breath flowed down the hallway. Greymoran tackled Jackson and hit a buton to slam the door shut. They backed away as the door and it's jamb and probably everything on the other side of it, turned into brittle ice. Greymoran rubbed his fresh bruises, bruises he got from hitting Jakcson's armor at full speed. "Jackson, when you see something that big, with that many teeth chasing me, and I tell you to run, YOU RUN!" "What was that thing?" Jackson asked, hardly noticing that the wizard was clearly miffed. Hudzen stepped up. "A White Dragon. From Greymoran's native universe. White dragons are like Black and Red dragons, in that they care about only two things. Hording treasures they can't actually use, and eating anybody who wakes them up." Hudzen is interuppted by a loud rythmic pounding. He notices that the frozen door and it's adjacent wall was starting to crack. "Um, let's hide." Greymoran murmurs. Jackson was surprised. This was the first time he'd ever heard the wizard actually be truly terrified. He'd seem him nervous and anxious before, but the wizard was genuinely frightened, like a child confrtoned with a zombie or a vampire or something. He nodded. "Yes, hiding would be good."

Into the conference room! That's where we left Keith!
The group head in that direction, and as Jackson follows, he fires a number of napalm grenades from his Slaynator to the ground. Soon, Jackson has joined the rest.
First of all... I layed a path of napalm grenades in there. When the dragon appears, they should go off, leaving a trail of fire that it might not want to follow.
Second... Sir, I think I remember you telling me stories of dragons when I was a kid...and I think I was always facinated by white dragons. That's probably why I had to stop and stare.
Third... What would it take to full stop it?
Computer, full shielding around the door! Enough to stop fire and ice!
With that, sheets of metal close around the door and the bulkhead around it, making a physical shield. Jackson scans it.
Impressive... Pure Plotonium... It should hold for the time being.

Greymoran shakes his head. I know of only one succesful killing of a white dragon, but unless we have on our hands a three story tall, sharp pointy icecicle, to drop on it from fifty feet up, we don't stand much a chance."

The walls bend and buckle as the sound of a loud exhale pours into the room where the napalm grenades had gone off. The dragon's breath was colder than the coldest winds of any planet any of the room's inhabitants had ever been on in their lives, and the fires were actually frozen in palce, not just extinguished. Everything that had been in the room was now brittle and forzen and would shatter at the slightest touch. The dragon couldn't fit it's entire body into the control room but was able to squeeze it's head, and the smaller portion of it's inside, to search for those who had intruded upon it. It banged it's massive horned head against a nearby wall.

Greymoran and the others didn't see this, but the fact was the only thing protecting them was a half frozen wall that would fly apart if the dragon hit one more time. Then, something occured to the wizard. "Where the hell is Ahz? He came into the control center with us, but I haven't seen him." Jackson smiles. "That guy does have a penchant for showing up at the last minute." Keith closes his eyes, breathing heavily, and trying to ignore the pain in his leg. "This is the last minute," he whispers.

with despration, Jackson glances around the room at the various equipment, pauses for several seconds, and then speaks.
Sir, with the items around the room, I think I can jury-rig a large wormhole that could be emitted from my suit. We can preprogram it and project it when the dragon gets here, so that the dragon is sent from anywhere from the heart of a sun to an icy world where we can drop the dragon on top of the icecicle you mentioned earlier... the downside is that once again, it would drain my suit's power.. then again, the upside is that this time, it can recharge.

Captain, I have to agree with Jackson. Waiting for Ahz to rescue us is not the best of plans.

Hudzen, come help me find a some places to send this thing.
Jackson and Hudzen rush over to the nearest computer and start speaking quietly about things. Soon, Hudzen has plugged himself into the console and begins the search. Several minutes later, Jackson looks back at Greymoran and Keith with determination.
Well, we've found a few places... We can send him to Hoth in one of the quieter Star Wars universes....We can drop him right inside the heart of a number of suns... all of them surrounded by dead systems. Or, if we're sadistic enough, I've found a universe where at least two black holes have collided and have formed a mega-black hole. I wonder if our friend out there could survive that.

After finding several locations in the computer to send the dragon, Hudzen does not immeadiately unplug himself. He continues to search for the information that he desperately needs. The "cure"...

Dragons are incredibly patient creatures. It didn't quite undersnad why the wall it had just hit several times didn't give right away so he deicde to simply curl as much of his massive bulk as posisble in the bridge structure and wait. He could hear the panicked adventurers inside and grinned. It knew something about portals, due in part to it's rather embarrasing capture at the hadns of Jake Grey and his minions, many of whom were forzen in a deep cave in the mountains not too far from where Jackson Dupree's counterpart, Captain Tacoman, had made his first foray into the Forgotten Realms universe. The wyrm didn't know that of course and even if it did the information would hardly have been relevant. The point being, the beast now had a cunning plan in place that would allow it to eat the intruders, and still leave him able to store up energy for the big ice blast he was planning to save for that other human, Jake Grey. He chuckled, or at least he did somethig that sounded like a chuckle. The humans inside that room were close to carrying out their plan. He lowered his and glowered excitedly at the door. SO intent was he on his brilliant plan, that he didn't notice the unforeseen x factor of a nearly invisble Wanderer, hovering at the the top of the command center, wondering exactly where the weakness in the dragon's armor might be.

Hudzen finally disconnected from the computer.

Okay, I think we've found a good place to send it. Let's proceed.

Listen? Do you hear the sound of it...not attacking? White Dragons can't understand Human speech, can they?
Well.. if decides to sit there and wait for us, I think I can come up with something... maybe even use the same plan I was going to use before...
Hudzen, where did you find to send it?

Restik II. It's a planet orbiting a blue giant. Surface temperature of over 1000 kelvin. It's over 20 light years from an inhabited system. It should be a ideal place for us to send the dragon.

Excuse me, the console seemed to be a little damaged. The temperature is just over 800 kelvin, not 1,000.

Greymoran, who had been staring at the wall that the dragon was on the other side of the whole time, shakes his head. "It can hear us. Even if we whisper it oculd still hear us. It's waiting for you to make your move. We've got one chance." He walks towards the door, and opens it before Jackson and Hudzen can stop him. Greymoran looks up and gives a quick nod to Ahz, whose presence he'd felt earlier by way of a detections pell, a split second before the dragon turns away from studying a flickering console to looka t him. "All right. We give up. You have caught us oh mighty and wise white dragon. It was wrong of us to assume you be as •••••• as your red and black cousins." Hudzen smiles as he realizes exactly what Gryemoran is doing. He motions for Jakcson to keep quiet, then points up. Jackson quickly raises and then lowers his head, hoping the dragon didn't see him. He turns around and allows a sly grin to show. He too knows what's about to happen. I just hope Ahz knows how to kill this thing, he thinks to himself. The dragon grins evily at the wizard. "Ha! White dragons have always been smarter and stronger! It's the cold that does it. Red dragons think they're so damned superior just cause they got fire! And the Blacks with thier acid breath? HA! My old lair is littered with statues of ice that were once foolish adventurers like you cursed wizard!" Greymoran smiles. "Oh without question dragon. You were clearly the better and you have won. Do with us what you wish. Now!" The dragon looks confused for a second, but then his pale white eyes widen when he realizes the "Now!" wasn't directed at him. He begins to turn his head to look at the ceiling.

Noticing the non-action, Jackson moves over to Greymoran and speaks quietly to him.
Sir, what if I were to position the wormhole under a very large icecicle and let it fall onto our friendly neighborhood dragon?

Hudzen also speaks, almost inaudible.
Or let's just send him away. Anywhere but here.

Greymoran sighs and hits a button on a enarby console. The dragon, who by now was looking up at Ahz, and wondering why the elf-looking thing floating above him wasn't doing anything, completely failed to notice that it was beginning to fall into the gravity well of a super-hot planet in another unvierse. By the time it noticed, it was too late. Greymoran looks triumphantly at the ground. "A dragon's greatest weakness is it's ego. Elminster told me that." He looks up, having shifted from happy to angry. "Dammit, Ahz, what the hell were you thinking? With your powers you could've saved us a lot of trouble. Not to mention the fact that we have to get off this deck fairly quickly because opening that portal burnt out the remaining circuits, including life support." Ahz floats to thr ground, and only now does the wizard and his companions notice the stup!d grin on the Wanderers face, and the tiny dart in his neck. Greymoran pulls out the dart and hands it to Jackson to analyze it. Ahz, still in levitation mode, seems blissfully unaware of everything going on around him. "I could use some of that stuff," Keith says to himself.

Jackson inserts the dart into his suit's analyzation compartment, and seconds later, he gets the results.
Looks like a mild seditive combined with a few other minor chemicals... He should be fine in a little while. In the meantime...
Jackson resets and points his Slaynator at Ahz and fires. Instead of something deadly, a rope emerges from he barrel, and wraps itself around Ahz's feet. Jackson removes the rest of the rope from the Slayanator and proceeds to pull Ahz in.
Look, instand kite. Just add floating Wanderer.

Interesting. Come on. We need to get off of this deck and stop Grey. Hopefully, he doesn't have anymore big surprises for us. But I wouldn't count on that.

The bottom half of Grey's monstorsity, inlcuding the lowest levls of the command strcture are now deply imbedded n the dimensional chaos of the rings around the Avalon system's gas giant. Mnay of Grey's ships are being torn apart by the currents, parts of them ebing spread across the multiverse. But now it seems that the movement has stopped somewhat. Carrie scans the area, adn Ryo-O does the same. They both reach the same conclusion. "The priamry propulsion system must've ben in those lower decks. Emergency thrusters have fired, adn now the station is a sitting duck. We need to escpae now Ryo-O," Carrie says. "We need to find Cpatian Redding and the fleet." "But what of Aaz and the others?" "They can take care of themselves. besides we need to help Sorik too. I'll patch myself into helm controls. I can pilot a ship just as well as a humanoid can. But I'll need you to handle the course plotting. We're going to have to go through those dimension riptides to get out of here, and I don't like the prospect of half the ship ending up in an X-Files universe while we end up trapped in Red Dwarf or something."

Greymoran pounded the wall with his fist, forgetting it was still frozen from the White Dragon's fatal breath. It shattered into a million pieces. "Dammit! That was my last healing spell and Ahz is still in his stupor. Jackson, how's Kieth?" "His leg is healing nicely, but if I were a doctor I wouldn't let him walk on it for a few days at least." Greymoran sighs. "Stay with him Jackson. Hudzen, let's find ourselves a working console. I have a plan. It's probably a bad plan, but so far our good ones haven't turned out so great."

Sir, look over there, I think there's a working console! And if it fails, I think I can jury-rig a temporary energy sourse...
Of course, Hudzen or myself may have to hack into the system...
Did anyone else get the feeling that time was frozen for a while?

"It's one of the by-products of frequent dimensional travel. You get used to it. Rig up that console. Check and see if any shuttles or escape pods have taken of since the last time we saw Grey."

Right!
Jackson starts taking pieces from other consoles and connecting them to the semi-working console. Consulting his handy Cybertec catalog, he orders an energy source. Soon, a small canister appears on the floor. Jackson connects it to the console, and the console lights up.
Well, that should give us power for quite a while... 5 years, at least... I've also connected the other console functions to this one, so you have access to all systems.
A few shuttles and pods have taken off, but were ripped apart by the dimensional forces below us. Grey seems to be two floors below us, in a room that's protected by the dimensional tides. It also seems that the room is also an escape pod, so we may not have much time. I think we can prevent it from launching from here, but I might need Hudzen's help.

"Protected by the tides? I think you mean from, but I'm not sure if that's even possible. The rings are notoriously unpredictable. Lock down all escape pods and shuttle decks. And make sure it's Grey! He may not be the only human on this ship, besides us of course."

Ok... escape pods and shuttle decks... locked down.
As for the figure in the protected room... it seems to be Grey's biosignature, but the sensors can be fooled...
Getting into the security camera system... hmm... the room seems to have its own camera system... bringing up the image...
On the console screen, the image of Grey appears. Jackson turns up the sound, and the group hears Grey coordinating escapes, and generally running the remainder of the station from his location. He casually glances at a screen, jumps in suprise, then looks at the camera. Pulling out a weapon, he fires at the camera, and then there's nothing but static.
Somehow he knew we were watching him, so he shot the camera... I don't know if he'll stay down there or not, but that's one of the safe rooms on here. We can't use the transporters to get down there, with all the dimesional interference around, so we're going to have to walk down there... either that, or make our own doors...
For emphasis, Jackson picks up his Slaynator and meaningfuly hefts it.

Greymoran shakes his head. "No. You stay here with Keith, and find a way back to the ship. Hudzen and I will take care of Grey." "But, fath-" "It's my call to make son. Get Keith back to the Archangel, and find Redding and the fleet." "But what if you two are trapped here afterwords? You'll be destroyed with Grey's station and all his ships." "And if all four of us are killed, Grey could escpae and rebuild his war machine, and millions more innocents could suffer. We can't afford that risk." Jackson sighs, and turns around to open a small portla that would take him and Keith back to the ship. Then he suddenly realizes something as his eyes pass over a sensor console. "Um, where's the ship?" Greymoran chuckles. "Well, it looks like Carrie and Ryo-O have already found a way out." he begins to wave his hands in an intricate pattern. "Jackson, are any of those ships out there currently unoccupied?" "Well, let me se. Yes, there's a small Klingon Bird of Prey docked to the command center, a few levels down. It has Blue Fugate markings, and some seirous hull damage, but the bridge looks intact. Do you think Grey captured thi-" before Jackson could finish his thouyght, Greymoran had finished his teleportation spell. Jackson and Keith were now on the Bird of Prey. Hudzen walked over and hit a button the disocnnected the ship from the command structure of Grey's battlestation. "Even if we die today Captain Greymoran, we will take the traitor with us." "I'm running out of spells Hudzen. So I want you to understand, if anything goes wrong, you will have to ignore your security programming. If it comes down to choosing between killing Jake Grey, and saving me, you must go with the former." Greymoran sighed, and pulled out his gem studded mace, a weapon he hadn't used in what seemed like ages. "Come old friend. It is time to save the multiverse."

Keith, take a station. I'll sit in the command chair and we'll do what we can.
Both men sit. Jackson extends spikes from both wrist gauntlets, a la Robocop, and inserts them into the controls on the chair. This allows him to control most, if not all, ship fuctions from his suit. Issuing a command, Jackson is launched into a virtual environment which lets him interact with functions that he has control of. The first thing he does is close off all areas of the ship that contain hull breaches.
Jackson to Carrie and Ryo-O, if you can hear me, please respond.

Hudzen silently follows Greymoran.

Carrie: I'm trying dammit! The port thrusters won't respond! There's something jamming one of them and the others have enacted some kind of fail safe program I didn't know about. •••••• XDCA programmers! If any of them are still alive I'll kill 'em!

Ryo-O: Calm down Carrie. Most of the ships around us have powered down their wepaons and have shunted all that power to their sheilds, likely afriad of the dimensional currents. Now I think I've spotted an opening at coordinates 42 Mark 169. I've angled us for it, just punch the rear thrusters. And hurry.

Carrie: OK, OK, I'm on it. Geez, you'd think this would be easier, us both being computers and all. I've got Sorik secured so we know he won't break. Any word from Ahz?

Ryo-O: Yes. I transported him to the lab when I reestablished the link and learned he's been drugged.

Carrie: Drugged? How?

Ryo-O: Not sure. The hole in the dimensional current is closing fast Carrie. Go to impulse.

Carrie: Inside a massive curved space station, are you mad?

Ryo-O: Quickly Carrie!

Carrie, muttering: Must go faster, must go faster, must go faster...

Ryo-O: BRACE FOR IMPACT!

The ship shudders as it slams throguh the small clear hole in the rings, taking the Archangel, or at least most of it, into clear open space, and, due to the unique nature of the rings, safely out of range of the enemy station's wepaons, despite being rather close. Any attempt to explain this to a human would likely drive them insane, but being hyper-intelligent, Carrie and Ryo-O are able to cope easily.

Carrie: Oh dear.

Ryo-O: What is wrong?

Carrie: 1/4th of our Starboard nacelle is gone! The dimensionla currents must've caught it. I wonder where it went.

Ryo-O: No sense in worrying about it Carrie. Can you locate the Revanche?\

Carrie: Working on it as we speak. I just hope the others are OK.

Greymoran and Hudzen came upon a fork in the corridor.
Hudzen: If I'm reading this right, both corridors will meet up 150 meters ahead. I suggest we split up and take a corridor. That way we can neutralize any threats that may be in these halls.
Greymoran nods.
Greymoran: Okay, Hudzen, you go right, I'll go left.
Hudzen nods.
Greymoran: See you on the other side.
Hudzen takes off, quickly running down the corridor and scanning for any threats. He sees him before he emerges. One of Grey's officers in and exosuit. The officer steps out with the suits gun pointed toward Hudzen. Hudzen quickly grabs it with his remaining arm and shoves the man into the nearby wall.
Hudzen: Durante.
Durante smiles.
Durante: Hey, traitor. Going to kill Grey?
Hudzen nods.
Durante: You know I can't let you do that.
Hudzen: You know that you won't stop me.
Durante smiles again. We'll see. He pushes Hudzen off, shoving him to the wall on the other side and causing Hudzen to drop the rifle he was carrying. With the suit, he is as strong if not stronger than the one-armed Hudzen. He tries to punch Hudzen, but the robot ducks just in time, the force leaving a large dent in the wall. Hudzen hits Durante in the midsection several times, knocking him back before grabbing one of the arms of the exosuit and slamming it against the wall, completely destroying the already damaged gun.
Hudzen: No more guns.
Durante head butts Hudzen in response knocking the robot back then kicks him in the leg, causing the robot to fall onto one knee. He brings both arms up to slam onto Hudzen's head but the robot stops him before he can follow through. Twisting Durante, Hudzen puts his back to Durante's back and slams the exo-wearing officer backward into the wall. He then begins to pull on the exosuit's arm. Durante has to let go of the controls to prevent his arm from coming off with the exo's arm when Hudzen rips it off of the body. Hudzen picks Durante up and slams him into the ground before ripping the front of the exosuit off and pulling Durante out. He holds the struggling officer up off the ground by the neck.
Hudzen: This is where your service to Grey ends. He throws him into the bulkhead and turns to his rifle which is lying nearby. Noticing that Hudzen isn't paying attention, Durante pulls out a small blaster that he had hidden. Hudzen sees it and quickly moves to knock it out of Durante's hand. This is taking too much long, he thinks. He reaches out, grabs Durante's neck and snaps it. Durante's lifeless body falls to the floor. Hudzen grabs his rifle and Durante's small blaster and continues to run. Seconds later, he meets up with Greymoran.
Captain, any trouble?

"Just some Kobolds and Goblins. Once I fried their leader with my last magic missile, the rest showed the kind of loyalty typical to their kind." The wizard smiled. Hudzen smiled back. "So, how many died trying to escape?" "About a dozen. You know how retreating Goblins are. They'll stab anything that gets in the way of running away, even their friends."

Hudzen nods before gesturing down the corridor with his rifle.
Shall we?
Greymoran nods and the wizard and robot continue on their way to Grey.

As Jackson struggles to fly the Blue Fugate ship through the currents, he notices something on sensors.
Computer, magnify the object currently on sensors!
The computer does so, and the object is clearly seen.
Keith, does that look like I think it is?
Keith: Like part of a spaceship nacelle?
Jackson: Yep. Looks like it came from...A Defient class Federation starship... more precisely, the Archangel...Either she's been totally destroyed, or...
Keith: Hold on, I'm reading an ion trail... from inside the Space Station! It looks like Carrie. The trail leads to what looks like a recently closed dimensional hole... They could have escaped that way...
Jackson: I see now...The energy readings from that spot are similar to ones on the piece of nacelle...Now, is there any way we can escape, too...
Keith: Sensors show another hole opening! Don't know if it leads to where we want to go or not, though...
Jackson: It's a risk we have to take. There are dimensional sensors, a dimensional communicator, and a small portal generator aboard, so when we get through the hole, we can find Carrie and help her find the Revanche!
With that, Jackson enters the commands, and the ship heads for, and goes through the hole without major incident.
Jackson: Keith, where are we, and can you find Carrie?

Keith sighs. "Look out the window. It just dumped us back in the station, only on the oppsotie- hold on, enemy ships firing!" "Sheilds up!" Jakcson yells but Keith raises his hand. "Wait, they're not shooting at us! They're blasting the hull. I think we're being hailed. Visual comm isn't working, so at least we won't have to fake that." "Judicator to Klingon ship. Master Grey, are you on board? The station has started drifting downwards, and the doors to eixt are jammed. We're attempting to blast our way out. Can you read?" Keith looks back at Jackson. "What do we do Jack? We only have three torpedoes on baord, and only one working disruptor. Grey picked this thing up in really bad shape, and he obviously never got around to fixing it. They outnumber us two to one." The call repeats. "Bird of Prey, please respond! The Arhcangel has gone missing, and we've regsitered hevay weapons fire in the command center! Master Grey are you still with us? Where is TorGal?"

While Jackson was busy working on a beleivable bluf that would allow him and Keith to escape, and Carrie and Ryo-O were searching for the Revanche and the rest of the fleet, Greymoran stopped Hudzen in his tracks. "Wait, do you hear that?" Hudzen looked around. He too had noticed the strange noise coming from the roof of the hallway they were walking down. It was dark, with the only illumination comming from Hudzen's wrist-light. The noise sounding like someone walking, but it was on the roof. "Perhaps someone on the deck above us?" the robot suggested. Greymoran shook his head. "No, I don't think so. It sounds like it's on this level." He patted the ehad of his mace with his free hand and conitnued looking around. Please Gods don't let it be a vampyre, he thought to himself. He had a spell available that could seriously hurt, maybe even kill any vampyres that attacked him and Hudzen, but the fact was it was the only offensive spell he had left to him. Suddenly, behind them, a hideously pale figure dropped from the ceiling behind them, having been completely hidden by the shadows. Hudzen immediately broguht his wrist-light around pointing it into the cretaure's eyes. The vampyre stumbled back, but he was a strong vampyre, and it only took him a second to recover. Enough time for an unseen swing of Gryemoran's mace to connect with his jaw, sending him flying backwards to the floor.

-

Meanwhile, hiding in the engie room, Jake Grey was screaming at his captains to stop their efforts to abandon the station. But the fact was his people, or most of them at least, were leaving him. Even that damaged Klingon Bird of Prey he'd taken as a trophy of his last incursion against the Blue Fugates was drifitng away, probably holding any command center crew lucky enough to have survived Greymoran's sudden assault. "At least their Wanderer isn't going to be a rpoblem for awhile," he noted, gently stroking his tranq-gun filed with the od liquid that had such a humourous intoxicating effetc on Ahz. He smiled when he noticed that the Archangel herself was gone. "Good," he said aloud to no one in particular "It looks like it got blown to pieces. I'll have to admonish the captain who disobeyed my orders with a medal and a promotion." He chuckeld evily. The three vampyres and the Magic Golem who stood guard near the door had no reaction. The vampyres ha dlong ago lost their sense of humor, and naturlaly the Golem never had one to begin with. The Romulan engineering crew just ignored him, and got back to their task of trying to get the station running again.

-

In a panic, Keith Yeager did something he'd never done before. He superceded a superior officer in what was tehcnically a combat situation. "Judicator, TorGal is dead. We lost track of Master Grey back on the station. I think his White Dragon got him." he said, hoping that it didn't sound like the total lie it was." A moment's pause. "Bird of Prey, you appear to be damaged. Will you need help geting out? We've managed to melt away a couple of the station's outer doors. Several smaller ships are already headed out towards the rendevous areas." Keith had no idea what that meant, but Jackson nodded for him to continue. "Our engines are just fine, it's our weaposn that're useless. Mind if we tag along?" Jackson wanted to shout at him, but bit his lip instead. "No prob Bird of Prey. Name's Farragamo by the way. We probably never met since I've never been in the command center before." Keith laughed, when in reality he wanted to breath a sigh of relief. Odds were he could use just any made up name he could think of and get away with it. This guy wouldn't know the difference. "Name's Roland. I worked in engineering." There was a nother pause. "Realy? I heard that grey's engine crew was entirely Romulan." keith panicked for a second, but the voice of the Captian of the Juicator came back. it sounded jovial enough. "Oh well. That's rumor for you. Master Grye desginated several points for the fleet to go if we ever got into toruble and to split. I'll send you the coordinates where I'm going. Most of the SWU ships will be going with us. Do you wanna come, or go with one of the STU ship groups?" Man this guy is stup!d, Keith and Jackson both thought at the same time. "We'll catch up with you. We need to reconnect our dimensional drive," Keith lied. "Jeez, that ship took a bigger beating than I thought. I wonder what Master Grey's hard on for the Blue Fuagtes is about anyway. They're just a bucnh of half-brianed pirates." Keith shrugged,t hen remembered the visual snesors were disconnected, and was glad at that. "I don't ask," he said aloud. The cpatian of the Judicator laughed. "OK, meet you at XFU9." Keith smiled. "Got it," he said then ended the communciation. Jackson smiled. "We'll meet you there, and so will the rest of the fleet you bastard. Keith, check adn see if any of Grey's ships are staying. Some of them may be unmanned. I want to try and get them out of here. If we can slavage anything it'll make rebuilding the XDCA a bit easier."

-

Ryo-O had found the Revanche and the rest of the fleet, and Carrie was ready to activate the dimensional drive. The problem was, they didn't know yet what universe they were in, and that was going to make claculations difficult. "Are you sure you can't find anything that'll tel us where we are Ryo-O? No XDSs or anything? No identifiable signals from any planets or ships withing long range sensors?" Carrie said. "Not on this ship's sensors Carrie, but mine are superior. I shall give them a try."

Where's a stake when you need it?
The vampyre jumps up in time to see Hudzen run at it, He grabs it and takes it down in a hard tackle to the floor.
I guess I'll just have to twist your head off your neck.

Hudzen picks the vampyre up by the shoulder and slams it back into the ground. Only lightly hurt, the vampyre kicks Hudzen off before jumping up again, grabbing Hudzen, and throwing him down the corridor. He turns toward Greymoran to see mace flying toward him again, once again making very uncomfortable contact.

Jackson sighs to break the tension.
Good job, Keith. Couldn't have done it better myself.
Now we just have to find out where Carrie and Ryo-O ended up, join them, and tell the fleet where the bad guys are going...or something like that...
As for getting the other ships out, it sounds tricky, but I bet it could be done.

Keith nodded in full agreement, wincing as the pain in his still impaled leg came back in waves. Jackson got up to help but Keith waved him off. "I'll be allright. Just go see if there is anythign resembling painkillers on this ship. I'm going to use the time I bought to find out what universes Grey's fleet, or what's left of it, are going to." "Good call Yeager. There may be hope for you yet," Jackson replied jokingly.

-

"Found them!" Ryo-O yelled excitedly. Ahz, finally coming out of his durg induced stupor groans and covers his ears. "That's great Ryo-O! If we were both humanoid I'd kiss you!" Carrie replied with excitement. Then a thought struck her. "Um, found what?" "XDSs. We're in RDU7 again." "Really? Wow, what're the odds. Never mind, don't calculate that, Redding adn the fleet should be in the unvierse we left them in, but let's double check our records to make sure. It'll only take a second and a half."

Now, if we were able to hack into what remains of the Station computer, we might be able to find the command codes for those ships and use them to our advantage.... I might not have Hudzen here to help, but I think I can do it...
With that, Jackson disconnects himself from the ship's functions and reconnects to the computer system. From there, he establishes a link to the station computer. What he finds is not pleasent.
Keith, there's interference everywhere around here! I think the dimensional crazyness has affected the computer...hold on, I think I found something.
From Jackson's point of view, he sees a now unencrypted file dealing with the command codes of all the ships in Grey's fleet. Probing a little more, and with a few close calls, he locates and captures the codes for the various ships that are unattended.
First, It looks like most of those ships are unmanned.
Second, Keith, I'm sending a copy of the command codes to your station. I'm going to see if I can cause a few portals to appear so we can take these ships!
Hmm.. the dimensional sensors still work... I've found Carrie and Ryo-O... If we do this right, we can free the ships and send them into a portal, right into the unverse Carrie and Ryo-O are!
With a little work and a lot of luck, they manage to gain control of most of the ships. Jackson manages to open a dimensional portal against a wall of the docking bay, and the ships are sent through. with the ships is a message from Jackson explaining the situation. Unfortunatly, these actions attract the attention of the few manned ships remaining, which start to approach our heroes.

"Oh that's just great, With one working disruptor and three torpedoes, this'll be over faster than the good parts of Unfaithful?" "Huh?" "It's a movie I saw in my 20th Century History course at the Academy. Didn't you take that course, or at least the original Tacoman did? Anyway, the only good parts were the sex scenes and those were over pretty fast. The rest of the flick, including the acting and the plot were terrible. My professor in that class made us watch all of Adrian Lyne's movies becuase he hated them so much and he wanted us to hate them too. I actually kind of liked Fatal Attraction in a sick sort of way." "That's great Keith. Now could you do evasive manevuers please? Those ships are within firing range!"

-

The stunned vampire got up to find himself covered from head to toe with a burning itch. Greymoran had extended his holy symbol of Helm, the God of justice from his home universe. The distacne from his home planet of Faerun weakend it consdierably but the effect it, plus the bright light from Hudzen's wrist-light was hurting the vampyre a good deal. But not enough. It was tsill coming towards the wizard and the robot. "Not good," Gryemoran muttered. He leaned forward, surprising the vampyre who'd assumed the wizard would simply run away. Greymoran took advantage of the surprise and pressed the symbol right into the skin of the vampyre's forehead. Steam began to billow out from the point of cotnact and the vampyre screamed, and ran away, far down the opposite end of the corridor, away from where Gryemoran and Hudzen were headed. "He's probably going to look for help. We should move fast."

Keith, now that we have the codes, we can get them to lower their shields or even self destruct!
And look here, there's two or three unmanned ships that we havn't removed yet.
Keith: So what?
Jackson: Just watch!
With that, Jackson enters the codes for two of the approaching ships, locates their shield frequency, and programs it into the Bird of Prey's torpedos. At the same time, he gains control of the remaining unmanned ships, has them raise their shields, and gives the order to fire at the manned ships.
Keith, at my command, fire torpeoes and disruptor at the manned ships' weapons. At the same time, I'll fire the unmanned ships' weapons at the same places.
Keith, Fire!

Captain Redding ended yet another unsucessful call for aid with a heavy sigh. The XDCA fleet now consisted of 4 dozen fully operational Starfleet vessels, made up of rag-tag groups of survivors from the STUs that had been so thoroughly violated by Grey and his minions. A small number of ships from B5Us, SWU, and WCUs were there as well, but even combined they made up less than 10% of the total fleet, and the ultiamte strike agaisnt Grey at Avalon was mere minutes away, ever since Carrie and Ryo-O had managed to contact them. It had been difficult, but ultiamtely Redidng conivnced them to take the Archangel to a repair dock. It wouldn't be much good in a fight, and Ahz and Sorik needed to be treated. The concerned chief of security Haer'Dalis stood next to Redding after the last call Redding made before the scheduled go time. "The Callahanians backed out too?" Redding sighed. "I get the impression they don't like us. Not sure why, but what can one do about it? The LICC was right out because they've got several cremen missing, and it would be just rude for me to call them away from that. I hope they find Quantum Man okay. From what Mr. milkshake siad he was a nice fellow. The Space Marshalls are bogged down in a corruption scandal, and don't even get me started on the Spelljammers." Redding rubbed his eyes. He was tired, but he simply could not afford to go to sleep, despite the contstant nagging of the Revanche's EMH. "We have to go now." haer'Dalis nodded agrement, but still looked worried. "Sir, what of Mr. Yeager, Mr. Dupree, Hudzen, and Greymoran?" Redding lowered his head. The happiness of the triumphant return of the St. Helens with a full crew compliment, and plnety of supplies to get some of the damaged ships up and ready for battel had completly worn off over the past several hours, and things were about to get worse. "Unless they can take control of the Macedonia 2, we have to assume the worst. They may have to beocme casualities of war." The bridge of the Revanche went silent. Most of them, in fact most of the survivors of Grey's campaign of terror had begun to look up to Greymoran and his crewmates as heros, almost as gods amongst them. Once considered a curse of a name, the Archangel had in recent months come to symbolize hope. The prospect that half of her valiant crew could be killed didn't sit well with anyone. Redding stood up, and looked determinedly at the screen. "All right, no more dilly dallying folks. Set a dimenisonalc ourse for Avalon system. This war ends today, or never."

Keith and Jackson yelp triumphantly as their Bird of Prey glides out of the station with a small fleet of empty ships quietly in two. The victory is short lived when several enemy vessels open fire on thier impromptu convoy. Since the empty ships are controlled by an 'exhausted' computer, none of thema re able to avoid the hits, and several are crippled or destoryed. Jackson orders Keith to fire those ship's weapons. Kieth tries. "Dammit, the nemy vessels are too maneuverable. They're picking apart the ships we're stealing," he says. Suddenly an explosion rocks the ship. Jackson manages to steady himself by grabbing the sdie of his chair. He walks over to Keith's console. "This is really bad. We just lost our one disruptor. We're going to have to try and outfly them," he tell Keith. The two of them look out at the screen at the several mid-sized warships closing in for the kill. "Man I wish Rita were here," they both said. Suddenly, a portal opens ahead of them, and a massive fleet of ships comes out, led by a Klingong Vor'cha class cruiser and a Wing Commander Vesuvius-class carrier. The ships that were firing on Keith and Jackson's commandeered Bird of prey turned around to greet the fleet. Jackson winced, fearing that this was the bulk of Grey's fleet returning. Only after the fleet opens fire on Grey's ships turning them into powder does Jackson's brain register the fact that Jake Grey didn't have any WCU carriers inside his station. "Enemy Bird of Prey," a familiar voice says over the ship's comm system, "Surrender yourselves and prepare to be boarded." Jackson and Keith smile and leap into each other's arms, hugging like two castaways finally being rescued. They yelp adn shout with glee. Keith hits the comm button as the Revanche closes in. "Captain Redding! It's us! Keith Yeager and Jackson Dupree!"

-

Hudzen tugged and pulled while Greymoran watched his back. The door to the engineering section had ben sealed shut. The wizard and the robot were certain that Grey was on the other side. "C'mon, c'mon," Greymorna murmered impatiently. Although he had wounded that one vampyre badly he didn't want to take the chance of it coming back with friends. Hudzen gave a groan as he pulled. The door began to come slightly lose, but immediately shut again, pinching one of Hudzen's fingers. He yelled, but out of frustration, not pain.

Soon Keith and Jackson are aboard the Revanche discussing their situation with Captain Redding.
...and so Keith and I managed to hold off the bad guys with only a damaged Bird of Prey, our wits, and some good use of the empty ships' command codes. The other empty ships are presumably still in the dimension we sent them to.
Now, have you been able to locate Greymoran, Hudzen, or Grey in that mess out there?

Redding shook his head. "The station, or what's left of it, is still deep in the rings. It's going to make an attack plan difficult, but if as you say most or all of Grey's fleet is gone it won't be too terrible, though we'll still have to worry about the station's defenses." "I wouldn't," Jackson chimed in. "The command area is a wreck."

By the way, one of the times my Cybersuit was connected to the Station's computer, I was able to download the schemetics of the station, just in case.
Jackson plugs his wrist gauntlet into a nearby console, which starts displaying information about Grey's station.

Hudzen, still frustrated, punches his arm into the door's control panel. He sticks his arm in and begins to fiddle around with the controls.
Greymoran: Hudzen, I don't think that's going to-
The door pops open a few inches. Hudzen grabs it and begins to push until it's big enough for him to squeeze through.
Greymoran: Never mind.
He follows Hudzen through, only to come face to face with another door.
Hudzen: I really do hate that man.

Jake Grey was very nervous. Everything had gone wrong. The only piece of equipment still working on his station was the warp drive, and that was beginning to fail. His defensive weapons were mercifully on a seperate power supply that had been left untocuhed by everything that had gone badly. He could hold of the incoming XDCA flet for a few minutes at least. Time for him and his Romulan engineers to get on the one remaining shuttle craft on the station. Sadly, it looked as though Hudzen and Greymoran were close top busting down the remaining door between him and them. He hoped desperately that his Golem and the Vampyre could hold them. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity of flickering, the lights finally went, and the red glow of emergnecy lights filled the engine room. All of the Romulans who had been working feverishly to get the station moving and out of the rings sighed dejectedly. Grey sighed himself. "Two battle stations in one month. Wrongway Peachfuzz has a better track record. All right, head for the shuttle. Golem, protect the door at all costs."

-

The door was flimsy, but it was made of a strong enough material to merely flex when Hudzen punded on it wiht his one good arm. Greymoran took to pounding on it with his mace as well. Finally, a crack began to show. This door was obviously not intended to repel inturders, merely to give the illusion that's what the person inside wanted. They leanred this the hard way when a large arm made of glowing blue flame punched through the crack in the door, and and yanked Hudzen through. The robot and the door were thrown hard into the inactive warp core. Greymoran ducked as the Magic Golem swung around, and Greymoran swung his mace. He connected so hard with the monster's kneecap he nearly lost his grip on the weapon, which had no effect. Greymoran at first had assumed this to be a Fire Elemental and that the blue glow was a trick of the light, but now he understood what had gone wrong. A Magic Golem could not be harmed by magically enhanced weapons, and Gryemoran's mace had ben imbued with the power to enhance his physical strength for an hour a day. Jake Grey, standing near an open door that led to an emergency landing bay where five Romulan men and women were boarding a shuttle, laughed. "Well, well, if it isn't my old and dear friend, in the flesh." Greymoran dived to avoid another crushing blow from the Golem. Five Vampyres fell from the ceiling, exposing thier fangs with undisguised delight at the propsetc of fresh blood. One vampyre was soon utterly surprised to find it's head being wrneched from it's neck by a very banged up and very angry gleaming black robot. "GET GREY! I'LL HOLD THEM OFF!" Hudzen shouted.

The St. Helens moved in first, slightly ahead of the Revanche. The Macedonia 2's auitomated defnsive weapons fired, but were unable to get a solid lock. The massive carrier fired, taking out several of the station's larger weapons which hadn't been able to fire due to the power loss the fortress had suffered. The Revanche and a small group of Star Wars ships moved in and began pummeling at some the smaller holes in the outer structure of the station. Bit by bit, the station began it's collapse. "I jusyt hope my father and Hudzen can make it out," Jackson muttered nervously.

Sir, according to sensors, much of the bottom sections of the station have been ripped apart by the dimensional eddies! Hold on.. something's coming through the rings...
It appears to be a large piece of furniture... sensors identify it as a Chesterfield sofa... it's being followed by two matching chairs and a footrest. Dimensional sensors indicate that that part of rings are intersecting a Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy universe...HGG42, to be exact...

Hudzen was thrown against the bulkhead again. Hard. He'd hoped to avoid the Golem until he got rid of the vampyres, but that was proving to be very difficult indeed. Despite getting rid of two vamps, the fact that he was fairly damaged and one-armed still put the odds in his opponents' favor. At least they were coming after him rather than chase after Greymoran.

Come on you guys, is that the best you can do?

One of the vampyres responded, spinning and sending their foot toward Hudzen's head. It made contact with the left side of his face, hitting so hard that it ripped his flesh off, exposing the robotic parts beneath.

Ouch. You're going to regret that.

The vampyre smiled and charged. Hudzen grabbed him and used his momentum to slam him into the wall. He then threw the vampyre into another that had been advancing. They landed near a still working console. The third vampyre tackled Hudzen. She seemed to be stronger than the one he had just faced since she was able to hold him down as the Golem came for one final blow. The golem lifted his arm up for one more crushing hit on Hudzen, but the robot managed to get his wrist out and activated his light, shining it into her face. She recoiled and the Golem's swinging arm made contact with her skull. Hudzen didn't wait for her to disintegrate into dust. He leaped up and threw himself into the Golem, pushing it toward the other two vamps. As one of the vampyres stood up, he was hit by the Golem and Hudzen and pushed into the console. It exploded, sparks flying all over the vampyre and electricity shooting through his body before he disintegrated.

That's what he gets for using ST-technology workstations.

The Golem tried to hit Hudzen again, but the robot dodged, quickly backing away. As the Golem stood and began to advance toward the robot, the remaining vampyre leapt to the ceiling, holding back behind the Golem, most likely to avoid the fate of his colleagues.

Grey was close to the rear door of the shuttle, but at the last moment decided to turn around. He saw he wizard, mace still in hand, barreling towards him as fast as his tired legs would carry him. Jake Grey was so close to escape. His hand was touching the console that opened the door. Instead he asked for a disruptor. A Romulan women handed it to him, and Grey held it tightly in the least damaged of his two artificial hands. He pointed it at the wizard, who suddenly dived forward, hurling his mace as he hit the floor and the bolt of the plasma weapon sliced throguh his cloak, painfully nicking his shoulder. Greymoran felt a nerve sever, and his pinky and ring finger on his left hand began twitching painfully and uncontrollably. The flying weapon struck Grey full in the chest, knocking him backwards. His foot caught on the ramp to the shutle, and his ankle twisted as he fell to the ground, a good half-dozen feet, to land on the already damaged right hand, snapping it off at the wrist. Grey began to hobble back to the ramp of the shuttle, but Greymoran began a cahnt. His last spell. Grey turned around, and grabbed for the disruptor on the floor. He made the mistake of looking at the wizard as the spell completed.

-

Hudzen and the Golem were taken aback by the glare. it was as if pure unfiltered sunlight as it would be seen if you were only a football field's distance away from an actual sun seemed to fill the room. Or that's how it felt to the vampyres that were somehow still alive despite the damage Hudzen had caused them. Their skin peeled, adn they shrieked with terror as their bodies were burnt away by the light. Hudzen heard Grey scream as the man was temporarily blinded, heared the whine of a shuttle door closing, and the hum of it's enignes as it began to take off. The magic Golem merely stood there, the stup!d creature unable to comprehend what happened. It swung blindly, angrily, trying to figure out why it couldn't see the tall hard thing it had been hitting before. Hudzen's artifical eyes that had beend esigned to look human were completely useless now, but he ahd other ways of seeing. The magic Golem was an almost lovely shade of blue in the robot's infravision mode.

-

The station began toc rumble. Redding was amazed at quickly the batte had ben won. What few manned ships loyal to Grey there were had been destoryed with minimal damage, and, so far at least, no serious injuries were beign reported. But now Reding had another concern. He winced as the sensors showed a large chunk of what had been a door to the interior of the massive station broke off and sliced through the bottom of the command structure. Sensors showed life-signs in that area, but none human. Still, the crew of the Revanche, Keith, and Jackson were very worried. At first Redding had ordered them to go in, to try and beam Greymoran and Hudzen out, but in doing so they came perilously close to being blasted out of the sky by a chunk of the station so huge not even the ship's sheilds would've stopped it. The piece floated into the rings, and was promptly shredded across the multiverse.

-

Hudzen and the Golem punched at the same time. Hudzen's shot was placed very carefully and did it's job. The Golem's was blind dumb luck, but it did it's job well. The Golem's head came clean off. Hudzen's non-magically enhanced arm hurt the beast with every hit, and this one got it in it's rather thin neck. The Golem's fist hit just the right spot, or in Hudzen's case, the wrong spot. The robot shut down, and went into self-repair mode. With all the damage he had suffered over the past 12 hours, he would be out for days. Maybe longer.

-

Greymoran had one good arm that he could still hit with. He also knew a bit of tae kwan do, so if he had the right amount of room he could kick pretty good. Grey also had only good arm, but despite his mastery in numerous forms of unarmed combat, his left leg was entirley useless. Plus, all he could see at the moment were brgiht colored dots. Greymoran's Sunray spell had done just what he'd intended it to do. But sadly, his amce was gone. The shuttle that had taken off had closed it's door just after Grey had been hit, and the mace had fell inside of it. He alternated his gaze between the broken man in front of him, and the shutle above him as it swerved to avoid hitting the flaling chunks of the station's outer hull, of which there seemed to be a lot. He only then realized that the deckw as shaking, and he knew he had to act fast. He couldn't allow event he most remote of possibilities that Grey would survive, even though it seemed almost certain at this point, that both of them were going to die.

-

Jackson spotted the shuttle at the same time Derisa Alex aboard the Revanche did. "Scan that shuttle!" Jackson shouted. He nervously hoped that his father and the security robot were on that, hopefully carrying the dead body of Jake Grey with them. "There are defiantley lifeisgns aboard, five of them I think, maybe six. I can't tell if any of them are hu-" The shuttlecraft exploded. Derisa gasped, and Jackson felt his knees wobble. Redding stood up. The shuttle's fuel cells and impulse drive had been pierced by a long and slender piece of flying debris from the explosions and fissure that opened on the outer hull of the Macednoia 2. "Derisa," he said, "please tell me there were no human lifesigns on that shuttle." Derisa tearily went back to her console. Her relief was overwhelming when she said. "Romulan sir! All six lifesigns were defintely Romulan. I'm still reading two huamn lifesigns in the command center." Jackson frowned. "Wait, what about Hudzen's signal?" he said. Derisa checked again. She wished she was back at her console handling the weapons, but with Commadner Durgin commanding the U.S.S. Montreal she needed to be a floater. "No sign of robotic activity of any kind. Not even the simplest of repair droids." One of the four massive support beams that held the commande center of the globe shaped battle fortress in place collapsed, and the small ball, now visible through all the debris, began to shudder. Jackson suddenly realized he was holding his breath. Keith stood next to Captain Redding. "C'mon sir, get out of there," he murmered.

Greymoran and Jake Grey locked eyes. Even with the loud vibration of the walls and the floor they were able to maintain the gaze. Grey cracked a smile. His vision had started to clear, and he stared menacingly at what he thought were his opponent's eyes. He was right, but he didn't know that. "So, the prodigal son has returned," he joked. Greymoran stopped forward, his arm still twitching. "I looked up to you Jake. You were my mentor. Radagast's mentor. You betrayed us! You betrayed the XDCA1 You betrayed yourself!" "Betrayed? Bullsh*t, wizard! I'll tell you what betrayel is." Grey forced himself to stand up from his kneeling position, but found it difficult to stand on his sprained ankle. "Betrayal Greymoran is dragging me out of my own daughter's bah mitvah to investigate a fu**ing supernova! And then to not even allow me to return to my home after a dimensional accidnet killed half the population of the Earth I was living on. I wasn't allowed to go to my family's funerals Gryemoran. And then, when I requested some leave time to just talk with one of the XDCA's psychiatrists, they refused! YOU said when they asked you about my mental status, "He just needs to get back into the fold. He'll recover from this. He can recover from anything. He's Jake Grey! He's one of the ebst commanders we have, if not THE best.'" Greymorn was taken aback. He'd said that? He really suggetesd that Grey not be allowed time away from the agency to grive for his family and his friends? How could he have been so callous? Why didn't he remember saying that? "And then I find out it's your idiot brother who said it," Grey continued, spittle flowing from his curled lips as he growled his tirade, not moving an inch from where he stood. "That blow to the head he took in that SWU ruined my life as well as yours. That's why I slipped him those drugs. He was already on the brink before but the durgs I gave him compeltely severed the portions of the brian responsible for emotional stability. I made him go completely mad. He deserved it for what he took away from me! My own sister thought me a coward, a heartless monster for not coming back to Earth. You were there though. You and your wife and your precious teenage son. Jackson Tacoma. What a name for a boy. No wonder he hated you." "BASTARD!" Greymoran yelled and he lept towards Grey, hadns outstretched, ready to throttle this man who had caused so much suffering. The bulkhead buckled, and a piece of the wall slammed into the ground, knocking both man backwards. When Greymoran looked up, the piece of hot sharp metal seperated him from Grey, and he saw no way around it. "A lousy supernova Greymoran. Think about it. The agency you loved so much you came back to defend it from me pulled me away from soemthing so damned important for something that has been seen a billion times in our lifetimes alone! So Igave them somehting worth studying. Somethign worth throwing the science division into a tizzy oiver. I stole the Small Bomb from HGU." Gryemoran gasped when he ehard this. The Small Bo,b had been invented by a super-intelligent computer that had been asked to create the ultiamte weapon. It was very small, but it's effects would be devastating if it were ever used. It would somehow link up to the heart of every sun in a universe, and cause every single one of them to go nova, at the same time, instanteously. "You, you did that? You wiped out that STU. You-" "MONSTER? MONSTER? I am no Monster my old friend, I just merely want is due to me. My universe was taken away from me when my parents, my brother, my wife, my children, my nieces and nephews, all I had was my sister, and she committed suicide after the funerals were complete. After all, all her family was gone, and as far as she was concerned I cared more baout my job than my life, than my home!" Jake Grey was crying as he spoke now. "My universe was gone, so I decided to take yours. ALL OF YOURS! Every universe the XDCA claimed as it's jurisdiction would be MINE! I earned it Gryemoran! For 5 centuries of loyal ••••••• service, I deserved some payback." Greymoran was speechless. He was at a loss for words. There was no question that Grey's anger was justified, but his actions most definitely were not. After what semd like an eternity filled with distant explosions and the sound of tearing metal, he finally spoke. "I idolized you, and you let me down Jake. I wanted to be a hero like you. I joined the Agency because I saw the good you were doing. You are dead to me Jake." No rpely. Greymoran couldn't see much through the jagged chunk of hull that blocked him from where grye was. For a moment he thought the man had managed to escape. But he saw that the other side of the artificial barrier was filled with collpased chunck of the station. He looked up and saw the flickering blue lights of the station's foce sheilds as they held the vacuum of space in check, but not for much longer. He saw a human hand, twitch slightly in the corner of his vision, and he looked down. He saw a hand, but it wasn't moving. He couldn't see much else though. He stpped backwards. A piece of the ceiling fell, and had Gryemoran not turned at the last second to see where that noise was comign from, it would've killed him, instead of sending him and his newly cracked ribcage flying to land next to Hudzen, unconscious.

Ahz sensed Grey nearby. He wasn't dead, but he was close. He had a score to settle with the man, and alhtough he was still a bit woozy from the effects of the drug, he was able to cencentrate enough to teleport himself from the wreck of the Archangel safely docked at a repair station in another universe, to the smoldering remians of Macedonia 2 as it began to sink deeper into the dimensional nether. He onl7y barely noticed the blur of orange and red as Gryemoran was knocked back hard by a fallin structure. The Wanderer turned around, and ducked as a piece of the warp drive violently cracked off and flew past him to embed itself halfway through the wall. The stationw as coming apart. Ahz sighed. "True justice dictates that your end be brought upon yourself Jakob Grey. You die by your own hand now." He ran with incredible grace, dodged flalinf chunkcs of the ceiling as he did so, and he grabbed Greymoran's hand with one hand, and put his other hand on Hudzen's damaged chest, and closed his eyes to concentrate on opening a portal.

The bulk of the XDCA fleet had moved away, but the Revanhce floated there, as close as i dared. Besides, it looked like the station wasn't likely to explode anyway. The center of the command globe was now deep in the rings of Avalon's only gas giant, and the warp drive had likely gone with it. Derisa and Keith sobbed. Oakenshielf and Haer'Dalis, lowered their heads in sadness, while Jackson and Redding simply gawked at the image on the viewscreen of the once mighty battle fortress of Jake Grey being ripped apart and scattered in tiny pieces across the multiverse. "Derisa, are you sure there were no life signs when the command center went?" Redding asked. "Just one faint human lifesign sir," Derisa responded. She heard a beep, then looked at Haer'Dalis's console. The Tiefling went to look at it. "Sir!" he shouted with alarm. "A dimensional portal just off the port bow!" "Bring us about! Derisa prepare to fire-" "WAIT!" she shouted. "It's the Archangel!" Indeed, the battered Defiant-class starship floated uneasily towards the Revanche. The ship was barely staying stbale on thrusters alone, one of it's nacelles still mising. The ship wasn't ready to travel, but that hadn't stopped whomever was in charge from flying it here anywya. "It must be Carrie and Rita," Keith said. "My God, how can we tell them that Greymoran and Hudzen are," he stopped, not quite sure if he should finsih the sentence, especially with Jackson standing right there. "We can mourn for my father later Keith. Just, say hello to your wife." Keith smiled and placea reassuring hadn on Jackson's shoulder. "She's hailing us captain," Derisa said. "Shoudl we repsond?" Redidng looked to Jackson, and Jackson nodded. The scren shifted views from the rings, to the bridge of the Archangel. Rita was in the pilots' seat. Ahx stood next to the cpatian's chair, and in the chair, was something that caused everyone on the bridge of the Revanche to gasp audibly in utter shock and disbeleif. A battered, bloody, and barely awake wizard in red and orange robes sat there, clutching at his wounded chest. "FATHER!" Jackson shouted, and soon the whole bridge crew of the X.S.S. Revanche was cheering with unabashed glee. Greymoran tried to smile, found that it hurt toomuch, adn gave up. "I just wantd to let you know I'm OK. Hudzen was hurt bad. He might ned a new body, but he's alive as well. Grey is defiintely dead." This brought another cheer. Greymoran winced and rubbed his temples. "Not so loud! I'm on heavy piankillers nad high as a kite so shut up adn listen." This broguht a small chuckle. "I'm OK. Honeslty. I just need some bedrest, and maybe some surgery. Now if you'll excuse me, I'll just turn Sorik back into a Vulcan and I can get some much deserved sleep."

Sorik, Ahz, Keith, Rita, a fully repaired Hudzen, and the crew of the Revanche stood on the ruins of what had once ben the capitol building for the XDCA on Avalon. Greymoran stood slightly ahead of them surveying everything he could see. In the few days that had passed since Jake Grey's death, the survivors of the XDCA flocked to Avalon, and just about eveyrone who was capable was contributing in no small way to rebuilding the once beautiful planet. Greymoran hadn't spoken much. Shortly after the EMH of the Revnahce had cleared him to walk around freely again, Redding had informed him that soemthing had gone wrong during one of the Revnahce's battles, and the suspended animation tube that held his twin brother Radagast had been damaged. His brother was dead. Jackson and Hudzen walked up beside him, and joined him in staring at nothign in particular. Redding stepped in front of greymoran adn smiled. "It's magnificant. Soon enoguh the XDCA will be what it once was." "I don't think so Jerry," Greymoran said unexpectedly. Redidng looked confused. So did everyone else, except for Sorik. "Jerry, remember back when you were a Lieutenant, and I was still an Agent, I had to drag you away from your uncle Shawn's retirment party? Jackson, you have my son's memoires, being a clone and all. Do you remember all the times I had to elave becuase the XDCA 'needed' me pressed back into service after my retirement?" "What are you trying to say sir?" Hudzen asked. "The XDCA has doen agood job of bringing justice to XD Pirates. It's done wonders at helping people whose lives have been turned upside down by dimensional anomolies. But as an organization, we've downright sucked in the treatement of our own people when it comes to their families. We're not going to be what we once were ladies and gentlemen." Gryemoran smiled. He simply knew, knew for certain, that the tragic error of Jake Grey would never occur again. "It's going to be better.

~THE END~