| "Thankfully, with this.....Doctor's agreement to help finish what the
Twins of Doom were fortunately able to begin....." Solomon continues before
Melissa interrupts.
"Hey, waita minute," the red headed model says in a semi-crossed voice.
"I and my Betty keep on hearing about us being some type of....what....messenger
of doom?! Now, tell me and tell me straight..... what is going on here.
"I mean, if someone would have told me that by answering that answering
that slightly....unusual newspaper article about an improvisational play....that
THIS is where I'd end up at....I'd have thought them insane! Things just
don't happen like this in the twentieth century...I mean, last time I checked
the calendar it read 1977 and then I, Betty, and this man who likes to
dress like he's going to an opera are bouncing all over time and crazy
things like that! I...."
She'd needed the money desperately, for while she'd gotten a degree
form college, nobody was looking for a degree in Acting, alas, where she
was in need of a job. Finally, in desperation, she'd taken the job offer
in the newspaper (the producer had less than savory rumors floating about
him), gotten through the interview without a hitch. She'd been told that
her understudy would soon arrive, and then things had gotten.....strange!
"1977?" the red headed Betty interrupts, suddenly looking like she just
figured out something. "The seventies? The last time I checked before
we met the Doctor.....when Addventure threw us into the Middle Ages it
had been Thursday. Jan 14 1999, Thursday!"
"Ah....that's when I wrote.....that's when L.E. began.....writing the
episode where Scott Chen.... gained the powers of an Author and threw the
other Authors into Addventure to be.....protagonists in their own stories."
Stacy's Betty whispered. "Then, on February 23, 2000 I met....."
"Them...." Solomon says, tail swishing as he looked up at the startled
looking humans in surmise. "This is....of course, due to the fact that
perhaps either this time machine of yours and this strange place called
Addventure allowed such.....er.....unusual circumstances to take place?"
Melissa and others frown and shake their heads, a bit dizzy from the
sudden revelations. Then Melissa smiles.
"I guess so....and in a way that'd would explain your reaction
to what I chose to wear when this Doctor picked us up," Melissa says with
a smile. "When I answered that this style of dress was.... The cutting
edge in fashion....if not a bit avant garde. A true symbol of a woman's
breaking with the stodgy 1950's idea of what a woman should wear! But I
have a sneaking suspicion....."
"That fashions change from the 70's to the 90's....even the year 2000,"
Stacy puts in.
"I could see that happening," Melissa says, nodding and frowning. Something
about this situation....especially with the destruction of the Doctor's
TARDIS and talk of parallel worlds.....is bothering her for some reason.
She can't put her finger on it, but something strikes her as....ominous
about the whole thing.
"So.....we may have answered some of our questions but there still is
the one you asked me," Solomon says. He then relates the story of
the Twins. He basically says that the Twins were to bring about the ruin
of a leader of a great nation.
"Now from appearances.....it did happen," Solomon says. "But it turned
out to not be so bad as we thought! Somehow, the evil entity inside Trilling
Blackfeather, an evil man by the name of Zular, has been somehow revealed
before it could wreck havoc and poison some officials of a vital meeting
for the formation of a Terran United Nations. That's the story we're going
to push after the.....Doctor......helps rid Zular from Trilling."
"Ah, well I like that idea....more than I like the idea of getting lynched,"
Stacy nods thoughtfully. The others nod in agreement. "I'd hate to see
somebody killed for something they have no control over."
"And if I ever get my hands on Scott....." the red headed Betty mutters.
"He'll wish that he...."
"If you meet the right, one....you mean," Solomon says in a calm
voice. "There are more than one, you know. The one I met saved the
entire Voyager from being assimilated by the Borg by sacrificing his life....and
played a part in bringing a halt to the dreams of conquest by an evil and
bald Janeway...."
(Author's Note: Read episodes 6922 through 6959. I'm not reprinting
it here.)
"Jesus," Stacy whispers hoarsely. Unladylike or not, that was....some
weird tale!
"And you are from the Voyager?" Melissa asks, curious.
"I'm from that Voyager," Solomon qualified. "The Janeway you
spoke with was a Voyager who had the same experience up to a point. That
other Voyager got home through several unlikely occurrences, and then went
back the Delta Quadrant when the Q....beings with godlike powers.....went
and gave them a device to transport the Voyager and her shuttlecrafts...and
ONLY her shuttlecrafts between the Alpha and Delta Quadrant in a flash.
That Voyager went back to explore and to aid a species that the Q said
would Need our help. Then a crewmember went mad and vaporized it
and himself, marooning that Voyager in the Delta Quadrant....again. Then,
through a twist of fate, my Voyager and the other Voyager nearly run into
each other....literally! With jangled nerves, we got a further shock to
discover.....we we're twins down to amazing levels. Both were a combined
crew of humans and furries. Both shared a history up to a point. Then,
when we finally were getting over that shock, the Military showed
up and.....brought both the Voyager home."
"I sense there is more coming," Betty Ragan, Stacy's Betty, says.
"Yes, there is," the demifox sighs. "The Military did drop us off. We
were able to begin to get our lives back in order when......the God D***
Enemy struck! They dropped countless tons of Omega that exploded. It caused
subspace ruptures that prevented warp speed, basically....."
"They made life as you had known it impossible," Melissa says, seeing
it. "Warp drive made stars moths or weeks away.....but now they were years
and centuries away at impulse."
Melissa was at least familiar with the original Star Trek series.
"Yes....and the bastards would have sweep into an analogous spot in
an unbollixed universe where warp drive was possible....raid Federation
and other's resources....including the secret of antimatter warp drive...."
(Author's Note: Read episodes 7311 through 7645 AND episodes 7689 through
7722 for fuller details. The Janeways soon find themselves promoted to
the Admiralty soon afterwards.....).
"And that is why....the Federation wears this emblem instead of the
usual," Solomon sighs, holding up a regular looking Star Fleet Delta combadge....that
has a strip of black material slashed across the front of it. It was masking
tape looking material. The symbolism being that the Star Fleeters were
in mourning.
"And the hell of it that somehow....they stumbled across a cure for
the Phage that the Military had been able to seed throughout various Federation
and other planets," the demifox apprentice mage sighs. "The Brix were always
mysterious and mystical in their views and sciences.....apparently TOO
mystical..."
Uncomfortable silence then fell.
"I'm sorry," Stacy says quietly.
"How about you," Melissa asks, trying to change the subject. "How did
you come to....become a demifox. You mentioned that you used to be.....a
regular human?"
"Oh, this?" Solomon chuckled, pointing to himself (his ears and fox
tail). "Well, I made a mistake. I crashed a Military party, thought that
they were serving Synthahol....I mean they got their initial technology
from that crashed Ferengi shuttlecraft that managed to teleport itself
not....back in time as what happened on that Star Trek show Deep Space
Nine. Rather, it went sideways in time....."
"Like the Doctor in Inferno!" one of the Betty's say, delighted.
"Right," Solomon says. "Now, the ship was in a heck of a mess....and
the teleport had gone badly. Parts of the ship were damaged beyond recognition....which
had some interesting consequences. The Military warship is a ship capable
of warp speed....but it's done by a modified impulse engine fueled with
Tiberium! Strangest mass of engineering I've ever seen, but it works. Warp
engines with either dilithium (or a tiberium substitute) are more fuel
efficient and such. Oh...."
The demifox clears his throat and apologizes for getting sidetracked.
"I offended a few people and got thrown out in my drunkenness. I was
on my way home, running when I ran through my now magic instructor's family.
I tripped over one of his kits. It scared her and angered her brothers
and sisters. They bit me in their anger before their parents could pull
them off. And....."
"They're....some type of lycanthrope?" Stacy asks, suddenly seeing something.
"Without the bestial...evil impulses of the animal within. Another new
apprentice said something about a sense of freedom that'd give her....but
after a long and heated discussion with Demifox Synizn....about
what he went through when he'd been a were-bear under the old style of
lycanthropy....about the times he nearly killed out of impulse.....that
cured her of her mistaken fantasies," Solomon says solemnly. "Now, a demifox
never falls under the sway of the Moon....something a dragon mage called
Minestus did to this brand of lycanthropy. Only time we need worry about
losing control to instinct is.....er.....mating season. That's controllable
with the right herbs and such....."
-
 "Now, that was
interesting but there seemed to be something for the Twin called Betty?"
Solomon says, looking up at the red headed Betty.
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