User:Nighthawkifikation/Time On My Side

Summary
Sol duels the power (quite literally) duo, Brian Storm and Sierra Nevada, while Jules fights a terrible demon of a man.

DESPITE HAVING BEEN FORCED OUT OF HIS TREASURED LATIBULE, JULES DOES NOT CONCEDE DEFEAT. HE IS NOW CLOSER THAN EVER TO DEFEATING APOCALYPSE NOW IN HIS FINAL FORM, DARK NECESSITY. CAN HE DO IT BEFORE TIME RUNS OUT AND THE UNIVERSE ENDS?

Plot
                 “I-I just went to uh…” She stops, trying to think up of a polite way to phrase her recent activities, despite the fact that this particular situation does not call for any form of politeness whatsoever. “Powder my nose…”

                 “Yeah, yeah, I understand. You head in to the bathroom to stick a tampon up your hoo-hah, when all of a sudden, an evil incarnate embodying conquest, war, famine, and death hops out of the toilet and chases you down the hallway.” You muster up a sigh. “This kinda stuff happens all the time in the apocalypse. I take it you’re relatively new to this whole menstruation thing.”

                 You don’t get any laughs for that terrible joke. Instead, you receive two strange looks. Deep down inside, you kinda wish that one, if not both, would kindly just look away. Your face starts to grow red, resembling a tomato.

                 After a few seconds of painful anguish, unrelated to your proximity to your penultimate time-space archnemesis and how it is much closer than you would ever like it to be, your anguish is ended by said archnemesis’s laughter. It’s not really much of a laugh. It sounds more or less like a dying animal wheezing and coughing up various odd-looking bodily fluids through a complicated system of airvents that may or may not even function. Still, it’s a reaction that’s more than most stand-up comedians get nowadays in this terrible post-apocalypse end-of-the-world economy.

                 You give him an odd look in return.

                 “That… That was a good one…” he wheezes. He continues wheezing and laughing for a few seconds as it seems like the fate of the entire world is running off of this deranged lunatic’s nonsensical, inhuman laughs. After a minute or two, his wheezes fade and become much softer, more like whispers emanating from between the gaps in his teeth. He moves a smoking scaly lizard-like claw-hand up to his face and begins to paw under his eyes. His pawing flakes away skin, which falls to the ground like paper that’s been burnt and is now on the borderline of being ash. You think his laughing might have seriously hurt his physiology, as his eyes begin to pour water like a sink’s faucet. You would ask him if he was okay and if he needed a tissue if it wasn’t for the crucial fact that he was your nemesis. You think it’s best to just let him cry for a bit and vent out all of his negative emotions in a healthy way. Though, for this oddball mutant formerly resembling a man, you’re not sure if this is healthy.

                 He quickly waves the lizard hand to

You quickly feel up your shoulder holsters, searching for your pistol. Oh man, if the Karma Police ever found out you had your own MacGuffin before now, Karma Court would’ve had your butt. But now, now you’re going to prove all of those authoritarians wrong.

VS. APOCALYPSE NOW (header thing)

                 He stares at her. You know she’s in deep trouble. You’re protected from most of his powers, because you have a (hope|god) to protect you. Normal biology won’t apply to you. But, her. She’s a lost cause. She’s (rage|godless)

                 “Hmph,” you snort, glaring at the beast before you. “You really think I cared about her?” He stares at you for a few moments, judging you and attempting to decipher your emotions

“That’s a very big river,” Sol stated, peering across a gaping gash that cascaded water across the horizon. It was not exactly a ‘very big’ river, as big is comparative. While you might argue that Sol was comparing the size of the river to one hidden in a vault deep inside his neuron catacombs, you would be entirely correct yet. You apologize for being a terrible narrator and continue along.

                 You boggle vacantly at this filler narration for no longer.

                 “That’s a very big river,” Sol states with inherent accuracy, peering across a gaping gash that cascaded water across the horizon.

                 “Indeed,” Gadsio commented, reinforcing Sol’s belief. Positive reinforcement is a useful function that almost all exceptionally civilized species have come to realize is important. However, some species contort this kindness into a dark magic consisting of lies and deceit known by the name of “sarcasm”. You assure yourself that there is no sarcasm in Sol 10 and there never will be, promising yourself to never ponder sarcasm for the foreseeable future (which, at the time, is a few scenes from now).

                 It was now time for Laika’s thoughts to have a commentary for which to taint the quality of writing and expand the size of this narration until it becomes such a major (or rather relatively minor) pain for the universe to handle or even contemplate.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 If you still do not understand that this was a very wide river, you are implored to please start the episode again. Perhaps you should also buy yourself a pair of corrective eyewear. In fact, corrective eyewear is considered very useful for all works related to Sol 10, regardless to your understanding of the subject matter. Otherwise, you might not see words and would instead find what appears to be mixtures of white and black powder, the product of crushing Oreos, which is probably much more appealing than Sol 10 when your current choices are considered. If you did manage to comprehend the notion that it was a very wide river, you might want to consider buying yourself some bladed eyewear, so that you will not have to read anymore filler and will instead see a large red curtain (do not question the composition of the curtain, it is most certainly not your own blood and you should not taste it).

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “So, remind me, Gadsio. What should we look for on that island?” Sol inquired.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 Gadsio sighed internally, letting his anger vent out through a metaphorical exhaust pipe and enter the void where it welcomed nonexistence. He had told Sol precisely what to do around five minutes ago, but it seemed as if that had not happened at all and the events had been replaced with some sort of meaningless filler inside of Sol’s head.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “Across on that island we will find an abandoned dig site,” Gadsio started, before being interrupted by Sol. Gadsio was not bothered by this interruption, but elated because it meant that Sol was paying attention.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “Why was it abandoned?”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “Funding.”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “Are you sure it’s not because there’s an ancient evil power hidden there?” asked Laika, with the well-being of his friends in mind. For some odd and probably best left unexplained (at this specific point in time) reason, ghosts and other evil spirits always seemed to inhabit creepy, abandoned locations throughout the universe.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “Most likely not,” answered Gadsio with inherent accuracy. Despite the dig site being home to things very ancient and things very powerful, such as the MacGuffin, there were no things that were very ancient AND very powerful. However, the same could not be said about future evil powers. Nevertheless, Gadsio continued.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                   “The plan to cross the river is that I will sit on Laika’s body and use my spear as an oar to paddle us to the island in the middle of that very wide river. Sol, I have no doubts that you will find an ingenious method of crossing on your own accord.” Sol laughed at all of that mental imagery, first imagining Gadsio paddling Laika like a canoe and then imagining a Honda Accord repurposed into a boat. He wished that he knew what a Honda Accord looked like so the joke was even more (or less) hilarious, but alas, Sol was not an automobile fanatic.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “I think I’ll take this one alone,” was Sol’s response.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “Is that a good idea?” asked Laika. It was not a good idea. Sol was a teenager and all teenagers need some sort of guidance in their life and now Sol was electing to go without it. That was not good for his development at all, unless Sol required some time away from his parents to mature, in which case going without guidance is a crucial part of becoming an adult. Adolescent maturation is a tricky thing you don’t yet really understand.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “If you’re really concerned for me or something… Just look at that rock over there!” the boy heroically announced, pointing to a rather-plane looking rock. The rock was exceedingly plane-looking, because superimposed onto it one could find a plane that appeared to be video footage of something happening.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “Incredible! What’s that happening!?” wondered Laika aloud. Clearly, this was no ordinary rock. Ordinary rocks do not have videos embedded, especially on this planet.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 Somehow, Sol understood to manage the language broken manifested question answer and an English for Laika.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “What you see on that rock is specifically what the similar plane on my dapper hat looks like!” Sol clued in, adjusting his rather gentlemanly hat that he had acquired through rather ungentlemanly means. On the center of the white stripe, facing forward, was a similar plane, except this plane saw different footage. It was hidden in such a way that one would have to be looking precisely for it, else they would miss it entirely.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “Ah, I see. The two are ‘linked’ together through some sort of spirit imagery. What you can see through the image on the rock is what the ‘point of view’ of the image on the hat sees, and vice versa.” Sol nodded, thanking Gadsio for his explanation. “But what I wonder is, when did you find the time to accomplish this feat?”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “You guys didn’t notice me transform into that cool looking alien a few minutes ago and do it?” Sol asked, rather disappointed. He was very hyped over that cool looking alien.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “No, I think we were a bit too preoccupied gazing at the utter width of the river yonder,” admitted the ever-observant warrior. He smiled once he realized that Sol had been planning to go on his own all along. Perhaps some time alone would be best for the poor boy with the Omnitrix attached onto his hand. Still, he thought, staring into the plane. He had to keep an eye on the Omnitrix. Its power and tendency for battle made it one of the most dangerous MacGuffins ever created, he was sure of it.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “So, I guess I’ll be going then,” Sol grinned, oblivious to the slightly traitorous thoughts his new spearman friend was making.

<p class="MsoNormal">

<p class="MsoNormal">Sol goes to an island to get pandora’s box, and he gets stopped by Brian and, who are heading after the same juju

<p class="MsoNormal">                 As Airtime hovered in the air, suspended from the sky thanks to his breezy harness, he came upon the realization that recovering the MacGuffin wouldn’t be the hardest part. Two other teenagers were stationed on the same island. Were they guardians of the MacGuffin? Innocent bystanders? Or perhaps, MacGuffin hunters as well? Either way

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “You’ve never been the same without that watch, have you? I wonder where it could be now. What puny, insignificant being I can pry it off of, effortlessly...”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “Don’t laugh at me. One day, the Karma Police will get to you too.”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “But how?” he throws his head back and laughs a tyrant’s laugh. His tongue writhes around in his mouth, salivating, while his eyes roll around like spinning cueballs. When he eventually chokes on his comically large tongue, he coughs up some acidic spit and half-chokes/half-pukes it onto the ground, where it dissolves some of the stone on the floor. You stare back, disgusted. “I’m more powerful than all of Karma Court at this point, Jules. I’m unstoppable.”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 You doubt the truth of that statement, but you don’t want to test it. Karma Court

<p class="MsoNormal">Apocalypse now looks into the screen

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">“There’s no room for all three of us on this island,” the older boy states in attempt to be threatening. His words aren’t threatening, but rather the electricity sparking around his hands is what inspires fear. “But luckily enough for you…” he points towards Sol, his finger still sparking. If he wanted to cause serious damage, he could right now. “There’s all the room necessary in that river.”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">“It’s a very wide river,” Sol backs him up on that statement, confused by his words. They don’t really mean anything. He thinks that he’s trying to be threatening, but his words just fall flat. Luckily, his girlfriend is prepared to explain that to us. She’s a good hypewoman.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">“He’s saying that we’re going to throw you into the river.”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">“Yeah, when we’re done beating you up. Dead or alive,” he threatens, as the sparks on his arms become more energetic and antsy for combat. Sol backs up a bit, hoping to not get killed this soon in his adventure.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">“Preferably alive. Because, you know, we’re not here to murder anyone,” his girlfriend reasoned. All three of them were already trespassing, but no well-do-do law enforcement officer really cares about trespassing. Now, on the contrary, almost everybody would care about the murder of a teenaged boy. She didn’t want to be sentenced with the death penalty this soon in her adventure.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">“You’re sending me some… Mixed messages,” Sol sighed and shrugged, feeling slightly nervous. “But, I guess, if you want a fight…” His mind begins to drain his nervousness, filling it with courage and bravery instead as he raised his fist. “I won’t deny you one.”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">Why’s he laughing? Sol and Laika simultaneously asked themselves, despite being a few hundred or so yards away from each other.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">“You really don’t know what you’re up against, now do you?” Brian answered their question, as he unleashed a maniacal laugh in an extremely threatening matter. He also extended his hand, although this was incorrectly deemed less threatening. Oh how wrong they were.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">Sol almost instantly began to feel the hilt of Excalibur squirm and shiver in his hand, as if it was a bird dying to be set free.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">“If Sol’s not careful, he’ll drop his sword!” shouted the poor, sweet, innocent, precious Laika. Gadsio said nothing but watch with a solemn look on his face.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">Eventually, the MacGuffin blade erupted out of Sol’s hands. “Weak grip,” his opponent taunted, as the blade gracefully flew up in the air, rotating around, and flying straight into the boy and piercing his heart.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"> Feeling his hand graze your dust-covered skin, you feel the need to explain to your enemy why he isn’t getting the satisfaction he so desires.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “I don’t have the time you’re trying to steal from me,” you promptly inform him, as you flex your arm as ever-so-slightly as you can. A spark of light ignites. It’s not much, but it’s certainly enough to accomplish what you’ve planned before. You quickly close your eyes. Your opponent probably wants to take advantage of this position, but really, he won’t be in a position to take anything after this.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 You’ve said it before and you’ll say it again.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 They always forget the star-sparkle skin.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 In seconds, your skin erupts with a blast as hot as the sun itself. Luckily, your plot armor protects you from being hurt. It definitely doesn’t protect him. He instantly recoils from the blast, as he probably should, because you know, solar energy. Shit’s hot. If this doesn’t significantly hurt him, it should at least give him skin cancer, which will hurt him physically if not mentally or financially in a few years. You’d feel bad for him not having any health insurance, because of the whole apocalypse economy and all, but, nah. You don’t feel bad at all. Serves him right for breaking into your house and killing your friends. Well, people who maybe could have been your friends. People who were on the track to being your friends.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">You get the idea.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">As you open your eyes, hoping that the incineration is over and that you won’t instantly blind yourself, you look around. You wouldn’t expect there to be much of anything to look at after a star is literally created and harnessed for power inside of a tower, but hey, it looks like nothing much happened here. I mean, one of your sleeves is gone. You’d say your outfit is ruined, but you consider that maybe sleeveless is just the look that you need in this apocalypse. You’ll have to find a mirror.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">But before you find a mirror to investigate new forms of future fashion, you’ll have to find your opponent’s body. Gotta make sure he’s actually dead.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">And luckily for you, he is. You look down to the ground to find a pile of soot. You’re not sure if stars can even feasibly leave behind ashes, but hey, you’re not going to bother with all the intricacies of astrology right now. There’s always time to be an astrologist once your work as a coroner and author is done. And fashion designer. And charity worker. And radio star. Whatever else you’re feeling, really. You know, global-wide depopulation really does wonders for the job market.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">“Jules…” you hear a smoker’s voice call-out. Maybe it’s one of your aunts. Realistically, it’s not. It’s probably you-know-who, because apparently all villains have to be god damned nigh unkillable. You sigh.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">“Did you really think…”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “Did I really think it would be that easy?” you finish for him, as you summon your revolver once again. “For a second, maybe, but now, no. You know, you’re not really a fun enemy. I think you’re down and all, because no one in their right biology could survive a blast from the sun. And then, hey look. My worst enemy is a sentient pile of ashes. How in hell does that even work?”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “How the hell does that work, you wonder? A good question.” the pile of ashes speaks, as you notice a surge of water comes forth from the bathroom, heading straight into the pile. “You wanna know what I’m wondering, Jules?”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “No. Not really. I’d kind of just like to kill you again,” you sigh. You look down as the pile of soot and water mix together like coffee grounds, before the odd Columbian mixture rises like a soufflé statue of a man. In a few seconds, he’s been reformed, as if nothing’s happened at all. Well, not as if ‘nothing’ had happened. He now has a blowdryer in his hand. You’d wonder why there’s no power cord, but hey. It’s the future. Someone probably invented a battery-powered blowdryer by now. Good on them.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “No Omnitrix, no time. I’m beginning to wonder why I even came here,” he elaborates, looking around your relatively-empty tower. He casually finishes blowdrying himself and tucks it safely in a pocket you weren’t aware he had until now. Really, you wish he was something else other than a black silhouette. That would really help.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “We already had that conversation earlier. You know, the whole parent-killing fiasco,” you reply, your hand still grasped tightly around your Velvet Revolver.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “Oh, but of course. My apologies, after a few millennia my attention span has…” He stops then and there, indirectly emphasizing the point he was about to make. You wish you had attained that level of plot convenience. Maybe if you weren’t enemies, you would ask him how you could ascend to that high of a level.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 You stop thinking about that. That’s all part of his propaganda. He wants you to not be enemies. But hey, that’s not the way it is. The entire universe is counting on you guys hating each other and you killing him and saving the universe, all because he wants to kill you. You know, if you drew a ceasefire, he might not want to kill off the universe. Unravel the fabric of reality and toss it around like spaghetti, if you will. But, if you stopped fighting, then you technically wouldn’t have to serve the entirety of your whole universal-fate-karmic prison sentence.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 But no, you realize, ordering the rationalization part of your brain to quiet down for the time being. You don’t need to think during combat. Besides, that’s all part of his propaganda.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 Your mind-tangent is interrupted by the growl of your bedroom intruder. You don’t think he intended to growl. It would make more sense in this situation for it to be a sigh. You would ask him why he’s sighing, like the true patron of the art of plot convenience you are, but he opens his monstrous alligator maw before you get a chance to even part yours.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “Oh, well. Let’s just get this over with.”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 With that line being uttered, he places a hand on his knee. You prepare yourself, hoping that he’s just going to whip out a spoon and entertain you with a comical knee-slappy-spoon performance like he’s a Soundgarden hit single, but no. Your dreams are quickly crushed as he looks like he’s preparing himself for the most demented game of knifey-spoony ever. Knifey-spoony from hell. Which, in this timeline, would just be regular old knifey-spoony from Australia, but that’s a tale for another day when you’re not involved in a universal-life-or-death battle with a man who just pulled a sword out of his leg.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 Seriously. Dude just pulled a sword out of his leg. Like, he had it sheathed in his knee-cap. It looks like the blade is the… bone? You would dub this as creepy-cool, but he’s not even cool. It’s just creepy and sickening. That, and you’re not sure if the sword is even made of bone or metal. Either way, you don’t want to be on the sharp end of it. Or any end of it, really, the thing is oozing with pus and gore.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “Time to die,” he tells you, as he raises the bone-blade, preparing to cut you down as you helpfully reminded him to do because of plot reasons.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “Uhh, wait, no, don’t,” you quickly reason with him. Your reading of Bargaining for Your Life for Dummies could never have provided more invaluable advice. “You see, you’re the one at the disadvantage now. You’re suffering from mobility loss. You’ve literally handicapped yourself,” you taunt, flashing a sly grin. “Check mate.”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 He lowers his blade.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 He then shrugs his shoulders as a few orchestras of bone-cracking and flesh-rearrangement can be audibly heard over the general sounds of the apocalypse (which normally consist of bone-cracking and flesh-rearrangement). When your gaze drifts down to his knee, you find that it has been perfectly healed, as if nothing happened. Except something did happen, and he now has a sword.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 He playfully pats his knee like a jolly grandfather, except instead of a grandfather he’s a mass murderer. Imagine if you gave Stalin the chance to reproduce and you think you have a fitting picture. Heck, just give Stalin the chance to smile and you’d be heading in the right direction. “All fixed,” he smiles, except because his jaw is so deformed he can’t smile (but neither can anyone else living in a totalitarian communist state, so your allusion stays valid).

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 He raises his blade again.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 Damn it, you hate it when they just heal themselves like that. You put all of that effort into watching him injure himself and then he just goes and undoes it like he has no care at all in the world for well-paced combat. And, oh look, now he’s swinging his sword at you.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 The slices from the blade assume a physical manifestation and fly through the air, heading in your direction. It’s not just a regular old ‘pulled this out of my kneecap for fun’ knifey-spoony bone sword. It’s apparently a ‘magical’ regular old ‘pulled this out of my kneecap for fun’ knifey-spoony bone sword. This is so unfair. You wish you had one of those.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 You prepare to dodge, but he has prepared for you preparing to dodge, and it appears that anywhere you could have dodged, there is now a swing from a sword that you must dodge, so you cannot dodge.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 He doesn’t stop swinging. Well, he does, when one of the swings connects and hits you straight across the chest. You find yourself being flung backwards through the air, until you find yourself colliding with a strategically placed wall. It hurts, and so does the sword cut. Looking down at it, you’re glad to find that thanks to the whole starlight shield skin lotion deal you have going on, it didn’t cut too deep. I mean, you’re still bleeding and now your outfit is totally ruined (or just apocalypse chic), but hey, you’ll probably only die if you let these injuries get worse or they get infected like they are liable to do in this apocalypse, but other than that, you’re almost deserving of an “okay condition” label.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 Well, not really. The guy who broke inside of your home is still here, inside of your home, and now he’s casually placed his shin bone against your chair (you’ll have to get a new one, don’t want the “inside-of-leg smell”). That’s definitely not okay. But there’s not really you can really do about it. You’ll have to bide your time and play dead while he lurks around your apartment, looking for any clues to where the treasure is. You can’t blame him. If you could steal DNA, you would go after something that would allow you to generate DNA too.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 Actually, you can blame him. The dude broke into your house and killed your friend after she went to the toilet. She’d probably have PTSD or something if she wasn’t dead. Now he’s ruining your furniture and wardrobe and is trying to access your computer. Fuck this guy. Really.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">They took his hat while he lie on the ground, clutching his wound.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “What does he even have in this stupid, dumbass wizard hat, anyways?” Brian laughed, holding the poor MacGuffin loosely in his hand. He definitely was not a tender hat handler.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “I dunno. Let’s find out.” With that response, Brian shook the hat a single time. Hardeen’s crystal ball, otherwise known as the crystal ball formerly belonging to Hardeen, (MAKE MORE RANDOM STUFF BELONGING TO SOL FALL OUT) fell out. NV picked it up, eyed it vacantly for a while, before finally focusing her eyes on the fog in the center of it. They cleared up, revealing an object like the clouds in the sky parting to uncloak the sun.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “What do you see, babe?”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “All I see is… The box.”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “I think that means it’s time to unleash the box on this kid. Go grab it and we can see what it can do.”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “I-I’ll go get it,” Sierra complied, nervously, heading off in the direction that the box was headed. I don’t really want to do it, she thought. ''But I had to get away from that kid. I feel kinda bad for him. We didn’t have to stab him. ''She clenched her fists as she walked. Maybe dating a boy willing to kill other younger teenaged boys was not the best idea. Still, now was not the time to do it. She had all the time in the world (despite the world being on a countdown until the destruction of the universe)

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in"> Brian glanced at Sol, suffering on the floor with the sword still stuck through his chest. He smirked and turned around, confident that nothing could help him to get on his hands and knees now. He was practically dead. ''But just before he dies… I want to unleash the MacGuffin box onto him. Not become I just wanna test it out. I wanna see the look on that kid’s face, the utter look of loss, when he realizes I have something he’ll never get his hands on.''

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">He was correct. Nothing could help Sol. But, unbeknownst to all involved aside from Laika and Gadsio, there was a someone who could help. As Gadsio and Laika stared through Longview, like they had been this entire time, they had witnessed Sol being slaughtered and impaled on Excalibur. Choosing to react to this, Gadsio morphed his body into a thin line of flames and charged through the window. When he emerged, he quickly shapeshifted into a cinder to be as stealthy as possible. Now that NV had left and Brian was looking away, he quickly morphed back into a trail of fire and trailblazed his way over to Sol.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">''His aliens can heal and recover when not transformed into. If so, all I have to do is trigger a transformation and he should be fine, as long as he doesn’t return to human form, ''Gadsio concluded, as he extended one of his hands out of the fire. He carefully pressed down on the Omnitrix, and seconds later, Sol’s figure (including the sword jutting out of his chest) became bathed in a white light.

<p class="MsoNormal">

<p class="MsoNormal">Outtathaway

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">Sol is defeated by Sierra during the combat, she came back with the box. Sol gets pinned by a lamp post or something

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">“Well, c’mon, babe. What are you waiting for? Ju <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;border:none; mso-border-bottom-alt:solid windowtext .75pt;padding:0in;mso-padding-alt:0in 0in 1.0pt 0in">Box opens

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">You laid there, slumped against the wall, with no motivation to do anything as the beast of a man lumbered around your apartment. You were considering nodding off to sleep, but no. You’re better than that.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">You know you’re not doing a good job of playing dead. Hell, he knows you won’t die that easily.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in"> “I’ve found my Omnitrix…” He stares, with dead eyes, into your computer monitor. You have no idea what he’s doing, but you know he’s not just watching. That’s not his style. He’s cooking up some nefarious scheme and seasoning it with his thirteen special spices of “universal doom”. But what could the plot be, since fried chicken (as well as Kentucky) are out of the question? Is he going to try to switch into that timeline?

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 You place one eye on him and the other eye on the television screen. Normal humans shouldn’t be capable of optical acrobatics this incredible, but if it’s not apparent by now, you’re not a normal human. <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in;border:none;mso-border-bottom-alt:solid windowtext .75pt;padding:0in; mso-padding-alt:0in 0in 1.0pt 0in">The longer you study him, the closer you get to figuring it out.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in;border:none;mso-border-bottom-alt:solid windowtext .75pt;padding:0in; mso-padding-alt:0in 0in 1.0pt 0in">Jules chandeliers pocky

<p style="text-align: center;">After this part, it becomes a mess. I'm so sorry.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">“DANCES…. WITH WOLVES!” the new alien shouted with confidence.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-indent: .5in">“Outtathaway!” Laika and the Omnitrix both shouted simultaneously, correcting Sol’s inferior name and replacing it with a superior one that had been decided upon long before Sol had even conceived the notion of wearing a shapeshifting watch.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"> The shards of the crystal ball, lying on the floor, began to move. They slowly hovered upward, before they flew at lightning speed towards each other. They painfully sliced at Brian and (envy)’s feet, who recoiled in pain.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “You were foiled by the laws of the universe!” Gadsio shouted triumphantly. “You witnessed one of the laws of the MacGuffins; when destroyed by purely physical means, a MacGuffin will regroup and reform!” With that, Gadsio quickly faded into the now-familiar trail of flames. He slithered across the floor until he reappeared behind Sol, his hand on the boy’s shoulder. The embers licked playfully at them both. “Now, Sol,” the warrior whispered into Sol’s ear. “Transform into the…   Outtathaway, I believe you called it… When she attempts to level the field by paralyzing you even further, instinctually turn the attack back on them, as you did when they attempted to unleash the box’s potential on you the first time.” Sol wanted to object, as he wasn’t that confident in his abilities with the wolf-man yet, but he had no time to even muster the faintest of complaints as Gadsio continued to plant the seeds of planning into his ears. “They’re at their strongest when side by side… Let that be their downfall. Paralyze the both of them with one shot.”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">As soon as the first ivory projectile escapes the gun’s barrel, you quickly place your nondominant hand on the back of the pistol and fan the hammer, until five more bullets follow suite. They relentlessly slice through the air, like missiles rocketing to Russia.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “I have strategically placed MacGuffins all over this planet, Pocky. I can fight you for as long as I need to.”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “Can he?”

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 “Now, for that sword stuck in me…” Sol started, as he prepared to revert. A look of terror crossed Gadsio’s face.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 (Sol reverts)

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 Sol stares off at the nearly empty-box, still hastily slammed shut as it was before. He gingerly approaches. “Do you think there’s anything in here left for me? Or did it all get drained by that psychopathic blonde broad?” He asks aloud, into no one particular, but still undoubtedly requesting an answer.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt">                 The



Notes and Trivia

 * Personally, I prefer this episode to Imagine Dragons much, much better.
 * I just noticed that Apocalypse Now's lines sound so weird if you don't have the "correct" monstrous voice for him.
 * Christ, the amount of space I had deleted to post this episode. I'm surprised by Enter bar still works.