"Stargate-Crossed" - Part Five

 

Part Five

            Rania was trapped!

            Craig had to get back to her TARDIS. Her only hope now was Maureen. He didn’t know how she would save her, but – being the Gladiator of Gallifrey (as he heard Neas always call himself) – she always had a trick up her sleeve.

            He stumbled his way back to the big white orb that was Rania’s TARDIS and entered to find Rick at the controls. “Lemme guess,” Sanchez said, without so much as looking Craig’s way, “Another end deader than Jeffery Epst—”

            “They’ve got Rania!” Craig shouted.

            This news broke Rick away from the TARDIS controls, giving attention to Craig. “W-What happened?! You guys were in there for like two minutes!”

            “You didn’t hear the massive spaceship that landed?!”

            “Rania must’ve soundproofed these walls. I didn’t hear squanch, kid.”

            “Well, we gotta save her. We gotta get Maureen.”

            “Then we better patch in with her TARDIS and get to work.”

            “But her TARDIS isn’t here with her. We tried to bring it here, but…”

            “That information would’ve been useful before we came here, Franklin!” Albeit irate, Rick maintained enough of his composure to come up with another idea. “You said that you came here with a bunch of military guys, right?”

            “Yeah, but…”

            Rick was already back to working the controls and semi-ignoring Craig. “They have radios on ‘em. Let’s just pray to God, Zeus, Gozer, or whatever cosmic deity you believe in that their frequencies are reachable.”

--------------------------

            What was kryptonite doing on Abydos? That was the question nagging in the back of Maureen’s head as she and the team arrived at the Abydonians’ settlement – a city made of stone with large walls and a single wooden gate. By its overall design, Maureen would guess it to be preventable from sandstorms.

            Throughout the city, Maureen spotted a familiar ancient symbol: three interconnected circles. They were engraved on several walls and makeshift tapestries hung over the streets, right beside those of the sun god, Ra.

            Her attention was distracted by the crackling static coming through the radio Colonel O’Neil had hitched to his side, accompanied by a drunken voice she (unfortunately) knew all too well. “Bravo, bravo,” it said over O’Neil’s radio. “Bravo! Tango! Tango! Cash! Somebody come in!”

            O’Neil, not recognizing the voice, unlatched the radio from his hip and responded, “Who is this? Is this an Earth frequency?”

            “Oh, wow! It is Cash!” the voice exclaimed with amusement. “There wouldn’t happen to be a saucy young Brit with you boys, would there?”

            O’Neil looked right over at Maureen.

            Taking the radio from the colonel, Maureen identified the caller by name in witty fashion: “Rick Sanchez. To what do I owe the pleasure of hearing your sweet, angelic voice?”

            “No time for pillow talk now, my sweet crumpet,” Rick said (Maureen venomously hated that pet name). “I need your coordinates to bring your dear ol’ pappy’s TARDIS to your location.”

            “You’re with my father?” Maureen reacted in confusion.

            But then she realized, Of course he is. Rick Sanchez and Aznavorian the Tinkerer together meant that the Cyber War had to be in full effect. She did recall their mission to search for the Byzinium crystal – the very same crystal embedded at the top of Craig Williams’s staff.

            Craig!

            “Rick, is Craig there with you?” Maureen asked with the utmost urgency.

            “Who?”

            “I’m right here!” Maureen was relieved when she heard Craig’s voice over the radio. “I’m right here, Neas!” She wasn’t surprised to know that he learned the truth. He spent enough time with Rick and her father (who had to be in his “Rania” regeneration, by this time) to find out.

            “Craig!” Kelsey grabbed at the hand Maureen held the radio in at the second she and J.P. heard Craig’s voice. “Are you O.K.?”

            “Where the heck did you go?” J.P. asked.

            “Can someone please give me the coordinates?!” Rick bellowed.

            Maureen supplied him with the information required to transport Rania’s Type-X TARDIS not far from the street they stood on. Upon witnessing its unnatural arrival, Kasuf cried, “By the mercy of Ra!” He immediately knelt down, along with his fellow Abydonians, bowing to the Gallifreyan ship.

            O’Neil, however, noticed something different in Kasuf’s speech.

            “Did he just speak English?”

            The others noticed it as well. “I thought they couldn’t,” Major Kawalsky, O’Neil’s second-in-command, said.

            “They can’t,” Daniel disclaimed. “I-I mean, they aren’t supposed to.”

            “Well, they are now,” Ferretti noted.

            “How is it possible?” Jo questioned.

            “The only way it is, Jo, is if there’s a TARDIS nearby,” the Doctor rationalized. His rationalization only brought his focus back on the Type-X TARDIS that materialized on the street, recognizing it for what it was. His mind suddenly raced with questions, all floating around Maureen. He knew something was amiss when Craig addressed her as this “Neas” he had heard so much about in the last hours.

            It all added up to a hypothesis that the Doctor wasn’t ready yet to openly confront.

            Rick and Craig stepped out of Rania’s TARDIS. Craig was welcomed back with a group hug supplied by J.P. and Kelsey. Maureen would’ve joined in on it had she not been blocked by Rick. “I forgot how stupidly attractive you are in this regeneration,” he marveled. “You’re way hotter as a blonde – just sayin’.”

            “Hey, hey!” She snapped her fingers in his face. “Focus! My father!”

            As soon as he got over his stupor, Rick brought them up to speed on the situation. When the name “Brainiac” came up, Maureen was reminded of the symbol she saw on the way into the city – the three interconnected circles. That, coupled with the discovery Craig and Rania made about the Stargate on Abydos being laced with Kryptonite (the exact mineral that the Abydonians were mining), brought Maureen to the same startling conclusion her father made.

            “Brainiac built the Stargates to trap and kill me here!”

            O’Neil felt his frustrations boil over. “Somebody wanna fill me in on what goin’ on here? We got a comic book villain bein’ the reason that we’re all stuck here, on account of one British girl?!”

            “I must admit that I’m with the colonel on this,” the Brigadier said. “It all sounds rather ridiculous.”

            “I guarantee you gentlemen it’s not,” Dwonch said. “There’s this dimensional plane that exists outside time and space called ‘The Infinite Dimensional Corridor’, or ‘Infinite D.C.’ for short.”

            “Yeah, yeah,” the impatient O’Neil uttered. “We got all of that. But you didn’t mention the part about one of Superman’s greatest adversaries comin’ to life!”

            “Some parallel universes are more familiar than others,” Dwonch told him.

            “Yeah, like the one where you’re Santa Claus in a low-budget Netflix movie,” Rick added.

            O’Neil frowned at the drunken scientist. “What?!”

            “Never mind that!” Maureen snapped. “Let’s just focus on gettin’ my father out of that pyramid. It’s pretty obvious by now that Ra and Brainiac are workin’ together to put an end to me.”

            “No!” Kasuf refuted. “Ra is a merciful god to us. Challenging him will bring disaster to all of us!”

            “Disaster is already upon us, Father!” His son (Skaara) argued. “For too long, we have lived as slaves to Ra. He is not a merciful god. There is talk among our people that Ra is not even a god!”

            “Blasphemy!” Kasuf exclaimed.

            “Your son speaks the truth,” Maureen told him. “If Ra is in league with Brainiac, then you’re not just dealin’ with one false god, but two.”

            “If Ra truly is false, then why does this one wear his mark?” Kasuf gestured to the gold necklace that Jackson wore, the pendant of which had an intricate design – the Eye of Ra. It was the entire reason why they garnered the Abydonians’ trust so easily and were welcomed into their city.

            Daniel figured there was miscommunication the moment that he saw Ra’s symbol on a few tapestries in the city. Initially, he figured the Abydonians believed they were sent by Ra; but, upon learning the truth for himself, he had to set the record straight. “This was a gift from a friend back home,” he said of the pendant. “We aren’t acolytes of Ra, especially not after knowing what he’s done to your civilization…your people.”

            Kasuf was appalled to hear this, seeming to have dampened his trust of Jackson and the other outsiders. Sensing this, Rick approached Maureen and whispered to her, “Show him.”

            His cryptic advice baffled her. “Show him what?”

            But she already knew the answer when he looked into Sanchez’s eyes – usually bloodshot (and sometimes glazed from substance abuse), they were intensely focused and influenced by the war in which he, Aznavorian, and Maureen’s past incarnation fought.

            The same war that she took Kasuf to in her father’s TARDIS.

            Kasuf witnessed a world ravaged by machines that looked like demons to his primitive perspective, some of which bore Brainiac’s insignia. It was the equitable evidence needed to convince the Abydonian leader of the malicious nature of his false gods…and to help the outsiders tear down their hierarchy.

"Stargate-Crossed" - Part Four (Second Half)

Part Four (Second Half)

            Rania stood paralyzed in shock, realizing that the most dangerous figurehead in the Cyber War – the extraterrestrial cyborg called “Brainiac” – was aboard that ominous alien pyramid looming over the battlefield of one of many Cyber Wars. She could hear him in her head, taunting her in his sickening way: “I’ve found you, Time Lord. You will be my greatest specimen.” The very sound of his voice pounded like an aluminum bat to her skull.

            “Yo, Aznavorian!” For once, she welcomed the sound of Rick. “How ‘bout you get us out of here before Brainy launches a full-scale attack!” She followed Rick’s advice and retreated back into her TARDIS with both Sanchez and Craig.

            With Rick’s help, she quickly brought them back into the infinite dimensional corridor, which was the safest haven to be at the moment. Still reeling from Brainiac’s telepathic call, Rania wilted to the floor, grasping her head. “I can still hear him,” she grunted.

            “Who? That Brainiac guy?” Craig asked her. “He has mental powers?”

            Rania nodded. “The worst kind.”

            “What does he want from you?” Craig kept the questions coming.

            “He wants to dissect her,” Rick bluntly answered on Rania’s behalf. “Ever since he went toe-to-toe with her and Neas, two of the few Time Lords across the multiverse, Brainy’s been anxious to get his hands on one of them, cut ‘em open, and find out what makes them tick.”

            “Thanks for that unnecessarily in-depth explanation, Rick,” Rania patronized.

        She was suddenly struck with another massive headache – another psychic call from Brainiac: “You cannot escape me, Tinkerer! No matter what dimension you go to, I will be there!”

            That call was more painful than the last. It drove Rania into a state of desperation.

            “Craig, where did you last see Maureen in the dimension we took you from?” she asked. The urgency in her voice was evident; but, she kept it in check, so as not to scare Craig.

            “Near this pyramid that we came out of the Stargate in,” Craig said.

       Rania had him touch a specific section of the control console while she linked his subconscious to the navigation system of her TARDIS. As soon as it locked on the location Craig visualized in his mind’s eye, they materialized back on the desert planet, just a short distance away from the pyramid entrance.

            All they found was the empty, abandoned camp set up by Colonel O’Neil’s men.

            “Ugh! Taking a whiz is worth more time than this!” Rick complained.

            “Would you at least try to be positive for once?” Rania scolded him.

            “Alright…I’m positive that we’re wasting our time,” Rick countered, already on his way back into the TARDIS. “I’m gonna establish some contact with Neas across the D.C., give him an update on our situation and maybe get help from an actual adult.” That last stab was clearly directed at Craig.

         Rania hated how much the old, alcoholic inventor harped on the boy. “Don’t listen to him, sweetie,” Rania encouraged him. “He doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”

          “But what if he’s right?” Craig cynically questioned. “All I’m doing is messing up things. I jumped through the Stargate, got me and my friends stuck here, I couldn’t bring the TARDIS with Neas’s crystal, and now I can’t help find anybody.” Craig hung his head in despair. “Some leader I am. I’m no Neas.”

          Hands on her hips, Rania smirked at him, trying not to laugh. “You think Neas never once messed up herself? Honey, I’m his father. I’ve watched him make several mistakes, ever since she was a little girl.”

            Craig’s head spun from all the gender-swapping in her pronouns. “Man, I don’t think I’ll ever keep up your family.”

            Rania let out that laugh she kept stifled, playfully rubbing Craig’s head. “Why don’t we use that amazing nine-year-old brain of yours for something a little less complicated – like that Stargate you all jumped through. I’ve been anxious to get a look at it since you told me about it.”

            “That I can do,” Craig smiled, regaining a little confidence.

            He brought Rania into the pyramid to get a closer look at the Stargate. Although she was excited to see it up close, it nonetheless unnerved her. “Stargates are the most dangerous constructs ever built throughout the multiverse,” she said while placing a hand against its ice-cold stone structure. “But this one…was designed by Brainiac himself.”

            “How can you tell?” Craig asked.

            Rania moved her hand away from the Stargate and gazed on the residue it left on her palm, finding hints of purple crystalline specks amid the bits of black rocks. “Because it’s laced with kryptonite.”

            Craig knew the term all too well. “The stuff that kills Superman?” It then dawned on him, “That’s the ‘Brainiac’ you were talking about?! But…he’s not real! He’s a comic book villain!”

            “Not in the world where we found him,” Rania said. She took a careful analysis of the kryptonite specks on her palm. “Purple kryptonite. If I remember what one of the Jor-Els told me about its properties, it’s supposed to…” Rania’s body went rigid, coming to a distressing conclusion: “Disrupt the flow between dimensions in space and time!”

            Craig didn’t understand. “Huh?”

            Rania turned to him. He saw the horror in her beautiful hazel eyes, which scared him a little. “Brainiac’s intended use of the Stargates is to trap Neas on this planet with all of his greatest allies. This is where he intends to kill the Gladiator of Gallifrey!”

            Upon this shocking revelation, a loud roar resounded all around Rania and Craig. It soon followed with a tremendous quake. “What’s going on?!” Craig bellowed, looking around nervously.

            Rania felt her head aching again. “It’s Brainiac! He’s caught up with us!”

            “What’re we gonna do?!” Craig panicked.

            “You have to get out of here, Craig. Get back to the TARDIS and tell Rick to find Maureen. Tell them about the purple kryptonite in the Stargates.”

            “What about you? I can’t leave you!”

            “Brainiac only knows that I’m here. He’s only after me. Now please go!”

            Craig wasted no time in arguing. He despised the idea of leaving Rania alone in the pyramid to the wrath of Brainiac, but he knew Maureen would find a way to save her. He ran as fast as he could out of the pyramid. Looking back, he was stunned to see that alien pyramid-shaped spacecraft descending on the other pyramid and engulfing it completely, with lightning locking the two together.

            There was no way for Rania to escape.

"Stargate-Crossed" - Part Four (First Half)

Part Four (First Half)

            The Doctor could have sworn he saw Craig go over that ridge while he was hot on the boy’s trail. Alas, the child somehow managed to elude the Time Lord, vanishing out of sight entirely. Feeling despondent over his failure, he returned to the others just as there was some discord among them.

            “I’m gonna break each of your bloody faces!” he heard Maureen in particular shout. It took three people (General Dwonch, Major Simmons, and Captain Yates) just to hold her back from O’Neil’s men.

            “What’re mad at us for?!” Louis Ferretti (one of O’Neil’s lieutenants) retorted.

            “You didn’t have to laugh at him like that,” Jo scolded, clearly referring to the spectacle earlier with Craig and his staff. “He’s just a boy!”

            “The kid said he could get us home,” Ferretti argued. “If he can’t back up a deal like that, then he might as well face the music.”

            Maureen nearly tore through the restraint placed on her by Dwonch, Simmons, and Yates. Thankfully, the Brigadier was there to diffuse the altercation. “Alright! That’s quite enough – all of you!” He turned to Jack and ordered, “Colonel, I realize I’m in no position to give you commands, but I suggest you get a hold on your men.”

            O’Neil tried not to act spiteful towards the Brig’s advice. “Duly noted.”

            When Kelsey finally noticed the Doctor had returned, she immediately rushed over to him. “Did you find Craig?” she asked with a look of hope.

            It irritated the Doctor being the bearer of bad news. “No, he disappeared past that ridge before I could reach him,” he told Kelsey, who hung her head in sadness. “But I reassure you that we will find him.”

            “You’re dang right we will,” Dwonch attested. “We’re going out there to look for the lil’ fella.” She looked to the two other C.O.’s – O’Neil and the Brigadier – and advocated, “How ‘bout it, gentlemen?”

            “A mass search party for one child?” the Brigadier interpreted her course of action.

            “What’s the matter, Brig?” O’Neil addressed in a snarky tone, presumably as payback for the Brig’s ill advice moments ago. “Too much legwork for you and your boys?”

            The Brig knew when another man was challenging him. Unbeknownst to O’Neil, he was not one to back down. “On the contrary, Colonel…I was merely surveying the general’s plan. I know my men are adept for such an assignment. Are yours?”

            Dwonch could no longer stomach this contest. Rolling her eyes with disgust, she pressed, “Let’s just get a move on, shall we?”

            While the teams prepared for the search, Ferretti approached O’Neil and whispered, “You can’t be serious about wastin’ our time looking for some whiny little kid. What about gettin’ back home?”

            “That ‘Doctor’ of theirs said the kid disappeared over that ridge,” O’Neil mentioned. “Nobody just vanishes out of thin air in the middle of a desert. If there’s a chance that kid did find a way off this planet, you better believe we’re gonna find him and ask how. Besides, Ferretti, this is punishment for hassling the poor squirt.”

            Ferretti’s mouth always got him in trouble. Left with no other choice, he joined along on the mass search party for Craig. It was hard enough trekking through the harsh desert climate with the sun (which seemed to have been twice the size as the one that orbited Earth) barreling down on him; but, throughout the trek, he detected Maureen’s icy glare directed his way. He didn’t want to admit it in front of the other soldiers, but the tall, angry Englishwoman terrified him.

            Maureen’s intense focus on Ferretti was interrupted as Major Simmons walked in place right beside her. “It’s you, isn’t it?” she asked in a hushed tone. Maureen densely looked on the major, not having the slightest idea what she was talking about. Her reaction only managed to amuse Simmons. “You’re still gonna pretend you’re not Neas? Don’t think I didn’t notice when you pulled out that sonic screwdriver to help make your lil’ friend look like the hero.”

            Maureen groaned. “You always were the observant one, Hill.”

            Simmons’ smile widened when she heard the abbreviation of her first name come out of Maureen’s rose-red lips – a trait she knew the real Neas had a habit of committing in their past journeys together. “I knew it!” she cheered, albeit still very hushed. “So you really did try to get us off this planet through your TARDIS. What happened? I mean, we all saw it right there one second, then it was gone in the next?”

            “It’s dimensional interference,” Maureen explained. “Possibly due to the Stargates.”

            “Star-gates? As in plural?” Hillary reiterated. “We only came through one.”

            “From one point in time, remember? Three Stargates crossed between three time periods and two dimensions.” Maureen rubbed the side of her head, her fingers combing through the long, flowing locks of her brown hair. “Somethin’ about all of this doesn’t feel right…like it was all by design and not accidental.”

            “Like it’s all a trap?” Simmons deciphered.

            “Exactly.” Maureen sighed, both her hearts feeling heavy. “It’s all my fault Craig’s lost out there somewhere. The lil’ bugger was so bent on provin’ himself to be as worthy a leader as I am. Truth is…he’s a better leader at nine years old than I am at over 30,000 years old.”

            Hillary saw the anxiety on the English brunette’s face. “You’re really worried about him, aren’t you?”

            “Of course, I am. He’s one of my best friends in the entire multiverse.”

            “Hey, you guys! Check this out!” The enthusiastic voice of J.P., who walked much further ahead of the search party with Kelsey, drew everyone’s attention to one of the indigenous animals of the planet – a beast that resembled a camel but woolly. Of course, J.P. described it in much different terms: “It’s a big ol’ horse-sheepdog!”

            “More like a giant iguana with fur,” Kelsey said, stroking the beast’s wool.

            “You kids be careful!” Dwonch cried out, sounding like a concerned mother. “That thing could be wild!”

            “No, it’s domesticated,” Jackson indicated the harness strapped to the beast.

            J.P. and Kelsey used that very harness to climb atop the beast. That action triggered some parental instincts within all the adults, each and every single one urging J.P. and Kelsey to climb off the beast. Unfortunately, as J.P. played with the reigns, he whipped them like he would with an actual horse, prompting the beast to gallop away with two screaming children on its back.

            “As if we hadn’t enough to worry about!” O’Neil griped.

            The adults moved in pursuit of the galloping animal. It was undoubtedly a fast creature, outpacing them all. Luckily, it left a trail behind for them to follow, and they caught up with J.P., Kelsey, and the beast right at the top of a dune.

            “Are you kids alright?” Hillary asked just as soon as they caught up with them.

            Both J.P. and Kelsey had huge smiles plastered across their faces.

            Seeing them was enough confirmation for Dwonch. “Yeah, they’re alright.”

            Once the children’s safety was acquiesced, the team’s focus shifted to the sands below, seeing a large mining region near some tall rock pillars. Several people worked in very primitive conditions with ragged coverings set up for protection from the sun.

            “Well, if there was any question of civilization on this planet, we just found it,” Maureen observed.

            The Doctor looked through a pair of binoculars to get a closer glimpse at the workers. “They’re human…or humanoid, at least,” he said before seeing one of the miners stop and spot them. He warned the other workers, who all ceased in their mining as well to look on the visitors.

            “So much for keeping a low profile,” the Brigadier bemoaned.

            “Doesn’t look like they’re any threat,” Simmons indicated. “They’re not charging at us for an attack…just staring at us.”

            Maureen made the first move in approaching the miners. The others followed suit, including the beast they discovered. One of the youngest workers, a fresh-faced boy with dreadlocks, approached and addressed the newcomers in a language none of them could decipher.

            “Anyone speak…whatever he’s saying?” Dwonch asked.

            “TARDIS translation circuits would be handy right about now,” the Doctor said.

            “Jackson, you’re the linguist,” O’Neil told Daniel. “Try to talk to them.”

            Daniel the Linguist was just about to do so when, out of nowhere, all of the workers began to genuflect to them. The one fresh-faced, dreadlocked worker also bowed momentarily before running off.

            “What’s going on?” Simmons wondered aloud.

            The young worker returned a short moment later, joined by others leading another beast like the one that J.P. and Kelsey rode on earlier. Atop the beast was someone seated behind curtains. They parted to reveal a middle-aged man, presumably the elder, peering out towards the strangers. He got down from the beast, took his staff, and approached with his entourage following behind. The young worker informed him of the situation, and the elder responded prior to speaking to the team.

            “Kasuf,” he uttered, gesturing to himself. He bowed to the group just as the workers had, while holding out his staff horizontally.

            “Kasuf?” Jo repeated. “What does that mean?”

            The Doctor closely followed the elder’s gesture. “I do believe it’s this fellow’s name, Jo.”

            The elder known as Kasuf straightened and made another gesture, which seemed to have invited the team to come with him. “He’s inviting us to go with him,” Daniel decoded.

            “I’m not sure that’s such a good idea,” O’Neil said.

            “Colonel, if any of us wish to go back to our homes, it’d be in our best interest to go along with the natives of this planet,” the Brigadier advised (O’Neil was beginning to tire of him doing that in front of his men).

            “He’s right,” Daniel vouched. “This is our best shot.”

            As O’Neil mulled it over, Maureen discreetly scanned the rock that the natives had been mining. Simmons took notice of her activity and questioned, “What you got?”

            Maureen gave a quick glimpse at her device before concealing it again.

            “It’s the same material as the Stargate,” she told Simmons. “And then there’s another alien mineral that I recognize.”

            “And what’s that?” Hillary inquired.

            “Kryptonite.”

"Stargate-Crossed" - Part Three

 

Part Three

            “You’ve gotta be kiddin’ me!” An incredulous Jack O’Neil berated. “Parallel universes?! Gimme a break!”

            “It’s all true, mate,” Maureen told him, smiling with her arms folded. “Don’t get me started on how I’ve met three other blokes who look just like you. One of ‘em even tried to kill me!”

            O’Neil glimpsed over at Jackson, who had the biggest grin on his face. “You absolutely love this, don’t ya?”

            “Are you kidding?” Jackson scoffed. “To find out that not only do other planets exist and the pyramids were built on them, but also that there are parallel universes…this is the best day of my life!”

            “Well, I’m glad to hear that, Daniel,” Jack patronized. “But, in case you’ve forgotten, we’re all stuck here, because you can’t dial the Stargate and get us back home!” It was a harsh reminder to Jackson, who nonetheless maintained a positive attitude.

            “That pyramid we arrived in lacked the cover stone with the proper coordinates for a return trip,” the Doctor noted. “I’d hoped there would be one – it would’ve made things so much easier.”

            “That was my hope as well before we got here,” Jackson coincided.

            “I have a better exit strategy,” said Maureen, who quickly became the center of everyone’s attention, including the Doctor. Between the presence of her future mentor/friend and her commitment in keeping him from discovering who and what she was, she diverted the attention over to the one person who practically welcomed it. “And by ‘I’, I mean ‘Craig’.”

            Craig stiffened at the utterance of his own name. “What? Me?”

            “Yes, you,” Maureen verified. “Don’t you remember Neas’s gift to you? That sonic-powered crystal you can summon his TARDIS with? Like the one you have at the top of your staff right now?”

            It took Craig a moment to follow her clues, not until she uttered them in verbatim.

            “Oh, yeah!” he joyously beamed in recollection.

            “Wait, that’s what your staff crystal’s been this whole time?!” a surprised Kelsey exclaimed. “It’s a real space crystal?!”

            “Space crystal,” J.P. muttered, virtually mesmerized by the artifact embedded at the head of Craig’s staff, which – until that very second – he had always given a passing thought to.

            “Sorry I couldn’t tell you guys about it before,” Craig said. “But wait ‘til you see what it can do!” He proceeded in aiming the staff towards one unoccupied space of the desert region and concentrating as hard as he could. Nothing happened, which made Craig wonder if he was following Neas’s directions correctly.

            While all eyes were on Craig and his staff, Maureen reached into her coat pocket to retrieve her sonic screwdriver. She discreetly pointed it at the staff crystal. It was actually sonic-powered, but not in the way Neas led Craig to believe when he gifted it to the boy. The crystal could only be powered by a sonic device, much like the Gallifreyan tool Maureen had in hand.

            With the press of a button, she activated the crystal on Craig’s staff, which glowed congruently with the tip of Maureen’s sonic. Craig was overjoyed to see it working; everyone else (especially J.P. and Kelsey) were mesmerized by the otherworldly power of the staff. They were even more amazed once the tall, black rectangular shape of Neas’s Type-Z TARDIS began to materialize at the spot where Craig aimed.

            “It’s working! It’s working!” Craig cheered.

            O’Neil removed his sunshades to get a better look at the bizarre scene unfolding in front of him. “What is that?!”

            “That, Colonel, is our way off this sandbox of a planet,” a hopeful Dwonch said.

            “The sound that it makes…and the way it materializes out of thin air,” Jo observed. “It’s a lot like your TARDIS, Doctor.”

            The Doctor’s focus on the tall, black rectangular (and translucent) structure flared in recognition. “So it would appear, Jo.”

            Maureen began to suspect something when her TARDIS struggled to fully materialize. She kept her hold on the sonic for as long as she could, just as Craig did with his staff. Unfortunately, she lost her hold on the ship, and it vanished back into the dimensional plane from whence it came.

            What seemed like a huge prospect for returning everyone to their respective times and dimensions was now a huge loss. Craig couldn’t believe that he failed his friends and the grown-ups. He looked on his staff, specifically its crystal head, wondering where he might’ve gone wrong.

            It didn’t help for him to hear Colonel O’Neil’s men mocking him behind his back:

            “What a crock!”

            “Kid doesn’t even know what he’s doing!”

            “Some toy was gonna get us home? Unbelievable.”

            Their words hurt more than the thought of failing all of them. Tears streaming down his eyes, he ran away from the group. Kelsey and J.P. tried to call him back, but he was already halfway up the nearest ridge.

            Maureen attempted to go after him, until the Doctor stepped in and offered, “I’ll go and get him.” She was grateful for his chivalry, which this Doctor appeared to be chockful of.

            Running across sand was harder than the Doctor imagined, but he toughened through it for the sake of bringing back a 9-year-old boy who he still couldn’t fathom how he ended up in this whole mess. Craig was only a few feet in front of the Doctor as they both climbed the massive ridge.

            “Craig!” he called to the boy. “Come back! Please!”

            Craig heard him but didn’t bother to stop for him. He reached the peak of the ridge and started making his way down the other side. He underestimated how steep it was, tumbling the rest of the way and getting sand all over his clothes and in his eyes. He could barely see anything in front of him.

            And then the world shifted right underneath him and he felt himself tumbling across a hard, metallic floor. The desert heat no longer bore down on him; instead, he was in a nice, air-conditioned space. He still had grains of sand in his eyes, making it impossible to see where he was.

            “Someone owes me a Dave & Buster’s gift card for this,” he heard a gruff-sounding voice say, followed by a loud, disgusting belch.

            “W-Who’s there?” Craig asked, wiping the sand grains out of his eyes to no avail.

            “If you’re expecting me to say ‘Someone who loves you’, this ain’t that kind of story, Franklin.”

            “My name’s Craig!”

            “Yeah, and I don’t care. All we want is that lame staff.”

            Craig never let up his grip on his staff that thankfully made it with him to wherever it was that he ended up. Only now, this gruff-voiced stranger tried to take it from him, but Craig’s grip remained. “No! It’s mine!”

            He engaged in a tug-of-war over the staff with the stranger when another voice (one that Craig recognized) yelled to the stranger, “Rick! You leave him alone right now!” It was Rania, a kind woman who Craig first met in the creek when she got caught in a trap he, Kelsey, and J.P. set outside their clubhouse.

            The stranger named “Rick” let go of Craig’s staff, though Craig hadn’t anticipated the action, falling back on his butt. He again tried to cleanse his eyes, only able to make out two adult shapes in his blurred vision – one was tall and white, the other was black and green (Rania’s signature colors).

            “What’s the matter with you?!” Rania asked Rick. “He’s only 9 years old!”

            “Hey, I thought we were on the doomsday clock here,” Rick argued. “Get the Byzinium crystal from the black kid and bring it back to contain the Cyberium!”

            “Did you really just refer to him as ‘the black kid’?!” Rania fumed. “He has a name, and it’s ‘Craig’!”

            “That’s what I told him!” Craig griped.

            Reminded of his presence there, Rania immediately tended to him. “Aw, Craig, sweetheart. I am so sorry we had to bring you here like this.”

            “Where is ‘here’?” Craig inquired. “I can’t see.”

            “Bless your sweet heart,” Rania said, momentarily leaving Craig’s side to retrieve something to help in his dilemma. “Here. Tilt your head back and keep your eyes open for just a sec.” Craig did as she instructed and, not a second after, his eyes were flushed with cool water. It made his body jolt for a fleeting moment, due to its ice-cold temperature and the unexpectedness of it all. Regardless, it was the remedy Craig needed, as his vision returned entirely. Rania’s gorgeous, smiling face, filled with love and warmth, was the first thing Craig’s saw.

            Craig remembered Rania being a Time Lord just like Neas. In fact, she was what they called a “regeneration” of Neas’s father, Aznavorian. It explained why she was so incredibly paternal (or maternal, in this case), having spent years being a parent to Neas. Craig began to feel safe, knowing that she was there inside of her very own TARDIS, a Type-X model not so different from Neas’s Type-Z. He was so glad to see her that he gave her a big hug.

            “Aww,” Rania gushed, stroking Craig’s low-cropped, curly black hair. “It’s good to see you, too, sweetheart.”

            “Ugh! Gimme a break with all this ‘touchy-feely’ Cartoon Network crap.”

            When Craig heard that gruff, obnoxious voice again, he glanced out from where he buried his face against Rania’s abdomen, spotting a tall, lanky old man with spiky grey-blue hair and a unibrow. He wore a white lab coat and had some sort of green spill on his mouth. He was revolting for Craig to look at, a stark contrast to the beauty of Rania. “Who is that?” he asked Rania of her aged companion.

            Rania barely wanted to acknowledge the old man. After a heavy sigh, she told Craig, “That is a friend of Neas’s. His name is Rick Sanchez.”

            “Why bother making *uuurp!* pointless introductions?” Rick said. “We’re just gonna erase every memory Franklin here has of us.”

            “You’re gonna erase my memories?!” the mortified Craig cried.

            “No, we’re going to do no such a thing,” Rania reassured him. She then glared at Rick and roared, “Can you at least try to show a little compassion?!”

            “Right, right, because he’s nine years old and blah-blah-Stop-The-Bullying whatever,” Rick dismissively blathered. “How ‘bout we just cut to the chase and tell him why we whisked him away from his playground dimension and into our nightmare scenario.”

            “You didn’t take me out of my dimension,” Craig said. “I was already out of my dimension.”

            This news astounded Rania. “You mean you’re already on a journey with Neas?”

            “Not really,” Craig clarified. “Just some weird British lady who seems to know a lot about his TARDIS.”

            Rick’s ears tickled at the description Craig gave. “Did your big, puffy lips just say ‘British lady’?” A creepy smirk slithered upon his wrinkled face. “And here I thought this trip was gonna be boring! Her name’s Maureen and she’s another regeneration of your pride and joy, Aznavorian.”

            “She’s Neas?!” a flabbergasted Craig reiterated. “How can that be?!”

            “The same way this sexy Lebanese brunette in the tight pants you’re so clingy with used to be an old white dude like me,” Rick told Craig.

            “Miss Rania?”  Craig spoke with deep concern in his voice. “What did you guys mean when you said ‘nightmare scenario’? Is there something really bad coming and that’s why you need my staff?”

            Rania glared at Rick, wishing he hadn’t been so blunt.

            Rick, however, treated their dire situation exactly how it was. “One way or another, you’re gonna have to tell him,” Rick advised her. “His world could be the next one they tear apart.”

            “Who’s ‘they’?” Craig asked.

            Rania sighed. She didn’t want to get Craig involved any further. But, with no other choice, she went to the control console of her TARDIS and pulled a lever that opened the door leading out of it. Craig looked out into the dark, apocalyptic setting outside, no longer in the hot alien desert planet where he was before. Beyond the horizon, he could see large flying ships and the top halves of massive tanks that rolled by, firing lasers.

            Nothing was more unsettling to Craig than the robotic parts and human remains littered all over the scorched earth. “What happened here? Is this…my future?” he questioned.

            “No, sweetie…it’s one of multiple futures,” Rania told him. “This is what Neas and I have been dealing with lately – an endless conflict that has been spreading through the infinite D.C. like wildfire. He’s fought it before in a previous regeneration, and he thought it was all over before now. He calls it ‘The Cyber War’.”

            Suddenly, a spotlight shined down from above, cascading over the region of the wasteland occupied by Rania’s TARDIS and drawing that much more attention to it. Rania, Craig, and Rick could hardly see where the light came from. Searching past it, Rania made out an alien spacecraft, immense in size and shaped like a pyramid.

            “That doesn’t belong here,” she discerned right before she was struck by a penetrating migraine that brought her down to her knees. She reactively grasped the sides of her head and groaned.

            “Miss Rania!” Craig yelled. “What’s wrong?”

            The migraine swiftly subsided, permitting Rania to look upwards to the alien pyramid in the sky. “It’s him,” she rasped. “It’s Brainiac.”