insertmeathere | And once again the day is saved...or is it?

"This is SO not fair."

Beastboy was wandering the streets of Jump City half in amazement half in frustration. Somehow they had done it! The entire universe back the way it should have been! He was a big hero! Him!

OK...well being a member of the Teen Titans already meant he was a hero but this time he'd done it on his own!

And not a single soul remembered.

The city itself seemed back to normal. Kids went to school, people went to work, Cyborg worked on his car and Raven was locked in her room.

Even Terra was still attending high school and pretending not to be who Beastboy knew she was.

The sound of tires squealing caught Beastboy's attention and he spun about to spot the street filling with cars and motorcycles racing in a pack. At the wheel of each vehicle was a red suited thug who looked like every other thug driving the vehicles.

Billy Numerous, Hill Billy, one man army, and about to run over the savior of the universe Beastboy.

Who promptly screamed and dove for cover.

"And now Azula...tell me more about the Ahm?"

"Ohm."

Here she was once again, locked away in her tiny little cell. Shackled and bound so she wouldn't be able to fire bend. The constant drip drip drip warning her that should she misbehave ocean water would be pumped in and dumped upon her.

God she hated that water. The stench of it permeated her cell.

A man stood behind the bars, safe in the hall away from Azula. They called him a doctor but Azula knew better. He was a sadist who simply came to get pleasure at seeing a princess on her knees.

"Ah yes, the Ohm. I'm sorry, how exactly did you save the world from them?"

Azula remained silent. Her role in returning this world to life had been forgotten, now all that remained was her brothers orders and the fickle loyalty of her people.

"You're not making alot of progress these last few weeks Azula. I think the time may come for some more drastic therapy methods.

Azula felt her muscles tighten at the words. She knew what he meant. Medical procedures, highly experimental ones. The kind that would leave her a highly manageable vegetable.

"I wish to speak to my Brother."

The doctor chuckled and shook his head packing up his things and leaving, "Now now princess, you know he has alot to do running the nation, rebuilding it from the damage your father did. I'm sure he'll have time to see you later."

Azula felt like screaming but denied herself. Her energy was best spent trying to figure out an escape plan.

Because if she ever wanted to see the world she had saved, she had to get out of this cell.

"Shit Shit shit shit!!!"

Sandy could practically feel the creatures hot breath on the back of her neck as she raced through the rain soaked streets.

"COME ON!" She screamed at the heavens which offered her no apology for her misfortune. The moment she had woken up was just a few minutes before the last one she had remembered back home.

Being forced to relive a moment she felt deeply ashamed of was not high on her list of "Things I want to do after we save the universe"

So now she was trying and failing to outrun a hideous monster. The same one that had almost killed her before...well whatever had happened with the Ohm.

Black as ink with sharp white eyes, rows and rows of razor sharp teeth and a massive tongue the Beast was as tall as a bus with massive muscles capable of shattering pavement with each thunderous step.

The lanky girl was weaving through alleys and desperately seeking out some form of cover somewhere...anywhere!

The place she had run to before, the church, was full of children. Once upon a time she'd gladly have sacrificed them to save herself.

But she wasn't that girl anymore.

Ruffnut sighed with annoyance at the sheep spread out in the field below her.

Concerned, one of the two heads of her two headed dragon gave her a nudge with her nose and hissed out some sparks because that always seemed to make Ruffnut perk up. This however did not help.

Everything was as it should be. Berk was restored, her family, her friends, her dragon...

But no one remembered a thing. Not even Astrid when Ruff had confronted her, or Hiccup who had been wearing his older peg leg from before and no longer had the super cool metal one with toes.

"Maybe I really am crazy?" Ruff thought out loud and the two heads of her and her brother's dragon looked at one another as if considering this. They didn't seem to have any objections.

The worst part about it? She had felt justifiably important! She wasn't just one half of "The Terrible twins" or one of Hiccup's friends who had helped end the feud between Vikings and Dragons.

She had been a big damn hero! Nearly an Overlord!

Ruffnut the Overlord...now Ruffnut the Shepherd.

Zouichi stared out at the alien landscape.

This is what had replaced Earth. The germinated Recreator. 4.8 billion kilometers long, approximately 1,000 kilometers in diameter. This is what he'd been fighting to defend? Were there even any humans left here?

There was a thin atmosphere, breathable enough, but... had the others survived? How much time had passed since he'd been returned here? He tried to call out on the comm, but if Nishu or Kozlov were here, they were out of range.

He eased the bike forward, taking in the vast white expanse of organic material that made up the Recreator's surface.

(http://www.flickr.com/photos/56712133@N04/5913489663/)

"Father, I must admit, it sounds like your memories of the Saernai ship and the sudden influx of bizarre Earth culture gave you strange dreams. But if you are certain it happened, of course I believe you. Is there anything to be done about it?"

"I...suppose not. We do have a war to fight, after all. Let us get back to the Emperor."

PARTY AT THE NETHERWORLD.

Sure, nobody had believed him when they'd wished the Netherworld, and all its denizens, back into existence. Then Zetta had vowed to kick everybody's ass the the same time, literally. So then they believed him.

It was good to be the Overlord.

Laughing, he set the Netherworld on a route through the cosmos and the spaces between worlds. He had people to find!

The war was over. The Ohm were sealed away, and all the worlds restored. Anwei was back with the Vizsnunishne fleet. Back with Horanckk. Back with her AI, with her friends, with her work and her plans, a thousand warships between her any anyone that might wish her harm. Everything was back to the way it should be.

She didn't believe it. She talked to Horanckk and wondered: who was manipulating who. Was it he who had freed her from Fle, or her that had broken his programming chains and let him escape?

She laughed with her friends and thought: would they really be her friends, if she was not the famous Abomination now calmed and tamed? Could she make friends by herself, without her AI's help?

She hovered, weightless, in the white-enameled cubicle she called home, watching with too-intense interest a wall-sized screen covered with dancing formulas and liquid flowing graphs. Prices, population flows, legal changes, rebellions, campaigns, rumors: everything weighed and counted and averaged, and when the graphs hit the right spot, she would execute her plans. Pay at last for the lives she'd taken, by doing her damnedest to take down the Ninth Empire.

But - was that what she had decided? Or had someone or someones else made the choice, biased her numbers, and pushed her out front to be a target, again? Just like someone had pulled her from the roiling energies of a collapsing dimension, made her fight and kill for their unknown reasons, then vanished away again?

Marcus was waiting for her. It was time to pack up what was left in the old apartment, as she was moving in with him and his wife soon, so goodbye to this old life as Hit Girl. It was a cute dream too: it's not like she hadn't been saving the universe, risking life an limb to return this world to its rightful place. To him, it was just another day, and he was itching to give her a slate to wipe clean. To her? It was playing the most brilliant poker face ever, being happy to abandon the dangerous life she had. He probably thought he was doing her a favor.

But she had an itch now, to be that girl that became an Overlord, to do more than be a student at some school, able to destroy any asshole dumb enough to so much as breathe the same air as her the wrong way. She wasn't crazy: she remembered all that had happened. But she would wait: the Overlord, or Ruff, would come, and she'd leave Marcus guilt free: who needed another mouth to feed?

For now, she was gazing at all the weapons dad had left behind: she would keep a few, maybe make some of her own eventually. Marcus would have the rest confiscated, he was clean like that.

A train howled in fierce joy, streaking past the platform where she stood, unsteady on her feet, blinking at the teeming mess of ehhif around her.

Instinct kicked in as a knot of teenagers converged on her position, gabbling on their cell phones and not paying attention to their feet, and she stepped sideways abruptly, becoming invisible before she streaked across a gap in the crowd to the stairs.

What had happened? The last thing she remembered, they were about to-

Rhiow looked around herself slowly. Manhattan. Grand Central. Her chest squeezed, and she streaked to the Gate, the oldest one, the one they used to go Downside. She couldn't be here right now.

A twist of her claws, and the blank locus of the gate distended into a kind of opaque sphere before it snapped flat, and Rhiow could see the rippling grass and the Mountain with the Tree through it. She jumped, her form expanding to ten times its size as she passed through before landing heavily on the other side, sleek and black and definitely not a housecat.

Only then did she fall heavily onto her belly, laying her head down in the grass. They had saved the worlds. They had done it. And now she would never see them again.

They'd won. And just like that, she was back at home.

Truthfully, Lash really didn't want to call it a home anymore. Black Hole was still gone and he was still gone as well. And the people she lost on the ship...the people that she...

Dammit! Why hadn't she been allowed to say goodbye? It was so unfair! She bit her lip in frustration, watching the trees sway against the cold, bitter wind.

Oh right. She'd been walking away from the latest Orange Star party, unsure what they'd be doing with her after this. She looked down on her hands, and the morpher was gone. Of course. Her only real proof, gone. No one would ever believe what had just happened would they? Hrrgh. The only thing that made her not question her own sanity was the fact she still had all her memories. Memories of ships, worlds, people, magic that was unseen and unused here. Memories of having a really good time with friends and...

That's when she realized...she still could do some damage. Right! No sense running away now. She hadn't run away from the battles on the ship, this was easy compared to that! Her mind was a precious commodity before, but now it offered possibilities unimagined in this world.

The first day in the rest of her life.

The Wunderkind walked back to the party a tiny grin upon her lips. Zetta would probably have appreciated what would come next.

The Gargoyles of course, had bought his story, after a while. Weirder things had happened, and there was no reason to think Peter was crazy.

Everyone else, however, was more difficult. He hadn't told them, although they could tell something was different. Gwne had eventually managed to dump Harry without a massive fallout, but after everything Peter didn't have the feelings he had before he'd been taken to Stacy. She hadn't understood at first, and tried to get Peter to tell her what was wrong, but eventually laid off.

He still fought crime, and he still quipped. Better than before actually, the war having improved his skills. But it was almost half-hearted. He missed everyone on Stacy. Missed the Spider-Mobile, missed his older self, Missed hanging out with Beats boy, and he definitely missed Starfire.

Ronnae had 'awoken' in the middle of a battlefield. The ground was dark and hot, cracks littered the area where steam could be seen rising from them and magma threatened to spew out. It was instinct, that allowed her to avoid being crushed by a fire behemoth just in time.

That had been a week back... The week she had returned from Stacy, and the Ohm war... but had it really happened? Dimensional travel was not a concept unheard of by her family, or some Azerothians. After all, the Legion and other creatures were believed to be from different ones, and the head of the household, her grandfather, was not native to Azeroth... but she could still tell that her story was a bit too out there for a few of her family members.

She retold the story in full detail to her grandfather, explaining all that had happened and the fact that if they were here, they have to had won... right? She'd have to find Nokosi! She needed to, at least to confirm she hadn't gone crazy... but she was yet to find him. Her grandfather had reassured her that he believed her. In the world of magic, there was no such thing as 'impossible' and different dimensions were very real. However she wouldn't have much time to work out how she felt about all this.

Azeroth was engaged in yet another world threatening war, and as always it was a war on all three fronts... against the threat, and against the opposing faction. It almost felt as if she never left... maybe it had been a dream... and yet... "Billy..." The words left her lips as if they were a fleeting dream. Had she really loved someone so much as to give herself to them?

Her thoughts were filled with the people she had met aboard Stacy as she walked through Silvermoon. Her friends, her lover.... the people who meant so much to her at that time... she really wished it was real.

Bump! She fell with a thud on the ground and she suddenly looked up embarrassed that she hadn't been looking where she was going. The all too familiar sneer of a noble looking down at her with disgust was all too real.

"Watch where you are going trash. You should be sticking to the alleyways and whorehouses where you belong, instead of tainting these streets with your presence." with a mocking laugh from his consort, he lifted Ronnae's face with the tip of his cane. "Although, I could use another servant." A wicked smirk rising on his features.

Ronnae could feel that familiar cold fear running up her back. She had no reason to be treated like this... She was after all of noble blood, and from a family of renowned heroes... and still... this felt real... as it always had been... She turned her gaze, looking away embarrassed. "I... I'm n-not a s-servant... I'm...." she stood up and looked at him with a frown. "I'm a noble." she finally said defiantly.

The elven noble looked at her incredulously before letting out a haughty, mocking laughter. "YOU? A noble?! The poor girls delusional!" He roared in laughter once more before suddenly backhanding her. "You are no more than a half breed, trash that let her blood be tainted. It is your duty as being part elven to kill yourself, so as you stop tainting our perfect, pure, sin'dorei blood. Noble, HA! you'd be lucky if you were nothing more than someone slave. Come Nashka, let us leave this poor creature since it would rather live a life of illusions rather than being my servant and live comfortably."

Ronnae couldn't retaliate... it wasn't her place... he was right? She stood in the middle of the city,looking down at the golden roads that paved the majestic city. I don't belong anywhere do I... With a sigh after rubbing her face, she continued on her way to the base... she'd been called into action earlier so maybe... maybe the battlefield would finally give her peace of mind once again...

Stacy seemed like a far off dream... Too good to be a real.

Ah.

Nice that they'd managed, after everything, to find the path to Salvation. Nicer still to find the path that allowed their worlds to return. Wonderful, really, if disorientating as hell to be slammed back to a moment of screams and metal grinding on metal, in the heat of day one of the Fourth Shinobi World War.

"How did--"

A man was groaning under her hands, and Sakura made herself focus. It looked like she was working on a Hyuuga family member, but this had been so long ago, it felt. But this was impossible. This was --

"Stacy, end this simulation."

|| Simulation ending. ||

-- impossible.

Sakura stood, shaking her head. "You almost had me that time." The medic stretched, walking to the Sensorium exit. If she was going to have to exist as data in any given simulation, she preferred if it stayed away from her home simulation. Besides, the illusion of traveling through space was more interesting than being trapped in the code that played out the shinobi war and destruction of the world she used to think meant everything.

"They'll figure it out," she told Stacy, since really, who else was there to tell. THE PROGRAMMERS? No, they were off being busy somewhere else. So she headed back toward the transport tubes, aiming for the City level. If she was living knowing she was actually just information programmed to serve a function for the entertainment of beings she really, sincerely never hoped to meet, she may as well do what the hell ever came to mind.

Like right now? Sure, there were some parameters she couldn't work around, but of the things she could do? Abuse censor bars.

And that is why Sakura decided to go skinny dipping in the Kohaku River at dawn in the City on Stacy the meatship.

Word.

Edited 2011-07-08 16:15 (UTC)

They all know her face again. Everywhere she goes, she's met with the caution and delicacy with which one should treat a very, very famous person with a very, very public and very, very tragic past. Met with averted eyes and hushed whispers. And ever since she started talking about how she helped save the world from the Ohm,, even the office interns treat her like a timebomb, expecting that she's become so cracked she can't remember the name of the alien race that destroyed her life.

She's back at work a lot, trying to avoid going home to Peter as much as possible. He may have sainted patience but he doesn't understand the change in her, now that she's had a fresh start and anonymity taken away. She asks " you don't think I'm crazy, do you?" and he always takes just a little to long to say "no", so they've been fighting. A lot.

The aftermath of the war with the Yeerks has left enough damage to be remedied to keep her busy. She directs charities to grants. She opines on legislation. She makes phone calls to senators and gives speeches before Congress. But she doesn't mention the Ohm to anyone anymore.

Splicer awoke on the couch that he was all too familiar with in his apartment on Korhal. For a moment, he simply sat, not blinking an eye or for that matter, breathing.

He turned his gaze to look around his living room, taking in the scenery as if it was some surreal occurrence. "Dude?! What the fuck? Are you just gonna bum away the day again? We got games to play, and you haven't even checked if we got a mission." Miguel's voice snapped him out of his thoughts as he leaned his head back to look at his ~~doll~~ friend.

"Yeah Sevy! You promised you'd take me to see the new park today. The one with all the new aminals!" He turned to look at Lil and smiled. He was home? So they had won huh... Not that he doubted it but... it all seemed to have ended too fast.

He wondered what happened to the people he had met on the ship... Z, Alex, Chase, Star.... Where they alright? Had they gone to their worlds as well? For a few moments he sat in thought before he felt Alice's hands pat his head, the doll had been sitting on his shoulder idly. "Come now sweetheart, no need to be discouraged. I'm sure they're all safe."

A smile rose on his lips and he nodded. "Yeah, I guess you're right." Pushing his shades up his face, he stood, just as the doll floated safely to the couch. He pulled a cigarette from his pocket and lit it up, placing it on his lips and taking a long drag before walking out to the balcony and looking down on the busy skyways that made up the very populated world of Korhal.

She had opened her eyes to GLaDOS' central control chamber, to the sound of the AI expressing genuine concern for her well-being. It took Chell a few moments to realize her computer nemesis was talking about the Moon thing, as if it had just happened. Maybe it had.

The rest of it was a blur. She was ushered into an elevator, and before she knew what was happening (and after a completely unexpected serenade), unceremoniously dumped out of a tiny metal shack into a field of wheat that extended as far as the eye could see. The Companion Cube was quick to follow suit, in another surprising development. A parting gift. Very cute.

Chell could not remember the last time she'd seen the sky, and the clear blue that stretched before her was almost enough to make her forget that she had no idea how long her stasis had been, and no idea regarding the current state of the world. Maybe she'd slept through the apocalypse, for all she knew (she realized it was a distinct possibility). That was, of course, saying nothing about the memories of her time on a strange, sentient spaceship, kicking ass and saving the multiverse. But maybe that had been a dream brought about by unfortunate exposure to the vacuum of space.

She walked.

"Sakura?"

She spent most of her time outside at night, even on the days where the clouds kept the stars masked behind gray-brown cover. She'd never been imaginative, not in the ways people had questioned her about when she'd first asked if they'd remembered. Delicate questions to the people who she'd seen there, with blank stares and puzzled glances in return. She only asked once.

More than that, and people would be asking her questions in turn. At the time, it hadn't mattered. One war won? There was another one to preserve her world, and their casualties were so heavy. She wondered how she could explain to the crew not here that they'd managed to lose 40,000 fighters in one day, to such comparatively unremarkable means. She thought of them when she discovered Zetsu infiltrating, called in her report to the Kages and sending everyone on alert. Identifying genetic matches back to the first Hokage, revealing Zetsu's origins.

See, Rory? Faiza? Even my world has some of the technology we had.

See, Marco? Even we have our weird versions of genetic manipulation.

Zetsu wasn't morphing, but for many intents and purposes, to most those she knew, it looked like he had. Into other people.

More died that night, but fewer than would have if she hadn't seen through the subterfuge. Even then, with her war back in the forefront, she'd stared into the night sky.

What're you looking for? She answered her own thought, speaking out loud. "Something impossible." The fact she did was more reassuring than anything else. Sakura didn't have that kind of imagination. Not for the Ohm, the Daligig, for the GIA, for the Tapestry; not for Yeerks and other people's wars and Azeroth and Krynn and a thousand different Earths and Hispania of all things. Not for Gundams or the TARDIS or Serenity, if nights were the closest she came to that anymore. "Why let us remember, when it ends up like this?"

Howard would believe that he'd just lost his mind and hallucinated the whole thing. He wouldn't be the first kid to completely flip his lid in the FAYZ, what with the fear and the starving and the Everything Out to Kill You. Mary cracked, plenty of kids stepped out, and out of the hundred and sixty left at the Lake, probably eighty have some serious screws loose. Talking to Toto on any given day is a surreal experience.

Howard would believe it if not for the bite scars on his right foot that could only be from a dinosaur.

He's tried to convince himself it was the coyotes, but even mutated, they don't have teeth that big. So he's accepting that he's back at the FAYZ. Back to barely enough food. Back to no electricity. Back to real, founded fear. Back to hopelessness.

Back to Orc, whose souled clothing Howard is currently busy washing in a bucket of water.

Winning was still something that Ben had been adjusting to.

Returning home after the world was restored was fun. Explaining to his folks that he and Gwen had been on a living ship for X amount of time was even funner even though they took it well. Kevin demanded to know why he was left out of the fun to be honest.

It was also a big point that Ben had grown significantly for the long time that it took them to win. Stronger looking although not quite to 10k standards, he wore facial hair now, and it was being neatly trimmed when Gwen called him down to see something on TV.

Then they had to go and confront a kid named Jimmy about exposing him to the world. That was fun. But Ben could deal.

He'd forgotten how hot this place was. It wasn't like the ship's muggy, organic environment. The canyon belonged to the sun and it reigned with an oppressive, dry heat that stuck in your throat and sent ripples of distortion wafting up off the stone and concrete.

The shade didn't help much, but it was something. You just did not bother going outside at high noon, there was pretty much nothing that was worth it.

Grif deserved better than this. Or at least, he was pretty sure he did. Hadn't he actually helped save the whole multiverse or something? It should be grateful! But instead of anything good, he'd just gotten thrown back in the canyon, and now Simmons thought he was crazy and Sarge...

...was still Sarge.

It was bizarre being back here. It wasn't as much of a hellhole as he'd remembered. It was still bad, sure, but it was... more tolerable? The canyon was just annoying. His team was just annoying. The Blues over there? Annoying. His sister being over there with them still pissed him off a good deal, but in the large scheme of things he just didn't care as much anymore. He was a bit stronger now physically, but also mentally. Compared to the ship and the shit he'd seen in that war? This was okay. He might've even been able to kill some of these people now, what with the little he'd managed to learn, but as much as he used to relish the thought of putting a shot between Sarge's eyes he just couldn't actually bring himself to do it. It was pointless. Nobody here was worth the time or the effort or the ensuing problematic fallout. They were just a bit annoying.

Maybe the canyon wasn't life-destroyingly horrible to him anymore, but either way it was annoying and he still wanted out of this place. Grif just wasn't sure how he could do that. So for now, he would just sit cross-legged in the doorway staring out at the canyon and hoping Sarge would forget he existed for a few more hours.

If it weren't for the distinct crisp smell of the planet of Roak, Reimi would believe she was in the sensoriums. But no, there was something different, something not FALSE about this world.

They had done it.

But why did she feel so empty?

Sitting up in her bed on the Calnus, she bustled by her companions, slid past Edge who called out to her but ignored it.

Exiting the ship into the world, she continued to run, faster and faster. Tears blurred her eyes as she remembered her friends, her family and their smiling faces.

Faster she ran, rushing through the landscape until she finally stood in front of the city that had once been her resting place when she had contracted the disease that laid her low for a while.

Curling up at the gates to watch travelers, she tried to convince herself everything was all right.

It was raining again, for which Jamie was grateful. Even though he was soaked to the skin, the rain meant the Redcoats wouldn't be searching as hard for him right now. Maybe, just maybe, he'd have a chance to get to the coast and stow away on a ship to France.

There were times, though, that he wondered if it was worth doing so. There were these memories - impossible memories, of fighting a war in a place that wasn't here, making friends, a strange man with a strangely familiar blue box, and a bonny lass that he used to travel with once upon a time...

Except he hadn't traveled with her. And he remembered seeing that blue box here, once, when he had taken a man calling himself the Doctor and his friends, Ben and Polly back there. It wasn't too long ago, only a few days. He knew this. So, why, in these other memories, had it been years? And why was that man called the Doctor completely different there?

There were all these things that he knew at the time that simply didn't make sense, and try as he might, he couldn't figure it out. The only thing he could think was that he was going mad, and he had no idea what to do about it.

All he could do was try and stay alive. Looking up at the sky, he saw the clouds beginning to clear away, and in the distance a small group of Redcoats moving through the hills, looking for fugitives. Looking for him.

With a muttered Gaelic oath, he ducked down behind a large rock. There was a cave he knew about that if he could make it to, he could hide out in until nightfall. The question was, was he going to be able to get there without the Redcoats spotting him?

Sometimes, Billy realized, what you desperately wanted with all your heart wasn't all it was cracked up to be.

According to his teammates, there had been no Ohm attack at all. The world had never been destroyed. Lord Zedd was still the only threat...and really, he was now sure that if the evil emperor remembered the events at all, it would likely make him resent Billy even more than before. So he was more vigilant on the invasion front these days.

Not even Zordon and Alpha's records turned up any sign of the threat that had taken so much sacrifice to end. For the rest of the planet, all that war effort would never matter. Billy had tried to explain everything to the Rangers when he'd first woken up in his bed one morning, and they sounded sympathetic, but it was clear to him that the concept was beyond belief. After a few tries, aside from the 'I've lost friends' bit that they understood very well, he finally dropped the subject and tried to move on with his life. The only significance it held was in Billy's memory, where what he'd witnessed and who he'd loved would always be remembered well.

A few departures from his original life in Angel Grove had already taken place. What he'd learned in the sciences during his adventure had more than qualified him to graduate high school immediately and begin work on a dual engineering/astronomy degree at Angel Grove University. His teammates didn't question it, really, but they definitely missed having him around in the high school.

Second, the value of the friendships he had was so much more firmly entrenched. In memory of the bonds he'd forged in the war, he'd vowed never to give up all he'd fought for. After arranging for an instant teleportation system with Zordon in the event of an emergency, he'd used some of his money from the few new inventions he'd produced to book six plane tickets to Switzerland. Next week, he'd finally get to see Jason, Trini, and Zack again.

Other than that, life in Angel Grove seemed the same. In fact, it was too...small. This beach wasn't like the vibrant sands he'd seen on shore leaves. The juice bar was no Drunken Dragon---sure, Ernie was willing to listen to a lot of ordinary teenage problems, but the reality of intergalactic war would fly right over his head.

Bulk and Skull still loved to tease, but Billy still couldn't believe he'd been afraid of them once. They were silly, comforting presences and nothing more. Everything about this life felt small, even the battles. After that war, he had no trouble at all with whatever was thrown at them anymore. Setbacks no longer worried him, there was always something else to try. Tommy had observed that Billy had become quite the strategist, which was...all true, thanks to the help of his friends.

Renne. Kaya. Alex. Jamie. Kaylee. Kang. Hoshi. Stephen. Daja. Goliath. Nokosi. Kate. Ron. Andy. Lash. Dustin. Tenaya... Dozen of names were now burned into his memory, ones that he would never forget. A journal he kept under his bed documented all his memories of each one, accompanied by a little doodle.

The last pages were dedicated to the love of his life that he'd lost, Ronnae. That and his Bondeds were the worst losses of all. A special connection had been lost, to a circumstance that he'd always suspected was inevitable in the back of his mind. Of course everyone was going to be split up when the war was won. Of course it hurt. Of course his heart was ready to break whenever he saw couples doing the cute things that couples did. The laughter of best friends---one with hair just a little too much like Jamie's, one with a laugh a little too much like Kaya's.

That was why...someday, after retiring as a Ranger, he intended to head out into the stars. If there was the slightest chance of finding them again (...well, except Dustin, who was on this planet but very young in this timeline), he would be out there searching.

But that was for later. For now, he had some studying to do in Angel Grove Park. Oh, he fully expected to be interrupted by a putty swarm, but Zedd didn't know about the latest weapons in his backpack. He was prepared.

For this wild future he'd lost sight of for a brief while.

Edited 2011-07-08 21:26 (UTC)

As far as everyone knew, the world was still in the process of being repaired after the devastation that Brooklyn caused when he went insane. It was only thanks to Takao that they still had an Earth to be on, but that didn't sit right with Hoshi. She didn't have the healing process that underwent on Stacy, so she still had bandages wrapped around her head, cheek and the sling that went around her to hold her arm in place after she fractured it.

There was one thing she was certain of -- she felt empty without all the different people she met. Sasami, Billy, Aqua, Kaylee, the Doctor, Philip... Everyone. Every single one of them held a place in her heart and she wanted to see them again, as well as see if they were okay.

She felt an incredible ache and yearning in her heart and an overwhelming amount of sadness, which her teammates and parents worried about, but she was assuring them and herself that she'd be okay. Maybe one day, she could get over that, but when she had so many experiences, it was hard to let go of them. A few people said it could be that she was shy about showing her wounds out to the open or it was simply just stress. But, no. She was certain that she meet other people, convinced it wasn't just a dream, but yet it was a reality that she had to somehow make work all over again.

What did give her hope, though, was the Nazca Memory stashed in her pocket. She liked to click it here and there just to hear it go "NAZCA", but she couldn't transform into the Kamen Rider she had been. Was it officially time to hang up the Driver? No, it couldn't be the end of her journey just yet, right? It... it had just begun, dammit! Her Ride wasn't over yet! She still had smiles to protect so that no one cried! That was her promise to Philip and Shoutarou when they had the Narumi Detective Agency on board Stacy, and she was determined to follow up on it even on her world. No one would cry anymore and no one would be sad. That was something worth fighting for.

"Where are you guys?" she muttered under her breath, sitting down on the porch that was connected to her home while she gave her mother a little smile to show that things were going to be okay with her. She didn't want to worry her mother, after all. She had enough on her plate to deal with, as well as her own father who decided to take some time off to help her recuperate after her injuries. Hoshi was truly thankful for that, but she did know he had to go back on duty soon, unfortunately.

Maybe... Maybe there was something that she could do. After all, with the strength of everyone, they were able to stop the world from ending the first time, right? Who's to say that they couldn't try the same tactic again and rework it to make a miracle happen? There were good people that she knew her friends would enjoy having around, especially those she made friends with on Stacy.

Edited 2011-07-09 02:03 (UTC)

Beastboy / Jump City California

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Ruffnut Thorston / The isle of Berk

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