Time Crash - Episode 2

[Sandy]

Welcome to the second chapter of the interactive story known as Time Crash. The characters introduced in the first episode awaken in a strange, derelict environment. They soon encounter each other and form small groups, but how long can they survive the unstable dimensional rift they have all been sucked into? It's up to you readers to decide.

This time, there are two polls to go along with the story. The first one defines which characters will get to survive through the next episode, and which ones will meet an untimely end. You can choose multiple characters, and the ones with the most votes will have the leading roles in the third episode. On the other hand, at least five characters with the least votes will die in that episode. If votes are tied, then more characters might be killed off as well.

The second poll will decide how the groups will behave in the next episode. There will be more specific options in the future, but since were just at the beginning of the story where anything can still happen, I wanted to keep them quite general. So, will the survivors gather their numbers together, or will the small groups fall apart? Or will everyone just stick to whoever they ended up with in the first place? Again, it's your choice.

If there is something else you want to see in Time Crash in the future episodes, don't be afraid to post about it. I'm more than happy to take "unofficial" suggestions into consideration as well.

But now, onto the story. This time it is told through the perspective of six characters as chosen in the first episode's poll. Hope you enjoy learning more from the survivors!

*****

Bob knew he had seen the boy walk in front of the ambulance he was driving too late. The impact couldn’t be avoided. He just closed his eyes and hoped for a miracle. With a jolt, the ambulance came to a halt, and Bob hit his forehead to the steering wheel.

He blinked his eyes a few times to make the whiteness filling them disperse. Much to his surprise, he first thing he saw was the scared expression of the schoolboy he had nearly hit.

“A-are you alright, sonny?” he asked as he rushed out of the ambulance.

The boy couldn’t answer, but just looked past Bob. The paramedic glanced over his shoulder, and cursed out loud as he saw what had happened to the ambulance: it had gotten stuck into a solid rock. He slowly realized that the entire surrounding had changed from the suburban street he had been speeding on just seconds ago. Everything was distorted and strange, and no other people besides himself and the boy were present.

It all reminded him of the drug-induced trips he had gone off to in his past. After the rehabilitation, he had studied to become a paramedic to give back to the society that had given him another chance in life. Working in an environment filled with drugs was tough, but Bob took it as a test of his strength of will.

After assuring himself that this was no hallucination, Bob remembered the doctor and the patient in the back of the ambulance. He saw that the back doors had sunken into the rock. Bob knocked on the side window.

“Doc?” he called, but there was no answer. Peering inside, he saw that the ambulance was empty.

Suddenly a voice came from behind him. “I beg of you, gentle sire! Please help me!”

Bob turned to see a young woman dressed in a decorative dark blue dress approaching him and the boy with tears running down her face.

*****

“Aaaah!”

Ferid awoke to a horrified scream. His finely honed instincts kicked in, and he quickly examined his surroundings. He was still at the window ledge of the house of the treasurer he had assassinated, but what he saw through the window had changed completely. There was a pool of water right below, and rubble everywhere. And the sky… it was empty.

The aching in his body told Ferid that he was very much alive, but he couldn’t help wondering if this was the afterlife. If it was, it wasn’t anything like the priests had told. He spotted his knife on the floor and tugged it into his sash.

Silently, Ferid jumped down from the window and hid in the shadow of the ruins of the treasurer’s house. It had practically melted with another house, a much larger one with an outlandish architecture.

Peeking around the corner, he saw a woman in a red dress helping up a fair man with gaudy clothing. The couple was staring at a body, which Ferid recognized as the treasurer. They spoke in a strange language. The fiery-haired woman tried to console the shocked man, which was very strange to Ferid.

Suddenly he heard voices from inside the houses, and the remains of a door behind him swung open. A bearded man with a white clothing came out, pulling some sort of sickbed with wheels where an older woman laid. The man noticed Ferid, and asked him something with the same language that the couple had spoken.

Now the couple had spotted all of them as well, and the woman waved at the white-clad man to come to see the body of the treasurer. The man looked at Ferid and pointed at the sickbed with an encouraging smile. Then he made his way through the rubble between them and the road.

Ferid’s instincts urged him to make a swift escape, but somehow he realized that he had better chances of surviving with the people around him. Just as long they didn’t connect him with the dead of the treasurer. Carefully Ferid covered his knife with his dark cloak.

*****

The bright light and the tremors following it took her out of balance, but leaning to her staff Uhla managed to keep herself from falling off the cliff. As the shamaness opened her eyes, she saw that the sea had retracted, revealing a sandy beach below her.

Being friends with the sky and the ocean, she instantly knew that it wasn’t the same sea she had known all her life. And the clear-blue sky she had grown under was gone as well. She knew that the air she breathed wasn’t the same either. She tasted death and turmoil.

The shoreline below her was filled with strange debris and bodies of people. Uhla saw one of the people twitch and get up. Their eyes met.

Quickly the woman Uhla was staring took a long knife from the sand. It was made of the shiniest and sharpest stone the shamaness had ever seen. Uhla sensed danger.

The wild-haired woman shouted something at Uhla angrily, but she didn’t understand it. Suddenly the stranger’s attention turned to another body that was getting up. This man had a similar long knife as well, and he was shouting at the vile woman. But there was a hint of despair in his voice. Uhla reckoned that the two of them had a peculiar relationship.

Suddenly the woman rushed at the man, and the knives clashed. Uhla heard a third body on the beach, one that was entangled to a net, moan. The old man couldn’t get up and was slowly drowning, as shallow as the water was. The others were too caught up in their battle to notice, so Uhla knew she had to get down there and help the poor old man.

*****

Sergei thought he had fainted from blood-loss, but he soon noticed that he had been whisked from a nightmare to another. The snowy battlefield the soldier had been on had changed to a landscape that terrified him even more.

There was snow around him, but the water that had suddenly surrounded it was quickly melting it away. A few empty boats floated in the water. Behind the small mount of snow was a small field of sand with a rundown shack and a skeleton of a horse, and beyond them there was a steep wall of rock with a front of a ship protruding out of it.

Sergei just couldn’t understand any of it. But his soldier’s senses told him to keep hiding behind the snow, for there were three men lying in the sand field – two that reminded him of the pictures he had seen of Americans, and one that looked like an ancient warrior.

Sergei still had his rifle next to him. He loaded it and buried his wounded leg in snow to numb the pain. Then he just observed.

What happened first was that the door of the shack opened slowly. A young man with a black cowboy hat and a revolver peeked out. There was a raven-haired girl behind the youngster.

“Father!” the girl shouted as she saw the bodies on the sand. She pushed the gunman aside and ran to an older man with a large feathered hat. Sergei was now sure of it: these people were Americans. But what had they done to his motherland?

“Cougar Claw, watch out!” the gunman shouted suddenly, and Sergei saw the other man with a cowboy hat getting up and pointing a gun at the girl.

“Move a muscle, Trigger, and the girl is dead”, the grey-clad man said. He had a cunning face crowned by a monocle. Sergei knew that he was looking at another experienced soldier.

“Northfalk, no!” the man called Trigger shouted back. “Look around you! We’re not in the States anymore. I have no idea what happened, but this is not the time and place to play cops and robbers.”

Meanwhile, the girl had lifted her father’s head to her lap and was singing a song in her native language. Sergei could speak several European languages, but this was unlike anything he had ever heard.

Next to come to senses was the warrior. He was a large man with a flame-red bushy beard and a winged helmet. He asked something in a language that sounded Scandinavian, but Sergei couldn’t interpret it.

When the warrior saw the part of the ship hanging above his head, he let out a terrified holler and fell to his knees.

Sergei kept on analyzing the situation. He could smell the tension in the air. The two men in cowboy hats kept aiming their weapons, the girl was still waiting for her father to open his eyes, and the hulking warrior kept on staring the ship he had obviously fallen from with terror in his eyes.

*****

The first thing Vanya thought when she woke up was that it was a pure miracle she was still alive. There weren’t any stories of people surviving a crash-landing spacecraft that she knew of.

The remains of The Starduck were steaming right next to her. Vanya realized she had landed on a bush. Knowing the fickle nature of crashed vehicles, Vanya quickly got up and took a few steps away from the spacecraft.

That’s when the reality hit her. She was standing in a grassy crevice with a few ruined houses around her and the spaceship.

“What the helium is going on in here?” she asked aloud, also applauding herself for the witty punch line in her mind.

Then Vanya saw a man among the stones in front of her. She had mistaken him as a piece of debris first because of the black iron suit he was wearing. As she approached the man, her eyes widened as she realized that the iron suit was actually an authentic armor worn by knights of the legends.

The historian inside of her woke up instantly, graving for more data about the strange man. She sighed in relief when she saw the man opening his eyes.

“Are you alright, mister? I apologize for landing on your house…” Vanya’s sentence was cut short by the sword the man was pointing at her. “Easy now, mister! I said I was sorry…”

“You demon! What have you done to my lady’s manor?” the armored man bellowed. Now that Vanya got a good look of him, she saw the madness in his eyes.

“It is alright, Ghast. I’m quite fine.” Vanya glanced up where the voice had come from. A woman with harsh features, a long conical hat and a ragged dress was staring down at them.

“Lady Morrigan! This bride of the Devil came with her iron chariot and laid your house in ruins!” the knight the woman had called Ghast said, frantically spitting every word out of his mouth. Vanya was taken aback by such barbarism.

“Shouldn’t we rejoice, then? It is a sign from our Dark Lord!” Then the wicked woman turned her eyes on Vanya. “Tell us, succubus, our Master’s message!”

“I’m not a succubus!” Vanya gasped. It was just her typical luck to warp through time into the hands of superstitious barbarians. “I’m a scientist!”

Sensing that these two were not in their right minds, Vanya made for an escape. She jumped back and climbed up the broken wing of The Starduck onto the opposite ledge from the witch. The knight tried to follow, but the heavy armor hindered him considerably.

Vanya dived through the smoke and ran into Captain Dereq, who was just climbing out of the cockpit of his precious vessel.

“Oh crikey, I guess The Starduck did us it’s last favor,” the white-bearded captain said with a wide grin that had a hint of sadness in it.

“No time for grief, Captain. You won’t believe me, but we seem to have jumped through time…” Vanya’s voice thinned as she saw a towering, derelict pagoda right in front of them. “… or two.”

“I’ll be damned! It seems The Starduck wasn't the only thing we trashed”, Dereq quipped.

Through the smoke, Vanya saw two figures at the upper floor of the pagoda: a very young girl and an older man, both obviously of oriental origins. The girl was pointing at the ground in front of the pagoda. Vanya looked down, and saw a deep crater in front of her. Peering inside, she saw a pair of legs pointing up.

At that moment she remembered the dark figure she had seen entering the cockpit before the crash. The figure was familiar, for it was one of the ancient alien artifacts she had picked up from the planet she had explored. Something must’ve brought it to life… And now the same artifact was lying upside down in the crater in front of her.

“Come on, help me pick the poor guy up!” Captain Dereq said next to her, reaching his hands into the crater.

“No, Dereq, I don’t think we should...” Vanya said cautiously.

Suddenly the legs started to writhe. Dereq got a hold of them and pulled. Vanya had no choice but to help him drag the artifact up.

It was roughly the shape and size of a human man, but it was constructed of fine mechanics. Despite being an apparent robotic, there was something awfully lifelike in it. Such as the eyes that were wide open and curiously staring at Vanya and the captain. Vanya couldn’t help but to find the droid endearing.

“Hi there!” she greeted the artifact. “You’re a funny feller.”

It blinked a few times, and then mimicked the explorer’s smile.

“Aw! Heartwarming, ain’t it? Now what should we call you?”

Much to her surprise, the droid answered. “XETA.”

*****

Tears filled the eyes of the old stargazer. His entire life Zhu Que had studied the mysteries of the stars and the constellations they formed. The Azure Dragon, the Vermilion Bird, the White Tiger and the Black Tortoise… Those were the gods he had worshipped for half a century. And now, in a blink of an eye, they were all gone.

“Master, look!” said Huang, his young apprentice. The girl pointed below, where a metallic bird was smoldering, and two fair-skinned people gazed into a crater. The mystic and the girl watched as the strangers pulled an even stranger being out of the hole. None of it made any sense to Zhu Que.

“Master Zhu Que, share me your wisdoms as we face this insanity”, Huang said in despair. But Zhu Que could do nothing but hang his head low. The source of his wisdom had vanished into the brightness.

“I have nothing to say. We are lost”, the old sage whispered. His apprentice gave him a terrified, incredulous look. Zhu Que felt sorry for the young girl. Orphaned and wounded at the war, she had crawled to the old man’s doorstep with the last ounce of her strength. Zhu Que had nurtured her back to health and started to pass down his wisdom to her. But now he couldn’t give the girl even that.

Once more, Zhu Que cast his eyes to the empty skies. Would he ever find wisdom again?

[Matn]

Good story, I really how this is going on. You did a great job on the pictures and the text. This must have taken a while.

The diversity in the different characters is worked out well, I'm looking forward to the conflicts they will have in the future episodes, and what will happen next.

[Sandy]

Good story, I really how this is going on. You did a great job on the pictures and the text. This must have taken a while.

It did, really. First I built the MOCs, then wrote the story around them (it's more inspiring that way to me), then me and my boyfriend photographed them and finally I edited the photos to what they are now and made this topic. All in all, it took hours and hours, so I'll be really sad if people don't enjoy reading through this.

[Quarryman]

Very nice! You've done a great job portraying the different characters' reactions to each other (and to the changes in environment they've all experienced). Looking forward to seeing what the results will be, how long are you planning to leave the poll open?

[Sandy]

Looking forward to seeing what the results will be, how long are you planning to leave the poll open?

For about a week, at least. I'd like to create a bit more buzz for this series, but I'm unsure on how to do that, exactly.

With Princess Quest, the popularity grew after each passing chapter, so I hope the same thing will happen to Time Crash as well.

[Quarryman]

For about a week, at least. I'd like to create a bit more buzz for this series, but I'm unsure on how to do that, exactly.

Though I hatestrongly dislike huge pictures in signatures (in fact I've disabled signatures because there are so many huge ones around that steal all my precious screen height) I suppose it could help if the Time Crash links in your signature were a bit bigger than they are now, a good looking banner is much more eye-catching than small text links.

[Sandy]

Based on current votes, it seems we have to get rid of 12 characters (since there are only four with one vote, and I promised at least five will die), so your votes are definitely needed! It also looks like Sergei and XETA are the strongest contenders for leading roles in Episode Three. You have the power to change all that to your liking.

You can also post to state your opinion on the upcoming characters. Which era or period in history you feel is missing from Time Crash? Do you feel a caveman would bring more action to the mix, or would you rather see someone from the antiquity or even near future? Your wish is my command.

[Batbrick]

Awesome second part Sandy! I love the way you're expanding these characters and giving them their own personalities, as well as forging interactions with the other characters. Are the ones we see here the only characters from the last bunch we'll be following? Or are we only seeing these ones and the others will be seen later? Either way, it's all good!

Let's see, I voted to survive:

Paramedic Bob: I like his character, though mind you I'll kill him if he keeps angsting about drugs

Assassin Ferid: He's still awesome. Plus I think you need a more dangerous character like him to shake up things, as well as possibly be of good help in danger.

Patient Anne: She's a nice dying lady, what can I say? I'm a natural saint I vote this because I think a lot can be done with her character.

Pirate Rosette: She is SO gonna kill that Lieutenant!

Explorer Vanya: She's cool, and you need a neat space character on the "show".

Witch Morrigan: She's a witch, that already makes her useful, evil and downright enjoyable!

Captain Dereq: I want him to do more than be a pilot of a crappy spaceduck!

Android XETA: He's a robot. End of discussion.

Also Sandy, I love the way you've fused the settings together. A little simple in spots, but overall very fun and imaginatively done!

Now bring on Part 3!

Batbrick Away1

[Sandy]

Awesome second part Sandy! I love the way you're expanding these characters and giving them their own personalities, as well as forging interactions with the other characters. Are the ones we see here the only characters from the last bunch we'll be following? Or are we only seeing these ones and the others will be seen later? Either way, it's all good!

I'm not quite sure what you're asking... Each episode will have different characters in leading roles, based on your votes. New characters join as old ones are killed off, but by the end of the show (I don't know how many episodes there will be, yet), there will be only a small group of survivors left. I have a few predetermined directions that the story could go to, but mostly I'm writing it out of inspiration.

So giving votes to certain characters both keeps them alive and ensures that you'll learn more about them. And all characters will appear in the poll in each episode. Hope that answers your question. ;D

PS. It currently looks like Ywen, Ashton, Santiago, Northfalk, Dancing Mountain and Huang will be the unlucky ones in the next episode... But there's still time to vote!

[Zepher]

What happened to the Viking? I liked him....

Okay. First, the merged sets were incredible! It was insanly cool how pieced together it looked, but still worked out. The merged houses were my favorite part by far! Awesome sets Sandy!

Okay, now on to my votes....

Ferid - Seems awesome. Could turn into a cool villian OR a cool hero, or be on a seperate side. I also want to know more about him.

Trigger - The obvious hero and good guy. I want to see him live to meet Captian Vereq too, simply becuase I think they'd be truely incredible together.

Sergei - Liked his intro, and I really like him. He ould prove to be a very indepth villian. His hate of war could really be interesting, and could make him the villian you understand, but still hate.

All the Pirates - I want the Old Guy to live just so that we meet him. I mean, he drowns? He hasn't even had a line yet. I vote the other two to see if you can get them to be friends. And I love pirates, soooooo...

Dereq - Like his older and wiser but still cocky attitude. He's really cool, and he and Trigger will make a great team, and are probaly my two current favorite characters.

Zhu Que - A wise man. Needed if they're going to ever get along.

Huang - I like her. She's not as young as the School boy, who will probaly get annoying if he survives, but she is young and could add to the story.

I really hope that you don't kill off Patient Anne, the Old Pirate, or XETA or The School boy yet. They've not done anything yet, so it would be a shame to see them die.

On another note...

I'd advise not killing as many characters, and not adding too many in. We want to get to know this cast, and don't want to have to meet a whole new one every episode. Try only killing three, or even two. I'd like to see more character's develop before they end up dead.

On a third note, I found the viking.

[Sandy]

On another note...

I'd advise not killing as many characters, and not adding too many in. We want to get to know this cast, and don't want to have to meet a whole new one every episode. Try only killing three, or even two. I'd like to see more character's develop before they end up dead.

Thanks, Zepher, for your thoughts and input!

I just want to remind you that I personally don't get to choose who dies and who doesn't. I just give a minimum amount of characters who will be killed off in the next episode, and your votes will determine who they will be.

And don't worry, I'm going to tone down the amount of people killed in future episodes. The fact is, though, that the story can't have 25 main characters with equal "screen time". Some of the characters are deadweight, and we need to get rid of them asap.

Also, the whole point of Time Crash is to tell a story that changes according to who survives and who dies. I can see that in future episodes, something that would've been discovered otherwise will not be because of a vital character has died. And vice versa. That's the thrill of this interactivity, to me.

But thanks for your votes! The amount of people that will be killed off has now jumped to seven, due to tied votes. But the poll doesn't close until Saturday, so there's still time to vote for your favorites.

[Raven Brickroft]

Thank you Sandy for this wonderful MOCFIC.

It really is like an RPG with MULTIPLE endings. I really hope that the characters I choose see through to the end.

I'd just like to repeat that Time Crash's plot really reminds me of LiveALive.

[Sandy]

Thank you Sandy for this wonderful MOCFIC.

It really is like an RPG with MULTIPLE endings. I really hope that the characters I choose see through to the end.

I'd just like to repeat that Time Crash's plot really reminds me of LiveALive.

Thanks! I've heard of the game, but I didn't know what it was about until you told me. It's cool that there's a game like that!

I'm just finishing up playing Chrono Trigger on my DS, and it too features characters from different times (albeit from a fictional world) coming together. But it features actual time travel, while Time Crash takes place in a dimensional void.

[Zepher]

Okay Sandy. I've been thinking about Time Crash (you really hae interesed me, it seems really cool) but this is the first chance I've had to get to the computer.

I very strongly advise in not to many killings. It would be a shame to see so many characters die who could of turned out to be intresting, you know. Maybe in the case of ties, round down or something, instead of increasing the amount of deaths. You could even just not feature a group of characters in one episode, but it doesn't mean they have to die per say.

As for cool new characters, I'd love to see Hippie thrown in. That could really mix it up. A conquistador or crusader could also be a cool add in to the mix!

[Sandy]

I very strongly advise in not to many killings. It would be a shame to see so many characters die who could of turned out to be intresting, you know.

I do know that. Each character in the list has potential to become a central figure of the whole story (well, some maybe have more potential than others), but I think I've made the nature of the interactivity part clear from the start: minifig heads will drop in each upcoming episode.

You can't play a Mafia game without killing people off, and this story has the same principle. I didn't start Time Crash to tell the story of 25 people as in-depht as possible. I started it to entertain readers with a survival-type of story (since Mafia-games are all the rage in these boards) and also to challenge myself to write a cohesive story with a very unpredictable outcomes due to the public polls.

I hope you will read on and enjoy Time Crash despite the upcoming slaughter of the interesting cast.

PS. I'll try to get the next episode up this weekend, so I'll close the poll early on Saturday. Currently, seven characters are under the threat of getting exterminated.

[Zepher]

Oh, I will read it, you certainly have me hooked, there's no doubt there. I personally really like the idea, and the story so far has been wonderful.

I'm just trying to give my help as a fellow member. I understand why your doing what your doing, but, while I can't cliam to be an expert writer (I'd like to be), I CAN claim to be an expert reader. And if you kill off 7 characters in the firt episode... well, tat's hard to get around. If you kill off 7 each episode.. well, look at it like this.

25 - 7 = 18 (Episode 3)

18 - I don't know, about 5 = 13 (Episode 4)

13 - 3ish? = 10 (Episode 5)

10 - 3ish? = 7 (Episode 6)

7- (2ish) = 5 (Episode 7)

See? Assuming there are about 5 surivors, and assuming you add in a few new characters... still over fairly quick.

Again, it's completely in your hands, and I sincerely look forward to all future episodes. I just will e broken up to see some characters go before they get to blossom.

[Sandy]

I just will e broken up to see some characters go before they get to blossom.

Heh, I love how you're so concerned about the well-being of the characters! But I already promised the amount of deaths will decrease in the upcoming episodes. I'm looking forward to at least ten episodes, if the story holds together. Also, I currently have solid plans for five new characters, with more ideas coming to me daily.

Anyway, your idea about splitting up the cast for certain episodes is an interesting idea, and I just might implement it in the future.

[Zepher]

Very well. I'll just sit hre quietly and hope that someone else votes to break the ties so we don't lose to many characters

I look forward to the next episode!

[Sandy]

It is now time to close the poll. Five characters were chosen in the poll to lose their lives in the next episode.

Also, the next episode will feature Sergei, Trigger and XETA prominently, at least. I'll have to take some artistic liberties on this issue to get the story moving, so the perspectives are also of characters who didn't get as many votes as those three.

But I'll start writing the third episode now, and you can expect it to be released in a matter of days. Stay tuned...