Frylight Zone Episode 5.5:
The Worst of Both Worlds, Part I
Note: this story takes place after the first five episodes of the Fan Fictions
series “The Frylight Zone”. You can read those stories at
.ar/fanfic if you’re interested. Being a continuation for other fics, there
are some things that go quite differently from the usual Futurama universe; so here
I’ll list the things you need to know:
The Professor modified his “What If” machine into an “Elseworld
Machine”; which could be used to visit other parallel universes; due to a
foul golf ball by Bender, the machine malfunctioned and sent Fry and Amy from
one parallel universe to another. Yes, this diverts from what was stated in I
Dated a Robot, that there was only one parallel universe. I don’t care. The
original Fan Fiction also said something to the effect of Fry being fated to be
the Dimensional Traveller, and introduced a villian nemesis of sorts. I don’t
care neither. I’m ignoring a bunch of story points that I didn’t like, and in
fact this story could be rewritten to be a stand-alone story. I’m not ignoring
continuity with the rest of the series, but not making a straight continuation from it neither.
In an earlier episode, Amy was killed, and then revived with a bunch of biocyborgenetic
enhancements; she has the hability to fly, superhuman strength, and other feats.
She’s also no longer a klutzoid… she’s had some “character development”
in the earlier parts of the story, after meeting her parallel self.
Likewise, Fry is no longer as dumb as a brick. He hasn’t gained any superhuman
strength, but he’s just a bit more smart t. And is no longer drooling over Leela,
though he’s still in love with her (but there will be no romance at all in
this story. I hate dumb romance fics.)
The Leela you see here isn’t the “real” Leela. Is Leela Fry from a parallel
universe; she’s a wimp from the 20th century that was frozen and woke up in that universe’s 30th century (doesn’t make any sense? Guess what: I don’t care).
That’s enough for the introduction, I guess. Onto the story!
New New York, Winter of 2987.
It is a cold night. Three mutants run as fast as their feet can
take them through a deserted street. One of them is small… and scared.
“Mom… I’m tired… I… why are they doing this?”
“Come on, Leela… we need to get to the sewer’s entrance… quick…
there will be time for talking… later…”
Little Leela, 12-years-old, keeps on running, putting a hand
on her chest and trying to breathe. But she trips, and falls. The taller figures,
her parents, Turanga Munda and Morris, stop to help her up.
On the distance, loud yelling can be heard. Munda and Morris exchange worried
looks; Morris picks Leela up and they keep on running. But the weight is slowing
Morris down, and the angry yelling grows nearer. Suddenly, another figure appears
from an street to their left; they stop cold. The figure looks at them, then
runs to meet them.
“Morris! Munda! Quick, don’t stop; they’re coming this way.”
“Vyolet! Damn, I’m glad to see you. Where’s Dwayne?”
“They… they got him. I couldn’t…”
The yelling grows even closer; the mutants decide it’s not the best time for
talking and continue to run as quick as they can. But Morris is running out
of breath. Vyolet realizes, and stops.
“Here, Morris, give me Leela. I’ll carry her for a while. Damn, I told
you you should’ve left her in the sewers! I knew things could get nasty very
easily here…”
Vyolet grabs little Leela and they continue running. This improves their speed
a little; they’re nearing their destination… but suddenly, they hear a hovercar’s
horn, and the yelling grows closer… way faster.
“Damn! They got a hovercar. Quick, now!”
Finally we see them. It’s not a hovercar, but a hoverbus following
them, at breakneck speed; an angry mob inside, their heads coming out of every
window, yelling at the mutants, some of them armed with laser sticks. The yelling
gets clearer; some yell “Death to the mutants!” and “Earth for
pure humans!”, some laugh. The hoverbus charges against Morris,
Munda and Vyolet; Vyolet and Munda jump out of the way, but Morris is too tired
and is run over. The hoverbus stops.
“Morris!” yells Munda. She goes help her husband, but at the
same time, people start getting off the bus…
Munda looks in all directions. The mob is circling her and
her husband; no escape… but Vyolet is outside that circle of death. She looks
at Vyolet straight in the eyes.
“Get Leela out of here! Now!”
Vyolet just nods… and runs away. Some humans chase her, but a voice rises.
“Stop, my friends! We’ve got two mutants here, and only
one mutant there. It’s simple math to say that we win by staying here. There’s
no need to go fish for pieces when you’ve got a full house. There’s only the
queen protecting her fallen king!”
Some of them laugh. An evil grin forms on the young man’s face.
He looks at Munda.
“Checkmate.”
Little Leela, too scared to shout or cry, looks over Vyolet’s shoulder at the
receding image of her parents being beaten to death by angry humans… for a
reason she doesn’t know or understand.
New New York, Summer of 3003.
The dimensional portal opens, suspended in the air two meters above a pool
filled with mud in New New York’s Nude Wresting Arena. Fry, Leela and Amy fall
from the portal and land straight into it.
“Yaaeerrrgh! Stupid portal!” says Amy as she tries
to get some mud off her face.
Leela, very carefully not to fall, gets out of the pool, as Amy just flies
a little to get out of it. Fry, on the other hand, tries to stand up in the
mud and falls several times, until Amy sighs and lifts him up to safety.
“Thanks, Amy.”
As he gets to his feet, the now familiar holographic image
of the professor appears just behind them. It is now much more clearer than
before.
“Awha? Fry?” says the hologram, looking at his mud-covered
great uncle.
“Yes, professor. Your doorway thingy just dropped us into a mud pit!”
“Oh, that’s fine, yes. Nothing a sonic shower can’t solve!”
“A what shower?” asks Amy, as she takes off her gray
jacket, her black pants still having plenty of mud, but her black top not so
much. She cleans her face and arms a bit with the inside of her jacket.
“Oh, it’s my new invention! I need someone to test it on, so…”
“Now wait a minute!” says Fry, amazed. “Your
last invention has been sending us jumping from one dimension to the next, and
you’re already planning on the next thing you’ll do to us?”
“Oh my, yes! But, I have to get you back here first, and
that reminds me… Good news! I have repaired the Dimensional Communicator by
using the What If machine’s dimensional scanner frequency as a carrier modulator.
That’s why I can keep longer contact with you now; I estimate I can still keep
communication for a few more minutes.”
“Oh, that’s great professor!” says Fry, following
Amy’s example and taking his red jacket off. Leela’s wearing only her tanktop,
so Amy gives her the gray jacket so she can clean herself a bit with it; Leela
gives her a shy “thanks”.
“Oh yes! In fact, I think I’m closer to bringing you back. I have been
working on a Dimensional Magnet, a device which will attract any objects from
this dimension back to this dimension! And since you appear to be the only things
from this dimension that aren’t currently in this dimension, that would be enough
to bring you two back.”
Amy lets out a little thrilled exclamation… then looks at Leela, who is holding
her jacket.
“Uh, Professor, but what about Leela? She’s not from our dimension. She’ll
be stuck here!”
“Oh, umm, my… I didn’t think of that.”
The professor’s hologram starts losing resolution. Fry notices.
“Professor, we’re losing your transmission! Tell us what to do to get
the portal to appear!”
“Ohwha? Oh, yes! Let me see… you need to end the private little war
that the offspring of hate has started.”
“Professor! Can you speak clearly?” yells
Amy, as the hologram’s image starts to get distorted.
“Oh my, no! Those clues are being generated by the poetry
machine I built for the academy symposium years ago… or was it last week? I
think you better go see the other me at Planet Express; with his help, we could
entablish a permanent communication. This hybrid communicator uses the the frequency
5ACV01, remember that.” The hologram started to break apart. “This universe’s
quite safe for you two… but don’t let them see your friend Leela, you must hid–“
The hologram dissapears. Amy and Fry look at each other.
“Poetry machine? The professor is giving us clues from a poetry machine?”
“At least he’s not giving us clues with that death clock. Frequency 5ACV01…
remember that, okay? I’ll go take a look around, wait here.”
Amy flies off. Fry looks at Leela, who looks more worried than usual.
“He, he said this world isn’t safe for me. Who… how… what could be
not safe for me?”
“Aw, don’t worry. Any universe that’s safe for us is safe for you. Amy
would kick the ass of anyone trying to harm you.”
Amy’s voice came from a nearby room. “Guys! Come here!”
Fry and Leela follow Amy’s voice, and they find themselves in the wrestler’s
showering room.
“Way to go, Amy! Um, I guess we go one at a time, we don’t want anyone
finding us with our guard down… and clothes, too. Amy, can you stand guard
while Leela and I go take a shower?” Leela looks at him and blushes. Fry
quickly adds, “In separate rooms, of course, right, I mean. Hmm,
are there any clean clothes around?”
Amy quickly takes off, flying out of the room. Some crashing
noise is heard, and she’s back with clean shirts and pants, and also three sunglasses.
“Courtesy of the manager’s dressing room. Now go, I’ll wait here.”
Half an hour later, Fry, Amy and Leela exit the Wresting building, wearing
identical white shirts, blue pants, and sunglasses, that cover Leela’s eye.
Leela has her hair down and carries a backpack with their dirty clothes. As
they walk out of the building, they come across someone very familiar…
“Bender?”
“Fry! Amy! What are you doing here, I thought you were
on that banana delivery to the Planet of the Apes. Hehe, you left Captain Wimp
to do the delivery alone? I knew I was having a good influence on you, meatbag!”
Bender pats Fry on the back, then looks at Leela. “And who’s the new skintube?”
“Uh, I, I am…”
“She’s one of the new wrestlers, erm, Purple Punch!”,
says Amy quickly. She winks at Fry and Leela, and whispers, “Universe not
safe for her, remember?”
“A new wrestler? Fry, you little…! Have you taken on my example to bring
new girls to the manager and split revenues fifty-fifty?”
“Uh… oh, yeah, that’s it!”
Bender actually lets out a small sob and wipes out a tear. “Oh, I am really
proud of you, meatbag! You really have come a long way. I’ve had some new ideas
for mass extortion that required a partner, but I wasn’t sure you were up to
it!”
Bender hugs Fry. Amy and Leela exchange looks. When Bender
breaks the hug, they start walking through the street, that’s really crowded.
Bender uses every chance he has to pick wallets.
After a few blocks, Amy speaks: “Well, Bender, nice to
see you, but we have to go back to Planet Express… the professor is there,
right?”
“Yeah, but what do you want that old meatsack for?”, frowns Bender,
casually grabbing a small purse from a passing woman and storing it on his chest
cabinet.
Fry replies quickly, “Uh, we… we want him to invent
some device that will mind-control the manager for a while… to see if I can
get a bigger comission, eh, seventy-five maybe! Of course, we’ll use it so the
commission goes up for you, too.”
Fry grins, and Bender looks amazed. “Wow, Fry, you are
making me so proud! Of course the old man is there, where else would he be?
I will be there in a little while, I just have to go to the gym and collect
money off those clothes outside the steamrooms. Later, meatbag!” Bender
turns to leave, and bumps straight into Leela, who was following them from behind,
evading people. She falls to the floor, and loses her sunglasses, exposing her
eye.
Bender looks at her, really surprised. “What the…? Turanga
Leela?”
Several people quickly turn to look at her. Some surprised,
some stand menacingly… and some look in anger, ready to jump at her. A few
start yelling.
Leela looks around. “What’s going on…?”
Suddenly, the whole mob explodes. They start screaming and
beating her up; Bender yells something about a bounty. Amy quickly grabs Fry
and Leela, and takes off flying.
Bender looks at them. “What? Amy? Come back here with
my prize! Fry, what are you doing? Fall down, now! That is my outcast,
Amy! I’ll get you!”
“What was that about?” asks a very surprised Fry.
“I don’t know. But I guess the professor was right about this universe
not being safe for Leela. Are you alright?”
“Yes… ow… thanks for the speedy rescue.”
“Anytime. Fry, give her your sunglasses. Time to go to
Planet Express before Bender realizes we’re going there and sends the entire
New New York Police Department to give us a laser-warm welcome.”
Underground. A mutant runs as fast as she can towards a small house in ruins.
She enters it, walks around a hole in the ground, and lifts a tile in the floor,
revealing a small control panel. She types a password, and suddenly a wall opens,
revealing a corridor. She enters it, and it closes behind her. It leads to a
command chamber, full of hi-tech equipment you wouln’t expect to see in a sewer;
she enters the chamber, still running.
“General Turanga? Are you here? General?”
A calm, cold voice replies, “Yes, Laren, I’m here. Where
did you expect me to be?”
General Turanga Leela is sitting in the shadows, staring at
a handheld device, writing, reading, planning… Lieutenant Ro Laren almost
jumps. She’s very surprised.
“General? You are here…! Oh god… for a moment I thought…”
Leela looks at her. “Laren, calm down. What is it?
“It’s just that… there were some… disturbances on
the surface… and you were there! We thought you…”
“What are you talking about, Laren? I have been here the entire damn day.
I’ve been planning the next offensive. I don’t want anything to go bad this
time… not a single thing”. She seemed a little sad, and looked back at
the handheld device. “Nothing.”
Laren looks at her. She starts breathing more regularly. “Sorry,
sir… but… I have a tape here. From the humans’ 2 News Network. As
soon as I saw it, I feared the worst… feared you had gone to the surface and
got caught…”
“Why would I do something so terribly stupid, Laren? What’s going on?”
“You better see this tape. You’re not going to believe what happened today
on the surface.”
Leela looks at Laren, and sees she’s deadly serious. She leaves the handheld
device on a table, and gets up, walking towards her. Her hair is short. Her
face is covered with scars, some of them old, others very recent. She has a
very sad look; it seems certain that Turanga Leela hasn’t smiled in a long,
long time.
“Okay, Laren. Let’s see what you have there.”
Hermes Conrad, Bureaucrat Grade 35, is reading the company
mail in the reception area of the Planet Express building, happily humming as
he watches the new forms he’s got to play with. He hears a nervous knocking
at the main door, and goes to open it.
“Fry? Mon, what are you doing here! Amy? You were supposed
to be making a delivery!”
Hermes looks at Fry in anger, ready to drop a truckload of
forms on him.
Amy decides to speak: “Sorry Hermes, there’s no time to
explain. We’re in big trouble right now…”
“You bet that, mon!”
Amy and Fry run past the angry Hermes. “Hey! Where are
you going? Report to my office for an immediate chewing out!”
Leela gives him an apologizing look through her sunglasses,
and follows Fry.
The professor is at his quarters, in front of the TV… sleeping.
Amy storms in. “Professor!”
“Awha?!” The professor wakes up, confused.
“Did my giant ants take over the world already?”
“Professor! We need to talk to you!”, said Fry, entering. “Please
tell me you have invented a What If machine!”
“What?” The Professor got up, and started yelling. “Who told
you about my What If machine! Not that I have one… and if I had one, I sure
didn’t get the materials to build it from a counterfeit source! You’ve got nothing
on me!”
“Uh, professor, calm down”, said Amy. “Fry and I just want to
know if you have some device that will allow us to entablish an holographic
connection through frequency, uh… 5ACV01.”
“Frequency 5ACV01? Why, of course! It’s the scanner frequency
of my What If machine! What do you want it for?”
Leela looked around, seeing little use for her presence at
the moment. “You explain to him… I’ll go clean our clothes.” She
left the room, carrying the backpack, and closed the door.
Fry and Amy looked at each other. “Professor, are you familiar with parallel
universes…?”
General Turanga Leela stared at the video screen as the tape finished playing.
It was a short report, with shaky video images taken by a tourist’s camera;
the video started with a look of the crowded New New York streets, and then
a voice exclaimed, “Turanga Leela?”, and the camera focused on…
that double of her. And then a flying human had gotten her and another human
out of there. The reporter, a disgusting alien named Morbo, had explained that
the authorities said the mutant leader would be caught and tortured soon, but
he hoped for the mutant to kill some more puny humans before that. His news
companion, a dumb blonde, just giggled. Lieutenant Ro turned off the video,
and watched as the General took it in.
“Those bastards”, Leela said. “They’ve built a… robot decoy,
or a clone, just for a propaganda stunt, to make me look like an idiot, or to
stage an execution to make mutants think I’m dead and lose faith, or something!”
“General, I… I don’t know how that could be. I don’t
understand… it didn’t seem like the normal propaganda.”
“Oh, I know humans. I know them all too well. This is probably just a
distracting stage… what with that flying human saving me and all? They…
they want something. I don’t know what, but I damn sure am going to find out!
How many have seen this tape?”
“A lot of mutants knew about it before I came in. They were searching
for you; the captain sent me here to look while he tried to calm them down.”
“Let’s go out. I’ll put an end to the silly rumours that may have formed
by my absense. And… we have an offensive to plan. Keep someone monitoring
the news channels! If the humans decided to pick a fight today, I am more than
willing to give them a good one!”
“Oh, my.”
Fry and Amy had just finished laying down the whole story for the professor.
Leela, now wearing her usual tanktop and trousers, was sitting on a chair; Amy
and Fry’s clothes were folded on a table, now clean.
“Well, I suppose I could rig up a device which will allow for transuniversal
communication through frequency 5ACV01, assuming there’s not much interference
from the that network of flabby old xenophobes who like to transmit a lot of
terribly boring sports programs through that frequency. Come with me to the
lab.”
The professor left the room. Fry looked at Leela. “Go
with him, would you? Amy and I need to change clothes.”
Leela nodded, and followed the professor, closing the door behind her. Fry
grabbed his pants and started changing clothes, carefully avoiding looking at
Amy, who was going the same. “You think that the magnet thing from the
professor, our professor, will work?” he said, to avoid the silence.
“Maybe”, she replied, putting on her black pants. “If this professor
can contact him, we could be back home tonight… as long as Bender isn’t playing
golf again.”
“But… I wonder… what about…”
“Yeah, Leela. I don’t know. Maybe that magnet of the professor
can send her back to her own dimension… maybe what you told him in the last
communication will make him think of a way”. She put on her black tanktop
and grabbed her gray jacket. “You can look now.”
Fry, fully clothed, nodded and looked at her. “I wonder
how she will take it. She’s been awfully quiet since we arrived.”
“Well… it doesn’t seem to me like she’s found all her courage yet. Our
Leela could have kicked the asses from that entire mob”. She looked at
Fry. Suddenly she felt a little uncomfortable. “Let’s go, the Professor’s
waiting for us.”
They left the room… and bumped into someone they weren’t expecting. “Kif?”
Captain Kif Kroker of the Planet Express delivery ship looked at her “Amy?”
Amy ran towards Kif, and to his mighty surprise, she hugged him very tight.
“Oufff… Amy!?”
Kif was very lucky for not having bones, for the superhuman
strength of Amy’s hug would have broken every single one there was otherwise.
A voice came from behind them,”Yes, Kif?”
It was Amy… the pink sweatsuit Amy. Fry and Amy looked at her… and then,
right behind her, Fry came in, drinking a can of Slurm. He looked at the bizarre
scene in front of him.
“Wow. This usually doesn’t happen until the hundredth can!”
“Look, you want the muttie or not?”
“Sure, but we need proof before…”
“Proof? You saw me in that video!”
“There are lots of Bending units, and…”
“Look, you gimme the money and I give you the muttie. I know exactly where
she is hiding. We’ve been arguing over this for an hour, geez! Tell you what,
get your troops ready. Gimme the money, and I’ll lead you straight where she
is. You think I will run away with an entire platoon following me?”
Smitty considered this and looked at his robot partner, Url. “We better
get the general on the line.”
“Professor?”
The professor didn’t even look up from the device he was building. “Yes?”
“I, um… there’s something I want to ask you, that Fry and Amy sort of
forgot.”
“What is it?”
“It’s about me. I, you, the other you, the one from Fry’s dimension, said
this universe is not ‘safe’ for me. And a mob on the street beat me up on sight…
do you know why?”
“Oh my, yes. You see, we’ve always had a non-interference
treaty of sorts with the mutants in New New York: they stay on the sewers, we
don’t mess with them. But, six years ago in 2997, the mutants suddenly declared
war on us. There had been a sort of insurrection movement that quickly spread,
demanding to live on the surface. They started attacking the surface regularly.
They come out suddenly from any of the sewer exits, attack, destroy and leave.
Lately they have had several defeats in a row, though; ever since a bounty was
put on their leader’s head.”
Leela heard it all. “But… what does that have to do with me?”
“Oh, girl, don’t you figure it out? You’re the mutant leader.”
“Me? Mutant leader?”
“Yes, General Turanga Leela. The most violent mutant known.
You, I mean her, started this whole revolution. It appears your, I mean her parents
were killed in 2987 by an angry mob of mutant haters who tricked them and others
to come to the surface. You, I mean she was very little then, but she saw all
that… and she spent her life trying to avenge them. She grew up as a warrior.
And she convinced most of the underground mutants to join her.”
“But… but… I am not… I mean, I’m not Turanga Leela.
I’m Leela Fry. I’m not a mutant… I come from…”
“It doesn’t matter what you were on your universe of origin, Leela. In
this universe, you look like, and are, the most hated mutant in the world. You’ve
led an angry mutant mob into killing innocent humans in mass attacks”.
Leela shivered a little. “A lot of people hate you, and for good reason.
Even some mutants do, thinking that it’s your fault they no longer have a peaceful
life. You… I mean, you know, her, is losing. Your last offensive, trying to
take over DOOP’s headquarters in New Jersey, was disastrous. Lots of mutants
died. That was nearly a month ago, and you’ve not been heard of since.”
Leela sat down, depressed. Amy, Amy, Fry, Fry and Kif, came in just then.
“Hi Professor. How’s the whatzit thingy coming along?”, Fry asked.
“He means the dimensional communicator”, Fry explained.
“G’uh, of course he does”, said Amy.
Amy just sighed.
“Attention, troops, this is General Zapp Brannigan. We
have been given a lead about the whereabouts of the mutant leader. So, following
this lead to the leader, I will lead us to victory! The mutant Turanga Leela
is said to be hiding in the building of the Planet Express delivery service.
This building has minimal defenses, and is likely that a single attack wave
will be enough to reduce them and capture the mutant, leaving me little chance
to look like a hero. Instead, I will send the first attack wave of one hundred
men completely unarmed, as well as a Killbot programmed to kill a hundred men
and then shut down. Once you’re all dead, I’ll go there with the Elite Team
and retrieve the mutant myself, as TV broadcasts how I suceeded where you all
failed. Are there any questions?”
Every trooper in The Nimbus’ lower deck starts shouting at once. Through the
cacophony, one single soldier manages to get his voice heard: “You suck!”
“Alright! It’s done!”
The Professor put the screwdriver on the table. Amy, Fry, Leela, Amy, Fry and
Kif got up and looked at the What If machine, now with several extra circuits
coming out of it. The professor touched a little keypad.
“Now here we go… frequency 5, A, C, V, 0, 1.”
The What If machine’s display went on, displaying a swirling red pattern…
that dissolved into an image of Professor Farnsworth sleeping in a chair. Fry
grabbed the What If machine’s microphone.
“Professor? Hey, Professor! Wake up!”
“Ohwhaaa?” said Professor Farnsworth. He woke up
and looked around: in the middle of his lab, there was a hologram of Fry talking
to him.
“Oh, my! You made it!” He grabbed an intercom. “Good
news, everyone! Our little dimensional travelers have made contact!”
“Alright, men, let’s show those mutants that they can’t go against the
Democratic Order of Planets!”
As a hundred soldiers marched towards the Planet Express building, Zapp spoke
to the 2 news camera. “And so, my brave men will destroy anything
that comes between them and finding Turanga Leela! But wait, what’s that?”
Zapp looked at the Planet Express building. The cameras turned
to watch where he was pointing, though the situation appeared to be the same.
With the cameras distracted, Zapp pushed a button on a remote control hidden
in his pocket, and a Killbot activated next to the Planet Express Building.
Zapp shouted, in a surprised tone, “Oh no! They’ve got a Killbot!”
“General Turanga! You better watch this!”
Leela quickly ran towards the screen Laren was pointing to. Turning the volume
up, she clearly heard the voice of General Zapp Braniggan. “The bastard!“
“It appears that coward mutant is sending a Killbot to
do her dirty work. Well, I will have to call my elite group of only ten soldiers
and go get her myself!”, said Zapp, with his hands on his hips, in a very
heroic pose.
“The bastard, the bastard, the bastard! See, Laren?
Just propaganda from that bastard. I knew he was behind this. Assemble the troops!
We’re going to the surface. He thinks he can kill every Turanga in the world,
right? Well, he may have suceeded with two of them… but the last one won’t
go down without a fight!”
“What was that all about?” said Fry, hearing laser
noises outside.
Kif went to look out the window. “Oh, no. Zapp’s here.”
Amy looked at him. “Zapp? Damn. Bender sold us.”
“G’uh”, said Amy. “Of course he did. It’s Bender.”
Amy decided to ignore herself and talked into the What If machine’s microphone.
“How’s the magnet coming, Professor?”
“Almost there, Amy. I can lock both of you anytime, thanks
to the dimensional signature I got from our universe; but I am still waiting for
the Professor over there to extract a dimensional signature from your Leela so
I can lock onto her. I also need to tweak the anular confinement beam a little
more; I was hoping to use it on a mass scale to attract everything with the same
dimensional signature back to our universe, but that would have only worked with
you two. If I use that with your Leela, it would get everything from her universe
here.”
Fry looked at the Professor. “How long will it take, Professor? I don’t
think it will be long before the DOOP decides to pay us a visit!”
“Oh, just a few more minutes.”
From the What If machine, Leela talked to Fry. “Be patient,
Fry. You two… three, will be with us soon. And by the way, I locked Bender
on the ship, so no golf balls this time”. She smiled and so did Fry, though
both smiles seemed forced.
“Alright men! The Killbot has killed our entire first attack wave! It
is time for our strike!”
Zapp, charged towards the Killbot on a hovering horse with
a sword drawn, followed by the Elite Team. The Killbot had shut down, and as
the cameras captured his heroic attack, he proceeded to single-handendly destroy
the robot.
But then, not too far, someone else shouts an order: “Attack!“
Hundreds of angry mutants charge towards him, General Turanga
Leela leading. Zapp gasps, then shouts “Elite Team! Attack!”, and
gets his horse running back to his shuttlepod. Some mutants follow him, but
can’t prevent him from taking off. The DOOP Elite Team, the only ten soldiers
ever to survive a strike led by Zapp, find themselves surrounded by mutants,
too scared to even shoot their laser guns.
General Turanga Leela approaches them. Lieutenant Ro Laren,
following her, addresses the mutants.
“Okay guys, looks like we win this match. The humans have
decided to sacrifice some pieces to save their king… well, the less pieces
on the board, the easier our victory will be. Get them!”
As the hopelessly outnumbered Elite Team was massacred, Laren
spoke.
“Checkmate.”
General Turanga Leela, the only one near enough to hear, opened
her eye… real wide.
“Things are getting too hot down there!”, said Amy, coming from the
window. “How long, Professor?”
“Almost there… Just almost there… There!” The
professor grabbed the What If Machine’s microphone. “I am transmitting Leela’s
universal signature right now, frequency 5ACV01!”
On the What If Machine’s screen, the Professor looked at his
Dimensional Magnet. “I got the signature! Everyone, stand by while I lock
onto Leela.”
A blueish haze surrounded Leela, who gasped.
“That’s it! Energizing!”
“Elite Team, sure”, said Laren. She looked at Leela and was surprised
to see her with her eye closed and a single tear running down her eye. “General?”
Leela opened her eye. “Nothing. It just…”
A roar from the sky stopped her mid-sentence. She looked up. The Nimbus was
here.
Leela looked as a blue glow appeared on the Professor’s lab,
forming a figure, gaining resolution, and after a few seconds she was looking
at herself, fully materialized.
The Professor let out a joyful exclamation. “It worked!
My Dimensional Magnet works!”
“Hi there”, Leela greeted herself, as she looked
very confused. “Welcome to our universe.”
“Alright, troops! Plan A didn’t work out, so that means I have to fall
back to my master plan for every situation, the element of surprise.”
The troopers looked at each other, knowing what was about to come. As he yelled,
“Surprise!“, Zapp pressed a button, unloading all his troops
from the lower deck of The Nimbus to the street in front of Planet Express,
ten meters below.
“Alright, Fry, Amy, I’ve finished setting the new dimensional
signature. I am resetting the Dimensional Magnet to mass scale; now I will attract
everything from our universe back into our universe. However, just in case, Amy
and Fry should get as close to each other as possible”.
Fry, Amy, Fry and Amy did so. Amy and Fry looked at themselves,
annoyed.
A blueish beam surrounded Fry and Amy… though it seemed weaker
for Amy.
“That’s it. Energizing!”
“Soldiers, move!” yelled Zapp, seeing that the troopers were barely
moving, aching after the fall. “Oh, well… do I have to think of everything?”
He looked at his viewscreen, that displayed the group of mutants all together
near the Planet Express building.
“Oh yes! That’s it!”
General Turanga looked as the Nimbus’ main torpedo gun pointed
straight at them. She yelled.
“Everyone! Move! The bastard’s about to shoot us! Move!“
A universe away, two figures surrounded by a blueish glow started
to materialize in the Professor’s lab. Leela let out a yell of happiness: her
friends were almost back home.
A single torpedo fired from The Nimbus’ main torpedo gun, blasting the Planet
Express Building and the mutants below.
“What’s happening?!”, yelled Fry, as everyone fell to the floor.
The Planet Express building shook violently.
The What If Machine fell to the floor, shattering to pieces.
The beam surrounding Fry and Amy grew…
…and grew.
“Move! Everyone! Back to the sewers! Quick!”
Leela and Laren were leading the mutants back to safety, as
the Nimbus shot another torpedo at them. The troopers that had fell off The
Nimbus were starting to get up, too.
“Quick! Come on!”
Leela gazed at the Planet Express building. A strange blue glow was coming
out of it.
“What is that?”
Inside the Planet Express building, everything was covered by the blue glow.
Leela helped the professor up.
“What went wrong?”
“Something has disrupted the carrier signal! The Dimensional
Magnet is locking onto another signature!”
Kif yelled from behind them. “It’s Zapp! He’s firing torpedoes
at us!”
Leela looked at him. “Kif?”
Two meters away, the professor got up, examining his broken What If Machine.
He looked at himself.
“Oh, my…”
The blue glow expanded. It covered the entire city. Then, the entire island.
Then, the entire planet, the entire solar system, the entire galaxy… the whole
universe.
“This is bad, isn’t it?!”, yelled Amy, as the building shook again.
The Dimensional Magnet was glowing brighter and brighter…
“G’uh”, replied Amy.
…and then, the bright white glow exploded.
The white shockwave passed through the Planet Express building. As it passed,
the blue glow dissapeared, leaving things looking normal…
…although they were not.
“Professor?”
“Fry?”
“Amy?”
“Leela?”
Inside the Professor’s lab, everyone looked at each other… and themselves.
General Turanga Leela looked around. A lot of people had appeared out of nowhere.
Not soldiers… civilians, on the streets, doing their usual stuff. All sorts
of wacky aliens and lots of humans, walking around, hovercars… and they seemed
to be looking at them as if they had just appeared there. She felt dissoriented.
Laren seemed confused, too, but she grabbed Leela. “Come on, General.
The Nimbus is still up there!”
She nodded, and followed Laren. She went down to the sewers… and ran straight
into the person she least expected to ever see alive again.
“Vyolet?”
Two Hermes came running to the Professor’s lab. Both said, “People! You
won’t believe what happened…”
Then they looked at the bizarre scenario of two Professors, two Frys, two Amys,
and two Leelas. Also Kif, but only one of him.
“Uh, then again… maybe you will.”
“For all the Velour in the universe, what happened here?”,
asked Zapp, to no one in particular. He had stopped firing out of surprise.
Most of the mutants that weren’t killed by his torpedoes had managed to escape.
He pushed a few buttons and a megaphone popped out of the Nimbus, pointing at
his troops. Zapp’s voice came out of it.
“Attention men, the mutants have escaped. Now, it is all too likely that
there’s hundreds of mutants in the sewers, with an ambush ready, waiting for
us to strike and kill everyone. That’s why, I’m staying up here. I order you
all to go down the sewers and get them!”
Zapp’s troops moaned, some swore at Zapp… then started advancing toward the
sewer’s entrance that General Turanga had just gone through.
“Vyolet, you… you’re alive… you’re…”
Vyolet couldn’t understand this surge of affection from Leela.
“There, Leela, get yourself together, please. Hey, Morris! Munda! Your
kid dropped in for a visit!”
Two mutants advanced towards them. Leela let go of Vyolet,
her eye wide open and fell to the ground, on her knees.
“Mom… dad?”
“Oh dear, this is bad”, said the Professor. “That
blast from the torpedo destabilized the universal lock, and restarted the mass-scale
attraction. The Dimensional Magnet has introduced all elements from that universe
into our same plane, overlapping our realities!”
The Professor translated for everyone present: “Our two
universes have merged into one.”
To be continued…