Princess Mira Nova moved down the dark corridor cautiously. She and the rest of Team Lightyear had been sent to investigate the mysterious fortress that had appeared on the planet Yma. It had seemed like a simple mission. Certainly nothing that the team of Space Rangers couldn’t handle. Of course, that was before they had entered the fortress courtyard.
The traps were sprung without warning. First, XR, the robot team member, had been lifted off the ground by some invisible force, only to disappear through one of the fortress’s high windows. Booster, the good-natured behemoth, was next. Rushing to help his mechanical friend, the gentle giant had tripped over an unseen wire and went flying, vanishing into an opening that appeared in a far wall, which closed behind him.
And then it was Mira’s turn.
She had been standing back-to-back with Buzz Lightyear, the team’s commander, keeping an eye open for more trouble, when she felt something take hold of her ankles. She looked down to see two metal shackles that had sprung up from the ground beneath her. She barely had time to note their existence before they began to pull downward. The sudden pain was enough to make her Tangean ghosting powers kick in instinctively, and she found herself being pulled into the solid earth.
It all happened so fast. Mira didn’t even have time to question how the shackles managed to still hold her after she had ghosted. All she could do was wait and see where she was being taken. She got her answer a few seconds later, as she found herself pulled from the bedrock into an underground tunnel. The shackles on her ankles suddenly let her go, and she returned to her solid form, which proved to be a mistake. Still maintaining the momentum from her sudden trip through the earth, she continued downward, slamming into the tunnel floor.
Stunned, she laid on the ground for a few moments to regain her senses. She knew that she had to get back to Buzz and planned to use her jetpack to carry her back through the solid rock above her as soon as she was able. But before that could happen, another set of mechanical arms came out of the wall beside her, snatching the pack from her back. “Hey!” she managed to call out, but still unable to get up, she could only watch as the arms retracted into the wall. The jetpack, having no way to follow, was shattered into several useless pieces against the hard stone.
“Craters!” Mira sighed, slowly standing up. She looked around her, but could see nothing but the tunnel stretching out in either direction. There were no doors in sight, and she had no way of knowing whether ghosting through the walls would get her anywhere. “Looks like I’m walking,” she said to herself. “Well, one way’s as good as another, I suppose.”
And that’s what she had done. It seemed like she had been walking for hours, but she knew it had only been a few minutes. She was starting to worry about her teammates. It was now obvious that the traps in the fortress had been set just for them, which meant that they had been set up. But by who? The obvious answer was Evil Emperor Zurg, of course. He would like nothing better than to have Buzz and his team out of the way for good.
She moved down the long, empty corridor slowly, keeping her wrist-laser at ready just in case she ran into trouble. She kept her eyes focused intently on the tunnel ahead. So intently in fact, that she wasn’t really watching where she was stepping. So, when she heard the sharp “click”, she knew she had messed up. “Uh-oh,” she said, looking down at her feet where the sound had come from. She wasn’t at all surprised to see that she had stepped on some kind of secret panel, depressing it into the tunnel floor. “Oh, nice one, Mira,” she scolded herself, as she looked around her. “I wonder what that does.”
A second later, as if to answer her question, she heard the mechanical sound of motors working on either side of the tunnel. Looking first to the right, then to the left, she watched as two nozzles of some kind extended from the walls. She didn’t have time to do anything before both began to release some kind of white gas. Throwing her hands up in a useless effort to protect herself, she was quickly engulfed in a cloud of white.
After a few seconds, the nozzles stopped firing and retracted into the walls. Coughing, Mira waved her arms to help dissipate the already vanishing cloud. “Well,” she commented to herself, “that was rather pointless. I mean, shouldn’t I be unconscious or some… Hey!”
She stopped at the sight of her own hands. Instead of the normal light green she was used to seeing, her skin now looked chalky white. But it wasn’t just her hands. As she continued to look herself over, she realized that her entire body, including her Space Ranger uniform, was now the same white color. A shake of her head showed her that even her fiery red hair was now white. She had been completely coated in some kind of white chalky substance. Using her hand, she tried to brush some of it off her other arm. The action raised a small cloud of dust, but the arm remained covered. “What is this stuff?” she wondered out loud.
“It’s a bio-molecular compound used in the transporting of criminals.”
The voice…the very familiar voice…had come from the darkness of the tunnel before her. She looked into the darkness, trying to see the person that had spoken. “Buzz?” she called out in confusion.
“Well, not exactly,” the voice answered, as a figure stepped from the shadows.
Mira immediately went into a defensive posture. It was Buzz…just not her Buzz. This Buzz had come from another dimension a few months ago. In his dimension, he wasn’t a Space Ranger. He was a galaxy conqueror that made Zurg look like an amateur. “You!” Mira said through clenched teeth. “What are you up to?”
“The compound is a really marvelous creation,” he continued, ignoring her question. He stood a few feet away with his arms folded calmly across his chest. “It eliminates the need to have life support systems on prisoner transports. You see, the chemicals in the compound generate everything a person needs to sustain life. Nutrients…water…and whatever kind of air that particular person breathes.”
“Really?” Mira commented with a slightly strained tone. “I’ve noticed that it also seems to be ghost-proof.” She had been trying to use her Tangean powers to get free of the compound that coated her.
An evil grin came to the villain’s face. “We have Tangeans in my universe, too, Princess,” he said, unfolding his arms. “As well as all kinds of other beings with various kinds of special abilities. The chemical was designed to counteract any of those abilities. Once applied, they only way to remove it is with a low-level laser.”
Now, it was Mira’s turn to smile. “Oh, yeah?” she said. “Well, I just happen to have one of those.” She again raised her wrist-laser, aiming it at her adversary. With a wink, she began to reach with her other hand to push the firing mechanism.
Before she reached it, however, she noticed something strange. Somehow, it seemed that it was getting harder for her to move. She had to almost force her arm across her body. She doubled her efforts, but it was to no avail. Just before her fingers reached the laser on her other wrist, her entire body seized up. She tried to move her arms…her legs…anything, but nothing responded. Even her eyes became locked in place, looking at the grinning villain in front of her. She couldn’t even move her jaw enough to form the words necessary to ask what had happened. All she could produce was strained moaning sounds.
The evil Buzz’s grin grew wider, as he walked toward the paralyzed Space Ranger. “Oh,” he told her, as he looked directly into her frozen face, “did I forget to mention that, shortly after application, the compound hardens to the consistency of Carnonian steel. Makes it easier to control the prisoners on the transports. There’s no need for cells or chains. You can just put them in the cargo hold.” He reached up and rapped his knuckles on her forehead, producing a solid sounding “bong”. Unable to do anything else, Mira moaned in protest.
“Well,” he said, moving back to look her over, “let’s take a look.” He nodded with satisfaction. Mira had been captured in a very nice pose. She stood with her legs apart, bracing herself for the recoil her laser would have produced. Her arm with the laser on it was extended forward, the other reaching to activate the weapon. Her face had been frozen in an expression of triumph, which just added to her overall appearance.
“Perfect,” the villain said, reaching for something on his belt. “I’ve been wondering what to put on that empty pedestal in the front foyer. I believe that you will do nicely, Princess.”
He aimed some kind of device at the immobilized Tangean. Mira recognized it as one of those anti-gravity lifters that workers used to move heavy crates around. When the pale yellow beam from the device enveloped her, she felt herself being lifted off the ground, still frozen in her heroic pose.
“Now, don’t you worry about a thing,” she heard the evil Buzz say, unable to see him anymore in her limited range of sight. “That compound will provide you with everything you need, and will continue to do so for as long as necessary. In fact, you could be kept like this for years.” With that, he headed off down the empty corridor. “Let’s get you in place, shall we? It’s going to be a busy day.”