//------------------------------// // Project Alpha // Story: Timberwolf Season 1 // by Dragonfire2lm //------------------------------// It was early on Monday morning and Dreamer was going over the morning paper when an article caught her attention. It detailed a string of murders that happened over the weekend and much to Dreamers amusement, the victims were people she knew. So those bastards got what they deserved huh? She thought. About time. Dreamer's mind drifted back to when she knew the scientists and researchers that were dead and gone and she grimaced at the memory. They had blackmailed her, threatened her and she gave in. She now sat chained to the ground in a cold concrete cell, her only scrap of clothing was a white robe stained with her own blood. her arms and legs were bound and her back ached in four different places. White feathers littered the floor and her back twitched at the sight of them, as if it trying to move muscles that weren't their. It only bought on more pain. She was tired, sore and the screams of the test subjects could still be heard and she no longer cared if the cries of pain were real or in her head. It was all her fault... Back in the present, Dreamer sighed and rubbed the top of her head, she could feel the scars and two small bumps that remained of the events all those years. With a stretch and a wince at the phantom pain in her back she got ready for a day of teaching. Scootaloo couldn't stay focused as she sat in class. With the packs celebration lasting for the whole weekend, she had been told that her test to join Timberwolf would be postponed until after school. She couldn't help but wonder what she would be tested about or if was even a test in the traditional sense of the word. She perked up when the teacher announced the start of history class. At least it's more challenging than Math... She thought and paid attention. "Alright class today we will be learning about the rise and fall of the Discordant Monarchy and the civil war that followed," the teacher began. "If you've been doing your homework, you would know that Discord the First began a campaign to take the different kingdoms and territories that ruled the country at the time of his rise to power. In 1550 he succeeded when he defeated the Dreemurr kingdom." "Wasn't that kingdom made up of monsters?" A classmate asked. "That is something that is still up to debate," the teacher clarified. "While Discord did unify the kingdoms, many accounts speak of the insanity present in many of his decisions as a ruler..." "Now can anyone tell me how the monarchy fell?" The teacher asked. "Yes Sweetie belle?" "Queen Eris the fourth was overthrown by her advisers Lord Solaris and Lady Nightshade at the start of the 19th century," Sweetie recited. "When the two nobles failed to agree on who should take the throne, they decided to gain the support of the people and over the course of their lifetime, started a war between their two factions the Solar Legion and the Lunar Rebellion." "Very good Sweetie Belle," the teacher praised. "The war last for 130 years and finally ended here in Canterlot City when the descendants of both nobles married in a show of peace. Now I want you all to pull out your textbooks and turn to page..." "So what's my test going to be?" Scootaloo asked and sat down on one the desk chairs in the office portion of the Timberwolf base. Dreamer was skimming through a large stack of files at an adjacent desk. "Dunno-" Dreamer began to reply when the light flickered for a moment before the power went out. "Dreamer?" "Yeah Scoots?" "That's not part of the test is it?" "Nope." "What do we do?" "Go find somewhere to hide Scootaloo, whoever this is won't be targeting you but better stay out of sight just in case." Dreamer stated. "How do you know that?" Scootaloo asked. "A hunch." The ground rumbled beneath their feet as something exploded down below. "That's not supposed to happen," Dreamer muttered as she stood up. "Scoots, go hide, I'll handle this." Just as Dreamer was about to move, she heard Scootaloo shout out in panic. She looked around only to be blindsided by a human shaped figure that tackled her to the ground. The figure was cold, heavy and when Dreamer listened close enough, she could hear the hum of electronics coming from her attacker. Before she could make a move, she heard footsteps coming from behind her and a swift blow to the head knocked her unconscious. When she awoke she found she was bound to a chair. Across from her a still unconscious Scootaloo was also tied to a chair with two humanoid robots guarding her. "You didn't have to drag the kid into this you know." Dreamer called out to her kidnapper. "Still if you wanted my attention that badly, you have it. So what the hell do you want?" "I needed your cooperation," a man replied from behind. "And from I've read, threatening your life just won't do." Dreamer chose to stay silent as ideas rapidly formed in mind's eye. "I take it you understand your situation then?" The man asked as he walked by, still hidden in the shadows. "Assist me and your friend goes free. Refuse and..." She heard him snap his fingers and one of the robots pulled out a handgun and aimed it at Scootaloo's head. "It's quite an easy choice to make Miss Prose, So do I have your attention?" "Yeah, fine. What do you need out from me?" Dreamer sighed and with another snap, the gun was withdrawn. "Why don't we start at the beginning." stated her kidnapper as he stepped into view. He was tall with his muscular build enhanced by the black, form fitting body suit that appeared to be made high grade material. Attached to the outfit on his arms and legs were pieces of plated metal that offered protection and his joins free to move and similar pieces of metal covered the top of his boots. Metal wrist guards matched his grey gloves and the man's neck and shoulders were shielded by a large piece of metal that encompassed those areas. "My name is Slade," he said as Dreamer looked up at his visually striking headpiece. It covered his entire head with his face hidden by a metal mask that was black on the right side and orange on the other. There four thin slots near the bottom to allow the occupant to breathe and only his left dark grey eyes was visible through the mask itself as the black half was void of all features. "I believe your already familiar with my work." "Those former Timberwolf scientists, that was your handy work?" Dreamer asked. "They were quite talkative too," Slade elaborated. "It's astounding what people will say when their lives were on the line. Those fools were more than happy to provide me with your information if it would continue their existence." "You still killed them." Dreamer pointed out calmly. "Once I had what I needed I decided to end their suffering, I didn't need to keep them alive," Slade replied. "You on the other hand? I have need of your abilities, your magic if I am to fix what they did to me." Slade picked up a folder of papers and placed on the desk. "Tell me Miss Prose, does the term Project Alpha mean anything to you?" he asked and moved to swivel her chair to face the folder. Dreamer looked up from the papers laid before her back to Slade, horror dawned on her face and the room began to spin as the realization hit. "You do remember. Good," Slade purred. "Your expertise will prove useful in negating the side effects." "Side effects-What?" Dreamer spluttered. "Y-you're a survivor? But they were all-" "Killed?" Slade cut in and Dreamer flinched. "I'm sorry, would you prefer the term euthanized?" "W-what side effects?" Dreamer asked as she struggled to pull herself together. "Visions, fragments of false memories and hallucinations," Slade explained."It feels as if I'm reliving the war over and over and I want it fixed." Dreamer stared at him for several seconds before her mind kicked into high gear. "Ok...Ok I'll explain as best I can," Dreamer replied shakily. "Project Alpha used soldiers recruited during the war as test subjects, t-they drained me of my magic in order to inject it into humans to create an artificial god and from the sounds of it, you are the only successful case." Dreamer paused to gather her thoughts. "I'm sorry, no one deserved to go through that," she said and took a breath. "Anyway you survived because my magic affects the soul, it makes it a physical, tangible object and further strengthens the body to protect it. You must have had the inner strength necessary for the procedure to go smoothly." "I have a soul," Slade deadpanned. "That's doesn't explain the visions." "I'm getting to that," Dreamer replied. "With your new powers comes a fail safe, should you die, time is...Rewound back to a point before you died. Since it's a copy of my fail safe, if I die, you are dragged back in time with me and with all your memories intact." "At least that's how it's supposed to work," Dreamer stated. "It looks like whatever happened to you didn't result in a perfect copy..." "Interesting, I assume if you fixed it, The fail safe would work as intended?" Slade asked. "You'd have to untie me, but yeah," Dreamer replied. "Though to make it work properly, we'd both end up going back in time anyway so your soul can stabilize." Slade made a gesture to elaborate and with an eye roll, Dreamer complied. "By living through those extra years you'll have the full experience of a 'timeline', the sequence of events that happens over the course of your life. You need to keep in mind that you can only travel back to a time period you were alive in, not before you were born and not after you permanent death," she explained. "The procedure involves summoning your soul, and observing the flow of magic within it as well how it's structured itself within your soul and body. From there I can alter the flow and composition of the magic to be what it should be when it comes to the fail safe, I'll be able to set a specific point in your timeline that acts the earliest point you can travel back to, from that point onward you will have all your memories and skills from previous timelines." "Going through a timeline in the correct way will lock the changes to the fail safe in place and your soul will stabilize," Dreamer concluded. "If you'll be so kind as to untie me, we can get to work." Dreamer stood in front of Slade as he sat on the exam table in the medical wing. She quickly glanced over at Scootaloo, who had been released and was now passed out on the couch. Dreamer took a deep breath and concentrated. She held her right hand over Slade's chest and as her hand glowed with white magic and white and orange mass of energy slowly began to rise out of her patient's chest. "Wow, talk about a hack job," Dreamer muttered. "Those scientists had no idea what they were doing." Dreamer twisted her right hand and several rings of silver magic covered in blue glowing runes appeared around the deformed mass that was Slade's soul. "These rings are the building blocks to how magic functions, similar to computer coding or DNA splicing," Dreamer explained as she observed the rings. "Ok it looks like the adjustments made to your body in order to protect your soul turned out fine, super strength, heightened reflexes, regenerative healing, increased pain tolerance and boosted IQ. It seems my theory of the fail safe being damaged was correct, it'll be easy enough to fix it once we extblish wht chnges i should mke to your personal timeline." "What changes?" Slade asked. "Well do you want to be test subject again?" Dreamer asked. "i can't prevent the war but according to your file you were a captain in the Solar Legion, since their philosophy revoled around the worship of magical entities for knowledge or power it would be simple enough to just tweak things so that you end up at my temple while you served the legion and got your powers directly from me, granted such a change wouldn't do jack shit in the long run but it would spare you from those experiments." "No keep it the same," he stated. " I survived it once, i can do so again." "If you're sure. when you do want the earliest point in your timeline to be? Dreamer asked. "How far back do you want to go?" Scootaloo woke up to find she was lying on the couch in the leisure section of the base. She sat up and looked around, everything appeared perfectly normal, the lights were on and nothing was out of place. Dreamer was no where to be found. The nine year old hopped off the couch and wandered around in search of her friend, she soon found a note that been left for her. Hey Scoots, I got the power sorted, turns out a couple of training robots went haywire after the blackout and jumped us. It's all sorted out but a job came up so I had to leave you behind, it's not pretty. You'll find a case file labelled "Project Alpha" a, for your test I want to read it and tell me what you think of it all when I get back. I've made sure most of the nasty stuff has been omitted. See you soon, Dreamer Prose. Scootaloo sighed and rummaged around in a nearby desk until she found the requested folders. She picked up the Project Alpha folder and opened it up, much of it's content was blacked out but few entries were still visible. Ready to face anything, Scootaloo began to read. Project Alpha- The source. An extensive study on the Angel of Guidance Entry 1 Reports throughout the last seven hundred years reference a divine entity that calls itself a guardian angel. Our studies have recently proven this creature not only real, but alive and well in the small state of Harmonia. Harmonia itself currently stands as the largest neutral faction during this war and has been so since the beginning. It is the organizations hope that our angel will cooperate with us, if the tales are to be believed, legends of omnipotence, powerful spells and the capacity to heal the most grievous of wounds, this Dreamer Prose will be the key to the projects success. Entry 3 It appears taking the angel's child away from her has born fruit, we have her in a cell ready to begin testing. Our initial scans show promise, the angel has a vast amount of magical energy stored in her wings, horns and tail. All we need to do is extract it for further testing. Entry 5 We've recruited soldiers from both sides of the war front claiming to be testing a countermeasure to the other's magical techniques. We've already harvested what magic we can from the angel's scales and feathers, though with the number of applicants we may need more. Entry 6 The interns we sent to harvest the angel's wings came back successful but their minds are damaged. They have been reduced to broken shells of their former selves and claim to have stared into the face of death. Many are praying for forgiveness from something called "Likrel Drofmeas" and our attempts to get a straight answer have yielded nothing. It seems if you want something done around here, you must do it yourself. Entry 7 ForgiveMeMyQueenForgiveMeMyQueenForgiveMeMyQueenForgiveMeMyQueenForgiveMeMyQueenForgiveMeMyQueenForgiveMeMyQueenForgiveMeMyQueenForgiveMeMyQueenForgiveMeMyQueenForgiveMeMyQueenForgiveMeMyQueenForgiveMeMyQueenForgiveMeMyQueenForgiveMeMyQueenForgiveMeMyQueenForgiveMeMyQueenForgiveMeMyQueen Entry 10 Something is attacking the base and killing the failed test subjects. whatever it is, it has produced a reaction out of the angel after years of dormancy. It would be best to cut our loses and leave while we can. Scootaloo put the Project Alpha folder aside and stared at a blank computer screen as she contemplated what she had just read, pieces began to fall into place and the lycan wondered what else Dreamer was hiding from her. Deep down Scootaloo hoped she could do something to make things if not better, then happier for her long time family friend by joining Timberwolf. With her mind in full gear, the nine year old found a piece of paper, a pen and began making notes. "Hey Scoots, I'm back!" Scootaloo heard Dreamer call out an hour later. "I got us pizza for dinner." Scootaloo whirled around on her computer chair to watch her friend as she unloaded several boxes of pizza, some sides and a few bottles of soda onto the kitchen bench. The base fell into a comfortable silence as Dreamer plated up their meals and the pair ate in silence, both thankful for the quiet moment. "Sorry about today.." Dreamer said as they cleaned up. "You uh, probably have a whole bunch of questions and stuff right?" "Yeah," Scootaloo admitted. "Timberwolf did some pretty bad stuff during the war right/" "Yup..." Dreamer replied sadly. "One thing the history books don't cover is that Timberwolf leaked knowledge of magic to both sides and the whole thing devolved into deity worship and demon summoning, at the time the organization believed they could exploit the conflict to further their research." "But why?" "Because Scoots, they still had a mindset that humans were the dominant species and all others should serve the human race," Dreamer stated. "They found out about me and what I really am and some moron thought 'hey gods are real, let's capture one.' Last time I checked I wasn't a Pokemon." The joke elected a brief chuckle from the two. Scootaloo hesitated before she asked the next question. "What...What are you?' "A magic angel dragon from space." Dreamer said with a straight face. "Dreamer, I was being serious!" Scootaloo grumbled and the woman ruffled her hair in good humor. "I know, I just like introducing myself in the funniest way possible, comedy helps with these kinds of conversations, keeps the mood lighthearted enough for everyone to walk away on the best terms possible at the end of it," Dreamer explained with a grin. "As for what I am, if you're up for a history lesson, I can show you." "Wait really?" Scootaloo asked surprised. "Behold, the seraph of guidance, protection and redemption!" Dreamer announced comically, pulled out a photo and handed it to Scootaloo. The picture showed an anthropomorphic, white scaled dragon with four feathered wings, deer like antlers, silver clawed hands and wolf like paws instead of feet. the dragon wore a flowing blue dress decorated with the beauty of deep space, a gold crown decorated with purple jewels and a matching necklace. Her serpentine tail curled up into an 'S' shape behind her as she stood off to the side looking at the camera. Scootaloo noted that her pointed canine like ears had tufts of fur on the end and her orange mane resembled feather like fur. "Where's your left eye?" Scootaloo asked as she noticed the empty left socket. "You have both eyes.' "I don't actually," Dreamer admitted. "I just have a spell on my glasses that makes it look like I do, it's all part of blending in." "Wait so if you..." "Yup, nothing but an empty socket without my glasses," Dreamer confirmed. "Anyway that's what I used to look like before Timberwolf drained me off most of my magic, it's why I look human nowadays, no magic means no magic angel dragon." "They cut off your wings to, that must have hurt." Scootaloo added. "That's all in the past kid, don't worry about," Dreamer said. " Anyway back on track, my species are a race of shape shifting beings that re manifestations of forces of nature, forces of magic and societal concepts. We travel to other worlds and watch over them taking on roles that best fit what we are. When mortals worshiped us regardless of what we did or said, we took that religious aspect into our culture and now we call ourselves Seraphim." "So what do you represent?" Scootaloo asked. "I represent the concept of a guide or guardian angel, pun entirely intended," Dreamer replied. "I work with people from all walks of life in order to ensure that things turn out better than they would have without my interference. I wtch and see how things play out, then I travel back in time and start doing what I can to help. Even if it means i need to take a more active role as their ruler or just do what I'm doing now and keeping to the sidelines." "You can time travel!" Scootaloo exclaimed. "That's how you bet Black Fire right?" "Yeah, because for me, this has happened before. I have to admit this is the first time I've told you all this though," Dreamer replied. "Usually I just step in when I need to and bow out when it's all over with everyone none the wiser." "What's different this time?" "Every time I've gone back in time I've failed to prevent the deaths of my old team mates, including your parents and in a couple of years the apocalypse is going to hit and I haven't been able to stop it by myself, so I thought, I mean I know it sounds dumb but..." "You need help?" Scootaloo asked. "I do, here let me explain,"Dreamer began and pulled out a sheet of paper and drew a bunch of circles on it. "imagines this is reality and all those circles are a different dimension." She then colored in two circles separated by several other. "This one is our dimension and the other is a world similar to ours but not entirely connected. A thousand years ago a wizard from that other world connected our world to his and it sort of looks like this." Dreamer explained and folded the paper until the two colored circles were touching. "This has caused a lot of strain on the other realities as well as ours. that causes those rifts in space time I told about yesterday. they're all over the counrty and have been leaking magic and other forms of energy into this world for centuries, to the point where the borders of every state is defined by where the different kinds of magic intersect each other." "That's why a lot of things are different depending on where you live right?" Scootaloo concluded. "because the magic from the rifts is affecting everyone." "Sometimes magical creatures fall through as well and the rift here in Canterlot is only getting more and more active, there's only so much I can do on my own even with foreknowledge and I'd rather not call in help from the friends i have around ere, they deserve to live their own lives." Dreamer said. "I thought I'd ask you to help because of what you've already seen." "So I can learn things to help others and not just my family." Scootaloo stated "Yeah are you, ok with that?" Dreamer asked. "I haven't told you everything but I will, just thought I'd take baby steps." "I'll join on one condition," Scootaloo replied seriously before she broke out into a grin. "You've gotta tell me about your old team, who were they? what were my parent's like? Did you go on awesome adventures?" Dreamer stared at her completely caught off guard. Slowly, she relaxed and chuckled. "Timberwolf operatives work in groups called divisions, there's usually one group per state, but sometimes there's more if the need arises. My old team was called the Titan Division..." Dreamer explained.