“This is Commander JT Marsh of Able Squad,” boomed through the halls of the Exo-carrier Resolute 3, “I’m afraid I have some unfortunate news. Nara Burns and Alec DeLeon, who went on recon earlier today, have vanished from our sensors. We are not sure if they were drawn into the temporal anomaly they were investigating or not. What we must do is pull together and search Io and the surrounding areas for any signs of them or any clues as to what happened to them. Good day.”
     JT sat back in his seat, his hands going behind his head to act as a pillow. The events of the past few hours played through his mind. The discovery of the anomaly, how Nara and Alec were eager to go and check it out in their E-frames. The readings that streamed into the science stations and the eventual failure when they lost communications. From that moment on his mind had been racing, calculations of every event running by. He pressed his right hand to his temples, and when he removed his hand he saw a beautiful brunette angel standing before him.
     “Still trying to figure things out?” Lt. Maggie Weston asked as she leaned forward.
     “Yeah,” JT sighed as he sat up, “I can’t help feeling I was somehow responsible for their disappearance.”
     “Don’t worry about it,” Maggie said as she took a seat on the corner of the command console between them, “they were the ones who volunteered to go out, and besides that they can take care of themselves. Anyway, Kas and Wolf are pouring over the data with the aid of Marsala and Professor Algernon. If we find anything you’ll be the first to know.”
     She turned and left a moment later, giving JT a friendly smile before the doors closed behind her. JT resumed his previous posture, closing his eyes in quiet meditation and prayer.

     Alec DeLeon awoke to blinding sunlight and warm, pleasant air. Around him birds chirped and sang their songs. He squinted against the sun to see thick forest all around him.
     ‘Well, at least I’m not dead,’ he thought as he dragged his aching body into a sitting position, ‘and I’m definitely not on Io, or at least the Io that I know.’ He chuckled at his little rhyme and quickly regretted it as the dull ache at the back of his head increased in intensity, 'O.K., where is Nara?’
     A motion off to his left caught his eye, and he turned his glance to see a head of blonde hair done up in a ponytail appear from the deep grass. The head shook from side to side and a moment later the posterior end of a body rose from the grass.
     “Nara,” Alec said. The head turned and looked at him.
     “Alec,” Nara moaned, blinking a few times, “where in the world are we?”
     “No idea, but one thing is for sure and that is we’re not on Io or even in our own time period.”
     Nara blinked a few more times before saying, “We must have been sucked into the temporal vortex and wound up where ever was on the other end.”
     As she said that a very large orc rose from the grass beside her, battle axe in hand, eyes glowing. Alec made a move for his blaster, only to discover it wasn’t there. Nara noticed this and turned her head to see the orc. In a flurry of motion the orc had a string of footprints on its face and Nara stood triumphantly on its head moments before it keeled over. From the other bushes in the area came more orcs, a couple of trolls, and several berserkers.
     “This is worse than fighting the Neos,” Nara said before performing some very acrobatic kicks and punches to the monsters before them, “Is there no end to them?!”
     “Not that I’m aware of,” Alec said as he dodged assorted weapons. As he put his arms before his face to block a couple of punches a large polearm formed in his hands. Without even realizing what was going on he slashed through the space before him, those that he touched with the weapon disintegrating and vanishing from the battlefield.
     “What in the....” he began to say before turning around, his weapon raking through another swarm of monsters and sending them screeching into nothingness.
     “Alec?!” Nara said as she kicked another orc, this time right where it counts. The orc turned blue and dropped to its knees. Nara turned and when she saw what she had done, said, “Oops. Sorry about that fella.”
     “This is going to take forever to clear out,” Alec said as he cleaved through another wave of monsters, “and to top it off I’m beginning to feel the strain.”
     “Think of it as field combat training with no weapons,” Nara said as she vaulted into the air and executed a near perfect Burning Dragon Kick. She landed next to Alec in a crouch, her breathing heavy from the exertion, ‘I’m out of shape for this type of combat.’

     Not too far from Nara and Alec, a young man was walking, wondering if he was going to save any young women in distress. He wore the garb of a samurai, on his back a scabbard that looked oddly like a red dragon’s head. His dark brown hair was cut close to his head, except in back where it hung to his collar. In his right hand he held his sword, which had a long thin blade that grew out at the top. Emblazoned on the blade were several runic symbols which spelled out Hostover, which was the name of a mystic weapon.
     ‘Damnit,’ he thought, ‘my training is going to waste. No action, no damsels in distress, no nothing. I should probably just...’
     His thought was interrupted by a woman’s cry of distress. He leapt into the trees, hopping from branch to branch until the source of the scream was in sight. He saw the monsters attacking a blonde woman and her companion, also blonde.
     ‘Well, it’s time for some action,’ he thought as he leapt from the branch, his sword’s blade glowing with energy. With a grunt that could only pass for a battle cry he swung his mighty blade, the energy extending and cutting down the monsters in its wake, yet leaving the man and woman unharmed. Any monsters that remained ran off in terror.
     “Are you O.K.?” he asked, helping Nara to her feet with his left hand as he resheathed his sword with his right.
     “Yes, yes I am,” Nara said, somewhat speechless, “Thank you very much.”
     “It was my duty as a member of the Red Dragon shrine,” the man said, bowing politely. Nara blushed lightly, since normally people saluted her.
     “Can you point a way out of this forest?” Alec asked, the energy weapon in his hand vanishing in a shower of sparkles.
     “Yes, it’s to the left,” the man said, pointing to his left, “go straight in that direction and you’ll reach a road. About half a mile down that road you’ll reach the town of Ragath. They have lodging and food there.”
     As he turned to walk off, Nara said, “What is your name?”
     “My name is not important,” he said, “but if you wish you can call me Tranlin.”
     Before Nara could say anything more, Tranlin leapt into the trees and was gone.
     “What an odd person,” Nara commented as she and Alec traveled in the direction that Tranlin had indicated.
     ‘Not as odd as you think,’ Tranlin thought as he watched them walk off, ‘Fare thee well, Miss Nara.’

     After much walking Nara and Alec reached the town of Ragath. It wasn’t much of a town in Alec’s opinion, since there were a few houses, a church, a temple, a library, a tavern and an inn. Nara thought it was quaint, since she was used to the hustle and bustle of Earth and the cities of Venus. Both were absolutely famished.
     “We need to eat something soon,” Nara said, “I can’t go on much further.”
     “We need local currency,” Alec said, “and we have none.”
     “We must something we could trade for food.”
     “I checked and we have nothing. We’re fresh out of options.”
     Nara then did something very unlike herself - she burst into tears. Fortunately for the townspeople they were spared from Nara’s outburst by the shouts of an advancing mob of undead monsters.
     “Nara, we need to move FAST!” Alec said, lifting Nara into the air and throwing her over his shoulder before he took off at a dead run. The undead were hot on their heels a moment later, slobbering and drooling. As the pair passed the tavern a girl of about fifteen or sixteen with flaming red hair stepped out, a half eaten leg of something or other in her hand.
     “What on earth?” she said as she watched the pair fly past. A moment later the undead army flew by. “Now I see,” she said, turning to the inside of the tavern, “Guys, we have some undead creeps to fight.”
     “Really now Miss Lina,” a girl with jet black hair said as she nibbled at her meal, “you know the undead only come out at night.”
     “Tell that to him,” a tall blonde man said, pointing past Lina at a drooling undead monster.
     “Oh puh-lease,” a green haired elven male said, yawning in the direction of the undead, “You’re doing it all wrong. To be an undead you have to be a LOT scarier than that.”
     “Right on Cenn,” Lina said, whipping about to deliver a fireball special to the monster. The undead sailed out the door and into the street, where it disintegrated into dust a moment later.
     “Um, Lina, shouldn’t we help those who were being chased by the undead?” a young man with blue stone skin and wire hair said. Lina gasped before taking off and leaving a cloud of dust, her leg of meat spinning in the air before falling to the ground. The others seated at the table followed her.
     “Hey,” the owner of the tavern shouted after them, “you forgot to pay.... oh, forget it!”

     Out in the woods Alec had since set Nara back on her feet, since with her added weight he was greatly slowed down. Behind them the undead army was still following. Behind the undead army a small band of people were running, throwing assorted spells and such at the undead, whittling them down very slowly.
     ‘We.... need to find a place to hide,’ Alec thought, looking about as he ran, ‘If they use any really big spells then there is a very good chance of us getting caught in its wake.’
     “Alec,” Nara said, grabbing his arm and pulling him in a new direction.
     “What?” he began to question, but saw her destination - a cave of sorts, with a very broken down marble entry way composed of large slabs. “A cave.”
     The pair ran into the cave and immediately regretted doing so. The entrance instantly closed over with broken iron bars and slabs of rock, leaving air spaces, but none large enough to squeeze or break through.
     “Well, at least there’s a place to see what’s going on outside,” Nara said, standing on the tips of her toes to look through the hole where a large tree branch had wedged itself in. Alec also stood on the tips of his toes and together they looked outside. Before them stood the undead army with their backs to the cave entrance. They heard bits and pieces of conversation between the girl and the supposed boss of the undead, since he was by far the largest and most formidable looking.
     “What do you think is going to happen?” Nara asked.
     “I don’t.... oh boy,” Alec said when he saw the girl with the flame red hair change her stance, an unseen wind blowing her hair and cape about. “Darkness beyond twilight,” Alec read from the girl’s lips, “crimson beyond blood that flows...”

     “Buried in the stream of time. I thy great name let the fools who stand before me be destroyed by the power you and I possess,” Lina chanted as she performed the motions for her more powerful attack spell, ‘How dare that little..... who in the nine hells does he think he is by calling me that. He’s gonna pay!’ “Dragon.... SLAVE!!!”
     A beam of ruby red energy fired from Lina’s hands, tearing through the ranks of the undead much in the way Tranlin’s sword had done with the other monsters. The beam struck the cave entrance before detonating into an energy wave which wiped out any of the undead that the initial pass had missed. The leader of the undead army looked at what Lina’s spell had done and his jaw dropped. What had he done by insulting the spell thrower?
     “Give it up,” Zelgadis said, “you know what usually happens when Lina Inverse gets upset.”
     “Things get blown up REAL good,” Cennarian said, brushing some of his green gold hair back from his face. The leader’s jaw dropped again.
     “So surrender in the name of justice,” Amelia said. This caused Lina’s left eyebrow to begin to twitch.
     “Guys,” Lina said, holding her fingers to her temples, “just let me handle him.”
     When Lina looked up again her eyes had gone cold, a dark flame glowing in her eyes. The leader began to step back, only to trip over a pair of bodies laying on the ground. Lina took this moment to nail him.
     “Dare Brando!”
     An explosion went off under the undead leader, hurling him into the air.
     “Elmekia Lance!”
     “Fireball!”
     “Flare Lance!”
     Cenn, Zel, and Amelia hit the leader with a triple spell combo, sending him screaming into oblivion. Sylphiel ran to the bodies, checking the vitals and when she found them to be nominal she breathed a sigh of relief.
     “Who are they?” Lina asked, looking the two over, “they’re not from around here, or from this time even.”
     “You can ask them when they wake up,” Zelgadis said, noting that the pair were coming to.

     “What hit me?” Alec asked as he opened his eyes and held his hand to his forehead.
     “How much do you remember?” a somewhat perky female voice asked from his left. He turned his head to look into the wide violet eyes of Lina Inverse. Beside here were Amelia Will Tesela Seyruun and Sylphiel Nels Raada. Behind them stood Cennarian Ul Coptura, Gourry Gabriev, and Zelgadis Greywords. Off to one side stood a young man with brown hair tinged with red that was parted in the middle, brown eyes, and tanned skin. He wore a black T-shirt, somewhat loose blue jeans, black boots, and a Hawaiian shirt with a dragon motif in red and yellow on a blue background.
     “Alex?” Nara said, looking at the young man, who had a look of surprise wash over his face.
     “You know my name, yet I don’t know yours,” Alex West said, “have we met before?”
     Nara began to say something in protest, but Alec interrupted her. “He’s not the Alex from our time. Most likely he’s the one from the 1990’s.”
     “How right you are,” Lina said, crouching down next to the two Exo troopers, “he got sucked in by Sylphiel’s time transport spell and hasn’t left since.”
     “Only because you won’t return two of my chaos emeralds,” Alex said in defense, “anyway, I can contact my grandson and tell him we’ve found you.”
     “Thank you, thank you very much,” Alec said a moment before his stomach grumbled loud enough to be heard half a mile away. Nara blushed from embarrassment.
     “How about lunch before we make that call,” Gourry suggested. The others nodded in agreement.

     In the trees, watching everything, was Tranlin. As he watched Nara and Alec walk off with the Slayers he said, “Take care Miss Nara, Master Alec. You’re in good hands there.”

     In the second chapter of Slayers Squad, Alex contacts the New Ronin Warriors, only to find the ones he needs to speak with aren’t there. To make matters worse they’ve already been contacted by JT Marsh concerning the same thing.
     Meanwhile there’s someone who resembles Tranlin going around and causing trouble for the people of the local towns. Now the Slayers Squad has a new mission - stop this person. How will it turn out? Stay tuned and we’ll show you.