After almost a year in space the USS Sevilia had come in need of maintenance and repairs beyond the usual daily fixes and post-disaster patching. Down in engineering [sev]-dummy had raised a forcefield around the room and taken the interdimensional warpcore off line for a couple of days. The ship was running on impulse power only. However, without the interdimensional warpcore set to constant homing in on the Sevspace dimension, the USS Sevilia fell out of it and ended up in one of the billion other dimensions in the multiverse, one know as Backupspace, somewhat resembling Sevspace but not really quiet the same. Having been there once before and registered it as "mostly harmless" the crew prepared themselves for an uneventful period of not-much-going-on. That of course was a mistake. Surprised?

*****

"This might very well be the worst threat ever to the ship", said Joeno as he emergency-piloted the USS Sevilia through the vast amounts of emerging interdimensional pop-ups.

"At least it´s the most annoying", said Leander, his head rising from behind a console.

"It´s just a bumpy ride". Th´kya´s voice could be heard from behind the same console were she was giving some unmoral nightshift support to Leander. "You´d never complained before".

"I don´t think the two of you are taking this seriously", said Joeno. "We don´t know if there´s anyone left but us three up here. We haven´t heard anything from anyone else in at least 47 minutes."

"All the more reason to enjoy ourselves while we still can", said Leander and Th´kya simultaniously.

"If I should happen to run the ship into one of those ghostly 50000 metre wide interdimensional pop-ups we´d be gone too", continued Joeno. "Totally insane, like everyone else that has been hit when they penetrate the hull like a warm knife through butter".

"Do not reply to that!" The Moderating Wizzard´s voice could be heard over the comlink.

"Thank Ford", said Joeno. "Is everyone okkey-dokkey down there?"

"Not really", said TGW. "There´s just a few of us left now. A corner of one of those pop-ups emerged on quarter decks and took out half the remaining crew. That´s why no one has come to assist you up there. We´re busy down here right now. Two of the cargobays have been transformed into emergency Asylums so that we could store away those ensigns who begun singing Brittney Spears tunes when they were hit and their IQ went out the windows."

"How about the Captain and Anubis and LGM and the rest of the away team? We haven´t heard anything from them up here."

"Same down here. Since they took that shuttle out to examine the first 50000 metre pop-up we´ve heard nothing. I guess they might had to flee in the other direction when the pop-ups started emerging everythere. At least those damn things don´t do any lasting damage to metal structures, and all three of them are pretty good pilots, so unless they been turned into shitlist-hymning vegetables they might still be out there somewhere, just like us. Now if you excuse me, I have things to do down here, I´ll get back to you later. If I can."

The Great Wizzard's voice disappeared and then Joeno jumped as he suddenly heard the aft turbolift doors open. He spun around, "Tri! Great to see you! Could you give us a hand?" She responded by slipping silently into the port science station and immeadiately started scanning the Pop-Up Field.

"Why is it only us two up here?" she enquired, "shouldn't there be some support staff? Leander in command perhaps? And Th'kya, I'm sure that she was taking this shift! She's normally very reliable, that's why she got the Moderator's Award! I was so sure she'd turn up for her shift."

"Yes, well. Reliable is as reliable does"

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"I'm not entirely sure, but it sounded good. What I should have said was - she did turn up, but so did Leander." He poinged discretely at the Ops Station. "They're, erm, making the best of a near death situation." Trideos nodded and smiled, but her attention was diverted by a beeping emitted from her console.

"Lieutenant, have you tried the normal evasive manouvers? And the Pop-Up Killers?"

"First thing I tried. They didn't work, this is a more intense field than we've ever encountered!"

She went back to work, chewing thoughtfully on a few strands of hair. Suddenly, it hit her! "OW! I mean, oh! I've figured it out! It's nearly 6 months since we were last here, since we were last patroling this space and wiping out the breeding grounds. In that time the pop-ups have gone forth and multiplied. But at the same time, they've diversified, mutated. They're immune to the standard Pop-Up Killers."

"Is there anything we can do?"

"I'm afriad not. If Sean was here, maybe. I hear he has the strongest Pop-Up Killer money didn't buy. But he's on the away team and God knows where they are!"

"How did you know that? I never told you that! Did TGW tell you that?"

"No Sir. I read the script."

Joeno rolled his eyes and muttered something about cheating, but quickly turned his attention back to his senior officer. "Erm, Tri. Why'd you call me Sir? You outrank me."

"Only in normal space Sir. Here you're more powerful than even dummy!" (Editorial Note: That was just her assumption, and very wrong, but we´ll get back to that later on in the story). "Anyway, we're digressing. We must work out how to activate Sean's Pop-Up Killer. SPIK for short. If not I fear there will be pop-up related suicides within the hour."

"You mean SPUK for short, don´t you?"

"No, that´s to similar to Spook." (Editorial Note: It's actually because the author of this section was ill and muddled it up. Also, she is familiar with English slang and doesn't like SPUK's similarity with spunk)

"Right, right. Well, SPIK it is then, but where does he keep it?" Joeno looked thoughtful.

Suddenly, a loud crack came from behind the Tactical Console and there was a muffled scream.

"Leander! You broke it! What was it?"

"Oooh, I dunno. It says IK on this bit, and, erm, SP just there. IKSP? Eh, I'm sure it wasn't important."

Listening to this exchange, Joeno and Trideos exchanged a look. "So Tri, what do we do now?"

"I guess we rely on Dave. He must have some pretty powerful charges in his quarters."

Suddenly, over the comm which had mysteriously been on all this time, came a scream, followed by a shriek. "Bridge! Bridge? EofS to bridge!!"

Joeno responded "yes E?"

"Dave just killed himself! We're trapped in his quarters, I can't get him to the BSBRU! I can't use mouth to mouth 'cos his head's not strictly attached to his body. Sir, there's nothing ...!" The Creator of Dramatic Tension's comm signal was cut off unexpectedly.

*****

Meanwhile, somewhere off in the Pop-Up Field the USS Ferryboat was dodging and wheeling through pop-ups at break neck speed.

"Come fly with me, oops, let's fly, whoah, let's fly awaaay" Anubis sang as he piloted the shuttle losing count of the number of times he almost hit a newly forming pop-up.

"I think I'm going to be sick." moaned WooHoo as the Ferryboat arched around almost clipping a pop-up that had appeared straight in front of them.

"That was a little too close." LGM commented "I think I should drive!"

"Relax will you, everything's under control, nothing can go wrong."

The three crew members paused and looked all about them and were rewarded by a whole lot of nothing happening.

"See." Anubis said "Nothing went wrong."

"Hmmm." WooHoo commented "Well in an effort to turn this mission into something more than a joyride I think we should get some work done don't you?"

The two others nodded reluctantly and went about their work, pressing buttons, looking at readouts and generally looking busy.

*****

On the bridge of the USS Sevilia was now ThunderDragon and ensign Gabumon who had been left in charge when the others rushed off in a hurry. ThunderDragon was sitting in the captains chair, with a padd, while Gabumon piloted the ship standing on LGM's little green box. ThunderDragon entered a thing looking like an URL on his padd and pressed the ENTER button. Suddenly a whole lot of pop-ups came up and behind them you could see a large text: Casino-on-net...

"The main pop-up creator!" ThunderDragon said. "If that can be destroyed, the number of pop-ups will be significantly lowered.

(Editorial Note: This sudden and unexplained change at the helm will be delt with later on. Stay tuned).

*****

Somewhere down on the sublevel decks, Joeno, Trideos, Th`kya and Leander reached Dave's quarters. Joeno overode the lock, opened the door and found "the hologrid!?" Joeno jumped back, surprised, nearly bowling Leneander over.

"We're gonna need a bigger boat" Trideos responded, examining what they had thought to be the enterance to Dave's quarters. "That, or Chimera."

"Joeno to Chimera. Joeno to Chimera!"

A breathless voice floated through from the other end "I'm here Sir. Can you make it brief, we're swamped down here!"

"Where are you?"

"I'm in the cargo bay with TGW Sir. The saner ensigns are commiting suicide Sir. We think it's either the pop-ups or the Britney Spears. We're having to restrain them, but God they try hard to kill themselves." She stopped abruptly as a gurgle could be heard over the comm. "That was Ensign Lennon Sir. He just choked himself to death on his own tonsils! Sir, whatever you need me for, it had better be damned urgent!"

"Chimera, you're the best qualified person on the ship for this job, it must be you!" He thought for a moment. "I'm sending Leander down to relieve you. In the meantime, head for the bridge. When you get there, make as if for crew quarters on deck 7. Aim for Dave's quarters in section 4. We cut through a lot of debris to get here, but it might have rematerialised."

"Rematerialised?" Chimera's voice was even more breathless now, she was obviously already running to get to the bridge, "what do you mean, rematerialised?"

"You'll understand when you get here. Joeno out." He turned to give orders to Leander to make his way to the cargo bay, but from the look on Th'kya's face, he had already gone.

When Chimera got up on the bridge, there was a lot of activity. ThunderDragon and Gabumon was busy trying to find a way to destroy the evil pop-ups. This far, they hadn't got much, except for starting various Anime music to keep all of the pop-ups away from the bridge. Chimera couldn't stand the music so she directly fled down to Dave's quarters and when she got there, she discovered that Joeno wasn't there anymore! Neither were Th'kya or Trideos. She entered carefully "hello? Hello!" Joeno? Dave? Anyone?" Furniture was strewn over the living quarters. There had either been a struggle, or someone had gone nuts. She made her way carefully into the bathroom and was surprised to see EofS knelt over the bath sobbing quietly, her civies red with blood, and her hair clumped together. "E? E? What are you doing in here E? What's the matter?" Moving closer, the question was answered. Inside the bath, laying in several inches of watery blood, was Dave. Or rather, Dave's corpse. His head was at an odd angle and seemed to be moving..."oh my God!!! E!! E!!!!!!!" Grabbing the ex-drone by the shoulders, she shook her vigorously. "Get with it E! The ship is in crisis, the top three officers aren't on said ship! I know Dave's dead, but we'll get him to the BSBRU. Snap out of it E!" She shook her again. There was a sickening thud and fresh blood began trickling down EofS' face. "Oh God!! I'm sorry E, are you alright?"

EofS stirred and murmered, "I'll... I think I'll be ok. I've had worse. There was this one time, Dave and I were... we were..." She sniffled and started crying again. "He's dead Chim! There's nothing I can do. He killed himself because of the pop-ups. I couldn't stop him Chim. He wouldn't stop. And this time he's gone for real! We can't get him to the BSBRU, we're trapped in these quarters. Chimera, HE'S DEAD!!!" Her crying turned back to sobs of rage and sorrow.

Chimera thought for a moment. Then her training clicked into place. She ran a basin of cold water and dunked E's head in it briefly. "Stay with me E, I'm going to need your co-operation if this is to work. I'm going to get you and Dave to R U Sick?bay and then try to find Joeno. They're starting to clear the corridors so it shouldn't be too hard to get there. If I was able to get here from the bridge, I'm sure we can get there OK. Is that alright? They'll get you fixed up straight away, and they'll get Dave into stasis until the BSBRU is available." She rummaged around and found some adhesive tape in a first aid kit. "He's well prepared at least," she muttered, taping Dave's head securely to his body. Then she gathered his bloody corpse into her arms, helped EofS up and provided some support, and headed out of the door for R U Sick?bay.

*****

Having monitored the situation from within the computer K1chyd suddenly realised the dangerous subplot situation. If the awayteam piloted by Anubis should find them right now with ThunderDragon and ensign Gabumon in charge he might just have a raging fit and crash the shuttle right into the bridge and blow them all up permanently. Pukémons sometimes had that kind of effect on him.

"Someday I´ll have to tell Anubis that all Egyptian Gods and Jackelian inhabitants are descendants of Pukémons sent back in time by himself in a timetravelling paradox eppy that only I can remember" thought K1chyd as he self-activated his holographic matrix on the bridge and materialised as the Ooooking librarian layout of himself that was introduced in "Murder on the Backup Board", the previous episode, or next, depending on where you read it. ThunderDragon and Gabumon stared at him.

"Ooook, Ooook, Ooook", said K1chyd in an attempt to explain to them that they most let him take over both the command and the pilot´s helm.

They kept staring at him. Ensign Gabumon missed an emerging pop-up almost right in front of them but only the left nacelle passed through it and no crewman or woman was hurt.

"Ooook, Ooook ", K1chyd persisted. ThunderDragon looked to his padd and Gabumon took a banana out of his pocket and offered it to K1chyd.

"There really is no time for this" K1chyd thought. 0.47 seconds later - and after an indescribable Kung-Fu scene - the two Pukémons both laid unconscious on the floor. Gabumon with a banana stuck where no banana should ever have to go. Really. We mean it. (Editorial Note: We apologise to the Foundation Against Cruelty To Vegetarian Energy Sources - a.k.a Fruitpeace - that has launched a formal protest, but the scene stays. It is clearly stated that we agree with your general argument so there´s no need for it to be removed. You whiney bastards).

"Ooook" panted K1chyd and sat himself at the helm too watch for any new readings. "Ooook" he repeated to himself a couple of times as he piloted the ship through the minefield of pop-ups and at the same time tried to stay on course for the nearest star. What he had found in the databases, but that no one else knew, was that all these killer pop-ups were pre-adolescent monolithic lifeforms of the kind that had first contacted Stanley Kubrick back in the 1960s. Each and every single one of them with the potential power to destroy entire civilizations.

"They must be destroyed, and I know just how to do it" he thought to himself as he continued to "Ooook" for himself. "I will emergency-eject the quarters of Hyberbole directly into the star. That interdimensional door/connection to the house of §trange will cause the star to go Supernova. And clean out this region of space from pop-ups in the process, like a Motörhead consert cleaning out a Concert Hall of Europop deadmeats.

"But won´t that kill us all as well?" asked Hyberbole as she conviniently walked onto the bridge just as K1chyd pushed the button and sent her quarters on their speedy journey into the center of a star that had just came within reach.

"Ooook, Ooook, Ooook, Ooook", said K1chyd, which in translation meant; "Probably, but I have eaten so many bananas lately that it has gotten to my brains and I don´t really care. And besides, someone else will probably sort it out anyway, it´s more fun that way." He offered Hyperbole a banana, but not the one still attached to Gabumon, and not the one that would cause the Moderating Wizzard to intervene.

"Thanx" said Hyper and slowly begun to peel it before she realised that panic probably would be in order. And that she was now homeless and her quarters would have to be rebuild if they should happen to survive.

"Heeeeey!", she started, but in just that moment the sun on the screen exploded with a huge novaflash.

*****

"Interesting...", [sev]-dummy thought. The dummy-essence was still around in a spiritual state, which require some concentration but is otherwise quite easy for someone who has spent hundreds of years in hidden digital-transcendent stasis. (Editorial Note: There´s no room for that to be repeated here but it´s all and more in the crew bio). He was monitoring the rest of the ship as problems begun to gather in the Backupspace dimension and would already have intervened if it wasn´t that at the same time he had to deal with another problem. Having to kickstart the interdimensional warpcore. One of the few things onboard that actually could be a huge problem for him and needed the tapping in to an outside power supply to work.

"Yes… That novaflash might just do. If I can just manage to convert the shields to absorb instead of just deflecting…".

He focused on the main processor in the bridge computer system and tried to mentally connect with it.

*****

At the same time, ThunderDragon and Gabumon woke up. ThunderDragon didn't like to have been kicked down by K1chyd, so he tried cut off his head with a swift slash with his tail. But that didn´t do much since K1chyd saw it coming and changed to un-solid hologram state. Gabumon tried sticking the banana up the same place on K1chyd, but with the same unsuccesful result. Then an emergency meeting was held deciding what to do and they realised that as long as K1chyd was unsolid they could reach the console through him. When they tried they discovered that this Ooooking version of K1chyd was tickly and fell on the floor laughing. ThunderDragon continued to tickle him by kicking him through the head, and other various parts of his chimp anatomy, while Gabumon tried to pilot away as fast as possible. But the shockwave from the supernova was faster than the Sevilia which had to pilot around millions of pop-ups.

"Does the House of §trange like Pokémon or Digimon music?" ThunderDragon asked.

"I don't think so." Hyperbole looked up from the corner where she sat. "At least not Disgustimon music."

"Good, now I know a way to save the ship from the supernova!" ThunderDragon walked up to a console. Some seconds later various Disgustimon songs could be heard over the shipwide comm system.

Luckily for everyone (Editorial Note: Because Disgustimon music is as painful as Brittney Spears and would have killed everyone else just as definitively as the supernova) this part was just a dream that ThunderDragon and Gabumon shared as they lay unconscious on the floor…

*****

The ship would have been destroyed by the outgoing novaflash but its tremendous destructive power suddenly and mysteriously dropped (as if diverted or drained) just when it hit the ship. [sev]-dummy had been succesful in changing the shields, but at this time no one but himself knew about that and what had really happened when they once again escaped death in the last possible second. But - as the saying goes - out of the ashes, into the fire. Draining the supernova of it´s outgoing energy, and throwing the house of §trange into the mix, caused the former star to undergo a rapid aging of unheard proportions. Only seconds later it had changed into a black hole and started sucking in all the material in its reach. Including the USS Sevilia and the remaining pop-ups. (Editorial Note: If you think this is getting weird and unbelieveable, stay with us, you ain´t heard nothing yet!)

Things got even stranger than it turned out that the dream of ThunderDragon and Gabumon not only sucked, but sucked so much that it spilled over into the "real" Backupspace world and contracted the material-sucking from the black hole that was now building up there the sun had been before going nova. So because of the contrasucking dream of ThunderDragon and Gabumon the USS Sevilia managed to stay put where they were when everything else around them was sucked into the black hole. Including the away team shuttle that suddenly passed by and was only saved because Hyperbole instinctivly threw the banana across the bridge and in the exact moment of a bananasplit second hit the very, very, very small switch that activated the tractorbeam and that way caught them and tied them to the ship. (Editorial Note: In another another dimension that throw got Hyperbole a contract with the Chicago Cubs, and she later lead them to their first World Series Victory in several hundred years. But that´s another story).

However, the energy loss from the tractor beam holding up against a black hole made it impossible for them to break free. The ship was now caught on the event horizon of the newly formed black hole. For a while they would be able to hold there own where they were because the impulse enginees still had a power supply. But for how long? Suddenly it was all up to dummy to get the main engineering back online. Because if he didn´t they would all fall into the black hole and - crew and ship alike - be crushed into a sevilian porridge of mixed atoms with no chance of escape or reassembly. He had managed to absorb the supernova´s energy and lead it into the interdimensional warpcore. But would it be enough, or rather, would it be too much?

*****

Chimera walked into the hallway outside R U Sick?bay, paused and took a few deep breaths. Inside there had been a flurry of activity as Dr Chris and 24/7 worked with a team of nurses to try and cope with the myriad of injuries from pop-up related attacks. Dr Jonas, it seemed, had made his way down to the cargo bay to try and console the singing Ensigns. EofS' head injury was just one amongst many, but Chimera was sure good care would be taken. Dave, in the meantime, had been put into a stasis pod. There had been a large number of pop-up induced suicides it seemed and the corpses were having to share. Chimera briefly wondered if she should later tell Dave how up close and personal he and Corsair had gotten. She smiled briefly before composing herself and setting about her duties. "Chimera to Joeno."

"Joeno here."

"Sir, I followed your instructions but for some reason when I reached Dave's quarters you weren't there. I've gotten Dave and EofS to R U Sick?bay and I was just wondering what you want me to do next."

"Well, we've been making our way up to the bridge, maybe you could meet us there"

"Sure thing. Chimera out" She tapped her combadge and sprinted for the bridge. The path was remarkably clear and she passed many repair teams already at work. Musing this she realised that the ship was no longer shaking from pop-up strikes. In fact, it seemed very... still! It seemed too much to hope that the crisis was over, but she did anyway. She reached the bridge right as Joeno, Trideos and Th'kya rounded the corner. They entered together. She watched Joeno walk onto the bridge and was surprised how commanding he appeared. He might normally only be an Ops officer, but there was clearly Captain's blood running through his body and soul. The conscious bridge crew turned to him as he addressed them.

"K1chyd, Hyperbole. Can you fill me in?"

"Ooook. Ook oook ooook. Oooooo"

Joeno cut him off mid oook "Chimera. Can you do anything with his matrix?

"It'll take me a few mintues" she responded, already heading for the panels at the back of the bridge.

"In the meantime," continued Joeno, "I guess we'll fill you in on what's been happening with us.

"On hearing of Dave's suicide, Trideos and I decided to go and see what we could do. After all, at that point, he had seemed to be our last hope. We had planned to leave Leander up here to co-ordinate but he and Th'kya pouted so much we just couldn't do it. Luckily, at that moment, ThunderDragon arrived on the bridge and that clinched it. From E's description of the scene, it was going to be quite tough work getting to the crew quarters, and the combined power of Leneander is ten times that of ThunderDragon.

"So we headed for Dave's quarters. It was slow going, but eventually we got there. But when we opened his door it didn't lead to his room, but to a hologrid. We tried to get Chimera to come to us, but somehow she ended up in the real Dave's quarters. Whilst we waited for her, we did some investigating. It turned out that the past 4 decks had been some sort of holographic simulation. Unfortunately, once we were out of the simulation, we didn't seem to be able to get back into it, so we headed up here. And that's where we joined you."

Hyperbole looked up from where she and Th'kya were tending to ThuderDragon and his Pukémon friend. "So what was the holodeck thing all about then?"

"We can't be sure." Joeno turned to Chimera, "any ideas?"

"It's not something I've encountered in all my years Sir. I guess we'll find out one of these days though" Joeno couldn't tell whether she looked worried or excited at this prospect. "Done Sir." She tapped a final button and K1chyd returned to his former Vorlon glory.

Joeno turned to the Ancient Confuzzling Spiritual Guide to ask for an update, but he was already at it.

*****

Having struggled to control the overflow of power in the interdimensional warpcore, [sev]-dummy finally found a solution in one of his experiments, a bottleshaped battery-thingie of pure quantum-level engineered Sevranium 147 and Spam. (Editorial Note: Spam being the cork part). He quickly diverted all the supernova energy not needed in the core to the bottle and - just to be on the safe side - had Ensign Handyman put in the cork. "Here you go", said Handyman, put the bottle in dummy's hand, took a respectful step backward, stumbled on his own shoelaces, and fell into a laundryshaft leading to the CRU (Editorial Note: CRU, Clothing Reincarnation Unit. And Ensign Handyman later came back as a red top and and a pair of red high-heeled boots for Sesspit, which made dummy secretly giggle for a whole week).

"I better not ever tell anyone about this bottle", dummy thought to himself. "If Dave or HirogenHunter or CBM find out, it´s just a question of time before they start thinking in terms of Molotov-Cocktail. No, I will definitely keep this to myself."

He held it up against the light and saw that not only did it shine from the contained supernova powers therein, but also there were some colourful bubbles slowly moving up and down through it. "It kinda locks like one of those lavalamps from the 1960s" he though, "I guess those bubbles are a leftover from all the pop-ups that were killed in the explosion, after all they were a pre-adolescent monolithic lifeform. One of these day I´ll have to transcend to the dimension of the dead and talk to Stanley Kubrick about it."

He quickly hid the bottle/lavalamp behind a bunch of much too old broccoli in his late night snack refrigerator, closed the door and put a safety lock on it. A broken and rusty one just to ensure that the whole thing would look totally uninteresting to anyone else.

And when he went about the business of reconnecting the restarted warpcore with the rest of the Sevilia. Bringing them all back into the normal Sevspace and out of the danger in the Backupspace dimension.

*****

As K1chyd rounded off his recap of the events on the bridge Joeno gave him a long look. And then he gave the screen an even longer look. The black hole that had been there just a minute ago was gone. Even Chimera seemed incredulous. She quickly ran some diagnositics on K1chyd's matrix, double-checking and triple-checking it.

"Sir, it's possible that I've found a connection to this strange phenomenon with the holodeck version of Dave's quarters that you encountered earlier. It seems these 'memories' stored in his matrix, this whole ridiculous business with a black hole forming in just minutes didn't actually happen in our reality, but in the holodeck version of the Sevilia. The House of §trange might have had something to do with it too, because it has actually been ejected and I can´t locate it, but all and all I´d say that large parts of this have all been an illusion."

Joeno walked up next to her, examining her instruments, not that it did him any good. "What can you tell us about it? Where did it come from?" Chimera looked up, but all she could do was shake her head.

"I don´t know Sir."

*****

The twisted smoking wreck of the Ferryboat lay silently on the pad. The tractor beam had locked on successfully but when the warpcore came back on line power was increased and the Ferryboat was too hastily dragged towards a shuttle bay and Anubis was unable to fully control it. This resulted in the Ferryboat smashing through the doors of the shuttle bay and slamming into the floor.

"Remind me again." said LGM as he got up from the floor brushing away some debris, "How did Anubis get his pilot's licence?"

A muffled groan was all Anubis could reply as lifted his head from the control panel and shook it slowly in an effort to get some feeling back.

"It wasn't my fault." he managed to say eventually and checked that WooHoo was ok. She waved off any help and he acknowledged that she was fine.

"We should get to the bridge." she said "find out what's going on."

"Easier said than done." LGM quipped as he got out a tricorder and waved it around the shuttle. "The exit is fused and from what I can gather ship wide communications are out." (Editorial Note: This was because, erm, errr... Chimera accidently switched them off. Yes, that's it!)

WooHoo tapped her com badge and the dull tweat that sounded from it confirmed that LGM was right.

"We'll just have to break the door down." she said matter of factly and picked up a phaser, set it to full and started to cut the metal. The others did the same and soon the door was cut. Together Anubis and LGM barged the severed metal and it fell to the floor with a loud clatter that echoed around the empty shuttle bay.

"Let's get to the bridge."

*****

Meanwhile, on the bridge, Chimera was just in the middle of forming a amazingly complexed, really logical, and to large parts totally faulty technobabbled theory of what had happened to K1chyd's matrix. By then [sev]-dummy was listening in over the comm system but quickly decided to not set her straight. He didn´t want to tell the others what a close call things had really been. He also quickly tapped into the accessable parts of K1chyd´s program and threw in some extra fuzzy math algorivems whereever there was a reference to monolithic lifeforms or Stanley Kubrick. Chimera went on.

"It seems he's interacting with the holographic version of the Sevilia, his consciousness jumping back and forth between reality and the holodeck."

Joeno was still not sure how to interpret the tricorder readings correctly but he stayed at Chimera's side anyway, trying to look somewhat professional and generally in-commandish. Chimera continued.

"Whatever the reason was, it was most likely also causing the malfunction with his appearance files. If only I knew what The Great Wizzard did to them. It seems to be fixed now, but K1chyd was the only link to that holodeck reality, and now we have no way of finding out what or why that popped up earlier."

Suddenly the turbolift doors opened and everyone prepared themselves for another cliffhanger. But it was just the away team with Captain WooHoo in the lead.

*****

The ship was back in the Sevspace dimension and in a solarsystem where the sun had never gone nova in the first place. After a couple of minutes everyone started to get a warm and wonderful and inexplicable feeling of having refound normality. Not wanting to spend endless hours in scientific technobabble debates about what really had happened, Captain WooHoo immediately took advantage of the emotional situation and ordered the investigation to be shut down, and LGM to take the helm and set course for the nearest planet with shore leave potential. When doing so LGM found that K1chyd had left the ship on a course to a primitive planet in a nearby system, so he let the controls stay the way they were. And by a freak coincidence of the kind that is perfectly normal in normal Sevspace, that planet turned out to be the Planet of the Apes and it placed them all in the middle of a monkey business insurrection. But that´s another Ooooking story.