The Return of Time

[meat_mooks]

As the Clock was destroyed, all of the stolen time rushed back to it's original owners, causing them to rapidly age back to normal. But as the crew would soon notice, it seemed that the stolen time didn't always go back to exactly the right place...

[[ooc: Time to get back to normal guys! This is basically a case of very rapid ageing - they'll

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[things_go_boom]

A tiny little toddler was busy running in the streets of the city. She knew that after the play, clearly there wouldn't by much time left for her to enjoy this body. The day was won! Everything would be alright! And now she still had all this energy to go around everywhere, and my what a wonderful building this was and this place did seem pretty nice and...

[things_go_boom]

Return to normality certainly hurt.

Lash definitely had not been expecting the change to be so sudden, as the memories came flooding back with each new heartbeat. The freecaring child felt herself turning back into a much more rational adult and in horror she realized how little she had been planning this. This was normal, a child would not have known. But a growing teenager knew that the pain was terrible, and she was now in the middle of the city, right in the open air where anything could have attacked her.

Her hands instinctively had gone to the sides of her head as a massive headache from so much imagery forced her to fall on the ground to avoid harming herself any more. At first like a burning pain in her chest, she felt the tiny little toddler clothing being torn to pieces and only the plantsuit remained as she grew into her adult body once again. When everything is done, Lash breathed in and out in gasps, the pain finally leaving her body.

[things_go_boom]

The body in question now feeling like pins and needles had been stuck in all over. Trying to get up and walk again, she found herself slipping down to the ground as fast as she had risen up.

"D-dammit!"

[morphitudinous]

Billy hadn't intended to follow Lash on her way out to wherever young girls liked to wander, but it so happened that en route to his destination. He'd meant to check somewhere else entirely for re-aging crew members, but it so happened that he crossed paths with the familiar body on the ground.

To be more precise, he recognized it by the familiar afro on the ground.

"Lash," Billy breathed, instantly falling to his knees and bringing a supportive arm around her. "It's okay. Take your time."

She was healthy, she was safe. His Yellow Ranger was all right. It was a lot to process at once.

[things_go_boom]

Lash's afro was, admittedly, very foretelling of who she was.

Billy's voice was not something she had been expecting, but it was certainly welcome. She coughed twice, feeling that each one somehow expelled the subsiding pain inside her.

"It's like I'm numb in the legs right now," she explained to him, trying to turn around one of her foot to drive the feeling out. "I guess the blood, the veins and then...everything need a few minutes to adjust to the fact I just got much bigger."

[morphitudinous]

"No, I understand," Billy answered softly, sitting down with her and gently nudging her legs. "Bodies aren't meant to age that quickly. Combined with the stress of the memories, I'm more than happy to take a few minutes."

He shifted on the ground, gently touching her arm. "We have all the time we need now. I never thought I'd be able to say that again."

[things_go_boom]

"Weeell, if you want to get technical, we're just humanoids with set timelines doomed to die at around the average lifespan of forty." At least Lash's sense of humor remained pretty much the same as always. And wow, Black Hole members tended to die young if that was any indication.

"I'll be okay," she protested, not used to having people fret over her or much in the ways of physical contact. "...this entire aging thing was a trip and a half."

Understatement of the century.

[morphitudinous]

"Forty?" Billy's eyes widened, his jaw dropping. Forty. That was definitely not the lifespan he was used to hearing. "It really is different out there. You weren't joking when you said what I went through is routine."

Lash, you now have a buddy who is very worried about you.

"Maybe you just need a rest? I know a guest room in a nearby house that's still clean."

[things_go_boom]

"No, I need to find a few other people," she answered. "Once this feeling gets out of my legs there won't be any problems." As proof, she was now wiggling her toes. "See? And what's wrong with forty? You guys die younger?" Not getting it at all.

"Um by the way...that was one hell of a play." Maybe even the tiny hint of a grin was creeping up on her face. "It really was fun."

[morphitudinous]

Billy agreed with that. "Yeah. I need to make sure everyone's all right. It makes me want to run in a hundred directions at once."

He flicked some hair back behind his ear, left wondering at that statement. "No, the normal lifespan on my planet is seventy. And...yeah, I have to admit that it was. We did it. After everything, we succeeded. No matter what anyone else thought."

The grin on his face could then be categorized as 'silly'.

[things_go_boom]

"Seventy is way too long," Lash said trying to imagine herself with white hair and an aging body. Like a female Von Bolt? Ewwww. Hey she remembered Von Bolt now. "Maybe if you live in Orange Star I guess, but Black Hole's not the type of country to take care of an aging population, if you know what I mean."

With that disturbing information out of the way, she grinned.

"So are all earth plays like that? I think we should do them more often."

[morphitudinous]

Lash, that is incredibly sad. You're not helping Billy worry any less, not at all. But he was determined to focus on the present. The wonderful present.

"That's just Shakespeare," Billy explained. "He's one of the greatly known playwrights, but there are others. There are humorous works, political satires, and...there's a particularly popular genre we didn't cover. The musical. In a musical, certain plot events are done in song and dance instead of dialogue."

The first person to propose he direct a musical was getting hit. No way, that was a dangerous road to go down.

[things_go_boom]

"Needs a lot more science and explosions, but the solid base isn't too bad. All the killing and cursing each other's families is really neat!" Trust Lash to focus on the parts she found really interesting. "I...dunno if I'd like that song and dance stuff. I'm not that great of a singing." Unless she's in the shower, surprisingly.

You're musical directorial debut was safe from Lash, Billy, at least there was that.

But there were much more important matters to attend. "I think we both have people we need to talk too that aren't here huh." That was as nice as Lash could be to him. "I'm good now." She stood up, wobbled a little, but managed to stay upright before dusting herself off. "Now I need to find my coat and my bag. Being around the ship with just Stacy's outfit isn't my style."

[morphitudinous]

Thank goodness for that, at least. He still hovered close by in case she needed him, but he could see that Lash would be all right. And they both had people to check up on, it was true.

"Yeah, I'll meet up with you again soon."

Before she left, though, he had one more devious trick to try. A hug. She'd earned one. Please don't hit him.

[things_go_boom]

"Are you hugging me?"

[morphitudinous]

"Not anymore!" Time to disengage. He was going to die if he didn't attempt some sort of apology. "I'm sorry. I just couldn't stop thinking about what would've happened if our production failed."