Wrench in the Works (Full Story):  Written by Exodus, Original Story by Planeswalker  

A small secretive meeting took place in the kingdom of Aruban, 
Resistance-related but necessary not to be discovered by evil.  
With the empire getting recruits for their armies out of nowhere, literally in 
some cases, the Resistors (the ten skilled individuals that led the Resistance) 
were becoming a little understaffed, and needed people both to work in the base, 
and to join the armies that usually fought against the many empire bog standard 
troops, human and robotic.  
Several tests and trials had been done in the Sanquar Forest but all of that now 
came to a close.  
Gear and Ruwin were in charge of the grading of the tests, but had kept a 
watchful eye on those involved, even though the tests were conducted away from 
the base, there would still be chaos if it was discovered while the tests were 
active.  
“Congratulations everybody.  It is to my delight to say that all of you have 
passed the tests and will be initiated into the Resistance, but just because 
these tests are over, does not mean the rest of your work will be a walk in 
the park.  The Evalon Empire is growing, and with each new warrior they hire, 
we must work harder to protect the other kingdoms from their conquest.”  
“But don’t get down ‘bout it, this is whut y’all wanted ta be doin’, or else ya 
wouldn’t be here.” added Ruwin, lightening the mood a little.  
“That’s right, but take into account that this isn’t all fun and games, this is 
a war, we expect each and every one of you to take your jobs seriously, Ruwin 
and I will now tell you how well you did and the duties we feel would suit your 
skills and personality...”  
This took some time, as there were about thirty or so people joining up, but the 
last three were now being briefed.  
“Lucy Reeve.” stated Gear to a blonde female in black clothing, “You scored a 
91, and what with you, Jenna and Douggie being the best at the stealth part of 
the program, I feel you should join up with our spies.  Its a slightly more 
dangerous job, but we won’t expect you to infiltrate the empire at such an early 
time, do you accept?”  
“Oh course I do Gear, it’d be a wonderful opportunity to-”  
“Work with very talented people, right?”  
“Well, yes, but I meant something else.”  
“Nice work Jenna, ya scored a 96, your skills are seemingly limitless from whut 
Ah’ve seen, an’ Douggie, an 89, but still a good score.”  
“Thank you...” said Jenna, a ginger haired girl with pig-tails and a shy 
personality.  
“Whatever...” frowned Douggie, a pale skinned man with black face tattoos with 
draping white hair in a dark purple smart suit, his facial features and careless 
attitude provoked a little suspicion, but those that had come here had been 
watched for several months to lower the possibility of empire infiltration.  
Ruwin returned to Gear and was slightly shocked, “Ooh, she’s cute...  Hey Gear, 
no fair, how come ya get ta talk ta the hottie blonde over there an’ Ah get 
stuck with the insecure ginger girl an’ that weirdo Ah’d rather not get ta 
know?”  
“I’m sorry Ruwin, but I know what you’re like, and we don’t want to drive people 
away because you can’t help but chat them-”  
Ruwin had left in mid-speech and was heading towards the blonde, “... Up...”  
Before Ruwin could make it to Lucy, he was distracted.  
“You heard me, I don’t think this guy should get in, I mean, look at him!”  
“With a face like that, he’s just gotta be an empire warrior.”  
“I think you oughta keep your opinions to yourself or-”  
“Hey whut’s goin’ on?” questioned Ruwin, separating two men that had been 
considered to become new guards, and Douggie.  
“You can’t tell? Look at Douggie, he’s a freak, the sort that the empire are 
into hiring.”  
“I wasn’t going to say anything cos I thought you’d see that and fail him, but I 
can’t let you compromise the group I’m going to devote most of my time to.”  
“Stop spouting nonsense!” yelled Ruwin, “We checked out you an’ every other 
person here fer months before this test wus conducted, he’s clean an’ has no 
empire involvement.”  
“But-”  
“But nothing.  Ah think ya should be leaving wit’ the others now.”  
The two left but their moaning and continuous distrust could be heard.  
“Ah’m sorry ‘bout that Douggie, the only truth ta whut they said is that you do 
look a little different, but as fer the rest-”  
“Just leave me alone...” he grumbled, walking away with Jenna and Gear.  
Ruwin turned to look for Lucy, but during the disciplining of the other guys, 
she had already left.  
“Damn...  But at least she’ll be working at Spybase like me, Ah’m bound ta see 
her about...”  

A few days later at Spybase, and Lucy, Jenna and Douggie, along with a few 
others, had been initiated into the Resistance, and straight away into the 
hidden underground base close to the empire.  
Ruwin had been called away by the other Resistors during that time to fight 
against a small band of demons, and after vanquishing them, he returned to one 
of his homes.  
“Man, Ah’m tired, the only thing keepin’ me from staying awake is mah mission ta 
find Lucy an’ introduce mahself...”  
Ruwin checked the many rooms, offices and halls, but came up short.  
“I don’t care about your regulations, I’m your superior and I want to know.”  
“But we can’t, and-”  
“Whut is it now?” asked Ruwin, “Ah swear you newbies are more work than taking 
care of babies, an’-  You again Douggie? Is there ever a day in which you’re not 
causing some form o’ trouble?”  
“He’s asking all sorts of questions that even we can’t tell him.” said one of 
the guards, he and the man with him had been in the Resistance’s services long 
before the recent recruits.  
“Like, where our mapping systems are, how the broadcasts to the Resistance Base 
work exactly, who has access to certain rooms, that sort of thing.”  
“He is? Is he?” squinted Ruwin, a little suspicious, “Well Ah’m sorry Douggie, 
but even if you are already overseeing the security staff, ya won’t need that 
sort o’ information, we don’t usually give out those sort o’ things ta those 
that are new or have no necessity fer the information in their jobs.”  
“Whatever.” he growled, “I was just curious...”  
Douggie walked away once more, but this time bumped into Ruwin rudely but didn’t 
stop.  
“Ah’m not likin’ that guy, Ah’m just glad he’s not a soldier Ah’d have ta see on 
virtually every mission...” sighed Ruwin.  

Ruwin was about to retire for bed and was heading down a hallway with many 
rooms, mostly for people like him that worked late.  
The rooms weren’t personalised like Ruwin’s room at the Resistance Base, but 
they each had a small desk and a comfortable bed inside.  
Ruwin yawned as he picked a room he’d become accustomed to, but instead of a 
nice empty room, Gear was inside, working on something with a girl.  
“Hey Ruwin, how’s it going with the new recruits?”  
“Whah are ya asking me that? Ah might be the authority here, but Ah’ve been away 
wit’ the other Resistors.”  
“Oh, sorry.  Where does the time go?...  Anyway, since you’re here, you might as 
well properly meet Lucy, you remember her, don’t you?”  
“How could Ah not? The hot-  Ah mean, the blonde from training.  Hiya, Ah’m 
Roberto Ruwin, but please feel free ta call me bah mah second name.”  
“Hello there Rob’.” she said, offering a hand.  
“That’s good too.” he shrugged, returning the handshake.  
“I know you usually sleep here Ruwin but we needed a private workspace, and when 
we started, the other rooms were booked.” explained Gear, “Lucy’s not only 
stealthy, she’s very intelligent with machines too.  I might just have to ask 
her to come back to the Resistance Base and become a lab assistant.”  
“I should fetch that battery, won’t be a sec’.” called Lucy as she swiftly 
exited the room.  
Ruwin shook off the looks he was giving off while staring and turned to Gear, 
“Gear, Ah’m a little concerned, Douggie’s been acting a little strange an’ 
suspicious lately, no one seems ta trust him an’ what if they’re onto 
somethin’?”  
“I was prepared for a little trouble from Douggie after viewing his data and 
results, but he’s quite the skilled fighter.  I didn’t want to send him away, or 
risk being attacked, just because he looks and acts a little funny.  Besides, 
even as head of Spybase security, there’s no way he can get to anything 
revealing here.”  
“Ah suppose you’re right, sorry Gear.”  
“That’s okay, I think there’s another room free next door, you could sleep 
there, or I could leave this room and-”  
“So you must know Lucy pretty well, huh?”  
“I suppose so, we’ve been working on this little chip for days, it’ll greatly 
speed up the time it takes for transmissions to reach you, and for you to send 
them to us.”  
“Whut’s she like?”  
“Oh, well, she’s smart, and witty, and-”  
“Ah mean, whut does she like... in a man?...”  
“How should I know, I don’t like her in That way.”  
“Good, cos Ah kinda like her an’ want you ta set us up.”  
“This is why I didn’t let you near her, do you know how many people have asked 
Lucy out since she came here?”  
“Nope, but it doesn’t matter, its all ‘bout how ya ask.”  
“Ruwin, I still think its a bad idea, you should sleep now, and we’ll talk more 
in the morning.”  
“Fine.” sighed Ruwin, departing for bed.  
It wasn’t soon after that Lucy returned and handed the small item to Gear, 
“Here.”  
“Thanks Lucy.”  
“Gear? You know when I said there was another reason I was here? It was actually 
because I wanted to get to know Ruwin, is there anyway you could set us up?”  
“But what with the others asking you out, I thought you weren’t interested in 
anyone.”  
“Not just anyone, that’s right, but Ruwin’s like a legend.  Has he not asked 
about me?”  
“Actually... he has.  I was keeping him away from you so as not to put you off 
this job.”  
“Put me off? If anything, I’d work harder just to impress him.”  
“Okay then, I’ll see what I can do...”  

True to his word, Gear set Ruwin and Lucy up for a date, which to summarise, 
went well.  
Ruwin tended to appear the ladies’ man, but once a girl he liked showed interest 
back, he never turned to another woman unless problems arose in the 
relationship.  
Naga, one of the Resistors that had long had a crush on Ruwin but never admitted 
it, wasn’t very happy at all, since Ruwin and Lucy quickly grew close together, 
she admired him for his skills and accomplishments, while Ruwin was happy to be 
the centre of attention and treated Lucy with lots of respect.  

Two weeks went by after that, no empire activity that required Resistors was 
happening, so work at Spybase was quiet unless a broadcast could be clearly 
intercepted.  
The only thing worrying a Resistor’s mind, was of Douggie in Spybase, and his 
growing curiosity of the whole of the base and other bases the group he worked 
for owned.  

It was night, and Ruwin was keeping an ear on many frequencies, hoping to come 
across some valuable empire information, and Gear was preparing to move Lucy’s 
things out of Spybase to turn her into an official lab assistant.  
Ruwin yawned and stretched his arms, nothing was happening at the empire, at 
least not in the throne room anyway, the unfortunate thing was that the 
courtyard was another place where plans were discussed, but the area was too 
well guarded to be bugged.  
“Take over Nick.” waved Ruwin to his brother as he left, “Ah’m gonna say mah 
goodbyes ta Lucy before she leaves the staff here...”  
“Shure.”  
Ruwin hurried down the halls, aware that there had been a small getogether for 
Lucy, typical that it’d be during his shift.  
He passed an open door, and briefly saw Douggie on one of the computers, he then 
turned to the doorway and walked out to where Ruwin was standing, only, he’d 
leapt up and clambered on top of several beams, and watched as Douggie strode 
away.  
Ruwin remained there for a moment, thinking about what to do when Douggie 
returned very quickly, and went back inside the room.  
Ruwin leapt down and peered in the tiny slit of the door to see some information 
on screen vanish, and be replaced by security information.  
Ruwin couldn’t stay, and leapt back up onto the beams as Douggie left again.  
“That wasn’t security detail, that wus somethin’ else.  We should have locked 
him away from the start.  Ah just hope he hasn’t passed on any information ‘bout 
Spybase ta the empire, or-”  
Ruwin stopped everything as for one last time, Douggie entered the room.  
Ruwin leapt down and opened a panel next to the doorway, soon enough, the thick 
metal door closed entirely and remained that way.  
There was no way out, the base was underground, there weren’t any secret paths 
from that door nor air ducts, air might even be a problem if Ruwin took too 
long.  

Gear was cleaning up after the party and Ruwin grabbed him by the hand and 
dragged him back, explaining the situation swiftly.  
The door was soon opened while the doorway was surrounded by a semi circle of 
armed staff, but there was no one inside.  
“Ah swear Gear, Ah locked the room, there’s no way he could have escaped!”  
“Oh my god, look...”  
Ruwin turned to the computer with several pictures from the cameras as they 
happened, Douggie was at Lucy’s room, and she opened the door to him.  
“Stay here Gear, Ah’m on this one...”  
Ruwin literally sprinted away, while the room was searched and all possible 
spots checked.  
Gear stared at Ruwin before a sound was heard and he turned to it, “What the...”  

Ruwin literally ran into Lucy’s door and forced the thing open, breaking the 
lock mechanism and squeezing inside.  
“Oh Ruwin...  It was horrible...”  
Ruwin looked down to see blood on the floor, but scattered around without making 
a path.  
“Lucy, whut happened?”  
“Douggie, he attacked me, but I barely managed to defend myself.”  
“Did you... kill him?...”  
“No, he got away with a wound, please don’t leave me Ruwin...” she explained, 
before pressing her body against Ruwin’s and bursting into tears.  
“Its okay, Ah’m here now...”  
“Can we please go?...  Out of Spybase?...”  
“Sure thing...  Ah’ll just go clear things up wit’ Gear.”  
“No, I want to leave now...”  
“Ah’m sorry Lucy.  Even though you’ve been through something rough, an’ Ah’m 
considered the leader o’ Spybase, Ah still need ta talk with Gear before lettin’ 
anyone out, somethin’ strange is happening an’ we can’t risk letting Douggie 
escape ta tell the empire whut he’s discovered.”  
“But I’m not Douggie, please, let’s go.” moaned Lucy, pulling on Ruwin’s arm.  
He pulled back slightly, and an item dropped from Lucy’s possession, a round 
silver communicator.  
“Whut’s that?...”  
“Ruwin.  Step away from Lucy.” said Gear firmly, standing at the side of the 
doorway.  
“Gear, whut are you doing?!”  
“Do it Ruwin, for your own good.”  
“Its Douggie we should be looking fer, not Lucy.”  
“I’m sorry if this hurts.” said Gear, revealing a large energy weapon and aiming 
it at Lucy.  
A wide green blast shot right through her chest and the rest of her body went up 
in green flames, but following that, Ruwin went flying, and the remainder of the 
blast tore into a large metal cabinet, and burnt away the door.  
Lucy’s lifeless body slumped out of the container, a black goo filling her mouth 
and dripping out, while the Lucy that had been blasted reformed and grew into 
its true form.  
“How did you figure me out Daddy?!” yelled out the black shapeshifter Morph as 
he pulled himself together, “I was far more tact than the last time I 
infiltrated one of your bases!”  
Ruwin’s lips were trembling and he was frozen as he stared at the true Lucy, 
“You... killed her...”  
“Her and that weirdo Douggie, his nature made it easy to sneak around while he 
drew attention to himself, but he wasn’t the one I originally posed as.”  
“Jenna, you killed Jenna and took her place for the tests, we got word of her 
body being found just a moment ago.  Then you killed Douggie because he had 
access to certain computers, and finally, Lucy, since your communicator doesn’t 
work due to this base being underground, you had to make your escape in order to 
reveal a lot of information about Spybase and the Resistance Base to the 
empire.” explained Gear with a serious tone.  
“That’s right! And you didn’t notice until it was too late! You may think I’m 
beaten just because you’ve found me out, but you’ve seriously underestimated me.  
Remember when our first battle stopped me from shifting my body when taking a 
person’s form? Well I got it all back thanks to Morn, I can take people’s shape 
by casually touching them now, they need not even notice I’m stealing their 
form, plus, I can use all my other abilities while pretending to be someone 
else! Care for me to jog your memory?!”  
With that, Morph, still in Lucy’s form shot out many long wirey parts of 
himself, each with a sharp tip that pierced into the walls, Ruwin and Gear too 
had they not dodged.  
Gear’s blaster however was caught and ripped in half.  
The room was now blocked up by Morph, including all the exits, and Ruwin and 
Gear were stuck in a tangled mess, and Morph still continued to shift his body 
around.  
“Its no good, I can’t break free!” called Gear to Ruwin.  
“I’m gonna kill you as I did the others, I’m gonna choke you on my substance, 
its a slow and horrid way to go, as Lucy proved.”  
Ruwin was stuck, but as soon as he heard Lucy’s name, and saw her body sinking 
deeper  into Morph, he became enraged, and thrashed his body until he wriggled 
free.  
“Its over Daddy, you and Shades have failed to protect your band of spies, and 
now you’ll die with only me on your mind.”  
Morph shifted his body and Gear was carried, it rose and fell as it was moved 
along until the tangle held him in front of Morph’s face.  
Before a wavy tentacle could shoot down his throat and kill him, a huge metal 
cabinet crashed down on Morph and flattened him.  
“Murderer...  Ah’ll kill you fer whut you did ta Lucy!”  
“Feel free.” he growled, his body rising elsewhere since the whole floor was 
covered with a part of him, “I’m not human or anything, it won’t be a burden on 
your moral values.”  
“You’ll wish ya hadn’t said that, Ah’d kill you even if ya were human! Ah’ve 
lost too many close ta me already!...”  
Ruwin punched forward but the body of Morph simply melted and disappeared in the 
large black puddle, and reformed behind Ruwin, several tentacles twisting around 
him and tightening hard.  
“You weren’t prepared for my powers to grow so much, its a shame really, as its 
been no challenge at all to finish this.”  
“You should have finished it instead of talking.” said Gear, reaching into an 
air duct by stepping on Morph’s parts to get up there, and producing a weapon, 
“Call it coincidence or just my forward thinking, but this gadget that Lucy and 
I made will make sure her death wasn’t in vain!”  
With that, the silver gun produced several blue rings that hit Morph and dealt 
him a huge sonic-like blast, his body fell apart and the flood in the room went 
back into him.  
“Noooo! You’ll have to kill me before I forget what I’ve learned!...”  
“That won’t be a problem...” growled Ruwin.  
“It won’t.” added Gear, changing the function of the device, “We also worked on 
this as soon as we heard someone might expose us.”  
A blue beam fired into Morph’s melting head and made it glow, before all of the 
black goo around the room was a part of him, and he lay on the floor, in his 
solid but unconscious form.  
“Ah’ll finish this, he has ta remain in liquid form fer long ta die, right? 
Ah’ll punch away until he’s nothin’ but-”  
“No Ruwin, its over.  I’m sorry for your loss, but do you really think Lucy 
would want revenge? She wasn’t like that, and she’d want to protect Spybase 
rather than risk the alternative.  We built that device to erase people’s 
memories dating back a few weeks, before the tests and invitations into the 
Resistors were performed, Morph doesn’t remember any of that now.”  
“But-”  
“If we try to lock Morph up, or even kill him, he might awaken and remember what 
I’ve tried to erase, all we have to do is get Morph out of here, and Spybase 
will remain safe.”  
“Ah can’t jus’ forgive or forget like that, he killed three people.”  
“He doesn’t remember that now, and this will be the biggest burden, but you can 
never mention that in front of him, if he remembers the people, he might also 
remember what happened here.”  
“Whutever, jus’ don’t expect me ta be the one ta carry him outta here, Ah have 
nothing but hate fer that thing now, even if he really is your son, he can’t be 
forgiven...”  
Ruwin stormed out while Gear sighed a sigh of tiredness and sadness...  

End...  

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