Quest Six -- Moonbow

The English ship Moonbow cruised peacefully through the northern Atlantic in July 1522. Her crew had no idea what was about to invade them.

Approximately 150 yards off the Moonbow's bow, a brief rip appeared in the sky. Four figures plummeted from it, and the rip closed. Davy Jones and Mike Nesmith hit the water hard and fought to the surface, gasping for air. Peter Tork and Micky Dolenz hovered about three feet above them, Peter's eyes glowing.

"You guys all right?" he called.

Mike glared at the Monkees' new leader. "Must be nice to be able to fly!" he snapped.

Micky grinned. "Comes in handy!"

Peter's attention was drawn to the clipper in front of them. "Cut it out," he commanded. "Into the water! We're being watched!" His eyes resumed their normal shade of dark blue and he crashed into the water between Davy and Mike.

Micky hesitated a second, then dissolved his unseen force field and crashed across from Peter. He surfaced and screamed, a hand going convulsively to his bandaged left shoulder.

"What is it, Mick?" Davy gasped, reaching for him.

Mike answered. "The salt water! It can't be good for that shoulder wound!"

In seconds a longboat arrived and hauled the quartet aboard. Mike found himself looking into his own face, framed by a ponytail drawn back so severely it seemed to give the eyes a shifty look. Davy raised his eyes to see his own face, though older and weather-beaten, with a V-shaped scar under the left eye.

"We're in the right place," Peter whispered to Micky, who was now crying from the pain.

The captain of the ship wore Micky's face, much older and careworn. "D'ye have them, lads?"

"Aye," Davy's double, Jonesy, called. "But one's in agony!"

"Bones!" the captain, Dolenz, called. "Git yer sorry hide on deck!"

Peter's double, black-haired and goatee'd, so altered he wouldn't have been recognized save for the distinctive birthmark visible under the mustache on his upper lip, raced to help the quartet unload. He knelt beside Micky. "I'll be havin' to remove the bandages, lad. I need to see the damage."

Past caring, Micky, merely nodded. Bones touched the bandage, and suddenly found himself on the other side of the deck.

"What hit ye, Bones?" Mike's double, 'Eagle-Eyes' Smith, cried.

Bones stood, shaking his head. "Not sure. Didn't see the blaggart move!" He went back to Micky. "Now it'll hurt, lad. Ye'll feel like I'm rippin' yer arm off. But ye've gotta let me do it, hear?" Micky nodded and braced himself.

Bones took a knife and slit the bandages open. The wound Micky had sustained four dimensions ago had become infected and the salt water had aggravated the situation.

Bones sighed. "Must be drained, or he'll lose the arm. Cap'n!" he called, raising his head. "I need brandy to cleanse the wound and whisky for the pain! Also clean fresh water and new bandages! And a sewing needle and thread!"

Shaking his head, Micky gasped, "No... whisky."

"But, lad," Bones said, clearly incredulous, "ye're in agony."

"No... whisky!" Micky repeated. "Do you need me... asleep?" Bones frowned and Micky went on, "I can... go to sleep... and feel no pain. Just... do what needs... to be done."

Bones sighed. "Do it, then. Sleep."

Micky nodded. His eyes took on a faraway look. Suddenly he seemed to be gasping for air. His eyes rolled back in his head and he slumped.

Davy took a step forward, and Peter held an arm across his chest. "He's all right," he whispered to Davy. "He just formed a shield around his head and knocked himself out. He'll be all right."

But even Peter flinched when Bones plunged a brandy-dunked dagger into the infected wound.

Micky opened his eyes to find himself tucked into a very hard bed. He turned his head and found himself looking into Peter's smiling face.

"Hi," Peter said softly, helping Micky sit up.

"Hi yourself," Micky moaned. "What are you doing here?"

"Keeping vigil till you woke up."

Micky managed a shaky grin. "Aren't you taking this leader thing a bit seriously?"

Peter instantly sobered. "I had to see for myself that you'd be all right. Michael would have done the same thing."

"That's the eerie part," Micky shuddered. "You're so much like him now and he's so much like you that at times, it's frightening."

Peter grinned shakily and changed the subject. "How's the shoulder?"

Micky looked at it, tested it. "It's sore and something's pulling at the bandages."

"That would be the seventeen stitches. Bones knows what he's doin', all right. Michael says you'll be fine in a few days."

"When the quests end," he sighed.

Peter's smile became a teasing one. "Provided you stay out of salt water."

Micky chuckled at that, then nodded toward Peter. "You're in different clothes."

"So are you," he smiled. "Our medieval leathers were shrinking from the dunking, so our doubles generously gave us some of their clothes."

Micky ran a hand over his sea-green tunic. "At least these are cotton. That leather suit was driving me insane."

Peter chuckled and leaned forward, dropping his voice to a conspiratorial level. "Just between us, I still miss polyester."

Micky laughed, wincing as his hand went to his aching shoulder. Then he looked closer at Peter and gasped in shock, his smile fleeing.

Peter frowned. "What is it?"

"Your eyes!"

Peter raised a hand to his cheek. "What about them?"

"You've...You've got blue eyes!"

Peter smiled as he visibly relaxed. "Yeah. We were wondering when you'd notice."

"Peter, your eyes were brown! What happened? How long have they been..."

The smile grew impishly. "Three months."

Micky's almond eyes widened. "Three months? That long and I never noticed?" He frowned again as the pieces fell into place. "Wait... three months ago..."

Peter nodded, grinning. "Three months ago we got our powers. The first time my eyes glowed, they changed colour. Michael says it's because the telekinesis dispersed the pigmentation. They're blue, just like the glow is blue." He fended off Micky's unspoken question by finishing, "And we were waiting till you figured it out on your own."

Before Micky could reply, the door opened and Dolenz walked in. "Ah! He be awake! How are ye, lad?"

Micky sighed. "Sore. But better."

Dolenz nodded. "Aye. Bones is the best, that's for sure. He's pulled us through so many..." He shook his head and grinned. "Think ye can teach my men that sleep trick?"

Micky grinned. "No, I don't think so."

"Ah, more's the pity. Rest a spell. I'll go get Jonesy to rouse ye some grub."

Remembering Davy's cooking, Micky winced. "Is he a good cook?"

"I wouldn't say that, lad, but it keeps ye alive." Dolenz's hearty laugh lingered after he was gone.

Peter sighed. "I guess some things are constant in every dimension... your humour, Davy's cooking, Susan Jacobs...." They laughed together.

Suddenly, the Moonbow lurched, pitching Peter to the deck. Micky threw a shield around the bed and stayed put. Peter picked himself up off the floor and gasped, "Hear that?"

Micky nodded. There were soft explosions, and each one made the ship rock. "We're under attack!"

"Come on," Peter ordered, eyes glowing. He lifted off the floor and glided out the door. Micky followed his example. Only by flying could they keep from being pitched and rocked. Outside the door, they landed without being seen.

Peter lurched to the bow where Mike and Eagle-Eyes stood together. "What is it?" Peter demanded.

"Another ship!" Mike gasped, pointing. The sleeves of his black shirt billowed as he did so.

"A French frigate!" Eagle-Eyes finished. "She'll smash us to pieces!"

Peter pulled Micky and Mike into a huddle. "Where's Davy?" he asked.

"Below, adding his strength to loading the cannons," Mike replied.

Peter nodded. "We can help this ship!"

Moments later, Mike moved to the stern and raised his hands over his head. His wrists pulsed with rainbow light, and light beams of every color shot into the air and exploded over the French ship. Peter moved to the port side of the ship, Micky to the starboard. Telekinesis and force fields protected the Moonbow from the French cannonballs, and Micky let the Moonbow's cannonballs through his field.

Demoralized by the fact the cannonballs seemed to have no effect, and panicked by the strange lights, the frigate broke off and sailed away as fast as she could.

The crew of the Moonbow started to cheer. Only Captain Dolenz looked at the trio with shock on his face. He alone had seen the display of their powers for what they were. Pulling Peter aside, he hissed, "Be ye angels or demons? Tell me truly!"

Peter smiled comfortingly. "Neither. We're only men, like you."

Dolenz shook his head adamantly. "Not like me! None of my men can do these things!"

"We're from a different place, Captain. A trinket from our land has ended up somewhere on your ship. We were dispatched to return it to its rightful home."

After a moment of silence, Dolenz slowly nodded. "And what might this trinket be?"

"It can assume any form." Peter pulled his tracer from his belt. "This box will show us. Do we have your permission to recover the item?"

Dolenz shook his head in wonder. "Ye saved my ship and my men. Tis a small matter ye ask of me. Aye, ye may search. And ye may take what's yours. Only... how shall ye depart? We're days from friendly port."

Peter's smile turned impish. "Don't worry about us. We'll be gone long before you put into port." At Dolenz's expression, he grinned wider.

The four surreptitiously scanned the entire ship and crew. They met up, compared findings, and then went to Dolenz. "Captain," Peter began, "we know what we seek."

"Tell me," Dolenz said, rising from the chart table.

Mike said, shaping it with his hands, "It's a pendant. A golden pendant with a star sapphire in the middle."

Dolenz thought for a moment, then slowly nodded. "Eagle-Eyes wears such a thing." He moved to the cabin doorway and bellowed, "Eagle-Eyes! Git in here!"

After a few minutes, Eagle-Eyes walked in, the pendant swinging from his neck. "Aye, sir?"

Dolenz jerked his head toward the quartet. "These lads declare ye've aught of theirs."

Eagle-Eyes began to protest, and Peter held up a hand. "Eagle-Eyes, we just want to know where you got the pendant."

Mike's marksman double's back stiffened. "Got it when we put into port a fortnight ago. Won it in a game of chance."

Dolenz sneered, "I recall that miserable game. As I recall, ye lost half a month's wages before ye won that sorry thing!"

Eagle-Eyes protectively covered the pendant. "Tis a good luck charm, Cap'n. I'll nay be givin' it up."

Davy extended the wand on his tracer and moved toward Eagle-Eyes. The clicking of the tracer got louder and louder as the wand neared the pendant, matched by the wideness of the marksman's eyes.

"Hear that?" Davy asked, deliberately thickening the cockney part of his unique blended accent. "That's proof the thing's ours. And the clicking will kill ye if ye dinna give the thing up!"

Mike and Micky shared grins. Peter closed his eyes and shook his head, holding his nose in a 'give me strength' gesture. Davy was bluffing, and they knew it.

Eagle-Eyes did not, and the growled threat and unearthly clicking frightened him. Within seconds the pendant lay in Davy's outstretched palm and Eagle-Eyes was bolting from the cabin.

Laughing, Dolenz followed him, calling over his shoulder, "Godspeed, lads!"

The tracer returned the third jewel, a ruby, to its rightful shape and sent it through the dimensions to a waiting Phyllis Nesmith. Mike then triggered his watch, and the Monkees vanished.

The Moonbow continued along her journey toward the newly-discovered land to the West, her crew abuzz about the four angels in the form of men that had come to save Eagle-Eyes from the demonic pendant. Captain Dolenz could not stop the stories, and they grew wilder with every retelling.