Calibrations

New Jersey 2002

When Ray Toro opened his eyes, he immediately recognized his surroundings. It all added up: the big, fancy house, the loud noises, the cars parked out front with New Jersey license plates. He never thought he would come back here, especially not after he'd moved to LA, but here he was. He was home again.

As Ray walked toward the house, he pressed a button on the side of his watch, turning it back into a giant robot keychain. As he attached the keychain to his key ring, he looked around, trying to figure out where Mike Pedicone could have possibly run off to. He was smarter than Ray had given him credit for, coming somewhere like this. Mike would have no problem slipping into the crowd, but for Ray, it was a minefield. Everyone he knew was here, and he couldn't let any of his friends see him: not Mikey, not Frank, and definitely not Gerard.

According to the Watch's computer system, there were two copies of Machine #41089042 in this time. One of them belonged to 2019 Gerard, and the other was the one that Mike Pedicone had reprogrammed. Ray had chased Mike through space and time, through wild forests and towering cities, through every wonder of the world, through the past, the present, and the future, and it had all led to this: a release party for an obscure album by a little-known band. Sure, My Chemical Romance would become famous in the future, but that didn't explain why Mike had come to this era. As Ray opened the door, he suspected that he was about to find out.

There were tons of people inside, and thankfully, Ray didn't spot his past self or any of his bandmates right away. He put his sunglasses on, hoping that it might make him a little harder to recognize, and he pushed his way through the sea of people at the party. He couldn't find Mike right away, but that didn't mean that he wasn't here. He'd just learned to blend in with the crowd.

Ray searched the whole first floor, but Mike was nowhere to be found. He paused for a moment as he thought about what to do next. He could check upstairs, or he could look outside and see if Mike had left the premises. He considered checking in with the Watch again, but doing that in this era would be a waste of time. In 2002, the Watch had just finished digitizing the machine tracker and the license database, and it was still glitchy. Ray would probably end up spending more time trying to get the tracker to work than actually searching for Mike and his stolen time machine.

He couldn't give up though. He had to stop Mike, and he had to get Gerard's time machine back. To be fair, he wasn't sure that Gerard wasn't a chrono-criminal too, but Ray had known him for years. He trusted him, even if all of his instincts as a Watch agent told him that he shouldn't. More than that, he had told Gerard that he would get his time machine back, and he wasn't the type to go back on his word. He had to finish the job, no matter what.

As he walked past the bar, he heard a familiar voice shout, "Hey Ray! Nice jacket!" He turned toward the bar, and he spotted Gerard. With his dyed black hair and leather jacket, he wasn't quite the Gerard he knew, but Ray almost stopped to talk to him anyways. However, he thought better of it, and he walked away just as Gerard took another drink from the bartender.

Ray kept on looking around the house, searching for nearly an hour, but he couldn't find Mike Pedicone anywhere. He got distracted for a few minutes when Eyeball decided to screen some of MCR's then-recent music videos, but he quickly went back to work. He kept a close eye on his bandmates, and he kept a low profile until both Frank and Gerard were gone. For a moment, he wondered where they were and what they were doing, and then he decided that he was better off not worrying about them. He had to find Mike Pedicone.

Eventually, Ray decided that he would need to get some help if he was going to find Mike. His past self had just joined the Watch - he was a new recruit, but he did know about time travel, so Ray could talk to him without violating Watch restrictions.