The Last Oddetsey

[steven_mcg]

Vengeance pulls up the file of the Botanist:

THE BOTANIST
Real Name: Unknown
Species: Unknown - probably a Post-human
Status: Alive
Known Affiliation: The Old Worlds Society, Every Botanical Journal in existence

The Botanist is a rare example of an Elder of the Multiverse, possibly the only one currently living - a being who has dedicated their life to one occupation to such an extent that they have come to embody that concept for not just an entire universe (see, the more common "Elder of the Universe" designation), but for all Universes. He is also one of the few surviving beings to be from a previous multiverse - and furthermore one of the four remaining attending members of the Old Worlds Society.

His physical flesh has long decayed when this universe came into being, and resembles a skeleton suspended in a turquoise gel like substance in a general humanoid form. The gel is some miraculous substance of his own design, which has defied analysis, but seems to be capable of storing vast amounts of data and has been witnessed seemingly digest seeds of plants only to be able to replicate them later. There is speculation he might be responsible for bring a large portion of the plant species to this world.

SCANNING:

Recent Contacts:
Spodra, The Night Pine, The Catalyst, Aurelia, Twitch, Marisa

So apparently the clues to saving creation lie with a jellied skeleton who also happens to be the multiversal god of horticulture.

I'll say one thing about this place, George - at least it isn't boring.

You keep an eye out for our dinner orders; I'll play around with the flight computer and see if we can't program a flight path to the Botanist's doorstep using his profile information. If that bloody parrot could find him, then so can we. Perhaps our flower-arranging friend can tell us what Doomy-Drawers is planning and where we can go from here.

[kodster]

Forward thinker... clearly, Eudial scowled. She let the thought go, though, as another issue arose. Her arms were beginning to itch again. "God damn it..." she grunted, before she could stop herself. She was sure Gaunt had turned to look at her, but still ignored it. What was that blade doing to her?! She wasn't even holding it now!

Looking for something to take her mind off it, she said aloud, "I suppose we should look for the other member of our party, if she's not fallen victim to severe migranes..." Cats... really, now? Wonderful.

[NFX]

"Choke it with a fish, right..." Twitch mumbled, head still inside his bag of iteming, "I don't think I've got one of those nearby." He kept his head down for a moment while Marisa gave her opinion, scratching idly at the ground with one of his claws. "Maybe don't draw too much attention to yourself," he suggested, "your singing's doing alright. I'll try and find some way into the tower first." The parrot brought his head back out of the bag, and began examining the tower, when Marisa called back to him about plants or something.

"Uh..." The parrot gave a quick scan of the ground. "...no, I'm afraid not..." he told her, "I'll get back to you when I've sorted the penguin, you keep the singing going, it's really good." With that, he grabbed his trusty bag once again, fluttered back into the air, and began flying in a circle around the main tower, trying to figure out a way in.

[alex_holt]

PROFESSOR VENGEANCE

After a while, Vengeance gets the hang of the controls enough to be able to operate the movements of the great floating castle. It seems unwieldy to begin with but after a few moments he gets the idea and with a sudden movement the castle is away accompanied by the sound of snapping vines and branches as the pillar of rock lifts into the air and moves outwards. It soon picks up speed and as Vengeance looks at the screens which show the view outside, he sees that the great fortress is quickly approaching the edge of Melded, then over the city itself. It seems to end up suspended in the air near to some kind of military looking base, and the engines thrum softly.

AURELIA AND MARISA

The vast fortress also sails over the Capella singers and showers both them and the metapenguin security team with soil and bits of loose root, causing them to splutter and stop singing to shield their faces from debris. A miniature blue mammoth, which floats lazily inside a bubble of energy (which had had a very impressive baritone) voice shouts out "Doomforall has returned! He shall save us all! We are saved!"

TWITCH
The Metapenguin stares out the window in disbelief - and following her line of sight, Twitch sees why - what is essentially a small mountain, encrusted in vines, and topped by a castle of sorts has suddenly begun hovering nearby - pretty much directly over the Old World Society. The Penguin looks slightly freaked out by this, talks into her walkie talkie, extracts what looks bizarrely like a mortar that fires little robotic armadillos and then waddles off outside, presumably to try and deal with this colossal apparition.

Twitch is left outside the control room, now only housing the flimsy Paper Golem which is only paying attention to the keyboard.

EUDIAL AND LELAND

Suddenly the Alakazam from earlier teleports in in front of the two.

"Are you two trying to get killed or just incredibly stupid - you just murdered a psychic in the middle of a psychic base - they'll be here in moments - I'll take you to your friend".

With that, the three of themselves feel a sudden blur leavign them feeling sick to the stomach, and find themselves in the room containing the vast tank of the Sucker, and Cleo and the Brain of Kull.

[GF93]

Once my character's approved, I'll be ready to start anytime.

[kodster]

Eudial went bug-eyed. "ExCUSE me?!" she snarled at the Pokemon, not paying attention to what else he was saying. "Murder, you say? I don't remember murder being part of their itinerary. This guy - " She jerked her thumb at Gaunt, " - wouldn't even be here if I didn't - "

And with that, she was cut off, because they had suddenly been teleported into a vast room, dimly lit, with a pool of sorts. She choked; teleporting wasn't fun...

"Okay, that's starting to annoy me..."

With another dirty look at Vortigon, Eudial scanned the room, and found... "You." It was Cleo, the psycat. "Glad to have finally found you again, I guess." Eudial looked back at Vortigon coldly. "I see... you helped us find our other member. I suppose I should be grateful, but you could do with being less arrog..."

Eudial trailed off. Her eyes had found something... something that she couldn't believe she was seeing.

There is a vast fish-like creature in there, it must be ancient, and a full 150 meters long. Even more disconcerting is that it appears riddled with some kind of parasite - resembling giant human sized leaches, if you somehow managed to cut a giant man-sized leach out of reality leaving nothing but utter blackness behind.

Damn, this world just keeps getting WEIRDER and WEIRDER... !!! Eudial whined.

[NWOWWE]

Gaunt was quite ready to give the Alakazam a real telling off. He was getting a bit tired of taking flak from the likes of him. Before he could start in on him, they were being teleported and Gaunt wobbled a bit with nausea.

"All right, I've had just about enough of this! Someone had better start giving us answers as to what's going on here without locking us up! I want to know what the f... what the..."

Gaunt trailed off as he finally took notice of the space they were in now. He put a hand out trying to find something to stabilize himself with, but failed and sank to the floor. He put a hand to his head and tried to will the bizarre sights away. But of course this was to no avail. He turned to look at the cat.

"Well, what do you know about this?"

[alex_holt]

CLEO, LELAND and EUDIAL

The Alakazam rolls its eyes and then with a sudden burst of psychic power dumps all the information the Brain of Kull had told to Cleo directly into the minds of the Pyromancer and the Demon.

"This is no time for the inevitable Chinese Whispers you simpletons will likely engage in. What is important is that those leach creatures are doing something to the Sucker, they are made of Rift energy, and for some reason, the members of your party are resistant to it. Therefore, we would greatly appreciate it if you could work a way to get rid of the vile things"

The Brain of Kull gives him a cold look.

"Fine... as you may want some sort of exchange for this - how about we will give you some useful artifacts, and the vague possibility that all of reality won't end?"

VENGEANCE

As the Fortress slowly reaches a stop above the Old World Society, suddenly an area behind the Professor is suddenly filled with the holographic projections of the members of the Society.

"We were wondering who would have managed to fidn the Fortress. We should have known it would be you Vengeance" says the metamorphing cloaked figure of the Catalyst.

"Why are you here?" Spodra interjects abruptly "And how did you manage to wrest control of the Fortress, I'm surprised that anyone could find it, let alone hotwire it".

[NFX]

"...what?!" Twitch asked himself in bewilderment. A flying mountain had appeared. With a castle at the peak. And a bunch of vines trailing after it. Even with everything else that had happened, the kangaroo cucumber man, the telepathic tree, his metamorphic helmet, this really took the biscuit. Although it did seem to have caught the attention of the second penguin, who had left his post to deal with this levitating geological threat, and the tower was now attended by only the paper creature. sure, he could shred it up in some way, but that would only draw attention to himself. He would DEFINITELY get shot if he did that.

However, the origamian seemed more interested in the computer in front of him than what was going on outside, so the macaw could easily sneak behind it if he were quiet. All he needed was a method of getting inside, such as the open window he had just flown past...wow, he was bad at this. Backpedalling for a moment, Twitch swooped his way into the control room, making as little noise as possible, and set about finding a way to open the hangar where the spaceship was kept. It was probably a button, and if it were, he would be pecking at that as soon as he saw it. He was quite good at pressing buttons for someone with no hands.

[majinb]

Aurelia, never ever dropping her singing performance, looked overhead at the massive Forretress flying over. As if the annoying Alakazam wasn't enough.