"The Last-Forever Conspiracy"

[Coolpikaaa]

Twenty two pages.

A swarm of hostile creatures.

Add them together and you have "The Last-Forever Machine".



Well, here we are at the third instalment to the series, so far along it takes hours to read the whole RP.For that reason, I have decided to break this section off from the main thread to allow those from the old story to jump right in and newer users to easily fit without much hassle.

And now, without much more interuption, the amazing summary of events by Cirrial.

THREE CHEERS FOR CIRRIAL!

---
The Recap
---
Backstory:
A group of hostile aliens have decended upon the dojo, taking over towns and cities, trapping their civilians in pods of "goo".As the story goes on, Coolpikaaa posters many areas hoping to attract heroes to fight his cause.As more events happen, it is discovered that the aliens, named the "goos", have been trapping life in their pods to work on a universal zoo, where now, the heros have met, making the final arrangements to take this zoo down and save the population of the dojo.

Page 1:
The blobs make their intentions known. A meeting is hastily called.

Page 2:
The meeting continues, more heroes arrive.

Page 3:
The blobs suddenly strike. They're met by resistance from those who attended the meeting and pledged to fight back.

Page 4:
The fight seems slightly winnable, but suddenly Ravil is encased by a blob. CP gets pulled outside of time temporarily to have an apocryphal message given to him. Ensichrys gets a message from Chronos who is beyond angry at this infraction against time. Ravil is freed but the goo tries to copy the shape of Ravil using itself as a mould. Cloud gets encased.

Page 5:
Clouds saved, more stuff happens but which ultimately just means more goo killing. After an initial strategy of running to the Southern Desert it seems to be almost unanimous to strike at goo city.

Page 6:
Finally, the goo Ravil clone alluded to two pages ago is completed. Its first act is to attack CP.Also, two dragons appear and attack.

Page 7:
The party attack the clone of Ravil and the two dragons. Ravil clone is obliterated, one of the dragons is taken out. Poison fog is emitted. CP's affected.

Page 8:
The dragons leave in a puff of fog. Nynaeve, a healer, arrives and cures those affected by the poison fog. CP becomes a Pichu due to a error in the healing spell.

Page 9:
Regroup. CP gets kidnapped by blobs. Ensicrhys has a personal revelation as he decides the blobs are the agents of Chaos, intentionally or not, and also fills the vacant leader role.

Page 10:
Cloud gets yanked away, replaced with a pod person. ...I mean goo clone. CP gets dragged to a zoo... from SPAAACE!

~End of RP Part One~
((So we made it to the tenth page and the end of part one! Everyone give yourselves a pat on the back Laughing .So just a short re-cap before we get started into part two, aptly named "The Last-Forever Gardens" that will start from this post on.

-The sun has fallen, making the forest darker and harder to find things in.
-Coolpikaaa has been kidnapped and taken to a zoo where many other life forms are.
-Most of the group is back beside the mill.
-No immediate threats are nearby except for the HQ dome of the goos.

Ok i think i got it all, here’s to another ten pages! Very Happy ))

Page 10b:
Plans are made, CP talks to children also in the SPAAACE zoo.

Page 11:
While the zoo sleeps, CP talks to kids again, and explains he needs to get back to his group.Cloud is kidnapped in an undisclosed location,while goo-clone-Cloud attacks Ensichrys as he sleeps. DUN DUN DUN.

Page 12:
False Cloud splits into two goos in presumably a Terminator 2 esque moment. Real Cloud leaves his body and looks for a way to escape his prison. Some random cloaked figure comes after Ensichrys and calls him a "Nexus soldier".
SUSPICIOUS.

Page 13:
Some food is obtained by the heroes, CP talks about the party, and Ensichrys manages to backfire his electricity.

Page 14:
Ensichrys gets mad. Sparks ahoy.

Page 15:
MARCH UPON THE BLOB CITY BEGINS!Ensichrys seems ready to kill. A little eager, even. ...Too eager. The party comes across a grendel that was in the zoo CP was in earlier.

Page 16:
CP hears of the goo plan by brilliantly and innovatively pretending to be asleep. It helps the goo people are in disbelief that he could possibly be the group leader. Ensichrys slips a little further down the slippery slope. THE PARTY ARRIVES AT THE ZOO. WELCOME TO THE JUNGLE, WE GOT FUN AND GAMES. Oh. Wait. Sorry, forest.

Page 17:
Ensichrys personal revelation no. 2. Has self-doubt. Decides to destroy goo indiscriminately anyway but loses bloodlust.The whole party is now either in the zoo or a cave. CP, either foolishly or bravely, follows two blobs to labs.

Page 18:
Ah, apparently the reason Ensichrys went so violent is because of a magic scroll he had. Cloud, meanwhile, after all this time, snaps back to his body, has been weakened by some enigmatic machine, and is moved to another cell. CP escapes! And is perfectly saf- Watch out for that lake- Never mind. The party finds Cloud. There is much rejoicing.

Page 19:
Did I say CP escaped? I meant he ran into a lake where, nearby, are the two dragons from earlier. Oh snap. CP returns to his normal self.

Page 20:
Ensichrys's scroll begins to activate, but oops, it doesn't. The dragons debate among themselves whether to kill CP now or later. CP dives down into the lake, is sucked into a hole and ends up with the rest of the party. The goos are more like the pod people than I originally thought. The most recent batch of clones, including a CP clone, all have the same memories and mindset as their source material.Cloud and clone fight over who is who.

Page 21:
More clone chaos. Ensichrys's scroll activates again, causing him to super-charge...
And it's here that the thread dies, on this cliff-hanger.

---
The Story
---

Thump.
Thump.
Thump.

Coolpikaaa has long given up on his plan of zapping his clone's cage open.Resorting to a more primative method, he winds up, and throws himself at the cage, repeating it again and again while the goo clone sits sadly, depresed by the fact that he is nothing more than one of the creatures he teamed up to fight.

It was going to be a long day...

-coolpikaaa

[Cirrial]

Station Zero

The vector clamp swirled its three spokes into an exactly equilateral triangle. Blue wavering fringes appeared, before a triangular hole in reality ripped itself into being, the multiple turrets, cannons, and cameras of the Marasphere's main access room scanning Station Zero intently through this portal in space.

On Station Zero's end, things were not going well. Several of the saa-kru darted through in the chaos, into the portal, diving headfirst. 501, Ak-tse and two other saa-kru were firing ion pistols rapidly around them.

The goo was everywhere, and no-one knew how, with all of Station Zero's invulnerability and precautions, they were being invaded.

501 rolled to a computer terminal and hit a series of buttons. "Automatic shutdown in five! Four! Three! Ak-tse, get the hell in th-"

Ak-tse sprang backwards, flying through the portal, as soon as the vector clamp disengaged. The triangular hole shrank almost instantaneously into nothing.

And that was it. Here he was, alone, with even more blobs just streaming through the new openings they were digging from above. The steel ceiling just buckled as if it were plastic.

"You'll never get me alive, you... whatever you are! Aargghh!" He fired the ion pistols with zeal, ignoring the fact that they were beginning to melt in his hands. As were his hands.

Well, if he was going down, the blobs might as well. He edged up against the same terminal he used to shut down the vector clamp and reached at the back of his head. He dropped his ion pistols. The blobs seemed to, oddly enough, just wait.

If he'd been thinking rationally, he would have realised something was very, very amiss.

He pulled at the tube in the back of his head. With a hiss of hydraulic locks disengaging, he pulls it free, revealing a gaping socket, crackling with static.

He reached for a cable, plugged it into the terminal and reached to plug the other end in his head, when suddenly a blob dropped from the ceiling onto his head.

He ran wildly and erratically around the room, screaming as the blob almost effortlessly forced itself into the socket, pushing itself through the holes into his electronic brain, winding itself around his blackbox.

He stopped, shaking and trembling, and very slowly extended his arm, making futile grasping motions. He fell to the ground, the lights all over him dimming to nothing.

Then, minutes later, as the blobs began to slowly leave, the lights flickered back on, and he slowly got back up to his feet.

He looked at his hands, and body, appreciatively. "Y'know, guys, I was all against you invading this place that I hold oh so dear to my heart. And, well, I still am. But I have to say, whichever one of you did the head thing? You've got some pretty persuasive arguments. Sign me up! When do I start? Now? Oh, okay. Let's go, people, there's a world to invade!"

Apparently having his mind invaded by a blob had no ill effect on his capacity for long-winded speeches.

501 struck a dramatic standing pose, and pointed to the sky. "To the surface! We shall strike back at those lousy surface dwellers that have taken our air and our sky and our sun!" He twitched, and the back of his head sparked. "Wrong motivation. And we shall take what is rightfully ours! And we will have our independance day!" He sparked again. "AND WE WILL RULE THE WORLD! ...Is that right? I don't know what you guys really want, so I'll do that one anyway."

---

((Sudden tense change ahoy!))

Kaz's Lab

501 zooms out of the ruins of a dilapidated shack, his wingblades glowing blue and humming ominously. He hovers over to the lab, where the damage from a seperate blob attack was blatantly noticable.

"Well, old friend. Acquaintance. Whatever. It looks like you fared as well as the old me did! But that was the old me. ..Not the old old me, who's dead anyway, but the old me, who was me up to about five minutes ago. ...Y'know what, I'm just going to stop talking now."

He hovers over the lab's roof. "Well, if my memory serves me correctly-" He twitches and a few more sparks fly out of the back of his head. "Then turning against my allies usually means I get powers beyond that which I had before."

He moves his arms in front of him, and channels warp energy down them. He sparks and twitches and fires two small globes of warp energy through his arms, which hit the ceiling of Kaz's lab, leaving blue vapour trails and blue burnt patches.

"Oh yes. Me likey. Me likey very much. Now, to go do something vaguely evil."

[TheBlackSoul]

((Can't think of any words for Elisah right now, so I'm going to make a brief introduction for the other, evil character I'm using. Good luck trying to find out where he/it is)).

Deep below the surface of the ground, something writhed with impatience.

It had sensed intruders above, but they had yet to come to the room it was guarding.

It couldn't wait. It wouldn't wait. Yet it had to wait.

And because of this, its temper was beginning to reach its end...

[Kazumaru]

The Spirit of Electricity looked around. To the best of his knowledge, he'd been captured by some sort of alien goo-beings and put in some sort of alien goo-being space-zoo.

"What would MacGyver do...?" he asked himself. "Ah, I know!"

Kazumaru emptied out his lab coat's pockets. "Lessee..." he said. "Three PCDs. A chocolate bar. A small teddy bear. Empty hip flask... Copy of the New Testa- Why do I have a copy of the New Testament?- Chalk. Something that I guess is used forgetting stones out of horses hooves. Pocket watch. Office keys... I don't even work in an office! Mint candy... Oooh, mint. Penknife... and a rabbit's foot. Well, can't use any of that."

Kazumaru prodded the wall, and a delicious shock flowed through him. "They charged my cage. With electricity. They left ventilation holes. Man, even I can see how to get out of this."

Kazumaru carefully removed all his clothing-- including, with much dismay, his top hat.

The spirit pressed his hand against the wall, and promptly disappeared, leaving a scorch mark where he'd sat. He followed the circuit to it's a point with exposed wires and proceeded to cut the wires using a handy piece of sharp metal.

With that finished, he leaned against the wall and slid down it, now sitting on the floor. Just the small task of following that circuit had taken a fair bit of energy.

Having little better to do until he felt like moving again, he sent a thought to Paranesia. ~Mornin'. How're you, Goddess?~

[Chronos]

Ensichrys shook his head violently, then smoothed his feathers down frantically, taking an absurdly long time to do so. Now back to normal, his attention was drawn to the Ultima Scroll once more. It was warm and vibrated ever so slightly. Something would have to be done about this.

Suddenly, Ensichrys decided to drop by reality-land and realized that Cloud was still fighting with his clone and had just been blasted into a tree. "By Chronos, Cloud's in trouble, people," Ensichrys said, then quickly dashed to Cloud's aid. However, it was taking a bit of time to figure out which was Cloud. "Cloud," he shouted foolishly "which Cloud are you?"

[Cloud]

The two Cloud's reacted at the exact same time and pointed at each other shouting "Get him, he's the blob!"

The real Cloud, stuck halfway in the trunk of a tree, put his hands on either side of the tree and pushed. With a small pop he was free.

"So how do we settle this?" the real Cloud prompted.
"I thought we were handling it quite well a minute ago, fighting to the death and all."
"Yeah but that's just asking for a whole lot of therapy."
"...Good point. So what do we do?"

Since the clone was an exact copy of Cloud, he would see things exactly how Cloud would see them. Long story short the clone would no doubt agree with everything the real version said. This could turn to the real Cloud's advantage, although this thought never crossed his mind. It was all well and good, however, or else it would have entered the clones mind and that would just be bad for all.

[Chronos]

Ensichrys looked wildly to and fro at both Clouds. "Hmmmm... I have an idea," Ensichrys said slowly. He leveled one hand at each of the Clouds. "If I blast both of you, the blob will be destroyed- or at least seriously wounded. Ah, but then I will also be harming the real Cloud. But then, real Cloud will bleed and char, whereas the blob Cloud will simply ooze that weird gel."

Ensichrys thought a bit. "Well, what do you think, guys?"

[Cirrial]

Kaz's Lab

501 floats and spins in the air, almost dancing. "So, my newfound alien overlords, what shall I do now? Track down those few that have clearly assembled at this point to brave everything and strike you down where it'll hurt the most? Of course! The city! Thank you for supplying me with that mental map, brain goo!" His head twitches to the side violently. "I have got to do something about that."

He flies down to the ground, hovering an inch or so off of it, his limbs dangling uselessly. His wings no longer hum so much as shimmer and chime, but their blue glow envelopes them like a mist, blue trails inexplicably hanging in the air as he moves.

"Saaaay. I just had a startling thought. Startling because my mind's never felt this clear in decades. Or this murky. I can't really tell. Anyone else feel like their head's likely to explode any time soon?" He glances down. "Hey! Where'd you all go? Don't go invading without me now!"

He bursts out laughing for no real reason, his laugh rapidly degenerating into static and sine waves. "Wow, that's never happened before. Oh well! Back to that startling thought. I've got that warp reactor core siphon thingy whatever it is powering me, right? The same stuff that makes- " More static, and a slightly fuzzy voice that sounds pre-recorded. "-Maratix the number one choice for Bluespace warp transporation!"

He flies up to the sky in one dramatic swoop, and holds out his arms to his sides. Slowly bring them to his front, he channels warp energy through them like before, except instead of releasing it, he allows it to build. His arms, from shoulder to wrists, glow blue. The panels on his arms begin to push out, outlined in blue lights, and the many little lights all over his arms explode, one by one.

"HERE... GOES... NOTHING!"

501 crosses his arms against his torso, curls up into a ball in the air and releases the warp energy.

---

Several Universes

Three things happen almost at once.

One, 501 suddenly remembers that it's more than incredibly dangerous to release any type of energy in large amounts around yourself, especially if you're highly vulnerable to being overloaded by said energy.

Two, 501 also realises that the goo in his head may have impeded his better judgement and he possibly should have taken that into account.

Three, reality shudders and splits open and a 501-shaped hole appears in at least fifty entirely different universes. 501 flies through each and every universe screaming loudly, spending less than a split second in each, narrowly avoiding being crushed, torn apart, and being turned into a fine powder.

---

The Zoo Forest

501 regains a sense of awareness of the world around him.

The world happened to be a forest now, and not a city, but it didn't matter all that much. "uuuRRGghhh..." He decides to remain prone, looking up to the sky. He can't see anything for the blue vapour pouring upwards like steam from his charred-blue darkened-steel exterior. And considering darkened-steel was designed for the sole purpose of resisting damage from all types of energy known to Maratix, he's lucky to still be in one piece.

The goo in his head convinces him to get up. He leaps to his talons and clutches his head. "OW! OW! OKAY, okay, dammit, can't you let me rest once in a while? Ever since I met you it's been all 'do this, do that'! Sure, I only met you, what, less than half an hour ago, but my point still stands!"

He looks around his new surroundings and spies Ensichrys and two Clouds. Not recognising any of them, he looks around for cover and hides behind a narrow, narrow tree. He couldn't be more conspicous if he tried.

[alakin1]

It began with 'tick' and then, rather hesitantly, moved onto 'tock'. It wasn't a clock, it came from the air itself.. The air around Muan shimmered, as though in a heat wave, then it began to warp, rapidly changing hue, making it look like some colour-changing gas surrounded the cat.

'tick, tock, tack, tuck, teck'

Muan himself stood impassively, his eyes perfectly calm before this strange show, then it suddenly stopped. He gave a tiny sigh, and ambled over to Ensichrys, and, in response to his question to the two Clouds, answered,

~I'd say it's rather stupid personally. You might as well ask a turkey if it wants to be cooked and eaten.~

[Chronos]

Ensichrys withdrew his hands and smoothed his arm feather a bit, taking little to no offense to Muan's tone. "Ah, yes, you're right. This is going to be difficult. Say, I wonder if their memories are also exactly the same..."

Ensichrys straightened up and completely regained his original chipper demeanor. "Ok, Clouds. Listen up. I'm going to ask something only the real Cloud would know." Ensichrys cleared his throat pompously.

"When is Fort's birthday?"

[Cloud]

[Chronos]

Ensichrys smacked his forehead. This was not working. He thought that the one who asked to confer might be the blob, simply because the other remark was so absurd, it could have come only from Cloud. However, there was no real way to be sure. He would ask more questions.

"What's the name of my pet serpent?"

Ensichrys was almost sure the real Cloud would know this one, but was completely certain that the blob would not have a clue.

[Cloud]

((This is reminding me of an episode of Red Dwarf where a creature changes into one of the crew and they have to decide which one is the real one. For more information see episode entitled Psirens, Season 6 I think What? I have to cite my work))

"It begins with N," one of the Cloud's mused.
"No no, it's an F! F I say," the other one interjected.
"Ok, it may not be an N but it's definitely not an F"

The Cloud's argued for quite some time, both insisting that they knew the correct letter that went at the beginning.

[Cirrial]

501 walks casually over, sauntering and waving to the two Clouds and Ensichrys. His head twitches violently to the side and slowly turns to face Ensichrys, tilting to the side in what could be confusion, curiosity, amusement or an attempt to look creepy and disconcerting.

501's head at 45 degrees to his neck, he takes a few more steps towards Ensichrys, and slowly reaches out his hand as if to poke him, despite being a few metres from the feathery being.

"Well, my, aren't you the interesting specimeennnnnnn..." He twitches some more, his left arm rotates slightly, and a few more blue sparks fly from his head to the ground. "Excuse me a second, I feel an adjustment's required about now."

He grabs at the back of his head with both hands and forces his head back into a more reasonable orientation, and looks straight ahead at Ensichrys. He then casually glances over to the two Clouds. "Oh, hey, I remember those! Or is that yet to happen? This is what time travel does to your minds, people, it makes them go... not working right. Not that this is an issue right now!" He laughs quietly and bitterly.

He flings his arms out in front of him, and a subdued glow shines from within them. His wings glow blue, silently, and he gently hovers off of the ground, as if he's just been casually picked up by some unseen force. Pulled up on a string, even.

"Oh, hey, not sure if any of you three have realised, but I'm not exactly on your side right now, and I thought you should know that. Fair chance and all. Unlike what I got."

His voice turns ominously sinister, and he turns his head slowly and deliberately to Ensichrys while his limbs dangle uselessly. "You should be inside a cage with the rest, along with those two friends of yours. Should you attempt to interrupt with our plans further, I will kill you where you stand. And should you take that as an invitation to attack me, well, I'll just kill you even more!"

He floats further up into the sky, and speaks more calmly. "Well, what's it going to be? ...No, wait, I forgot to give you the options, didn't I. Sorry, I'm new at this. Either stay here and perish, or turn back and await your inevitable incarceration peacefully. Or whatever it is these goo blob things do. Granted, if they want to eat you or something, I won't blame you for trying to fight back, but otherwise, just do what they say."

He twitches again, and his arms swerve out in front of him, as if he were a zombie shambling forward, while floating in the air.

"Do I need to repeat myself? I don't think I do. Please don't say I do, I can't remember what I just said, and I'm pretty sure it won't have the same impact twice anyway."

[Chronos]

Ensichrys again slapped his forehead. "No, it starts with a 'G' you nincompoops! A 'G'! Oh, this is getting us nowhere," he said irritably, when 501 sauntered on into the area.

Ensichrys listened to what he had to say. The alignment switch would probably have meant something to Ensichrys had he any real relations with 501 before this. However, Ensichrys knew no better. The choices being given, however, were very pressing.

"501, if I may," Ensichrys began, the gears turning in his head as if a broken pocket watch had just been fixed. "You gave us only two options that result in very nearly the exact same thing. Now, I'm all for packing up our mission and taking it back home, but if we do so, we await what could very well be the same fate," Ensichrys began to pace slowly in circles beneath 501.

"Now, wouldn't it be just grand if you were to give us some guarantee of safety? We'd be far more inclined not to fight with you- and with your circuits or whatever it is you run on being in such a vulnerable state and all, I think it would be a terrible shame if everybody here teamed up and attacked you at the same time. I don't want to do that, because frankly, I don't want to get my feathers all burnt and charred, but you may leave us no choice. Think about it, my good sir, what have you or your new superiors got to lose by simply letting us go free?"

Ensichrys was condensing a small bit of electricity into plasma behind his back and beneath his primary feathers the entire time he was talking to 501.

This would be so much easier if Mortracta and the Guivre were here! Ensichrys thought to himself.