Memoirs of a RAFian

[Cloak]

Just don't expect immediate resolution. Chances are you're gonna forget all about it before it becomes relevant again.

Just like Maul's "siblings". Oh, I haven't forgotten about that . . . even though my readers might have.

New chapter later, I've a meeting jn the morning and I best get to bed. Be sure to check my sig if there's a new chapter.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN:
But A Pipe Dream

"What is that?" Abby said.

"A mechanical planet of overlapping pipes," Yarin said.

"Or Pypevania," Shadow added.

"Thank you," Abby said, facepalming, "but I was to the communication signal thing."

"Goom?" Cloak asked.

"No," Yarin said, "the signal is coming from the planet. Here . . . let me open it. . . . Adjust the acoustic perimeters . . ."

"Let us introduce ourselves,
O people of this land."

"We are the Goomba Brothers."

"With sister close at hand."

"I bet you all are wondering
Who are this young unknown?
And why am I inheriting
The Pypevanian throne?"

"Yes, why?
Yes, why?
Oh, please, please tell us why!"

"The bottom of the family tree
Starts with Goomer; that is me.
I'm the cousin to the sister
Of son's niece's brother
Of the uncle's daughter's father
Of the nephew's sister's mother
And my grandpa's only cousin
Was the king's daughter's sibling,
But they're all gone --"

"So that is why . . ."

"I am now your king!"

"He is now our king!"

"Yes, I am now your king!
Repeat what I just said!"

"Repeat what I just said!"

"And let the pipes ring!"

"Old King Goomer's mania
Was for Pypevania!"

"So, good citizens, I pledge to you
I'll do the best that I can do
For honor, country and the king!
Let the pipes ring!"

"Let the pipes ring!"

"Let the pipes ring!"

"Let the pipes ring!"

"Wait -- Goombas?" Abby said. "I thought that they all lived in the Mushroom Kingdom."

"Doesn't mean that they aren't immigrants." Yarin said. "Perhaps they sought asylum from --"

"It doesn't matter right now." Cloak said.

"Cloak --" Abby said, in a reproachful sort of tone.

"Don't bother trying to dissuade me, Abby," Cloak said, sternly. "We have a mission that is foremost priority. We can debate and discuss the reprecussions of this find later. We must find Letheterra, and now."

[Cloak]

Currently planning out the chapters for Book CCCXIX ("Simply Skin Solutions") -- yes, I changed the title -- and I'm two-fifths of the way through it.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN:
The Danger of Darkness

"That's weird," Abby said, with a tremulous tremble to her voice.

"You're not still on about that Goomba business, are you?" Cloak said, marshalling his self-control. Even he can succumb to cabin fever, it seemed.

"No!" Abby said, taking care to make it not sound like a sneer. "Look there. At that planet."

It was a dark circle, writhing with shadows and evil. No light penetrated its surface, no hope was present as it quickly burned and rotted away. No Blue Lantern would have survived on it, as it would immediately sap its power.

"Darkterra," Shadow identified. She possessed an aura of the purest sort of light, whereas the other three had light too, but theirs possessed a shadow of darkness. "Said to be the home of darkness, the birthplace of it. Said to be the residence of the one with the darkest heart, the most twisted soul."

"Then Malice has to be there," Cloak said, heavily. His eyes were narrowed.

"But the mnemoraptors would not," Shadow said. She didn't like the effect that this planet was exuding over the three. It didn't seem to affect her at all. But was scared her was how it affected her uncle. Realm Walkers tended to be resilient to most things, but darkness had existed before even the Realm Walkers. Their species were born from the darkness, giving the Nexus some light, other than the planets and landscape. "We have to get away from here."

Yarin didn't respond.

"Yarin! Get us away from that planet! Get us away from Darkterra!"

Again, it was as if the Nyac was incapable of hearing her.

"Yarin! Abby!" Shadow practically screamed, unaware that her aura of light was growing bigger. "Uncle . . ."

The power of the dark planet seemed to exude weaken seemingly. Shadow realized that it was the aura of light that encompassed her. It was keeping the power of the dark planet from her traveling companions, that Darkterra appeals to the darknesses within an individual's heart. Grasps onto it. Makes it grow. But her aura of light stopped that. It atrophied the growth of the darkness, causing it to wither and retreat.

It did not, however, purge the darkness. It still remained within them, but suppressed by their own light.

"Yarin, get us out of here. Out of the vicinity of Darkterra." Shadow said, fear still coursing through her.

The Nyac complied, though his arms shook a bit, afraid of his own darkness, made real by Darkterra.

[redtailedsaffa]

I like how each planet is having different anti-effects on each character's nerves.

[Cloak]

Well, not any longer . . .

CHAPTER FIFTEEN:
Different Approaches

"There it is," Shadow said, pointing. She looked emotionally drained.

She had indicated a planet that whose atmosphere seemed to be consisted of nothing but mists. Perpetually foggy. Everlastingly eerie.

Yarin hesitated. "How deep is this atmosphere?"

"Your ship will be fine." Cloak said, correctly guessing the source of the apprehension.

"You said the same thing about Aquilai's TARDIS when we were dealing with the mutant MP-3 player!!" Yarin protested passionately. "And you remember what happened to that!"

Cloak really couldn't refute that. He had forgotten the precise events that occured at the particular point of time. However, they didn't have the time for this.

"Do we even have to go?" Abby asked. "No, seriously. Do we have to go down there? Goom called us, remember?* Sakki, Az and Faerie are conscious. They remember how to speak."

"Yes, I remember Abby." Cloak said. "But they don't remember any of their friends, any of their family. They don't remember their favorite food, or book, or movie. They don't remember their cultural etiquette. THEY DON'T REMEMBER THEIR NAMES. They don't remember who they are!"

"But that will come back!" Abby protested.

"No, it won't! Amnesia like this just doesn't automatically reverse itself. Without our memories, we lose that sense of self we have. We are not the people we are if we don't remember any of our experiences. We're just biologically the same -- nothing else is the same."

"Uncle, why do you feel so passionately about this?" Shadow asked, gently. There was a reason she had so much light in her.

Cloak's eyes darkened as he recalled the imprisonment in his head that his mother had forced upon him. He very nearly lost his identity, his sense of self, in that living situation. He was treated as essentially a punching bag, a doormat and a slave, all rolled up into one. And he knew that his mother didn't care, as long as she got what she wanted. And when she couldn't have it, whenever Cloak told her "no", she threw him away. Like yesterday's garbage.

"Uncle?"

But Cloak wasn't sure that Faith would want Shadow to know this. Faith still was in contact with there mother, who treated Faith more like a person than he. But then again . . . Faith did not really, truly realize how deep the abuse was. How, for that period of his life, he would have liked for nothing more but to have never waken up. To have died in his sleep. Neither Faith or Shadow knew about that. Or the fact that he wasn't allowed to be himself, that he had to hide himself, his emotions from everyone.

"U-Uncle?"

It was in RAf that he experienced true freedom, as silly as it may have sounded. He was allowed to speak his mind. He was allowed to be himself. It is why he bears his Mark proudly. It is why he would go to such lengths to help his friends, his surrogate family.

"Did I say something wrong, Uncle?"

She must not know. Not yet. Not until Faith gives the okay.

"It doesn't matter, Shadow," Cloak said, repressing his emotions. But Shadow was never a stupid girl, as such, she didn't push her luck. "Yarin, take us down to Letheterra's surface."

Yarin made to object and protest again. But Cloak raised his hand, and said, "Slowly and carefully then."

---
*Off-screen, unless I royally screwed up somewhere.

[redtailedsaffa]

Nah, don't think you did.

[Cloak]

Ah, 'kay then.

I'll post another chapter soon . . . ish. Be sure to check my sig.

Here it is.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN:
Landfall

"Yarin, you're going as fast as my grandmother drives," Abby said, with a dry, sardonic tone.

The Nyac said nothing, but wore a look of uber seriousness. He cared for his ship as if it.were his child, much the same way Aquilai cared for his TARDIS and Parker cared for his armor. Cloak said nothing. His face still carried that seriousness.

Cloak was thinking. Had he the option, the choice, to forget all his painful memories, to eliminate all recollections of his mother's verbal abuse . . . would he do it? Sure, he'd be an hypocrite, but would he take the choice? Would he be looked down on if he did?

"Good God, Yarin." Abby teased, rolling her eyes playfully. She was masking trepidation at the task that laid before them. "You're like those guys who take two parking spots just so no one will park next them and scratch their paint."

But no, Cloak reminded himself. No, those experiences are the ones that shaped him, he couldn't forget them. He would not be the same person he was. He would be less paranoid, more naive, less cynical, less skeptical, less brooding . . . a completely different person than who the RAFians knew him to be. He'd be that overly optimistic, carefree child that he used to be. Back when he was too stupid to see his mother for what she was.

But, then again, back when he was hatchling, he was still cute. She wasn't so bad against him. It was when adolescence started that she began to become horrible. Pressuring Cloak horribly to be perfect, to get perfect grades in schooling (Cloak had an abysmal time with topics that he wasn't terribly interested in). Cloak found himself struggling to live up to her impossible standards, to gain her approval (a monumental task in and of itself).

Yet, even these memories, Cloak would not have wiped clean. He would not desire to go back to being the formless, metaphorical clay that he was as a child. It is our experiences, and the memories of said experiences, that shape us. He had to believe that. He had to believe that some good had to come from his suffering his mother's tyranny.

"We've made landfall," Yarin declared.

"Finally!" Abby teased again.

"Backseat pilot," Yarin teased right back.

Cloak snapped his thoughts to the present with this exchange. There was a task to do,  and he must be mentally present. He wasn't aware that Shadow had been eying him shrewdly, concerned. She had seen how the darkness had affected the three, but her uncle worried her. She had been accustomed to Realm Walkers being immune to basically everything.

She didn't know about the Dementor incident at RAF.

Anyway, Yarin would stay with the ship, while the other three went to gave the mnemoraptors what for.

[Cloak]

Here's another chapter. Fair warnin', it might be short.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN:
RAFians in the Mist

"How do we find anything in this fog?" Abby said. "I mean, I get why you tied us together. We won't separate now, but that doesn't invalidate the question."

"Abby." Shadow said, with a slightly playful tone that said that she thought Abby was clearly overlooking something.

"What? What do --" Abby said, before it clicked. "Oh."

The two Realm Walkers took the lead, but making sure Abby said between them. Abby did not like this fog, this mist. And it wasn't because of something shallow like frizzy hair.

"I have got to have a morph for this," she said. "But I can't think of any to morph that would be suited for this environment."

"Just as well," Shadow said. "The Fog of the Forgotten might claim you. Not to mention you'd lose your tether to us."

"Fog of the Forgotten?"

"That's what we are traveling in now." Cloak explained as they continued to move forward. "It engulfs the planet. Which is unusually smooth and uniform, I might add. It's not quite Earth, not quite metal, but some intermediary between the two."

"It is said whoever wanders within it, never leaves." Shadow said.

"Never?"

"Don't give it any credence, Abby," Cloak said. "It is only a story."

"Every planet of this nebula was a story before the mnemoraptors attacked!" Abby exclaimed.

It was true, but neither Realm Walker said anything.

"You know," Abby said, "you two aren't really inspiring confidence in this plan."

Silence fell once more.

"We are going to be able to find Yarin's ship again? Right?"

"Yes. It touches the surface of the planet." Shadow said, brightly.

"This way," Cloak said. "We're nearing the mouth of their lair."

"Jow can you be so sure?" Abby asked.

"It is the only burrow on the planet -- and the planet isn't too big to begin with."

[redtailedsaffa]

Wow, Abby's unusually chattery. Nervousness?

[Cloak]

Well, Saffa, yes. The Fog of the Forgotten is so thick that you can't even see your own body. Nothing but swirling shades of white.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN:
The Lair of the Mnemoraptors

"Whew," Abby said quietly. "I can see again."

"Quiet!" Cloak snarled in a breathy whisper. His back was ever-so-slightly haunched, his tail deathly still except for the flicking tip. His claws were being unsheathed and sheathed again. He had all the mannerisms of a tiger on the hunt. "You'll give away our position!"

"Touchy." Abby said, ppacing emphasis on the last syllable for some reason, before falling silent.

They prowled along the tunnels. Cloak wasn't fond of the tunnel. There was no cover to dive behind in case of attack. Then Cloak remind himself of the marble-like stone beneath their feet. It was stone, which means that it was earth, and so, Cloak and Shadow could make their own cover, if need be.

They continued down the tunnel, which sloped downward at a fifty-degree angle or so. None of the trio made a noise, and Cloak had his senses attuned to the smallest and faintest of stimuli. He was also Earthsighting, but this was pointless. Mnemoraptors weren't bound to the ground, they floated like dementors and Amperi.

Meanwhile, Abby was wondering idly if she should morph. But she couldn't think of a morph in her repertoire that would give them the advantage. Besides, to complicate the matter, she did not have a watch and the Realm Walkers did not have the innate time sense that Andalites somehow had.

"I don't bel--" Cloak muttered. Something unexpected had happened. He had Earthsighted something. "But I should have seen it."

"Don't be so hard on yourself, Uncle."

"What?" Abby whispered, looking thoroughly bemused.

As they positioned themselves right before the opening to a grand atrium-type place, Abby saw immediately what the two.Realm Walkers meant. It was the hive palace of the mnemoraptors, three of which looked like brains, and seemed to be as bored as the person sitting on the throne as the other four mnemoraptors hovered lazily and listlessly about, apparently unaware of any event (which of course, they couldn't remember).

The person on the throne was Malice, of course, looking thoroughly bored. Cloak could imagine why. Mnemoraptors don't speak, and they couldn't regurgitate the memories to Malice without risk of.losing them, of having them snap back to their rightful owners. Or perhaps she could, but just didn't know about it.

"No point in drawing this out," Cloak said.

"Wait! Couldn't we just use stealth to kill them?" Abby said. "I can go Psycholepterran --"

"You're not invisible when you're intangible," Cloak said. "At least, not to Realm Walker eyes."

"Well, uh," Abby said. But the protest died in her. Cloak understood her fear. She didn't want her memories taken from her.

But there was little choice but to reveal themselves. They walked brazenly into the room, with much false bravado (not Helmacron-level bravado, mind you). They strode across the room to stand about sixteen feet from Malice, who gave them an unimpressed, supercritical look.

"About time," she said, irritably. "You took your sweet time getting the Veil here."

[redtailedsaffa]

Such swagger and entrance.

[Cloak]

Anxiety is coming over me (don't wanna give specifics), and the only cure is to write.

CHAPTER NINETEEN:
Contest of Wills

"You know why we're here, Malice," Cloak said, without preamble.

"What? That's it?" Malice said, with a venomous coyness. "No drawn-out monlogues of morality? No nonsensical non-sequiturs? No heroic speeches of which you're so partial? Just getting to the point, are you?"

"Malice, relinquish what you have made thes mnemoraptors steal." Cloak said.

Malice laughed mirthlessly. It was no Joker laugh, though.

"Just like that? I'm supposed to hand them over, just like that?" Malice said, mockingly. "Hand 'em over, without a fight? Just let you go skipping on your merry little way, ignoring how much effort it took to get here?"

Her voice had become harder, her gaze more severe and cross.

"After the effort it took to find the burrow that led to the tunnel that led here?! After the effort and power it took to slay the mnemoraptor queen?! After the ef -- er, the, the wait for the menmoraptors to collect the memories and return back here. Earth isn't that close you know."

Despite her trying to hastily cover it up, the three noticed her about change of phrasing in the last sentence.

"You were going to say the effort it took to get the mnemoraptors to even come to Earth in the first place, weren't you?" Shadow said, shrewdly.

"Nonsense!" Malice practically screamed. Such a reaction was unintentional confirmation of it, but he insisted."Foolish Hatchling, I have full control over the mnemoraptors! My every wish is their one true desire."

Cloak snorted, and smiled a slight smile akin to Seto Kaiba. "You protest too much Malice."

"Oh, no?!?!" Malice.said, allowing herself to get baited. She lost all control and roared, "Minions of Letheterra, attack!"

It would have been dynamic . . . had it worked. The brainy mnemoraptors appeared to have understood what she meant but got distracted by their stolen recollections. While the other four mnemoraptors continued their lazy flight pattern, not even acknowledging something was said. Cloak and the others quickly realized that it must have taken an extraordinary amount of sheer willpower to force the seven to Earth. The mere act of it should ha e been enough to exhaust Malice for several days.

"Mnemoraptors! I am your queen! I command you to attack!" Malice declared, hiding the evident signs of exhaustion.

They only turned to look I. The RAFians' general direction once, before gokng about what they were doing. She hadn't rested up enough to gather energy, her strength, up again to control them as she did before.

Cloak narrowed his eyes as he realized the boredom Malice had affected was a facade, and a crumbling one at that. Cloak, Abby and Shadow, unafraid, just walked up to the brainy mnemoraptors fearlessly, as Malice continued to scream, depleting her energy levels even more. Each one took a brainy mnemoraptor and squeezed it. This caused it to vomit up the memories they had taken, which snapped back to their rightful owners.

Those mnemoraptors changed back to the basic mnemoraptor form. Malice was absolutely livid at this rather anticlimatic ending. Especially since the mnemoraptors had apparently selected a new queen, an actual mnemoraptor this time, having finally rejected Malice.

"NOOOOOO!" Malice bawled in a shriek akin to the Abridged Krillin. "I'll get you yet, Cloak! If it's the last thing I do, I'll make you pay for this indignity! Mark my words! All the energy for this plan, all FOR NOTHING!!!"

The three were already in the tunnel, when they heard Malice's shrieks of fury and frustration. Cloak shrugged and said, as they left the lair, "Yeah, yeah, yeah."

[redtailedsaffa]

The bigger the lie, the harder it is to phrase.

[Cloak]

Too right, Saffa. Now, the final chapter . . . of this book. . . .

CHAPTER TWENTY:
Schemes and Normality

And so, the trio made it back to Yarin's ship. It startled the Nyac a bit, because he was just finishing giving his ship a full diagnostic, which made it all the easier to Earthsight him with the exterior movement, although it was risky, going outside into the Fog of the Forgotten without an Earthsighter.

But Yarin wasn't stupid. A bit eccentric, perhaps, but not stupid. He had tethered himself to his ship, so he wouldn't be lost to the fog. Eventually, he gave up the external examination of the ship as a bad job, on the grounds that he couldn't see anything in the fog.

The trio had reappeared just as he had reentered the ship and shut the door. He let them in, and he slowly navigated his way off of Letheterra.

"What if they come back and do this again?" Abby asked.

"They won't." Cloak said, confidently.

"How can you be sure?"

"Because," Shadow answered, "there haven't been problems with the mnemoraptors before, has there? They only came and did that because of Malice's will and drive. Without that, they haven't any will to do so."

"But Malice could try again when her strength is back." Abby fretted.

"No," Cloak said. "Malice won't. She never tries a scheme twice, and, in any case, it took everything she had to just make them come to RAF and steal the memories of three RAFians. Three out of a possible seven. And bring them back. That's why she didn't put up much of a fight, remember."

"Right," Abby said, as they came from the mists and into the nebula again. "And they wouldn't have the initiative to do it on their own. They'll be content staying on Letheterra."

She didn't sound too terribly convinced.

"It'll all turn out fine, in the end." Yarin chimed in, as he increased the speed and left the nebula. It was rather reckless, but Yarin had had enouh of this nebula, like the other three.

[redtailedsaffa]

Another delightful book, another PDF.

[Cloak]

*shakes head* And here I thought that I might have offended you. I really need to stop being so fatalistic (easier said than done, though, I'm afraid).

Anyway, I'm currently planning through the chapters of Book CCCXX ("Suit and Lie"), which looks to be more serious than the title suggests. Tad darker, too.

BOOK LXIV:
APPLIANCE ARMAGEDDON
CHAPTER ONE:
RAFphone

Cloak, while mulling over the events of the nebula, reflected a bit on how Goom managed to know how to maintain communications within it and the Goombas heard on Pypevania. Was there a correlation? Was it Goom's homeworld? Cloak had always assumed that Goombas had come from the Mushroom Kingdom, though he couldn't begin to hazard a guess where that would be in this Realm. In Realm #762, sure, it was easy. But the Prime Universe? The Universe were most, if not all, other Realms had spun off of?

Then he looked down at his portable communicator. It was rather like a Nintendo 3DS, even with a holster on his belt. This was the newest version, one that Yarin, Aquilai, and Goom whipped up. The predecessor of this communicater was like a Nintendo DS, and the one before that was similar to a GBA (Game Boy Advance). Then its predecessor was like a Game Boy Color in design, its predecessor was like a Saiyan scouter, and its predecessor was similar to an old-school Game Boy. But the very first communicator was like an eighties cellphone, called colloquially a "RAFphone", and it was the first model that Cloak ever got in his tenure with RAF.

Cloak thought to himself, in song, remember how it was like with the flawed device.

RAFphone.
Why did I buy this stupid RAFphone?
I just can't imagine now what I was thinking at all.
(What was I thinking?)
My friends stare at me whenever I get a call.
Well, everybody (everybody),
Everybody (everybody),
Everybody in the realm really hates my RAFphone.

When my RAFphone goes off as I lurk,
I look like the biggest jerk!
Total strangers wanna slap me around.
When it's ringin' on the terrace,
My friends get embarrassed.
They're beggin' me to throw it outta town.
Well, it made this guy so sick,
He smashed my RAFphone with a brick.
But I had it fixed, and now it's just fine.
It's a pain, but I really do need it,
And I cannot delete it.
But, for me, that would be crossin' the line.
'Coz I hate to wast a dime ninety-nine.
Hey, RAF paid good money for this!

RAFphone.
Why did I buy this stupid RAFphone?
I just can't imagine now what I was thinking at all.
(Really, what was I thinking?)
My friends all stare at me whenever I get a call.
Well, everybody (everybody),
Everybody (everybody),
Everybody in the realm really hates my RAFphone.

Dracon factory workers (they hate my RAFphone).
RAFian lurkers in burgas (really hate my RAFphone).
Starving RAFians with Olga (they hate my RAFphone).
Even folks with Ebola (just hate my RAFphone).
All the mums and Bannies (all the troll mothers).
All the "I-can't-stand-these" (all of the Smash Bros).
Every one on the land, everyone on the sea,
Every single person everywhere unanimously
Everybody (everybody),
Everybody (everybody),
Everybody in the whole wide realm really hates my RAFphone.
RAFphone . . . RAFphone . . . RAFphone . . . RAFphone . . .

Then Cloak chuckled, as he if he came out of a reverie. Perhaps it wasn't that bad, but it certainly was not as good as the communicator they had now, which also doubled as scanners.