Memoirs of a RAFian

[Cloak]

New chapter, as I can't sleep. Still a bit furious at myself for not looking hard enough for my d@mn SSN card, giving up hope, and then just finding it in the first place that I should have looked.

CHAPTER TWO:
The Commisceo Concoction

"You've done well in procuring the fuchsia Geryon flowers." Malice said, eyeing a vial of a purplish liquid. "It was the essential ingredient for the Commisceo Concoction."

"Thank you, Mistress," Mega-Maul croaked throatily, bowing deeply. Malice took no notice, to his words nor his gesture of respect.

"And, yet," Malice said, as if continuing a thought that began silently in her head. Mega-Maul visibly tensed at these words, tensed with fear. "None the Concoctions that I've brewed from the supply that you procured for me . . . were satisfactory."

She indicated the corpses that littered the floor behind her. A male African lion the size of an oversized housecat with proportionate wings and antennae of a bumblebee. A female sun bear the size of a Pomeranian with proportionate butterfly wings and antennae. An androgynous creature the size of a small car with the body shape, pouch and tail of a female red kangaroo and a bull elephant's trunk and ears. A male, surfboard-sized creature with moose antlers, seal body, and a head blended somewhere between a moose and a seal. A female, footlocker-sized hippopotamus with rabbit ears, tail, and teeth. A male, man-sized rhesus monkey with a rhinocerosid snout, horn, and hindlegs.

If Mega-Maul tensed anymore, he would pass for a statue. This amount of stress isn't good for anyone. He was so scared that he might have offended Malice in some way, and it was a.particularly apt fear, as the smallest thing could set her off. And Mega-Maul didn't even know about Abom . . . th Realm Walker formerly known as Abomination.

Malice continued her rather macabre musings in a light conversational tone, "Unfortunately, these failures have exhausted the supply of the flowers. As well as subjects on which to test the resulting Concoctions."

"Mistress?" Mega-Maul muttered, afraid that he actually dared to speak. He knew that could anger her, but anything could. Malice was no Elements Master, but that didn't mean she couldn't be intimidating. If she played it just right, she could be remarkably subtle and manipulative. However, she felt that, as of lately, that she might be suffering from what the Dwellers called "villain decay", which she saw as an affront.

But Malice paid this no mind, and kept her light, thoughtful tone. When she spoke, she actually looked at him directly for the first time since the conversation began. "I should wish for you to procure some more for me, Mega-Maul."

He had been dreading this request. But he was well aware of the inevitably of it. Malice was ridiculously difficult to please. Getting praise, even the most minute praise, was paramount of her requesting something difficult in a near-impossible amount of given time. There was no tolerance for arguing or backtalk. There was no wriggle room. He would have to acquiesce.

Mega-Maul turned to leave and Malice once again turned her back to him. She spoke again, over her shoulder, "Oh, and Mega-Maul?"

He turned to look at her, but before he could ask what, she said, with a slightly more authoritative edge, "Don't take so long this time."

[redtailedsaffa]

Those corpses sound like something out of The Human Centipede.

Also, what's an SSN card?

[Cloak]

Social Security (Number) card. You can't get a job in America without it. I dunno if India has an analogue to it.

And those corpses? They were actually based off of . . . Wuzzles.

[spoiler]The Commisceo Concoction merged two individual creatures into one, in an almost Potterian magical way.[/spoiler]

Now, a new chapter.

CHAPTER THREE:
Concoction Completion

"F-forgive me, Mistress," Mega-Maul whimpered, as he knelt, head bowed, hands held up. He was cradling a few plucked flowers. The petals were a brilliant fuchsia, with a simple but odd vascular segmentation appearing on the stem, like a rigatoni except with crevices instead of ridges. There were two broad leaves axially on the stem, one had smooth, plain edges, the other was rough with serrated edges. The stamens were Pikachu yellow, and the centers of the deep-belled flowers turned the fuchsia coloring scarlet. "F-forgive me. These were the only ones that were left on that field . . ."

It was then Mega-Maul was shown in greater relief. His armor was chipped and cracked. He was shaking slightly, a nearly imperceptible shiver echoing throughout his body. His mostly hidden eyes looked puffy, but whether that was from the dangers he faced or from the tears he shed was debatable.

Malice scooped up the flowers, and Mega-Maul winced at this briefest of touches. Malice pretended not to notice, as she scrutinized the flowers passively and seemingly indifferently. There were slight variances from the other flowers procured and used, but that was to be expected from any species. Realm Walkers themselves varied far more drastically in form from one another than most species. She looked up from her flowery examination, and gave Mega-Maul a long hard look, which he flinched at, as if he had been shot.

"If this prove unsatisfactory," Malice said, voice still light and breezy, but conveyed a very real and very subtle air of danger. "If the Conction brewed from these flowers prove unsatisfactory, you'll just have to go and find some more."

"B-b-but . . ." Mega-Maul began to protest before he lost his nerve.

Malice spoke with her back to him now. "Remember your vow."

Mega-Maul was at a lost for words. He felt overcome with crushing stress, like trying to lift up one of those cartoony sixteen-ton weights off his back. It was an impossible task. The flowers only grew in that field, and he basically stripped the place of them. It did not sit well with the keeper of the field -- a terrifying monster of a person with the head, legs and arms of a man, but three bodies connecting them.* There was a reason the flowers was named Geryon . . . actually, two, but let's not get ahead of ourselves.

Correctly interpreting this sudden silence, Malice said, with a girlish coyness, "Or maybe . . . maybe Ravager could do it. He would do it without question. Or hesitation."

Mega-Maul despised the assumption. But he was at a lost of what he could do. There was no more flowers, no more Geryon flowers in that field, in that meadow. He looked so painstakingly hard, while dealing with an irate Geryon.

"Leave me." Malice said, dropping her embarrassingly girly behavoirs for someone her age, revealing it all to be an act. Mega-Maul was quick to acquiesce, but one thing bothered him. He hasn't delievered any test subjects like Malice requested, but she didn't seem to mind.

Truth was . . . she already had two subjects in mind . . .

* This.

[Cloak]

Alas, the "modify-post" syndrome! Either that or Saffa's busy. j/k

CHAPTER FOUR:
An Attack! An Attack!

In the Bannedlands, a creature that appeared to have the body of Phineas T. Ratchet from the 2005 movie "Robots", a head like Voltron and a face like Optimus Prime was speaking to the mass of trolls. The Banned were all off doing whatever it was Banned do in their off time -- scheming up a scam, out on a lam, taking whatever they please . . . wait, those were lyrics to "Welcome to the Forty Thieves".

The trolls did not seem to understand that this creature manner of speaking an inhumanly dispassionate way and in such a monotone timbre that even Ben Stein would tell him to show a little more emotion. The trolls did not seem to grasp that they should not trust this robot. But they allowed him to whip them up into a frenzy. And they proceded to go and try to attack RAF.

Again.

Meanwhile, the robot showed up at Malice's side, who had been watching the whole ordeal with a sickening smile. She addressed the robot, "Very good, Mauler. You made for a very good test subject."

Yes, she tested the Concoction on both Mega-Maul and Ravenger. It fused them together into this robot . . . thing. Mauler did not answer. He no longer had any will of his own. It was as if he had been roboticized. That was Malice's goal with the Concoction all along -- it wasn't merely enough to completely fuse the subjects, but to completely bent the more-powerful fusion to her will and desires. They would not have any will whatsoever, but complete and utter loyalty to her, and her alone.

This attack by the trolls would naught but a mere distraction. A mere slight of hand. . . .

***

"Here in the land of RAF
We're having twice the fun!
A little bit of this.
A little bit of that.
And when you add it up,
You get a lot of laughs!
Ooh, we've got originality!
Living with a split personality!
We're the RAFians! (Oh yeah!)
We're the RAFians! (Hoho, yeah!)
'N' times the fun,
Wrapped-up and rolled into one . . .
Ooh, we've got originality!
Living with a split personality!
We're the RAFians! (Oh yeah!)
We're the RAFians! (Hoho, yeah!)
'N' times the fun,
Wrapped-up and rolled into one!"

"Oh, Abby, give it up already, will ya?" Saffa said benignly, working on a paper or something school-related. "No major network is gonna green light a RAFian television series."

"Nickelodeon green lit 'Fred: the Show' and Cartoon Network green lit 'Annoying Orange'," Cloak pointed out, sitting upon a smooth rock, legs crossed, eyes closed. He was trying to focus his mind. "And both shows have no substance to speak of."

"See, Cloak gets it!" Abby insisted.

"That is to say --" Cloak began, afraid that he didn't clarify his position well enough.

"Guys! Lock and load!" Parker said. "The trolls are staging another coup."

This.was stretching the true to breaking point, Cloak thought. Still, if it was just another attempted troll incursion, why was Parker so amped up? He soon realized it was because Parker had gotten bored.

"UGH!" Saffa snarled. "Why couldn't they do this on a day when I didn't have so much homework?!"

[redtailedsaffa]

Actually I was asleep.

Oh, NOW I remember where Geryon came from!

[Cloak]

Okay -- you were busy sleeping, then!

New book ideas comin' at ya.

• Book CCCLII: "Blackout" -- The RAFians must save the world from a global blackout.
• Book CCCLIII: "The Phaetovore" -- The RAFians must deal with a ghost-eater.
• Book CCCLIV: "Shoggoth and Papa" -- The RAFians must deal with a Shoggoth, which reveals a truth about Underseen's "father".
• Book CCCLV: "Grundel Grievances" -- The RAFians must save a boy from  Grundel, which a RAFian has had a painful past experience with.

There. Don't think I rehashed anything, if I did, I'll find some way to work around it.

CHAPTER FIVE:
Getting Close

The RAFians were surprised to see that trolls were being unusually viscious and uncommonly untraditional in how these coups usually went. They weree fighting as if their very lives depended on taking back the forum. But no one seemed to notice that the trolls usual leaders, the Banned, were nowhere to be found. They had no knowledge of this incusion, this assault, and were probably very livid to discover the Bannedlands were currently troll-free. Whether they would suspect that someone took their troll (the Banned basically thinking of them similarly to a rancher thinks of his cattle) or that they all decided to up and leave upon their own accord, it would be most likely the former. This was not the usual song-and-dance of the coups past.

The trolls weren't above fighting dirty, either.

"Is it me," Hunter asked, forced by sheer numbers to fight with his back basically touching those of Cloak, Phoenix, Yarin, and Blue, "or are these trolls stronger than before?"

"Or have something they're fighting for that we're not privy to." Cloak said.

"Or it could be a -- HEY, THAT'S MY FACE, YOU JERK!" Phoenix began before yelling a troll who slugged him in the face.

A short distance away, Saffa, Horse (in her Tempest Blade-generated human form), Abby, and AniDragon were similarly grouped. They fought just as hard, but even RAFians could not stand up to such numbers. This led to the awful realization that the Banned always pulled their punches, held back their true numbers . . . but how were the RAFians to know that Malice managed to amass some extraneous trolls from other parts of the world to help out with this siege?

And Malice was quite confident that the Concoction would not work on the trolls. How? Why, she tested it earlier. It was concluded that the person's intelligence had to be more than the lowly brutish minds of a troll could allow and could afford. It rendered them fundamentally immune from the Concoction.

Malice waded unconcernedly through the undulating bodies fighting so hard, as if she was taking a midday stroll through the loveliest of parks. She loved the sound of fighting, of strife, of pain. It is a reason why she took the name of Malice. She delighted in the screams, in the cries, in the suffering.

She came upon the two groups of clustered RAFians. She smiled evilly as they were to preoccupied (yes, even Cloak) to even notice. To even realize that Malice had what appeared to be a Windex bottle of a strange fuchsia liquid . . .

That she sprayed both groups and retreated to a good viewing spot as the trolls finally withdrew. As the trolls left, there were no longer two groups of RAFians. There was just two individuals now. Just two -- a girl and a man.

The girl looked like a female version of Cloud, as represented in Kingdom Hearts, with long flowing hair. The man looked like a wingless Sephiroth, with a cloak and silver hair. The two looked unharmed, and a tad confused.

[Cloak]

. . . Hopefully, the forum doesn't go down again. As corny (and maybe pathetic) as it might sound, I don't care: I don't want to imagine my life without RAF. RAF was the first real place I was permitted to be myself without fear of hypercritical judgement. It's rather important to me.

And I'd donate . . . if I could afford it. . . .

CHAPTER SIX:
. . . Huh?

"Are th-they g-gone?" Rotiart cowered from behind the nearly shut door of the Bored Board. But he what he saw answered his question, and so he swaggered out as if he hadn't been hiding during the battle where braver RAFians fought and struggled and were injured. The fact that he dared swagger when he cowered in relative safety was infuriating.

Then he caught sight of the two newcomers.

The girl, upon closer inspection, only had the clothing of Cloud, not his sword or demeanor. She possessed long strawberry blond hair, with rather iridescent, blemish-free skin and a kind, friendly sort of face whose eyes had a lovely twinkle to them. She was a sassy, vivacious person with an earnest honesty to her. But this was not to say that she was frail or a push over, she wasn't. She wasnt any more than the RAFians who made her up.

Yes, you read that right.

The man was of a lean build, standing about seven feet tall. He had long flowing hair as silver as moonlight. His clothing may had a Sephiroth feel, but his cloak was rather more familar. His.face was hard, stern, and unyielding. Everything about him conveyed the thought that this was not a man to cross. There seemed to be a coolness, a chill, that exuded from him like a mist.

Both possessed a Mark on their palms and lower arms, but only the man possessed a Mark on his forehead.

Rotiart, being not the smartest person in the world, though he fancied himself to be, asked, sneeringly, "Who are you?"

Even to anyone who did not know what a snot-nosed brat Rotiart was. It didn't help that Saffa and Cloak constituted part of these individual fusions, and both had a very low tolerance for the spoiled monster (though technically, Rotiart was human).

"I asked you a question!" he snarled, as if he was the one in charge here.

The two held the memories of their fusees, though they were not their fusees. They were their own individuals, though their minds were, like their bodies created from the RAFians' own. Not only created but blended in such a way that they were obviously different. But they had no names yet.

"Answer me!!" Rotiart ordered, but it came out as little more than a childish whine. Which was sad, considering Rotiart was like sixteen or seventeen or thereabouts.

"You don't issue the orders here, boy," the man said in a rich baritone.

"You don't talk to me like --"

But the girl, full of vim and vinegar (er, whatever that means*), grabbed the boy by his shirt and pulled him toward her so that they were nose-to-nose. "We'll speak to you any way we want, you pile of puke."

"Saffa?" Rotiart said, jaw agape like a slack-jawed snapping turtle.

"Not quite," the girl said.

Meanwhile, Laserbeak was watching this, and decided that this was an appropriate time to go fetch Gaz.

*

[redtailedsaffa]

Good Lord.

[Cloak]

Right, Saffa. Looks like I'm gonna have to deviate a little from my planned notes again. Wouldn't be the first time. Heck, I did so at the end of the last book!

CHAPTER SEVEN:
Overlooked and Addressed

"What is taking them so long?!" Malice snarled, venting out some pent up anger. "They should have been here by now!! With total and unwavering loyalty to me!!"

There was no indication that Mauler had even heard her. Then again, he did not have a thought that Malice did not give him. He no longer had any real emotion, any real sentience. He really was little more than a mindless automaton now. Anything he said now would simply be parroting Malice, anything he did now would be because Malice commanded it. He had lost any complexity he once had -- which served Malice just fine in the interim.

Malice consulted her view screen, provided by a tiny camera disguised as a harmless, if overlarge ladybug. Malice knew that humans have a strange affection for the carnivorous beetle, although she wasn't quite sure why. She saw that the last of the Concoction (because she was forced to accept that Mega-Maul was right that there were no more, as she sent Mauler back to obtain more, and he came back empty handed) had worked splendidly.

But, yet they resist joining up with her . . . why? Why were they able to resist the call? Why were they still burdeoned by their own will and minds? This did not make sense. The Concoction was specifically designed to . . .

She caught sight of the man's forehead. She felt a plummeting sensation that she refused to acknowledge. The Mark of a RAFian. Of course. It was that ridiculous Mark Cloak had made for these lesser beings that he palled around with. When would he learn that Dwellers are nothing but tools? Instruments to serve your ends? They are not and can never be "friends", and friendship itself was pointless as well. People exist to serve your needs, Malice believed. Dwellers were sources of entertainment, like the blood sports the humans love so very much.

"Well," she grumbled, "this scheme has been a total misfire."

She refused to acknowledge that it was just one of many. She refused to remember how bored she was when she didn't have this constant struggle between her and the progeny of the progeny of Sage.

***

The two were brought into the auditorium, where they stood on the stage with the mods as they briefed the rest of the forum of this happening. Shadow was there as well, though not technically a RAFian. Rotiart made sure to sit in the very back, left hand corner of the auditorium. He was still a coward at heart.

"But you two need names," Richard said.

"Just call me . . . Composite." the girl said, with a shrug.

"Oh, like Composite Superman?" Sam, the Green Lantern, asked.

"Sure, whstever," Composite said, with an indifferent shrug.

"And you?" Richard prompted the man.

The man was silent for a moment, remembering Cloak's interaction with his earliest ancestor, Wan . . . er, Avatar.* He considered that for a moment, and said, "Call me Progeny."

"Excuse me, but we didn't quite hear you. Did you say Prodigy?"

"Sure, let's go with that." Prodigy shrugged noncommittally.

*

[redtailedsaffa]

OMG I REMEMBER THAT BOOK.

[Cloak]

Which one? "The First Master" or the pied piper one in which Malice gets dreadfully bored?

CHAPTER EIGHT:
Solutions and Ranklings

"Yes, now then," Richard said, continuing to brief everyone. "This is the first time we have dealt with a problem like this before."

"Excuse me, problem??" Composite said. "I don't see any problem."

"Surely you want to defuse?" Super Nate asked, gently. "Return back to your normal state?"

"Our nor--"

"Don't you see, Composite?" Prodigy said, dourly. "They don't want us. They want the people we were born from back. We don't matter."

"It's not like that," Richard said hastily, foreseeing a problem down the line. "We simply thought all of you --"

"Oh, stop that 'all of you' talk." Composite said. "Prodigy and I are two people. Two. We may have been born by the fusion of your friends, but we're not them, not totally. We are two unique individuals from the RAFians you knew."

"Yes, so will you stop trying to appeal to us as if we're the Borg, the One, Legion, or something? Yes, our minds and bodies have been blended from your friends -- and we possess most, if not all, of their memories -- but we are not them. They're gone. There is only Composite and myself now."

Silence met this words. Shadow was looking a little grief stricken, but was contemplating a possible way for them to be defused . . . then wonder about how ethically-sound it was to do so. She was conflicted, unwittingly and unknowingly feeling what her uncle usually felt about his very life.

"You talk about solutions," Composite picked up the thread from there, "you talk about problems. Speak as if our existence was in error. I ask you, do Prodigy and I have no right to exist? Do we have no say in what will be our fates?"

Prodigy intoned, "Are we mere Nobodies, languishing from a missing heart? Do we have no right to live as a naturally born species? We are an amalgam, yes. Born artificially, by the fusion of preexisting individuals, but don't Yeerks start out similarly? Granted, we won't fission into new individuals, but that does not give us the right to live? To feel? To simply be?"

Silence broke over all assembled. Rotiart had snuck out, finding the whole proceedings pointless drivel. It was Shadow who spoke up.

"And what of those that your births constituted? What of them?"

[redtailedsaffa]

The First Master. It's my favourite book in the series.

Ooh, this is getting dicey.

[Cloak]

Ah. It's one of my favorites, too. And ironically no RAFians other than myself (granted rather briefly) show up in it, either.

As for this book getting dicey . . . I'd get used to it. Its not gonna get -- well, that would be telling, I suppose.

CHAPTER NINE:
A Difference of Option

"What of them?" Composite asked.

"You talk about your right to exist. Your right to live." Shadow continued, emotion flooding jn and out of her words occasionally. "But whag of those that constitute you? The thinking, feeling people whose bodies and minds have gone to create and give rise to you two. What of them?"

"They exist," Prodigy said. "They exist as and through us."

"But you keep asserting that you are not them," Shadow countered deftly. "That your are different and unique and separate from those that made you up. You cannot be them and yet also be separate. It is one or the other."

"It's true that we are not them, but they do exist, within us and our memories." Composite argued. "As long as their memories remain intact, they exist."

"Point conceded," Shadow said, but, by the resolute way she folded her arms, she wasn't done yet. "But there are flaws with that line of thinking. Their memories are intact, fine, I concede that fact. But with your creation their individual memories stop abruptly."

"That's not true, our memories are their memories." Prodigy protested.

"Then you cannot argue that you are separate from them!" Shadow said. "You may have newer, distinct personalities of your own, new identities -- but if you make such a claim how can you state that you are not them? Their memories stop at your creation because they effectively become YOUR memories!"

"This all semantics!" Composite snarled. "We exist, we have a right to exist, to be, and yet you are arguing that we are nothing more than science experiments to be undone!"

"I am arguing nothing of the sort!" Shadow said, matching Composite in anger now. It coukd have been an unfortunate thing, as that side of Cloak's family was rather known for tempers. "I am arguing against you two just blatantly writing off the beings that made up by fusing together! Yes, you may have a right to exist, but, by the First Light, that does not make writing off and forgetting about those that made you up right!"

"You are advocating slaying us for the selfish desire to have your uncle back!" Prodigy protested.

"Perhaps, in part, yes," Shadow said, still heatily. "But you are advocating that we allow the RAFians that we all knew and loved to remain gone forever. You are demanding that we accept this lying down. I will not. I will question. I will ask."

She swept from the auditorium in a man er eerily similar to her uncle's favorite dramatic exits, before saying over her shoulder, "And I will find a way."

She left.

[redtailedsaffa]

Well. That was dramatic.

[Cloak]

Okay, planning may way through the chapters of Book CCCXXV, which is now entitled "Tick, Tick, Tick". Only on Chapter 8 though.

I'll post another chapter after some well-needed shut-eye.

And here it is.

CHAPTER TEN:
Immediate Inquiry

In a junk-filled room, full of the detritus of abandoned ideas and half-finished project, a figure was working, buzily hammering away at flattening a solid metal rod the diameter of a quarter. He did not hum to himself, but focused entirely on the project at hand.

Soon, he looked at it, appraising it for its quality. He looked somewhat displeased, but whether that was because of the item he was itemsmithing, or because of the faint tinkle tinkle that signified that someone had come into his item shop. Yes . . . his item shop.

"Piggy! I told you no! Your business is no longer desired here!"

Piggy was basically a Realm Walker version of Rotiart, only much older . . . and married. To a snake Realm Walker. Piggy had solicited this shop to make jewelry for his wife, only to throw a tantrum when she saw a flaw that didn't exist. It was their attempt to wriggle out of paying for it, but Itemsmith was a beaver Realm Walker. Not stupid.

But the new customer's voice was young and female. She spoke dignantly, "I am not Piggy."

"That voice . . . you're Cloaky's neice, aren't you?" Itemsmith said, returning to the front of his shop. His voice was very different now, gone was the hostility and anger, replaced instantly was warmness and pleasantness. "How is the old so-and-so?"

Shadow's simian face remained sadly serious, and this was not lost on Itemsmith. The two, Cloak and Itemsmith were friends for a long time, even during their schooling. Itemsmiths demeanor turned just as serious and dour.

"What happened?"

***

"Polycorporeal fusion, eh?" Itemsmith said thoughtfully.

"I didn't know who else to turn to for answers of this nature. No one else in my family, other than Uncle, would know how to solve this. Uncle always spoke so highly of you . . . so . . ."

"Yes," Itemsmith said, "I don't suppose they would. It's not a very common problem, per se."

"There is speculation at RAF that maybe simple defusion magic would work."

"Perhaps, unless they use the Commisceo Concoction." Itemsmith noted.

"What's that?"

"It is a potion that does exactly what you described. It requires a fuchsia Geryon flower to be viable, and they only come from the Meadow of Geryon." Itemsmith said thoughtfully. "But beyond that I'm not too entirely sure. Magic and mysticism are well outside my expertise, I'm afraid."

"Are there any relics, artifacts or items that can reverse it?" Shadow asked desperately.

"Hmmm . . ." the beaver Realm Walker rubbed his chin in a pensively thoughtful way. "Well, I suppose there is an accessory that could be used . . . in conjunction with another item . . ."

"May I have them?" Shadow said, quickly but earnestly. "I'm sorry, I can't give you much for them, but I --"

"Hold on there, young one," Itemsmith said. "I don't have them here. I didn't even make them."

Shadow looked downcast.

"Now, now, none of that." Itemsmith said, good-naturedly. "I said I didn't have them here -- I never said that I don't know where they are."