Threads Unbroken, Stave I

 ~The Royal Alchemists' Guild, London~

Victoria Thorne did not want to be here. She hated being here.

The phrase "familiarity breeds contempt", as old and tired as it was, continued to ring true even in the modern day. Places and names and faces that you see too much of lose their mystique very quickly and soon any and all respect or wonder you had for them dies away. And if you were Victoria Thorne, who had lived far longer than any person in the world had any right to live, you could become so familiar with a place that, in the end, contempt was all you had.

She was far too familiar with the council chamber in which the Royal Guild of Alchemists convened. Not that it made a good showing for itself besides - three hundred years of time had deteriorated the room beyond the wit of any duster, cleaning solution or stonemason to rescue. The marble stonework of the high, arched roof had lost its lustre and was worn in many places. A line of scuff marks crossed the dulled, cracked floor to the central podium, smearing out the faces of many once-worthy historical alchemists of Britain. And the high desks that surrounded the central podium, once a dark mahogany, had long lost their lustre.

What annoyed Victoria the most, however, was not the room itself. Her contempt came from the fact that, every time she came here, she had to deal with the five faces looking down upon her from over the lip of the desks. Each one belonged to a member of the High Council of Alchemists, the ostensible leaders of the Royal Guild - aside from herself. Blue-blooded to a man, woman and intermediate, and practically raised in the halls of the five great universities - Oxford, Cambridge, Dublin, Edinburgh and Cardiff.

They were also bunch of officious, bureaucratic idiots. As they were once again proving.

Black Hole Sum

Faust. Pandora's Box. Nebula Gas. Kamen Riders. House Arak. Miu. 

The names, in huge block capitals, swirled around him as he stood in the middle of a vast horizon of black sand. It stretched to infinite on either side of him, seeming to merge with the starless void that hung above in lieu of a sky. A white fog swirled around his heels, amongst which the words danced and twisted like swallows. Each one silently shouted themselves at him, their size alone conveying wild and accusatory tones without sound or voice.

He looked up. Mars hung in the sky, and he only knew it was Mars because he recognized the continents upon it. But it was dead - not the vibrant red of its youth and prime, but dark and ashen grey. Not even a single glimmer of the once-proud towers, no light from the once-bustling cities. Somewhere in the distance, a disembodied voice was singing - an old Martian lullaby, he knew, to which the words had long been lost to him.

There as an awful glooping noise.

He looked down. 

The fog parted, and faces came up at him from out of the sand. Each one of them was screaming in hate and agony amidst a miasma of purple smoke that belched forth from between the bubbling sand grains. He didn't recognise a single one of them, disgust and fear bubbling in his chest as he watched them twist and merge with each other like a kaleidoscope in a John Carpenter film, flesh flowing like modelling clay.

YOUR FAULT! they screamed, voices mingling with each other. YOUR FAULT! MURDERER! YOU DID THIS! ALL YOUR FAULT!

"What the fuck?!" he asked, before he could stop himself.

A shadow loomed over him. He made the mistake of turning around.

"They're your children," hissed the impassive, emotionless, bat-shaped visor that hung in the air above him. "Are you proud of them yet?"

And then it was joined by more. The leering, snake-shaped helmet of Blood Stalk. The gilded, imperious eyes of Evol. Build's helm, cracked and broken and worn. Kamen Rider Clear, now covered in so much scratches and dirt that the name was ironic. Slavering, fang-filled mouths appeared on each one, sliding into reality in the same way that, in a badly-generated AI video, details morph and change without rhyme or reason.

The faces beneath him screamed and roar louder. Only snatches of individual words could be heard now - MURDERER! KILLER! - as they rose up around him. He felt as though he was on the stand and the jury had finally lost it's shit with him, screaming for him to be hung.

"I... I couldn't!" he cried, ice in his stomach. "I had no choice! I-"

But the helmets closed in, looming, twisting. Horrible, cackling, mocking laughter spilled from their maws. And at the same time as he cowered from them, he felt twisted appendages and digits clawing at his shins as the things writhing in the quicksand beneath assaulted his ears in the screaming denouncement that echoed off of the nothingness around him.

ALL YOUR FAULT! ALL YOUR FAULT! ALL YOUR FAULT!

--------

Evolto Naja opened his eyes and realised he didn't know where he was.

This was nothing new to him. He'd developed a habit of doing this ever since he'd arrived on Earth and began to mingle with the culture. Accidentally jettisoned from his home planet by Pandora's Box, which was a whole story in and of itself, his awakening in the middle of Manhattan with a screaming headache and a dry throat was the first in a storied history of waking up in odd places. Even when he'd been roped into working for Faust, he'd still had his fair share of amnesiac mornings, although in that case that was mostly to try and forget what he saw writhing in the tanks.

It was only now, as he opened his eyes and saw himself surrounded by a huge expanse of grassland, that he began to wonder if it was becoming a problem.

He didn't know what time it was exactly, but the morning sun was already hot on his skin. His body ached as though he'd been running a marathon. His head felt like a swarm of bees was trying to escape from inside his skull. And as he pushed himself upright, groaning from the effort, his stomach churned in protest at being forced into a vertical position. None of these are insurmountable problems if you are at home in your own bed, or even in somebody else's bed. They're quite another matter when you're inthe middle of an unidentifiable grassland in God knows what corner of the world.

He blinked several times, trying to clear the fuzz from his vision and get a better look at his surroundings. But no matter how much he tried, it refused to be anything other than rolling grassland dotted with rocks and strange bushes he didn't know the name of. So he brought his secret weapon into play - a forked tongue flickering out from between his teeth before snapping back inside, and his jaw clenched as he pressed it up to the roof of his mouth.

Dusty. Dry. Primarily cheap beer, barbecue smoke, sweat and motor oil, all fighting for space. Hints of gum tree and eucalyptus. And a strong aftertaste of...

He turned his head, and saw a kangaroo grazing nearby.

Australia.

He gave a groan. Of all the places to wake up. Not that he wouldn't have minded going to Australia in any other circumstances, but... What even happened last night? How did he end up here?! Granted, that was a question he asked himself most mornings, but on this occasion it felt... more urgent. Like it was actually a conundrum this time, and not a comical happenstance. And he didn't know why that was, unless it had something to do with how he got here at all.

A nearby rock caught his eye. As if by instinct, he pushed himself to his feet and wobbled over to it. The action made every one of his senses howl, all of them refusing to come to work and demanding that he go back to the comforting blackness of sleep. He ignored them and sat himself down, adjusting and grimacing until he couldn't feel any sharp edges digging into his thighs. His brow furrowed as he tried to extricate some form of memory from the black soup that had swallowed up the previous night. 

Well... he'd been drunk. Obviously. But there was more to it than that, or else he wouldn't have this nagging doubt in the pit of his stomach, the lingering worry that he might have actually fucked up somehow. All he could dredge up, though, was the idea that he'd gotten in trouble - for what, he didn't know. Had he been drunk when he'd done it? That sounded like him.

His ears picked up the sound of the kangaroo bounding across the grass in his direction.

He vaguely remembered being... angry. Like, actually angry. And that was significant, because he spent so much time in a fog of weed, booze and dangerous experiments that it was rare for him to get angry. At worst, he got whiny, like a little kid. The last time he'd been angry, it had been when Gentoku - that warmongering bastard - had infected one of the Lupinrangers under his care with Nebula Gas, despite knowing she wasn't compatible with it. It had been the most genuinely angry he'd ever been.

But he remembered being blindly angry. He remembered shouting. Somebody had said something back, he didn't know what, but it had only made him angrier. And then... he was here. Because he'd gotten angry, and most likely had come here just to spite whoever or whatever it was that had made him angry.

Not that it made much difference. Because, in truth, Evolto Naja hadn't been very happy for a while. A long while. And it wasn't anything specific that had started it off. Nothing Dawn or a Ravensky or even any other Kobber had done. It hadn't even really started when Shouma, his cousin, had turned up. That hadn't helped though - not that he hated the kid, he was just a handful. Like a big, stupid dog on a sugar high. Except dogs didn't usually try to become heroes in spite of their simplistic, black-and-white view of the world around him.

The kangaroo had pulled up alongside him. He could see that it was glancing at him as it ambled forwards, sniffing in search of the tastiest  morsels.

No, Evolto'd been in a bad mood even before then. And as he sat there on the rock, the hot Australian sun beating down on him, the Martian was starting to put a name to the sense of worry and discontent in his stomach. It was...

And then he remembered the nightmare that he'd had, just before he woke up. The dead black sand. The dead grey Mars. The faces, screaming, accusing, condemning. The laughing masks of those he had, indirectly, created-

"Lovely mornin', cobber!

Evolto shook his head, and it was all gone. He turned his head to see only the kangaroo standing there.

He was less surprised than he should have been. And when he looked back on this moment later on, that would also trouble him. Because the fact that the kangaroo had spoken and had the pleasant and cheery lilt of a preschool teacher in her voice, should have at least made him do a double-take, if not shriek in horror. But he didn't do either of those things. Instead, he chose to glance back at the talking marsupial with the distracted look of somebody who was recovering from a night they didn't remember.

And maybe that wasn't the right reaction, he would later come to think. Maybe being desensitised to the strangeness of the universe was actually a bad thing.

"Is it?" he asked, still unsure as to wherever to take the word "cobber" as an insult or not.

"Somewhere in the world, it is!" The kangaroo did not seem to be bothered by his attitude, and instead dipped her head down to nibble at the short, coarse grass beneath. There was a moment of silence - inasmuch as the silence of the wild, with the deep rush of wind and rustling of grass always present in the ear, could be described as such.

Evolto wasn't sure what possessed him to say what he said next. Maybe he just needed to break the silence. Maybe everything that had been weighing on his mind like a blockage in a water pipe had finally reached maximum pressure and needed to be let out. Or perhaps he was hallucinating the entire thing due to crumbs of edibles still in his guts. But he said it, regardless.

"...do you think I'm beyond redemption?"

The kangaroo lifter her head from the grass and, still chewing, fixed him with the half-lidded stare that is the default expression of all kangaroos. Without much effort, it gave the impression of unimpressed boredom, that she was waiting for him to do something exciting and he wasn't currently living up to the hype. Evolto stared back, feeling deep down that he shouldn't take that kind of insult from something that kept her babies in a horrible skin bag on her stomach.

"I dunno," she said, at last. "D'you think you are?"

Evolto's eyes narrowed. "If I had any idea, I wouldn't be asking you."

"Fair dinkum, mate," said the kangaroo in that same upbeat manner. "But it's an odd question to be askin' me, right? I mean, I don't even know anythin' about you!"

Evolto blew out between his lips and leaned back slightly. Oh, boy. Might as well keep it brief - no kangaroo, talking or otherwise, would be able to comprehend his life story in detail.

"Well," he said, "I come from a noble family on a distant planet. In another dimension, too. I'm a genius and was very good at manipulating space gas. We used it to do things that shouldn't even be possible, but we did it anyway because reality is more of a suggestion to us than a hard rule."

"Uh-huh," interjected the kangaroo.

"There was a civil war, and my family took part in it. I stopped it, but that meant my entire race got trapped in a space-time pocket and I got thrown to that dimension's version of this planet. Then I ended up getting involved with a paramilitary terrorist organisation that wanted to exterminate all superhumans and instigate a global dictatorship." Evolto winced as those words came out of his mouth.

"Wow," said the kangaroo. He bristled to hear that one - it sounded vaguely condescending.

"I... turned a lot of people into monsters. I also might have killed a few people. Some of them were heroes who protected that world. We staged an invasion of another dimension - this one. Turns out, all the heroes we killed on our world were still alive here. But I stopped them from killing the big bad evil guy right off the bat. He'd taken the device that I used to stop the war and was holding it hostage to ensure I gave him what he wanted."

"Crickey." Okay, that was unnecessary, in Evolto's opinion. You're Australian, we get it, lady.

"But then he made somebody I cared about very sick, and that's when I'd had enough. He was going insane. I left him and joined up with the heroes, and I helped them win in the end, but... it was a very close thing. I ended up making a lot of people mad, and most of them... still don't trust me. Especially that Dawn Cosineau." Evolto snorted. "She can go fuck herself. Judgemental bitch."

There was an even longer, far more protracted silence. In the distance, a kookaburra let out its signature chattering cry and then abruptly fell silent.

"Well," said the kangaroo, at last, "sounds like you've had a pretty wild life, mate."

"Yep." Evolto smiled mirthlessly. "I'm a real wild card, me. Never know what I'm gonna do next."

"Proper larrikin." The kangaroo turned her head and nibbled at something vaguely bushy. "And what 'ave ya done to make up for it?"

The question was like a hammer blow to the skull. Evolto's expression betrayed nothing, but his mind screamed in panic as it reeled, knocked off balance by the words and their implication.

Because he'd never been asked that question. As far as he could remember, not a single person had directly asked him, to his face, what he'd done as penance for his acts under Faust. Not even the Kobbers. Oh, sure, Dawn held it against him, but she'd treated him more like a nuisance than anything, so it obviously wasn't that huge on her priority list. And there hadn't even been a grieving mother in a shawl, or a vengeance-seeking youth with a huge sword and stupid hair, to confront him about it, either of which was the usual cliché in such situations.

His mind continued to scream as it sought a handhold on the jagged rocks of memory to stop itself falling into an ocean of shit.

"...I helped them fight a bunch of villains," he tried, lamely. "And I got an organisation back home that's trying to undo the damage. Fighting old remnants of the bad guys, rebuilding, offering aid..."

He trailed off as he realised the kangaroo was staring intently at him. The unimpressed expression suddenly seemed more cutting than it had been.

"...I don't think that's gonna cut it, mate," she said, shortly.

Evolto bristled, anger rising in his chest. "The fuck do you mean?!"

"Look," said the kangaroo, "far be it from me to rock up to a bloke and tell 'im where to get off. But you ain't doing much good getting full off your head and joyridin' around the multiverse like a bored swaggie. Sounds to me like you're just ignoring all the crook stuff and hopin' it'll fix itself. And you know stuff like that doesn't heal that easy."

"And what if I can't heal it?" retorted the Martian? "What if, instead, I get condemned and judged by the people I pissed off? Or even by people I didn't even do anything to, just because the fact that I'm alive is offensive to them?"

"Now, that's a trickier problem," said the kangaroo, scratching herself. "You've got me there. But I reckon that what you're doing's worse, if not just as crook. You're acting like you didn't even do anything wrong, or that what you did back then doesn't bother you. And that doesn't look good from the outside, especially when your hands are as mucky as you say they are."

"So what?!" Evolto shocked himself with how quickly his voice rose. "Why should I care about what other people think of me at this point?! They can sit there and judge me all they want, but they haven't a goddamn clue what it was like! I'm not a cartoon villain over here! It's not that cut-and-dried!"

"Never said it was, mate!" said the kangaroo in the same infuriatingly level and upbeat manner. "Seems a bit odd, though, that you ask me about redemption, then go on about how you don't care about what others think. You need a word with yourself or something? Because last I checked, caring about what others think is a big part of redemption. Or d'you think you can go on lyin' about that?"

That was too much. Evolto stood up so quickly that something in the  nearby grass scurried away. His forked tongue flickered and his fangs stood out against his gums.

"Listen, you lean and tasty alternative to beef," he hissed, "I was in a fucked-up situation and I had to do fucked-up stuff to survive! Of course it bothers me! Why do you think I switched sides?! But I'm not gonna fucking sit on my ass and weep about how dark and troubled my past was! I've got a life to live, and I'm not going to live it by moping about it! And I'm certainly not going to spend the rest of it handing out apology cards to people who don't even want to hear it!"

The kangaroo stared at him, unfazed by his outburst, for an uncomfortably long time. Then she shrugged - an impressive feat when your shoulders are as broad as a kangaroo's.

"No need to split the dummy at me, mate," she said. "Go ahead and keep doing what you're doing, if that's what makes you happy. All I'm sayin' is, you can't run from your past. You ever watch The Lion King sober? And you can't find peace if you're not prepared to do right by the blokes and sheilas you've hurt. Runnin' away might seem easier, but it ain't helping anyone, least of all yourself."

The fact that she was so calm about it was only half of what was annoying the Martian. The other half was the sneaking suspicion was that she was correct. And he didn't fancy that idea for two very good reasons. Firstly, he'd be damned if a talking kangaroo, of all things, was going to talk anything resembling sense into him. And secondly, because if she was, then it meant he would actually have to do something about it, which... 

The image of the screaming faces came back to him.

...no. Just no.

"Whatever," he snarled. "You're not even really talking. You're just the crumbs of edibles in my stomach from two nights ago. I don't have to think about this ever again, if I don't want."

And he got up off the rock and, not even particularly knowing or caring which way he was going, set off across the Australian bush. The kangaroo watched him leave, ears twitching.

"Seems a decent bloke," she said to herself.

Then she went back to eating. So she didn't notice the drone swooping overhead, following Evolto as he stubbornly marched off in a direction that, unbeknownst to him, would lead him right to where he didn't want to be.

 Evolto Naja will continue to bother the Kobbers
in 2025

Kaydence's Vacation

WARNING: The following post is, like, really long. Maybe make a cup of coffee or geta snack while you read this.

 

-Day 3-

“‘Sup, choomies.”

Kaydence was no stranger to vlogging. She didn’t do it often - streaming was more of her thing - but she’d dabbled a few times. They’d been nothing fancy, merely a few trips to a holiday park or two, but it had been the current trend at the time and the technopath was nothing if not eager to jump on a trend if it meant more views and a bigger payout.

This, though… was the strangest vlog she’d ever done.

Mostly because it wasn’t some mathematically-curated holiday village. It was a large raft floating just off the shores of somewhere in the Kuwahawi island chain.

And it was already late morning. With Kuwahawi being as tropical as it was, not to mention it being mid-late springtime, it hadn’t taken long for the temperature to start climbing up. The air was as humid as the inside of a washing machine and the sun was glaring down on what felt like a full blast already. In the distance, dark, rumbling clouds threatened the chance of a storm - which was not ideal when one was on a piece of floating wood anchored miles from shore. Kaydence was extremely grateful she’d dressed light for this one - thin bikini top, short shorts, flip-flops… if she’d been wearing her usual outfits, she’d have baked by now.

“So, uh…” She flicked some of her bangs out of her eyes - although, with how sweaty she already was, it didn’t stop them sticking to her forehead - and grinned. “Long story short on this one. My coach asked me ‘hey, you wanna go on vacation’? And I was like ‘sure, where you wanna go?’ and then she said something about a tropical island and to meet her, like… three days after she’d left? And I honestly thought it was gonna be, like… some preem cabin overlookin’ the ocean? I didn’t think it was gonna be, well…”

She turned and swung the phone around slowly, giving the potential viewer a good, long look at her surroundings. Although there wasn’t much to look at aside from the great expanse of flat, still sea that glistened in the sunlight. A small boat - the one that had brought Kaydence here - was already a speck in the distance and growing smaller by the second, and the dark clouds had shifted, looking dangerously as though they would sideswipe the raft with whatever winds and rain they would bring.

There was, however, one very large consolation. And that came in the form of Julia Ravensky, who was tugging on the ropes that lowered the sails on the raft.

Oh, yes. This raft had sails. Among… other things. Kaydence took pains to pan the camera around, highlighting all the additions to what had presumably once been no more than a flat lump of wood. An enclosed fire pit and cooking station, a makeshift shelter, a washroom, a fishing chair platform - all of these encircled the raft, their distribution ensuring it didn’t

“As you can see,” said Kaydence as she panned the camera around, “my coach already got everythin’ ready. Shelter, fire pit, cooking stuff… the works. Yeah, she’s hardcore. And if y’all know who she is - and if you don’t, get the frag out from under that rock - then you’ll know I ain’t bullshitting. She’s done survival stuff since she was a chiddler, and she knows her shit back to front. Me? I’m, uh…”

“Could you not call me that, please, Kaydence? Chiddler. I know it’s just some slang term, I’m sure, but it sounds…off to me.” Julia poked her head in from the right side of the camera frame, adjusting a dully colored sweatband with one hand. “Mind if I hold this for a moment?”

“Uh, sure coach.” Kaydence handed the camera over. Julia was a bit more awkward in holding the camera to film herself, though that was more out of lack of practice. Kaydence could definitely see the changes from years past. When they’d met, she’d have actively avoided the camera, let alone made herself part of the Vlog.

“Now, as I’m sure some people would say, how is this a VACATION? Shouldn’t you be doing things in an easier way, instead of making your life harder? Well, yes, that can be a vacation. But if you just wanted to relax and indulge, well, you don’t have to change much. Especially in our lives. ESPECIALLY in our lives. We could probably have a dozen types of relaxing vacations just in our shared employer’s backyard. To me, a vacation is also about going out and doing something you don’t normally do. Moreso Kaydence than myself, but I’ve never done this sort of thing on an open salt water space. A lot of stuff sort of like it on land, and on some lakes, and I read some books, and have some more tucked aside to consult if need be…but to me, stretching your legs, learning some new things, keeping active, that’s a vacation. If you just want to lie somewhere and drink sweet things, well, that’s you. And yes, since I sort of sprang this on Kaydence, I went ahead and did the initial ground work. I like that sort of stuff. I suspect she wouldn’t. Hopefully what I can teach her she’ll never have to use in a bad crisis situation, but I don’t like predicting the possible future. Okay, handing it back Kaydence. I feel the wind, and I suspect you might get a trial by fire soon. Or water, rather.”

Julia vanished from the frame, the camera buffering around before Kaydence was holding it again, panning back to her own face. She suddenly looked a lot less sure of herself. And, if one peered closely, a little pale.

“...like she said. I never did any shit like this. Never roughed it in my life. Miaj panjo kaj paĉjo never even so much as took me on a camping trip. Not that there was much chance of that on Spero, the zen garden of rich assholes. So, uh… this is my first time doing anything like this. And I think coach knew that, which is why she asked me to wait until day three to come on over. It’s… gonna be rough for me, not gonna lie.

“But… it’s a challenge. And you should all know what I’m like with those.”

She made another valiant effort to brush her sweat-slickened hair out of her eyes, seemed to realise the futility of it and gave up with a sigh.

“Anyway, I gotta go. Coach wants to help me get my sea legs. Wherever the fuck those are.”

Of course, she kept it on recording. Just so she could record the time lapse montage of all the times she nearly fell over. And when the rainstorm hit and Kaydence got to test the shelter.

It wasn’t bad. It didn’t completely stop the wind, and some water did drip inside, but Julia mostly didn’t stay in the shelter with her, going out into the mild storm (SURE DIDN’T SEEM MILD TO HER) and making adjustments. Ardent WAS on board, but he was essentially napping in a box. Julia had said that, worst came to worst, he’d basically wrap Kaydence up like a cocoon so she could sleep undisturbed from moisture, cold, and motion.

Julia HAD also brought chocolate. There was roughing it and then there was outright suffering, after all.

Heir to the Throne (2/2)

WARNING: As before, the following contains themes not suited for younger audiences or those of more sensitive dispotion. Viewer discretion is advised.

"An Unhallowed Cradle..."

Samuel Baker had never seen Victoria Thorne act the way she was acting now. Granted, he hadn't known anything about her until last year, and he hadn't learned very much about her even then. He Still only really knew three things, even now - that she was headmistress of an Alchemist school in London, that she was a skilled swordswoman and that she stood no nonsense from anyone. She was like Mary Poppins, if Mary Poppins flashed a piece everywhere she went and would skewer anyone who looked at her funny.

She was not a woman who flinched at anything, in short. So to see her now, looking suddenly and starkly haunted, was a shock to both the former Destined Hero and to Horace Irving, who was still bound and kneeling on the floor.

"It is... not something Alchemists like to acknowledge." The words came out of Victoria Thorne's mouth slowly, haltingly and unwillingly, as though she were trying to free a stubborn toffee from the back teeth. "It is one of the worst crimes of the Decadence, when they tried to do something far worse with homunculi than just making slaves or experimental fodder. It... it allows complete and total manipulation of genetic material. An Alchemist isn't limited to just sperm and eggs, or raw flesh, if they can throw it into an Unhallowed Cradle. Whatever you want, within reason, you can grow it."

She directed a piercing look at Sam. "Do you remember me telling you about the Stalingrad Incident?"

Sam blinked. "Um... no. Because you didn't. You just said 'let's not repeat the Stalingrad Incident' and then didn't elaborate no matter how many times I asked you."

"Correct. Because we don't talk about the Stalingrad Incident."

"...then why-?"

"But," Victoria carried on smoothly, as if the blonde hadn't spoken, "the Unhallowed Cradle was a major factor. The things it made possible, as well as what it could potentially make Thus, part of the global ban on homunculi included the destruction of every Cradle that could be found. But, thanks to a little... shoddy record-keeping on the Soviet's part, not all of them were accounted for."

And it was at this moment that Horace Irving, never the brightest bulb in the box to begin with, thought this was a prime opportinity to chip in once more.

 "That's right," he said, out loud with his entire mouth. "And do you have any idea how much a single one of them costs on the black market? Never mind making an entire new one from scratch. Which I'm pretty sure isn't possible anyway, because the original blueprints-"

There was a noise like ice being cut in half, and the tip of Blue Ben was suddenly much closer to the sweating Horace's face.

"Consider yourself lucky that, right now, we're not considering you fully culpable," Victoria hissed. "But the possession of an Unhallowed Cradle cannot be excused. It's the key to creating far worse things than abominations in mason jars. If we can prove you actually possess one, and no doubt we'll try our best, then you can expect us to leverage the full extent of the law and Alchemical Lore against you. Understood?"

Horace didn't even try to speak this time. A sword blade in your face was generally a good warning that you'd already put your foot in it.

Sam huffed. "Still, it's not much to go on, is it? A high-school dropout, paid by some mystery woman to make monsters in a warehouse? If you even believe even half of what this loser's saying."

"I wouldn't be so dismissive, Mr. Baker," said Victoria, still keeping her sword pointed at the trembling Horace. "It tracks with what we know about him and why he moved to this area of London to begin with. And who better to commit your crimes for you than somebody completely beneath notice? Nobody would ever suspect a man so average the eye slides right off of him."

"You don't have to be so hurtful," Horace murmured. But nobody listened to him.

"This is not a man of initiative," Victoria went on. "He's very obviously acting on behalf of somebody else, even if it is of his own choice. He'll be punished, no doubt, but until we have the full facts of the case, pinning the entire blame on him will be like throwing tomatoes at the puppet and not the man with his hand up it's arse. And we can only sort that out once the main business is taken care of."

"Speaking of which," said Sam, "I wonder how he's getting on with that."

There was a brief silence. Turning his head, Horace noted that the woman - Victoria - had suddenly gone silent and stony-faced. This seemed to surprise Sam yet again, who looked at her as though he thought she might have wandered off with the fairies. The silence dragged out a little longer.

"...maybe I was asking too much," she muttered. "I know it has to be done, and we couldn't wait for the Kingsguard to arrive, but... is he even up to it? Would it not have been better to have him report back and then...?

"Oh, he's fine," said Sam. "He's twenty now. He can handle himself."

"Unless he meets the Big One," said Horace, without even thinking about it.

"The what?" 

"Oh, that's the one that got too big for the-"

And it was only upon looking up and seeing the faces of Victoria Thorne and Samuel Baker that Horace Irving realised the full scale of how unbelivably fucked he was. He thought he still was only waist deep in the metaphorical quicksand. But the incredulous anger radiating from both of his captors was like a splash of ice-cold water to the face. He now fully understood that he was, in fact, neck deep in it, and there were no amount of stray jungle vines to pull him free this time.

"...I should really learn to keep my mouth shut," he lamented.

Heir to the Throne (1/2)

WARNING: The following contains themes not suited for younger audiences or those of more sensitive disposition. Viewer discretion is advised.

Scientists are actually preoccupied with accomplishment. So they are focused on whether they can do something. They never stop to ask if they should do something.
- Michael Crichton, Jurassic Park

~Coastal London, England, Mantraverse~

Horace Irving's day had not been off to a good start, because he'd cut himself shaving.

And that was saying a lot. Because Horace Irving was the kind of person whom, if they stood still for long enough, would fade into the background noise of the universe at large. He was unmemorable in the same way that empty space is - nobody paid much mind to him or, even if pushed, remembered him at all. Friends would have called him a quiet sort and keenly interested in Alchemy, except that would require him to have any quality remarkable enough to obtain even one friend.

The disinfectant stung like a red-hot needle as he rubbed it over the gash on his neck. He clenched his teeth and tried to focus on the shape of his own nose instead.

He wasn't even a real Alchemist - and he would fully admit it if you asked him. He'd dropped out of St. Jerome's Alchemical Academy because the very mundanity of his being had translated to his own schoolwork. It wasn't that he was stupid - far from it. But it wasn't that he was smart, either, which was the problem. He'd sat so painfully in the middle when it came to grades that, in a rare moment of self-reflection, he'd realized that it held no career prospects whatsoever. 

And for several years, he'd aimlessly drifted down the current of the great river of life, not particularly caring if he touched shore or not. Until this job had come along, that is.

The sticking-plaster was layered carefully over the wound.

It still baffled him, even now, that he'd been paid so much to do what he was doing right now. Of all the people in all the world to find to do it, why on earth would you ever pick a failed Alchemist who nobody ever remembered? Surely, there were people actually much more qualified to do it than him? And why...?

He looked at himself in the mirror and heaved a sigh. Mostly because his eyes kept wanting to slide off what it saw and look at the wall behind him instead. Not even his own eyes wanted to remember him.

Oh, well. The money was good. It had bought half-decent equipment - not the professional stuff, but close enough that it didn't matter. The flat he was in was roomy enough and out of the way of anyone who might ask awkward questions. No landladies to come knocking for rent, no neighbours peering. It was close enough to the warehouse district that he didn't need to waste money on a taxi, so no paper trail there.

And the results were promising. Give it a few more months...

He stepped out of the bathroom, his cut still twinging. There was a lot to do today. Check on the cultures, top up the blood - he'd have to buy more chickens soon - get some milk, keep the Unhallowed Cradle ready for-

And then the front door burst open, and Horace Irving's day became significantly worse.

Cutting Room Floor 2023 (part 2)

 Cancelled Plot: The Shadow of Evil

• This was a secondary plot to be run alongside and complementary to One World, One Ocean. It would have served as a final wrapup for Ultraman Trigger's story and been an alternative end for Cleve Sharpe as a villain.
• The idea was, instead of Rahab, the merfolk would have worshipped Ghatanothoa, the final boss monster and true villain of Ultraman Tiga. Ghatanothoa was the insane spawn of Cthulhu and the dark god that the Giants of Darkness, with Trigger's unwitting help, reawakened to destroy the original Ultra civilization of Agama and claim dominion. They were foiled by Tiga, Trigger's father, who destroyed Ghatanothoa's physical form at the cost of his own life, but a Shadow, the disembodied intelligence of the monster, remained in the spot where he was killed - the oceans off the coast of Whalestrand.
• As One World, One Ocean progressed, signs that all was not well would make themselves apparent. Giant monsters would rise out of the ocean and into the city, neccesitating the Kobbers pull out their big guns to drive them away or kill them. Dark visions would afflict many of the populace - Valério and Trigger most of all. The merfolk would, in fact, be praying to Ghatanothoa - either the captive merfolk or the outsider pod would be responsible.
• It would also transpire that the pearl of Sharpe's collection was an artefact he'd ignoranrly dubbed the Eternity Core. It was, in fact, Ghatanothoa's heart, sundered from his body when Tiga sacrificed himself to destroy the evil god. Through the Eternity Core, Ghatanothoa would influence many monsters and villains through the Whalestrand season.
• By the climax of the story, Sharpe would attempt to escape by boat, taking the Eternity Core with him. Passing over the Shadow as he sailed, Sharpe's body would be hijacked by the Eternity Core, with the Shadow taking control of this new form. This humanoid form of Ghatanothoa, dubbed Megalothoa, would turn its insane wrath upon Whalestrand, seeking to restart its dark conquest of Earth, but would be destroyed for good by Ultraman Trigger and the Kobbers.
• In truth, the more I thought about this, the less enthused I was for it. In my mind, Trigger's story was done. He'd already faced his demons several times in the Agama years and there wasn't really any more I could drag out from him. Having him face the original monster that bested him and killed his father might have been an interesting angle to attack his character, recalling Agony's words about how futile the Ultranian species' battle against evil seemed to be on the surface. But I didn't really fancy going through what I felt was the same motions over and over from those years. Trigger had been through enough trauma, in my mind. It was time to let the boy rest and enjoy his hard-won peace.

Cancelled Storyline: The Other Vent

• This one's... weird. It came about shortly after I decided to have Sharpe send an assassn after Vent. I'd been musing on Vilfred's attraction to Vent at the time, because while I was fully aware that it could only end badly, I didn't really... want it to end badly, per se? The way Aqualand plot was shaping up at the time, I felt that the inevitable conclusion was that poor Vilf would be out of a job due to Sharpe firing him - which technically did happen, if you count a Stand punch to the jaw as a firing notice. So I wanted to give the poor guy some form of happy ending.
• The general idea was that Vent would end up having his own Easter, of sorts. But while Easter's development was due to convoluted multiverse stuff I still don't understand, Vent's was... a different matter. The plan was, following the assassination attempt, Vent would begin constructing a backup body in case something like that happened again. While he's normally against making backups of himself, as he sees it as making light of the experience of living, he would soon realize that, on a practical level, it would be a neccesary evil.
• Unfortunately, something would happen to the backup body. That was all I had down in my mind - something would happen. Either it would be stolen, or something would go wrong when Vent tried to download himself into it. The end result was that the body would go walkabout in some fashion. The Kobbers would have to track it down and recover it. Beyond these steps, I didn't really have any idea for what would come in the middle, although thinking about it now some ideas begin to take shape.
• Whatever the intervening steps, the end result was the creation of a 'second' Vent, seperate from the original. Bearing some of Vent's memories, but having a personality closer to the canon Mega Man ZX version of the character. He would use the MEGA system from that game as well, and would eventually hook up with Vilfred as a sort of apology for the original Vent putting him through all the trouble of facing up against Sharpe.
• This new Vent would have also needed a new name to differentiate himself. I was thinking either 'Thomas', meaning 'twin', or Valentine. Because Easter.
  
  ...actually, 'Valentine Twain Cosine' does sound like a JoJo name.
• If you noticed that this looks like me trying to have my cake and eat it, then congratulations, you've figured out why I dropped this! I ruminated on this idea for a month, including up to and after Vent's actual assassination and the battle with Tomas 'Smoke' Vrbada. But at that point I was starting to get turned off by the whole 'Vilfred's hot for Vent' thing, which I suspected was starting to raise eybrows. and I knew that me trying to pull this off would definitely raise some eyebrows. So I quietly shelved the idea and never made any hints or steps towards it.
• On a side note, I considered Kamen Rider Shinobi instead of Smoke as Vent's assassin. But then Mortal Kombat 1 was announced, and... well, there it is!

Cancelled Plot: Tall Tales

• This one actually came about during the second Agama season. I hung onto it for the entire year to see how I felt when the Whalestrand season came around, but decided to drop it in the end as I'd completely lost interest and it didn't really seem fitting for the setting.
• The plot would revolve around characters who were descendants of figures from American folklore and tall tales, banding together as a sort of motely crew united by their shared heritage. The crew would consist of:
• Captain Jennifer Stormalong. A talented sailor and able to communicate with sea life. She was the leader of the group and spoke in a sterotypical Boston patois.
• Peter Bunyan. A quiet and mild-mannered young man, only seven or eight feet tall compared to his giant of an ancestor. Very strong and good with an axe.
• Jolyne Magarac. Able to turn her skin into solid iron and heat up her body. Loud and scrappy.
• Ronnie Appleseed. Lover of nature, but not in a spaced-out granola guy way. Could control plants. Was probably in a relationship with Peter.
• 'Eagle-Eye' William The direct descendant of Pecos Bill and Slue-Foot Sue. Owned a magic lasso which could tame anything. The only sane member of the group.
• The entire conceit of their story was Jennifer assembling her crew in a bid to try and find adventures comparable to their ancestors and write their name in the history books. But in the modern world, even with the kind of strange things that Kobbers face, there just simply isn't enough untamed wilderness and fearsome critters for the kind of impossible feats that Paul Bunyan, Pecos Bill etc. But Jennifer would keep dragging her crew into more and more dangerous adventures in a bid to make a name for herself.
• Eventually, the other members of the crew would turn on Jennifer and tell her to stop living in the past and that the world has no more room for big folkloric heroes like themselves. Crushed and full of injured pride, Jennifer would steal Eagle-Eye's lasso and try to prove them wrong by fighting a dangerous monster on her own, eventually becoming the villain through her bllody-minded determination to become a legend. 

Cancelled Plot: The Ocean Hunter

•  I don't want to give too much away about this one. Basically, if you ever heard me talk about that old light gun game The Ocean Hunter, the general premise was similar to that. The Kobbers would help the main characters of that game protect Whalestrand from the Six Great Monsters attacking ships and shore:
• Kraken, a giant octopus
• Leviathan, a megalodon
• Charybdis, a giant anglerfish
• Karkinos, a giant and highly agressive crab,
• Ahuizotl, an elamosaurus
• Midgardsorm, a huge worm. This thing's boss battle would involve it swallowing the Kobbers, nd you'd have to journey through its body cavity and fight its sentient heart.
• There would be character development between the lead characters, of course. Chris, the Player 2 character, would grow resentful of Torel, the Player 1 character, for hogging all the spotlight and treating ocean hunting like a game. Perhaps Chris would have been the one becoming Kamen Rider Poseidon...
• Mini bosses from the game would have made appearances, too. Naga, Vlitra and Kaliyah the oarfish would have shown up, as would the shark triplets Kerberos, the giant jellyfish Medusa and Umi-Bozu the octopus.
• I don't wanna spoil too much, but... I didn't pick the name Rahab out of a hat. You'll just have to sit and wait for 2024 to find out more on that account.
  

Cutting Room Floor: One World, One Ocean (2023)

The following is a list of stuff that got cut from my 2023 plot. To spare myself from doing huge reams of text, for the sake of my own sanity, I'm trying to condense this into a bulleted list. Any further questions will be answered in the comments. Note that some of this may be reworked into plots for next year, depending on my mood - I won't say which, but you'll know which ones it'll be when/if I do them.

Rejected Plot: The Last Cult

• My initial plot idea for this season was in direct reference to Gorillaz' new album, Cracker Island. Essentially, a book called "The Book of MAN" would appear in stores around Whalestrand, with people who'd read it acting oddly as a result. In turn, strange events would happen on an offshore island called Cracker Island, prompting Kobber investigation.
• It would be revealed almost immediately that Murdoc and the rest of Gorillaz were starting 'The Last Cult' on Cracker Island as a means of spreading the band's (well, Murdoc's) personal philosophy and to promote their upcoming album. Unfortunately, their efforts would face a pincer attack of complications - the actions of the Forever Cult next door and Russel's upcoming predictions of 'The Rupture', an apocalyptic event.
• The Book of MAN would also be revealed to be an acronym - Book of Murdoc Alphonce Niccals.
  
• By this time, the characters would be much older and match their current incarnations.
• Noodle and Stephen would have broken up due to the latter not being able to handle the reality of dating a member of a highly popular and scrutinized band, with Murdoc's decision to start a cult being the straw that broke the camel's back. As a result, she would be much more dour and less talkative than usual.
•  2D would have started getting a big head due to being named the 'Chosen One' of the Last Cult, slipping into something closer to his more arrogant Demon Days persona. He would have gotten quite friendly with the female leader of the Forever Cult next door - a bad decision.
• Russel would have essentially become a non-entity due to being completely whacked out from staring into TV static trying to divine the secrets of the universe. Maybe the Kobbers could have scooped him. He would have been running around in the background trying to prepare for the 'Rupture'.
  
• Murdoc would still be Murdoc, obviously.
  
• Scenes planned include: Visiting Murdoc during a mass of the Last Cult, Murdoc trying to pitch his 'Essence of Murdoc' bathwater at people and rescuring 2D from the Forever Cult, who would turn out to be the actual villains.
• By the end, Stephen would have returned and reconciled with Noodle, although wherever they would rekindle their relationship was up in the air. Murdoc, rather than bailing and leaving his band to get arrested, would take the blame. The Last Cult would be disbanded and all copies of the Book of MAN recalled and destroyed. The Rupture would turn out to be nothing at all since Russel read the clues wrong, disappointing him but snapping him out of his trance. The album would be a success, however. And maybe a Smirnoff cocktail party would follow.
  
• The ultimate lesson of the plot would be 'Utopia is what U make it'. Tomorrow comes today and it's the same as yesterday. So rather than chasing the impossible, work hard now with what you have so that tomorrow can be a little better. Also, don't drink Essence of Murdoc.

I dropped this plot because I realized there really wasn't anything going on with it. There weren't really any things for Kobbers to do that I could think of, besides investigating and possibly a battle with the Forever Cult. It wasn't so much a plot as it was a series of happenings, and there wasn't much reason for Kobbers to get involved in any way outside of a final battle. Also, I didn't feel comfortable writing stuff involving a cult, or subjecting people to the unhappy revelation of Stephen and Noodle breaking up.

Plot Events Overall

• There were plans made for if any of the Kobbers decided infiltrating Sharpe Manor was in order. It would have been revealed that Sharpe would have had a bunch of supernatural security to keep his mansion safe, including a pet that had a Stand akin to Pet Shop from JoJo. Any Kobber infiltrating this mansion would have faced this pet.
• More artefacts from Sharpe would have been present or made appearances. 
• Plans were drawn up to include the Ruinous Quartet from Pokémon Scarlet and Violet, who would have been artefacts bought by Sharpe for his collection and would be awakened by Sharpe's ever increasing greed, needing to be captured or subdued.
• The mezzotint is a reference to the M. R. James story, and at one point there would be an actual event where somebody got trapped inside it with the ghost and needed to be rescued.
• Other artefacts from M. R. James stories planned to appear include the whistle from O, Whistle And I'll Come To You, My Lad, the papers of Canon Alberic, the wood carving from The Stalls of Barchester Cathedral and the cursed crown from A Warning To The Curious. I was in an M. R. James mood during that time period :P
  
• The ghost of the Beast of Gévaudan would have stalked the grounds and become an obstacle for the Kobbers to fight.
• Stand Arrows, Majora's Mask, a piece of a Dalek and various Sentai/Rider artefacts were planned to appear.
  
• Following the Brawl, the plan was to have another pod of Merfolk make their appearance. Led by the son of Boreal aka Heartful One, this pod would have been highly aggressive and distrustful of humans, becoming a secondary antagonist alongside Sharpe as they tried to influence humans into releasing the Merfolk inside Aqualand. The Kobbers would have had to face them in order to prove that they could be trusted.
• Rahab was going to be a much bigger presence in this plot, possibly tied to the second Merfolk pod, but with the focus shifting towards Sharpe as the main villain, this couldn't be worked in.
• The second part of the Mermaid Rescue was going to be much different. It would have been an actual raid on Aqualand and not a different facility. Knaggs would have played a vital role, and it would have ended with one of the Merfolk dying due to Knaggs' actions. This would have infuenced Vilfred's character development, briefly shattering him but increasing his resolve to fight Sharpe.
• I was planning to use a lot more music from Endless Ocean. Unfortunately, I listened to a whole bunch of it, which made me realize that, as fitting as it was, I didn't like a single instance of it. So I stopped using it after the one moment.

Heroes

• Vilfred and Vent's first meeting was planned to be slightly different. Vent would have startled Vilf into falling into the tank, wherupon Vent would try to fish him out, only to fall in. Both would be rescued by Blue, establishing that, unlike the other captive merfolk, she was recognizing the potential good in humans.
• Speaking of, Vilfred's attraction towards Vent would have spanned the entire season and formed a major crutch of his character development. His idolization of Vent as a model Kobber, while played for laughs at first, would have eventualy started to affect his judgement as he went out of his way to try and impress his new mentor, not knowing about Vent's own marital situation despite idolizing him. There might have even been a moment where Vilfred impulsively kissed Vent, causing their working relationship to crack a bit and leaving Vilfred wracked with guilt enough for Sharpe and/or Knaggs to get the drop on him. I pulled back on this entire thing and ended it prematurely because I was starting to get the nagging sensation that people would think the entire thing was weird and kinda creepy.
• On the other hand, the plot was originally heaving much harder towards Vilfred and Blue having an attraction to each other, with a scene planned where the two of them, ah... re-enacted The Shape of Water, if you get my drift. If I had gone through with my plans of offing Blue, it would have left Vilfred heartbroken and driven by vengeance, which leads to...
• Vilfred was originally intended to have the ability to completely understand Merfolk language, which I hinted at early in the beginning. As a result, he would have have nightmares of Rahab's approach as he heard the despairing cries of the Merfolk. This would culminate in Rahab trying to influence Vilfred to take vengeance for the suffering of the trapped merfolk, which would eventually manifest as Vilfred becoming an actual Kamen Rider - Kamen Rider Poseidon, controlled by Rahab's will.
• Of course, none of that went in because there was literally no time anymore and the focus was now completely on Sharpe as a villain. Not to say that the threat of Rahab is gone, however...
  
• Grey was planned to be a lot more anti-heroic, threatening staff members and actively killing one. I dropped this one like a hot potato because it was too close to the plot's overall inspiration.
• Kaydence's character development would have taken a lot longer than what it turned out. She would have dropped training with Julia when it became too hard and, following the Brawl, would have tried to use martial arts braindances and other VR sims to cheat her way into becoming stronger. This would have developed into an addiction, which would then spiral into actual cyberpsychosis that needed a healthy dose of Kobber fist to shake her out of it.
  
  As you all saw, I began to regret sending Kaydence into the Suspense when I did because then it looked like I was skipping too much of her character development, that she hadn't had the time to show off what she could do on her own and that the opportunity for stuff like this would be lost. Of course, that's all been worked out and I'm generally okay with what I have now, but I still kind of regret not going through with it to begin with and I wish I'd taken more time on her development. That said, nobody's perfect - people do backslide into bad habits and ideas sometimes...
  

Villains

• Sharpe being descended from DIO was a last-minute addition. He was intended to originally be just a human, albeit with good fighting skills as a Bartitsu/cane fighting practitioner. He would have also interacted with the Kobbers in public more, trying to win them over by being his usual smarmy self.
  
• Knaggs was going to be involved a lot more in the plot, being much more of a backstabbing prick than he ended up being. In the final raid on Aqualand, he would have shown up and, identifying that Vilfred had feelings for Blue, would have held her hostage and threatened to kill her and/or the entireity of the Merfolk population unless the Kobbers backed off. The ensuing scuffle would have killed Knaggs, but also resulted in one of the Merfolk (possibly Blue or Grey) dying.
• The Jyamato were thrown in to give Del something to do with his Geats Riders. Needless to say, it didn't work out :P
• There would have been more to do with the Cyberpsychoes and a bigger examination of what causes the condition. Kaydence would ultimately admit that becoming a cyberpsycho is one of her greatest fears - she's terrified of the idea of not being in control of her mind, having already endured living in a world where she had little control of her own life.
• I was gonna have a brief moment where Arktos, the villain from the German film Tabaluga, showed up as a one-off fight solely because he was voiced by Benedict Campbell, aka King K. Rool. I didn't go through with it because I imagined the responses would have been a collective "Wait, who?"