New Beginning 23: One for the Record Books

[Marvelous Miscreant]

"Narrator, Welcome! How are you liking my little Soiree? Are you enjoying Kethencia?"

[The Narrator]

"Yea, but it's seeming uneventful...."  Narrator said stretching, "I was wanting something a little fight-y-er."

"Also, I've suffered a mental loss, an escapee I can't seem to find....."

--
Derek A. Haynes
Lead Tutor
Destined for Greatness: Academic Services

[Marvelous Miscreant]

"I apologize if the party isn't to your liking. I myself was just thinking it was lacking a certain something. But hey, you can't win 'em all..."

[Gentleman Vaultboy]

(It's nowhere near as grandiose as your first one.)

[The Narrator]

True, but I get bored easy. But nonetheless, PU needed us?

--
Derek A. Haynes
Lead Tutor
Destined for Greatness: Academic Services

[Celadon's Penultimate]

The Penultimate was on the verge of wandering off in the opposite direction after Marvelous, when he sensed another familiar presence. It was at least a fraction of an entire presence with whom he required an audience ASAP. Through a crowd of mages, vampires, werewolves, elves, Gallifreyans, Martians, immortals, subhumans, Inhumans, mutants, Raxacoricofallipatorians, sports fans and various other assorted freaks, that presence--though it didn't look it--was just about the freakiest.

As the strobe lights coursed across the undulating crowds, the Penultimate made his way through the masses, side-stepping, sliding past, parting ways, begging quick pardons. When he came to it, he rose up, and levitated across the Mermaid Pool, passed around the ring where a Cyclops boxer was busy knocking the living daylights out of an Ogre, and parted the crowds gathered to watch the fourth Full-Contact Origami Tourney.

Down the short staircase he descended, grabbing a drink of tea from one of the servants' trays along the way, as he made his way onto the pavilion, past the back terrace. At last, he saw the source of the presence. One had made herself known. It had been a long time since that first time they'd met (one of perhaps just two or three times), but he'd know that eccentric whiff of otherworldly intensity anywhere. Like the stark ozone of a lightning bolt striking horizontal through a busy hookah bar.

The Penultimate would have tapped her shoulder, but thought better of it.

Instead, he just cleared his throat, and after greeting his friends, The Marvelous Miscreant, The Narrator and Bug (whose serendipity it was to have caught up to her first), addressed her by name, "Ahem...Miss One, if I'm not mistaken?"

[Philote]

Miss Shield floats up from her seat until she is hovering over the floor. "Dash, will you be joining us?"

"Do you even need me?" he asks

"Not particularly"

"Then I've got other duties to return to"

"Stand back then please"

Dash takes a couple steps back and those running the restaurant just stare as they wait for the show to happen.

"Don't get to disorientated now boys" Miss Shield says as she hovers a little higher.

Her body glows blue again as it did before and the spot below where she hovers begins to shine the same light. Spreading out from below where she floated, the light wraps around and rises as it forms a box around the three of you. The restaurant table and chairs become covered as well until the only things left out of the glow are Vault and Knight. Once everything is covered, Miss Shield reverses the process and the box surrounding you all begins to fall.

Dash, the restaurant, and even the seat Knight was sitting at are all gone. Replacing them is a golden horizon stretching out in all directions. You all float weightlessly in this new space and a large mansion floats parallel to you as well. Circling the mansion as a focus point, many doors fill the space out to the horizon.

[Marvelous Miscreant]

Marv half-turned to see The Penultimate and the woman he'd addressed.

"Hmmm? I didn't notice you two there. Welcome!"

[Gentleman Vaultboy]

Knight is laughing and clapping his hands joyfully.  "Oh ghosts, how wonderful. Look at this place."

Vault could not. Despite the warning the teleportation had thrown him for a loop and he had the nauseating sense that he was falling. He waved his arms in the air, desperate to find his floating-in-a-gravity-less-abyss legs. Finally pulling himself into a position that had at least some dignity, he let the surreal beauty of the scenery was over him.

"It's a bit ostentatious, isn't it?" he said dully. "And it's not a very good spot to build if you ask me. There's no lawn. What if you want to take a walk outside?"

"How do you even know someone build it?" Knight asked.

"It's a mansion. They don't just pop into existence."

He got the distinct impression that, behind that mask, Knight was giving him the pitying look that adults give children when they sad something stupid, which was just insulting because Vault was sure he was the older of the two. That was when he noticed something.

"You left the fish sitting in the middle of main street." He said quickly, reasserting himself as an intelligent man.

"I know." Knight said, crushing Vaults weak counter offensive like it was an ugly gnat. "It's being run by a part of me, though. If there's a way for it to find me again, it will."

Seeing this was one battle he wasn't going to win, he turned to Shield. "So, what is this place?"

[Celadon's Penultimate]

The Penultimate returned the Miscreant's greeting, but somewhat less jovial than just thoughtful, "And it's a good thing we should happen to meet up at just this time. Not long ago, I came across some rather interesting stuff that you all might find interesting. I'm not even sure it's safe to discuss here, verbally or mentally. Should we maybe pop into an observatory, or a tower somewhere away?"

[The Narrator]

 "I'm for it!" Narrator exclAims!



--
Derek A. Haynes
Lead Tutor
Destined for Greatness: Academic Services

[Philote]

Dash walks out of the restaurant and scratches his head as he realizes that he has been left to care for an undead fish.

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"This is Haven" Miss Shield replies. "Its an interdimensional hub that has existed for at least as long as, or longer, than my dimension has existed. One of the first Elementals in my dimension once traveled here, but we don't yet have any history of what happened before then. It exists in the space between the borders of dimensions, or at least it used to before Philote ate it"

She gives off the last sentence with a confused shrug.

"The mansion is the control system, but we can head directly for the door we need."

[Gentleman Vaultboy]

Vault looks at the floating doors. "What, just walk right up and knock?"

Knight was already doing flutter kicks past the two of them, taking in the whole of the view.

"Which door is it we need?" he asks

[Philote]

"Make your way over to the door marked with the meteor" she tells them. "Knight, it should be the one leading to the dimension where your sealing spell is being held, you might be able to recognize something about it. Remember though, they aren't rude, just non-sentient."

[Marvelous Miscreant]

"We can speak in the conference room," Marv suggests," KARMA can insulate us and make sure nobody eavesdrops. Good enough?"

[Ericus Europaeus (Bug)]

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[Marvelous Miscreant]

Marv exhales an exasperated sigh and massages his temples, "Bug....neither K.A.R.M.A., nor I have seen your sock....It would be a gross misappropriation of resources to task a supernatural computer linked with every system in and on this planet to find a single sock. In the future, maybe keep a closer eye on your footwear? Hmmm?"

[Celadon's Penultimate]

Shaking his head, with a smile, at Bug, the Penultimate returns to the matter at hand, "We honestly do have bigger fish to fry."

[Gentleman Vaultboy]

"Meteor door, Rodger!" Knight says, and with a huge flap of his arms he off toward the nearest group of doors.

Vault tries the same maneuver, but only succeeds at spinning end over end in one place. A kick of the legs sends him listing off away from the doors, a furious lash of the arm causing him to spin like a top instead of stopping. "Is there some trick to this?" He asks.

[Marvelous Miscreant]

"...And I'd like to hear about it. So, shall we adjourn to the conference room?"