Morpheus Road

Cyril's ship landed and dropped them off near an ocean on Heaven. It was all very dramatic.

Artik blinked. "Right. So, Saiyans and Solar Saiyans can withstand enormous pressure, or lacktherof, and oxygen deprivation, if we have our tails. What about the Seraphim, Cyril?"

Makoto wondered what they would steal from next

"Oxygen deprivation I can handle." Cyril said, "But extreme pressure?" Cyril looked thoughtful as she tapped her foot. "Give me a moment." Cyril's hands glowed white and ki poured off her in sheets. The ki wrapped itself around her in a whirlwind of glowing energy. Cyril was now back in his original form, almost. Now he had a tail and his build was stockier. He was a Saiyan. Cyril looked wiped. "There."

Artik found the ocean and dove in. He had no need to draw this out. He opened his mouth to speak, and it worked. However, water still rushed in. 'Right,' Artik projected his thoughts to the other two. 'There it is, down there.' He pointed at a glowing, green and black line. 'You forgot to carrry the three!'

All at once, the world was fixed.

And they woke up. Artik struggled against his restraints. "This leather is something even stronger than Ravafibres. So, what fresh hell is this?" He looked to his right and saw Makoto also tied up, and Cyril tied to his left. And in front of him was Cyril again. "Err. Cyril. Have there always been... fucking shapeshifters!"

Evil Cyril grinned, "The simulated reality served its purpose. For instance, we learned how to start the human/Seraphim war. And man is it working. The greedy, angry, corrupted humans need land, and on their best day, they're well, savages."

Artik nodded, "Right. So, the simulation was flawed. But... it was fime until the fourth dimension was introduced. Time travel. It couldn't handle it, so things turned to goo. And I... Turned to goo. Fourth dimesnion. Goo. Time travel. Travel. Travel. Trave... Tr...."

Evil Cyril laughed, "You died almost right after being plugged in. Your mind remained in the machine, and tried to save your friends, and now... you've been ghosting, Sun King. And now you eclipsed." He paused, "His bringing the Cosmic Dicks back made us realize it was time."

Ryuzaki woke up, watching all this. He was the farthest chair on Cyril's side. "Damn."

"Fucking..." Cyril exhaled sharply. "The Oneiroi are gone!" Cyril strained against his bonds uselessly. That transformation had wiped him out. "Gone! The Seraphim were victorious!" Sparks of white ki crackled across Cyril's skin as he got upset. "Twice!"

Evil Cyril tutted, "Don't be stupid Lord of Heaven," he spat out this last part like an insult, "We have always been here. Longer than even your silly race of Seraphim!" Evil Cyril looked pleased and almost gave a sigh of content. "It has been so long since our name was spoken. How did you know us, Lord of Heaven?" For now Evil Cyril maintained an amiable demeanor, but there was an underlying cruelty in his voice.

"After your defeat I decided it was best I researched our ancient history. You lot are very elusive, but when you do come up it is plain. The legions of Oneiroi are hard to play down." Cyril muttered. "The Oneiroi are shapeshifters with a kind of hive mind. Their preferred form is what you saw on Halloween. Demons of all sizes. They have strong telepathic abilities and are notable for the terrifying dreams and hallucinations they bring." Cyril rattled on to inform his friends. Any knowledge would serve as a tactical advantage.

Ryuzaki was trying to figure something out. 'What was I doing in there to begin with, if they only met me in the simulation?' He blinked, 'Maybe we go back into their past and they spy on us, and then when the present caught up, they found me vulnerable and... yeah. That works.'

"But why does the arrival of the Romans bother you?" Cyril asked.

Evil Cyril's face twisted up in barely controlled rage. "Those wretched Romans are worse than the Seraphim!" he spat. "The Oneiroi were a proud and powerful race before the Seraphim were even children. We ruled over the beasts of Heaven, including your pitiful angels. But those wretched Romans discovered us and decided we made excellent sport." Evil Cyril snarled. "They hunted us and the ice wraiths to near extinction. The ice wraiths simply multiplied and were never in any danger. The Oneiroi however, we could not replenish our numbers fast enough, so we hid underground where we remained for a very long time. We vowed revenge." Evil Cyril had control over himself again and looked composed. "And I believe you know the rest of the story, seraph."

Cyril nodded, subdued. "You woke up. The legions poured from the ground and expected the world to be the same. But it wasn't. The Seraphim had grown up and were even more powerful than you lot. Your leaders sought an offensive pact with us, they wanted revenge on the Romans and expected our help. When we refused you slaughtered whole cities."

Evil Cyril smiled with relish, as if remembering fond times. "I was not there, but I remember. Your kind is so delicious."

"But then we destroyed you." Cyril went on triumphantly. "We found your underground society and obliterated you!" Cyril still couldn't break from his bonds. He looked to the others to see if they were having any luck. Cyril stalled for time, "How do you manage to keep coming back?"

Ryuzaki noticed his restraints were of way worse quality than Cyril's. He sighed.


Evil Cyril answered his body double's question, "We have adapted our hive mind. If the race survives, I survive. We came close to extinction, once... those Dragon Balls of your civilizations come in handy... We used them once, around two centuries ago. And now... we have them again."

Ryuzaki shut his eyes in concentration; it was obvious they weren't paying attention to him. He tried to remember what Cyril taught him in the fake world.

Makoto was still reading.

Cyril idly wondered how the fuck Makoto was reading if he was tied down. I mean come on.
"And what do you plan to do with those?" Cyril grunted. He felt he was quickly recovering and saw Ryuzaki moving in the corner of his eye.

Ryuzaki was too busy concentrating on something for me to write whatever the hell Evil Cyril said....

Makoto has google glass.

And thus it was collectively decided that Makoto truly was a douchebag.

Evil Cyril sighed disappointedly, "I had expected more of you Cyril, did you really think I would just tell you everything? I figured one of you would have gotten free by now as well. Not that you would make it out of here! You would certainly be slaughtered."

Ryuzaki did the trick. The one where he discreetly radiated ki and used it to destroy shit. While the ki slowly built up around his arm restraint, he spoke to Evril, "But you're wrong. There'd actually be an incredibley easy way out."

Evil Cyril turned to Ryuzaki and looked delighted. "Ah, the human. And what might that be young one?" The air around them shook as if every Oneiroi in the complex was speaking at once, "Death?"

Ryuzaki shook his head and laughed. "All those eyes, all those minds, and you just can't see it. Our salvation's in the bag. Cyril can teleport!"

Cyril hung his head and sighed and Evil Cyril began laughing wildly. "Your goldfish amuses me, Artik! He is SO adorable!"

"This place is sealed off somehow. None of us can teleport and our ships wont be able to get in."

"See. There's the thing. A told you, salvation's in. The. Bag." Ryuzaki caused his restraints to explode and reached to his right, pulling the satchel off of Artik's body. He pulled it over Cyril and his chair and jumped in.

"Hah!" Ryuzaki blinked. "Wait." He reached upwards and pulled the satchel through itself. He unfolded it and donned it. "Right. We're safe and Makoto can read in peace. Everyone wins." He looked at Cyril's chair. "Now. How to get you out."

Ryuzaki /did/ find a bit of shock in watching Artik die agaaain. Ugh.

"That was clever, very clever. Good job Ryuzaki." Cyril said from his chair. He looked thoughtful. "Oh!" Cyril bit a small leather strap around his neck and pulled out a ki charm. He stuck it in his mouth and sucked on it for a moment. Shut up.
"Alright there we go." Cyril's skin crackled with ki and he struggled to destroy his bonds. His face crunched up in pain. The bonds disintegrated. "Alright. So now we have to stop the Oneiroi and the Humans from attacking and destroying the Seraphim. We also have to take the dragon balls from them before they do something awful with them." Cyril immediately began operating the controls of the TARDIS rapidly. "I suspect they are located in Morpheus Road. An ancient cavern underneath the ocean. That's where Artik broke the simulation. Where do you think we should go first Ryuzaki, Morpheus Road or the hallucinogenic forests to see the humans?" Cyril figured they were too late either way so whatever.

Ryuzaki was getting the hang of this, "Morpheus Road. Twenty-four hours ago?" He shrugged, "So we have more time?"

"Well, since the Oneiroi have already said they had the balls, we would have to go there after we escape or else we're breaking a few laws of travel. It would perhaps be better to go back to the hallucinogenic forests and find the humans and try to calm them. Or go ahead and grab the dragon balls."

Makoto melted out of his restraints. "I'll I to the humans. You find the balls."

Ryuzaki really didn't want to get the Dragon Balls. "Teach me first. Finish what we started in the simulation. I'm not going into this unprepared."

Ryuzaki's face scrunched up, "Hold on! That actually happened. How did that..." He stroked his chin. "Oh. I get it! That hasn't happened yet! They needed to keep us sedated... so they used Artik's weed. Must've not've known about the side-effects," Ryuzaki was watching their adventures in the dataworld while he was plugged in.