Taking the Initiative [Dark]

[Bee]

The journey was filled with fitful eating and the occasional desultory conversational attempt. Mnem didn't feel much like talking, and apparently neither did Minh; in Mnem's case, she was too mentally focused on following the compass back to the path to pay heed to much anything else except what was directly in front of her. And with her headache completely gone, she was free to concentrate as much as she pleased. On the endless stretch of trees, on the--

Circles and circles of mushrooms?

Mnem accepted this new bit of oddness with weary resignation. Of course there were mushrooms. Why wouldn't there be? Maybe they were landing pads for tiny flying saucers filled with tiny gun-toting flying monkeys in leather jackets.

She shook her head, trying to clear it, and then turned to Minh and Monty. "For the love of everything precious in this world, don't eat them. They might be poisonous or hallucinogenic, and the last thing we need is either of you two on drugs."

[Dark]

Minh eyed the mushroom distrustfully, smacking away Monty when she ignored Mnem's warning and attempt to go wandering. Monty wasn't to be trusted around anything even remotely edible, and cast iron stomach or not, Minh had a feeling the bander wouldn't fare too well with this lot.

She inched forward and toed one of the purple and acid green monstrosities. Poisonous or hallucinogenic, eh? She could believe that. The odd little things looked like they were straight out of an acid trip.

What she couldn't fathom, though, was how they were growing in such neat, uniform circles. It was...unnatural. There was probably a perfectly logical explanation for it, of course, but after the adventures they'd been having Minh was a little leery of everything.

"Mnem, how do they grow like that?"

And, more importantly, what was the green haze that had suddenly taken to the air?

[Bee]

"It's not generally understood," Mnem replied, looking at the fairy ring with a troubled eye. She didn't like the little green spores that were rising up from them, either. She also didn't like the fact that the grass and plant life around the ring was just about completely withered and dead. Pixie circles sometimes killed the grass, but not like this, and she didn't like it at all.

She tried to back away from the mushrooms, but she knew it was already too late when a chipper little voice in the back of her head said, We're going to have lots of fun now, Mnem. Let's break things.

No, Mnem thought, irately, but the Perky Faerie Voice did have a point. Breaking things would be fun. Vases. Skulls.

Something strange was happening to the world, though; things were taking up more space than they used to; the green and purple of the mushrooms in front of them were blossoming and swirling, forming a lovely vortex of color. Her body felt weightless, but she wasn't aware that she was actually hovering a foot or so off the ground, drifting as though in space.

The Perky Faerie Voice giggled.

[Dark]

Minh was fairly disturbed and started backpedaling when Mnem started giggling rather insanely and swaying through the air, even though she'd already managed to inhale a substantial amount of the little green spores polluting the area and was fairly certain she was doomed. How long did hallucinogens last? Monty rolled about on the ground, making odd squeaking noises and pouncing on things that weren't really there.

Minh slumped down next to a tree, suddenly feeling all-together too dizzy to be standing, and lolled her head back so she was looking at the puzzling purple sky. The sky opened up, and the visions came--gods and spirits, scraps of memory and wisps of nothing.

One in particular, a bizarre looking bipedal who never seemed quite in focus, introduced himself as Dwyn, the god of man-love. Dwyn, who was from another universe, spoke rather eloquently of a mission he'd traveled great distances to deliver unto them.

"You must go to Candy Mountain. That way," he gestured dramatically. "On your journey you shall encounter many strange things, but if you were to succeed you would change the course of SD-kind...forever."

Minh thought that sounded like a rather nice idea, and strolled over to convince Mnem, hand-in-hand with a small wisp of nightmare who was feeling rather depressed. Minh tried to talk him out of it to the best of her ability, but promptly forgot about him again when she saw Mnem. There was something she needed to tell her...

"MNEM."

[Bee]

Mnem was rather cheerfully wafting through the air--You are a leaf, said the Perky Faerie Voice, a feather, a petal on the wind, and you shall float into the heavens like a beautiful pink balloon--when a rather rude interrupted temporarily disrupted her effortless suspension. She jerked, fumbled, and almost hit the earth, but the voice told her she could keep floating, so she did.

"What?" She asked Minh. Her voice sounded dreamy and soft. Her voice never sounded like that, she realized dimly. Her voice was mean or sly or seductive.

What's wrong with me?

You're stoned out of your fucking mind, the voice giggled. But that's okay. Listen to the kitty. She'll help you kill them, Mnem. She'll help you kill them all. Then we can rule the world uncontested.

That sounded lovely. She listened as closely as she could to what Minh had to say.

[Dark]

Minh preened, happy to have Mnem's sorta-undivided attention--except for the fact that she kept talking to someone who wasn't really there, which made Minh a tad bit nervous. She looked to Dwyn, who shrugged. Apparently, not even the gods could understand and/or explain Mnem.

Anyway.

"So, we've been blessed by the divine god of man-love, Dwyn--hailing from a parallel universe, respectively--to take upon us a quest of, like, great significance. It's gonna, like, change the course of history."

She paused in what she thought was a dramatic manner, seconds stretching into undefinable minutes. Dwyn coughed, and gestured meaningfully.

Right.

"We embark to... Candy Mountain!"

Pointing in the vague direction that she instinctively knew the fabled mountain to be, she scooped up her trusty companion Monty, and made a grand, sweeping gesture with the tiny fluff ball.

Yes. Their journey had only just begun.

[Bee]

Yes, said the Perky Faerie Voice. You must go to Candy Mountain, Mnem. It is a magical land of joy and wonder and joyness.

Joyness. She liked joyness. Mnem began dutifully floating after Minh--who was actually looking more like a teal-streaked bubble of blackness that was careening about the area like a pinball than a feline, and she seemed to be carrying some bouncy ball of whiteness--but after they had bounded off for a few hundred yards, Mnem had to talk to the Voice again.

"I don't think Minh knows where she's going."

That, replied the Perky Faerie Voice with alacrity, is because only one creature truly knows the way to Candy Mountain. It has been hidden from Card-kind for more than ten thousand years.

"One creature?"

You must visit the magical Leviscyllaproteus, Mnem. It will show you the way to Candy Mountain. Tell your kitty-cat to turn very slightly to the left. That should do it!

"Minh," said Mnem. "Minh, we need to talk to the magical Leviscyllaproteus, Minh. It will show us the way to Candy Mountain."

[Dark]

Minh dutifully altered her trajectory, as Dwyn agreed that they would need to visit the magical Leviscyllaproteus before being able to truly move forward, and continued her skipping way through the forest. Her new friends, the spirits and wisps, mostly, glided on ahead, cheerful little fragments of iridescent light.

They heard the Leviscyllaproteus before they saw it, a gentle, wet rasping noise that Minh assumed was it breathing. The creature, when the reached it, was hideous--curled up on itself, coil upon coil of scaly folds, with multiple misshaped limbs and three gigantic heads that seemed to be in constant motion.

Minh didn't move too close, lest one of the heads gobble her up.

"Great Leviscyllaproteus, we seek the prophesied Candy Mountain. In your infinite wisdom, would you be too troubled to tell us the way?"

The Leviscyllaproteus gave a deep, gurgling purr that the three heads sang in something resembling harmony. Minh had no idea what it meant.

[Bee]

The magical Leviscyllaproteus has spoken, the Perky Faerie Voice said, with a very cheery brand of solemnity. It has shown us the way to Candy Mountain.

"But it didn't say anything!" Mnem was more than a little confused. The gigantic multiheaded beast had done nothing more than issue an enormous yawn. And this was supposed to show them the way to their destination?

It has shown you both the way. You need to follow your heart, and you will reach the magical land of sweetness and light.

Something penetrated the mushroom haze, that she didn't like sweetness and light, and was in fact disgusted by it, but the thought was gone before it even had a chance to form coherently in her mind.

Her heart wasn't really telling her anything, other than that the mushrooms were making her pulse slightly irregular, but then--

She felt it. Perfect. Magical. Oh so colorful and filled with joy.

"This way," she told Minh, and they continued on with their journey. Until they reached a very wide, shallow stream. There seemed to be big brownish monsters swimming under the surface (they were actually just rocks.) The only way safely across was a very long, rather thin log.

[Dark]

Minh eyed the water fearfully, the log with downright distrust; she was still having very serious issues with her equilibrium. She balked.

"I can't do it; I can't go on. I'm finished. Go; go on. Complete the quest and think of me."

The wisps hummed in disagreement, urging her forward while Dwyn fixed her with a solemn stare, "You can not fail me now, Minh. You must complete the quest. Now--cross the bridge."

Minh blinked. Bridge? What bridge? Oh. She wasn't sure why she hadn't seen it before--granted, it was rather skinny, but the craftsmanship was good and everything looked to be in working order.

At the urging of Dwyn and the wisps, she followed Mnem out onto the bridge, panic forgotten. It really wasn't a nice bridge. She hadn't the foggiest clue why she'd been so worried.

"Hey, Mnem; guess what... Mnem... Mnem, guess what, Mnem... We're on a bridge, Mnem. A magical bridge of Hope and Wonder."