AIW 3

Chapter 4: Railroading The Remnants

"You helped him... escape???? Again!?" shouted Ancelot. Before him stood two of the deadliest creatures in the world of Pokégirls, one of which was easily the deadliest ever to exist. Within the Ragnarok's meeting hall stood: Ancellot, Tate, Genevieve, a very annoyed Snowflake, and two Legendary pokégirls, Bastit, and Ancelot's own 'patron', Sexebii.

"Not to be rude but... can you PLEASE explain why???" Ancelot asked, his annoyance clear.

"You reeeealy don't understand the situation you're in, do you?" was Sexebii's reply. "The other Authors can affect the world around them by their perception. As such, EVERY author but you percieves the Sanctuary Goths to be evil, unlovable, hateful monstrosities. Really, it doesn't matter WHO you send, if they're not directly spiritually linked to you, whether as a Daemon, like Snowflake, or bonded like Tate and Genevieve, they will INSTANTLY begin to act like how the other authors think they would. This leads, inevitably, to them torturing their targets, knowing full well they should be brought to you unharmed...."

"...you have got to be shitting me." Ancelot replied, stunned into confusion.

"To quote my old 'friend', 'I shit you not.'" Sexebii replied, continuing her explanation. "Beyond that, if Snowflake HAD brought Soldier here, and if PJ hadn't escaped, guess what? They'd lul you into a false sense of security, resulting in you blabbing about your Phylachtery... and you know damned well what'd happen then." Ancelot stood silent, he'd almost forgotten about his tendency to babble. If any of the authors who wanted him dead learned of his phylachtery, then they could find and destroy it, which would leave him a pile of dust, and Snowflake defenseless against their Power of Perception.

"Alright. sorry I got mad, thanks." Ancelot replied, knowing he'd nearly dug his own grave... again. Thankfully, Sexebii had gotten used to his short fuse, which wasn't as short as it was all those years ago.

"Now, Madame Bastit... what the bloody hell happened???? There was some kind of Magick Static on par with a nuke out there...."

"Well." Bastit said, petting Snowflake gently. She'd just returned the little munchkin personally, after Soldieroflove, AKA Scott, her protectorate, had banished her by magick. "I guess you underestimated Soldier's skills. I'd heard him calling on me for help and, when I looked, he was trying to banish this lil' fuzzball back to you..." Ancelot looked like he was about to comment, but Bastit shush'd him like a mother. "Don't get me wrong, I'm just protecting one of my babies. Aside from keeping a close watch on Scott, I'm staying out of your little game of chess. You two lunatics want to try and alter the face of the Pokégirl World, go for it. Just leave me and my babies out of it."

Ancelot's mask was expressionless, but beneath it was a mix of annoyance at their interference, thankful that no one got too badly hurt, and a desire to dive between Bastit's beautiful mounds and cuddle her, if only for his fetish, and maybe to try and annoy Sexebii some more.

"Very well. Thank you both, for saving my ass and for ensuring Snowflake's safety. Just because she can't be permanently killed doesn't mean that I want to see her hurt." Ancelot sighed gently. FF had vanished shortly after they learned of his escape, likely because of Macavity's antics. New Fate was being moved separately, so they wouldn't need to bother picking him up. But now, there were more problems arising and not enough that can be done to fix it. However, it's about time he and his girls got back to their roots...

"Sexebii, Bastit. Can I make a request?"

"What'll it be?" Sexebii replied, Bastit making wild motions to suggest 'No, bad idea!'

"i was kinda wondering if you two would like to take the Ragnarok for a spin once the authors on board are dropped off at the Beta Site... Buuuut if you don't wanna..." before Ancelot could finish that, Bastit leapt on top of him.

"YES! We'll take it! Gimmethekeysnow!!!!" The outburst resulted in Ancelot and his 'girls laughing, and Sexebii miming the playing of a harp.

"whaddyamean it's not symbolic?" said Snowflake, looking right at YOU while pointing at Sexebii.

"Meta-gags... I love 'em." chimed in both Sexebii and Ancelot, the masked mage nuzzling the cat-legendary whilst jingling the keys just out of reach.

"Hey, not to break up the fourth-wall-breaking." said Tate, "But... if I'm down here, and Ancelot has the keys...who's flying this thing?" Cut to a scene of a red-scaled Gynadose piloting the Ragnarok, wearing the classic 'Pirate Jacket', unbuttoned and nothing else. The scene cuts back to the small group within the ship, all of them refusing to comment on the obvious meta-gag used...

###
Elsewhere in the TimeStream
###

"Where am I?" said Jesse Mcferon. He was still in a daze from that battle with Lindi. That mage... said that they were the same. But, that's impossible. Jesse had no talent for magick at all, let alone time-travel magick. A light yip was heard. Snowflake. She sounded afraid. Jesse tried to open his eyes, but couldn't. He could hear voices around him.

"But why should we?"

Why should who what?

"Because... Ancelot already paid for his tuition and courses..."

tuition? courses? Who's Ancelot???

"The boy's coming awake. Leave his beast here, she can tend to him."

Beast? Snowflake? that's not very nice... she's a tad rough, but no beast.

"Still, I don't see why we should have to MAKE him learn such dark magick. Let alone for the express purposes of becoming a Lich."

Lich??? Dark Magick? Is that what that 'Ancelot' is??? A Lich!?

"We don't have much of a choice. It's either that, or we'll have to deal with the ramifications of upsetting the time stream so seriously. You know what happened when someone tried to kill Hitler, it only made things worse. Frankly, I'd rather this boy become Ancelot, rather than someone far more cruel."

...Become... Ancelot? what the hell....

Before Jesse's thoughts could continue, his mind blanked out, returning to silence. His fate...had been sealed.

###
Flashback Time!
###

"Y'know, I almost forgot how this whole mess started..." Ancelot said, his mind wandering into the past.

*flashback #1: How it all began*

"Shittiest Month Ever." Jesse shouted. His car had been wrecked, again. He'd had a falling out with one of his best friends, only to make things worse by not thinking. He'd been in argument after argument with people he cared for. He'd still failed to find a job, and his hopeful move to Texas had hit a massive brick wall. The few friends who hadn't lost their tempers with him were at each other's throats constantly. And now he'd had to go and buy a fuggin' whole fish, because mom wanted fish tonight. It's as if a combination of some ethereal force and his own stupidity, if they weren't already one in the same, have been conspiring against him to make this December his worst month since the day he'd barely dodged a flying dumptruck several years ago. Or was it the day his endless ngihtmares began? He couldn't tell, so damned many shitty days in his life, they all kept getting mixed up.

"Five bucks says I got the wrong damned fish..." He said, looking at YOU. He didn't know who, exactly, 'YOU' was, but he felt it give himself some semblance of calmness to 'break the fourth wall', as fellow authors put it. Just a little bit [more] oddness he had than normal people.

"tch, normal people. Normal people frighten me." He said, thinking for a second, "Oh shit... not supposed to read my own narration...." This... may take a while. "Damn straight!"

Disregard that, please. Anyway, as he continued his drive home, he didn't notice a face who should be familiar too him appearing beside him in the passenger seat of his old buick LeSabre. Out of the blue, or green, as the case may be, came Sexebii, the annoying nekkid pixie brat he'd so feared having to deal with.

"Wait what???" She said "Hey! You're not the only one who can do that, you know!" As Jesse realized what the hell was going on he, understandably, freaked the hell out.

"WHATHAFUCK!?" He screamed in an annoyingly high pitch, slamming on the breaks and sending his car fishtailing and careening off of the road. In a flash of green and gold light, the car and it's occupants vanished from the so-called 'Real World'. Elsewhere, however, they appeared from thin air and slammed face-first into a dirt hill.

As the vehicle came to a fullstop, the gravity of the situation became apparent.

"I need to get those damned airbags checked." Jesse said, rubbing his bloodied nose after pulling his face from his steeringwheel. It seemed as if the damage to himself and the car was much less than what it should. Almost as if it was... toony. "Why do I get this sudden feeling I'm in a cartoon???"

"Because you hear the music?" Said a soft, feminine voice from behind him. Jesse turned to see the originator of the lovely voice, only to come face to face with a pair of scale-covered epic tits, held back only by a band of frilly lace. He looked up, to find his face within biting distance of a Tyrannodame, he recognized the breed almost instantly, having studied the so-called 'Menace' pokégirls rather thoroughly. Jesse gulped and pulled his head back into his ruined car, testing the engine in a forlorn hope that it will work. Sadly, his hopes were shattered when it didn't even make a sound.

"I'm gonna die... aren't I?" He asked his 'passenger'. Sexebii only shrugged and gave him a gentle smile. The T-dame ripped his door off the hinges and pulled him out in an unexpectedly gentle manner. She began spinning him around in different directions, checking his body for bleeding wounds of bruises. "Y'know, I was always told that this is a BAD idea to do with someone right after a car crash..." His statement was met with a woman in barely more lace than the T-dame casting a healing spell on him. She was, like the t-dame, beautiful. But in a much more human and classical manner, to the dinosaur's primal and bestial beauty.

"OK." said the Sanctuary Goth, at least, he thought she was a Sanctuary Goth. "Dana, go ahead and set him down. Gently, please." The T-dame turned Jesse right-side up and sat him down on the ground, moving into his car and sniffing out the contents. It wasn't even half a second before she found the fish.

"Hey! I was gettin' that fish for my momma!"

"Sorry, but you won't be seeing your mom, or anyone you know, for quite soem time Mr. Mcferon." was the goth's reply. She patted him on the head and he took a better look around. The road he was just driving on was in shambles, as if it had been left untouched for decades or more. Around him were other Sanctuary Goths, along with another garter-wearing T-dame and several Dameosaurs, one of which seemed like he was in charge of the other dinos. Jesse couldn't make an intelligible reply, babbling and twitching at the slow and steady realization of two possible answers. either he was dead[quite likely, considering his car's steering tendency to go insane or Sexebii had just pulled him into the world of Pokegirls.

"Dana." said the 'boss' dameosaur, speaking to her higher evolution as if the t-dame was the underling. "Give him the fish."

"But why, Tate?" 'Dana' asked, "It's tasty!"

"We'll eat the fish later. We both know full well what's going to happen soon." 'Tate' replied, taking a combat stance as Dana hands him his fish. Confusion suddenly began to drop away as Jesse's lingering insanity mixed with his rage at his life and his love of where he was. If he was dead, this had to be heaven, and if he wasn't, then he was gonna live life to the fullest.

*End Flashback #1: how it all began*

###
The plot thickens! And actually gets MOVING!
###

"Why... did you just make us sit through that dorky flashback... then cut it as it was getting to the good part?" Tate asked.

"Because I'm an evil bastard? Oh, and you already knew how it was gonna end."

"Yeah but... still. I wanted to hear you describe how I kicked your ass."

"I WAS FIGHTING YOU WITH A FISH!!!! Of COURSE You kicked my ass!!!!"

"Ah well." TGte replied. "So, what's the plan?"

"We can't act too quickly right now, it'll screw up our plans even worse than the other authors are." Ancelot said. "So... we go back to our roots. Ladies, we're going to act like a proper Tamer and Harem. Immediately. We move on foot throughout the leagues and track down the authors one by one, the old fashioned way."

"Soooo, we're not gonna cheat and read their stories anymore?" Genevieve asked.

"Errr... we never cheated like that." Ancelot replied hastily, trying to cover plot problems. "So no, we're not gonna cheat. I swear!"

"Well, Boss. Hopefully we'll be able to keep tabs on everything happening while in the field. Can I bring Dana too???" Ancelot remained silent at Genevieve's request. Dana was, still is, and likely always will be the biggest slut he'd ever met, worse so than even Snowflake... Genevieve knew the answer... would be 'Yes'.

"Red!" Ancelot shouted to the Gynadose. "Drop us off here! I'll need my red cape, and my Bloom Cannon!" He giggled, the 'girls knew his fetishes well and had gotten together and designed a 'spellgun' that fired a breast enlagring spell. Best christmas gift EVER! Most of them laughed, though Tate's expression clearly said 'we should have never made him that damned gun'. Considering she was a common target, it's unsurprising.

"Oh yeah!" Bastit said, sitting on the bow of the ship. "I've been wondering what the hell your motive was. Mind explaining it, Ancie?"

"Yes ma'am, but, please...No pet names unless we start getting romantic, ok?" At Bastit's nod, he began what's going to become a rather long diatribe... possibly.

"OK. My motives for doing this? I've seen how the pokégirls community acts. There's some who listen to the mods without question, others who'll attack anyone who disagrees with them. On both sides of the fence, mod and member alike. They'll welcome new members with open arms, but any new ideas wind up getting slammed down into the dirt, even if from a long-standing member. I've known and even befriended quite a few respectable members, only to witness them being treated with no more respect than me, the 'Village Idiot' of the community. This is by anyone, mind you. The masses as a whole need to learn the difference between respect, and worship. They always get the two mixed up, since they say they respect someone, but act like they worship them, only to expect someone like me, who just wants someone to listen, to be begging to be worshiped as the next godsend.

There's problems beyond those, as well. I've seen ideas shot down for no reasons, good ideas, like Verkandt's mars colony. I've seen great authors get no feedback at all, and others still wind up with complaints, but no clues WHAT was wrong. It's enough to drive someone up the wall. I've come face to face with people who'll take things too damned personally, myself among those number, but far from the only one. I've seen legitimate discussions spiral out of control into flamewars and hatespamming. It's enough to drive a man to drink!

My motive is to get some of these people to sit the fuck down and learn that you can hate someone but still respect them, and that everyone has good ideas! Change is GOOD! We NEED change! But it's not going to come about if everyone's at each other's throats for no damned reason! We've turned this world into a hodgepodge hellhole when we could have easily made it into a paradise. Even a paradise has conflict somewhere, no place is perfect. But we don't need the constant gorn and torturefests. We don't need infestations of menace pokégirls who come from innocent pokégirls being tortured. And we don't need 'irredeemable' menaces like the goddamned Widow at all! But will anyone sit down and listen? No. THAT is why I've decided to take drastic measures! THAT is why I'm hauling them into this world, to SHOW them the horrors we've created! To SHOW THEM Why we need change! That is my motive, my goal, my focus. To change this world for the better, even if I have to beat it into their skulls with a sledgehammer!"

Tate, Genevieve, Snowflake, and Bastit were dumbstruck, having not expected that kind of purified, untampered rage to come from anyone, let alone the normally goofball-ish Ancelot. Sexebii, however, simply turned to look at YOU to say, "You're the ones who pushed him...knowing damned well that, yes, he WOULD be this insane..."