Everything hurt, which was why Devlin opened his eyes. Taking a breath was painful--his nose was broken, and when he tried to take a breath through his mouth, he felt the pain from his broken ribs and sternum. He tried not to, but he breathed shakily, as if he was going to cry.

It started with a faint tremor.

In the depths of the Ben 10,000 headquarters, there was a faint crack as a containment field, long since degraded over the course of many years finally gave way, and reality split in two. From it, three hulking forms spilled from it, and there was a faint rumble of satisfaction from the first one.

"Free at last," rumbled the first, a gargantuan behemoth in a powerful looking exosuit.

"Yes," remarked the second, a massive albino gorilla with what appeared to be a tiny head on the shoulders. "We made it through the barrier separating us from the rest of reality."

The third grunted, folding his powerful looking arms as he sneered down at his companions. "So then, we all know what to do."

"Of course," chuckled the first, clenching his fist. "From here, our paths cross no longer. It's them or us."

The others nodded and quietly they moved as the first sneered, accessing a scanner on his wrist. Scanning the area, he smirked to himself. "Jackpot."

And quickly, he began moving towards the Armory, eager to get his hands on whatever was laying around.

 After dropping off some of the crew at Balisair, it was time for the crew to set course for Lirath. The situation greeting them wasn't the most promising.

The cracked surface of the moon called Lirath was one of its most unmistakeable features. One of the three moons of the planet Kehoe, it had been terraformed and served as a settlement for a hundreds of different species, some humanoid, some not. Despite occasional class struggles, environmental issues, and speciesism blocking their way, the darker parts of Lirath's past were largely left behind, and an era of peace and tolerance had reigned for quite some time. The only problems they'd had recently were with a terrorist group whose cause for their actions had been a mystery, but they weren't tied to any particular species or social group and had been likened to a cult and had largely gone quiet in recent years.

Now the peace on the moon of Lirath had been shattered by the invasion of the Ohm.

The capital city had been destroyed. Now, all that was left of the peoples of Lirath was evacuating from one of its smaller cities, one known as Smyteval. A desert city, existing in a valley in between a rocky range of canyons and mountains, even though it was in the low ground, the natural channels of rock served as bottlenecks for any Ohm attacking from the ground.

GIA squadrons patrolled in space, locked in explosive warfare, protecting the Bleed-gate that had been activated to see the evacuated ships to the refugee world, and a shield created by massively-powerful shield generators extended around the city and up into the atmosphere, creating a shielded tunnel so ships could escape.

Word had come that there was a vital weapon to be deployed on Lirath, one that needed to be destroyed, hence why the Transmigration 9 had been called in. Given the diverse crew, and the ships that were in its hangar, there was at least someone or something on board that could blow the weapon up if it did show.

There was no sign of it yet. Right now, there was just chaos, streams of evacuees boarding ships, armies of Ohm engaged with GIA soldiers outside the shields, and forcefields that everyone hoped would hold out just a little bit longer.

The crew would be following Leon's orders but finding themselves fighting side-by-side with GIA platoons, full of various species that were currently all getting their asses kicked severely.

[ooc: STAGE 1 is now open! Please do not tage STAGE 2 until it's announced as open as well.]

[ooc: STAGE 2 is now open!]

What had he been doing? How long had it been? Superboy had no clue what as going on, all he knew was that he had woken up only to find that a few weeks had past. He didn't know what had happened over the time and it wasn't as if he knew a lot about the place to begin with.

So he found himself again wandering the city, but this time with a purpose. Discovering what happened to him.

( OOC note under the cut )

Lately Ben had been kind of restless, and thus had been buzzing around the city. It was way too quiet with everything going on, and as much as he hated being idle, there was really no helping it at times.

He had gotten a RideVendor remote from Philip and had taken out one of the cycles for a spin. A few false starts and he was roaring around the city at a breakneck pace before pulling up to the park. Removing his helmet, he brushed his hair of sweat. "I really like motorcycles," he declared to no one as he got off and began to do a few warm ups.

While training in the sensoriums was always fun, he was often finding himself preferring the city more and more, and he selected an alien from his watch, an old standby favorite.

"CANNONBOLT!" yelled Ben as he began to roll and bounce all over the place.

The rest of the crew assembled on the Observation Deck to meet the latest editions to their numbers. After the revelation that their worlds are gone, many of them are even more eager to see people they knew from home.

Several people are set up near the doors to provide the new people with omnicoms and comm rings. New crew-mates might see a tall man in green armor and snake girl among their number. There are also several authoritative-looking figures ready to introduce themselves.

There's a lot to tell the new people. It's going to be a lot to take in.

[ooc: Only new characters and Command Staff can start new threads for introductions, to limit the number of threads. Everyone else, just tag in and have your guys greet the newbies.]

Hydroponics was where Ben had planted one of his recent acquisitions from XaXing, just to make sure that it flourished. It had grown rather well, the vendor promising him that it would be space worthy. A tall tree with purple leaves and seemed to shimmer with an inner light. The vendor said it was a Mana Tree, and he was curious to see if it made any fruit.

"You're getting pretty big," remarked Ben as he continued to water it, having brought water all the way from the river since it was the purest source of water they had. "I wonder what kind of stuff you'll make..."

If anything, the presence of the tree was making all of the other fruit-and-alcohol trees around it blossom well and Ben reached up to the next tree, plucking a juicy looking fruit from it and biting into it. "Mmm juicy!"

Allenby rocked back and forth on her heels, frowning at the Great Wall for a couple of reasons. One, apparently the Daligig or whoever had yanked out a big chunk of the Great Wall (or one of them, given how many Earths there were) and slapped it into the City like a cheap bookcase. She wasn't big on cultural heritage preservation, but sheesh.

The second reason was that she was thinking. Next to her feet was a bag of toys: jacks, a gymnast's ribbon, a kite, spinning tops, and a few superballs. Believe or not, she was going to use these to develop a new specialty technique--just as soon as she figured out where to begin.

"Man, Nobel Gundam... I knew I shoulda asked Chibodee and George what they did to figure out theirs." She winced when she caught herself talking to her Gundam yet again, and she wasn't even in the Hangar this time... oh well. Allenby picked up the ribbon and began running, executing a technique she already knew well from piloting.

[ooc: So anyone in the Water Cooler post who wanted to do sparring/training stuff, this would be a good place to do it! :3 Or anyone else who'd like to pop in, of course.]

Ben had fuelled upon smoothies and he was truly bored for the point being. So he was dialling through the Ultimatrix when he began to shift to different ones. It was here that he noticed something rather SUPER in his rotation.

"He-llo what is THIS? I had forgotten I had it."

In a flash of light, Ben stood there, taller, muscular, not quite as massive as the original but somewhere on the path towards becoming Ben 10,000. He smirked down at himself, patting his black outfit that came with it. It had been a long time since he checked playlist five, but he had forgotten that he had a scan of Kryptonian DNA.

"Now this I like."

And he hovered into the air.

"WHOA! Okay, make that REALLY LOVE."

For once, Ben hadn't deemed to go to the newly restocked Mr. Smoothie, or drive around. Nor was he beating on simulated monsters. Instead, he had been buried in a pile of books in the library, almost literally at times. He had purchased a lot of books and had been reading up on various things, including something that had been nagging at him for a while - Temporal Mechanics.

A lot of it was garbage from what he could tell, having experienced time travel in many forms. Discarding another book, he set it aside before picking up one and his eyes widened at the title. "Since when was this in here?"

The front of it read "Gemstones and Chrono Particles, a Dissertation of Time by P. Paradox."

Eagerly, Ben began to read it, pushing through the slightly bland material. Finally, after several hours, he set it down, rubbing his eyes. "It makes sense," he said, leaning back in his chair. "Now I get why Professor Paradox is so intent on protecting me."

The chapter he had opened to, was entitled "Cross-Time and You", and there was a symbol of the Omnitrix on it, or rather the Plumbers symbol on it. He chuckled ironically as he leaned back in the pile of books, trying to figure out how to deal with the knowledge that there were other timelines just as real as his own, with many Ben's sharing his face.

Mewtwo had been searching for somewhere less busy, and he found it in the form of the city. It was more open and somewhat cooler, but the most important thing was that there were fewer people. There were some, true, but it wasn't as much of a big rush of strange beings as there was in the main living area.

He could think here.

Probably his biggest concern was checking that his powers were still working properly. There was something... off. He had to figure out what it was.

The catlike creature could be found on a grassy hill, floating with eyes closed just above its crest. His legs and arms were folded up almost in a fetal position, his tail swishing slowly back and forth behind him. As he meditated, he was focusing on the grass below. If someone stopped to watch, they might notice he was slowly flattening out all of the blades of grass on the hill a handful at a time from the center down.

It was something to do while he thought, and it was a test for his precision to see how badly it had been damaged.

Ben was testing out a few of his aquatic aliens as he swam through the Kohaku River in Articguana form, and then swinging through the city in Spidermonkey. He was relaxing for the most part, swinging down from the buildings to smoothly transform to Cannonbolt.

Spinning around, the young man tore through the city, bouncing off walls and then launching off a well-placed piece of stone which served as a ramp. Hurling into the sky, he unrolled and came down, tapping the Ultimatrix and changing into Big Chill -- sliding through the ground instead of coming to a rather splat-like end.

Floating upwards, Big Chill folded his wings around him. "There," he hissed in a happy voice. "That's a pretty good workout. And the Ultimatrix is working just fine."

(ooc: feel free to poke him at any location in the city. He's probably passed on by.)

Between security patrols, nocturnal crew members (or whatever passes for nocturnal on a ship with no normal day-night cycles), and those who do not need regular sleep, the halls are rarely devoid of activity. But there are times of day when it is less likely that a friend will notice a pair that appears to be completely healthy making their way toward the Med Bay well outside normal visiting hours.

Billy has chosen one of those times to shuffle through the halls with his girlfriend's hand in his, doing his best to keep himself and Ronnae unnoticed. Unfortunately for them, the exact behaviors he is using to attempt to avoid confrontation peg their activity as suspicious.

This is going to end well, isn't it?

((ooc: So this is mostly closed, we have one character ready to confront the pair and accompany them to their destination, but we're open to the hilarious possibilities! Just PM this journal or otherwise contact me and ask to be shot buddies please.))

Mrs. Yagami Signum feels restless. After the mission to get the map (which she hadn't really helped that much on, now that she's thought about it) and filling out the paperwork to join the Magic Department, she hadn't done anything she'd felt was productive. Exercising in the Sensoriums and taking care of Hayate's and the Reinforces' "shopping" (such as existed on this ship) was all well and good, but there was work to be done here and she felt she wasn't doing it when she could be.

However, barring an actual opportunity for action, there's only two ways Signum can work out this feeling of restlessness. Exercising more in the Sensoriums (which she'd done already today, up to her tolerance for the illusionary setting), or meditating.

Sitting atop the Jedi Temple, which was both conveniently high and conveniently in tune with the ambient magic on the ship, Signum folds her legs under her, sits, and contemplates on nothingness, clearing her mind of the distraction and frustration of daily life on the city ship...

((That's your cue to bother her))

Ben had spent the last couple of days feeling strangely hollow inside. As such, he had filled it with junk food (what was left) and watching his DVDs of Sumo Slammers. But he was getting restless.

As such, he was standing in the sensoriums, thinking up locations and discarding each one, one by one. “Too much debris.” Flick. “Too risky.” Flick. “Too high.” Flick. “What the moon? Why would I even…?”

Finally he settled on a familiar sight, the base of Mt. Rushmore.

Next he cleared out as much room as possible, removing manmade items and then filling them with various trees and rocks and stuff. A few hazards ought to do it.

Finally he thought hard, and in a flash of light, about fifty of his old opponents appeared from both kid years and elder years. Going down the line of unnaturally still opponents, Ben started weeding each of them out. “One-shotted. Not this one. Nope.” He paused at Tinny!Kevin and dismissed him completely. “Not my cup of tea today.”

After weeding out the weakest from the strongest and most dangerous, Ben asked Stacy to save this scenario and title it “Smackdown”, over-writing his previous attempt at this.

Cracking his knuckles, Ben asked for danger to be cranked up a notch, and looked at everyone who suddenly came to life.

Vilgax stabbed his giant sword into the ground. “Ben Tennyson, I’ve come to subjugate your entire world and kill you. Is this a bad time?”

“No not really,” said Ben as he struck the Ultimatrix. “FOUR ARMS!”

On cue, his entire rogues gallery rushed him and they met in a resounding clash of flying fists.

Somehow, this was soothing the ache in Ben’s chest.

Those left outside the city would find their experience to be far less exciting, but at least it was still relaxing for the most part.

The accommodations they were given were relatively spartan but well maintained, and the locals seemed nice enough. The food was good, and they were treated fairly well despite refusing to undergo the rituals.

But strangely, by the time night started rolling around, the locals began hurrying to finish up whatever they were doing, cutting conversations short and rushing back inside. By the time the sun fell, none of the locals were outside.

...Well. That certainly wasn't ominous.

[ooc: secondary plot is go! try to keep everything in one thread for now]

Stacy's voice came over the comm, blaring across the entire ship.

||Attention, Attention. All personnel please report to the Observation Deck. Attention, Attention. All personnel please report to the Observation Deck. Attention, Attention, all personnel...||

The mouth in the main sculpture on Obs Deck opened, revealing a screen with the image of a mottled blue and purple planet, rotating slowly.
( Read more... )

Time for another mission, then.

The rest of the crew assembled on the Observation Deck to meet the latest editions to their numbers. After the revelation that their worlds are gone, many of them are even more eager to see people they knew from home.

Several people are set up near the doors to provide the new people with omnicoms and comm rings. New crew-mates might see a tall man in green armor and snake girl among their number. There are also several authoritative-looking figures ready to introduce themselves.

There's a lot to tell the new people. It's going to be a lot to take in.

[ooc: Only new characters and Command Staff can start new threads for introductions, to limit the number of threads. Everyone else, just tag in and have your guys greet the newbies.]

After recent events - that run in with Big Zero, hearing about had had happened to Big Zero, not to mention the eternal fact that Iniss was still running around in Tom - Marco was feeling the serious need to randomly destroy stuff. Sure, things weren't all bad - he had his Mom, he had the rest of the Animorphs - but the situation of being on the ship still grated. They were all stuck under Stacy's control, and the Punishment had made it pretty clear that she could wipe them out of existence anytime she wanted to. Or worse.

So, he'd wondering into the sensoriums and called up a miniature New York City. Then he morphed gorilla and stomped on a few cars. Then he paused, looked down on the small city, and made it even smaller so that he could smash the buildings as well. Then he got rid of all the people, cause having them all screaming and running away from him like that was kinda unnerving, and Marco didn't actually get a kick out of squashing tiny people. Okay, so they weren't real, but they looked real and that made it freaky anyway.

He stomped around, flattening buildings as he went, before ripping one up from the ground and climbing up the Empire State Building with it, so he could toss the building at the other buildings. The resulting crunch was very satisfying.

Ben had heard the announcement, but ignored it anyhow. He had the gut feeling that whatever happened there, he'd hear from Matt anyhow. Instead, he made his way to medbay where he knew Nura was resting, albeit in a coma.

He contacted Gwen and Devlin, and let them know at least not to worry and try to keep Devlin away from Punishment. As he sat down in the bedside, he sighed. "Things really aren't looking up huh mom?" he said to Nura in a low tone.