Finally decided to edit my opening post and state that the first four chapters are up, and I'm working planning chapter five. Any suggestions on who gets replaced next? Spoiler: Chapter One Another day in the fabulous town of KHV was drawing to a close, and I felt the way I always did when I left for the night. Extremely bored. I opened the door to my life and clicked on the light, flinching as the glare of the lightbulb gave me an instant headache. The standard sitcom response flashed into my head and "IT BURNS!" came out of my mouth. I quickly adjusted, however, and went to go get a late dinner. I looked around at the empty room, dusty with disuse and cluttered up with all the things I was supposed to do that day. School, chores, job hunting... all still where I had left them when I headed to town that morning. The door opened and jojojojo97 came in. My little sister, she and I are so much alike, it's scary. "How was Wikipedia today?" I asked as she hung up her jacket. "Fine," she answered. "They're doing pretty good. I went to a new district today, I was researching vampire towns, and guess what?" She and I were alike in a lot of ways, but one thing I didn't get was how she could stomach all the Twilight garbage she loved so much. "What?" I asked. She smiled. "There's a town in Idaho named South Forks," She said. I chuckled. "Really? that's so stupid." "Well, it was either South Forks or North Forks or Brook Forks or something like that." That was jojojojo97 for you. Spends her whole life in the town of Wikepedia and can't even remember what she read about. I turned back to my dinner. "I don't know why you do things like research Vampire towns," I said. "Last time I went to Wikipedia, I researched..." suddenly I remembered what I researched. "...Nothing." "What?" She said. "Come on, Marushi, what did you research?" I sighed. "Unusual homicides for a murder story I was working on." She looked at me. "Hey, at least I'm not researching vampire towns!" I said defensively. But I made a mental note to stop teasing her about Twilight in the future, not when I was into stuff just as wierd. I thought of the story I had been writing. I never finished it. "I couldn't find a murder I liked, so I just stuck with the standard asphyxiation routine. Nothing serious." She was still looking at me, shaking her head this time. Finally, she laughed and said "Well, I'm tired, so I'm gonna hit the hay. Don't asphyxiate me in my sleep, alright?" She went into her bedroom and closed the door. I sat around for a few minutes, thinking about the long night ahead. I wasn't tired, and I most likely wasn't going to sleep anyway, so I decided to go back to town, there wasn't a lot of activity at night, but hey, something could be going on. I grabbed my jacket and ventured out into the night. It took me awhile to get to KHV. For some reason, the street that led from my life to KHV, named "Loading", always seems to be longer at night. I walked along in silence, thinking about my day. When I reached the town, I breathed in the air, feeling a thrill as I looked around. I was used to the community, but night always makes everything different. Even the air tasted different. The town wasn't completely silent, I could hear a few places still active in the spamzone, and I thought I could even make out the sounds of a debate still going on into the night. I wandered around aimlessly for a while, all the people I usually talked to would be off by now. As I walked toward the Creativity district, I thought I saw something, or heard something, and I turned around. Nothing was there. I turned around and kept walking, but I couldn't shake the feeling that someone was watching me. I glanced over my shoulder again as I walked, but I still couldn't see anybody behind me. I scolded myself for being so paranoid and I resolved to not look behind me again. I continued walking, and I realized I was going faster than I normally would. Dang it, Marushi, stop being stupid and just relax! Nobody is behind you! I stubbornly slowed down. That's when I heard it. A footstep on the gravel road, directly behind me. I gasped and turned around, swinging my arm to hit whatever was there. I still couldn't see anything, but my elbow connected with empty space and a voice said "Ow! What was that for?" I took a few steps back. I hadn't meant to hit anybody. "It was a reflex," I said. "Dang it, will you take off invisibility so I can see who I'm talking to?" "What? Oh, right, sorry." A figure appeared in front of me, a boy about sixteen, with green hair and an impish smile. I looked at him for a second, I didn't recognize him as someone I knew. "I haven't seen you around," I said. "What's your name?" He looked around, like he was making sure the area was clear, then he leaned in closer. "My name is Teal_Lion36," he whispered. "And I had invisibility on so They wouldn't see me." He backed up and smiled, and I figured it was probably safe to assume that Teal_Lion36 was, like my sister says, cracked like the boom. "Uh... who's "They", and why would it matter if They see you?" I said, more to humor him than anything else. He looked around again, and I sighed as he repeated his earlier action of leaning in. "They are the guests," he said quietly. "There are always a few lurking around... watching us." I looked at him. "The guests? You're afraid of the guests? But, they're totally harmless, you know that, right?" He chuckled and shook his head, backing up . "Harmless?" He said. "If they're so harmless, why do I see them stalking every page I go to?" I just stood there for a second, not sure if I was hearing this right. "Not to change the subject," I said. "But, when did you join?" "Yesterday, why?" he answered. "Oh, no reason. and, uh, how many forums were you involved in before this?" He shrugged. "This is my first," he said. Things were starting to make sense. "Well, you see, and this is just me making a guess here," I said. "But I think the guests are just web-surfers who pass through town, they don't actually hurt anybody." He smiled again, his smile really made me uncomfortable. When he smiled, you could just see mischief written all over his face. He looked... almost evil in the darkness of night. "Oh, they don't hurt anybody?" He said lowly. "How did I get this, then?" He held out his hand, and I realized with a jolt that it was phasing in and out of existance, like it was a holographic image or something. I stared in surprise. "Wha-! What happened?" I looked up at him. "Finally believe me, eh?" He smirked, as he put his hand back in his pocket. "They got to me, but I was lucky and I escaped." I couldn't believe what I was hearing. "What do you mean, they got to you?" I asked. "They're just guests, how would they get to you?" He sighed. "Well, you were right when you said guests are just surfers, passing through a town, but sometimes, a group of surfers travel together, and if those surfers just so happen to be up to no good, things happen. Right now, there's a certain group of surfers, calling themselves Unmasked, and this site just happens to be their next target. Haven't you noticed the increasingly high amount of guests lately? That's why I joined, so I could warn you guys." I scratched my head. "So, you're telling me that there's a group of guests, called "Unmasked," and they're going to... what are they gonna do again?" He looked around for a third time, and I said "Oh, for pete's sake, the area is clear, now would you just answer my question?" He looked at me. "...Fine," he said. "What they do is they find a community like this one, not too well-known, but pretty big anyway. Then, they take out members of the community, one by one, starting with the inactive members. Those are the easiest to take out, because they're practically dead anyway. Then, they take the place of the member, they disguise themselves and pretend to be that member, and start posting regularly. They usually start off with something like, "It's been so long," or "I forgot about this place, wattup?" and then they start gathering info. They're a scout for the group. They find out who's who, and which members have the most influence, and who the staff are, stuff like that. They report this back to the group, and the rest of the group goes in and targets the influential members and the staff. It can take months or days, but eventually they have replaced enough of the real members to stop with the charade and seize control of the community. And once they have control," He smiled again, that evil smile. "They wreck the place. Burn it to the ground, destroy everything within sight. Once it's down, they move on to the next town." I stood there for a second. "But, why would they even do that?" I said. "What could they possibly have to gain by burning down communities?" "Oh, they have no reasons," He said. "They do it for the thrill, the challenge. They like being able to say that they took down a community. Their goal is to completely obliterate the internet, just to be able to say they did it." I thought about that. I guessed I could see what he was saying, I mean, "I broke the internet?" Sounds pretty impressive. But anyway, this all was pretty far-fetched. Still, though, I was curious. "And, how do they get rid of members?" I asked. He took his hand out of his pocket again, and held it out to me. "Feel that," he said. Cautiously, I reached out and tried to touch it. My hand passed right through and his flickered off for a second. "That's the result of their weapon," he said. "If you're hit with it, you phase out of existance, and get replaced with one of Them." He put his hand back in his pocket. "Wait a minute," I said. "How do you know all this?" He smiled. "I know," he said. "Because I used to be a part of Unmasked myself." I froze. "What?" I said. He sighed. "I was part of their group. I've gone scouting before. I've replaced staff of other communities. I've even started the fire that burned a place down. That's how I know. But, I guess I went through a change of heart, because I just can't let this place go down. I tried to convince Mr. Boss-man to skip this one over, I mean, one little community doesn't matter, right? But he said no. So I decided to come here and warn you guys about what's happening. Mr. Boss-man found out about it and sent some of the others to come get me, they found me as I was signing up. I almost didn't escape, they shot me right as I became a member. For some reason, the gun didn't work all the way. Something went wrong, and instead of phasing completely out, just my fingers got damaged." He pulled his hand out again and looked at it, as it flickered. "I think it might have something to do with my being a member of Unmasked already. I'm supposed to be replaced by the member best fitting my discription, but that's me. It's overloading the system. By the looks of it, the phase is spreading slowly, I'm not sure what'll happen at this point. They're probably trying to figure out a faster way to get rid of me as we speak." I looked from his hand up to his face. "Does it... hurt?" I asked. He smiled. "It's exruciating," he said calmly. "Pray you never get shot. But then again, if you do, it'll only last for a few seconds as your personality is matched up with a member of Unmasked, and then you're just... gone. You've phased completely out of existance." I stood for a moment, thinking over everything he had said. I didn't know if I believed him or not, it was a pretty wild story, but it sort of made sense. Then again, it was late at night, anything could make sense in the dark. "Look, Teal_Lion36," I said. "It's getting late, and I really should be leaving now. It was nice meeting you, maybe you should head to the Chamber of Awakening, it's just down the street a couple blocks. Introduce yourself, get to know the community, it might be good for you." I turned to walk away. "You think I'm crazy, don't you?" He said behind me. I turned around, but he was gone. Well, invisible again, most likely. "Honestly, Teal," I said. "I don't know if you're crazy or not. I'll have to think about it before I make my decision." I waited for a moment, there was no response. I sighed and started walking back down the street to leave town. When I reached the boundary, he materialized in front of me. "Just to let you know," he said. "I've decided to call you Rushi. You didn't tell me your name, so I ran by your profile and checked it out. Marushi takes too long to say." Then he ran down the street before I could say anything. "LATER!" He called as he dissapeared again. I sighed. Girl, What on earth have you gotten yourself into? Spoiler: Chapter 2 The next day, I couldn't stop thinking about everything Teal_Lion36 had told me. Now that it was daytime, his story seemed a lot less believable, and I had practically decided that he was either paranoid, crazy, or some kind of prankster trying to scare me in the dark. So why did I feel so freaked when I went into the Community News and Projects district and saw three guests walking around, peering in at all the Threads? I turned around to go to a different district. Eventually, I decided to head over to the Introductions and Departures district, see if Teal had taken my advice and introduced himself. Unfortunately, he had. When I got to the district, I could see right away that some big news was going on. There was one new thread, created the night before, and it had so many replies, I was surprised. I went over to see what he had done to warrant such popularity. With a sinking feeing in my stomach, I read the title of the thread: "Look behind you." I went inside and reveiwed all he had done and said. He started out his first post with the words "Hi, I'm Teal_Lion36, and your community is going to be destroyed by a group of seemingly harmless guests," and he ended it with "Watch your back, or you might end up being completely erased and replaced with a guest." I looked at all the replies people posted. it seemed like a lot of people responded like I had, they politely tried to tell him that the guests were harmless and that he would get used to the forums before long. Some people seemed to think he was joking, and some other members out and out told him he was stupid. But there were a few who actually seemed to believe him. Or at least, they thought that he had a good point, and there were too many guests around. As I was walking out of the building, I heard Teal's voice from across the street, although he was invisiible again, so I couldn't see him. "Rushi!" He called. I heard his footsteps, he was running toward me. Then he stopped. "What'd'ya think? I decided to take your advice and I created a thread to help spread awareness." I couldn't help but feel sorry for the guy. I mean, most of the members thought he was stupid, or at least, a little strange and paranoid. He didn't seem to have any sense of how crazy he sounded. "I didn't mean for you to tell everybody about your theory," I said quietly. "I meant for you to just post like a normal member, maybe you'd figure out-" I stopped. "Figure out what?" He said. I couldn't see his face, but it sounded like he was smiling as he talked. "Figure out that I'm mistaken and the guests are indeed harmless? Sorry, Rushi, but that's not something I'll ever be able to figure out." I sighed. "I suppose you're not going to take off invisibility, because the guests might see you?" "Yup," he said. "It's one thing to show yourself at night, when you can easily hide in the darkness and nobody's online anyway. It's another thing altogether to show yourself in broad daylight in the middle of the street. Especially as there are six guests here, stalking my intro thread." I looked around, and sure enough, I could see guests lurking around, eyeing the building I had just left. Now, the guests are kinda creepy to look at, their faces are non-descript and blank, they wear plain clothes, and of course, they have no names. Usually, I paid no attention to them, but in light of Teal's story, they seemed a lot more suspicious. No way of knowing who they are, they're easily able to slip in out of crowds unnoticed, and people usually ignore them while they stand by and see everything. And now they were looking at me suspiciously. I turned and began to walk away, out of the Introductions and Departures district, careful to not look like I was suspicious or hurrying. Once out of the district, I looked behind me. The guests had stayed where they were, and hadn't followed me. "Teal," I said quietly, to see if he was still near. "Yeah, wattup?" He said. Alright, so he was still with me. I felt stupid, like I was agreeing to something that I knew was impossible. "Are you sure about this 'Unmasked' thing?" "I'm afraid so," he said. I thought for a moment. "I'm still not agreeing with you," I said finally. "But I'm beginning to see where you're coming from." As I walked towards the spamzone, I noticed eight more guests walking around and heading into the different districts. Yeah, I definitely was beginning to see where he was coming from. Of course, I about stopped breathing when I went into the spam zone. At a glance, I saw so many guests, I couldn't get a good count. They were milling about, looking at everything. You'd think with so many of them, someone would notice, but nobody even glanced at them a second time. Now that I thought about it, the only real member I could see from where I was standing was Fearless. She was hurrying along into another thread, she didn't notice how many guests there were. I heard a low exhale beside, me, like Teal was surprised about something. "Fifty-six," he whispered. "They sent a whole army. I'm not surprised, we've never had a turncoat before. Of course they'd want to send as many out as possible, track me down faster. And they'd all end up here, where the highest amount of posting is. If you don't mind, Rushi, I'll be waiting over in a less populated area, like, your place. See ya." I nodded my head slightly, to indicate I understood, then I went into the crowd of guests, pretending to ignore them as I checked out the latest spamzone threads. There was something about a movie someone had watched, there was a thread about pizza, there was a heated political debate going on, there were three threads calling all Whovians, and there was a wierd trend going on, something about a cat and a bar of soap, I didn't really figure out what it was about, I didn't even glance in the windows as I passed. Basic spamzone stuff. Then I saw another thread, and I stopped to check it out. It was titled "Long time no see, KHV!" And it was by a member I'd never seen before. Remembering Teal's story about a scout taking over a dead member's profile and using it to scope out the most influential, I went inside. It was by a member named overload, and according to his starting post, he'd been away for a couple of years and had seen the site's name bookmarked on his family's PC. It seemed like everybody who veiwed this thread hadn't really known the guy too well, a few older members were like, "Oh yeah, I think I saw you around in the RP arena a couple of times. Welcome back." Of course, overload might actually be a returning member, but I just couldn't get Teal's story out of my head. If it was a practical joke, it was a very well thought-out one. Cast suspicion on the most common of occourances, and you're sure to have at least some people suspect those aforementioned occourances. Was I being tricked by Teal? There was really no way of knowing. I left the thread and headed for my place. Even if Teal was just trying to trick me, I still felt sorry for the guy. I didn't just want to ignore him, I might as well humor him somewhat. I sighed, this was turning out to be quite an interesting day. Teal didn't seem surprised when I told him about overload's thread. In fact, he almost seemed smug about it, like he was thinking "I told you so," or something like that. "So then," he said. "It's begun. Over the next few days, he'll be observing everything, talking to everyone, learning all about this place, and then he'll report it all back to his superior. Now, since warning all you stubborn people of the impending doom didn't work, I guess the only way to save this place now is to stop this "overload" from getting back to the rest of the group. Come on." "Wait!" I said. I looked around, he was still invisible, so I didn't know if he had waited or not. "...What?" He said impatiently. Oh, good, he had waited. "Okay, first off, you're invisible," I said. "How am I supposed to follow you if I can't see you? Secondly, I don't even know if I believe you! In fact, I kinda don't think I do. I'm sorry, but I think you're probably mistaken, I'm 78% sure that there is no group called Unmasked, they're not going to try to destroy this place, and the guests are perfectly harmless!" Well, I was maybe 43% sure. In fact, I don't even know why I said 78, it was just the first number that popped into my head. Usually is the first number I think of, 7 is just such a magical number, and 8, I mean, come on, it's just cool. It's spelled cool, "eight," it sounds cool, "ate," and if you layed it sideways it would become the symbol of infinity. Wait, what was I thinking? I shook my head, trying to focus on Teal again. It would have been easier if I was able to see him. I heard him sigh, and then, he appeared. "Look," he said, and he held out his hand again. More of it was gone this time, all the way from his fingertips to halfway up his forearm, he was phasing in and out, just like he had been last night, like a hologram. This wasn't something a normal prankster could pull off. Still, though, I simply couldn't believe it. The whole thing was just too ridiculous. I shook my head. "Sorry, Teal," I said. "I- I can't. It just doesn't make sense." He frowned at me. "Fine," he said. "I'll be on my way, then, no use talking to you if you're not going to believe me. Someone'll listen." Then he took off. I sighed. I really did feel sorry for the guy. Spoiler: Chapter 3 A few days later, I stayed in KHV late into the night again. I hadn't meant to, things just sort of happen that way sometimes. I was at the playground, playing Truth or Dare, and I ended up getting in another pointless debate with Makaze, the resident troll. It was over something totally unimportant, as usual, but as always, I bit the hook, so here we were, back again. It seemed it was going to take a while, so I requested we move it over to our profiles, so we wouldn't clutter up the ToD thread. We were walking down the street towards the Member List district, still arguing about the topic, when suddenly, about ten guests came out of nowhere and made a sort of half-circle in front of us. I gasped, startled, and then I turned around, but there were ten more behind us, making it a full circle. We were completely surrounded. Makaze also was looking behind us, and he looked slightly confused and rather annoyed. "What's going on?" He said shortly. "Please, move aside so I can get past you." But of course, no one moved. Instead, the one directly in front of us said "Username; Makaze, counted posts; 785, friends; 35, rep; disabled, Forum influence; 8/10." Then he turned to me and said "Username; Marushi, counted posts; 189, friends; 39, rep; 6 bars, Forum influence, 5/10." I swallowed. Teal was right. Go figure. The guy looked at all of the other guests. "Priority: Makaze. Secondary: Marushi. Proceed." Before anybody could proceed, however, there was a loud thud as one of the guests fell to the ground. The guest next to him looked around, startled, but then he fell to the ground too. Suddenly, all was chaos, as the remaining guests all pulled out strange metal things out of their pockets and ran to some of the nearby buildings for cover. Seeing an opening during this mad scramble, Makaze made a run for it, and I followed him. With a yell, about six of the guests ran after us. We turned a nearby corner that I remembered led to the arcade, but, "CLOSED DUE TO SECURITY RISKS," was written on a sign hanging over a newly made concrete wall maybe six feet away from us. I turned around, the guests were coming up fast. "What're we gonna do?" I said quickly, turning back to- Whoa, where was Makaze? I looked up, he was already on top of the wall, jumping over the other side. I gasped, he had left me behind! Well, sort of. I ran up to the wall and jumped, but I couldn't reach the edge of the wall. I've always been kind of short. Okay, so there was no way out, I would just have to try and fight. Which was really not going to work, because really, six armed individuals who have been trained to work together vs. one geek who spends all her free time on a laptop, learned everything she knows about personal defense off a website and never had really practiced before, and whose only chance of survival would be if she had a lightsaber, which, I didn't have, as they didn't really exist. The odds were slightly in their favor. I saw the first guest come around the corner, then collapse, then the second, who again, collapsed. It happened to the third and the fourth, but the other two didn't come. "I already took care of the others," said a voice. "TEAL!" I said, relieved. Who knew he was so good at hand-to-hand combat? "Yeah, yeah, you're wrong, you apologize, you're eternally grateful to me for saving your life, now can we get out of here?" He said, all in one breath. Then he grabbed my arm (which was wierd, because he was still invisible, so it looked like I was being pulled by thin air) and began to pull me towards the main street. "Wait," I said, pulling back. He stopped. "First off," I said. "I would never say any of those things. Unless they were true. Second, why not go hide in the arcade? It's totally empty right now, we'd probably be pretty safe there, at least for a little while. "No," he said. "It's their current headquarters, that's how I was already here. I've been tracking their movements, almost every guest goes over that wall when they leave the forum. Which is why we need to leave, now. As soon as the others stop looking for me, they're going to come back here, and believe me, they can't find us here." He started to pull me away again, but I still pulled back, alarmed. "But what about Makaze?" I asked. "He went over the wall!" Teal groaned. "I'm afraid there's no way we'll be able to save him, then," he said. "By now, if they haven't already found him, they're tracking him down. He's all but gone." I felt sick. "N-no!" I said. "We have to help him, we have to go back-" I tried to break free from his grasp, but before I could do so, I heard a scream. It was probably the most blood-curdling scream I'd ever heard, just because there was no way on Earth I ever would have thought Makaze could make such a noise. I was shocked. "Not good, not good," Teal was muttering beside me. He pulled me away from the wall and across the street, and then down a sidestreet, but I had stopped resisting. I couldn't think of anything except the guests had got Makaze. Not that I had ever been like, good friends with him or anything, and granted, we only ever talked to each other if we were in a debate, but still. He was gone! I couldn't believe it. We continued running until we got to my profile, and then we stopped. "Well," said Teal, becoing visible in front of me. "Do you believe me now?" I looked up at him. He was sweaty from running so far, and he was breathing hard, but he stood over me and frowned. I looked down at his arm, it was phased all the way to his shoulder, and his hand was completely gone, the holographic image fading as it went down. I thought about when he had told me that being phased was "excruciating," and I thought of the scream I heard when the guests had caught Makaze. I nodded. "Yeah," I said, out of breath myself. "I believe you now." I realized what I was saying and half-smiled despite all that had happened. So now I was agreeing with the crazy newbie. Nice. Tomorrow was going to be very interesting. Spoiler: Chapter 4 If you want a challenge, then here's a good one for ya: Go to the spamzone, where you're most likely to have people read your posts, and try to tell all the people of KHV that there's a group of evil, body-snatching guests out to destroy a Kingdom Hearts fansite, of all things, without sounding insane. If you want a little extra challenge, then go ahead and tell them that you witnessed the death of a well-respected member, while he's arguing with you that he is not, in fact, dead. Because of course, Makaze was replaced with the guest that best matched his personality and description. So when Guest Makaze heard me saying that he was dead, he most certainly tried to disprove me using every ounce of fact, logic, theory, and just about anything else he could think of. If convincing a group of sane people that an insane thing is happening, and arguing with someone that they really are dead aren't challenges, I don't know what is. Of course nobody believed me. Well, a few people said that they "saw my point," but that was about as far as it went. Frustrated, I left the spamzone and headed to my profile, where Teal was hanging out, keeping out of sight. "How goes things?" He asked. "Let's just say they believe me as much as I believed you the first time you told me." I said. I sat down and sighed. "They probably believe me even less, what with Makaze repeatedly calling my attention to his apparant existance. Who knew that guy could argue so much?" I chuckled at my own joke and Teal rolled his eyes. "Unfortunately, we have even bigger problems than our dear guest Makaze." he said. "Oh yeah?" I looked up at him. "Why, what happened now?" Teal looked tired, and as he began to talk, I let my gaze fall to his arm. The phasing had reached his shoulder. "Another member has been taken, I'm afraid." I focused my attention back to his face. "Really?" I asked. "Who?" "Mike." The one-word response nearly made me fall out of my seat. "WHAT?" I yelled. Teal looked amused. "I said Mike," he said. "Mike has been replaced, simple as that." I was shocked. I didn't know Mike very well, and as sorry as I was to admit it, I couldn't count him among my close friends. Not that I didn't want him as a friend, of course, I had always wished to get to know him better, but now I would never get the chance. Mike was one of the first names I learned when I first started to frequent KHV. Back in those days, I had come strictly for the cutscene archive, being interested in making AMV's. He had written an article that caught my eye, and I read it. Then, being interested, I went to the reporter's profile and read about him. He seemed like a rather nice guy, and it was in the hopes of possibly getting to know him and others like him that I finally officially became a member. And now, he was dead. Replaced. "You know what this means, right?" I looked at Teal, he was still watching me, amused, and he was still talking. "What?" I said. "Don't you realize what this means?" He repeated. I thought for a moment before shaking my head. "No, what does it mean?" Teal sighed and put his head in his hands. "Out of all the members to believe me, why would it have to be you? Use your head, Rushi, think! Is that too hard for your obviously inferior mind?" "No reason to be rude," I said. Then I realized what he had been talking about. "Oh no, this is bad!" "Finally, she sees light!" Teal said sarcastically, turning and walking away to look out the window. "If Mike has been replaced," I said. "Then that means they've figured out which members are the most influential! They've started the invasion!" I mean, really, if you wanted to go for influence, than Mike would be a good target. It made sense, Mike was one of the more influential of the members, even if he didn't realize it. And now his influence was in the hands of the guests. Teal looked at me for a second. "And here I thought you were actually being intelligent," he said. "Yes, Rushi, they have indeed started the invasion. Or did you think that Makaze was merely an accident?" "The invasion officially began two nights ago, when they attempted to replace a different member. Luckily, I stepped in and stopped it, but I wasn't so lucky with Mike, and your being present at last night's replacement certainly screwed up poor Makaze. No, I'm not talking about the start of the invasion, I'm referring to the important matter of a certain two members who have been drawing attention to themselves, attention that will no longer be ignored now that the higher-ups have been infiltrated." He looked at me, and I said "Go on." "Oh, for pete's sake," he said. "Figure it out already!" Wait a minute. Two members, drawing attention to themselves, in danger now that the staff had been infiltrated. "You mean us, don't you?" I said. "You and me, because we know. We know the plan and have been telling other members about it. They'll be after us now." "And you finally get an answer right," Teal said. "The guests already knew about me, I'm at the top of their threat list. Being as how I'm an ex-member of Unmasked, of course I'm at the top, I know their entire plan. But now, they have a new threat, albeit a very stupid one." "Still rude," I muttered. "Sorry," he grinned. "You have been drawing much attention to yourself, Rushi, what with all the "convincing" you've been doing. Not to mention, that little scene last night in which you were seen eluding replacement and making off with Threat No. I, leaving behind you at least ten unconcious members of Unmasked, and just as many confused as there were unconcious. Oh yes, you've got quite a name for yourself among the guests now, I'd wager." I proccessed this new information for a second, so I was on the threat list of a dangerous group of member-replacing, site-destroying guests. Somehow, it made me feel rather important, even though it scared me half out of my wits. "Well then," I said. "What should I do?" Teal looked out the window again and I followed his gaze. There were guests practically standing in plain sight, staking out my profile. "There's only one thing we can do at this point," Teal said calmy. "Say goodbye to your precious Forums." "WHAT!?!" I shouted again, surely he couldn't be serious, the invasion had only started two nights ago, the situation couldn't be as desperate as that already! Teal laughed. "Relax," he said. "I meant, we have to stop coming to this site as members. Know thine enemy, and whatnot." "You mean, pretend to be guests?" He nodded. I let out a sigh of relief. "Why didn't you just say so? I thought you meant that it was too late, that the site was practically condemned." He shrugged. "Who's to say it isn't?" he said casually. "The most important thing to do right now is to stop as many replacements as possible, starting with our own. As members, we're easily recognizable, and can be followed wherever we go. As guests, we will be just as invisible as they are, and can stop more replacements than we normally would be able to." "Not to mention, the more replacements we stop, the more members will believe us. The funny thing about people, they have a tendancy to not believe anything at all until either it is too late, and they are dead, or until they've survived a close call. If we can cause as many "too late's" to turn into "close calls" as possible, we will have gathered quite a following." I thought about this. "Yeah, that makes sense," I said, feeling a strange sense in the pit of my stomach. I was going to leave KHV. That was something I'd promised myself not to do. I had planned to grow up on the site, I had planned to stay here until everyone I knew was gone, and there was absolutely nothing left for me. And now I was leaving. "At least let me have a chance to say goodbye," I said. Teal rolled his eyes. "Seriously, you KH people are so emotional," he said. "You spend too much time babbling on and on about hearts and friends and connections, and the sky... I mean, seriously, we're just going to be disguised as guests, you'll still be able to see everything that's going on. Besides, you'll be in an even better position to protect your friends. Let's just get out of here." "No." I shook my head. "I can't just log off and disappear, that would be suspicious. I've gotta say goodbye first. Give me a week." Teal sighed. "As loathe as I am to admit it," he said, "that actually makes sense. A week, not a minute more." I smiled. If this was all the time I had left, I would make it count.
I enjoyed this story quite a lot. It was very well written. Just out of curiosity, is Teal_Lion36 an actual member?
It twas a lonish read, but it was a very easy read for me, so props for a great start "Rushi"! ;P If you're able to keep my attention then you must be doing something right. xD You planning on involving more members as the story progresses? Also... Teal_Lion36...there must be a deeper meaning or I haven't met someone.
This. I was singing it in my head and expecting a beauty and the beast story using khv members. Anyway, I think what you've done is really good. It's a clever idea and I like how you've made the guests the enemy as opposed to the usual bots. It's really quite good and well thought through. I like the interaction between between the different characters and I'm really looking forward to you bringing in the more well known members and see how you portray them. Keep up the good work, I'll be sure to keep track of this.
No, he is not. I wanted to make somebody up whom I could have complete poetic liscense with, not having to worry about keeping him realistic with whichever member I was writing about. The name just came to me out of nowhere. But, just to be sure I wasn't writing about any real member, I checked the member list. There is a Teal_Ninja, but no Teal_Lion36. Thank you, I'm glad you find it easy to read. Yes, I'm planning on involving more members, and yeah, you haven't met Teal_Lion36. Like I said, I just created him so I could have my way with him. Haha, good catch. Yes, I named it after the song. I just thought that'd be kind of ironic, plus it fit the storyline I'm going for. Again, nice catch. XD Thank you for all your high praise, I really liked the idea of guests being the enemy as well. I've been sort of building up the idea ever since I saw ten guests reading a fairly dead thread once. But yeah, I'll be bringing in more of the well known members soon, hopefully in the next chapter. BTW, how's your story coming along, the New Hope one? When I first saw that, I expected some Star Wars or something. I liked what I read, I'm looking forward to more of it. :)
Read. Not going to lie; I sometimes find your writing style somewhat difficult to follow. Nobody else seems to have that issue, so perhaps it's just me. I love the idea behind it; with Guests as the 'villains' rather than bot as is so common. It's a really refreshing way to frame the story, and I actually like the member Teal_Lion36, because it makes me think... did the guests get him so badly that he literally was erased from the members list? If you want to know how bad the guests thing is, just look in on Last Person to Post sometime. I've seen 39 guests in there at one point, and only one member, which was of course me. Now that puts it into perspective. In anycase; I'm looking forward to more (aren't I always?).
I must say I rather enjoyed this my dear. The idea behind it is great,and confirms my paranoid fears about the guests. And just that whole working in Wikipedia thing was a stroke of excellence. Your writing style is very fast paced and interesting,but maybe space things out a bit more or something? As my eyes were completely confusing themselves trying to read it. But it is a lovely story so far,and I simply cannot wait to read the rest~
Oh thanks, unfortunatly I currently don't have Word so that's at a stand still however just before I lost it, I kept adding little paragraphs without posting to say I'd updated. So if you look there might be a bit more there that you haven't seen.
Thanks for the advice, I''l try to space things out a bit more in the future. But did you mean, like, cut the paragraphs shorter, or what? Sorry, I get a little confused about spacing and stuff. XP Yeah, I don't have word either. All the stories I was working on before I got my laptop don't open with Notebook, which is what I've been using lately, so they're all at a standstill. So I totally understand. But yeah, I check back all the time because I read in the comments that you wouldn't post after each update. I've read all of it, up to where he never got into roleplay but enjoyed the magic of watching them. EDIT: Hey everybody! I just updated with the second two chapters, so enjoy! Bear in mind, I wrote them quite a few months ago, so they're already outdated, but they're still fun, and I wouldn't change a thing. EDIT NUMBER TWO: Chapter four is up! Another shocker in this chapter, not to mention an explanation for my prolonged absence in the forums. Since much of the info in the first four chapters is outdated, I've decided to just leave the time-line as if all this took place within the past few weeks before I left. Then, in chapter five, I'll write as if I have been away for months, making it present-day, and all of the outdated info will be replaced with the correct info for this present time. Anyway, I just popped in to post the chapter, this isn't an official visit. Pirates, don't worry, this is not the story I promised you, I'm writing a pirate-version of my absence as well. Well, time's just about up, I've gotta go before the guests spot me. BTW, 22 guests in the spamzone right now. Just sayin'. XD
