Froufrou entered the new scenario with her wits about her, knowing immediately what action she would proceed to take. Sure, there was alternative Omar, alias Gazpacho, knelt before her with a tray of tempting edibles - but she would not fall for this, and she would not give him or indeed alternative Kahli a chance to interfere with her whims.
With a flick of her tendrils, she knocked the tray out of alternative Omar's arms and smacked him in the face.
[Critical hit]:
"Froufrou! How could you do that to poor Gazpacho?" cried alternative Kahli with a scowling frown.
Froufrou squelched in irritation and unleashed a large, green globule courtesy of her [Putrefy] [skill]. It exploded all over alternative Kahli, sending her tumbling backwards in shock.
"Froufrou, how dare you!"
How dare her? Normal Kahli would never talk to Froufrou like that. She couldn't get out of this wretched alternative timeline fast enough, Froufrou decided. And thusly it was time for the next step of her plan.
She focused her mind and indeed also her writhing tendrils. In a wild display of her [LIN], she intentionally reached through time to grasp at the tendrils of her alternative self - and not just any alternative self. Froufrou wanted to specifically arrest the tendrils of the alternative self that had so cruelly trapped her in this timeline.
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Alternative Froufrou tapped her tendrils impatiently. "Well? Are we going to the third scenario? Why, I oughta-"
"Fine!" said Kahli. She felt incredibly on edge around this strange version of Froufrou. What had changed? Of course, she knew that something had to have changed - usually, despite her squelchiness and putridity, Froufrou was a positive aspect of Kahli's otherwise incredibly hectic life as of life. And yet, every interaction with Froufrou recently seemed to suck the soul right out of her, and Kahli had no idea why! Maybe it had something to do with the way she talked... Had Froufrou always talked?
And of course, Froufrou had not always talked, but Kahli was not interacting at this moment with Froufrou - she was with alternative Froufrou, who was maliciously utilizing her [Tale Teller] [skill] to purposefully keep Kahli from understanding fully what was going on.
"Well? Kahlizone? We doing this thing or aren't we?"
Kahli's eyes shook as she glanced at alternative Froufrou with a hint of fear, and then down to her big left foot. There was the final scenario. Was this one going to end in Omar's death, too? Sure, she didn't like that Omar seemed determined, over and over again, to paint her as some sort of a villain as opposed to just a tauman being, but that didn't mean she wanted him to end up dead. Kahli hoped with all of her hearts that somehow, Omar wouldn't die in this scenario. And it was with this as the motivation that she finally beheld and indeed entered into the next scenario.
[Now viewing scenario 3]
"You know what, Omar?" asked Kahli as she floated in the air.
"What?!" spat Omar with frustration as he jostled Froufrou around cruelly. "You don't think I'll kill this fucking thing?"
"Woah, woah, woah there, buddy!" interjected alternative Froufrou. "What in the fuck did you just call me?"
Omar looked into Kahli's purse and scowled. "I called you a thing, thing!"
"Yea? A thing? Why I oughta-"
Kahli cringed as she waited for alternative Froufrou to lapse into a lengthy diatribe lambasting Omar for all he was worth to the point that he would destroy himself yet again. Instead, inexplicably, the moment never came.
"It's gone," said Omar, with genuine confusion in his voice and barely a lick of anger.
"What?" asked Kahli. "Also, don't call Froufrou it."
"Your Froufrou has... disappeared. IT isn't in the fucking purse anymore, Kahli."
Kahli was angry with Omar, and wanted to berate him, but then she caught sight of something that gripped her attention away from her ornery ex-mentor. She saw, from afar, the perfect black hair of Sahdi tumbling through the air. Of course, Sahdi was attached to her hair - that is to say, Sahdi had seemingly fallen off the back of G'athoong.
With renewed vigor, Kahli kicked off her rock rapidly again and again, zooming through the air. She reached out her arm and snatched her purse out of Omar's clutches by use of her left, living wooden hand.
Stolen novel; please report.
"Hey! Where are you going? Aren't we going to fight?!" asked Omar incredulously as she soared past him.
Kahli zoomed closer and closer still, until finally she was right under Sahdi. With a gasp and a clutch, she held her unlikely healer in her arms.
"Kahli!" said Sahdi, her voice shrill yet her hair - of course - flawless as if she'd just styled it. She tussled it for effect. "You saved me!!"
"Oh. Yea. I guess I did," said Kahli. "That's funny."
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Froufrou pulled and pulled, and with a final yank out into the timeline slid alternative Froufrou.
"You, Omar, are the vilest fucking piece of shit I've ever had the displeasure of meeting in my entire Theseosus-damned life!" spat alternative Froufrou. "By the singular god herself, I swear, you really are detestable. You are hardly even a person, hell, you're the worst tauman in Nomachiato and that's by a wide fucking margin. Your fuse is so short you might as well be expired dynamite. And your flaming arm? Pfft! It's like a damned expired sparkler is what it is! It's the most disappointing fucking thing. I remember when I first fucking heard about you, I thought you were some big, cruel, intimidating guy. Bah! You're not shit, Omar, and you never will be! You're a worthless excuse for a living being and the whole world would be better off without you in it! In fact, that's it. I'm not dealing with this stupid air fight with you any second longer, timelines be damned. Why don't you just take that big flaming arm of yours and light yourself ablaze?"
Alternative Omar was crying. "Why-a would-a you say-a such a thing to-a Gazpacho?" As he sniffled, he raised his arm - and with a burst of flame, it seemed he was ready to comply. He screamed as the flames began to engulf him.
"Wait a fucking second!" said alternative Froufrou. "Gazpacho?! Is that you? Gazpacho, oh my one god, please don't burn yourself!!"
"Oh, thank Theseosus," cried alternative Omar as he set off his flaming arm and stamped himself out with a huff of relief. "By the way, Froufrou, do you want some custard? Or possibly some cherry pie?"
"Boy, do I!" said alternative Froufrou with glee.
Froufrou squelched sarcastically. She really couldn't believe it, but this alternative version of herself must've had much lower [INT] indeed - she genuinely thought that alternative Omar was this 'Gazpacho' person. Well, at least it seemed to be enough to distract and incapacitate her.
"Wait a second, why are there two Froufrous?"
Froufrou squelched in frustration. Leave it to alternative Kahli to ruin everything. She seemed like a real wet blanket of a version of Kahli, that much was for certain.
"Forget about it, Kahlizone! I wanna eat some pie!" spat alternative Froufrou.
And so it was that alternative Froufrou ate some cherry pie, and indeed alternative Kahli ate some strudel, and Froufrou watched as they both quickly became paralyzed.
"Heh heh heh! Little did they know that I'm not really Gazpacho, but instead am OMAR! HAHAHAHA!" said alternative Omar as he ignited his flaming left arm, popped off his white chef's hat, and tore off the small, unconvincing mustache he'd had plastered over the living wood on his face.
Froufrou squelched, unamused.
"Oh, well look at that! The other Froufrou!" Alternative Omar knelt down and glared at her. "You reek much more than normal Froufrou, but you also nearly blew my cover! You must be from some other timeline - Froufrou has used her [class] and [Rift Walker] [skill] to traverse timelines before. You must have time powers like our Froufrou does, but you don't seem thrilled to be here. Of course I'm dying to destroy you just like I plan to capture and torture yourself and Kahli from this timeline, but I don't really see a reason to waste my energy on you if you don't even belong here. So, let me cut you a deal. You keep your trap shut, and you let me carry out my plot in this timeline, and I'll let you out of here."
Froufrou squelched with a confused affirmative. How would alternative Omar allow her escape?
"I've been planning this for a while. See, Froufrou's [Rift Walker] [skill] activates through use of her tendrils. So, if I finagle it in just the right way, we should be able to move her tendrils in a fashion that will cut a rift to your timeline. Only, I think she usually doesn't get a choice on where her rifts open up unless she's returning to this timeline, to her home timeline. So, you'll need some way to ground yourself to the right timeline, I think."
Froufrou squelched with determination. She was also quite impressed - it seemed that, in this timeline, whatever [INT] alternative Froufrou and alternative Kahli were missing had flowed over to alternative Omar, for he was not only more articulate but he also seemed quite intelligent. She also felt confident that she could use her [LIN] to reach through time and space and grasp her purse from her own home timeline. With that, she made her best attempt - and indeed, she felt the soft, fluffy interior of her makeshift home that was so often slung over Kahli's shoulder. It warmed her distributed mucus membranes to think of it all. Finally, it seemed, she was going to make it home. And if all her plans were going to pan out as expected, then Kahli had surely saved Sahdi back in her home timeline. Froufrou truly couldn't wait to be back.
"Sike!" said Omar with a cackle as he swung his flaming arm down in a flash so quick that even Froufrou's heightened reflexes couldn't react it time. With a slam and a spark, Froufrou tumbled to the floor and ceased her writhing.
[End scenario]
Froufrou was in the bright white void. And who was next to her, but alternative Froufrou!
"I just can't believe it about Gazpacho," said alternative Froufrou. "He seemed like such a nice guy!"
"I know," said alternative Kahli. "I think it's a [skill] he's using to trick us, because I seem to fall for it every time we enter the scenario."
Froufrou squelched with a stinky dissatisfaction. She was so tired of this wacky, alternative timeline - she wanted to be back in her wacky, normal timeline.
"Oh, great," said alternative Froufrou. "So it looks like both of us are here now! Listen, me, this timeline's too big for the both of us! If I'm going to be stuck here, then there's no way you can! If only there was some way for us to get a fourth go at a scenario, but of course as we all know here there's no way to do that-"
Froufrou squelched incredulously. Of course there was a way! This might have been a nested timeline, but that didn't mean she couldn't twist one of the scenarios. Right?