Futuristic Abeona Travel Agency | Dimension-Hopping Shenanigans

[Ambiloquous]

Abeona Travel Agency​

For a business that provided the rare intermediary services to those that cannot travel between dimensions, the Abeona Travel Agency was surprisingly destitute. Tucked away in a corner nook at the fringes of a city, the Agency was both unfrequented by actual travellers and visited regularly by persnickety inspectors waiting for them to fall through. After years of dealing with the situation, the eclectic boss and owner decided to arrange a business trip around dimensions to find a solution but forgot about the bureau in the bustle. During the first warp, technology chose to go awry and all communications with the boss were cut off. The only two available, licensed dimension travellers now have to travel in person to the conveniently pre-set list of places the owner could be to bring them back.

Syntra x Ambiloquous

 

[Ambiloquous]

Dimension R3P71L3 - Planet 51 D1N0 c in the D1N0 Galaxy

 

[Syntra]

Yulia stared at her cup mournfully. The cup itself wasn't the problem, of course-- the issue was that it contained coffee, and she needed it to be booze. Maybe, she thought, if I stare hard enough, it'll turn into vodka. Some guy from some distant planet had apparently done something similar, and if Yulia remembered the story right, it had led to people worshiping him for over two thousand years. Which, duh! A god who provided alcohol for free was a god to be followed for sure. Way better than all those psychos who demanded, like, blood sacrifice. (...although, come to think of it, Yulia could think of a few people who deserved exactly that. All the customers who had decided to bother her today, for example. Yup, guessed it right, today was her turn to deal with complaints. Hence why she needed the booze!)

As always, though, the reality didn't seem to care about what she needed-- instead, it stubbornly insisted on proving to her that she had no supernatural powers whatsoever. Rude! (Should she just smuggle a bottle of wine into her office next time? The option was tantalizing, but-- no. No, Yulia had her pride as an office worker. She wouldn't bring alcohol into her workplace, no matter how easy it would be. That would be a violation of everything their company code considered sacred! Now, if the booze were to appear there mysteriously, that would be a whole different story. A story in which Yulia would be a victim, practically forced to drink for... for reasons, and-- Focus, she reminded to herself. The sooner these emails were taken care of, the sooner she could visit her therapist, which was a small light at the end of the tunnel.)

That light began to fade quickly, though, when she opened the first mail.

'Dear Abeona Tracel Agency, I am extremely dissatisfied with the services provided. Nobody told me how wet the Atlantis dimension would be, and so all of my pot plants died. I demand a refund!'

...okay, Yulia didn't have the strength to unpack all of that, sooo maybe she could bump it down and pretend she hadn't read it yet. It wouldn't solve anything, of course, but it would postpone the inevitable shitstorm for a few blissful minutes, and that was all she asked for. Yet another problem for her future self!

The other emails were, uh, similarly fascinating. There was a guy who complained that Sahara was too sandy (?), another man who didn't like the fact that dolphins from Enoxia didn't speak English (??), and a woman whose left arm had apparently stayed behind in some holiday dimension and grown a new personality by the time she had returned to pick it up (???) All of them required compensation, and Yulia knew damn well they wouldn't get it. Like, no company had ever reached success by not fucking their clients over! ...too bad she had to be the one to explain that basic principle to them, though.

A different email grabbed her attention, however-- and when she opened it? All the color drained from her face. An audit. A fucking audit, in a month from now. That would have been bad enough even without the Director missing; bad enough in a 'you-will-pay-some-insane-fines' way. (For some reason, the authorities had very little understanding for their business. Something something, causality, something something, tearing the reality apart. Who even cared, anyway? This world sucked so much that destroying it accidentally would be just a pleasant bonus.) With him not there, though? They could straight up shut the company down! And since he'd been missing for weeks now-- well, Yulia wasn't holding her breath.

Alright, time for the only reasonable solution in sight.

Yulia opened the door of her office, wearing the expression of the angel of vengeance. "Friends," she shouted at a bunch of tired coworkers who were trying to get the coffee machine to work, "the enemy is trying to take us down again. But, hey, there can't be an audit if they never reach our offices, right? So, if someone ties themselves to the main entrance, we're all saved! Any volunteers?" What a brilliant, brilliant plan--this proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that sleep deprivation was a bullshit concept. See how clearly Yulia still thought despite not having slept for three days? Haha!

 

[Ambiloquous]

Ophelia Mun-Seol​

There was an agonized snarl, a few choice curse words and the slam of a squeaky door. A woman with dead eyes and orange hair—looking closer, it was actually orange liquid—walked out the only female washroom in the building; the one with taps that stopped working only when people needed to wash their hands or in her case, wash their entire body. The janitor thought the employees were pulling her leg because it always worked by the time she arrived, and so it was never fixed. Not that the male bathroom was any better off, having only one toilet and a leaky ceiling when it rained. It was also never fixed. Honestly, most employees wondered why they even had a janitor if she never did her work.

Ophelia was done. She was done. This was it; this was the end. She should have taken that cuddle therapy offer when she had the chance. Trudging through halls that varied in cleanliness, she glowered at anyone who took a second glance at her, ignoring the fact that she was dripping what looked like papaya smoothie from the tip of her head to the sole of her dress shoes. The substance was thought to be the weirdly specific parasite-based poison that caused swan-pox in two-tailed merhippos and made everything else very, very high. Evidence for the claim came in the form of two humans and one water sprite dancing on the ceiling near Gate B—affectionately known as Bob—with intoxicated grins on their faces.

She wanted to stab their stupid faces. And everyone else's stupid face. And her own stupid face for ever agreeing to work here. Every day, she regretted her decision to come, but stayed anyway because she was an adult with an overactive sense of responsibility and what if the agency fell apart after she left? The guilt would kill her. Ophelia should have listened to negative reviews online about Abeona Travel Agency from the beginning, saving her the effort of ever being held accountable for this underpaying, over-discounting business with no morals to speak of whatsoever.

Ophelia released a long, drawn-out breath to cool her temper. Deep breath in, deep breath out. Think of the positives: she was still alive and there was going to be coffee in her future if she could just get the damn machine to work. No, no. Happy thoughts. Lighthearted thoughts. Just think of the coffee. Cheap, cardboard coffe—she decided that being content was overrated.

Once she had finally reached the paltry lobby where her dear, beloved coffee machine rested, she lifted her perma-frown two degrees in just in time to hear “—if someone ties themselves to the main entrance, we're all saved! Any volunteers?” and her lips dropped right back in place, undoing her millisecond of possible not-negativity.

“What in the world, Yulia.” Ophelia moved her dead-eyed stare to her greatest nemesis in the office, pushing orange-coated hair away from blocking and dripping into her very intimidating gaze. “What’s going on now?”

 

[Syntra]

Yulia's suggestion, of course, was entirely reasonable-- she always offered reasonable solutions, so this one had to be reasonable as well. That was how these things worked, right? Receiving anything but a reasonable solution from her would be like, uhh, going to a hairdresser's and getting a hamburger instead of a new haircut. So, in other words, completely out of question!

...why the fuck, then, did everyone stare at her as if she'd just asked them to sacrifice their grandmothers to Satan? (Which, by the way, they should have gotten used to by now. Stupid religious freedom act! Sure, it was nice people could choose their personal brand of delusion freely, Yulia supposed, but they did not have to fill her inbox with spam like that. She didn't even have a grandmother anymore, for god's sake. And if she did? Exchanging her life for three fucking concert tickets wouldn't have seemed like a fair deal, dammit! ...maybe ten would have done, though. Depending on the band.)

"Well, why don't you do it?" Brian finally asked. "Since it was your idea and everything-- wouldn't want to take your credit away from you."

"A good question, actually," Yulia straightened. "Why, indeed? As always, it's out of the goodness of my heart! I wanted to give you guys a chance to prove yourself. I can't hoard all those awards when you are here as well-- that would have been too cruel." ...and she also didn't want to risk her neck in case they came with fucking chainsaws, but hey, details, right? Just small things, really.

Yulia opened her mouth to continue her rousing speech, though then, of course, Ophelia made her grand appearance. Did she have a radar or something? Because she always, without fail, appeared exactly at the moment Yulia didn't want to see her. (Admittedly, that may have been caused by the fact she never wanted to see her, but still! Spooky. Not as spooky as her fashion choices, however.)

C'mon, you're a professional, she reminded to herself. Don't laugh. That proved to be surprisingly easy-- all it took was to redefine what laughter was. Like, yeah, she may have giggled, but giggling wasn't laughing, so checkmate, atheists! The smile froze on her lips pretty fast, though, when she remembered why they were here.

"And good morning to you too, Ophelia," Yulia couldn't help herself. "Always a joy to see you. But anyway, there will be an audit, so clearly this is the only chance for us to defend our way of life." Not that it was luxurious, or even remotely okay, but it was the only life Yulia knew and she would rather die before letting go of it. ...or, preferably, make other people die instead. And speaking of that--

"Since the Director is not available," Yulia shrugged, "you know what'll happen. So, wanna earn your award this month?" Two birds, one stone! Genius, truly. Maybe she should, uhhh, start playing chess, or whatever geniuses did in their free time.

 

[Ambiloquous]

Ophelia Mun-Seol​

Ophelia’s scowl deepened from I’m-in-a-bad-mood-touch-me-and-your-finger-breaks to if-you-so-much-as-look-at-me-wrong-I-will-personally-send-you-to-hell as Yulia giggled and smothered laughs were heard around the lobby. When her nemesis’ smile froze in place, she huffed in concealed satisfaction, pleased that her glare was finally working its magic after so long of people disregarding it. What was it with people and believing she was all bark and no bite? She had never been lenient with mistakes or even simply work that wasn’t the best it could be. Pleasant was not at all the descriptor for her critiques, and she made sure that all staff connected to her duties remembered it. Did she have to be even more heavy-handed to receive a little respect around here?

When Yulia mentioned an audit, Ophelia made a face that really didn’t look much different from her normal face, ignoring whatever other nonsense Yulia was blabbing. It was impolite and bad manners, but she was clearly not in the right state of mind to be making decisions seeing the first solution she had come up with was tying someone to the front entrance.

There was no good solution for the mess they would be in if the director didn’t come back soon, and Ophelia didn’t think he was coming back soon. She sighed. “When is the audit?”

She looked up at the ceiling and prayed to the deities of dimension transportation, if there were any, that there were more legal dimension travellers in the office than just the crazy beside her. “And who else is available to drag him back from his vaca—important business trip?”

 

[Syntra]

...when was the audit? Really? That was the reaction Ophelia was going with here, in the face of impeding apocalypse? 'Cause, make no mistake, that was what this undoubtedly was. Without the Director present, the whole company would be shut down, and Yulia-- Yulia hadn't built her entire identity around being a good employee to let it go down in flames now, dammit. And as for Ophelia? Her response was the equivalent of pouring a glass of water into the raging inferno! What did she hope to do in the brief time before the officials showed up and destroyed their dreams? Steal office equipment? Deny the reality and hope the universe would correct itself with their wishful thinking serving as the new template? (Because, spoiler alert, that didn't work. Yulia would know-- she had spent an embarrassingly long time pretending Ophelia didn't exist, and yet she was still distinctly there. Thanks for nothing, Paolo Coelho!)

"In a few months," she replied nonetheless. Answering questions was the civilized way, after all, and the fact that her colleague behaved like a brute didn't mean that Yulia had to sink to her level. She had her standards, thank you very much. "But I don't see how that is--" Oh. That was how it was relevant, then. A helpful solution, one would be inclined to think, but the vile woman couldn't fool her. Oh no, Yulia saw it for what it was-- a blatant attempt to butter the Director up! If she showed up like a knight in shining armor, all righteous and unwavering in her efforts to save the company, surely the award would go to her. Stupid Ophelia and her stupid, empty gestures. Did she seriously think Yulia would let her steal the spotlight? Because, no, not happening. Over her dead body! And if it meant she had to spend more time in the snake's presence-- well, career demanded sacrifices. Yulia would simply get over her grievances like the well-adjusted, reliable adult she was, and everything would be just peachy. (...or so she hoped, anyway. Besides, if things got too unbearable, she could always push Ophelia off some cliff. Accidents happened!)

"I'll go," she said before anyone else could volunteer. (Admittedly, it didn't seem like anyone else was too eager to do that-- when Ophelia spoke up, most people tried their hardest to avoid her gaze, and Thomas muttered something about 'having to stay there to change the toilet paper.' Stay classy, everyone.) "Do you have the faintest idea where he went?" Yulia raised her eyebrow. Because, uh, searching through all the available dimensions might take a while.

 

[Ambiloquous]

Ophelia Mun-Seol​

A few months? Ophelia furrowed her brows, loosely calculating the chances of finding the director and hauling him back to his proper position: the ultimate blocker of Abeona Travel Agency, preventing inspectors from ever setting their nitpicky feet into the office building. Her brain concluded that the possibility of finding him in a sea of different dimensions was a big, fat zero. Yes, that was right. She didn’t think they could find him in time. If there was one thing the director was good at, it was running away from responsibilities.

As the office came alive with far-fetched, interestingly random excuses—there was never toilet paper, Thomas—and gazes that gave a wide berth to the woman dripping orange, Ophelia felt a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. Was her worst imaginings of how this trip would go coming alive? It certainly felt so. She glowered at Yulia, shooting her the most vehement death stare she had ever had the need to bestow on her enemies, hoping for dear life that she would reject her proposal. She hated her; they both knew that. There was little chance that she would actually agree, but even so, those little chances were enough for her to want to crush them under the blocky heels of her leather pumps.

When Yulia accepted her offer before anyone else—really, anyone else, please—Ophelia blinked at her with a twisted expression and then promptly covered her face with her hands. It was an emergency; she was allowed to do it. Screw propriety and etiquette, her newest partner sure didn’t have it.

“Do I have any ideas where he went?” She dropped her hands from her face, an appearance of having aged ten years resting upon it. “No, no, I don’t. The real question is: does anyone?”

 

[Syntra]

Yulia merely rolled her eyes. Just, sheesh. She didn't expect Ophelia to like her or anything, but couldn't she at least pretend that she was okay with sharing the same dimension with her? Surely, surely it couldn't be that hard. (It wasn't like she was the worst person in the dimension, either. Absolutely not, ma'am! That would have required effort, and her energy reserves were constantly drained by trying to survive on her wage. Where were you supposed to find the opportunities for murders, unethical experiments and occasional acts of terrorism if you spent the majority of your free time fighting over discounted bread, anyway? Truly, this supervillain shit was for the rich.)

So, all in all, Yulia was a pretty upstanding citizen-- no murders, no frauds, not even those cute little phishing scams. Hell, she had never received a parking ticket in her life, and the fact she didn't actually own a car was only tangentially related to that, she was sure. Given the state of the world, that practically made her a fucking saint! ...what, then, was Ophelia's problem? Jealousy? It had to be, really, because Yulia saw no other explanation here. (...how petty! Like, yes, not everyone had the immense luck of being born as such a beautiful and talented individual, but still-- being this bitter over it did her no favors, man. If anything, it only made the differences between them more obvious! She, a graceful swan, and Ophelia... well, distinctly not that. Very, very distinctly.)

"...you've got a point," Yulia admitted, mostly because it was true. Actually, she had her doubts that even Director himself knew where he was at any given point-- his brain and the rest of his body were, uh, connected in interesting ways. (Translation: They weren't. She loved him, of course, because he was Director and you had to love your Director, but that still had to be said. Like, Yulia was half-convinced it was a genuine neurological condition.)

"But I mean, obviously we need to start somewhere." Because, uh, it was kinda difficult to finish something if you never started in the first place. Yulia happened to be an expert on Not Starting Things, and yeah, it had never worked out so far. Where should they start, though? Now that was the question.

As always, however, Yulia had a solution-- and this time, that solution could be found in her pocket. Pursing her lips, she pulled out a dart, covered her eyes and threw it... well, in the general direction of the large map hanging on the wall. "Where did it land?" she asked, still covering her eyes. (...because, hey, why the fuck not? Fate had gotten them into this mess, so it could also bail them out. Theoretically, at least. And if not-- well, if not, Yulia would sue!)

 

[Ambiloquous]

Ophelia Mun-Seol​

Yulia had agreed to her statement. Did the moon turn blue or was this a different dimension? Ophelia boggled at her words, trying to connect them to the obstinate person in her memories. Then again, this was the Director, and the Director did strange things to people’s minds. She shook off the thought, fixing her face back into her characteristic cheerless expression.

As her now-partner threw a dart at the wall, even knowing it was a ridiculous idea and shouldn’t be supported in any other situation, Ophelia instinctively whipped her head to the map and squinted her eyes. “This is an absurd idea, but—and I hate to say it—it might just be the answer to our problem.”

She blinked and then sighed as she read the tag tacked onto the old-fashioned style map on the wall. “Dimension R3P71L3, Planet 51 D1N0 c.”

The location just couldn’t be an easy one, could it? Probability was not on her side today. Or any day, actually. But especially today. Trips to 51 D1N0 c had been stopped two days ago, after too many customers had come back complaining of man-eating plants and sacrificial locals. It wasn’t on her top places to visit if she had the chance, but it likely fit the Director’s odd tastes.

“Alright, fine,” Ophelia said, tired of the way her life worked. She looked around the area. “Does anyone have a towel? A pack of tissues? Anything?”

 

[Syntra]

Yulia, too, was similarly overjoyed by the dimension fate had picked for her. Like, really? The Dino Dimension of Doom, as they lovingly called it? Might as well have handed her a noose, really, because that place was bad news. You know, as the word 'doom' implied. And considering that they worked in an environment where coffee was a rare, rare treat, they sure as fuck didn't use that word without knowing what exactly it meant!

Well. At least Ophelia would probably object to it? Since objecting to things for no reason at all seemed to be her greatest hobby. No, really, it wouldn't shock her if Ophelia objected to being greeted one of these days-- probably because the phrased used wasn't fancy enough for her refined tastes. Ugh! Gods, she should be thankful that murders were illegal and Yulia was such a fucking model incident. Anyway, everything had its silver lining, it seemed, because now her bitchy nature would save their lives. Yulia could already imagine the scenario unfold-- her colleague would bitch, she would come up with a counterargument or two and Ophelia would bitch some more. Reluctantly, Yulia would yield (not before letting everyone see that SHE was the more selfless employee, though, hehe) and then she would pick a different location. Perhaps B3ACH 23MK? A place likely too tame for Director's tastes, true, but hey, he did like surprising people. Well, that, and Yulia hadn't been to a beach in ages-- not since that shark incident, anyway. (Look, that wasn't her fault. How was she supposed to know that the stupid animals couldn't withstand some antifreeze? She was just trying to feed it, dammit, and it should have appreciated her kindness nonetheless.)

So, haha. Saved by Ophelia being her usual dumb self! Who would have guessed, right? ...except that, somehow, her colleague found a way to disappoint her. Geez. Did she have an algorithm in her head that always managed to count what would annoy her the most in any given situation? Because it sure as hell seemed like that! (It wasn't like Yulia could afford to scrap her own suggestion now, either. That would make her look like a flake and a Bad Employee, and Ophelia didn't need more advantages than she already had. So, um... A good thing she had written her last will in advance, Yulia guessed? In case her family wanted to fight over the three pairs of socks she owned or something.)

"Yeah, here you are," she made a face before handing Ophelia her handkerchief. "Will you manage on your own, guys?"

"Well, I mean, you've mostly been a bother--" Thomas began, but Adrianne elbowed him. "Sure, sure. Have a nice trip! Make sure to bring me a souvenir as well, if you can. I've heard dinosaur poo is really great as a fertilizer. Miracle stuff, especially for cucumbers!"

Yeah, nice to know Adrianne worried about her cucumbers. Meanwhile, Yulia worried about her fucking life, and about the fact the only shoulder she would be able to cry on would belong to Ophelia, and-- no. No, she wouldn't cry. She would face her destiny with all the dignity of an underpaid office worker, and the stars themselves would align to give her the things she wanted. (Or some shit.) "Do you... gods, do you plan to do something before we leave? As for me, I can go right away. The Transportation Chamber is free, I suppose, unless someone is throwing a party in there again."

"Oh, geez," Mel rolled her eyes. "Will I have to listen to these accusations for the rest of my life? I only did that to test its acoustics!"

 

[Ambiloquous]

Ophelia Mun-Seol​

Making it a show to display an even more displeased face than Yulia—as Nietzsche once said, “he who fights with monsters should be careful lest he thereby becomes a monster”, so the proximity to her nemesis was surely causing her mimicry of childishness—she almost-politely snatched the small square of cloth that barely covered her palm from her outstretched hand.

Ophelia stared at the handkerchief, looked down at herself and stared at it again. Maybe it was one of those fabrics that expanded when wet? She gingerly touched it to her face and rubbed. Yanking it back to study the handkerchief, she noticed that no, it had not expanded and that it was likely at the end of its lifespan. Sopping with the poison and feeling weirdly light in her hands, it began to float away from her fingertips. It flew around in dizzying circles before plastering itself to the ceiling. Ophelia blinked. Well, it wasn’t her handkerchief, and it was an interesting reaction to the poison that no other inanimate object had experienced. She should find some time to record it later.

As she pondered control groups and locations, she glanced up and realized she was still mostly orange and had lost the last item to clean herself with. She would have groaned again, but by now, she felt mostly used to it. When comparing soaking in mer-hippo poison and partnering with Yulia, losing her last handkerchief was nothing special.

Ophelia thought about her choices as Mel tried to clear herself of her party shenanigans. She grimaced. She could go as is, or she could go wetter and possibly more illegal, but less orange in colour. “A client tried to traffick the Water of Purity through one of our gates, and we still have a bucket in the chamber. I’ll borrow it and return it later.”

Without waiting for Yulia, she started walking to the door.

 

[Syntra]

Perhaps, Yulia thought, this clusterfuck could still be salvaged somehow. A naive idea, yes, but not entirely out of the realm of possibility. Maybe Ophelia could suddenly remember she had to feed her dog? The trip would have to be postponed, and Yulia would have enough time to... uh, change her identity and move to a less hostile planet, she supposed. One with a system far, far kinder than this particularly vicious brand of capitalism. She could spend the rest of her life lying around on some beach and drinking coconut milk and laughing at her former colleagues and-- okay, no. Ophelia could go immediately, because duh, of course that she could. Why had she even suspected she was responsible for another living being in the first place? The aura that emanated from her was so evil, so full of concentrated malice, that even cactuses would wilt and die in her presence! A dog, pffft. Yeah, right. That Yulia had had a thought so stupid was a proof enough that she needed a goddamn vacation!

...a vacation wasn't what she would get, though. Instead of a relaxing stay at some hotel (and maybe a few sessions of therapy), Yulia would get to go on a wild goose chase. Wonderful, truly! Exactly what she wanted. A welcome break from the everyday boredom in the office-- like, sure, a dinosaur might eat her, and some fucking plant would probably finish the job if she happened to be lucky enough to escape from the overzealous lizards, but so what? At least she wouldn't have to invent all those excuses for not going to family gatherings anymore! (Although, Yulia thought grimly, Auntie Genevieve would probably just dig my coffin up and drag it there. No, really. The woman tended to interpret the word 'no' in creative ways, to the point that some members of her family believed Uncle Phil had never actually married her in the first place. And, who knew? Maybe they were right! Yulia had never seen the man without a duct tape wrapped around his mouth, so it wasn't like she could have asked him for his side of the story.) But, anyway. The power of positive thinking, right? Perhaps, if she viewed this experience as something good and not inherently traumatic, the reality itself would bend to her will. (Unlikely, yes, but you know what they said about drowning men and straws!)

"Okay. That means we can go now. Yay!" Yulia exclaimed with a cheer so fake it rivaled that of telemarketers. (Hmmm, a telemarketer. That could be a nice, peaceful career! Yeah, it required a complete rejection of one's ego and complex coping strategies for dealing with all those weirdos who thought you had gotten their phone number from some nefarious government agency that was spying on them, but, like, at least you could be reasonably sure a dinosaur wouldn't bite your head off. That was an improvement, right?)

Those were just daydreams, though, and Yulia knew it. Abeona was her life, and leaving it would be like-- like murdering her baby. Still, as they entered the chamber, she found herself hoping that the stupid thing wouldn't work. They had at least three malfunctions per week, so maybe the company's famous incompetence could save her ass for once as well...? Aaaand, nope. Of fucking course. When the door shut behind them, the tell-tale green light flickered on the screen, and Yulia had no choice but to put the coordinates in. "Well, here goes nothing. Here's to hoping it doesn't fry our brains." ...maybe that would be sort of nice, though? Abeona would be someone else's problem then, and Yulia would get to enjoy the sweet, sweet embrace of nothingness. Ah, the thought alone made her heart sing!

It seemed, however, that she simply couldn't have nice things-- the machine made a few suspicious sounds, put on its usual laser show and, within the blink of an eye, the two women were suddenly standing in the middle of a lush forest. Somewhere above their heads, a parrot screamed passionately. "Um. Well. Can you see the Director somewhere around here?" Yulia scratched her head. "Because I can't." ...admittedly, she hadn't really thought this through. As in, what now?

 

[Ambiloquous]

Ophelia Mun-Seol​

Ophelia huffed at Yulia’s disagreeable enthusiasm for rushing to their unfortunate assignment and set her eyes away from the machine at her tone when speaking of frying brains. She wasn’t scared of arriving brain dead or anything, of course not. She was never scared. “Frying brains would be the lesser of evils after a malfunction. There’s a larger chance it would simply just vapourize us.”

When they appeared on Planet 51 D1N0 c, the vacuous question from an admittedly sleep-deprived Yulia made her look around by reflex before she realized her own inefficiency.

“No, I can’t see him either, Yulia,” Ophelia said condescendingly, pretending she had not just done a 360-degree check for the Director. Pulling out and tapping on the screen of their sole multi-purpose communicator and travel aid—yes, it was communal; there weren't enough of these surprisingly convenient devices to go around—she zoomed in on the last updated map of the planet. “But we built a rest stop five kilometres away, and it might still have traces of him inside.”

Slipping the flat, square-shaped piece of very expensive metal into a pant pocket, she pointed to a clearly very overgrown direction of the rainforest. Her face was grim. She had somewhat expected their destination to be in not-so-great condition when they arrived, but having the only cleared path be grown over, and grown over with only particularly hazardous plants? That was extreme.

 

[Syntra]

"Naturally," Yulia said in the tone of someone who was disappointed, but not surprised. (A tone she had heard often, usually while presenting her newest excuse as to why her rent payment would be late to her landlord-- for some reason, the woman didn't appear to be too thrilled by the anecdotes of her dog eating her credit card and subsequently blocking her bank account due to entering a wrong PIN code at least three times. ...what? The excuse was literally perfect! Like, dogs definitely weren't smart enough to remember the right PIN code, so nobody could complain about it not being realistic enough. Now, her not actually owning a dog might have compromised it somewhat, but so what? If Yulia could pretend not to notice the very obvious corpse disposal shaft near the communal bathrooms, then the landlord could pretend she had a freaking dog!) "I suppose expecting some actual results from you would be pretty naive, huh?" she asked, happily ignoring the fact that her own results... also hadn't been exactly stellar so far. But, hey, offense was the best defense, right? Surely, surely Ophelia wouldn't be able to spot the contradiction if she had a mental breakdown thanks to her, uhh... you know what, let's call it 'constructive criticism'. Ah, the power of re-branding! This sounded way better than 'incessant bitching'.

When her colleague shared her hypothesis, Yulia furrowed her brow. "How do you know that, though? I mean, is there any evidence pointing to the conclusion? It's the Director. He could be anywhere." And by 'anywhere,' she really did mean 'anywhere'. Like, yes, he may have visited the rest stop like any normal person would have, but he also may have decided to get in touch with his inner monkey and travel via tree branches exclusively. (Yulia sincerely hoped that wasn't the case. The Director half-assed many things, but not his stupid games, and if he was cosplaying a monkey this time-- uhh. Well, it was likely that the shit he would throw at them would not be of figurative nature.)

Anyway, there was nothing to be gained by standing around, so Yulia turned around to face the... could it even be called a 'path' at this point? The map claimed it was there, sure, but she had a hard time believing it with all that-- all that demonic foliage. Alright. Alright, this is my new life, I guess. Ophelia and... carnivorous plants. What a wonderful, wonderful combination! Can't wait to write my diary entry today, really. "Let's go, then," she sighed. "So, how dangerous do you think this is? Personally, I'd say it can't be that bad. So a few tourists have died here, pffft! There have been people who drowned in their own freaking bathrooms, and did those incidents lead to us banning bathrooms? No! That's why I think that putting restrictions on dimensional travel is total bullshit. I mean, it's not our fault that our customers are dumb!" And, predictably, that was the exact moment one of the plants grabbed her with its tendrils, lifted her high in the air and swallowed her whole before you could say 'tax evasion'. Whoopsie! Well, at least karma worked fast this time?

 

[Ambiloquous]

Ophelia Mun-Seol​

“That is a valid point.” Ophelia grimaced, feeling mildly irked that she wasn’t the one to call out the discrepancies. It was something she had thought of but had not voiced, expecting that Yulia would simply go along with it since her logic was supposed to be all but gone due to lack of sleep. “But where else do we go, if not there? Tromp through the jungle a bit and hope we stumble upon his footprints?”

As her partner-nemesis complained about tourists and bathrooms and dimensional travel restrictions, Ophelia wanted to object—her brainless opinions were part of the reason she and Yulia had to be set at the exact furthest points of the building—but a large flower with many teeth-like growths decided to do it before her. She paled at Yulia's quick outcome and rolled under a waving tendril, dodging by a hair’s width. Little Ophelia had taken taekwondo classes one upon a time, but it wasn’t as if she could axe kick the human-eating, larger cousin of a rafflesia into submission.

“Yulia! Are you still alive?” she yelled after she scrambled quite a few meters away from her original spot. Whipping her head into her surroundings, she noticed a somewhat small boulder covered in moss behind her back. She slowly hefted it with both hands after taking a deep breath and waddled to the edge of the plant’s attack range. Steadying herself, she tensed her muscles to lob the rock at the trunk-sized stem and threw.

Plop.

The mini-boulder plonked right beside a writhing, green tendril. A writhing, green tendril that was reaching out straight for her.

A few minutes later, she contemplated her life choices and regretted every single one related to Abeona, regretted so much, she could just stab her old self. Sitting in the depths of a flower beside the employee she detested the most, having her suit melting through the means of very leisurely acid, and barely being able to move in the tight space wasn’t doing all that great for her already fragile psyche. Though she could try to converse with Yulia before their imminent—that was a lie; their deaths were very slow-going—demise, she really wasn’t feeling it at the moment.

 

[Syntra]

Yulia was alive, thank you very much! The plant's efforts to digest her were valiant indeed, but apparently it just wasn't used to prey this large-- in human terms, this was probably the equivalent of a middle aged man trying to swallow three hamburgers at once. (Which, not an advisable course of action! Yulia would know, mostly because she had tried to do exactly that. Well, what could she say? Elementary school had been a dark, dark period in her life-- chaotic times, when she had valued her honor more than she had valued her life, and even the stupidest of bets had been legally binding. Ah, all those sweet memories! Back then, Yulia had been on a first name basis with pretty much every doctor in the local hospital. ...too bad that, not so long ago, some stupid bureacrats had shut the hospital down. Like, sheesh! Way to overreact, man. As far as Yulia was concerned, selling organs shouldn't have been considered a crime-- wasn't that what the state was effectively doing with health insurance plans and the like, anyway?)

But, back to the main point. Yulia was alive, though she kinda wished she wasn't-- since, you know, had she died quickly, she at least would have been spared this humiliation. Because, being slowly eaten alive by a giant fucking flower? Yeah, that wasn't the death Yulia had envisioned for herself! (Not that she had spent days imagining her ideal death, of course-- that would have been unhinged, and she was perfectly normal. A model citizen, even! ...she had only dedicated a few hours per day to such fantasies, really. And, hey, doing that was not only acceptable, but also a timeless bonding activity among the employees of Abeona! Would they have been so close to one another had they not had to talk someone out of committing suicide every other week? No, Yulia didn't think so.) Anyway, she had always wanted to drown in paperwork or something, instead of-- instead of this. Well, maybe Ophelia would save her?

Hahaha, yeah, right! That seemed about as likely as the prospect of them ever receiving a thirteenth salary, or corruption being eradicated. For once, Yulia would have loved to be wrong, but her biases were confirmed almost immediately. Just, ugh! Was disappointing her Ophelia's greatest hobby? Did she have a bingo card specifically for those instances? Because, surprise, surprise, Ophelia! If they both died there, her stupid bingo would no longer matter. Nothing would, to be precise.

"Thank you, Ophelia," she sighed. "Without your help, I truly would have been lost."

Well, okay. What now, though? Being snarky was all fine and dandy, really, but it wouldn't get them out of there! And of course that she didn't have a knife, or anything that could be used as a weapon, and-- oh. Wait a goddamn second! Yulia still had her teeth, didn't she? "Ugh. Gotta fight fire with fire, I suppose," she announced to her colleague, her tone entirely resigned. This was simply her life now-- no point in complaining about it. "I hope you haven't eaten your breakfast yet. Bon appetit!" And with that, she took a bite out of her plant-y prison.

 

[Ambiloquous]

Ophelia Mun-Seol​

Ophelia lifted her head to hear Yulia thank her. Her brows rose and she almost felt like her actions weren’t in vain for a second before her delusions shattered with her sarcastic second sentence. Her face turned once again bleak. “You’re welcome.” No matter what she really thought, she wasn’t uncultured enough to avoid the obligatory two words—not that it would matter at the end of their pitiful lives. Anyone was pitiful when they worked and died because of a place like Abeona.

As Yulia piped up again, she didn’t understand what the other meant by fighting fire with fire until her partner-nemesis proceeded to chow down on the flower. Her eyes popped. Not exactly literally, but quite close. Quite close. Ophelia shook off her surprise and shrieked, “Are you serious?”

Yes, it seemed that her idiotic partner was serious as always with her stupid plans. She made a disgusted face after Yulia didn’t cease her ridiculous actions, wrinkling her nose. “You do know that you might be eating nutrients from a tourist, right?”

The smell of the flower grew stronger with every bite Yulia took out of the flesh-like walls, and as she continued without pause, their fuschia prison began shaking. At first, they were little tremors, something that wasn’t uncommon for a planet like 51 D1N0 c, but soon those tremors became bone-shaking quakes, and those quakes became full-on convulsions that slammed the two from wall to wall.

It didn’t hurt as much as hitting an actual wall would have, but it was nowhere near pleasant either. Ophelia made muffled “oof”s as she was ping-ponged around the insides of the plant. Scrabbling for a handhold that wasn’t slimy, weirdly breakable or generally hell to grip on to, she yelled at the offender of all this, “Yulia, why did you decide munching on it was a great idea again?!”

With that final sentence, she was spat out of the instrument of her impending doom.

 

[Syntra]

Yulia merely rolled her eyes-- the gesture was quickly becoming one of her favorite ones, most likely due to all of that recent Ophelia overexposure. (...hmm. Could she possibly sue the company for this? As in, Yulia was pretty sure that being exposed to radiation and the like was illegal, and anyone with two brain cells to rub together would agree that the resident pain-in-the-ass was much, much worse than that. Chernobyl, you see, had at least been useful before exploding! That analogy, Yulia was sure, would convince even the greatest of non-believers. So, maybe she could lawyer up and get that sweet, sweet cash for damages? Tempting! Dangerously tempting, in fact. The company had stolen the best years of her life, after all, and so it only seemed fair to steal something away from it in return. ...something more expensive than shitty pencils, anyway. In order to bankrupt Abeona, however, Yulia first had to save it-- which probably said something deep and meaningful about the duality of human existence, or something.)

"You believe you haven't eaten human flesh before? Cute. What do you think they're doing with all the people who don't pay taxes, huh? Let me tell you, I worked at a restaurant before landing this job and I've seen some shit." ...well, okay, maybe Yulia was fucking with her a little bit, but so what? Her life had been depressingly devoid of any causes for happiness for a while, and her momma had always told her that she should just create those on her own when fate wouldn't provide them. So, that was what she was doing! (...and besides, she really had seen some shit. Not necessarily with human flesh, true, but there had been some, uhhh, interesting cases of recycling. Now that she thought of it, human flesh would actually have been more hygienic!)

"Less talking, more munching. This flower isn't going to eat itself." Yulia took another bite, and then another, and frankly? It tasted... kind of okay. (Better than her landlord's waffles, really-- although they were good for self-defense purposes, Yulia had to admit. The last burglar had ended up with broken bones, so yeah, 10/10. An excellent weapon if you needed to bypass all those pesky, pesky regulations!)

The plant apparently decided it had had enough, for it spat them out. Too bad for it, though, because Yulia wasn't nearly done with her revenge. Oh no, no, no. Her ability to hold stupid grudges was stronger than reason, and... uh, she also may have been just hungry. Turning into an angel of vengeance was cooler than admitting to that, though, and so she put on her best self-righteous expression. "Oh! So suddenly, you don't want trouble anymore, huh? Well, shouldn't have started this fight in the first place! Too late for that now, though. I have to make an example out of you-- you know, in order to show your little friends what happens to Yulia's enemies. I'll eat you in front of your horrified children, you soulless fucker!" And with that, Yulia attacked the poor plant again. "Come on, Ophelia! Stop being a bore and give me a... tongue? It's pretty tasty, actually. Plus, we need to earn their respect."

 

[Ambiloquous]

Ophelia Mun-Seol​

Ignoring her words from before—obviously, they were nonsense; she had surely never eaten people before because there were regulations and inspections and—Ophelia blinked as Yulia went on a spiel about eating the plant to make an example out of it in front of its children and fellow plant kind or whatnot. There was a certain point where she gave up, and while she would like to say it was now, it was not and she was compelled to say something about this action of her dumb partner’s. True, her decision in the flower might have saved them all, but it also might have crushed them to bits since the plant definitely seemed like it had the strength to. As the other asked her to join after her mini-speech, she really doubted the reason behind it was of a good-hearted nature. It was likely that the leaves tasted revolting or some such since there were few other rationales that would lead Yulia to purposefully request her participation in an activity that she was very able to do alone.

“No, my tongue is fine where it is, thank you. Yulia, are you not afraid that the plant will simply pick you up and toss you to the other side of the forest before you get a chance to finish eating?” Ophelia had a resigned expression. It was better to get used to her partner’s antics fast; it saved herself dangerous heart rate spikes and general mental flailing.

She waited for her words to come true. It didn’t. Instead of whipping the vines at the weird prey that wanted to eat itself and tossing it far, far away, the flowering plant had retracted all trailing parts to the back of the stem and stood shivering underneath Yulia’s efforts. It appeared almost… afraid of her. Of Yulia. Ophelia wanted to laugh.

“What—” Before she could finish, the ground shook and the world tilted. She turned to the direction of the shaking and turned white. Giant plants were scary, sure, but megaannum-old megafauna beat them any day. “Yu-Yulia! I don’t think the plant was chilling because of you!”

 

[Syntra]

"...no? It won't do that if I eat it first," Yulia reasoned. "Which would be much easier if you actually helped!" Like, sheesh. Did Ophelia have no pride as a fellow Abeona Travel Agency employee? Would she let something as pathetic as 'reason' stop her? That was good news, Yulia supposed, for someone as narrow-minded couldn't possibly hope to win the coveted award. Nuh uh. Abeona demanded your blood, sweat, and, uhhh... occasionally your tongue as well, it seemed. Anyway, she could probably start preparing her victory speech now! ('It is but a small step for Yulia, but a big leap for... Yulia?' Okay, okay-- clearly, some tweaking was needed. But hey, not even fucking Shakespeare had written Hamlet in a day!)

Anyway, Ophelia's lack of enthusiasm couldn't stop her. If she wanted to remain at the bottom of the food chain, then she was welcome to do so-- Yulia's ambitions, however, were greater than that. After she was done with the stupid plant, none of the local flora would dare to so much as... uhh, photosynthesize in her general direction? Or whatever the fuck plants actually did. "See?" Yulia grinned, not caring that green juices were running down her chin. It was her war paint, okay? Her badge of honor-- the symbol of her victory over the villainous, villainous fuck. The triumph of humanity personified, truly. "It's working! Just try and hide, you goddamn coward. None of you will escape the great Yulia! My hunger is fierce, and I shall drive you to extinction in two weeks tops. Don't believe me? Well, look up how many life forms humans managed to eradicate, and despair!" ...so what if that had all been collective effort? The plants, Yulia imagined, weren't educated enough to understand such subtleties, so one tiny girl = the entire species in their tiny, underdeveloped brains. Come to think of it, they didn't even have brains! "Curse the day you decided to antagonize me, because that was the day you sealed your fate," she said dramatically.

There was more she wanted to say, too, but naturally, Ophelia just had to ruin her flow. Like, was she doing this on purpose? Because this could not be a coincidence-- not when this, or some variation of this, happened every. goddamn. time! "Wow, thanks, Ophelia," Yulia rolled her eyes. "I forgot what I wanted to say! And I'm pretty sure it was something badass, too. Anyway, what were you saying? Is there something else I need to eat?" Since, apparently, that was her new universal solution for every problem under the sun! (...as long as she didn't need to eat, say, buildings, Yulia was weirdly okay with that. Surviving on Abeona salary had taught her to eat various things, including the mold that grew on the walls of her apartment and the unlucky spiders that had wandered there in hopes of catching some insects. Well, too bad, fuckers!!! Those belonged to her, thank you very much.)

Before Ophelia could give her a satisfactory answer, a tall, lizard-like thing emerged from behind her-- it had a giraffe's neck and Bambi's eyes, if Bambi had been an overgrown murder machine. "Oh, not again," the creature sighed. "I thought the next batch of tourists was supposed to-- oh!" It didn't blush, mostly because its scaly skin was incapable of changing color, but it definitely looked as if it wanted to do so. (How did she know? Womanly intuition, or something. Look, she just did, okay? Don't question her authority!) "I-- I mean. Aaaargh! Wrauuu!"

 

[Ambiloquous]

Ophelia Mun-Seol​

Ophelia flinched. Only a little. Then she turned and straightened her suit best as she could, put on the most severe expression she could don, and glared at the dinosaur-progeny local who had shown that they could speak and definitely had a language that translated through their earpieces. She stared unflinchingly into its little bambi eyes and said, “What do you think you’re doing.”

She certainly wasn’t angry out of mortification or anything of the sort, that would be petty and she wasn’t Yulia. It was simply out of concern for their well-being and whatever ruse the creature thought they would fall for.

The organism tried to play dumb and continued making off-tune fake roars. Every so often, it glanced at the two and waited for a reaction that didn’t happen. Once it had peeked enough times out of the corner of its eye—as if it wasn’t obvious it was all a sham—Ophelia strode up to it.

Her legs weren’t shaking; it was the wind and the planet-wide tremors. The tremors currently weren’t happening, but the aftereffects still influenced the human body of course. Tilting her head up, she yelled at the head of the creature, “We know it’s an act so quit it.”

The dino-like local stopped. It peeked down at Ophelia and Yulia, then out a leaf-shaking sigh. “I knew I should have switched my shift with Ark.” They shook their head and gave the two puny humans a pitying look. “Well, it seems I have to bring you back now. No hard feelings.” With that said, the creature proceeded to pick up the two with one hand and sling them over their shoulder.

 

[Syntra]

Yulia wasn't too impressed, either. Like, she had two ears and those very much worked, thank you very much! Did the creature think they were scatterbrained enough to forget it had actually talked? Seriously? Because while she occasionally may have forgotten to eat, bathe or even what her reason for continuing to stay alive in this indescribably shit world was, a giant fucking dinosaur saying actual words wasn't something that would slip her mind easily. Oh no, no, no. And so, for once, she found herself in agreement with Ophelia. (...wow. Surely, this had to be a harbinger of the upcoming apocalypse! Everyone knew that they got along about as well as water and fire, the police and criminals, or pollutants and... things that didn't want to be polluted? But yeah, kissing the dinosaur's ass just to prove a point would be counterproductive. So, uh, a temporary alliance? Sounded sensible, really.)

"Yeah, you stupid pile of scales!" Yulia shouted. "We've heard you, loud and clear. Now, shut up and tell us everything we want to know! I-- I mean, you don't need to shut up. That would make talking difficult, I imagine," she admitted, wearing the expression of a philosopher who was contemplating the deepest mysteries known to humanity. "But, geez, you should stop roaring! It's embarrassing. And if you don't, I'll fucking deck you," Yulia threatened. She raised her fists and punched the air a few times in order to demonstrate what she meant, too-- because, duh, intimidation was important. (...look, it had worked on the plants, okay? Which meant that if it had worked once, it would work again. That was science, baby, and arguing with science just made you look like an idiot. So, don't even try! And that Yulia was sleep-deprived, and almost everything activated her 'fight' response in such a case? Pffft, that had nothing to do with that. Besides, 'flight' was for goddamn cowards!)

Sadly, the creature didn't appear to be interested in a fair duel. "Hey!" Yulia protested as she was being lifted into the air. "What the-- I'm pretty sure this is illegal! I'll sue! Can you hear me? I have lawyers at my disposal, and I am not afraid to use them!" A lie, yes, but one that usually worked. Lawyers were demons from hell, and as such, nobody wanted to risk having to deal with them. (No, really. A well-timed lawsuit threat could get you a free dinner in most restaurants-- as long as you didn't mind pretending their food had almost killed you. But, hey, their prices sure as fuck routinely killed Yulia's soul, so she wasn't even being that dishonest!)

"Yes, yes," the dinosaur gave a long-suffering sigh. "You'll sue, just like everyone else. If you need to know, I'll have you meet the Council. All the dissatisfied customers have to meet the Council."

Uh oh. For some reason, that sounded kinda ominous. As in, Yulia could hear the capitalization! "Alright," she turned to Ophelia, "I saved our asses the last time-- so I'd say it's your turn to come up with a daring escape plan now. Well? And if you don't suggest anything within five minutes, I'll start eating him."

 

[Ambiloquous]

Ophelia Mun-Seol​

Ophelia visibly winced at Yulia’s antics, and turned away, pretending she didn’t know the person beside her shouting exaggerated bluffs of lawyers of all things. She didn’t know her; it’d all be over soon; it was fine. It was more of a self-brainwashing session than anything for the sole audience watching them, but if it actually tricked them, she wouldn’t be at all unhappy about it. The dinosaur-like creature was not tricked, unfortunately, and instead told them that they would have to meet a Council with a capital C. Eyebrows raised in apprehension, she felt some mixed emotions about the local “Council”. They knew their detainer’s group had a basic governing body in place, which meant that she might just be able to talk some sense into them, but on the other hand, the alarm bells going off in her head reminded her that there were so many ways that this Council could ruin their careers.

Once her partner pushed the job of planning—which, thinking about it, was redundant since she was the only one that had been using her brain enough to be actually planning—their escape onto her shoulders and mentioned eating their captor in the same breath, Ophelia levelled Yulia the most unimpressed look she could manage. She needed to come up with a way out, fast, else watch Yulia try to munch on the local for reasons that only made little sense when thought of in the most basic way possible. Ophelia understood her brain was not in the best state—not that it was ever—but when faced with her actions, she always wondered how in the world she was still alive after so long. It was Abeona, for goodness’ sake, not some corporate office position where the most she would do would be pushing digital paper.

“Excuse me!” Treating the person that could firmly hold someone in place with one hand with civility was a good idea, she had heard. She lifted her hand, elementary school-style, speaking to their very brightly coloured captor. “I need to go to the washroom. Could you let me down for a moment? That would be great.”