After Schwarz and Anastasia had been freed again, all kinds of shouts got thrown at Qualli as soon as the group had digested the mad reality that they had been abducted to compete in a baking competition and after the speechless moment angry voices raised over Pathfinder's laughs. “This is madness!”, “You can’t expect me to do this bullshit while my troops are without a leader!” and “You fucking Octopus, I’ll rip off your tentacles!”

Mike looked around and saw how Eris's patience snapped, she joined Anastasia in showering the Alien with profanity. Gregor tried to stop her by telling her to keep a poker face in the presence of the enemy, but given the situation who could blame her? Shady didn’t join the other women but was whispering something into Schwarz's ear, in contrary to the former outburst he now sat there with his hands folded under his chin, with a dark expression. Daiyu who so far had looked to be the most composed one seemed also to be on the edge, her left eyebrow was twitching when she spoke. “You can’t get pregnant? Do you really think now that you have imprisoned us we will start fucking around like some disgusting hippies? Are you insane?”

Qualli shrugged. “Insane, sane, what does it matter? You, humans, are quick to use the word insane on things you don’t understand. Try to look at it from my perspective, I know your species is quick to say one thing and then go and do the opposite just a moment later. You all will stay here for a while, sooner or later some of you are bound to have sex. Do you really want to get pregnant and raise a child in this environment? I’m not suggesting anything or judging, I simply analyzed human behavior and placed some countermeasures.”

Xian promptly stood up. “Fine, spout your nonsense but mark my words, Alien. For the abduction of the Empress I: Xian Daiyu, Great leader of the Red Dragons, herby vow to kill you! Hide behind your tech, it doesn’t matter. I might not have the means to do so or escape at the moment. But that doesn’t mean I have to sit here and listen to this crap. Anastasia, we are going!” Daiyu turned her face away from Qualli and gave Anastasia a hand sign before marching straight past the throne into the dark gate. Anastasia stopped her harassment but still gave Qualli a nasty look and the finger before trotting after her. Qualli tried to call them back. “Wait you shouldn’t leave without the…” But when he got ignored he gave up. The two women disappeared within the gate and he flew back to his pillow. 

Manch hadn’t said a word so far, but other than Mike who had observed everyone’s reaction, Manch's interest was in their surroundings. He looked around like a kid who went to the fair for the first time, probably lost in thought about how everything worked.

Mike chewed a little more and then flushed down the last bite with his drink, he let his eyes wander again. Schwarz was now chatting with Shady and occasionally shooting a grumpy look in Manch’s direction, which he pretended to ignore. Gregor had managed to calm down Eris, or at least she was good at pretending. Pathfinder had changed after Qualli announced his first challenge, now the former silent elder was inhaling his third plate of food and giggling to himself. Probably has lost it. Mike raised his hand to get the Jellyfish’s attention. “Ehm, Qualli? So just to make sure I understood everything that was explained.” The jellyfish who was now chilling on his pillow again looked at Mike. “Yes?”

“I mean… what the point? You brought us here and gave us food and drinks. Now we are supposed to compete against each other for some points? The best player will be the new leader of the planet. Like… what?”

Qualli nodded and scratched his chin, if the part between his face and tentacles was the chin. “That is an excellent question, thank you, Mike. The main purpose is rehabilitation, and if I succeed with that recruitment.”

“Recruitment for what?” asked Gregor and Qualli smiled scheming at them. “That, I will tell you if you prove to be worthy of knowing. There is no point in telling you everything if we don’t know that you can be useful to us. In the end, we still might go with Plan B, which means enslavement, or in the worst case extermination. By the way, I said ‘leader of the entire human race’ not ‘leader of the planet’.”

Manch sat up straight. “Are you telling us that there are humans on other planets?”

Qualli shrugged. “I’m not telling you anything about that… yet.”

Shady raised her hand. “So first you tell us to ask away and now you don’t answer? Is this some kind of joke to you? From all the people you could have abducted you chose us, doesn´t that make us already worthy enough? And, rehabilitation, what are you talking about? To me, we look all just peachy.”

“Just peachy?” Qualli chuckled. “You call this ‘Just peachy’? If not for me you wouldn’t even talk to each other, the first thing you do when you see somebody from another faction is shoot. Or am I wrong? Open your eyes guys, almost a third of your planet is a radioactive wasteland. There used to be billions of you living on this tiny rock, now what? A couple of million? The only technical advancements you make are in weapons to destroy yourself. What happened to explore the universe? You used to be so close to colonizing Mars, the first step to a brighter future for humanity, and now what? You trapped yourself in a circle of violence and do nothing about it. In fact, if keep going that way your entire species will die out in about a year. Here, let me prove it to you.”

Qualli pointed to the ceiling and his eyes lit up, a squared portion of the ceiling turned into a screen. The screen switched between pictures for a while, a couple of movies, and old sports recordings, before showing Planet Earth. A [LIVE]-mark was in the upper left corner, they could clearly make out the Spaceship. Its castle-like shape in combination with the roller coasters made it look like the planet itself was wearing a crown, just like the Alien. Qualli cleared his throat. “Let me give you a quick history lesson. This is your Planet in… let's use easy words… your timeline. Nothing special, at first glance, large parts are uninhabitable due to radiation and/or unbreathable air. Small colonies aside most humans live in these three megacities: Berlin, Los Angeles 2, and Hong Kong. Let’s go back in time.” The [LIVE]-mark disappeared and the planet began to spin backward faster and faster and came finally to hold in October 2077.

“World War 3, hey fellow humans we are running out of resources let us just nuke each other instead of working together. Awesome, great idea!” Accompanied by Quallis mocking words the planet on the screen lit up as he was showered in nukes.

“More than half of the entire world population died that day, and more followed in the aftermath. A few million survived in vaults and a couple of lucky ones on the surface. Now the awesome part begins. Starting slow, humanity starts rebuilding, facing mutants and other abominations created from radiation, and slowly climbing back up to the top of the food chain, reinstalling laws and governments. I Respect that, starting over at almost zero again. Then 2146, World War 4, guess what? Nukes! Like honestly I don’t get it, haven’t you learned anything? You guys acted like a guy who shot himself in a round of Russian roulette, miraculously somehow barely survived just to be like: ‘You know what? Let’s play another round.’ How is it possible that doesn’t matter what you do you always go back to using nukes? Honestly, at this point, I’m wondering why you not worshipping nukes instead of one of you weird gods.”

Manch raised his hand. “Actually there once was a group who just did that, worshipping nukes.” Qualli looked at him mildly surprised and asked. “And what happened to them?”

“They got blown up…” said Manch quietly.

“What?” Qualli held a tentacle to the place where a human would have an ear.

“They got blown up, for money.” said Manch louder.

Qualli laughed. “And there you have it. I’ve traveled across countless galaxies but I’ve never seen anything weirder than humanity. How can a live form be so creative, so intelligent but also so imbecilic in the same moment?”

Earth spun back to the [LIVE]-mark. “Let’s have a look at next year…” Qualli's eyes lit up again and the mark changed to 2216.

“Of course, as you might have guessed: Nukes. But this time, not just that, also a virus that only targets human DNA ‘accidentally’ will escape out of a lab. Also, there is the use of other bio-weapons and robots programmed to hunt down anything humanoid. The newly reconstructed power grids and water pipes get destroyed as well, etc. And that’s it, that’s the whole story of humanity. Your planet recovers in a couple of thousand years, a new life. But everything without you.”

Schwarz stood up and spoke. “So what? You show us some kind of 3D-Animation and expect us to just believe you? I don’t know about the others, but I find it quite hard to believe that you traveled through time just to save us. Why now? Why not earlier? I think you are lying.” Qualli nodded and answered. “I understand your skepticism, and yes time travel is not real. But Multiverse-travel is. What you saw wasn’t an animation, it was a recording of your planet just a few jumps away, its end to be precise.” That caught Manchs attention and questions spurt out of him like a waterfall. “The Multiverse is real? Is it infinite? How do you crossover? How much energy does one jump take? Are the other humans just like us? What kind of technologies are they using? Is the Internet still a thing?...” Schwarz gave Manch a disapproving look but didn’t interrupt him. Getting answers was more important than shutting up his nemesis. “Woah, hold your horses friend. One question after another” said Qualli calmly. “Ok, I’ll try to explain as easily as I can: The Multiverse is composed of infinite worlds. Let’s take your world as the starting point, the world right ‘next’ to yours is not that much different, only an atom is in another place or of another nature. The further you jump from your start point the more differences occur. First, it's small changes like the atoms, after a couple of thousand jumps small changes to the environment, changes to the species you will encounter, and changes to the history of a Universe. It’s impossible to travel through time within a single Universe, but it’s possible to alter the curse of a jump slightly to end up in a different time on the timeline in the next Universe, be it past or future. So let’s say I want to travel back in time 50 years in your universe I need to make around 432000 jumps.”

“It's infinite, so there is a Universe where I am the King of the Planet?” asked Mike. “SHHH!” made Manch, he listened to Quallis's words like a Kid to a story around the campfire. “You ‘SHHH’ me? The hell you think you are?” said Mike, before he could add an insult Schwarz gave him a sign to let it go. “Yes, there might be a Universe where you are the king of earth, like I said it's infinite, there also are Worlds where you aren’t even born. Neither of you. There are even worlds where the human race doesn’t exist in the first place.” answered Qualli. Manch seemed annoyed. “Who cares what he is in some other universe, please let's go back to the interesting stuff. How does a ‘jump’ work?” Qualli smiled excusing at Mike and continued. “That's a bit complicated to explain with human words. Theoretically, I could show you…but no it's too dangerous.” Manch stood up and walked towards Qualli. “I don’t care, I need to know.” He let himself down on his knees and raised his hands in a bagging manner. “Teach me!” Qualli scratched his forehead and signed. “Fine. But don’t complain to me if something goes wrong tempering with the human brain has its risks. I’ll transfer a bit of my knowledge to you and form extra connections inside your brain to hold it there. Sit down.” Manch did as told and Qualli took place on his head. “This might hurt a bit.” The tentacles sucked themselves around Manchs head, the thinner ones suddenly entered his ears and nose. It looked disgusting, Manch began to squint and with a twist of the tentacles in his right ear also his right eye spun around weirdly. “Alright, here it comes.” Said Qualli. His eyes began to shine and Manch seemed to get an epileptic episode. Everything lasted for about 10 seconds. From the corner of his eye, Mike saw how Eris bit her lip as if what happened turned her secretly on. WTF

Just when he turned his head in her direction she stopped. Did I just imagine it? Qualli let go of Manch and flew back to his pillow. Manch stood there like a drunk for a moment, and then with a laugh, he fell face forward into the food. “Whoops, I might have overdone it a pit. Don’t worry he will be back in a moment.” said Qualli. What nobody knew at this moment is (except Schwarz and Shady of course) that Mike was, despite his talent for technology, an addict who hasn’t been sober for a single day in eight years. With all of his ‘equipment’ gone he started to feel restless. Seeing how Manch passed out Mike got an idea of how to get his next fix. Mike also stepped in front of Qualli. “Show me too.” Now the Jellyfish looked surprised. “Are you sure? You saw what happened, you will pass out too.”

“Let that be my problem. I also want to…know.” answered Mike. “Fine.” Qualli sat down on Mike's Head like on Manch's before. “Ready?” Mike nodded. “Hit me.” Qualli's eyes shined and Mike started his epileptic dance. Contrary to Manch's performance Mike stayed mostly conscious and laughed. “Wuhuuu, yeah Baby!” Qualli let him go but Mike kept standing, drooling like a dog, but standing. He wiped his mouth and said. “Do it again.”

“Wha…what’s wrong with you?” Qualli looked unsure of what to do. “You absorbed more knowledge than the other guy. How can you still be conscious?” Shady's display turned off, maybe she was ashamed to be known as Mike's teammate. Schwarz tried to hide a grin behind his hand. Eris, having a red face, smiled at them with excitement, while Gregor put on a poker face and Pathfinder kept snacking. “Less talking, more zapping Mr. Tentacle,” said Mike. With obvious restraint, Qualli sat again on Mike's head and ask. “What do you want to know?”

“Whatever man, just do it already.” said Mike and raised his hands like he was at a live concert. Qualli signed, his eyes began to shine and Mike got into an episode worse than Manch. His eyes turned back so that only the white of his eyeballs was visible. He started sweating and drooling a disgusting amount of salvia while his face made all kinds of grimaces. After Qualli was done he let Mike go, who stood there for a second without making a sound. Then, with a ray of puke shooting out of his mouth he also fell next to Manch into the food. “I kinda feel used…” said Qualli.

After a couple of minutes, Mike slowly started to gain back consciousness. The first thing he realized was that somebody was carrying him. What a weird dream. Did I get abducted from a giant flying amusement park after fighting the Reds? He smirked at himself but when he opened his eyes he screamed like a little girl, two black expressionless eyes looked at him. After he screamed the thing let him down, it was a yellow, weird-looking thing, the body of a way too swollen bodybuilder and a face without a nose or a mouth. The most unsettling part was it didn’t have a neck, the head just grew right out of the shoulders into a half-sphere. Even though Mike was still confused and felt hangover, years of combat training made him take a defensive pose but before he could do anything he heard the familiar voice of Schwarz. “Alive again?” Schwarz stepped into sight, around the weird thing. It didn’t move since it had put Mike back down, but seeing how it was actually a bit bigger than his leader wasn’t a reassuring sight. “Don’t worry they belong to me.” Said the voice of a preschooler and Qualli flew into sight. “They?” asked Mike. “My sentinels.” Answered Qualli, another sentinel stepped in sight carrying the still passed-out Manch. “You see, I´m not capable of carrying your heavy bodies around.” Qualli wiggled with his tentacles. “So I called for muscle power, don’t worry under normal circumstances they are harmless.”

Now also the others, except Daiyu and Anastasia who were still somewhere on their own, grouped up. Mike looked around they were standing again in one of these weirdly fluffy tunnels. Schwarz offered Mike something that looked like a cereal bar. “You have puked out everything you ate, remember? Qualli gave me this for you, it will give back some energy.” On mentioning his name Qualli performed a theatric bow in the air. “Thanks…I guess.” Said Mike and while he reached for the bar he realized that somebody put a toy watch around his wrist. The fuck? It looked like one of those toys they gave to children at that burger place in Los Angeles 2. He saw that everyone was wearing the same watch and asked. “What’s up with this shit?” Shady shook her head. “We also don’t know. He said it’s a surprise for when we are there” she nodded to Qualli. “And you will, follow meee.” And with a raised tentacle he flew away in direction of the light at the end of the tunnel, and the group followed.

When they stepped out of the tunnel into the light they were amazed. A tropical paradise awaited them, a kilometer long lazy-river was surrounded by other smaller pools and big rubber rings were gently floating their rounds inside. Everything was connected with bridges and various waterslides invited them to have fun. Between the walkways and pools, tropical plants decorated the area, and the air was warm, but not too hot and not too dry. On the right side was a beautiful beach with soft sand and a seemingly endless ocean rolling waves toward it. In the middle of the lazy river was another pool, but what was special about it was that it had a pool bar within where you could sit at the bar and still chill inside the warm water. Another sentinel was standing behind the counter, wearing a barkeeper uniform and another artificial sky covered the whole area.

While everyone’s eyes slowly adapted to the sudden brightness outside the tunnel Qualli looked around and Mike could hear him say. “Hmm, strange I expected that the other two had been already caught.”

“Caught by who?” asked Mike. Qualli looked at Mike, realizing that he just said out loud what he was thinking. For a split second there was an awkward smile on Quallis's face. “Nevermind.” His attention went to the rest of the group and he spoke with a louder voice. “Everyone welcome to your new home!” and raised his tentacles to give himself a round of applause, the only one joining was the sentinel that has been carrying Mike before.

Qualli cleared his throat. “Let's have a look at that fancy watch I gave you, please press the main button.” Eris was the first to try it out, she pressed the biggest button that looked like Qualli’s face. Somewhere out of a hidden speaker, the watch said. “Yo, sister. Whazzup?” The eyes on the button began to shine and projected a screen in the air in front of her head. “Player status?” She was looking at a miniature copy of herself that was surrounded by all kinds of information, similar to the status screen of any RPG game. There were some differences though, instead of a health bar it was showing her heart rate and blood sugar. One by one also the others activated their screen, and they found out that all of the watches had custom-made greetings on them, for a moment all kinds of prerecorded greetings floated through the air.

Shady’s watch: “Konnichi-motherfucking-wa”.

Schwarz’s watch: “Guten Tag.”

Gregor’s watch: “Yoooooooo!”

Pathfinder’s watch: “A good day to you mister.”

 Mike’s watch: “Bro, Bro, Bromisimo.” In the rhythm of ‘Row, Row, Row your boat’.

Qualli looked very pleased with himself and he didn’t realize that nobody else liked it. Mike saw that the status screen also had a clock: 13:34, 26. April 2215. What? The gravity train mission was on the 16th. How could 10 days have passed since then? That explains my craving for stuff, haven’t been sober for so long in eight years.

Gregor also found out about it and asked. “Ten days? We have been already here for ten days?” Schwarz inhaled sharply. “Ten days?” he looked at Qualli. “Why haven’t you mentioned anything about it? Can you even imagine what would happen when suddenly a mercenary elite team goes missing? Not to mention the leader of the reds and a EUA-Commander!?” Shady’s face display went blank when she said. “Oh my god, that could bring the conflict to another level. So much for helping save the human race, you just might have doomed us all. Everyone will blame the others and use our abduction as a chance for revenge.”

Qualli smiled.” Abduction. What a nasty word. You are my guests after all. Well, let me ease your minds a bit. Here, have a look.” His eyes shone for a moment and again a screen appeared in the sky, they could see a reporter doing a live report under the giant Space castle with a massive crowd behind him. “We are witnessing a historical moment. For the first time in almost 70 years, after a week of bombardment that didn’t even leave a scratch on this giant structure the governments of the Euro-American Alliance and the Red Dragons announced a temporary truce, people from all over the world are traveling here to worship, to what some say: The arrival of God.”

Qualli smiled into speechless faces. “See, nothing to worry about. Alright, let’s check out some of the functions of your new watch, shall we?” Before he cut the connection they saw how a bold, naked guy ripped the microphone out of the reporter's hand, poured some oil over himself, and screamed. “This is the end of the world! He needs sacrifices. Sacrifices!” Then, with a confused screeching, he lit himself on fire with a lighter.

“Can’t save them all, after all.” Without anyone noticing Manch had regained consciousness and now climbed down from the sentinel. Qualli still stared at the ceiling and mumbled. “This is insane.”

“Now hold up. Who gave us a speech about using that word too much again?” asked Shady.

Qualli scratched his head and turned around. “Well, I see now where you coming from.”

Meanwhile, Manch had figured out how to use his wristwatch and after he got greeted with a ‘Sup, four eyes’ he asked. ”MP? Like Mana-points? Are we gonna shoot some magic spells or what?” That got everyone’s attention and they were looking at their status screen again. “Muffin points.” said Qualli.

“Muffin points? And why are there already 100?” asked Gregor.

Manch smiled. “I get it, just like in a game.” He pressed something on his holographic screen and suddenly the pajama he was wearing reshaped itself to swimming trunks. Qualli applauded. “Very good. Yes, please scroll up, and there you can see the option to switch to the ‘Item shop’.”

Mike did as told and saw a field that said: ‘Available Area-items’. When he pressed it he got offered various choices of swimwear, one piece for 100 MP. “So we have to spend our points in order to get items?” he asked.

Qualli floated a little bit higher into the air so everyone could see him. “No, you just have to collect them to unlock an item, you won’t lose the points you have. But once you unlock your first item of a kind…”

While Qualli was explaining Schwarz was scrolling through his item shop. “Let’s have a look at those.” he said to himself, without thinking much he pressed a button and his pajama changed to a tanga.

“…you need more points to unlock another item of the same category.” Finished Qualli his explanation.

Mike snorted laughing, Shady’s face display turned off again but also she was laughing. Schwarz stood there and helplessly tried to change his swimwear to something else but saw that the price for the other items went up to 200 Muffin points, his head turned red from embarrassment.

Manch was rolling around on the ground laughing tears and also Pathfinder held his belly from laughter. Eris held a hand in front of her face, blushing, but also laughing. Even Gregor who so far had a poker face, most of the time, couldn’t help himself. Qualli looked amused, after the group calmed down he spoke to Schwarz. “Sorry, there are no returns. You need to choose wisely, but you still can change back to the pajama.”

“No, I'm good. That's exactly the one I wanted.” Claimed Schwarz, with a still red face. Manch wiped away a tear. “That’s what you get when you press buttons without knowing shit, old man.”

One after another they changed into swimming wear. Mike also chose trunks, as well as Gregor. Shady and Eris decided on stylish bikinis, and when Mike saw them he felt how his groin came to life, hastily he turned away his head. What nobody knew, except some hookers around the slums, Mike also was fond of pornography and not just the ‘normal’ stuff. Man, I need a quiet corner for myself somewhere. For some reason, Pathfinder had chosen a full-body swimsuit and was wearing it now only halfway up, just like the pajama before.

“Great, you are almost all set up. Let me show you your rooms, follow me.” He wiggled away to the left side. After passing a couple of pools and invitingly looking hot tubs they reached a wall, made from the same fluffy material they already had seen. “Anyone cares to get the first room?” Qualli asked while turning around. To no surprise Manch was the first to step forward, he seemed to have an almost unhealthy enthusiasm for anything that involved Qualli’s technology.

“Alright Mr. Doctor Professor,” said Qualli. “Please open up the item shop again. Manch did as told and discovered that a new button had appeared: ‘My first home’. He pressed it and the screen switched to some kind of camera mode and showed him available spaces on the wall. “Well, this is interesting.” said Manch, he got to choose from different basic rooms that included a comfortable locking bed and a sturdy desk with a chair. After a bit of scrolling, he decided on the German oak style. “Nice.” After he pressed the ‘build’-button the room formed itself from the pink hairs, as they have witnessed many times before.

Shady briefly judged the size of the wall and asked Qualli. “So you expect us all to live here next to each other, the other two bitches too?”

Qualli nodded. “For the time being, yes. Just for the start, just until you get more points and unlock more stuff and areas.

“It’s like that super old game…now how was it called again?” said Mike.

“What game?” asked Shady.

“I remember now: ‘Shroom plumber’, you play as a plumber who is constantly consuming shrooms and you have to collect stars in a castle to unlock new areas. It’s the same concept.” He answered.

“Why ain’t I surprised that you know silly games like that? Sighed Shady.

Qualli cleared his throat. “Well, everybody let's set up your first room. After that, I´ll show you around a little bit more before you can relax. Remember you have a cake to bake in 3 days. But before that, once again: Welcome to your new home!” The sentinels started applauding his words and one by one his ‘guests’ claimed a place at the wall and set up their rooms.