the peice of frozen time begins to shake as giant footfalls shake the ground, and a HUGE Dragon, gold colored, pounds toward the n00b trapped in it
when he gets close he takes a deep breathe and breathes *FIRE* out all over, evaporating the block (even time thaws under a Dragon’s breath!!!!) but stoping before he fries the n00b.
Chaos Descending looks up and screams, wetting himself and trying to run, but it is no use and the Dragon smacks him like a little mouse, throwing him against a rock and dazing him.
Scooping him up with one foreclaw, Yevaud333 tossess him hinto the air and watches as he falls back down, breaking his legs upon contact with the ground so he can’t run any more.
The Dragon tears off the n00bs arms, “that’s for asking fora n initiation, twerp” and then his head darts down with his jaws wide open and his teeth flash as
There is a flash of light, and Chaos_Decending finds himself standing, whole and unharmed, a few feet to the right of the version of him which is still lying on the ground. The prone, armless figure is absolutely motionless, as are the dripping jaws no more than a hand’s-breadth from his skin. A wry voice comes from over the shoulder of the bewildered victim-turned-spectator.
“What you see before you is an alternate timeline in which you are not the first, but the two-hundred-and-twenty-first n00b to have been initiated by me....” A sigh. “...in this exact same fashion.” Grimacing, another Yevaud333, this one in human form, moves forward into your line of sight. “The ‘me’ of this reality is both much more sadistic and much less imaginative than I prefer to regard myself as.” Stepping around you, he peers at his alternate self’s 2-foot-long teeth. “And apparently much less conscious of dental hygeine. Ugh.”
Shaking his head, he waves a hand dismissively and the scene slowly drains of color, then begins to lose all contrast until it has faded to a uniform shade of grey. Turning to Chaos_Decending, Yevaud333 speaks again.
“My first plan to initiate you involved visiting several such alternate realities, each of which would reveal to you a new and creative way in which either I or some other board member chose to welcome you to our ranks. However, upon reflection I realized that this style of initiation was more suited to my Lord’s abilities, and so not wishing to intrude upon his territory (certain though I was that such intrusion would be forgiven) I tried to come up with some alternate idea. Fortunately for me, while the version of myself which you just saw is utterly unable to do anything of the sort, there are others of us which more than make up for his deficiencies. My thanks goes to a
me three Junctions back which was able to devise a scheme much more befitting of our office and area of mastery; namely, Time.”
Beckoning Chaos_Decending to follow, Yevaud333 begins to walk through the nothing which surrounds them. “I’ve been doing some research, and I admit I can’t quite figure you out. You seem very well-informed and knowledgeable in certain ways (for example,
knowing why H-Kat was initiated) but at the same time I cannot tell from your posts and those of wolf346 whether the current crop of n00bs fully understands the meaning of an initiation, or the implications of asking for one. (Which is what you most definitively did, else we would not be standing here now, I assure you. Begging
not to be initiated is the same as begging
to be initiated in that both simply serve to draw attention to yourself and associate you with the word “initiation” in the minds of the regulars. As I suspect you well knew.) And so, since as H-Kat said, an initiation should teach you something, and as MR. Dead explained, an initiation is really meant to be a welcoming ritual (albeit one which often involves subjecting you to horrors beyond human comprehension, though
not simply humiliating you), I (or at least, that
I I mentioned previously) thought it would be appropriate to take you on a little stroll down memory lane. It should be both instructional and... memorable, to say the least.” Yevaud333 smiles, but somehow it is not a reassuring expression. “Ahh, here’s our timeline now!
(Wrap your head around that statement. ) Let’s see....”
As Chaos_Decending and Yevaud333 draw near, vague grey outlines of forums, topics, and links go whizzing past. Finally, Yevaud333 extends a hand and their surroundings slow, then stop. Making an intricate gesture, he explains as the world fills with color around them.
“You may have been wondering why I mentioned ‘hoping I could live up to krylex’s standards’ when I claimed you. (That is, assuming you read subject lines.) Really, it’s more a matter of living up to my own standards; however, they were set rather high (no pun intended) by krylex’s initiation of Boom316, which I still look back on fondly as one of the best examples of a beautiful initiation. And here it is now.” The last of the color returns, illuminating
two men staring each other down, each with a diminutive cartoon companion by his side....
As the scene finishes, Yevaud333 laughs. “I still enjoy reading that.” With a wave of his hand, he sends them once again careening into the past. “Now, this next one is an example of the sort of initiation for which you were preparing... oh, yeah, almost forgot about that; you shouldn’t be needing that lube after all. A teflon brain would probably be helpful, though.” He turns his back and peers at the timeline studiously as Chaos_Decending takes care of the apparently unnecessary KY. When the n00b finishes and looks up, he finds before him
a man seated in a control room, with another n00b visible on the screen in front of him and two rabbits just coming into view....
It takes some time for Chaos_Decending to recover sufficiently to keep down what little remains of his lunch. The greyed-out timeline, once more zipping by at high speed, doesn’t help. “There there, you’ll be alright. Now, no tour of the initiation circuit would be complete without an example of Rae’s endless creativity with networking hardware.” Their forward acceleration slows, leaving them just a couple days ahead of the initiation by krylex which they started with. “There are lots of these scattered about, but I’ll only inflict one on you during this tour; one of the few in which he showed mercy. You can thank me later.”
A soot-covered figure strides toward them through a portal that makes molten lead look cool by comparison....
Yevaud333 snaps his fingers. “Oh, right; that bit with the revivifying weasel-smoothie reminds me of another classic.” Once again they race along the timeline, traveling a couple months back. “Fairly recent to be considered a ‘classic,’ I know, but the fact that it was posted by BiShouNenKaMi (one of the fabled but absent Board Eldar, blessed may his wanderings be until his return) helps advance it to that status. It being an initiation of an über-n00b who had managed to do all the wrong things also makes it a particularly pertinent example.”
Chaos_Decending finds himself in the fabled Initiation Auditorium, with the one-and-only pretty-boy deity making his way to the stage down the packed aisle....
Shivering at the sight of the crowds lining up for weasel smoothies, Yevaud333 gets them moving again. “Almost done. You’re hanging in there well, I must say.” Watching carefully, the chronomancer halts their progress a month or so previous to the infamous initiation by Rand Al'Tor which they had visited previously. “Sorry, but I just keep finding new ones. This happened to come up when I searched for BiShouNenKaMi posts with the word ‘weasel’ in them, and it’s too good to pass up. A very creative format; I think the only init-a-trois I’ve ever read, actually.”
A dramatic soundtrack fires up, and text begins scrolling up overlaid on a trio sitting at a Juice Bar....
“Heh, wonderfully creative and polished, one of the few that makes it fun to hear about pure violence and n00b-bashing, since it's just sort of ‘something they’re doing’ in the midst of enjoying themselves.” Yawning, Yevaud333 glances at his watch. “Crap, I need to be awake in like three hours... ah, well, I’ll just have to make myself a moebius minute, though it’s a real pain to get out of one of those when you’re finished with it.” Grimacing at the thought, he kicks them back another couple of weeks. “Anyway, here are some last words of wisdom which I’ll leave you with. When you’re done listening to the sermon, there’ll be a lifeline waiting for you at the other end; follow it and you should sync up properly with when you were before all this started. Enjoy, and good night!” Waving cheerfully, Yevaud333 fades into nothingness, leaving Chaos_Decending sitting on a hill with a great contingent of the faithful who are gazing raptly at
Rand Al'Tor, who is wearing a habit and carrying a big book....
As the crowd disperses, marveling at the wisdom of the wise man’s words, Chaos_Decending sees a golden cord dangling by his side. The card attached to the end of it says, in glittering letters, “
Pull Me!” When he does so, the cord stretches like a rubber band, then snaps back toward whence it came, dragging him along with it. A year blazes past in the blink of an eye, and he is left stunned in this very thread, with the card still in his hand. Holding his spinning head, he turns the card over; on its back is written, “Oh yeah, almost forgot: you’ll want to put ‘Initiated by Yevaud333’ in your sig. But then, after all you’ve seen today, I’m sure you already knew that.
”