I have returned with a few reviews. Where was I? Busy. And that's all that you need to know at this point. :) Whuzzup with this story? Four people have been flattened, smooshed, crushed, and entirely humiliated. That leaves our next unwitting 'player', Achenar, and after him Saavedro, to take the field. Be on your toes, though, people! There might be some other characters joining the party. Or maybe not. Maybe I got all of your hopes up for nothing. :) Sick of my babbling yet? Very well, then – on with the story!

Dislaimer: I don't own Myst, nor do I own Hershey. It'd be cool if I did, though. It'd be almost like in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Mmm... chocolate. Aslo, WARNING: Don't read this chapter whilst hungry and having bad chocolate cravings. Seriously. It'll make you crave it worse.

Achenar looked at the piece of candy in his hand, a small bar labeled "Hershey". Not exactly knowing what a 'Hershey' was, he opened the wrapper. There lay a tiny brown rectangle of what appeared to be chocolate.

Happily, Achenar ate the tiny candy. Yes… it had certainly been a long time since he had last tasted this. Which was why he was careful to conserve it.

Unfortunately, it still didn't last very long.

Achenar glanced at the door with the golden star and considered his options. He could try to barge in there and steal the candy – no, he was outnumbered four to one. He could ask nicely – uh, that still probably wasn't going to work. Hmm… could he take on four people at once?

Annoyed at his lack of a plan, he stood up and kicked the door, which created a small dent in the wood. Of course, this was quite painful when you had soft animal skin boots on, and so the end result was of Achenar falling backwards and eventually sitting up, muttering about his foot and the stupidity of the door in question.

Eventually, Achenar forgot about the chocolate, his foot, and the stupid door, and began to look for his brother, who was almost certainly crying somewhere in a corner, begging for help. Though 'helping' Sirrus wasn't exactly what Achenar intended to do…

Eventually, Achenar ended up on the very same stage he had seen his brother on earlier, yelling and cursing up a storm. That was enjoyable, he thought to himself as he took a seat in the plastic blue chair.

"Know your stars, know your stars, know your stars, know your stars, know your stars…"

Achenar looked around expectantly, half thinking that it was Sirrus playing a joke on him, and half thinking that it was… something else. Living in a jungle where danger lurked around almost every corner was certainly not helping by adding to Achenar's growing unease.

"Hello?" he called out warily. "Hello? Is anyone there?"

Achenar was startled greatly when the voice that spoke earlier said his name.

"Achenar… has a Huggy-Wuggy Stuffy Bear!"

"What?" Achenar asked, quite clearly confused. What in the worlds was a 'Huggy-Wuggy Stuffy Bear'?

"Achenar… is always confused!"

Achenar did not respond, probably because he really did have no clue as to what was going on.

"Uh… okay. Achenar… eats pig lard!"

With no clue as to what a 'pig' was, Achenar asked "What's a pig? And I actually don't mind lard that much…"

Clearly the voices in his head were playing tricks on him. Wait a minute… hadn't he gone through therapy for that?

Now extremely distressed, Achenar yelled "I'm going crazy! Again!"

"Yeah. You do that…" Clearly, this victim was beginning to freak the voice out. Nonetheless, it managed to squeak out another insult.

"Achenar… um… uh… eats… camodiles?"

"Actually, they do make very good steaks." Seeing how much like Sirrus the voice appeared to be, Achenar decided to continue prodding the person.

"Yeah… really good, I bet…"

"I like to eat them raw."

At this, the voice made an audible noise that sounded as if the person had choked.

"Do you, now?"

"Yup. Raw. With fish guts and swamp worms. Mmm – mmm."

The voice made another noise that sounded like violent vomiting, to the great delight of Achenar. Who only continued to goad the voice.

"And what about chocolate?"

"I wouldn't eat it if I were you."

The voice sounded weak and almost like it was going to vomit again.

"I… really don't think that we should talk about this."

"But I like gore. And pointy things. Yay I like pointy things!"

"Erm…"

The voice was clearly spooked by Achenar, which only made said character all the happier.

"You know, one time I serial stalked this guy in the Mechanical Age…"

"I bet that -" here the voice gulped audibly "- was a blast."

"It certainly was." Achenar had now started to slip back into his 'crazy brother' ruse, one that he often used to unnerve people, though at one time it was very real. Nonetheless, it worked like a charm.

"H-ho-how did y-you ki… kill…"

"Kill him?" Achenar asked with mock relish. "Took a knife to him. Got him in the back and then…" He lifted a finger and drew it across his neck horizontally, hoping that whoever the person was got the point.

He certainly got the point, for at the same time Achenar heard a scared little "Oh" from the voice.

"The pleasure was all mine, really," Achenar continued. "No, really. It was mine."

He could hear the voice's knees shaking from over the intercom. His act was working perfectly.

"I think that the guy had a job as that voice you always hear over the intercom…"

A sudden audible thud reverberated through the auditorium. The voice, whoever he was, had fainted from sheer fright.

Achenar grinned gleefully. "Father was right," he said as he began to walk offstage, "I should've been an actor."

Meanwhile, somewhere backstage…

Silence was overcome with the roar of the link, followed by a very bewildered – looking figure in a white maintainer's uniform. His dark skin, golden from the sun of a once living Age, blended into the shadows almost perfectly, though he was still light enough to be seen by the naked eye.

His curious dark eyes scanned the area in child-like wonder. He had never seen a place such as this before, with rough grey brick in place of smooth adobe walls and large black blankets hanging from the skies by long iron bars. It may not be surprising to us, since we know that these are only curtains and that the man was backstage, but it was constantly surprising to him, and as he gazed at the place in astonishment, he could only ask one dumbfounded question, an expression that he had used upon meeting another being from somewhere else. The word that he had uttered before recalling his master's orders.

"Cho?"

Cho blinked for the moment, letting all of the environment soak in, then recalled the reason he was here – to release his imprisoned lord. Of course, that required the ultimate sacrifice – a sacrifice that Cho was not exactly willing to make unless he needed to. Hey, it wasn't like he was looking forward to being stuck somewhere for the rest of his life!

Hoping that he would find someone else to share companionship with, and fearing that there might be something rather sinister lurking just beyond the things that he could see, he hastened his pace, tightly clutching the green book he was carrying under his arm.

Meanwhile, in the Dressing Room…

I love chocolate. I love it, I love it so much, and it's the only good thing about this Godforsaken Age that Atrus wrote.

The Stranger was busily pulling wrapper after wrapper off of the tiny chocolates found in the jar on the desk, and she was enjoying every bite of the chocolate inside. The others hadn't asked for any, and though she offered some to each of them at one point or another, only Saavedro had actually eaten some, and now was trying to snatch the chocolate from the Stranger's fingers when she wasn't looking. The Stranger, rather than share with Saavedro after offering him a piece, had hogged the jar for herself, and Saavedro had since gotten good at timing exactly when to grab and run.

Catherine and Atrus, meanwhile, were playing a quick game of Heek, with Catherine winning, much to Atrus' chagrin. Occasionally, the couple would look up and watch for how Saavedro would try to snatch the Stranger's candy next, which was actually much more entertaining than it sounded, for at one point both got into a huge fight over one bar and both ended up with minor bumps and bruises to show for it.

Eventually, Saavedro began to tire of chasing after the candy, and he wasn't really that hungry, anyway.

"I'm bored," he whined, glancing carelessly at the game going on between the couple. "I'm going to go look for a way out."

"Are you sure that you want to do that?" The Stranger asked sarcastically. "Achenar's still out there, you know."

At this, Saavedro clammed up, not speaking for the remainder of the time.

Eventually, this silence was broken when a deep pounding came from the door.

"What is that?" Catherine asked, as bewildered as everyone else in the room.

"I don't know," the Stranger responded jokingly. "Maybe that guy is a fan of heavy metal music."

Nobody laughed at this, either because it wasn't particularly funny, or because the didn't understand the joke.

Meanwhile, just outside the Dressing Room door…

"Sirrus! Cut it out, the pounding hurts my head!"

"Oh, shut up, you big lummox. You're actually useful for something this time. I thought that you'd be grateful."

Sirrus currently had Achenar running head-first into the door at full-speed, and since it was wood, it would easily splinter and break with enough time. Sirrus had gotten the idea after Achenar had explained the dent that had appeared in the door as a result of him trying to kick the door open, and, Sirrus figured, since Achenar was the harder-headed brother, he would be perfect for the job of trying to ram it open.

"I think it's almost broken through."

"I'm about ready to almost break you through, dear brother."

"What was that?"

"Oh, nothing. Moo-shoo-goo, and all that."

Sirrus gave his brother a look of bewilderment. "Uh, what?"

"Nothing, nothing," Achenar responded. "I assure you, you were hearing things."

Sirrus gave him a suspicious glance. "Erm, okay. You just keep pounding on that door until it gives way. Assuredly soon, by the looks of things."

Achenar took one last running start, and like a massive freight train collided with the door at such great force as to break a hole through it. Achenar lay dizzy and achy on the floor, partially inside of the room and partially outside of it. Four astonished, spooked, and surprised people looked down at the now unconscious Achenar and then up at the equally amazed Sirrus.

Only the Stranger, bold as she was, dared to break the silence.

"So, what now?" she asked, smiling cryptically. "Did you two stop by to borrow a cup of sugar?"

Meanwhile…

Cho glanced at the remains of the door from afar. A tall, thin man stood in front of it, perhaps guarding the hole, but after a few moments, he entered, causing a flurry of voices to erupt in speech.

In the same language as the traveler he had encountered in the cage.

You idiot, he thought to himself, You'll be walking into a death trap! You were His lackey, His servant. Do you really think that they'll allow you inside?

And yet, they were still people. And Cho couldn't live alone forever.

So, in through the hole in the door he went, again causing a commotion.

"Cho?" Asked the Stranger, in a perfect representation of the way he had said the word.

"I thought he died when Riven collapsed," Catherine whispered.

"What in the worlds are you doing here?" Atrus asked, confused and more than a bit skeptical of Cho's motives after having spied a conspicuous green book tucked under his arm.

"Uh, did we miss something?" Achenar asked.

"I'm fairly certain we did, brother," Sirrus responded.

"What in the Weaving is going on here?" Saavedro asked, utterly confused.

"Looks like he missed something, too," Sirrus pointed out.

"Well, twenty years is a long time without word from the outside – hey, wait a minute!"

Saavedro, upon snapping out of the mass confusion caused by Cho's entrance, suddenly realized that Sirrus and Achenar had been standing in the room, which caused another mass hysteria due to Saavedro whipping his hammer out and chasing the boys around the room with it. Cho looked confused and stood there dumbly, out of the way of the chase that had ensued. Atrus and Catherine were trying to separate Saavedro from the two boys, while the Stranger was just trying to settle the argument to begin with. Eventually, Cho said one word, the only word of English that he did know.

"Silence!"

The entire room grew silent, with the Stranger not saying much of anything except something that sounded an awful lot like "OmigawdChocanspeakEnglish?"

Eventually, a microphone squeal followed by the words "Test, testing, test one-two-three. There. All fixed up. Now, to prepare for the next sap who walks out here," broke the silence.

"Oh crap," the Stranger said. "Oh crap, oh crap, oh crap. He's preparing again. And he's going to take another one of us."

Atrus sighed. "Wait, wait, don't panic," he said. "Who here hasn't been insulted by this, sorry if it offends anyone here, bahro of a person?"

"He got me," The Stranger offered helpfully. "And he got you."

"Well, that's two of us," Atrus said. "Who else?"

"Me," Catherine said.

"He got me pretty good," Sirrus replied, "But Achenar seems to have one-upped him."

"Cool!" Achenar shouted. "I'm a threat!"

"That's four," Atrus said. "There are six of us here. And hopefully," here he nervously glanced at Cho's green book, "It will remain that way."

The Stranger blinked in sudden realization. "There are two who haven't gone yet," she said, "And look at the order we linked in. You went first, then Catherine, then me. But you shoved me out on stage first because you were a chicken and didn't want to go, so our positions in the line-up switched."

"Then came Achenar and I," Sirrus continued, catching on to the idea. "But Achenar went first – why was I bothered first?"

"Because," the Stranger explained, "You went onstage first, so you bore the brunt of the insults. Achenar managed to make the person's plan backfire through a sort of scare tactics from what you've said, which caused the person to faint and leave us alone for a bit."

"But it wasn't enough," Saavedro added. "I linked next, so I have to go out there. Cho was last, so he goes after me. Unless we draw straws – I'm not necessarily looking forward to being insulted mercilessly."

Cho said something in rapid Rivenese, which Catherine translated as "I'm not going, either, the hammer man can go. He has a weapon."

"Oh, no," Saavedro responded, backing away from the door. "Not doing it."

"Play rock, paper, scissors," the Stranger suggested. "The person who gets best two out of three doesn't have to go."

So, as Saavedro and Cho lined up to play rock, paper, scissors, the Stranger counted wins and losses.

Unfortunately for Saavedro, he lost.

He sighed, unable to beat the fact that the game was fair, and it was his turn to go.

"If I die," he said, stepping through the hole in the door, "And you guys find a way out, go tell my wife that I love her. And keep Sirrus, Achenar, and that creepy Cho guy away from my funeral."

Uh-oh, here it goes… how will Saavedro fare? You'll just have to wait and see… NEXT CHAPTER!!!! (Insert evil laughter here)

Author's Notes: Uh, yeah. I got a tad un-Myst-ish in places. First of all, do not ask me how Achenar knows what chocolate is. We'll all just assume that the D'ni enjoy chocolate as much as the next race, and say no more about it. Second of all, I don't know how Cho and the green book got here, either. They fell into this age through a random rift in the Star Fissure that they fell through after it was opened at the end of Riven. (Convenient placed plothole explaination) Last thing - please don't PM me about why Saavedro and Cho were playing rock, paper, scissors when both come from different ages and have never even heard of the game. How do they know it? The Stranger taught them. There. All random discrepencies are now fixed. You may go back to your regularly-schedualed sanity now.