Notes Taken by Samantha and Alastair Beadle.
The airship that is Mirov continues on towards the flatter green area Napalm saw from high altitude off in the distance. Despite the altitude it is still swelteringly hot and humid, with a thick stench of rotting vegetation. The land in the area of Siberia we arrived in is being rapidly covered in new tree grow, and Mother Bear can feel the weird effect she gets from the vegetation her covering the area. Mirov sprays some weed killer around, but it appears to have little effect.
The star patterns on Nut's skin seem to have altered - because of being on a different planet, or in a different time, perhaps?
As we fly in the direction of the green area, we can see that the former clearing where we appeared has practically disappeared. Then Akula notices that the new forest over there is writhing and rustling around. We turn back to investigate. Mirov creates a telescope and peers in that direction. The forest appears to be receding downwards towards the ground - as if it is being sucked down! Mirov grows rocket engines on the balloon and we zoom back towards the former clearing.
As we approach we notice that part of the forest is turning white. Then Mirov notices that it is actually an arm! From a body. All in white. Then The Rose stands up from the forest - but this time he is four kilometres tall! He laughs maniacally. Not a good sign. We discuss methods for attacking him on the grounds that only bad guys laugh maniacally! Mirov banks away from The Rose, getting out of arms reach.
The Rose makes no attempts to pursue us - for now. Mother Bear promotes the idea of "'alking 'o 'im" (she is still in bear form, and her speech is not as coherent as it might be).
Then The Rose states "At last I have the power - when I return I will finally have the power to wipe the scourge of humanity from the world! Mwa ha ha ha haaaa!" Talking to him is removed from the agenda.
As the forest shrinks down around The Rose it becomes apparent that he is absorbing it. Mirov creates and then fires an intercontinental ballistic syringe at The Rose. It buries itself in The Rose's chest and herbicide is injected into him. "Foolish gnats!" he booms, "where you not paying attention when you where told that plants from this time were not effected by chemical weapons?"
He throws the syringe back at Mirov, but Mirov turns it into a bird which flies back towards The Rose - and craps on his head. The Rose looks surprised at this.
There is a huge snapping and cracking of wood as The Rose pulls one leg free from the forest. The Mirov balloon backs away swiftly. "Yes, run you fools!" he booms, "By the time you get back there will not be a human world to return to!"
General Winter starts to generate low temperatures, and a cold fog starts to form around The Rose. As the air freezes around him he starts to absorb more of the forest. "Fools, your powers will not help you."
But frost begins to form on his skin and clothes. Nut detects some magical forces in the forest nearby - it is not The Rose and does not feel like any of his DEMON comrades. Nut warns the rest of the group. Mother Bear cannot sense anything other than the forest in that direction, so she begins to teach herself about all the smells of this place. She notices that there is a faint human being-type smell amongst the others, though again not of any of the four who where with The Rose. Nut senses a magical/telepathic dead zone in that direction - like the one she noticed in the last forest incursion, back in Siberia. The dead zone then disappears, and she feels something that, although wordless, feels like a telepathic plea for help just as that section of forest is absorbed by The Rose.
The theory is now that these people - whoever they are - control the planet and that The Rose is attacking them. Nut searches for another telepathic dead zone - and finds one! We head in that direction, a few kilometres further from the Rose. Mirov starts growing some large explosive-tipped rockets.
By now the Rose has been considerably slowed by General Winters frost, but considering the local climate, that level of cold is as much as can be achieved. Mirov fires off the missiles he has been preparing. Napalm, flying about separately, times her attack to hit at the same time as the missiles. The combined attack strikes The Rose's head, which vanishes, in a huge explosion. "So, now we have deflowered the villain!" comments Mother Bear.
There is a loud cracking sound and The Rose's arm drops off. More missiles appear from Mirov and fire off in his direction. Napalm continues to blast him.
At about this point the Mirov-airship reaches the telepathic dead zone Nut detected.
The Rose's torso shatters, leaving a pair of frozen, white clad legs which in turn topple and fall into the forest, shattering on impact. Flying things flap into the air away from the huge shock wave caused by the two kilometre tall legs crashing into the ground.
Napalm moves higher to see if she can spot anything - she suspects that The Rose has moved location.
We now turn our attention to the telepathic dead zone. There is a small black tree here (like the time travelling trees Nut investigated in the earlier incursion), though this one appears to have immature seeds and is smaller and thinner than the one seen before. Nut moves down to attempt to communicate - Napalm (not having seen any more signs of The Rose) carries her and acts as escort/wingman/bodyguard. The rest wait up above the top of the canopy in the Mirov Balloon.
As they arrive in the top of the forest green airborne jellyfish and plant-like butterflies flap up around Napalm and Nut. Napalm flames them and they avoid the fire and head for Nut instead. Nut kicks out to protect herself and Napalm weaves to avoid as many as possible. As they get into the canopy vines lash out at them. Nut leaps from Napalm and swings down from tree to tree. Huge Venus fly trap-like plants snap out at her and pincushion type animals leap at her. Napalm provides cover by toasting the more threatening forms of plant life, although she is also knocked about and clasped by vines. She strikes back and burns them.
Up in the sky everyone else notices that the patch of forest at the centre of where the Rose's legs ended up is starting to shrink away again! General Winter freezes that area again.
Nut and Napalm make it into the telepathic dead zone. As they do so the plant attacks become more and more frenzied, as they did when she entered the dead zone in the Siberian incursion, before. Several trees occupy the zone, the black tree being a parasite on one of them, as are many other bushes and plants. No one else is visible in the vicinity.
Napalm blasts things as they attack her and Nut. Nut grabs one of the immature seed pods from the black tree. It is firmly attached but comes away eventually. The black plant itself does not appear to fight back but other plants continue to attack. Napalm comes up with the plan of blasting the area as much as possible - to attract attention in an attempt to communicate.
In the air we notice a significant increase in the fire within the forest where Nut and Napalm entered! As the fire burns up the area, the telepathic dead zone drops and a magical cry for help is felt by Nut. This time Nut can feel that it comes from about a dozen points, that appear to be swellings in the branches of the tree that the black tree is a parasite of. Nut leaps to the nearest one of the swollen areas - there is a sense of worry and panic from it as she does so - and touches it. She tries to talk to it telepathically (as best she can during the Napalm induced firefight around her!).
The parent plant is about two kilometres tall. The swellings Nut detects are scattered within 100m of each other in this area only.
Up above, the new area suspected to be The Rose is now frozen, and we fly off in that direction. General Winter and Akula are lowered down into the scene on a rope, which Mirov extrudes. The area is very cold and covered in mist. The plants there are blackened and appear to be dead. The rope develops a mouth and ear to talk to the General and Akula. They appear to be being lowered onto The Rose's knee at the moment.
Half a Rose can be seen through the mist, half way formed as if growing out of some bushes on a tree branch, and frozen in place. Akula smashes his frozen head off with a hammer supplied by Mirov, and the body falls into tiny pieces as a result.
Akula theorises that this is no longer The Rose, and that he is nearby somewhere, ready to form again. Mirov records all that goes on (with his perfect memory). Akula and General Winter go back up to the Mirov Balloon.
When we are back Mirov launches a huge napalm attack on the area and General Winter forms his 'donut of cold' around the area to encourage a firestorm.
Back in the forest Nut suggests they kill the black tree. Napalm complies with much enthusiasm, reserving some of her power to fend of the rest of the forest but showing much self control by avoiding the thing in the swelling that Nut is attempting to communicate with.
Nut can definitely sense a very strange mind in the swelling. It feels vegetable but also intelligent. Napalm encourages Nut to ask it about time travel, but Nut is currently working on the concepts of 'Me' and 'You'. The plant mind appears alarmed at the attempts to communicate with it, and also appears to be communicating with its neighbours. Nut taps the swelling. After a while it responds with a series of mental blips.
"Beep, Bloop, Beep, Blarp, Beep-Beep" goes the swelling, telepathically (it's trying to communicate '1 + 1 = 2'). Suddenly the plant creatures stop attacking. Showing unprecedented self-control, Napalm stops attacking them in return.
The Mirov/General Winter firestorm is coming on nicely. No sign of The Rose is seen for now. The firestorm grows slowly over half an hour to encompass the whole of the Rose's first, large, body. The firestorm continues to grow as they attempt to cover the whole of the area absorbed by The Rose.
Nut receives a mental image of a short, green, camouflaged-skinned, naked, gender less humanoid figure. It is made clear that this is a question. Nut taps out a response to indicate comprehension. Nut wanders over to the biggest bud in the area to see if it is better at communicating. She thinks about the image sent to her and tries to send it to the large bud. She gets a sense of understanding in return. She sends a picture of us and our home planet - including the trees of the region we have just left. There is a pause.
The rest of the party arrive at the scene and descend to where Nut and Napalm are. An image of The Rose is met with confirmation that they consider him a bad thing. Images of the black trees, along with the question sense, are met with a good feeling.
Other responses they give:
At this last set of images plants nearby start to rustle as if in preparation to attack. We confirm, by thought to them, that we agree this whole episode was a bad idea. The anger calms.
Mirov turns into a rocket with spider legs ready to move us around vertically and fast if it becomes necessary.
We show The Rose coming with the trees from our world and starting to attack their world, reaffirming that we tried to help fend him off. This is met with approval from the swelling-thing. Images of plants attacking us, and us defending ourselves are met with a sense of understanding.
An image forms of a single huge tree from the forest, under the sun of this world. It shrinks and returns to seed form as the prominences on the sun decrease. This repeats as the sun gets smaller and smaller. Right at the end a forest appears. This is interpreted as them wanting to flee a doomed planet. We follow it up with images of what they are doing to our world when they arrive: birch forest Utopia being destroyed as their seeds arrive.
"What are you doing?" asks a voice from the undergrowth behind us. Mother Bear spins around. A figure steps out from the undergrowth - a beautiful oriental woman.
"We're trying to stop the trees invading our planet," says Napalm.
"Oh, is that what is happening. I am Shikari-Doe. I live up there." She points up towards the canopy/triangle-covered sky. She tells us she lives in the shield. We explain what it is that we are doing, about the intelligent plants and our theories about what they are doing. She then recognises that we are the Moscow Superheroes, and seems surprised and pleased by the news of the sentient plant-things we have found.
On questioning she tells us she comes from Earth and explains that this is the Earth - of five and a half billion years in the future!
We tell her of The Rose and bringing him here with us. In return she explains that she has been alive for seven billion years! She says that the little green people the plant-thing sent an image of are what humans evolved into - but they are not very intelligent. She does not recall the forest incursions in her past, but says she does have a very good memory, implying that it didn't happen in her version of history - yet.
Much discussion of time travel, time lines, paradoxes and other such things ensues. Apparently (according to Shikari-Doe) history can be changed by time travel, re-writing what happened after the change, but only so many times before damage to the structure of time there prevents any more changes taking place. So we won't have to worry about the outcome of the Great Patriotic War being changed on us. And the changes in history have a speed of propagation forward, so even if the trees have changed history (Shijari-Doe doesn't remember themn, after all) any changes resulting from this won't have reached here yet. We then get bored of this and go on to more constructive topics of conversation.
Shikari-Doe says that she and her compatriots (all now dead) built the shield to protect them from the ever-increasing energy output sun half a billion years after our time. She says that otherwise all life on Earth would have been wiped out by the sun's heat five billion years ago. She has never attempted to contact the plants herself, and in fact didn't know they even existed. She is now just sitting around, waiting for the world to end - which it will in a few thousand years, when the sun turns into a red giant star. She has not yet decided whether she actually wants to be here when it does.
A method of teaching the plants space travel so that they can find sanctuary without invading the Earth of the past is discussed. Shikari-Doe is of the opinion that this is possible, as she says that travel through time and travel through space are just different aspects of the same thing.
Shikari-Doe says that she can fly to and from the shield, which is 36000 kilometres up - i.e. what used to be the altitude of geostationary orbit. She says the shield only exists on the side of the planet which faces the sun, but that that side always faces the sun now - the Earth's rotation is now tidally locked to the sun. The cables we saw going up into the sky are apparently made by the traversers - miles long vegetable spider-things that travel between the Earth and the Moon (which is visible, very small, off in the sky).
Mother Bear has noticed that Shikari-Doe produces a scent to mask her from the plants so that they do not attack her, like the goo we are covered in.
She asks us to go back to talking to the plants, as she is very interested. She offers the co-ordinates of planets the plants could go to if they'll stop invading us and go somewhere else. A plan to destroy the shield, and thus the plants, does not get her approval.
We continue to communicate with the plants. Attempts to describe space travel to them are initially met with confusion. Shikari-Doe offers to take us back to our own time in the event that the plants will not or cannot do so. "You will be needed," she says ominously. She says she last communicated with the Green People (the devolved remnants of humanity) a billion years ago, and points to a couple of them lurking in the undergrowth some way off - watching. Nut tries to get in telepathic communication with them to see if they have gained in intelligence since then, but their minds seem to be between dog and ape levels of intelligence.
Nut sends an image of the trees boarding a ship (unfortunately, Nut translates this into images of sailing ships and Egyptian gods, as she doesn't know about any other kind of ships) and travelling to a new planet (again, Nut's translation does not help). The plants just get confused again. Mother Bear tries the same thing with different images - the trees getting into a big, sturdy Soviet rocket; its launching into the sky; flying through space; past their sun; the stars appearing (some confusion from the plants at this); getting towards one of them, a normal sun this time; planets appearing; one planet looks like the Earth; orbiting around it; popping out in little pods; floating down to the surface and populating the entire world. This is repeated several times and they finally catch on.
They then repeat it back, but with their travelling using their teleportation-using tree with bright flashy-type powers. This also gets the thumbs up. It seems they were completely unaware of this concept of space or anything off the Earth! They just knew of the Earth and that big light in the sky - as there is no night they have never seen the stars.
Now - how to get the co-ordinates of one of the known life bearing planets in Shikari-Doe's database (which we decide should be one with only the lowest forms of life on it) to the plants so that they can travel there? When asked, Shikari-Doe says that some planets have Earth-descended life on them, having been terraformed by one of Earths sentient races; in fact she says that some worlds have been terraformed more than once.
The story is repeated with only some of the plants escaping. This is greeted with a "good and bad" reaction; it would be better than nothing. There is some concern that if they can only teleport areas a kilometre or so across at a time that they cannot actually get all of their ecosystem off the planet - the forest (and thus the plant-intelligences) will grow back into the vacated areas before they are all gone. They describe that they can limit their growth so that all of them can get off, in lots of little transportations, and no new ones of themselves will be produces in the plants which 'fill in the gaps' they make.
The idea that they should not attempt to inhabit occupied planets in future again is also passed to them. They agree - phew!
Shikari-Doe considers the idea of going with the plants to their new worlds. She seems generally bored by any such ideas, but considers it all the same.
She describes the human race as having gone to the stars several times, along with intelligent species evolved from the dogs, the squids, several waves of robots, the Bears (as descended from Mother Bear, she says!) and others. As well, of course, as evolving (devolving) into green ape-like morons.
A method of relaying distance measurements to the plants is devised, based on powers and multiples of a measuring rod produced by Shikari-Doe from behind her back, and a direction. 'Rods to the power of a lot in that direction' is transferred to the plants. A boom is heard in the forest, from some way off. Several rods and several directions are passed on. More booms follow, from various directions.
Napalm zips off to see what the transported zones have been replaced with. One is a (rapidly shrinking) meadow purple clover-like plants (actually single purple discs on stalks) with a single dark blue tree with purple leaves. Another is covered in thick black vegetation and is also shrinking, slowly.
We ask Shikari-Doe if she can do anything about The Rose. She says she probably can.
Shikari-Doe then prepares to send us back to our time. She warns us of a margin for error in this time travel thing - one part in a million or so, which could be thousands of years from this far in the future!
Mirov's spider-rocket takes us up into the air, as Shikari-Doe recommends. She and Napalm fly along outside (though she has no visible means of propulsion). Then she remembers something and zips off. She returns with The Rose's head in a glass jar - he does not look happy. "That should hold him", she says.
We decide to go back to Siberia at the point we left, if only to take as much credit as we can for stopping the tree incursions. Going back prior to our train tickets expiry date or directly to Moscow is discussed - but not for too long. Given that the error is plus or minus 5000 years or so we may be being overly optimistic in even trying it!
We thank Shikari-Doe for her help. Something that looks like a ten-metre soap bubble in a frame of flowing blue metal floats down from the sky and over us. There is a brilliant flash of light - and we are in a large hemispherical chamber that looks to be on the triangular grid in the sky, looking down on the Earth below. Shikari-Doe steps out through a door briefly.
The Nazi box of tricks we borrowed from Mr Svoyan is showing red blips indicating the trees leaving the planet in droves.
We stand in a circle on Shikari-Doe's time travel machinery (just an area on the floor as far as we can tell). She thanks us for an interesting time, tells us that most of us will meet again, and pushes some buttons on a portable console she brought with her when she came back.
Swirling white energy rises around us in the circle. As it becomes opaque the sensation of being twisted we had when coming here returns, if slightly different. There is whiteness all around for a timeless time, and then the process reverses. At this point Mirov sheds an eyeball to see what happens.
And we all appear out of the whiteness (Mirov's eyeball does not, and Mirov feels a stab of pain as a result)...
We appear to be in the ruins of Red Square, with the tumbled walls of the Kremlin to one side, rubble which is probably St Basil's cathedral on another, surrounded by desert and dry, desiccated trees. The Nazi device identifies the time as 2876, October 31st, 1PM (Berlin Time).
"Quick, you lot, over here," shout a voice in Russian from the ruins of the Kremlin. It seems to be a stocky woman with a somewhat bear-like build. "Quick, we've got to get you back to the 20th century," she says as we come over to her. She appears to be wearing a battered high-tech space suit with no helmet. She explains that 'the patrols' may get us if we do not hurry, but decides that is best that 'we do not know' the details.
Inside the ruins of the Kremlin is a sparkling white framework in the shape of a pyramid (Nut is impressed!), with a high-tech control panel attached on one side. We are pressed into the pyramid while the bear-like woman manipulates the controls. White energy fills the spaces between the frame of the pyramid, and another time travel special effect occurs. Another timeless time passes.
Then we appear, close to burning forest, six hours after we left (according to the Nazi device) which is just before the expiry date on our train tickets! It is late on the 25th February 1997.
We take to the air by Mirov balloon and go towards the fire. We quickly find the military headquarters there, and go to talk to the General. "How did you get back so soon," he asks. He asks us for a full debrief, but we are not sure he will believe us. Mr Svoyan is also there.
Regardless, we tell him that the plants will no longer be invading and that The Rose has been taken out of action. We start to explain about sentient, time travelling trees and our pact with them to use space travel rather than time travel... Mr Svoyan pays close attention to all this.
Mirov, reluctantly, gives the Nazi box back to Mr Svoyan - but only after a threat to cut him open to find it! Mr Svoyan packs it away.
The army offers to take us back to Moscow by plane. Mother Bear starts to negotiate for them to let us stop off at the station in Krasnoyarsk so that we can reimburse the unused half of our train tickets. The General looks put-upon and pays us the equivalent amount.
We are flown by helicopter to the airport in Oymyakon (the nearest city), the board a transport plane for Moscow.
As we fly, we check the news. Canoe-helmeted monsters have been attacking parts of the city again.
Also as we fly, Mirov studies engines in general, and jets in particular.
After a long flight we arrive back at Moscow late on the 26th February 1997. We are whisked through customs and into a big black Zil limousine that is waiting for us. The limousine drops us off at our requested stops.
Mother Bear and Napalm return to Mother Bear's apartment after being dropped off near the apartment building. It turns out that Mirov goes there too after hiding in a pocket in a pea-sized form. Her family welcome Mother Bear (Ludmilla) warmly. They eat a hearty meal and drink vodka. Mother Bear writes a note to send to a distant relative to Moscow in the far future, with a time machine, in preparation for her to send us back in time to now. Boggle, boggle goes her family.
At General Winter's mansion, Adrik welcomes 'Sir' back. He nods sagely to General Winter's description of what happened - as if he understands and believes all of it. The General has a bath, tea, pipe and evening paper arranged for him by Adrik. Then he goes to bed.
Akula returns to his flat - and is welcomed by no one, as usual.
Nut is dropped off at a random quiet spot close to a somewhat dodgy area of the city. She turns back to Andrey, and goes home.
We check our answering service. It has several calls recorded, most of them from Captain Ostranko:
And so on - getting more and more irate as time goes on!
Also, Napalm has a message from Molinya , asking how she is. Napalm returns the call and explains what we have been doing, briefly. Molinya also boggles slightly, then, when asked, explains that she cannot return to Moscow yet as her face is still wanted there.