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Horace paused in the doorway surprised at the activity in the room. Medical personnel were setting up three medical bed along the wall, while an array of devices he didn't recognize were being put together in the opposite corner.

"What's all that? We're just going to the Lands."

"I want to keep an eye on your status while all of your are there," the ... tiger?--the feline had vivid purple fur with yellow lightning shaped stripes--who looked to be in charge replied.

"Horace, that's my dad," Trevor said, mildly annoyed, "Dad, Horace, and Nori."

The bull pulled his gaze away from the striking fur. Father? So this tiger was also an Orr? Right, Horace had to call on the Orr genealogy file; Eric Orr. He was mildly disappointed the tiger was dressed now, wondering just where all that lightning pointed to. "It's a pleasure to meet you."

"Likewise." The colorful tiger looked Horace and Nori over as they shook hands. "You, undress," he told Nori.

"I still don't see the point of keeping an eye on us," Horace commented as he turned to watch the squirrel undress.

Nori noticed that everyone in the room had stopped what they were doing to watch him. "Aren't you guys used to seeing a naked man? I mean I've been seeing them everywhere."

"Doesn't mean we stop appreciating when a good looking one unwraps himself," Tucker said, licking his lips. "If you need help, I'm volunteering."

"He will undress himself," Eric said.

"Dad," Tucker whined.

"We don't have the time to indulge your kind of help."

Horace smiled at Nori's blush. Even he had to have heard the stories of how Tucker could turn anything into a sexual escapade. Even for the Orrs, who were known to be extremely sexual, Tucker was a beast when it came to engaging in sex.

The lightning covered tiger motioned for Nori to continue undressing, and after a look around the squirrel gave a shrug and did so. "Feels like I shouldn't be the only naked one," he said.

Trevor's father nodded in approval.

Nori looked good, slim, but not skinny. Muscled legs of a runner, cock slightly above average in thickness, and in length--it grew hard under the gazes--decent sized balls, firm ass. Horace nodded too.

Tucker walked around the squirrel, his clothing melting away into the belt he wore. "When this is over, you an I are going to have fun." He was thick an long. Horace envied Nori for the coming encounter. "You too," the tiger said and Horace realized Tucker was grinning at him.

"Tucker," Eric said, "stop playing."

"Just warning them so they can get ready."

The bright tiger stepped close to Nori and wrapped something around the squirrel's waist, leaning in to his ear. When he stepped away, Nori's ears were bright red and he wore a belt like Tucker.

"Unfortunately, you can't take control of it," the tiger said as black fabric flowed up and down from it. "But this model has a sensor mesh in the cloth, so it will be more responsive to your motions, it will also allow for a more precise sensory stimulation. Once it has calibrated to your nervous system, it will be as if you were in the game's environment." He indicated the array which was being finalized. "In conjunction with the gravity assisted motion field, the experience should be as close as that of having an Implant as can be achieved."

"Should?" Nori asked, looking himself over as the fabric covered him from neck to toes, even encompassing his tail which lost it's fluffiness, but none of its motion.

"It's the first time this model is being used," Eric answered, "as you can imagine, we don't have a need for an interface system that doesn't rely on an Implant, so until now this was more of a theoretical exercise than an experimental one."

"Don't you have Independents here?" Horace asked.

"Of course we do," the tiger replied, his tone neutral. "But these belts are a family item. We don't go around handing them to the general populace, which is were those Independents would be located."

Horace was thrown by the lack of derision in the comment. Corporates weren't known for their inclusion of Independents, tolerating them more than anything even when they worked for them. But Trevor's father seemed completely at ease with the idea of them within their corporation.

"Is it safe?" Nori asked.

"Completely," the tiger replied. "It's nothing more than a sensor field and sensory stimulator. At worse, if it doesn't perform to speck, you're experience of the game won't be as realistic as I said. It will also serve to keep me appraised of your vitals."

"Right," Horace said, "which reminds me you still haven't explained why you want to keep an eye on us. The Lands are perfectly safe."

"Nothing is perfectly safe," Eric replied. "You will be interfacing with an outside program no one within this corporation has been allowed to study. For all I know there are flaws in it that will let malicious people infiltrate your Implants. Uncle will be looking over you, but I want my own method of watching what is happening, so I can pull you out myself if needed."

"You can't access my Implant," Horace stated. The tiger gave the bull a look that made him doubt what he'd said.

"You're standing inside the Orr corporate building. Every connection to the outside is under our control. If I need to isolate you from your game, I will do so."

"But it won't come to that," a new voice said, and another tiger appeared among them. "Caduceus will be keeping an eye on you while I look over my family and Nori not having an implant isn't at risk from that type of attack."

The tigers physically in the room exchanged a look Horace dearly wanted to know about.

"Now that this is resolved, please lie down on one of the bed," Eric said. "Nori, you can step within the field and don't panic when the fabric covers your head. It won't impede your breathing."

* * * * *

Nori caught himself holding his breath as the fabric flowed up again, then everything was dark as it covered his eyes and he stumbled. Someone caught him as his sight returned. He looked around, expecting things to look distorted, or projected, which was what even the best visor caused. But it was like the fabric had turned clear.

"Are you alright?" the medic holding his arm asked.

"Yes, just adjusting. How am I going to connect to my account?"

She offered him his interface. "When you place it on your arm, the belt will connect to it and act as your visor, gloves and other items you'd normally use." She motioned at the array around them. "The gravity array will keep you stationary so you can move as needed."

"I'm going to get sensory feedback, but how about things like resistance?"

"The fabric will provide that."

Nori nodded, even if he couldn't see how it could. He didn't even feel it, as far as he could tell, he was naked right now. He looked at the purple tiger. "How can I be sure my information is secure? Wont this suit have access to everything I have through my interface."

"Nori, with all due respect," the tiger replied in that oddly neutral tone, "there's nothing you have we would be interested in."

Right, Nori thought, good way to remind the Independent in the room just how insignificant he is. He made sure he was in the center of the array, placed the interface against the fabric and watched it flow around. Information appeared in his sight, his account, the usual readouts as if he had a visor on. He had extra information, such as the purple tiger's name, Eric Orr, the holographic one, Uncle and a distortion next to him, marked as 'unknown'. The holographic tiger rolled his eyes and the distortion vanished.

"Ignore that," Uncle told him.

Nori shrugged and happily did so. He took a breath and clapped his hands twice. With a scroll his sight of the outside world was replaced by his lobby. Again he picked up some of the items that represented functions, marveling at the texture. He'd made adjustments to them while wearing the hotel suit, but now he could feel it wasn't quite right. He brought up a menu to make--

"Nori?" Trevor called. "You coming?"

Right. "Sorry." He put the item back in its place. "Getting used to the suit." With a touch against his lobby's wall he called up the portal control. He hesitated, reminded himself no one here would care about his game account and tapped in his login. The portal appeared and he stepped through.

Who to play as? The usual question, the usual dilemma. Nori could spent hours debating who's time it was for him to be. Hours he didn't have. He sent the display sliding with a swipe and stopped it on the bat. He'd been Taro the last time he'd played with Bobby. It would be appropriate to be him for his rescue. He tapped the token counter, and he'd been idle long enough to have accumulated a good number of them. He stepped through the bat and appeared among his friends.

"I win!" a leaf, moss, and branch monkey said, executing a jump roll.

"Only because you don't know him," the metal tiger replied. "It's usually at least twenty minutes from when he enters the game to when he steps into the Lands. He needs to make himself pretty before we see him."

The monkey looked Taro over. "If he's that good looking just coming in like that, how do any of you do dungeons if he pretties himself up?" the monkey's long leafy tail snaked up and around Taro's leg. "I can barely resist him as is."

Taro stared at the tail, at the end, the flaring wooden crown. "Is that a cock?"

"It's a tail," the monkey stated. "This is a general rated area, a cock is only allowed in adult areas." He looked around furtively.

"You can count on my brother to find a way to make anything lewd, even in places he shouldn't be able to."

"Tucker Orr?" Taro asked. Of course it was Tucker, it wasn't like anyone else had joined in the few minutes it had taken him to enter Gaia. But the monkey was so... not Tucker Orr. He was no more then four feet in height, slim, with the moss and leaves giving him some musculature, but nothing like the bad ass tiger outside the game. Even the coloring, red and oranges and green highlights made him look more clownish than threatening. As he studied him, the monkey did a one handed cartwheel, his loincloth falling away to reveal the flat under cloth which was the only thing possible in a G rated zone.

"He doesn't take the Lands seriously," Omar said.

"It is a game," the monkey replied, tumbling around.

"See what I mean?" the metal tiger sighed, steam escaping his mouth.

"What do I call you?"

"Tuck."

The tiger's eyes did their three-sixty thing that denoted annoyance.

"It's customary to use the character's name when in the Lands," Taro explained. He bowed. "Taro Sato, humble alchemist at your service."

The monkey did his own bow, which folded him in half, then he rolled until straightening before the bat. "Tuck LongDong's the name." He offered his hand, at groin height. "Cause I just love to tuck my long dong in warm and tight places." The monkey's hand slipped between Taro's legs and ran a finger between the cloth covered ass cleft, wriggling his eyebrows. "If you know what I mean."

The monkey went flying back, the brass tiger dusting his hands together, smirking. Tuck landed, rolled and jumped to his feet with a flourish that made Taro smile. Omar turned and threw his hands up in exasperation, steam coming out of every joint in his face.

"As amusing as this is," Marc Bonesword said, "maybe we should get moving? Do you have anything appropriate to fighting Tuck?"

The monkey looked down at himself, shrugged and pirouetted in place. When he stopped he wore a leather armor that didn't look particularly strong, but in the Lands looks could be deceiving. He gave another bow.

"How are we doing this?" Marc asked.

Tuck joined them, opening a map. "This is the general area we know Bobby stood when he took the snapshot from Gaia that he sent to you. What we need to find is the exact location in it." Nori did a double take as the clown was gone, and the serious Tucker back. "The only way I can think to do that, is for each of us to go to the edge of the zone, line with the item in the picture and walk toward the center, keeping it as centered as possible." He traced lines from the edge to the center. "We should end up meeting up around here, and hopefully there will be something to indicate to us why he sent you the pictures."

"That's a bad idea," Taro stated, "any time a group splits up in a movie is when the members get picked off one by one."

Tuck smiled. "Fortunately for us, this is real life." He frowned. "Virtual life?" He looked at the metal tiger. "If no one's recording this, it doesn't count as a movie, right, Theo's not here so...."

"Doesn't matter," Omar replied, studying the map. "You won't treat this any more seriously than you do anything else." He cursed. "Tuck's right. I can get us there," he indicated where the lines met, "but we're going to be off and as we try to line up, we could trigger whatever the reason Bobby wanted us there. I don't want us doing that alone. If we come from the outside the odds are better we'll meet up before whatever that is, and like Tuck said, there will hopefully be something to point us in the right direction from there."

"I don't have a fast travel to wilderness areas," Marc said. "I'm a city dweller, and the closest city isn't that close."

Taro brought up his menu and looked through his options. The alchemist wasn't a class geared toward traveling. "Marc, any mana spring close to one of the destination?" he had lots of work tokens, and while potions were what he specialized in, alchemy could do a few other things.

"There's one there." The bone bull pointed at the map, but Taro didn't see where through the distortion his menu caused, but knowing there was one was enough. Did he have the ingredients to make Manarium? Of course not, but he could use tokens to make those. He set the queue going, thirty-eight minutes, was it worth dumping more tokens in this? Maybe once they had a plan of action. He dismissed the menu and looked at the map.

"I can take one person there." It was closer to one of the line than the other, but at least the two were on one side, so Omar could handle the other two.

"Since when do you have a fast travel?" Marc asked.

"It's not technically fast travel, since it can only take someone to a mana pool and those aren't usualy anywhere useful. Manarium is this element alchemist can make as a means of going to a mana pool and restock on mana since we're more dependent on it then the other classes."

"How long until it's ready?" Omar asked.

"Thirty some minutes."

"Can you speed it up? Traveling through the wilderness is already going to take long enough. Marc, you know what we can expect as wild creature levels?"

The bone bull studied the map, consulted something none of them could see and opened his mouth--

"Really?" someone said and they all turned to look at a regal plant man standing a few feet away. Taro couldn't tell his species, but the wealth was obvious. The gray fabric of the shirt and pant was Garanio cloth, which had to be imported from Ceril. He identified the gems that acted as clasps to hold the jacket closed as coming from Amakron, Koldur and Umbreth.

"What--" Marc seemed to have trouble finding his voice. "What are you doing here?"

The man raised a leafy eyebrow. "Waiting for you to do introductions, what else?"

"Marc?" Omar asked.

"Come on," the man said motioning for Marc to hurry things along.

The bone bull swallowed. "Omar, Taro, Tuck, I'd like to introduce you to Constantine. Constantine, these are my friends."

"And you are?" Omar asked.

"For the purpose of this situation, you can consider me to be Gaia itself."