Marshmallow was rudely awakened from a deep slumber by the sensation of rolling. Her eyes shot open to see the world spin around once, twice, then finally settle down. "Ohhhgg..." she mumbled, dizzy. "What...?"

Someone picked her up by the shoulders and placed her on her feet gently. "Sorry, Marsh!" Her eyes managed to regain focus, locking onto the figure in front of her; Paintbrush. "Are you alright?"

"I... think?" She rubbed the remaining sleep out of her eyes. "What happened, exactly?"

An apologetic look appeared on Painty's face. "Rocky was about to vomit on you, so I just pushed you out of the way without thinking. You looked like you were sleeping well, too..."

Marshmallow glanced a few feet away, where Rocky was obliviously sitting next to a pile of barf. "Well... better to be rolled around than vomited on, so it's alright."

Paintbrush breathed out a sigh of relief. "Good."

Now mostly awake, Marshmallow took in her surroundings and frowned when she remembered where they were. Idiotic Island... nobody had many pleasant memories of the place. It was pretty small and barren; excluding the grove of trees on the north coast of the island — where everyone had crash-landed the previous evening, thanks to Bow — the only notable features were four walls made of iron bars. And even most of those had fallen to the ground years ago after Bomb's elimination from Inanimate Insanity.

Currently, it simply existed as a resting spot for the survivors of Purgatory Mansion's inferno. Above Marshmallow, Paintbrush, and Rocky were Puffball and Bow, chatting up a storm midair. Grassy was perched atop Puffball. Nearby, Leafy and Baseball talked slowly to OJ, who seemed to have more or less returned to normal. Basketball sat alone farther away, working on something that Marshmallow couldn't see from where she was.

Leafy noticed that Marshmallow had woken up. "Good morning!" she called over cheerily, waving.

Marsh returned the wave before turning to Paintbrush. "Did I miss anything while I was asleep?"

"Basically nothing's happened." Painty rolled their eyes. "I forgot how boring this place was. The only thing of interest is that Basketball's fiddling with MePad, trying to get him to turn back on or reboot or whatever, but she hasn't made any progress."

"I got MePad working!!" called out a voice suddenly, attracting the others' attentions.

Paintbrush blinked. "I stand corrected."

Everyone walked over and crowded around Basketball, who stepped away from MePad. He was propped up against one of the metal walls, a loading bar having appeared on his otherwise black screen. "He should be waking up in just a moment," she explained.

The bar filled up completely and vanished, replaced by the Meeple logo. That, in turn, was replaced by MePad's purple and pink background. His eyes appeared, accompanied by his sound wave mouth. "MePad?" Baseball asked cautiously.

The device blinked. "Mr. Baseball?" he wondered in confusion. He saw everyone else and his bewilderment only increased. "Mx. Paintbrush? Ms. Marshmallow? What... where am I? My GPS has not fully loaded in yet, so I am unaware of our current location."

Basketball opened her mouth to reply, but before she could, a notification went ping and appeared on the top of MePad's screen. It read New Meeple Update Available. "Actually, please excuse me for a few moments, everyone. I must quickly attend to this update."

Leafy's eyes widened. "Wait!!" she cried, leaping forward and swiping at the notification to make it disappear before MePad could update himself. "Don't perform that update!!"

The device's expression changed from a mildly perplexed one to a very perplexed one. "That was very rude of you, Ms. Leafy. And quite unlike you. Could you please explain why you just did that?"

"Yeah, that was a little out of left field," agreed Baseball.

Leafy nodded quickly. "I can, just promise that you'll hear me out completely first before updating at all."

"As long as you can provide me with a logical explanation."

"Well, it's mostly logical..."

--------------------

Team 3 — or what was left of them — was finally nearing the end of their five-day long journey. And, boy, what a messy journey it was. Golf Ball hadn't uttered a word since being told what had transpired the previous night. She was probably in shock, but none of the other three girls knew what to do about it yet, except to get back to the BFB competing grounds. They hadn't spoken much, either. The only sounds they'd heard for the last hour and a half were footsteps and raindrops, the latter of which was gradually increasing. Two members of the group still had to hold up umbrellas.

The falling ball of fire changed everything, of course. All four pairs of their eyes were drawn upward as something resembling a small meteorite burst through the rainy cold cover above. They silently watched as whatever it was plummeted towards the ground, and eventually hit the earth somewhere ahead with a muted THUMP.

The first to speak was Pencil. "Um. What was that."

"I'm going to make an educated guess and say it was Four," replied Test Tube confidently. "It wouldn't be the first time he's done something like that, right? He did that before the..." She snapped her fingers over and over as she tried to remember.

"The boat contest?" offered Pie.

"Yes, that's it!"

Pencil groaned. "Don't remind me of that one..."

"As to why he was in space... I've got no theory about that."

Pie shrugged. "No need to fret. We'll probably find out soon. The competing grounds are only a few minutes away now, and if I remember correctly, we'll be able to see them once we get over this small hill." Pencil nodded confirmation.

They continued, but the silence only returned for approximately 30 seconds before a horrific shriek reached their ears. It came from ahead, but they were just far enough away that it didn't do anything more than make the four of them wince a little. "Ok, that was definitely Four." Test Tube shook her head. "He's the only creature in either of our worlds capable of making such a painful noise on that level."

"Yeah, but... that wasn't like like his normal screech. It sounded more..." Pencil shuddered. "Menacing. If that's even possible."

"Shhh." Pie calmly shushed them and raised her hands. "Listen."

They quieted down, and suddenly, other screaming could be heard over the pattering of rain. As the constant bass of Four's zappies was added to the mix, the contestants wordlessly exchanged surprised glances, a single question forming in their minds: What's going on over there?

The sound of zappies doubled, and all four girls simultaneously broke into a sprint. Just before they reached the top of the hill, an impossibly brilliant blaze of white light appeared, illuminating the world like a second sun for a split second before vanishing. A wave of electrical energy followed, rolling over them rapidly and gone in an instant, but leaving behind a bad feeling in their mouths. "What was that?" Pie asked none of them in particular.

"It looked and felt like an electromagnetic pulse," came TT's response. "But I've never seen one with an electrical discharge that powerful before..."

The group reached the hill's crest, finally able to get a proper view. Ahead and a little below lay a large ring of lava-scorched vegetation, marking the field that was the location of BFB. A new crater was indented in the earth, and several objects could be seen hiding behind bushes or tree, while others were lying on the ground, unmoving. Roughly in the center of the field was a small circle of smoking, completely blackened grass. Four was nowhere to be seen.

"What happened here..." murmured Pencil in confusion.

Golf Ball shrieked at the top of her lungs. Startled, the other three objects whirled around to see her pointing into the sky with her handless right arm, where something had materialized — a large, rounded, black and green spaceship, looming just underneath the cloud cover.

Realizing that Golf Ball must be thinking the spaceship belonged to humans, Test Tube grabbed her dimpled friend and forced her around so that their eyes would meet. "Golf Ball, don't panic! Look at me! That is NOT a human spaceship!"

"How- how do you know?" There was a sense of urgency in GB's face, her eyes darting from side to side frantically.

"Because that ship belongs to the Light Shimmers! They're friendly, and they're from... my... universe." Testy blinked. "Wait, how... how did they get here, into your universe?"

She was momentarily distracted by the Shimmers' ship tilting to one side. Then, without any warning, it went into free-fall and collided with the earth, creating a massive CRASH and causing the ground to tremble. "Jeepers," she muttered, before the reality of what transpired hit her. "The Shimmers are in there! They could be injured!!" She let go of GB and dashed down the hill, the other three following right behind.

It only took the four of them a minute to reach the crash site inside the pre-existing crater. By this time, several other objects had appeared from their hiding spots and were drawn towards the center as well. Ruby was the first to spot them arriving. "Guys! You're back!" she exclaimed.

"It is SO good to see you, Ruby." Pencil rushed over and embraced her friend.

"I love your scarf! Where'd you get it?"

"Erm... Lollipop."

Hearing Ruby's cries, Fan turned mid-sprint to see them. "Test Tube!! Golf Ball! Where's the rest of your team?"

"No time, Fan! We have to make sure the Shimmers are unharmed!"

"But... oh, darn it, you're right." Fan gestured to the other contestants staring at the egg-shaped vessel with curiosity. "Come on! Help us get inside!!"

As the majority of objects in the clearing slid down the crater's edge and gathered to find an entrance into the Shimmer ship, Golf Ball broke away and began purposefully walking somewhere else. Only Pencil noticed — everyone else was too engrossed in their task. She decided to follow discreetly.

When she reached the globule, she was at her underground factory's entrance, placing a foot on the scanner that would open the door. "Isn't that a handprint scanner?" Pencil wondered.

GB flinched slightly at the sound of her voice, not expecting her to be there. "It's multipurpose. This also reads the signatures of my feet, as well as Tennis Ball's, in the instance that one or both of us lost our mechanical arms and Test Tube wasn't around." The scanner beeped, and the door slid open. "It pays to have a backup strategy."

"Noted. And, um, before you lock me out..."

The ball turned, inches away from doing just that. "You want to come in, don't you?"

"Well, yes, and... I... also wanted to apologize. Again. For earlier." Pencil rubbed one of her arms, refusing to meet Golf Ball's eyes. "...you were right. When you said that I got us into this mess. I mean... I have no idea what happened here in the last few days, but... I wanted to-"

She was interrupted by a large sigh. "You know what? Just save it and come in already."

Pencil blinked. "Really?"

"Yes. But I am only doing this out of necessity. Everyone else is preoccupied at the moment, and it would be... unwise of me to go after Teardrop alone. Especially with..." She lifted her handless limbs (although the copper spike was still attached to her left arm). "These. Walk ahead of me, though."

Nodding, Pencil stepped in front, and the two girls descended into the factory.

--------------------

"So, to summarize, you believe that MePhone 4 is being controlled by your evil doppelgänger, and has possibly taken over the MeCloud and any other Meeple devices out there."

Nobody spoke for a moment. "Well, when you put it like that, it does sound ludicrous," admitted Leafy, scratching the back of her head nervously. "But as much as I hope I'm wrong, that's the conclusion I'm drawing here."

"I'm finding this situation a little hard to believe."

"I think it makes at least some sense, though," Bow chimed in. "Like, last they saw MePhone, he was apparently loose in the MeCloud yesterday. To me, it sounds a little suspicious that there's suddenly a Meeple update the next day."

MePad considered it. "Mr. Cobs is quite organized, and almost always punctual. It IS odd that he wouldn't give a notice in advance, assuming this update is from him."

"It's not from him."

All eyes turned to the sky, where Puffball was descending from. "I just flew over there and took a look through this huge glass window," she stated. None of them had even noticed that she'd left. "I don't know what room it's for, but I could see several devices in there. What were they called? MePods? Point is, they all had these glitchy red screens. So..."

"I was right," uttered Leafy glumly.

MePad hmmed. "This is most unfortunate. I'm not quite sure how to proceed."

Inhaling deeply, Basketball stepped forwards. "Well, I don't know about you guys, but I don't like the idea of an evil entity controlling an entire network of electronic devices. So I think we need to come up with a plan to stop them."

--------------------

As Pencil and Golf Ball walked, the latter breathed in deeply, immediately comforted by the soothing scent of lavender that mostly masked any other odors. It felt good to be back again, after all the time spent walking in unfamiliar or uninviting terrain. The familiarity of the factory gave her a sense of comfort and peace that she rarely felt anywhere else. Here, she was at home.

But now her home had been claimed by an erratically-acting Teardrop, and hell if she was going to let that go so easily.

Just ahead of her, Pencil reached the halfway point, where the claustrophobic walls of the stairwell opened up to reveal the rest of the underground building. She halted abruptly. "Um. Golf Ball."

"What?"

Wordlessly, Pencil gestured for her to look. GB crept to her level, careful not to stray too close to the edge, and almost had a heart attack.

Down below, over twenty objects were hard at work. The massive pile of metal scrap that always sat in one corner of the factory was considerably smaller, and also somewhat more organized. Objects were picking out bits and pieces from the pile, then throwing them into the incinerator, which looked as if it had been repurposed to be a giant metal furnace. Other objects were removing metal from the furnace once it had forged into a flat sheet — seemingly uncaring that it was red-hot — and cooling it in a vat of water. Yet others were gathering miscellaneous electronics together, and the last few interlopers took everything handed to them and were building... something. It sat in the middle of the factory floor ominously, grey and rectangular. Whatever it was, it appeared nearly complete. And it was big.

Both girls were speechless at first. This was the last thing they'd expected to come across. But the longer Golf Ball stared, the more anger grew inside her, until she found herself yelling, "HEY! TRESPASSERS!! GET OUT OF MY FACTORY!!"

Almost comically, everyone on the factory floor stopped what they were doing and simultaneously looked up to see GB and Pencil glaring down upon them. Every single one of them had glowing red eyes, the combined intensity of which could be felt from the top of the staircase.

"That," Pencil stated plainly, "was probably the stupidest thing you could have done in this situation."

The blind rage in Golf Ball's eyes subsided, replaced by realization, and a smidge of embarrassment. "Er. Whoops."

Every single object below them suddenly broke into a sprint, rushing towards the base of the stairs as fast as they could. "RUN!" Pencil shrieked.

GB didn't need to be told twice. They began dashing up the stairwell at top speed, the mob right behind. Fortunately, the duo had a head start, and the narrow passage couldn't hold so many objects at once, which slowed them down a little.

Right before reaching the top, GB skidded to a halt, letting Pencil pass. The globule wasted no time in using the metal lance welded to her left arm to impale the factory doors's control panel, causing it to spark and sputter. "That will stop them from opening the entrance from there," she explained, extracting her arm and jumping outside. She turned and lifted a foot. "So as long as I close it from the outside, they'll be locked i-"

She froze, her leg hovering in place. The front of the mob had just rounded the final corner, and leading the charge was Tennis Ball, his eyes burning crimson. Golf Ball found herself unable to move.

Behind her, Pencil turned and realized what was happening. "Oh, fiddlesticks," she complained loudly, before seizing Golf Ball's foot and roughly slamming it against the "hand"print scanner. Two metal sheets rapidly slid closed moments before Tennis Ball and the other objects could have escaped, sealing them underground for the time being.

Pencil let go of Golf Ball, who promptly fell over, and sat down hard. As the adrenaline left their systems, they suddenly realized just how fatigued they were. The exhaustion acquired from having spent most of the last several days trekking across the continent was finally starting to catch up, and the events of the previous night didn't help any.

Both girls simply lay there until their breathing slowed to more reasonable levels, not saying a word. It was only after Pencil noticed something welling up in Golf Ball's eyes that she decided to try approaching what they'd just seen. "...Golf Ball?" she spoke weakly. "Do you... need to talk?"

Realizing Pencil could see her face, GB sat up and turned away. "...let's just get back to the others," she stated plainly, her voice wavering ever-so-slightly.

Pencil opened her mouth to try again, but Golf Ball stood and walked off before she had the chance. The woodsicle sat alone for another few moments before deciding to leave as well, following her teammate back to where the fallen Shimmer ship rested on the ground.