World Tree MUSH

It has been a couple days since Eddie Brock broke into an office and 'battled' demons in an alternate San Fransisco. Almost as soon as he stepped out of the vine he was on the phone, "Hey Anne, back. Yea I'm fine," He dodged around the 'welcome wagon' that popped up, waving at a guy that was manning a stall selling t-shirts that read 'I just stepped into another universe and all I got was this shirt!'

Eddie actually liked that design, classy in a sort of graffiti print sort of way. He streached as he walked through the parkland, updating his ex on what he had been up to, "Oh! Oooh ohohoho big thing! I got a better idea on the sort of diet my buddy needs. So like... Kinda expensive, but I can narrow down from 'the entire everything with a handful of chocolate, to basically a bodybuilder diet."

He continued walking, chatting, catching up.

<Eddie, in the bushes, jogger being hurried along by two men.>

"Yea we're gonna have to talk later Anne." Eddie's head turned just enough to see two guys in grungy denim jackets jogging just a little too close to a woman as the trio left the paved paths and were moving to a more secluded part of the park. Which caused Eddie to jog along behind. Nothing to see here, just a guy in motorcycle leathers out for a jog.

 
A little ways away a woman in a white black and pink spider-themed outfit complete with mask and hood is unceremoniously dumped out of the vine, with only a little bit of screaming! She does manage to land on her feet at least, or rather all fours, crouching low to the ground like she planned it that way. 

Her first instinct is to blend in with her surroundings, literally. Her outfit shifting to match the spot of ground she landed on perfectly, rendering her nearly invisible. This gives her a moment to get the lay of land. The world looks fairly normal, but this definitely isn't New York

A few moments later a perfectly normal looking girl has emerged from her camouflage and is perusing the pamphlets ...so this is San Francisco after all! She's still casing the area, taking note of the jogger that;s apparently being accosted mid jog and the creepy looking guy following him. She casually starts to wander in that direction to get a better look.

A Vine opens up and quite literally spits out a middle-aged guy in green and blue laborer's attire, with a green poorboy hat. By 'spits out', we mean of course that it sends him tumbling across the park and into a patch of underbrush with a shower of leaves, a "Waaaaaah!", and a thud.

Luigi extracts himself from the underbrush with only a little bit of difficulty, ensuring that his hat's still on his head. He looks around, and smiles a bit. There's something about a city that makes Luigi feel at home. Which is weird, since he doesn't live in a city, he lives in a scary forest, in a haunted mansion. But whatever it is about a city, in general, he tends to like them. Maybe memories of that first job he went on with his brother, who knows?

And then he catches sight of... oh, he knows that guy! He'll start in Eddie's direction too, at a leisurely walk. He's noticed Gwen, to be sure, but doesn't know the totally normal-looking girl. He does offer her a jolly tip of his hat if she happens to look in his direction, though.

     Quite the opposite of Luigi, Diantha generally finds cities about as far from home as she can imagine. Though at least some of them had nice parks speckled across them, and this one happened to be the home of a fairly recent acquaintance of hers that she feels could be considered a friend after their last few meetings. 

     She has also discovered one thing about cities that is rather nice, in that all the asphalt baking in the sun creates thermals unlike you'll find almost anywhere in nature, and she does very much love flying. So today she is inconspicuously soaring above the park area, a rather large purple raven that few are likely to give a second look unless they are a bird watcher or an Ornithologist. 

     From her bird's eye view, she doesn't miss the arrival of the woman in the white pink and black hooded outfit, and she also takes notice of Eddie, and by extension, the green-garbed man starting to walk in his direction.

<We've got company.> Venom announced as Eddie kept pce with the girl that very obviously looked like she was being hearded along. <That plumber from the mole city, and a girl.... Something smells strange about her.>

"Like what, magic strange?" Eddieat this moment didn't care if it looked like he was talking to himself. Last thing he needed were bystandards when things got ugly.

<Just a feeling of familiarity. Hard to put into words.>

"Gee thanks buddy," Eddie grumbled as he powered ahead right as the trio he had been following rounded a corner into a thicker patch of shrubbery. 

When he came out on the other side it was Venom's grinning face that greeted the trio. "Hello. Don't suppose you're simply helping a girl with directions." Tendrils shot out towards the pair of men. Only to suddenly retract back into Venom's body as the woman had what lookedlike a radar gun aimed at its head.

"Oh wow it actually worked!" The woman grinned as her finger kept the trigger held down. "So it is true, the big bad head hunting monster likes to play at hero huh?"

Venom shrieked, emitting inhuman noises as the weapon was trained on its face. tendrils tried lashing out yet turned aside when another pair of men aimed similar plastic pistols at it.

Through it all the only real sounds were of Venom shrieking and tendrils whipping about, trying to ward the attack away. Gwen might hear something annoyingly close to a dog whistle amplified. Diantha wouldn't hear these sonic weaponsfrom her vantige point, but she likely could see Venom on the ground in obvious pain with weapons trained onit.

All this as a white panel van slowly rolledthrough the park, more people inside.

     It didn't take long for Diantha to realize that Venom was following a trio of people, or rather, following two people that were in turn following a third. Having a feeling that something was up, she turns their way and begins to descend. When the weapons are drawn and trained on Venom, she tucks in her wings and goes into a full dive, now streaking toward the group. 

     Just when it seems she's about to crash into the ground, there is a screech as she opens her wings to slow down while aiming to grab the woman's sonic pistol. Her talons slam into the top of the weapon and the woman's hand respectively, leaving a gash before she repositions and tightens her talons around the pistol and flaps her wings once more, soon flying upward back into the sky.

 
Gwen has to do a double take as she watches the scene unfold in front of her. Just which one of these weirdos is the bad guy!? She winces as she swears she can hear the tendriled monstrosity screaming both out loud and in her head, and that sonic weapon is making her want to keep her distance. She quickly decides that a subtle disarming is the best course of action and sends a half dozen 'gummy spiders' out to crawl up the woman with the gun and then start circling her hand in hopes that she'll freak out and drop the thing.

Her own symbiote isn't too happy about this but as long as her spiders stay away from the business end they can do their job. Assuming she does in fact drop the weapon, she'll quickly yank it away with a webline. If she insists on holding onto the thing, she'll try and yank it away anyway, she'll just have to be more obvious about it.

Luigi stops short when suddenly everything goes wrong with Eddie -- EVERYBODY seems like they're the bad guy all of a sudden! He probably hadn't been aware of the original problem, but he's definitely aware of it when Eddie collapses!

That's Luigi's cue to both get scared AND to try to run between Eddie and the people that appear to be causing him pain. "H-h-h-hey! L-l-l-l-leave-a my f-f-friend alone!" he declares. Yes, he's stammering, and he's clearly shaking. And he doesn't have his trusty Poltergust this time. No, it's just all five-foot-seven of himself and whatever magics he has.

And suddenly he notices there's help! Mind, there's weird spiders crawling around now, and that's not so comfy to watch, but though he pulls his hat down over his head a little tighter (missing all but the sound of the bird coming down from above), he does not move from between Eddie and the aggressors. Besides that, it looks like there are a handful of people using the things that made Eddie collapse, so keeping himself between them and Eddie is still kind of important.

"Nobody said anything about it having spiders!" One of the thugs shouted as they started to get swarmed. One of the ohters tried swatting the 'goo' bugs off of their cohort, cuasing a merry distraction, which lessened the noise hitting Eddie, who by this point was starting to pull himself upright. 

Then one of the weapons were yanked away. Then ther'es this guy there. Scared witless, but it's a whitness. And they're covered in spiders. 

Then a van showed up disgourging more people. They expected to see their people on top of a unconcious or at least in pain Eddie Brock. Instead they see whitnesses, and their people covered i nspiders, all while Eddie looksl ike he's about to hurl. A man steps out of the pasenger side of the truck. "Excuse me," he's dressed in motorcycle leathers as he hefted a shotgun, a regular plain jane shotgun held at the ready, "That man's very sick. the Life Foundation sent us to pick him up for treatment." he then took another step forward. "So we're gonna have to ask you lot to back away before whatever space-bug he's got gets in your systems. We're professionals here."

Says the guy that looked more at home at a biker bar than working for a high profile science and research oriented business. Also the shotgun was now aimed at Luigi right before a bird divebombed, screeching, causing the man to throw up his arms to ward it away from his face.

<Eddie!> Venom screamed as Eddie's attention turned to a pair of men coming out of the van with weapons drawn. They fired, except black covered each of the newly made bullet wounds. Eddie grinned as he lifted both and threw them back in the van.

Then he'd look about, "Now. RUN!" The voice wasn't entirely Eddie's own. "We are not your sport to hunt! Leave."

     Diantha is back right around the time the Van shows up, only she's shifted back to her normal form, which was likely to get a reaction from the men if it wasn't for the fact that they have bigger things to worry about than a half woman half deer creature running around. She comes to a stop next to Eddie as the man dressed in leather gets out of the van and starts talking about how Eddie is sick and they need to back away. She moves to stand between him and Eddie.

     "I don't think so. If I was in danger of catching anything from him, it'd have happened already, but you're not taking him anywhere either way." She states firmly, but it seems Eddie/Venom has recovered enough to fight back, and the next thing she sees is the men being thrown into the van, which makes her grin.

 
"Life Foundation huh? Try not to make your shady business sound so culty next time!" Gwen says as she starts shooting webbing at the eyes of the thugs she's now convinced are cultists. She doesn't have time to shift into her costume without creeping people out, so blinding them first seems like a good idea. "I also recommend weapons that law enforcement and security peeps actually use rather than a pawn shop shotgun! A competent criminal is a successful criminal!" She says cheerfully, then takes a quick look around to make sure no one else looks threatening before dealing with the added weirdness of the deer-taur and the stammering Italian guy dressed in green.

"You guys are friendly right?" She says uncertainly, they do seem to be helping out the guy with the suspiciously familiar symbiote after all, "Or have I just made a huge mistake?" she adds nervously.

Luigi pokes his eyes out from under his hat at the words spoken by the man. 'Sick', he says. Then Luigi sees the shotgun pointed at him! And immediately he pulls his hat back down over his eyes. It really looks pitiful, honestly. Though anybody who happens to see it is probably going to see it for what it is -- a scary guy pointing a shotgun at a scared guy.

Though when the guy starts to flail, Luigi takes the opportunity to look again. The guy's distracted, so... Luigi lobs a ball of ice at him! He's hoping to freeze the gun, but if it freezes the whole guy, well, that's just a bonus!

He instantly feels better when Diantha comes to stand between Eddie and the attackers, when Gwen starts webbing the Life Foundation guys, and when Eddie himself stands up, since now it means he's not by himself! So his shaking ebbs somewhat. This time he's got the courage to offer a bit of threat -- he summons a fireball in his other hand. "You'd a-better s-s-scram!" he warns. Yeah, still shaking a little, but he's a little braver now that he's got allies. Also that's a fireball, and fireballs ouch a little.

Gwen's question gets a nod. "I'm a friend of his," Luigi replies, indicating Eddie. "He's a nice guy, really!" he declares. There's not a whole lot of time to explain in more detail just yet.

Eddie wobbled as he stood up. "OK... We good?" He didn't appear to be addressing either ally or attacker as the van's tires started spinning before catching dirt and driing away, leaving the biker built guy with the shotgun behind.

<Hungry.> Venom responded as Eddie's gaze lingered on mr shotgun for just a moment too long. <Not in the mood for greaseball, and our friends would object.>

"Naw," Eddie looked over to Gwen, "Real place around here. Kinda upscale, did end of the world cold war preppers with lots of money business for awhile." He shook his head slowly, "Problem is a few months back they kinda brought back a few things from space. Big fight, explosions, and-" He held a hand out to Gwen palm held upward, just as a black tendril coiled in his pal and formed a face. Wide white eyes, teeth, and it was grinning. "As you can see, they would rather like to haul us back for our wellfare and study." Venom's voice positively DRIPPED with sarcasm before the tendril disappeared into Eddie's body.

The widebody took a look at the group and decided descretion was the better part of valor and hobbled off after the van that had abandoned him. 

Then Eddie smiled at Diantha and Luigi, "Small multiverse. What're you two doing here?" He managed a weak smile, "Right when I got home even." A gesture to Gwen. It was pretty obvious he wasn't alright. The little tremors of his hand when gesturing about. His too-fast greeting.

<We're safe Eddie. It's over.> Venom tried sounding reassuring.

He just stood there looking between dryad and plumber before looking to Gwen. "Uh yea I'm guessing the little goo spiders were yours? Thanks. Seems they're handing out sonic guns as door prizes now."

     Diantha smiles and addresses Gwen first, wanting to ease the tension. "Well, never met the guy in green before, but it seems we're all friends by extension of Eddie here. I'm glad you showed up when you did, I noticed you coming through the vine earlier. My name is Diantha, I'm a dryad from a world called Azeroth. She then turns to Eddie and laughs. 

     "Small indeed, I discovered one thing I like about cities, they're incredible for flying. It seems all the hot air rising from the asphalt and concrete just makes it so much easier to stay aloft without having to flap your wings as much. It's really quite nice." She says with a grin before finally offering Luigi a wave. 

     "That was very brave I have to say, jumping between the men and Eddie. I thought you were unarmed, but then I saw that bolt of ice. Are you some kind of mage?"

 
"Whoa.." Gwen murmurs as she watches Eddie's tendril form into a face. As disturbing as that is she can't seem to help reaching out toward it, and as she does her sleeve oozes into a little tendril of her own, that momentarily looks for all the world like a little newborn hand reaching out towards it's father. "You're Eddie.. right? And your really hungry? Or your friend is?" She's not even sure if she's talking to Eddie or Venom, she's still trying to make sense of the voices in her head.

She pauses, takes a deep breath, takes one more look around to make sure those Life Foundation guys are gone, then offers a hesitant smile to Luigi and Diantha, "Hi, I'm Sp.. Gho.." She sighs heavily, "I'm Gwen." She furrows her brow at the Dryad, "This isn't the weirdest thing that's happened to me, but it's up there... I think I just had my first ride on the vine? Is this sort of thing common around here?"

The goons finally run off, and Luigi extinguishes the fireball in his hand. Then he slumps, with a sigh of relief. "Whew..." he sighs. And after a moment, he stands straight again, looking at Eddie. "...Are you okay?" he asks. But he understands what just happened, at least. A lot better than he did.

Diantha addresses him and he looks to her. Really LOOKS. Because now that he's not panicking, he can notice that she's... a deer. Partly. This makes him tilt his head a little, but... well, there are a lot of weird creatures in the Mushroom Kingdom. But he also realizes that she's asked him a question? "Wha? Mage? No, I'm-a supposed to be a child of a star. Or something." He doesn't completely understand it well himself, really.

He offers a wave of greeting to Gwen, and offers cheerily, "I'm-a Luigi! It's nice to meet you!" A nod, then, and he notes, "Yeah! Vines are how we get between worlds here." He pauses. "Oh... did your world come with you? Or did you come without it? I've heard of both happening."

<...H-.... Hello?> Venom's voice was soft. <She. It.> For a being that had no experiance with newborns from a culture where their young wasn't particularly nurtured. Venom sounded almost gentle.

"Oh man you ain't seen nothin yet." Eddie's own voice was distracted as he tried processing the idea of this girl being bonded to an infant symbiote. Then he took a deep breath, "OK so... Gwen? How new are you to having one of these things riding shotgun? You seem like you wanna try being good people so yea." Deep breaths Eddie. He missed Luigi's question as he was trying to focus. Guilt? Why was there- Another toss of his head. Later.

<Yes,> Venom's voice was soft. <Very later. Make sure the girl's eaten. She looks healthy so she has to be a good match.> A tendril reached for Gwen slowly attempting to reach for her Symbiote. For its part Venom had no idea what to do, except it wanted to make reassuring noises. Let Gwen's symbiote know they were safe, these were 'good' people. Venom itself was not going to hurt it

Eddie managed to steady his legs. Deep breath. His eyes closed as he tried to focus. "Yea, food's a good start." A black tendril handed Eddie his wallet causing him to smile and pat his hip affectionately before pulling a small stack of bills out. "Right now I'm kind of on a corndog sort of budget I'm afraid, but I'm pretty sure I saw a noodle truck in the pack back there if you're hungry Diantha." Then he stopped to elaborate, "Vegetarian." Then a look to Gwen then Luigi, "I've got more money, just not on me, and part of the reason I came home was to sort groceries out. Whey protine, eggs, almonds...." A helpless shrug. "Hey, big guy keeps me in good shape they deserve the best food I can find."

Then he spun on his heels back towards the impromptu market stalls and food trucks, "But for now corndogs and cold drinks while breaking the new girl in. Sound like a plan?"

 
Gwen's face pales at Luigi's words, "That can happen!? It *better* have come with me!" She practically gasps, "All I know is I was checking out some sort of portal in Central Park. There were reports of weird people and things coming out of it. I got a little too curious and ended up here." She looks at him worriedly, hoping that means her world came along too.

Gwen's Symbiote doesn't really talk, but Eddie's can sense it's emotions and it seems elated to have found a being like itself. "I think he likes you." Gwen says with a genuine smile, "I've had Venom about.. a year and a half? He helped give me my powers back... long story." She brightens up at the mention of food, "Hey that's fine with me.. corndogs are kinda my favorite.. I don't suppose this world has a Dollar Dog? I know it's a roll of the dice if my money will work here or not but I'll help out of I can."

     Diantha laughs a little as both Gwen and Luigi react to her odd appearance, with Gwen even saying as much. "I get that a lot. Let's just say the origin of my species is somewhat unique, even on my world." She does find Luigi's explanation of his powers interesting, but for now just nods, as her attention is soon drawn to Eddie starting to talk about food, specifically corn dogs. She blinks, then shakes her head. 

     "I don't think I want to even ask what a corn dog is, but I'm going to assume it is some sort of meat-based food if your suggesting I find something else to eat." She says before nodding as Eddie explains that she's a vegetarian. 

     "I'm not particularly starving though, I'll get something if I see something I like I guess." Turning back to Gwen, she almost mentions how her world didn't come with her, but seeing how the woman reacts to the possibility that it didn't, she decides not to worry her even further.

Well, if Eddie's talking, he's okay... right? Luigi stays quiet here, recognizing that there's a connection between Eddie and Gwen, one that he really isn't going to understand. though when Eddie volunteers money for food, Luigi offers, "It's okay! I got some money, I can help!" He does know Eddie's a little... between money sources, so he doesn't want Eddie to put himself out too much.

Gwen's words of worlds not coming with people get a nod. He looks a little sad, though. "Some people who come here, they kind of get... booted out of their world, and it's hard for them to find their way back," he notes. Pause. "I-I mean! I know it's scary! B-but this place isn't so bad!" he suddenly adds, realizing he's probably NOT HELPING someone who just arrived!

Helpfully, Luigi offers, "A corn dog is a ground meat link covered in cornmeal batter and fried!" Though at the mention that she's a vegetarian, he notes, "Oooh... no, that's no good for you, then." When she mentions waiting to have food, Luigi notes, "I can find something for you! It looks like this place has had a lot of offworld traffic, so they probably have something around here you can eat!"

Headshake from Eddie at Gwen's question, "No Dollar Dogs, I mean maybe ther'es a place in New York?" A shrug as Venom retracted back int oEddie's body. "Funny, buddy here's also Venom, and the other spider woman that blew through here said something about another Venom." He gave a soft snort as he looked about. Normal day, everything just kinda happening as if nobody had tried kidnapping Eddie in broad daylight. "I've got a lot of questions, but if you're literally on our first hop out of one of those things we'd better focus on getting you home." A beat before he added, "I spent a week trying to find my way back aftr I got dumped through one in the middle of the night.

No need to mention that Venom was having a panic attack because all this happened during a mild earthquake. No need to mention that at all.

Then he glanced to Diantha and grinned, "Hotdog wrapped in batter and deep fried." He frowned, realizingthat probably didn't sound good either. "OK, sausage sandwich, hotdog because old joke and rumor that slaughterhouses would put just... whatever in 'em. So it kinda became a bit of a joke that stuck."

He watched Luigi, eager to help out which caused Eddie to smile and gesture to the food trucks. Lot of options here because these portals were naturally hot spots of traffic, and even if that wasn't always offworld traffic, there were alwaysthe stall owners and other locals hoping to see the weird things wanting food.

 
"Awesome! Luigi's buying!" Gwen hugs the green plumber with one arm, maybe just a little tighter than she should. She's a little miffed that she didn't get a straight answer about whether she's stuck here or not. "Aw that's a shame." She says to Diantha, "Corndogs are awesome, you don't know what your missing!" She also can't help but notice that the Dryad seems to be part plant, so that might mean being a vegetarian is kind of like being a cannibal, but she keeps that to herself.

What Eddie's saying is the least weird thing so far, she just nods and seems to take it in stride. "Yeah that's standard multiverse stuff, meeting alternate versions of yourself and your friends. Every time you think you've gotten used to it you find a new twist on things." So vines are new to her but the Multiverse is old hat apparently. "Alright, lunch first, then we can talk about symbiotes and finding me a way home." She says with a nod, already starting to wander toward the food trucks.

     Well, after Luigi went and spelled it all out, and Eddie said how long it took him to find his world, Diantha figures she may as well give her story as well. "I still have yet to find my world. I guess I'm one of those examples of people who's world didn't readily join the tree with them. Though Luigi is also right, the world tree is not so bad at all. Some worlds are... not so great, but overall it's rather nice. I'm actually not sure I'd go back to my world at this point if it did show up. It's never been a world for the faint of heart, and lately, it's a bit rough living in Kalimdor if you're not an orc or an ally to the orcs..." She gives a sigh, and the subject moves to each of them describing what a corndog is or how awesome they are. Luigi's description isn't too bad, but Eddie goes into a bit too much detail and Diantha suddenly looks a bit pale. "Please stop, before I vomit."

Luigi actually blushes when Gwen hugs at him. But he just quietly chuckles. Her itinerary of food then talk gets a nod. "Works for me!" he chirps, and heads in the direction of the trucks too. He's also looking for something in particular -- wasn't there a truck around here that was selling fried green tomatoes? Or like, fried pickles or something?

And he does look rather worried about Diantha as Eddie's description seems to make her sick. "Oh, I think I get it! It's not vegetarian by choice, I guess? It's because your stomach can't handle meat?"

Corndogs were easy. Fried, hot. Guy made small talk with eddie. Seemed this version of Eddie brock was at least locally well liked. Vegetarian optionswere a bit trickier. there were noodles, nachos, a stirfry truck, and the noodle truck alsooffered eggrolls. "Yea none of this is healty." Eddie admitted to Diantha, "But a lot of the guys here make it at least taisty.

He tried not so much 'not apologizing' as 'we're moving on to something you might find less upsetting.'

<Smooth Eddie. Real Smooth.>

This got an eyeroll from Eddie before looking t oLuigi, "Don't listen to her man. I'll buy least I can do for you saving my neck."

 
Gwen waves a hand dismissively, "I don't care about healthy right now, too hungry." Soon enough she's got a little paper tray with three corndogs in it and is already starting in on the first one, while looking worriedly at Diantha, "Do you know for sure that your world's not out there? Or do you just keep trying until you get lucky?" She glances to Luigi and Eddie, "Tell me more about these vines.. It's starting to sound like they're random.. Is there a way to know where you're going to end up? I do *not* want to end up like Captain America, stuck in the multiverse for 75 years..."

     Diantha ponders Luigi's theory that her stomach just can't handle meat. "Well, to be totally honest I've never tried, it's just the idea of a mystery whatever meat link does make my stomach churn. I have never heard of a dryad that ate meat. We live among and protect the creatures of the wilds, having no need to kill them for food because there are plenty of other options." She explains, then listening to Eddie list off food that he states isn't healthy, but he hopes would be more agreeable to her. She first answers Gwen though. 

     "I tried for a while, visiting a different world each day, sometimes more than one in the same day. If my world is out there, it is rather elusive. The vines have some randomness to them it seems, but it is possible to learn which ones go to which worlds, and get to a specific place without just randomly trying vines till you get there. Luigi might know more, he seems to have knowledge about the vines." She offers with a smile directed toward Luigi before her gaze shifts to Venom. 

     "Hmm, stir fry, egg rolls?" She looks past him to the food truck serving Chinese fare, and sure enough, they do have a small vegetarian section on the menu pasted to the side of the truck. "This feels like a stupid question, but are egg rolls actually made from eggs? And what is Moo Shu?"

Oh hey eggrolls! Those are vegetarian, right? Even if they're not, they're tasty, so Luigi will get a few of those himself. Probably more than just 'a few', actually -- he tends to metabolize food like a nuclear furnace, so... yeah. Eddie's words get a sheepish look. "W-well, I know your situation's not that great... I wouldn't want you to need the money later and not have it."

Once he's got his food and is sitting near Gwen, and she asks about the Vines. "They almost seem like there's an intelligence to them," he points out. "I'm not sure if there is, or if there's something else guiding it. Maybe it's just... the Tree senses problems and points people that have power to places they can help. I'm not-a sure."

Diantha's mention of the Vines gets a tilt of his head. "Oh, it's not that I know more about them. Just I've seen that they tend to spit me out into places that need help, especially when it's really important." As for moo shu? "Um... meat and vegetables, in some kind of flatbread. They might make a vegetarian version; tofu is pretty good when prepared right. And egg rolls are called that because they wrap them in something called egg dough, I think?"

"Yes and no," Eddie similarly grabbed several corndogs, because hungry venom is hungry andthe pantry is literally in a building that's in a hole in the ground and these corndogs were right here. "I get the impression the locations change but usually they sorta stay hooked up to the same worlds unless something happens." Eddie practically inhaled the first corndog. Manners be damned. Venom's tounge literally wrapped aroundit and it just... disappeared.

Then he looked over to Luigi, "You look like you've been through this longer so feel free to fact check me, but it almost feelsl ike whatever this 'tree' is.... andyea it's metaphysically described as a tree." He looked at the stick the corndog had been on and shrugged. "Just as a side thing you'd think a web would be a better metaphore for us puney liniar meatsacks to follow. Worlds get stuck on a web, and threads go from here to there to anywehre, but nope. tree, Vines, gardeners...." Shrug.

He similarly inhaled a second corndog, though this time he had the decency to chew, actually tasting this one.

<OK fine, I like your cheese tater tots better, but this is pretty good.> Venom practically purred as Eddie reclined, giving Luigi time to correct him on any of the metaphysical bits he'snot grasping.

Then he would look over to Gwen and,with all the sincerity he could muster, "We'll find a way to get you home." Then he relaxed and sounded thoughtful, "That other spider woman wasfrom new york, you were from there. Damnit now I'm gonna have to look up see if we've got anyone like you here."

Food! Food got him away from thinking about the metaphysics of this tree thing. "Eeeehhh I think it has to do with the coating you brush on before frying them. Generally cabbage or vegetable filled so unless you don't do dairy or eggs you're fine."

 
Gwen leans over toward Diantha, "Egg Rolls usually have a little meat in them, at least they do where I come from. Spring Rolls are usually all vegetables, but make sure they're frying them in vegetable oil to be on the safe side, you can tell by the smell." Food, especially vendor food is something she's an expert on! "Same thing with the Moo Shoo, I'd mostly trust it if they it;s vegetarian, but it's often associated with pork.

She seems to relax a little as Luigi explains a little more about vines, "Intelligence.. That makes me feel better in a weird sort of way, like maybe someone's watching out for us out there. Maybe they know that my New York needs me." She says hopefully. "I'm guessing Tree is a nod to how things are organized and not an actual tree.. though living on Yggdrasil would be kinda cool." She grins.

She watches Eddie in amusement as she eats, not yet fully aware that she's getting both sides of his conversation, it feels oddly natural. "Man I thought I ate a lot, That giant tongue thing is a little disturbing too.. Hope I'm not looking at the future of my Symbiote."

     Diantha takes a moment to look a bit more at the menu. Sure enough, the Moo Shoo dish was listed under pork as well. Having overheard some of the conversation, the guy manning the truck calls to Diantha as she looks at the menu. "We do use vegetable oil if that is important to ya." Though he fails to mention if they use a different frier between cooking vegetarian and meat dishes. 

     Diantha ultimately looks up from the menu and places her order. "I'll have a few spring rolls and the vegetarian Moo Shoo." The man in the truck nods. "Coming right up lady, that'll be twelve dollars." Diantha pays and moves to join the others again. 

    "Hmm, maybe if your world has great need of you, the tree helps direct you back to it more easily. That might be my problem. Sure I have talents that can be helpful to my world, but there are plenty of others that can do as much as me and more. Me not being on my world isn't going to cause any drastic changes." She offers as a theory.

Luigi listens to Eddie's take on the Vines and the Tree. Though he does look more than a little surprised at Venom's Amazing Disappearing Corndog Trick. He blinks a little bit at that, but he's not going to be rude and say anything about it. Since he kinda knows what that's like.

Though he does nod to Eddie's assessment of the situation. "It sounds about right." As for a web and threads as opposed to a Tree and Vines? "Well... I guess worlds are alive, so it's a little more like a branch on a tree, or a fruit on a tree, than a web with threads, since that's not really alive?" He shrugs too, not really sure.

Luigi seems relieved when Gwen pipes up with further explanation of food trucks. "Ah, good!" he notes. He doesn't want to rely totally on his very limited knowledge of these sorts of things. And he does nod to the mention of the Tree being metaphysical. "Seems to be right. I haven't actually ever seen any 'tree' that anything's connected to, or walked on branches, or anything like that. The worlds just connect to each other."

But as Diantha explains her view on the problem of finding her way back, Luigi suddenly feels kind of bad. And so he tries to encourage her, "...Maybe it's more that other worlds need you just as much! So... so your world will have to wait a little bit, because you're in really high demand in the other worlds!"

Eddie chuckled soft <It's more convenient. We have.... discussions on the merits and flaws.> For Eddie thsi felt somehow just kinda natural. Also weird. <Either way Gwen, don't worry too much about it. Yours is young, and has a ... .Gentler... life than I have had til now.>

Eddie took this moment to eat the third corndog, conventional normal person sized bites and all. It really was good. He wanted to ask where the guy sourced from because it didn't taste mas market, but at the same time he REALLY didn't want to offend Diantha.

Instead he looked to the Dryad and smiled, "So you can fly right? I remember you turning into like this big Elk, or maybe it was a deer? so what other creatures can you do? Or is it like 'anything from your ome woods'?" 

Eddie then opened his mouth, normal tounge. Then close mouth. "Working with Venom's weird, but like... it's kinda starting to just be 'ok thisis normal, this is how things are and it's just gonna get to be an even wilder ride when you take multiverse into the equation."

<That will do, least until we get home.> Venom again purred as Eddie listenedto Diantha speak.

"Gets into the argument of 'what diffrence can one guy make in a world full of people." He used the corndog stick to gesture with. "Luigi there's essentially a knight errant and wandering hero near as I've been able to tease out of the kingdom he's from." Well, when they bothered remembering his name, or didn't just call the poor guy 'green mario.' Profesional courtasey demanded he not punch the interviewee in the face, or eat them. A shrug before gesturing to Gwen then to himself. "Sure I did A Thing and stopped a bunch of Venom's buddies,"

<They were NOT my 'buddies.' I was chosen because I was expendable.>

"wanted to treat eart has an all you can eat. Point is I'm with Luigi here. Maybe home can hold out long enough til you help right a few placesthat need you just a little bit more."

A pause before adding. "Like me, a vampire hunter, and a london scholar that is probably also an asassin interrupted some stupid rituel. I mean yea the poor girl still ended up as a vampire, but least we gave her enough room to run and maybe solve the problem of the gender flipped paris hilton deadbeet that did it to her."

 
"I really appreciate you guys making me feel better." Gwen says as she settles down on a bench, "There used to be a literal web of worlds connected to to each other until a few months ago, it's how I got around. Then the Web got sort of.. shredded." She sighs, "But maybe this is a sign that it's being rewoven. I can hope anyway." She gives Eddie an odd look, "That sounds horrible.. though I gotta ask, an actual Vampire or a metaphorical one.. I've only met the latter. Though I think our cervitaur friend here has met my Fantastical quota for the day." She beams a smile at Diantha.

     Diantha nods to Luigi and smiles. "There are certainly plenty of worlds that need help, which is honestly a lot of why I don't think I'd go back to my world if I did find it at this point. I might visit, but while my world has it's problems, it has no shortage of powerful people trying to make things better. Life will go on with or without me. But there seem to be plenty of other worlds in which I can really make a difference. It's really a great feeling." She offers with a bright smile before going over to get her food from the truck. 

     She moves back to set her food down next to Gwen and Luigi, and first tries a spring roll as she listens to Eddie ask her about her shapeshifting. "Well no, I can't change into any animal. The ones I can do are elk, nightsaber, stormcrow, and tideskipper dolphin." She finally beams a grin back at Gwen and laughs. "You may have to up your quota if you start traveling the vines."

Luigi looks a little surprised suddenly, and looks at Eddie. "Oh? Did you ask in the Mushroom Kingdom?" He seems a little sheepish all of a sudden. "I don't really spend a lot of time there. I haven't since I settled down in Evershade Valley. But that's kind of a scary place, so I wouldn't recommend going there." Though the mention of a girl getting turned into a vampire gets a scared look. "Oh gosh... poor girl!" he notes, his hands going over his mouth briefly. He's not sure who 'Paris Hilton' is, but he doesn't think it's a positive comparison.

Luigi smiles as he notes that Gwen seems to be... well, feeling a little better? Sort of? Maybe? "He probably means a real one. There's all kinds of stuff going on in these worlds. Like... Evershade, where I live? It's full of ghosts. They're nice, though, mainly. Even if they like to startle jump out and scare people a little."

Diantha's words get a nod. "Yeah!" he encourages. He almost jumps up out of his seat with his enthusiasm! "Lots of people still need help, even if it's not in my world, and I'm happy to help them!" He does chuckle a little at Diantha's mention of 'upping the quota'. "I'm afraid she's right... there's so much weird out there."

"Actual fangs and everything vampires. I mean other than that, it wasn't a bad place to visit." Eddie shrugged, "Also ... Yea we're gonna need to compare notes because it sounds like you were in A multiverse that here might have or have not been part of. That then got blown apart, and the tree caught all of them." He had no idea if this was true or not, but all that was missing was some kind of god-squirrel cittering away at people walking on a rainbow bridge. 

"Oh by the way!" He smiled to Diantha, "Forgot if I told you about this or not, but those diggers were apparently looking for a city that's beneath us. Streets, lights, buildings and all donwn there with a community of people."

He grinned as he gestured to Luigi, "S'where Luigi here rolled in. Nice people. Lotta space down there." Then a pause as he considered the dryad, "Well they weren't after the city so much as 'it's there, it isn't claimed by anyone. We want it' near as I can tell. So barring anything pressing plan is to make life misirable for anyone who triestil they get the hint they need to go somewhere else."

Then at Luigi's question, "Ah man I'm a reporter. I nose around just as part of what I do." He was leaving out the fact people there constantly forgot Luigi's name, but at the same time he still leanred a lot. 

Then Eddie's phone buzzed, causing him to frown at the picture that showed a pair of winged eings annoying a pier full of sea lions. Large, batlike with humanoid faces and red eyes. "Well hate to say it but there's my cue. If any of you wanna join in awesome, but my town and the cops don't really have any idea what to do with Weird just yet." He started to get up and.... he seemed to grow. Black veins spidering out over exposed skin until it formed a sort of second skin that grew muscular and broad before his head was swallowed by Venom's.

The symbiote grinned at Gwen before waving to Diantha and Luigi. Then it bounded away, almost running on all fours until at some point it lept, then used a tendril to start hopping onto the nearest building to get above street level.

 
"I've been around the multiverse a few times." Gwen smirks, "If it gets weirder than a bunch of cartoon animals taking down a giant robot with bad puns then color me impressed." She seems confident, though some of these names, Azeroth, Evershade, give her pause.. and did Luigi saw something about a world full of ghosts!? She gives him an odd look at that. She meets Venom's grin with one of her own, "Sounds like a fun night, count me in. I could use something to get my mind off... all this for a while. The shadows are starting to get long anyway. Back home that means it's time to get ready to patrol!"

Luigi nods at Eddie's mention of having shown up at the underground city sort of thing. "Those corporate guy wanted me to 'see to a clog'. I think what they really wanted was for me to come back and report where those people were so they could start bleeding them for money! I didn't do it of course. I just told them I didn't find anything."

And despite Luigi's showing of fear earlier... when Eddie and Venom start to bound away, Luigi calls out, "Waaaaait!" And then he actually starts running after!

...He's actually pretty darn fast. And he jumps pretty high. But at least it's pretty clear that he's not a mage. There's probably no mage in Azeroth that does that. At least not without magic, and he doesn't look like he's casting anything.