Chapter XXVII: Parting of Ways ~Kyanosa

Everybody was pretty much sitting around, staring at each other. Nubi and Oedipus looked all around the group, wondering about everybody's individual reasons for getting trapped on a doomed planet. Magikia was watching Kyanosa closely, waiting for a reason, any reason, to blow his head off. Kyanosa was watching Kaia, trying to figure out how she got her hair to shine in that color and why he couldn't, stupid rotten lousy fate. Kaia was looking absentmindedly at Kaye's wings, actually thinking about colors and why orange doesn't go with purple. Kaye was looking at Mazzic, trying to remember what those symbols on his shirt meant. Mazzic stared at J.C., studying the dichotomy involved in creating a robotic being that can move and think of its own accord yet making it look like a short, big-nosed dinosaur. J.C. was staring at empty space, and suddenly came to the realization that Mecha Vector was no longer standing there. Speaking of not there, neither was Pyrina. And nobody had seen Eugene or the Professor for a spell.

While everybody was pondering the last few points in the above paragraph, Vector appeared (okay, so it wasn't really appearing, but it was fast enough to look like it) in the middle of the little circle in which they had instinctively sat. He held up two small boxes, looking as triumphant as robots can. "Here we go."

"Gnarly!" Ignoring the looks he got from everybody who couldn't believe he had just said "gnarly", Kyanosa hopped up on one foot, fell over, got up again, and walked calmly to Mecha. He took the boxes, one in each hand, and grinned. "Now we can talk to each other no matter how far away we are!"

"Yippee." Magikia twirled one finger in the air unenthusiastically. Everybody else with a sense of humor responded with an eighth-hearted "yay".

"No, really, now we can go search the planet for anything that'll help us not die but not waste time dragging the same thousand-stone kobold statues around with us." He got more looks. "Well, everything else here is video-game related."

Mazzic crossed his arms. "I'm not."

"Yeah, well, you're not really here. Now, who's going with who?" He thought for a second. "Whom."

Oedipus and Nubi immediately pointed at each other, then smiled. Nubi stood up. "We'll be one."

Oedipus jumped up after her. "Maybe we can still squeeze an adventure out of this."

Magikia huffed. "Hang groups; I'm going by myself."

Kyanosa started counting on his fingers. "Since 'going' is a verb of doing, then that which follows has to be in the objective case..."

Kaia slumped her shoulders, because process of elimination was not putting her in a very good group. "If she's going alone, she can't have a radio."

Magikia shrugged. "Fine with me. Hate you all anyway."

Kaye raised an eyebrow at Magikia. "Why are you still here anyway? You're bringing the whole group down."

Mazzic raised a hand. "I'll attest to that."

Oedipus nudged him. "Aren't you already down?"

"Hey, if it'll get rid of her. And don't touch me."

Kyanosa was now counting on his feet. "But the question lies in whether 'who' or 'whom' is objective in the first place."

Kaye, generally not fond of fighting as a whole, sighed. "If it will help consolidate groups, I'll go with Nubi and Oedipus." She turned to the two. "If that's alright with them."

Nubi smiled. "Always nice to have somebody to talk to."

Kyanosa woke up. "I'll go wherever Kaia does. She has nice wings."

Kaye held up a finger. "Wait, and I don't?"

J.C. tapped Mazzic on the shoulder. "I think you should probably stick with Kyanosa."

Mazzic blinked at him. "Voluntarily? Like on purpose? Did you hit your head?"

J.C. pointed at Kyanosa, who was busy trying to weasel out of a very unfortunate conversation with Kaye. "He's going to need somebody to keep an eye on him, or else he'll fall down a cliff or get killed by Magikia or something."

Magikia looked around. "Who said my name? I'll rip off your leg and feed it to you."

Mazzic nodded at J.C. "You're right. I apparently want him dead less than the others."

"I don't want him dead."

"He hasn't spoken to you yet."

"Come to think of it, that doesn't make me happy."

Mecha looked about the group, then remembered that Kyanosa had that book to which he kept referring, so he must know something about what's going on. Thus, he would be good to follow. I mean, duh.

Oedipus walked over to J.C. "What about you? You coming with us too?"

Nubi stood on his other side. "Honestly, I don't think you could stand Kyanosa for too long."

J.C. shrugged. "I figure I'll head back to see the Professor. You can never have too many hands working with mechanics, and I think my experience will be an asset."

Since it's a convenient point in the story, Kyanosa suddenly held up his hands. "Alright, hang on!" Everybody quieted. "Okay, get into your groups so we can take inventory." Kyanosa, Kaia, Mazzic, and Mecha stood together, Nubi, Oedipus, and Kaye stood across from them, J.C. stood alone, and Magikia muttered something and leaned against a tree.

Oedipus nodded. "Hey, that's perfect. One radio to each group. J.C.'s going to talk to the Professor." He added that last sentence after Kyanosa discovered that three and four are not the same number and nearly passed out.

Mecha grabbed Kyanosa's radios and handed one each to Oedipus and Magikia. "Then I believe we're good."

Mazzic nodded. "Good. Then let's leave before math forces him into the fetal position." He left, forcing that group to follow. Magikia stormed off in another direction, J.C. turned around and wondered where exactly that cave was, and everybody else made sure to go somewhere completely different.

Ten minutes later, Yoshi6400 arrived at that exact spot, only to find everybody long gone. They did, however, leave tracks. Using the great Yoshi fallback called upon in only the most extreme of difficult decisions (spinning around with his eyes closed, opening them, and following whatever tracks were closest to his line of vision), he quickly determined his route and began tracing the footprints. Five minutes later, he discovered that they were his own, went back to the aforementioned spot, and followed a different set.

Eventually, the other three people following the group found the same spot. One of them took of in a totally different direction, one of them took the biggest group of footprints, and the last made sure to follow more than one person.

Now that you have all the clues, who killed Mr. Boddy?