Beyond Alterna

> *"HOW did Arya manage to pull this off in one night???" —Voppi*
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**Beyond Alterna** is the name given to a custom-made mission created by Natasha when she took control of Arya and O.R.C.A. as a computer virus. It is also the official name of Thread #4 of Season 2 of the Meep Team Stories Threads.

## Layout

**[To be edited...]**

Beyond Alterna has a similar layout to "After Alterna,” albeit with five parts instead of four, and much higher difficulty.

### Starting Area

The starting area is a white rectangular room with no doors or windows, with propellers on the outside of it, which make it hover over 1000 feet in the air. Whoever gets placed inside this room will be deprived of each of their belongings, replacing their clothing with a bodysuit akin to Arya's, and get an electric microchip inserted in their neck, for O.R.C.A. to shock them if they do not follow the rules. One of the longer walls of the room is retractable, and behind it is a giant compartment where you can store almost everything. Specifically for this mission, it contains a single copy of every single main weapon, a bag with ten of each sub-weapon, and two cans of each special weapon. On the leftmost corner is also a panel for selecting ink colors (It adds a sense of teamwork, but also rivalry, as choosing different colors means you can splat each other), and four transparent tubes with yellow, magenta, cyan and white ink, that gets dispensed onto your ink tank. The floor of the room acts like a giant trapdoor, opening and dropping everyone inside when the 15-minute timer hits zero.

### Part 1 - Ride Rails

The first part consists in riding one of five Ride Rails until the end. It is a simple concept when said out loud, but it's more complicated and difficult that it seems. Firstly, when you drop down from the starting area, there is only a small, squarish, 3-meter-long platform with a puddle of ink that you can land inside. The rest of the area is an enormous pool filled with water, that will splat any Inkling or Octoling in the act (Except for Charcoal, but Natasha didn't take Desertan Inklings into account). Only after five of them have successfully landed in the ink, a bridge will extend, and the five Ride Rails will appear. However, these rails have broken the length record, at three whole kilometers, and they twist and turn so much that one could get motion-sick from them. This part's special gimmick is that, once every three seconds, O.R.C.A. will charge-shoot (which means "shooting someone with a Charger weapon or similar") all people on a random rail and make them fall to the water. Once someone finishes, that adds two seconds to the time it takes.

### Part 2 - Octomissiles

Once you finish the first part, there's a launchpad that will transport you to the second part. This one is directly above the last one. Not as high as the starting area, but still considerably high. In this part, there is an Octomissile launcher that remains inactive until someone steps on it. You might think this is just like the same missions of regular After Alterna, but that couldn't be further from the truth. These Octomissiles were powered with the leftover Golden Eggs that the Meep Team used to create the Time Machine, making them go 1000 times faster than a regular one. And not just that, either. All of them were headed straight for a wall, so to survive, you would need to jump off it and grab either the top of the wall, or one of the teeny tiny grab bars scattered throughout the course. This process repeats itself 20 times, and in the last jump, you would need to dive from the Octomissile midway through the voyage, into a tunnel just tight enough for you to fit, which leads to the next Launchpad.

### Part 3 - Platforming

The third part is a timed obstacle course. You must make your way from the start to the finish in under 3 minutes, or you get paralyzed and splatted (Or "Inkshowered", as Voppi says) and have to start from the beginning. This course has everything that other platforming missions in Alterna have done, but combined. The tilting platforms from "Dive and Dash", the sinking staircase from "That Sinking Feeling", the moving floors from "Conveyor-Belt Tightening", and even the Squid Surge Walls from Part 1 of "After Alterna" itself. Along with the platforming is also the fact that some of the platforms are traps. You could step on a seemingly normal tile, and it will spring you up into the air with an immense force. And even if you get through all the traps, the ending is a path filled with crystal ink (which is just like Fuzzy Ink, color and all, but way thicker), which immediately sticks to you like superglue. If you walk right into it, prepare to move no more and restart from the beginning.

### Part 4 - Maze

The fourth part takes place inside a cubical structure of 5 floors, each one with many branching paths. To exit a floor, you must complete the requirement hidden somewhere in the maze. But be careful, because some floors also have traps. The first floor has sensors at every dead end that add a signal to the exit terminal, which will display questions about Alterna that only Arya or her friends would know. The second floor has ten locks on its exit, and 100 keys distributed in the maze, and they all look alike. The third floor directly pulls a Han on you, as the exit is locked behind twelve 34-digit codes, double the amount that Han used to secure the Time Machine. The codes can be found on secret compartments in the walls. The fourth floor will insert another chip onto you, preventing you from generating ink. You must then reveal keywords using the limited ink that you have. The fifth floor has traps located in split paths. If you choose a wrong path, you'll be placed in a similar capsule to the one Arya was in, and it'll launch you out of the maze, into the water.

### Part 5 - Ambush

The final part of the course is a dark, foggy, and seemingly empty room. Once someone enters, a glowing ring of the color of your ink will appear in the center of the room. Stand on it, and a mechanism under the ring will scan you. Once fully scanned, the mechanism will create realistic-looking Inklones, improving CaleBoi's formula to make them with actual skin. They also have overpowered main weapons, and unlimited subs and specials. The Inklones will circle around the area, not letting themselves be seen, and shouting out your name. The purpose of this is to pull on your heartstrings. To trigger an emotion overload inside you, just like the ones Arya has. And when you least expect it, they will all come towards you, along with Infected Arya, coordinated like a fish school. However, there's a hidden Special somewhere amidst the darkness and fog, and you will need it to blast all the Inklones you can get. But it's only a one-time use. If you do use it correctly and manage to defeat all the Inklones, the glowing ring will turn into the final Launchpad.

### Ending Area

Beyond Alterna ends right back at Arya's studio, in the 33rd floor of building #3 of the Happiness Research Lab. That dimly-lit room with various screens monitoring everyone's move, lab coats hanging on the walls, and a sign on the door with the name of Arya's mother. The first one to reach the end would expect some kind of prize, for her to congratulate them on passing one of the hardest missions ever made. But since Arya was overtaken by Natasha's virus, even the ending was a trap in itself. After a few seconds, Arya would activate the microchip that sends out shockwaves, and splat the finisher with her own special light, trapping them inside the same hard drive that Natasha was in as a computer virus. She did this for two reasons. Firstly, because she thought Arya was being held hostage by the Inklings and Octolings of the Meep Team, so she wanted to separate them from her. And secondly, because, to pull off her plan, just one of her wouldn't be enough. She needed someone just as powerful as her, or even more, on her side.

## Trivia

**[To be edited...]**

\*The first room, where challengers lose all personal effects, was added after Caleb was accidentally sent there with a Dynamo Roller and no MainSaver.