Jeral Cormier (Classic Gerosha)

The following is a fictional biography of Botan the Plant-Man from the Ciem Trilogy.

Jeral Cormier was a lowly man of few means, simply struggling to make his way in the world. Never able to hold a job for very long, Jeral often drifted about in life. He nevertheless won over the heart of Gvadouin Tricou and married her upon himself moving to Dirbine. The early years for the couple were their best time spent together, but their marriage would ultimately not last.

Non-consensual involvement in Phaelite experimentation
Around the same time that Candi battled Jeff the Invisible in the Stolly's building and met Donte, Jeral was kidnapped by some Phaelites who violated conduct code. The Phaelite scientists who supervised Jeral's abduction were looking to create a race of plant-men that they could use in battle against the Meethlites. It was believed that Centhuen Prototypes might fail to produce the "pure" Centhuen race that the head powers that were in Phaelite command believed were necessary to advance their agenda. With advancements being made in Meethlite technology, the Meethlites were coming very close to having the technology to advance Milthuen Prototypes like Milp into full-fledged Miltheuens. Rumor even spread that a formula existed which could mutate Milthuen Prototypes into giant millipede-like monsters that could take an entire city hostage.

With some research, the unethical Phaelite scientists decided that a race of plant-men were the only things that could hold their own against such monsters. Several attempts were made on kidnapped humans to mutate them into plant-men, but there was very little success. Most of the victims reverted to their original forms. Others were curable with a potion. With Jeral, however, one scientist skirted even the code of conduct of the others and changed the mutation formula for Jeral's experiment to require Milthuen Prototype blood for the reversal potion to be permanent. The others supplied Jeral with several pill forms of the cure before sending him on his way and informing him that they'd eventually expect a phone call from him if he decided to take them up on their offer to fight the Meethlites with his plant-man form.

Aftermath of the experiments
When Jeral was leaving the lab, he stumbled upon the victims of several kidnappings who died as a result of the experiment - including a small child! Because of this, Jeral became convinced that the Phaelites were just as evil as their Meethlite counterparts, and developed a strong hatred and mistrust for both.

Jeral returned home to his wife, only to discover that the cure was temporary. When he transformed into his plant form, Gvadouin grew terrified of him and began to avoid him. Jeral would get a job at the Hazy Eighty's Bowling Alley under the supervision of then-owner Cladeus Hutchins. He kept gradually exhausting his cure packs as the effects would only last a few months. Too proud to return to the Phaelites for more, he believed he could get by for a while before coming out to his boss and co-workers about his condition.

Betrayal by Gvadouin and Katalina
At home, his situation continually frustrated his wife Gvadouin to the point that she considered threatening to throw away the pills and expose him to the world. After being backed into a promise he had no intention of keeping, Jeral decided to get smart and hide the pills where Gvadouin wouldn't find them. Gvadouin, feeling deceived, decided to manipulate Jeral further by reason of an affair. Feeling unloved, especially when his parents rejected him after he used his botanokinesis to help their garden grow; he began seeking comfort in an affair of his own. His lover, Katalina Tse[See note, 1], soon left him when she too could not reconcile with the reality that Jeral was botanokinetic.

Divorce from Gvadouin
Securing herself in the opportunity, Gvadouin finalized her betrayal of Jeral by confronting him with divorce papers. After a heated argument, Jeral signed the papers. Gvadouin then proceeded to take nearly all of the home assets and left Jeral with nothing but an empty house and his misery. Nearing the end of the duration of the most recent pill, Jeral decided to take a two-week vacation from work and head out to the forests of Kentucky to experiment with his new-found botanical powers.

Ultimate rejection by parents
He began developing for himself an ideal of a persona as "Botan," a demi-god in control of plant life on Earth. However, he decided that while he enjoyed his powers, he would have preferred a normal life with a normal family. His attempts to reconcile with his parents fail when they begin opening fire on him. He begins summoning weeds to defend himself, and virtually destroys their entire house in his attempts to get away from them. It is then that he realizes that his loved ones believe he is a monster. Not ready to accept that he truly is a monster since he never asked for his condition, he begins to obsess with finding a way to make his cure permanent.

Betrayal by second post-Gvadouin girlfriend
He ends up having a brief fling with a sinister woman named Marie Tan. However, this affair ends when he discovers that she is intending to cut him up and use him for research to manufacture new drugs for a friend of hers involved in pharmaceuticals. Jeral manages to escape from Marie, but not without using his botanokinesis to summon weeds from the ground to stop his assailants.

Relationship to co-workers
After this betrayal, Jeral grows extremely bitter and spiteful against all of society. He continues his job at the Hazy Eighty's; yet he all the time fears the day will come when he will have to give up the one stable thing in his life. It is working there that he meets Candi Flippo, who is working under the alias of "Candi Stevens." Candi initially doesn't know of Jeral's condition, and so she is reluctant to share it with him or with anyone else at the alley. She fears that if she reveals her secret to anyone, the Meethlites will be able to find her and exact vengeance on her for the death of Don the Psycho.

Early search for a cure
Jeral lost his job at the bowling alley after suffering a meltdown of his powers that caused him to attack patrons with animated plants inside the building. Candi intervened to try to stop him, and he escaped the building in shame. He fled to the nearby city of Farrenville to start investigating what was needed to make his cure for his condition permanent. He learned that a student at the Farrenville Community College and an acquaintance of Miriam Flippo's, Emily Astair, was investigating the Phaelite experiments on creating Plant-Men. The two strike up a relationship. However, the experimenters grew terrified that Emily would expose them. They arranged to have her kidnapped, hoping that would solve their problems. Not able to stop the kidnapping, Jeral grew enraged. After several failed attempts at a heroic rescue of his new girlfriend, he grew even more bitter and spiteful than he had been previously.

Botan the murderer
Emily's captors take her to a lab in Florida, where they force her to serve as their lab assistant. Jeral begins searching some more in vain for a cure without her. However, his luck grows worse when one of his last possessions in the world - his car - gets stolen by a man who was recently involved in some drug dealings and robberies.

Jeral, now fully manifested as Botan, goes out in pursuit of the robber. He catches up only to find that the robber had completely demolished the car in a failed effort to get away from Candi in an early version of her Ciem suit. Still being controlled by his anger, Botan attacks the robber and forces a tree to grow around the man's body and devour him. Candi objects to this blatant act of first-degree murder while agonizing over her own guilt in Don's death. In the comics, he attacks Candi in a blind rage. He only relents because she reveals she is pregnant, and he will not let himself kill an unborn. In the books, he gains control of himself before the two actually fight.

He leaves the Dirbine/Evansville area in shame, vowing to return when he has answers. In the mean time, he finds shelter in a Florida home.

The Stibbs family
Jeral escapes from Dirbine right as the police begin to suspect him in the death of the robber. However, the charges are dropped when they are unable to provide solid evidence to a judge of any wrongdoing. Jeral assumes the alias of "Derrick" and tries to start his life over in New Port Richey, FL. While down there, he befriends a young girl named Tabitha who helps him find a place to live.

Initially, Jeral is able to disguise himself by day in the back yard garden of Tabitha's single mom, Sheryl Stibbs. However, Sheryl begins to grow suspicious as to how Tabitha could have grown such as large sunflower. She grows mad when Tabitha, teary-eyed, insists that the sunflower is really "Mr. Derrick." In a rage, Sheryl traumatizes her daughter by attacking the sunflower. Jeral, infuriated at Sheryl's unbelief and insensitivity to Tabitha's feelings, manifests himself as Botan and confronts her. Sheryl retaliates by physically assaulting Jeral.

She reaches for some weed killer and tries to spray Jeral in the face with it, but he regenerates through plant life in the earth. He grows as tall as a tree and ties her up in several branches, lecturing her about her vanity. Realizing that she is failing to get the message and cares at that point only about herself, he ponders killing her. However, Tabitha's tearful begging for "Mr. Derrick" to spare her mother's life touches a sensitive string in Jeral's heart.

He remembers how he felt when his own parents attacked him with shotguns for turning into Botan. He decides that he has to show his current family the same mercy that his last family failed to show him. This leads him to instead of killing Sheryl, sending her flying through a window and into the house. He threatens her more harm if she does not learn to trust her daughter more.

TV show
Jeral tries to get a kids' show for himself, as "Derrick of the Dandelions." At first, a local studio in Tampa approves of his idea. However, after the terrorist attack on Dirbine/Evansville, Sheryl Stibbs begins to wonder why her daughter is so cheery. Vainly envying her daughter and being spiteful to her for being happy when Sheryl cannot, Sheryl demands of Tabitha an answer for her happiness. Tabitha replies that Mr. Derrick is "all better," and that he now has his own TV show. Sheryl drops off Tabitha at the grandparents' house, and proceeds to buy a sniper rifle. She revokes Tabitha's TV viewing privileges, and won't explain to the grandparents what her reason is for this.

Sheryl tracks Jeral down to Tampa; and attempts to have him assassinated right outside of the studio where his show takes place. Jeral fakes his own death to escape from her, leaving behind a shell of himself that she repeatedly shoots at and finally, starts pounding into with her fists. A security officer near the building manages to restrain Sheryl long enough to get her in cuffs. When her hatred for Jeral and her emotional abuse of Tabitha are revealed in court, she is denied the insanity plea. She is sentenced to life in prison for attempted murder with a firearm.

Rescuing Emily
The Phaelites responsible for Botan's creation are later exposed by Ciem and Ploribus/Darius Philippine. This sends them into a fit of desperation about what to do next. Frustrated with the eternal conflict between Phaelites and Meethlites, some Phaelites begin to plot a coup against the other Phaelites both on Earth and on Phaelon. This small band joins the researchers responsible for Botan's creation, and they begin to band together and call themselves the Phaletori. Mutating themselves slightly to look a little different than their normal Phaelite counterparts, they set themselves up as a clinic that vows to "fight the scientific oppression" of the rest of Phaelite society, which has condemned them for their unethical experiments.

At this point, Jeral, having faked his own death; resumes his persona of Botan. With no Ciem in the way, however, he feels free to take on the role of an anti-hero as opposed to a villain. Emily then sneaks into a room while her captors aren't looking and discovers what happened to Jeral: his formula was altered to require the blood of a Milthuen Prototype to reverse his condition! She immediately begins to formulate a plot to escape from the clinic and tell Jeral. Her plans are to capture the Meethlite-faithful Kimiyato Hiriyama and extract her blood to cure Jeral with it. However, the Phaletori decide that Emily's usefulness to them has expired.

The majority of them take off, leaving a few in charge of the Tampa clinic where they tie Emily up. When they learn of her plot, they decide to strip her naked and torture her before killing her. Just as their sadistic ritual on her leads to the guillotine blade's descent, however, a tree branch pops out from the ceiling and blocks the blade!

Botan begins to extract horrific amounts of violence on his girlfriends' captors, eventually freeing her from the apparatus and then using it to behead Phaletori with. Growing into a giant, walking redwood tree; Botan chases the remaining Phaletori from the lab down the streets of Tampa. Every chance he gets, he crushes them. He finally chases one of them to a highway, where he ties up a Phaletori in a tree-like bush and forces him to meet an untimely demise during a collision with a semi truck.

Escape back to Dirbine / Evansville
Jeral and Emily begin to fear that they will be blamed for the collateral damage of Jeral's assault on the Phaletori. Emily decides to write in to the Tampa police with a letter that informs them that a group of rebel Phaelites have mutated themselves into Phaletori and have been staging a rebellion against Earth's Phaelite defenders by creating plant monsters. The two of them secure some masks and makeup to help Jeral disguise himself and they head back to Dirbine / Evansville to find Ciem. At this point, Jeral is willing to seek help from Candi.

Temporary alliance with Ciem
Finding it all-too-easy to locate Candi investigating at a local bar in an effort to collect a sample of murder suspect Terrence Frintz's DNA, Emily reveals to Candi that she knows about Candi's double life as Ciem. She arranges for Ciem and Botan to meet in secret, where they will reveal to her what their plans are and ask Candi if there's anything she can do to aid them in their quest.

Candi decides to go see them anyway, against Laurie's wishes. True to their word, the couple make no attempt to ambush Candi and Laurie. They reveal that Kimiyato is still alive, and ask Candi if she can arrange for them to meet with Ploribus / Darius about capturing Kimi. Candi agrees to talk to him, although he is preoccupied upon learning that Lex's girlfriend and their son have gone missing.

However, the three of them don't realize that Kimi herself, having acquired a Milp costume, is already in town and is already spying on all of them! Milp attacks along with Lobe while the mayor is at his birthday parade in downtown Dirbine / Evansville. He was about to award Ciem for her efforts to keep the city safe. Candi almost didn't go, being too humble and paranoid to go in costume and accept an award. However, her son Charlie urged her to go; making her feel compelled to show up anyway.

She warns the mayor that she is not confident showing up in-public and in-costume with no major disaster to stop. However, the mayor and the townsfolk ignore her sensation of a bad omen in the air. Telling them "I told you so," she goes to investigate a recent explosion. It ends up being Milp, who challenges her to a duel on a highway bridge. Ciem is able to easily block both of Milp's sword and mental attacks; and even causes Milp to lose the sword that was her one advantage over Ciem in battle.

Milp vows revenge, and then leaves Lobe to fight her. Taking advantage of the distraction, Milp sneaks off to Candi's house and kills the babysitter that was paid to watch Charlie. After beating Charlie some, Milp then takes off. She does her best to make it look as though Candi had been abusing him, but leaves behind evidence of a break-in. Nevertheless, some nurses at the downtown hospital decide to accuse Candi of beating Charlie, ignoring Charlie's story and telling him to shut up about the "woman in black."

Charlie, enraged at the injustice being committed against Candi, attempts to run away. However, the nurses take advantage of Charlie being weak from his beating and have him sedated. As Ciem is battling Lobe and trying to get him to calm down so they can talk, Lobe makes a false move and falls to his death. Ciem jumps off the highway and Zeran-teleports to a building top.

She gazes down, horrified at what happened. Jeral, believing it was Candi's fault and an accident, decides to provide her with a cover story by turning himself into a giant weed and swallowing up Lobe's corpse to destroy the evidence. He then pretends to be a villain again and has Ciem feign a fight with him as he disappears underground. Candi walks away, confused and covered in wet leaves.

From there, she finds herself wrapped up in the conspiracy of false police working for Kolumn, who further convince the nurses to call them in and have Candi arrested. Candi immediately gets clairvoyant vibes from Charlie that the whole thing is a setup, via her centuition. She calls the event for what it is; but the nurses initially don't believe her and threaten to call a psychiatric ward on her. As she exits the building, she is surrounded by Kolumn's forces in disguise as a SWAT team. The real police are called to a distraction created by other forces of Kolumn's, so that they won't interfere with the false bust. Candi is then "arrested" and shipped to Kolumn's facility in California for execution.

Return as a villain
With Candi out of the way, Botan begins to fear that Ploribus / Darius won't help him. He makes a desperate plea for help, but to no avail. Lex discovers that the reason for this depression is that the formulas Ploribus/Darius is using to keep himself young aren't working anymore. He fears aging and dying, and has slowly descended into cowardice. Still angry with Lex over the Yvette/Mallorie and Silo Wade affair, he is reluctant to listen to Lex at first.

Milp takes advantage of the situation and begins a reign of terror over Dirbine/Evansville. Frustrated with Ploribus'/Darius' inaction, Jeral Cormier and Dolly Malestrom decide to take matters into their own hands. However, the Earwig costume which Dolly steals has a flaw in its AI, which was modified from Meethlite backvisor AI. The helmet begins to awaken Dolly's darker personality traits and sends Dolly into a rage, as she heads about town trying to kill Botan.

She almost succeeds, save for the combined interference of Milp and Emily. Milp, however, attempts to kill Emily and then steals the weakened branch that is all that remains of Botan. Emily survives, but the sight of her injured forces Dolly to decide that Emily's life deserves to be saved more than Botan and Milp's lives need to be ended. By the time Dolly returns to the cave, both Milp and Botan are gone.

Milp realizes that Botan is the only being powerful enough to stop her. Armed with a backup AI backvisor similar to the one used to create Musaran, she allows Botan to regrow his strength only until he has formed a head. She then quickly slips the visor on the back of his head so she can control him. She reveals that she has the potion needed to transform herself into a giant, dark-purplish monster, and drinks it up after a monologue about how her life up until then had been a failure. Botan continues to regenerate his plant tissues and begins working for the Milp monster.

As Milp's mind slave, Botan shares in her campaign to terrorize the city. She learns that she can use her main underground, giant millipede self to generate attached blob manifestations of her former self that, as long as the connection to the root is not lost, may terrorize as many locations as possible. In this manner, she is able to rob several banks at once and tear apart the center of town. With Botan's help, she forms the Forest Funnel Town in the center of Dirbine/Evansville and uses Botan's structure and Botan himself to protect herself from the National Guard.

Emily makes her way back to Ploribus'/Darius' hidden lair for treatment for her wounds, but Dolly goes off to rescue Charlie with the help of Lex. Candi makes new friends in the jail complex in California, and escapes after a new friend thwarts Kolumn's attempts at beheading her. Ploribus'/Darius' base is raided by Botan's weeds, forcing most of the survivors out. Ploribus/Darius, staying behind, decides that Lex was right. He mans a mecha that he built for himself, and races off in it to battle Milp. He decides that his era has ended; so he may as well compensate by honoring his family's wishes.

Dolly makes her way to California, after having witnessed the deaths of Nolle and even her own nephew Henry (in the comics.) Losing her sanity to the helmet, she begins battling Candi and the other survivors of Kolumn's prison. However, she loses the helmet in battle and is able to regain her sanity. She becomes emotionally scarred at the realization of all the bad things the helmet made her do; and she agrees to join Candi, Kyle, and Charlotte in taking back the city.

Ploribus/Darius manages to get his mecha inside the funnel that Botan created, and sacrifices himself and the mecha by self-destructing while the Milp root is covering the mecha. The explosion injures Milp, allowing her to bleed slowly, but does not inflict enough damage to kill her. She tries hard to disguise her battle wound, in spite the continual bleeding. She also orders Botan to try hard to keep his most important structures away from her blood, fearing it would cure him.

Final redemption
When Candi and the others arrive in the following afternoon to battle the Forest Funnel Town, they learn what Milp and Botan have done to the city. Lex touches base with Dolly to assure her that he and Donte as well as Jeraime and Frank are all okay. With a few frantic news crews still left over in the desolate town, Ciem returns to the scene with her friends Mukade, Meerkat, and Earwig. Because Dolly lacks the helmet, she is asked by the other three to head to ground level and do some reconnaissance.

As Milp battles the other three inside the Forest Funnel Town, easily getting the jump on all three of them when she sends multiple manifestations to attack them, Dolly finds a pistol lying on the ground and shoots the AI backvisor off of Botan when he is not looking. This is done in front of a British journalist covering the scene, who is appalled at the violence.

When Jeral snaps out of his trance and regenerates his damaged tissues from the gunshot wound, he sees Dolly there and initially panics. Dolly, however, apologizes for trying to kill him earlier and negotiates with him that they can all end the violence very easily - by Jeral killing Milp. She argues that this may be the very reason why he was allowed to become a Plant-Man in the first place.

At the same time, Milp makes numerous taunts to Candi. She tears the Ciem suit into so many pieces, so that Candi is left with just her belt and a few shards to accompany her mask and cover her bra and underwear up. She then beats Candi bloody, taunting her about her personal moral failures and her sexual exploits with Donte. Candi replies as best as she can; and the other two take advantage of this distraction to stop Milp from killing Candi.

However, their efforts turn out to be in vain. Just when the Milp blob decides to wrap around them and suffocate all three of them, Botan turns on her and starts generating weeds to rip into her battle wound from her fight with Ploribus/Darius. Hungry roots begin absorbing her blood, which is then fed into Jeral. Finally, the plant structures tear the Milp blob to pieces; and the creature dies in screams of agony.

Jeral relaxes himself from his assault, and immediately feels a calm come over him. He passes out, only to wake up and find himself human again. The journalist, hearing the screams, panics and flees the scene. Emily arrives with Lex to greet the heroes. Jeral awakes to realize that he is human again; with his powers as Botan completely gone. He and Emily embrace each other, knowing that they can at last have a normal life together. Candi, Kyle, and Charlotte walk away from the battlefield and join the others.

They all lament together on how the mistakes they've made over the years have resulted in countless deaths and the near-destruction of Dirbine/Evansville; and make commitments to themselves and each other not to let it happen again.

Post-recovery
The Meethlites have lost the last of their Earth leadership with the demise of Lloyd Kolumn and company. They predict another 30 years before they can return to Earth to terrorize some more. The Phaletori are officially deemed outlaws, and the legitimate-ruling Phaelites offer their condolences to Jeral for his grievances.

Kyle and Charlotte marry and retire to Louisiana to start a family together. Candi and Donte move to Kentucky to raise their sons Frank and Charlie in relative peace. They would eventually have two more children. Lex moves to Gerosha, where he continues his search for Yvette/Mallorie using resources he acquires from his father's lair to set up a new one in the Gerosha Cemetery.

Jeral and Emily move to Viron permanently, and begin raising a family without further major incidents happening in their lives.