023 - A Lost Apocalypse
Corona and Tempest stood before the arches, preparing for what Corona believed to be one of the cooler missions they’d been assigned. Usually the area around the arches was crowded – but not today. Today, it was just the two of them, the arches, and a spherical white capsule with two seats in it.
They were to climb into the capsule and take it through the arches into a universe that had absolutely nothing in it. Just eternal blackness. Visiting this place would be amazing all on its own, just to feel what floating in nothingness really felt like. But there was a real purpose to their mission – they were to take the capsule ‘up’ and use a dimensional device to return. They were going to try and get into orbit around Earth without using a rocket.
Corona was a little surprised they hadn’t tried this before – it’d be so useful if they could pull this off. No more huge, expensive, accident-prone rockets. It’d be as simple as shifting to a dimension, moving ‘up’, and you could escape the gravity prison of the Earth.
Corona zipped up her custom red spacesuit – it was rather tight around her body, and made her limbs look puffy. It wasn’t anywhere near as baggy or awkward as the suits she’d seen used around the International Space Station, so she considered herself lucky. Yet, she couldn’t get the itching at her shoulders and hips out of her mind.
“And they say these are designed for comfort…” Corona muttered, zipping up the arm pieces around the gloves.
“As much as a spacesuit can be,” Tempest said, adjusting the shoes on her own purple suit. “Haven’t discovered a universe with a true bodysuit yet, so we’ve got to deal with this. Suck it up.”
Corona rolled her eyes. “I am.” She snapped her fingers, creating a small flame in the air. Her gloves didn’t catch fire. Good. She flexed her legs and arms, getting a feel for the movement of the suit. “You know, if everything goes right we’ll never have to leave the pod, and these suits will be pointless.”
“Better safe than sorry,” Tempest reiterated, grabbing her fishbowl-esque helmet and placing it on her head.
Corona moved to place hers on as well.
“You don’t need your sunglasses on under the helmet,” Tempest said, muffled through her helmet.
“But what about-“
“The helmet has the same scanning systems,” Tempest told her. “You’re too dependent on those glasses.”
You have no idea, Corona thought, folding the glasses up and placing them in an internal breast pocket. She put the helmet on, getting a much larger version of the display she was used to – faint green lines and symbols that quickly minimized themselves so as not to obstruct her view. It briefly identified Tempest as a friendly and logged her location.
Corona tapped her helmet. “Is this what a fish feels like?”
“Who cares?” Tempest muttered. “It’s a helmet. It does what it needs to do.”
Corona rolled her eyes. “You’re never any fun.”
Tempest harrumphed, climbing into the open pod. “Get in.”
Corona bounced in, landing on the plush seat with considerable force. She buckled herself in. The top of the pod slid over them, sealing the two agents in a white sphere with a single oval window in front of them. There were numerous levers and dials below the window, forming a complicated console. Corona realized that she knew what most of them did. Apparently she really was learning. Go figure.
“Ready,” Tempest called into the microphone.
The arches activated with the usual song and dance – electricity, rings of blue star patterns, a clear portal to another world. In this case, the portal led to a place of infinite blackness.
“Initiating roll,” Tempest said, pressing a button.
Corona blinked. “…Roll?”
The pod rolled forward, rotating Corona and Tempest with it. Corona felt the blood rush to her head when the seats were at the highest place, then back to her feet when it made a full turn. She shook her head. “This is disorienting…”
She didn’t know what she was talking about. The pod passed through the arches when it was upside down, jarringly changing Corona’s orientation from upside down to none whatsoever. She blinked and tried to get her bearings, failing miserably to determine any up at all. She brought her hands to her stomach. “Ooogh…”
“You don’t want to hurl in that,” Tempest said.
“No, really?” Corona said. She realized that the orb was continuing to turning slightly, tumbling through space. The portal was visible, passing across her vision. She cocked her head sideways, trying to line up her orientation with the floor on the other side. The portal closed before she succeeded.
Corona tried to grab her forehead, but the helmet got in the way. “Good gravy… This is bizarre.”
Tempest ignored her. “Orienting.” A few maneuvering thrusters activated, twisting the pod to an orientation Corona assumed was upright. “Beginning ascent.” The thrusters on the bottom of the pod activated, accelerating them ‘upward’. The acceleration pushed Corona into her seat, giving her a feeling of partial gravity. She let out a sigh of relief as her brain processed the gravity into directions.
Tempest looked at her and raised an eyebrow. “You’d make a horrible astronaut.”
“Not arguing that point,” Corona said. “…How ‘high’ do you think we are now?”
“Chronometer says we’ve moved about a hundred meters.”
“Accelerating really is easy without gravity or friction.”
“We don’t know how the distance correlates to Earth,” Tempest reminded her.
“We can check,” Corona said. She pressed the ‘establish portal’ button, planning to look through the portal to see how high they were.
Nothing happened.
Tempest frowned. She popped open the hatch that was supposed to contain the dimensional device – it was empty save for the wires supposed to plug the device in.
Tempest sighed, facepalming. “You didn’t, by chance, bring a spare did you?”
“Uh… No. I was told we didn’t need it.”
“We weren’t supposed to.” Tempest narrowed her eyes. “Somehow, this is Ike’s fault. I know it.”
Corona sighed, sitting back in her chair. “Now we have to wait for them to come get us.”
Tempest cut the engines to conserve power, removing the artificial gravity. Corona groaned. “How long until they check on us?”
“An hour, at least. And even then they may have to get an actual ship to come find us.”
Corona looked at the nothingness outside.
It was suddenly a lot less interesting.
~~~
Renee stepped out of a portal, alone, into the endless forest. There was nothing there but a bench and a man sitting on said bench – Daniel Jackson.
Renee lifted her hat and sat down next to him. “So, what brings a man like you to a place like this?”
Daniel rolled her eyes. “Same as you.”
“Binaries.”
“Binaries.”
Renee shrugged. “It’s been so long since I’ve been to their world… Actually, I’m not sure they’ve let us back there since our first visit.”
“I’ve never been,” Daniel admitted. “Always met them at the Hub or in the SGC.”
“I wonder why they’re so paranoid, sometimes. It’s not like they’ve had experience with aliens before. As far as they’re concerned, it’s just them and their two planets in their universe. What do they think we’re going to do?”
Daniel frowned. “From what I’ve garnered from them in my discussions, they are a thoughtful rather than emotional people. To them, the question of if you should or shouldn’t is rarely asked. The question is ‘can you do it and not suffer any negative consequences’?”
“They’re not robots, dear.”
“No. You ponies aren’t thoughtless emotional bundles of happiness either. But for many of you, emotions and morals overrule your mind. They’re just the opposite – their minds overrule their emotions and morals.”
“So, they put themselves in our shoes. If they had all our magic and technology, they would be using it to raise themselves up?”
“Exactly,” Daniel said. “I’m not sure how their government is structured precisely, but what I do know tells me that it’s a very strict council regime.”
“You’re not wrong,” Renee said. “Though it doesn’t exactly seem evil, like you’d think any ‘strict regime’ would. It’s more of a… place governed by secrets.”
“How so?”
“Well, when we arrived there, the Binary who found us thought he had seen something he wasn’t supposed to. He wasn’t afraid, but he was sad. He thought he would be forced to move with his family to another location where we ponies were known about, so as to not spread it. Apparently the Binaries’ living arrangements are determined by what they know.”
Daniel blinked. “That’s an interesting way to deal with classified information. Move anyone who finds out about it, or wants to know, to the other people who do know. Suddenly the classified information isn’t classified and there’s no chance of further breach. Unless, well, the person is crazy or malicious.”
Renee furrowed her brow. “I’d solve that by creating a ‘prison district’ of sorts, one where all those who want to scream the secrets out would be sealed up. …I would not be surprised if they had such a thing.”
“This all does explain why I couldn’t get him to reveal the names of all the councillors, or even how many there were.”
Renee rolled her eyes. “Their leaders love their secrets. I wouldn’t be surprised if not a single one of them was allowed to know how every facet of their government worked.”
“By the way, what happened to the Binary that found you?”
“We revealed ourselves to the whole district,” Renee said, smirking. “They didn’t have to move. The Binary higher-ups weren’t happy about it though.”
There was silence for a moment. Renee stared blankly ahead, expression unreadable.
“Renee? Are you holding up okay?”
Renee gulped. “I… I’m sorry. I just… I see her face again. Exploded… The image just hits me from time to time. Give me a minute.”
A portal opened, cutting short Renee’s minute. Boxen stepped out, flattening out his considerable hair. “We’re ready.”
Daniel and Renee nodded, standing up. They followed Boxen through the portal, arriving in the Binary universe. They appeared inside a building of standard Binary architecture, which was to say really tall ceilings twice as tall as they needed to be with one-way windows that could be looked through, but not into. The buildings visible through the giant, round portals seemed solid and windowless, even though they had the exact same design as the one they were in. The majority of the skyline outside was covered in buildings, with only the occasional tree about seven times taller than any of the round, egg like structures. In the distance, Renee saw a red glow, a sign of a district boundary energy fence.
The interior was well decorated, filled with electric candles, complex carpet patterns, a motorized sculpture of their sun and two planets, and a few portraits of Binary leaders. Renee noticed with mild surprised that one of the Binary leaders was hairless, revealing a creature that might as well have been human if it wasn’t for the black skin and beady eyes.
“Dasei,” Boxen said, noticing where her gaze had fallen. “She had a hair disease. Immortalized here because she created a split media.”
“Split media?” Daniel asked.
“A system of selecting news stories and segments based on district that allowed media companies to expand beyond single districts, increasing unity while adhering to regulations.”
Renee blinked. “Well, you’re certainly being a lot more open than previously, Boxen. It’s a nice change.”
Boxen harrumphed. “Offworlders have officially been declared part of District 7-Z-8 after much political deliberation.”
Renee blinked. “It took two years?”
Daniel shrugged. “I’m not that surprised, honestly. Sometimes things take longer on Earth. Though usually when something’s a pressing matter we can force ourselves to get things done quickly.”
“Approval to move the Apollo to Ardent?”
“Yeah, that was one of those times.”
Boxen shook his head. “For better or worse, you’ve been placed to one of the higher knowledgeable districts that I’m aware of. Enough that yes, you are allowed to know that information between districts is controlled, and that we have two planets, and that we are in contact with otherworlders.”
“We were placed here because we figured these things out, just like when dealing with your people, huh?” Renee asked.
“You were placed a bit higher than that. You have clearance to know some things you didn’t know before. You have to ask though, we’re not just going to spill all our secrets.”
“Not asking you to spill them all, it wouldn’t be proper,” Renee said. “Unless you want to brief us on something particular? Is that why we’re here?”
Boxen shook his head. “You have asked us, time and time again, to increase relations in some way or other. Six council members have convened here to hear what you have to say.”
Daniel sputtered. “It would have been nice to know this ahead of time!”
“This is ahead of time. They won’t be here for a few hours.” He gestured towards a plush couch, sitting to the side of a pair of giant double doors.
Renee gulped. “Well… Then…” She took a piece of paper out of her saddlebags. “Daniel, we better figure out exactly what we want.”
Daniel nodded. “Do you by chance have a table?”
Boxen rolled his eyes. “Of course we do. What kind do you desire? Wooden? Metal? Antigravity?”
“Just whatever’s the easiest for you to get.”
Boxen bowed, leaving to get them a table.
Renee bit her lip. “So, we need to offer them some things… Do we know if Cosmo’s ponies are willing to provide spaceships?”
“They sold one to Earth Vitis, I don’t see why not...” Daniel said, scratching his head. He opened a portal to the Hub and dialed his phone. “Yeah. This is Daniel Jackson, Earth Tau’ri. Need to get a message to Princess Twilight Sparkle, the ‘Cosmo’ version. See, we’re talking with the Binaries and we need to know a few things rather quickly…”
Boxen brought the table, raising his eyebrows at the open portal. “Hrm?”
“Trying to get a hold of Cosmo,” Daniel said. “Have to go through her to even discuss giving you ships.”
“Ah,” Boxen shrugged, looking at Renee scribble furiously on her piece of paper. “I suppose you can open the portal for phone service, just don’t let anyone in.”
“Of course,” Daniel said, adjusting the portal to a much smaller size. “There.”
“Much better.”
Renee lifted up the sheet of paper and squinted at it. “So, we want economic relations, yes?”
“Yeah.”
“How can any of us sell things to them that makes sense? We know nothing about their economy!”
Boxen sighed. The long day just gotten longer.
~~~
Corona tumbled through the emptiness, a bored expression on her face. She was vaguely aware she was rotating in the darkness, though that may only have been because the white dot of the pod rolled through her vision every few seconds.
“Corona, I can’t see you anymore,” Tempest’s voice came through her radio.
“I can see you,” Corona said, stretching herself out and pointing at the pod. “Pointing at you now.”
“Corona, you need to stay within sight range. If you drift too fa-“
“I’m attached by a cord, Tempest,” Corona said. “I’m not going anywhere.” To prove her point, she tugged on the cord, knowing the slight jerk would jostle the pod in the distance. She heard a satisfying grunt from Tempest, but no further comment.
After a few minutes of silent tumbling, Corona groaned. She tried to shoot fire again, but there were only a few glowing sparks to fly off her hand. No air meant no fire. If I was a unicorn, I’d be able to do this. I’d be able to do a lot of things. Possibly even do something.
“Hey, Tempest, what do you think happened to this world?”
“What do you mean?”
Corona sat up, placing a hand on her helmet. “I mean, was this universe made like this, or did it just… die?”
“I don’t know. You’re the physicist.”
“Don’t have my degree yet!” she chuckled. “I can make a guess though… Physically speaking, an empty universe and a universe that has fully entered heat death would be indistinguishable from each other. One never had anything in it. The other has things like photons zipping around, but space is expanding so fast you’ll never get to see any of them.”
“Who cares, then?”
Corona rolled her eyes. “Come on Tempest, you have to admit you’re at least a little curious here. Are we stuck in pure emptiness, or some sort of lost apocalypse?”
Tempest gave no response.
“Wow, you are grumpy today. Come on, we’re stuck here for the foreseeable future, let’s get to know each other!”
Nothing from the other end.
“Fine, I’ll go first. You have extensive files on me from my life on Earth, but I never told you much about my early years in Equestria. You know I was Celestia’s Protégé – actually still am according to paperwork, apparently – but do you ever know how I got there? No? Well, I wasn’t a student of any kind, I was just enamored with the sun. Everything about it was just glorious to my eyes as a young filly. I practiced fire magic, solar magic, and any sort of magic I could think of that was vaguely sun related. It became my special talent. I was young, and silly, and thought that if I studied enough I could learn to move the sun itself, just like Celestia. She eventually visited my town one day and saw me trying. Apparently I just looked ‘adorable’ and she sensed an eternally burning determination with my heart. She didn’t want me to waste my life trying, so she took me in and told me there were other things I could learn.” Corona sagged slightly. “…Her mistake, really. My determination just found a new goal to focus on. Power.”
No response.
“Tempest, come o-“
“I’m not from the United States,” Tempest said. “I’m from Afghanistan. I was a young child when the war broke out.”
Corona sighed. “I’m sorry you had to live through that. War isn’t pretty-“
“The invasion of Ardent was nothing,” Tempest blurted. “That lasted less than a day. You didn’t have to deal with bodies piling up. You didn’t have to deal with watching your family die. You didn’t have to see the same place bombed over and over again.”
“No. I didn’t.”
“…I felt like I was going to die so many times. But I didn’t. I was brutalized in every way you could think of by both sides, near so many bombs that went off, and witnessed kinds of bloodshed that no girl should ever see.” She paused. “Then Director Storm got me out of there.”
“He was in the war?”
“He was in a lot of wars. The way he talks, sometimes you’d think he was in World War Two.”
“There’s no way.”
“Exactly. He just pulls on your leg, like always. But he was in that war. And he saved me. Today, I’m not sure if he did it out of kindness or obligation, but at the time I thought he was a saint for pushing me out of the way of a bullet and taking it in his own leg. I wouldn’t leave his side and he wasn’t bothered by the tagalong girl. He took me back to the United States and trained me. Then I ended up working with him in everything he did – moving with him when he became Director of AID.”
“I didn’t know you had such a history with him.”
“I do. He may not be the best man, but I trust him with my life. I refuse to believe he’s left us to rot out here.”
Corona blinked. “Where’d that come from?”
“It’s been three hours, Corona. Not so much as a radio message to check in on us. Something’s wrong.”
Corona gulped. “That… You have a point there.”
“I know it’s bad, and I just want to be there instead of sitting here in the middle of nowhere doing nothing!”
“Right… I get it.”
She heard Tempest punch something on the other end.
“Woah, Tempest! Think calm thoughts! Everything’s going to be fine! I’m sure help will arrive soon, the moment he deals with whatever the problem is, okay? Maybe the arches just broke down.”
“I’ll think calm thoughts, but I won’t believe the bullcrap you’re spilling about everything being fine.”
“…All right. It might not be fine. But we can’t do anything, so we have to sit here and be okay with that. Okay?”
Tempest said nothing.
~~~
Director Storm looked up from a crystal paperweight he was fiddling with when Mike came into his office. “Ah, Mike!”
“You wanted to see me, sir?”
“Yes. I’m going to take a vacation for a day or two,” Storm said, winking. “I’ve got enough vacation days saved up, time to use a few of them.”
“Good to hear you’re finally going to relax.”
“Heh. You’re in charge until I get back,” he said, pocketing the paperweight.
“What about Tempest?”
“She’s away on a longer-term mission. She probably won’t get back before me.” Storm shrugged. “Though if she does come back, your choice if you want to give her the big chair or not. But, knowing you, I think you’ll keep it.”
Mike smirked. “You know me.”
Storm stood up and shook Mike’s hand. “Good luck. I hope nothing explodes while I’m off.” He pulled a dimensional device out of his desk, setting the dials to the Hub. “I’m going to go visit an old friend first.”
“Not going to say goodbye to the agents?”
“The best vacation is where none of them figure out that I’m gone,” Storm smirked. “I doubt you can actually pull that off, but consider it a challenge.” He opened the portal. “Don’t burn the place to the ground, mmkay?”
Mike nodded. “I won’t.”
“Good.” Storm stepped through the portal, standing tall in the halls of the Hub. He kept his toothy smile wide open for all to see as he marched through the mazelike corridors. He stopped to purchase a small dumpling-like ball of food that tasted like strawberries. Very delicious, he decided.
He looked at one of the large screens hung near the ceiling. A deer news anchor was interviewing Saxton Hale. Storm had no idea what was being said, but he knew he’d want to watch that later. It would be hilarious no matter how well the interview went.
Storm eventually arrived at his destination despite numerous stops to ‘smell the roses’. He walked right into Iroh’s tea shop and sat down. He leaned back, tapped on the side of the table seven times in a particular pattern, and ordered orange chai tea ‘in a blue cup, if you don’t mind’.
He waited a couple minutes, examining the patrons of the shop. Most of them were just regular people wanting to have a good time, but he did see Siron discussing something with a Binary. Why was he always with a Binary? There was definitely something going on there, but sadly that wasn’t why he was here. Investigating now would prove problematic.
Storm saw the doors that led to the tea kitchen tilt open slightly. That was the signal. He stood up, shrugged, and walked out the front door. Circling back around, he headed through the Elemental Nations’ Embassy, ignoring the receptionist’s strange look as he passed her and went through a back door that led to the rear of Iroh’s tea shop. It was a single room with a small card table. Iroh himself was sitting alone at the table, a single eyebrow raised. “You must have some problems if we had to use this room.”
Storm snorted, closing the door behind him and sitting down opposite Iroh. “You don’t know the half of it.”
Iroh sighed. “I have a feeling I can relate more than you’d like to whatever it is… What happened?”
“I was ordered to have Tempest and Corona killed.” Seeing Iroh’s expression, he held up his hand. “I didn’t. They’re just stuck in an empty universe with no way back. But my superiors think they’re dead.”
“That is concerning. Why would they want this?”
“I don’t know,” Storm said, taking a large folder out of his suit. “I’ve been slowly building a case against Senator Pearse. I’ve got so much damning evidence in this folder I might be able to get him executed. I’m planning to bring it to him and blackmail him into some real answers.”
“That sounds dangerous. Also rather foolish.”
“It is. Extremely,” Storm said. “But there’s something rotten happening on my world, and it’s starting to interfere with my agents. I’m fed up with this, not going to stand for it anymore.”
“I’m your backup. Wonderful.”
Storm slid the folder to him. “You’re the only one I can trust not to file this with some bureaucracy. O’Neill’s fine, but if he was going to act he’d have to tell everyone he reports to. You don’t really report to anyone. And you’ve got a personal stake in Corona’s safety.”
“What am I to do with this?”
“Nothing. I’ll return, having completed my mission, and will ask for the folder back.”
“If you don’t return?”
Storm smirked. “On the extreme off-chance that happens, you publish the information however you see fit.”
“What of Corona?” Iroh asked, leaning in. “Do we just leave her in that universe?”
Storm shook his head. “Of course not. But if I can’t figure out how to get her back myself, that’s up to you. I don’t envy getting into that empty universe and finding her with the resources your world has.”
“You better succeed then. Root out this corruption, Director.”
Storm laughed heartily. “I plan on it. Don’t worry, I have extra insurance.” He opened a portal to the endless forest. “Until then, Iroh. Never stop being you.”
Iroh laughed back. “That’s the idea! …Take care of yourself.”
Storm winked, vanishing as the portal disappeared.
~~~
Corona was back at the pod, though not inside of it. She was sitting on what qualified as the top in a contemplative position. She stuck her head in front of the porthole, looking at Tempest. “Hey, you should come out. The weather’s great!”
“There’s no weather out there at all.”
“That’s what makes it great.” Corona shook her head, sighing. “Tempest…”
“Five hours,” Tempest said. “It’s been five hours. People could be dying.”
Corona shook her head, popping the hatch of the pod open, climbing back in to her seat. “You’re letting your thoughts run away with you, Tempest. That’s… Well, that’s my job. I get the influx of emotions that I don’t always deal with. You… You’re the cool, calm, collected one. You’re, well, you’re the leader.”
“I need to do things,” Tempest admitted. “I can’t just sit.”
Corona put her feet on the dashboard and leaned back. “Honestly? I can’t either. But I went outside and danced around in the nothingness. I distracted myself. Got you to tell some stories. It wasn’t as effective as I would have liked, but I’ll take what I can get.”
Tempest stared ahead blankly, saying nothing for several moments. Then she stood up, popping the hatch open. She stepped out of the orb.
“Woah – hey you need a cord!” Corona blurted. She tossed the cord attached to her out of the pod. Tempest grabbed it and yanked, pulling Corona out as well. The rapid movement swung the rope around the capsule, eventually ramming them into the bulk of the white sphere.
“Ow…” Corona muttered, trying to stand up, realizing that she was still spinning in space. Tempest locked her feet around the open hatch of the pod and pulled the cord, yanking Corona back. Corona tumbled back to Tempest, and the two knocked helmets together.
Corona started laughing as Tempest pulled them both back in.
Tempest just smirked. “That enough of an outing for you?”
“You bet it is!” The two sat back down. “I never thought I’d get you to have any fun.”
Tempest nodded. “Neither did I.” Her smirk vanished instantly. “I’m sorry,” she said out of nowhere.
“…For what?”
“For resenting you. What you were. Given a place instead of working for it. I thought you were a brat. When I decided you weren’t a brat, I thought you were just plain childish. And then…” She shook her head. “I’m sorry. You are a valuable member of the organization. It’s not just because you’re from another world.”
Corona smiled. “Thanks. Good to see I finally got through to you.”
Tempest looked right into Corona’s eyes. “You have an immense amount of patience.”
“…I think it comes from me realizing that I used to treat people like they were nothing. I’d want them to have patience with me, after all.”
Tempest let her smirk return. “Apparently not.”
Corona grinned. “Yeah, it-“ her smile vanished instantly.
“What is it?”
“…Something on my helmet. Give me a sec…” She took in a deep breath and closed her eyes. “Why now…”
“What? What did you see?”
Corona grabbed Tempest by the shoulders. “You are going to hate me in about twenty seconds.”
Tempest, for once in her life, looked bewildered. “…What? Why?”
“I… Have a way out.”
“Why would I be mad about that?”
“Because you aren’t going to like it, that’s why.”
Tempest blinked. “Corona…”
A portal opened right in front of them, depositing a Puddlejumper in the empty universe.
Tempest gawked. “How did you call the Tau’ri?”
“I didn’t,” Corona said, opening the hatch on the spherical pod. The back hatch of the Puddlejumper opened at the same time. Corona grabbed Tempest’s hand. “Come on.”
The two of them drifted into the Puddlejumper – falling flat on their faces when the ship’s artificial gravity took over. The hatch closed behind them and air rushed into the cabin.
Corona took off her helmet, letting her hair spill out. Tempest did the same, though her hair was nowhere near as large. Corona was smiling nervously and sweating.
Tempest raised an eyebrow with her. “I don’t care if you broke protocol somehow to do this, we’re getting out. That’s what matters.”
Corona nodded. “It’s… Good to hear you say that!”
Tempest glanced around at their enclosure; the Puddlejumper’s back half, sealed off from the front currently. It didn’t look like a normal one, due to all the open panels, extra screens, and a few throw pillows tossed around and a rug on the ground. “…Who runs this ship?”
The second hatch of the Puddlejumper opened up, revealing the bridge to be even more mutilated than the back half. The two driver chairs had been replaced with a single large swivel, and numerous screens lined the walls and the controls. Holograms flickered in the air, and a large keg of fruit juice sat in a huge cupholder.
Sombra swiveled the chair around, smirking. “Hey.”
Tempest drew her gun and pulled the trigger. Nothing happened.
Sombra glanced at Corona. “Told you I needed to disable her gun.”
Corona sighed, swiping Tempest’s gun out of her hands and tossing it to the ground. “Tempest, be nice, Sombra just saved you.”
Tempest made no sound, still processing the new information.
Sombra shrugged, leaping out of her chair. “By the way, good to see you in one piece Corona.”
Corona hugged Sombra. “Nice to see you face to face.”
Sombra snorted, but didn’t reject the embrace. “I couldn’t exactly let you suffocate in nothingness, could I?”
Corona stepped back, shrugging. “Thanks, by the way. I don’t know what we would have done otherwise. Had, what, a day’s worth of air in that thing?”
“Traitor…” Tempest growled.
Corona looked at Tempest with evident pain in her face.
“Traitor!”
“Yeah. I am,” Corona said, sitting down. “Not going to deny it. I lied to you, Mike, Ike, Director Storm – everyone. I’ve been lying since Pearse’s scam on the Hub economy. I’ve been feeding secrets to Sombra through my glasses.”
Tempest curled her hand into a fist and punched Corona. Corona took it, going so far as to hold up a hand to keep Sombra from intervening. She propped herself up against the Puddlejumper’s wall – only to get punched again.
Corona moved her hand to wipe blood off her face – but Tempest punched again. And again. And again.
Sombra grabbed Tempest’s fist at the sixth punch. “Time to stop, amiga.”
Tempest pulled back her other first – and this one Corona caught. “Tempest, no.”
Tempest pulled both her hands back and folded her arms. “Fine then. I’m your prisoner.”
“Prisoner?” Corona sighed. “You aren’t a prisoner. We can take you back to AID right now.”
Tempest narrowed her eyes. “Corona. Why?”
Corona wiped the blood off her face and rubbed the back of her neck. “Director Storm said he couldn’t help me expose Senator Pearse. Sombra could. Her deal was that I feed her information from the AID, with the promise that she’d help me keep you all accountable.”
“Accountable!?” Tempest spat. “We are the-“
“We are not!” Corona blurted. “We need to be held accountable! I’ve found nukes that have been dropped on unusual universes that were thought to be a ‘threat’. I’ve found Senators manipulating us to exploit everyone else. I’ve found corruption that runs deep. Very deep. With Sombra’s help we’ve stopped several disasters that our little government organization wants to cause.”
Tempest twitched. “You’re such a naïve child.”
“That’s not what you said earlier.”
“Clearly I was wrong,” Tempest spat. “Things like that are a necessary evil. If we don’t have the strong arm, if we don’t attack first, if we don’t let those who may be ‘corrupt’ run things-“
“Equis Vitis. The Elemental Nations. Lai. The Space Ponies. None of them do what we do. None of them drop bombs on worlds. We’re wrong, Tempest.”
Tempest sneered. “You disgust me.”
Corona was legitimately hurt by this. She couldn’t respond.
Tempest continued. “You say you hate our means – our bombs, our betrayals, our deceptions. Then why are you using the same tactics against us?”
“I’m fighting fire with fire,” Corona said, summoning a flame into existence. “I didn’t like what I was doing. I still don’t.
“You betrayed AID, Corona. It never betrayed you. How is that-“
Sombra coughed. “Mind if I interject?”
Tempest twitched. “What?!”
“The reason you’re stuck here? Director Storm was ordered to kill you two. Make it look like an accident.” Sombra folded her arms. “Evidently he decided he didn’t like that order, since you were both trapped rather than dead, but it doesn’t change the fact that they wanted both of you, specifically, dead.”
Tempest blinked, her rage vanishing. “…Why?”
Sombra pulled up the document on a holographic screen. “This here says that you needed to be ‘eliminated’ due to ‘uncertain loyalties.’ Frankly, I don’t buy it. I think they were testing your Director’s loyalty to them.”
Tempest’s face blanked. “But… What about all my years of loyal service? What of-“
Sombra enlarged a portion of the document. “Ahem. Says here that your contributions will be honored posthumously should Director Storm desire. If not, all your achievements could be stricken from the record and given to other agents. Clearly, they don’t give a rip.”
“Where did you get this?” Tempest demanded.
Sombra’s smile soured. “That’s the fun part. I’m in your security camera systems, watching everything I can get my claws on closely. Today, Storm started acting weird around them. He dropped a single sheet of paper in plain view of one of the cameras – when he usually keeps everything well locked inside folders. Then he ordered your mission, and walked out not an hour later without making an announcement. His official file says he’s ‘on vacation’ right now.” Sombra folded her arms. “I think he knew I was watching.”
“…Wait, why’d you take so long to get us then?” Corona asked.
“I didn’t notice the paper instantly. And it took a while to piece together that you guys were stuck on the other end. Also, since your glasses were in your pocket, I not only didn’t know you were stuck, I had to hack into your suit helmet, which took several minutes with my limited connection. And here we are, a happy family of hacker, agent, and physics student. Two of whom are not supposed to be alive.”
“We can’t go back to AID,” Tempest realized. “They – some of them at least – want us dead. Or need to think we are dead, for Director Storm’s sake.”
“…Where can we go?” Corona asked.
“Iroh, maybe,” Sombra said. “I think Director Storm went to meet him just after he left AID, I’m not sure. Other than that… You two can stay in the shadows with me! I’ve been hiding for quite some time now, getting pretty good at it.”
Tempest growled. “Never working with you.”
“Oh? Am I beneath you? Last I checked, I didn’t drop nukes. Also, despite my ability to do so, I haven’t even tried to crash the Hub market. All I do is find information and sell it to the highest bidder.”
“You’re a killer. I’ve read the files of Earth Omnic.”
“And you’re not!?” Sombra waved her hand in a wide arc. “Every person here is a killer. If we’re judging by how much we hate killing, I think you’re the one with the most unhealthy outlook on it. Tell me, did that cube, asshole that it was, deserve to be blown to kingdom come? Was there even a mission objective there?”
Tempest threw a punch. Sombra caught it. “Thought not,” Sombra said, smirking.
Corona pulled the two of them apart. “Stop it! We may not like it, but right now we’re in this boat together. Can we please stop it with the antagonizing?”
“I’ll agree if she does,” Sombra said.
Tempest leaned back. “Fine. Let’s revel in treachery and betrayal, why not. What’s our move, oh great Sombra?”
Sombra shrugged. “No idea. I’m here to save you. You two do what you want. I’m just pretty sure you want to stay off the grid.”
Corona nodded. “I know how to meet Iroh in an out of the way place. It shouldn’t be too difficult to explain. He’s very understanding.”
Tempest shrugged. “Fine.”
Sombra gave them a thumbs up. “Nice talk! Now we-“ She blinked. “That’s odd.”
“What?” Corona asked.
“I’m picking up subspace signal in this universe,” Sombra said, tapping a screen and bringing up a wave-form diagram. “FTL communication.”
“What’s it say?”
“Encrypted. It’ll take a minute to clear up. Or significantly longer…” She frowned. “I do know where it’s coming from though. Few hundred light years that direction.”
Corona tapped the Puddlejumper walls. “This thing have FTL?”
“No. But we can cheat.” She smirked. “Your mission to this world was complete bogus, by the way. As a ‘heat death’ universe, there is so much space here that moving an inch in another universe will move a million inches here. Or something like that, the number keeps changing because space is expanding so quickly. The point is it actually won’t be hard to get to the source of this signal if we do some jumping…”
Tempest raised an eyebrow. “Are we really investigating a signal at a time like this?”
Something tugged at the back of Corona’s mind. “Yeah… Yeah I think so. I think there’s something important there.”
Sombra smirked. “Activating cloak!” The Puddlejumper vanished from sight and jumped through the portal, ready to investigate.
~~~
Director Storm adjusted the collar on his suit and marched into what was perhaps the most boring building he had ever seen. It was a white brick with windows. The worst part was he knew that unlike his unassuming base, there wasn’t even a secret basement in here. There were just a lot of offices. Offices, offices, offices. One of those offices happened to have one Senator Pearse in them at the moment, though nobody was officially supposed to know that.
Storm smirked. This was either going to go wonderfully or crash and burn. It had been a while since he had taken any actual risks like this, but he was fed up with all the political shenanigans going on over his head. He was the Storm, dammit, and he wasn’t going to be pushed around like some normal scribble-monkey secretary. They’d clearly forgotten who he was. It was time to remind them.
Well, he was just going to see Senator Pearse, but it was symbolic of putting them all in their place.
He walked in the front doors like he owned the place. It helped that he sure felt like he owned it. He waved his badge at security. They thought it was a regular FBI badge. Morons.
Nobody ever questions the tall man in the well-tailored suit with sunglasses and a slight sneer. Nobody wants to. Storm secretly loved it when some schmuck who didn’t get the memo would ask him what he was doing there. He’d flash his badge, grin menacingly, and say ‘investigating every nook and cranny of this place. I’ll have to come back to you when I’m done with preliminaries.’ Glorious. He rarely checked up on them later, which just made their lives even worse.
But even with his badge, he definitely wasn’t supposed to just go barging into the office that didn’t exist. So he had to look really confident and impressive. Yes, his position as Director should be able to get him through that door should he flaunt it, but the Senator could always just refuse to see him if he asked.
He wasn’t going to ask.
He marched up to the office door, plain like all the others in the place save for a single guard.
Director Storm made sure to add urgency to his voice. “I’ve got some things he needs to see!”
“Who needs to see?” the guard asked.
“You know I’m not supposed to say! Just let me in!” He waved the folder in front of the guard’s face, letting him catch just enough glimpses of pictures of Senator Pearse.
The guard nodded. “Of course.” He let Storm into the room, following him.
There were only three people in the room besides Storm and the guard – a Chinese man standing at attention, a black-haired woman with a vicious smile scribbling something on a sheet of paper, and the aged Senator Pearse himself.
Storm threw the folder on the desk in front of Pearse. “We need to talk.”
Senator Pearse took one look at the size of the folder, realization dawning in his eyes. “Leave us,” he told the guard. The guard nodded, backing out of the room.
Storm sat down in a chair, leaning in with a smirk. “What about the other two? Want them to hear this?”
Senator Pearse smirked back – new behavior for him. “They can hear whatever you want to accuse me of, Mister Oncoming Storm.”
Storm opened the folder. “Let’s see. I’ve got affairs, embezzlement, many dozens of lies, a half-dozen cover ups that had nothing to do with my organization, a very damning story about a river full of dead kids, and – here’s the fun one – evidence of you ordering two agents to their deaths without a trial.”
The Chinese man and the woman didn’t react in surprise to any of this. Senator Pearse folded his hands and smiled. “This all looks pretty convincing. I bet you could have me imprisoned with this despite my army of lawyers.”
“Exactly what I was thinking.”
“So, what is it you want Mister Oncoming Storm? Or should I call you Director Oncoming Storm? General Oncoming Storm? Sir Oncoming Storm? Thane Oncoming Storm? Boyar Oncoming Storm?”
Storm whistled. “You must have done some impressive digging for that last one. Though, I have to ask, am I supposed to be impressed? You’re the Senator in charge of my organization, of course you’d do some research on me. Trying to make me feel uncomfortable?” he laughed. “Many, many people besides you have tried and succeeded.”
Senator Pearse frowned.
“As for what I want, it’s rather simple really. I want all this bull to stop. Yes, all the bull. All of your muscular, giant, angry mooing plans that you put so much stock into. I want AID to run free of your influence. You give us funding, then leave us alone. Couldn’t be simpler! No more stupid orders, no more hiring agents under my purview to do your bidding, and no more looking at the other worlds with your hungry, perverted expressions. Screw up your own world first, mmkay?”
Senator Pearse smiled. “I’m sorry, Oncoming, but that just won’t do.”
Storm pointed at the papers. “You know this goes live if you refuse, right?”
“Oh, I do. But the bulls are much bigger and angrier than even you could comprehend, Oncoming.”
Storm narrowed his eyes, putting two and two together. “Pearse would never act like this. You’re not Senator Pearse.”
Pearse’s eyes glowed. “Oh, he’s in here somewhere.”
“Ba’al,” Storm said, leaning back. “Can’t believe I didn’t see this until now.”
Ba’al closed the folder and handed it back to Storm. “Go ahead and publish these papers. There are others, many others, to continue my work.”
Storm laughed. “We both know it’s not that simple. You can’t let me live now that I know you’re a Ba’al and that you have other big plans. You have a particular interest in my organization. It means you’re doing something with magic. You’d have no need to meddle with us if it was just for the other worlds. You Ba’als have your own devices.”
“You’ve been playing this a long time haven’t you?”
“Not as long as you, but eh, I like to think I’m pretty good.”
Ba’al smiled. “So. I’m curious, how do you plan to get out of here alive?”
“Knock you all out, cut, and run.”
Ba’al grinned. “This should be interesti-“
Storm pulled a crystal out of his jacket and hit Ba’al in the head with it. The secretary stood up and the Chinese man drew his gun. Ba’al just blinked. “What is that?”
“It’s a perfectly normal paperweight, I assure you.” Three bolts of lightning shot out of the crystal, hitting Ba’al, the Chinese man, and the secretary. Both the man and Ba’al fell with ease, but the woman… She caught the electricity in her fingertips and shot it back into the crystal.
Storm raised an eyebrow. “There’s more to you than meets the eye, isn’t there?”
The woman smiled. “I’m Azula. And you’re in our way.” With one hand, she summoned lightning - the other, fire. She launched both at Storm in a single motion.
Storm moved the crystal in a circular pattern, generating a ring of magic that met the incoming attacks with a small whirlwind of fog.
Azula roared, readying another attack.
Storm reasoned that he could probably take her, but he wasn’t going to chance backup arriving. He pulled out his dimensional device and dialed Equis Vitis. He leaped through, rolling under a bolt of lightning.
The portal closed as he stood up, surveying his surroundings. He was in Canterlot and there were several ponies staring right at him with looks of shock.
He waved. “Hello there! I’m Director Storm – you may or may not have heard of me – and I need an audience with Celestia! Care to point me in the right direction?”
A pegasus pointed at the main body of the castle.
“Thank you, good citizen. I’ll see if I can get y-“
A portal opened up behind Storm. A large, fleshy, purple hand jittering in an impossible manner reached out. Something about it snapped something in every pony who saw it, making them scream or pass out.
Storm kept his wits about him. Obviously, this was bigger than political corruption… Bigger than Ba’al. Something else was involved. He leaped back and thrust his crystal forward, summoning a miniature thunderstorm to beat back the gnashing hand.
His storm did nothing.
The claw grabbed him and dragged him in. He tried to yell to the ponies’ warnings of Ba’al, but they were clearly unable to listen to him at this moment.
The portal closed. The hand and Storm were no more.
Ponies would not remember what had happened that moment well. All they would know for sure was that they were terrified.
~~~
“That should be enough!” Sombra said. “Dropping back into the dead universe!”
They did.
Corona screamed, collapsing to the ground instantly.
Sombra and Tempest didn’t move to help her up. They couldn’t. They were transfixed.
There were three things in space before them. One was Ba’al’s mothership, hiding out in the dead universe so as not to be found. The second was a freshly built Ha’tak, shiny and new.
The third was a Ha’tak covered in purple… somethings. At times, they looked like tentacles. At others, they looked like eyes. At one point, the entire mess looked like a face. It was as if the Ha’tak was a living being and the purple horrors were mutations, or parasites - there to control it and use it for their own ends.
“IT’S HERE!” Corona screeched. “IT SEES ME!”
This snapped Sombra out of it. She leaned down. “Corona, listen to me. Just like we practiced, okay?”
“IT’S HERE! MAJORA’S HERE!”
Sombra slapped her. “GET AHOLD OF YOURSELF! Think, Corona, think. Let your mind overrule its influence. Slow, deep mental breaths. Count… Count… One… Two… Three…”
“You’re a fool,” Corona spoke with a voice that was not her own. “She can do nothing to the power wi-“
Tempest cut the eldritch monologue short by hitting Corona’s skull with the butt of her pistol. Corona’s eyes rolled up into the back of her head and she fell to the ground.
“…Good call,” Sombra said.
Tempest grunted. “What was that?”
“She’ll tell you when she wakes up. I’ll summarize by saying the more you know about it the more likely you are to go loco like… that.” She typed on her screens. “Now to break into Ba’al’s systems…”
“You can do that?”
“Easy. Same design as the Starfinder. Hacked into that months ago. Just need to…”
A dimensional portal opened in space, and the Mothership and free Ha’tak went through it. The corrupted ship turned right at them.
Sombra stopped hacking. She leaned over to the button that activated the dimensional device. “It can’t see us… We’re cloaked...”
The corrupted ship shot a tendril of impossible purple energy that corrupted every display that showed it.
“It can see us!” Sombra said, smashing the portal button. The Puddlejumper shot a portal into existence and flew through, appearing in a completely random universe with stars all around. From the other side of the portal, the purple tendril coiled around back, reaching for the Puddlejumper.
Sombra pressed another button, closing the portal. The purple tendril-thing shook, screamed, and then vanished into nothing.
“…You can’t hear screams in space,” Tempest said.
“I know,” Sombra said, shaking her head.
The two of them looked down at the twitching form of Corona. They quickly lifted her up and placed a pillow under her head, trying not to let spastic seizure motions cause any harm.
Tempest stood up and breathed out a long, hard breath. “...Something’s happening.”
“Something bad. Worse than me destroying the Internet,” Sombra added. “What now?”
“Iroh,” Tempest said. “We call Iroh.”
~~~
Renee and Daniel left the meeting with haggard expressions. The two of them went right for the couch they had sat on before the meeting began.
Renee took out the list of topics and suggestions she had drafted up before the meeting started. She crumpled it up in her magic and tossed it over her back.
“That… could have gone better,” Daniel muttered.
“Did we decide anything?!” Renee blurted. “Is there any future discussions on any of the topics? Did they say yes or no to any of them? Did they even know what we were talking about?” She grabbed her head. “Augh! There’s no way for an outsider to get any say in this system!”
“I got the distinct impression that none of them really had any say in the system. It’s like they’re all compartmentalized in areas of specific knowledge. Their system is unable to change significantly because of the way it’s designed…” He adjusted his glasses. “I understand why it took them two years to decide on something urgent…”
“I got the impression we weren’t in the right ‘clearance district’ to know about the decisions they were making,” Renee harrumphed. “I guess this system works for them but it does not work when there are outside forces…”
“Maybe that’s the point,” Daniel suggested. “I’m curious how this system formed. Could they have built it to increase unity, in a way? So there’d be no infighting, no rebellion, no revolution? Since, well, anyone who learned anything that might drive them to revolution would be displaced to a district where they could use that knowledge in some way… And become part of the societal ‘leaders’. When this was first created, it would have needed to be a very oppressive regime ruled by an iron fist. But after that… It might just propagate itself. There may not be a leader here anymore. They don’t need one, or even really a council. The system keeps building itself up… maybe.”
“Maybe?”
“There are a few holes in the theory. How can they organize forces to keep track of who knows what? What about all the operations going on in space? Obviously, there’d have to be nuance…”
“And if your theory there is right, there really isn’t anyone we can ask to find out how they do it, because they don’t actually know. It just works.” She shook her head, rather boggled by the nature of the Binaries. “I think I liked them better when they were xenophobic and gruff…”
“They’re an alien culture,” Daniel said. “It seems to work for them, and their people seem more or less happy, so… I don’t think we have the right to judge them.”
“We do need to find a way to work with them, though…” Renee said, shaking her head. “And I’m not sure how to do that.”
“Me neither.” He leaned back, stretching his arms. “…Hey, think this world has a place for lunch?”
“You mean dinner? We skipped lunch.”
Daniel glanced at his watch. “Well then.”
“And yes, I’m sure there’s a place for dinner around here somewhere. Oh Boxen!”
Boxen looked up from his clipboard. “Yes?”
“Is there a restaurant in this district?”
“Several. Most food is imported from districts with cooking knowledge though, don’t expect to see a chef.”
“Fine by me,” Renee said, leaping off the couch. “I need to unwind. What better way to do that and still technically do my job than eating alien cuisine?”
Daniel shrugged. “Can’t think of one right now.”
Renee adjusted her hat, smirking. It was time to eat some alien soup.
~~~
Iroh sat in the back room of the teashop, folder on the table.
Director Storm walked in, a huge grin on his face. “Mission success!”
“Oh?”
“Yes, I got Senator Pearse to listen to me. He’s removing all of his oily, grimy fingers from AID.”
Iroh smiled. “That’s great news. Everything go smoothly?”
“Smooth as butter!”
“What about Corona?”
“Pearse still thinks she’s dead. She’ll have to stay that way for a while, until I find a reasonable explanation for sudden agent revival. She’s fine, Iroh, don’t you worry your beard. Of course you can’t tell anyone that, but I’ll try to sell the story that she and Tempest are on an extended mission for a while so you don’t have to pretend to be devastated.”
“That would be appreciated.”
Storm quickly grabbed the folder Iroh had, flipping through it. “Right, everything checks out. It was a pleasure, Iroh. Let’s hope we never have to do this again!”
Iroh smiled. “It is never healthy to have this level of intrigue.”
“No it is not!” He opened a portal and jumped through.
Iroh stood up, dusted himself off, and went to the restroom. He closed himself in a stall and pulled out his phone. “Definitely not Storm anymore. Something’s off about him – not to mention he claimed everything went smooth as butter. No mention of a purple hand.”
“Probably just doesn’t realize ponies carry phones now,” Sombra said, playing the shaky video of the purple hand grabbing Director Storm again. “Doesn’t matter if you’re an abomination that can alter memory, a video’s a video.”
Iroh sighed, looking at Sombra and Tempest on the phone. “How is Corona doing?”
Tempest shook her head. “Not well.” She glanced behind her at the back of the Puddlejumper. “Still twitching and muttering. We’ve seen purple magic sparks a few times now.”
Iroh sighed. “I may have an idea, but we can’t do it right now. We have to lay low. They’ll be watching. I’ll soon take a page from Director Storm’s book and declare I’m going on vacation, and we’ll meet on my world. Understood?”
“Understood,” Tempest said, saluting.
“Keep her sedated and tied down until then,” Iroh said. “I fear what will happen if she wakes up and that thing is still in her.”
Sombra nodded. “You can count on me.”
“Can I?” Iroh asked.
Sombra smiled cheekily. “Hey, it’s Corona. I’ve got her back. I’ll keep in touch.” The feed ended, and Iroh’s phone went back to normal.
He made sure to flush so no one got suspicious. He went back to work, serving tea.
He reflected on the fact that he was really good at acting normal when there were conspiracies twisted all around him. What did that say about his life?
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I have to ask because it's just nagging in my head that I recognize the symbol to the left of Twilight's cutie mark.
It screams that I've seen it before but for the life of me, I can't place the name of where I saw it. Also, first 50 comments didn't say which it was. Or if it did, I skipped it.
Also tentative on reading this mega-crossover as you have stated but not sure whether to do so yet...
8747640
As far as I know, it's the symbol of the goddess Farore from The Legend of Zelda.
8747640
it's the symbol of courage from Legend of Zelda. Hope you enjoy if you do decide to read it.
8747665
That works too.
-GM, master of all the answers.
Appropriate point in the story, because that's 23 flavors of not good. Still, at least Sombra's keeping the eldritch Baskin-Robbins honest... though if anyone's going to fall victim to a corrupting meme, it'll be an information broker with a tendency to reach beyond her grasp. Iroh's right to be concerned.
As for Corona, here's hoping whatever Iroh has planned will work. It might well end up making things worse depending on his methods.
And then there's the Binaries. The opening of the multiverse is an adapt or die moment for every civilization that doesn't opt out, and those regimented Ewoks can't adapt. Their entire society is structured to prevent change. I don't see this ending well for them in the long term, and I don't think they do either. But ironically enough, their intellectual quarantine system is actually a great way to minimize Majora infection.
A lot to take in with this one. And no sign of the primary Twilight has me deeply concerned for her. Looking forward to more.
8747665
8747674
Ahh.... Now I'm at that moment where I feel like I should have known but didn't and want to facepalm.
Why the fuck you dont have 500 likes, this is AWESOME, an increfibly big family is tising here.
8754234
I dunno why I don't have 500, but i'm glad you're enjoying it!
(Maybe it's because it's a bit long...)
-GM, master of colors.
This is getting fucking intense :D.
Hey GM, not related to the chapter, but is your profile picture Sunset looking at an infinity sided dice from Gravity Falls?
-Raven, chieftain of assumptions
8757096
Yes, it is.
In fact, all the icons I've had on this site have had the infinite-sided die in one way or another. In the previous one, Vriska was holding a cueball - but that cueball was replaced with the infinite-sided die. I've taken that die on as my symbol.
-GM, master of assumptions.
He dropped asinglesheet of paper in pain view of one of the cameras
1. Forgot your spacing, Plain.
8771821
The italics spacing on "a single sheet" works on my end... Weird.
-GM, master of oddish.
Welp. This has gone FUBAR times 100.
>Conspiracies
Deus Ex intensifies.
Anti-Grav tables? Always been my favorite kind of table. Aside from hard light tables. Although, hard light chairs aren't that comfortable. Anti-Grav chairs are better.
That sounds like something a space marine might say...
Or a Tyranid.
A lot.
By the way is cosmic twilight inspired by some fanfic? Or is she an entirely original creation?
9786390
Original.
-GM, master of OG.
9786437
are the demons original?
10239588
Yes.
-GM, master of 10239588
Discord and Overwatch Sombra would get along very well.
Wow
You know, I didn't see it until just then either, honestly. I thought it was just a case of a shady poli. Really should have put two and three together when he ordered Sunset dead.