Obviously the Mateo standing here was not the one who reached out to
Olimpia, and told her to join this team. It could have been a future version
of him, or an alternate version, or just someone masquerading as him. Either
way, she seemed like good people, so they decided to keep her around, and
assume that everything was totally cool. They put her through a little
orientation, explaining what The Parallel was all about, how it was created,
and why the team existed. She accepted all information without judgment, and
no questions. She assumed everything they told her was everything they
needed to tell her. They would expect this kind of relaxed behavior from
someone who knew and trusted them, but a stranger should have been more
cautious. Presumably, until now not being able to communicate with anyone
without giving away her temporal condition just made her feel lucky to be
around people who understood her. They ate, they went to bed, and they woke
up three years later.
Mateo, said Amber while they were in the middle of breakfast.
“Back so soon?” Mateo asked out loud.
“I’m sorry?” Leona questioned.
“I’m on the phone,” he said, a little rudely. He didn’t need to talk to
carry on a psychic conversation, but a side effect of being carefree was
that Mateo was sometimes careless. “How long has it been for you, Amber?”
I’m here to serve as a psychic booster, Amber said, bypassing his question.
Someone wants to talk to you, and while she’s capable of communicating
across the bulkverse, I can help maintain the signal, since you and I are
already bonded. She wants the whole group to hear what she has to say, so
please make physical contact with your people. You can release once she’s
made contact.
Mateo nodded, and held his hands out.
“You know we can’t hear whatever she’s saying to you, right?” Angela
reminded him.
“Take my hands,” and unfazed Mateo clarified.
An image appeared before them, maybe a hologram, of a young woman. “My name
is Thack Natalie Collins, and I live in a brane called Voldisilaverse. To
give you a little background, there are three types of people with
abilities. These are mutants, witches, and spirits. Mutants are the kinds
you generally see on TV. Their bodies are genetically dissimilar to regular
people, and this gives them some way of manipulating energies, matter, and
other forces. People like you are witches in that you tap into the physical
properties of the universe. It has less to do with your bodies, and is more
about your minds, though there is a definite substrate component that
sometimes prevents you from maintaining your abilities upon consciousness
transference. I am a spirit. I possess a less defined connection to the
world around me, and its peoples. My power comes from my soul. There is some
chance for overlap. For instance—due to an interesting bloodline—Amber is a
mutant witch spirit. But these are the three classifications, and
understanding this is important in regards to what I am about to tell you.
“The Superintendent is another spirit. The reason the people in yours and my
universes have free will is because, while he enjoys a great deal of
influence over our worlds, he does not control them. To do that, he would
need to be a witch. He also has almost zero control over his own life, for
he is not a mutant. He is weak, and it is this weakness that forces him to
exert as much control over the worlds he creates as possible. He is only a
spirit, and he wields this power to manipulate the events across a number of
branes. That number, from his perspective, is about to grow. And the more it
grows, the more power he gains, and the more at risk people like you are.
You’ll still have free will, but there will be some question as to how you
encounter your circumstances, which determine the cards you’re dealt.
“To explain, the Superintendent did not rip you from reality so that no one
you loved could remember that you existed. He altered your universe itself,
making it so that you can’t exist within it during that time period. And you
only returned at his behest, after Leona and her friends suffered through a
series of arbitrary obstacles that he believes made for an interesting
story.”
“I think I know where this is going,” Leona interjected politely. “This
corrupted universe is destined to exist two years from now. Our next jump
will take us seven years into it.”
“That’s right,” Thack confirmed. “Mateo, you can’t exist during that time
period, and this team will move on, completely unawares. They’ll do this
just as they did before, but this time, you may not come back.”
“Why wouldn’t he?” Jeremy questioned, almost upset with the messenger, but
knowing that it wasn’t her fault. “Why won’t he come when we jump to...”
“Twenty-two nineteen,” Leona finished his sentence for him. “That’s after
the end of the corruption.”
“Why would he?” Thack posed. “That’s not his pattern. He’s not designed to
jump sixty-three years into the future. He wasn’t born that way, and those
cuffs don’t make him that way. He will disappear when the clock strikes
midnight, and you will forget him, and this time, you won’t have twin babies
to provide the spiritual connection you’ll need to fight for his return.
Because like I said, the Superintendent can’t bring him back. That, Leona,
is something you did on your own, and it wasn’t his intention. He planned on
removing Mateo entirely, and essentially starting a new story that focused
on you. Your babies, and your freewill moved the circumstances beyond his
control. You went against him, and that won’t work a second time.”
“So, what do we do?” Angela asked. “We understand the problem, now what’s
the solution?”
Thack sighed, and they waited patiently for her response. “Have you ever
heard of Westfall?”
“Someone mentioned that once,” Mateo said. “She didn’t say what it was.
Uh...Emma.”
“I don’t want to get into the details, but there’s this theory floating
around that practically every television series exists in the same universe.
Due to one character crossing over to another, and then a character from
that appearing in a third, and this huge complex web of crossovers and
mentions, and whathaveyou, people believe they’re all connected. Well,
they’re not, and Westfall explains why they’re not. Sometimes a character is
just randomly dropped from one universe to another, and it’s due to a
malfunction in The Crossover. The individual is transmitted, has an
adventure, and goes back without ever knowing they weren’t on their same
world that whole time. While the Superintendent actually has a little bit of
access to Westfall—meaning he knows when it’s happened, not that he can make
it happen—he doesn’t have any control over most of the universes that it’s
interfered with. He’s not a writer on any of the Law and Order shows, so he
can’t do anything with those characters, or those worlds.
“Mateo could survive in one of these universes, and then he could slip back.
But there’s an issue. Like I said, the Superintendent can’t move him over
there, or it would defeat the purpose. Plus, Westfall isn’t a consciousness,
or at least it’s not in the same way you, or even I, define it. It’s
probably not random, but it certainly seems that way. If Mateo wants to
crossover...someone has to invite him. This someone would have to be
unconnected to Mateo, or any of his universes.”
“Why would they do that?” Jeremy asked. “You’re saying a writer on a TV show
has to conjure a character named Mateo, and say that he’s the Mateo from
this universe?”
“It doesn’t have to be a TV show, and they don’t have to explicitly say
where he’s from. They just have to strongly suggest it. And again, the
Superintendent can’t write that story. There are lots of people who can
cross universes, like The Prototype crew, and Meliora Rutherford, but those
people can’t help here. It must be someone else.”
“Bottom line,” Leona began, “what do we do? How do we make this happen?”
Thack waited another moment. “I can reach out to other branes, like I’m
doing right now. There are other storytellers who...let’s say, treat their
characters as a little more real than others do. They surrender to the
direction of the story, and don’t try to decide everything that happens. The
character can make a suggestion to the storyteller that Mateo should show
up. Keep in mind that we’re still dealing with time travel, and universes
whose respective timelines are independent from each other, so nothing has
to happen right away from anyone’s perspective but yours. Mateo has to
disappear at the end of the day, but Westfall can drop him off wherever and
whenever it wants.”
“Are you asking us for something?” Leona asked. “It seems you don’t need us
to make this happen.”
“I’m a spirit,” Thack tried to explain with a smile. “I need consent. That’s
what sets us apart. Mateo can choose to step aside, and let the story
continue without him. I can’t make him do anything he doesn’t want to. I
reached out to give you the facts, but you have to ask me for help.”
“We want your help,” Leona said clearly.
Thack chuckled. “I meant that Mateo has to ask me for help.”
They looked at him with a certain assumption. The obvious response was to
let her do it, but it wasn’t necessarily the wisest choice. He wanted to
survive, and to exist, and to be remembered, but there was a chance the
sentiment was only a gut reaction. If there was anything that the last few
weeks had taught him, it was that a rush to any decision was never better
than a thoughtful reflection, and as long of a discussion as necessary. “I
need to speak with my counselor.”
Leona opened her mouth to argue.
“Please...” he stopped her before she could say a word, “respect my wishes.”
Mateo went off to another level to consult Amber in private. A grumpy Leona
sat at the table impatiently. She asked Thack what her husband and the soul
psychic were talking about, but Thack reiterated the part about consent, and
refused to eavesdrop. She didn’t say whether she could eavesdrop anyway.
Mateo had his decision ready ten minutes later, but spoke only to Thack, and
never revealed it to Leona, or his team. They would either find out in
sixty-three years...or never worry about it again.
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