Fluence: Elder (Part VIII)

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They were time travelers, so there was probably no need to hurry away, but there might be. It was unclear how connected they were to their shifted selves. Perhaps every second they spent at one point in spacetime had an impact on the events in another that they couldn’t understand, or determined precisely when they could return to a given place. They watched the butterflies for a few more minutes, but had to focus on the task at hand, which was what exactly? They didn’t know yet. They were just going to go back to Po, and see what was going on there. The four of them came together as twilight was falling, and reached for each other’s hands, but then Goswin stopped, and massaged his chin while he looked upon Briar. In response to this, Briar flinched and leaned back. “Is there something wrong with me?”

“You know what...” Goswin began cryptically, pausing to everyone’s discomfort. “I don’t think that there is. You grew up under extraordinary circumstances, and you’ve improved in a very short amount of time. Do you regret killing Mateo?”

“Of course I do,” Briar said. “What does that mean? Why do you ask now, when we’re about to leave?”

“It means that I think we’ve officially become a real crew—all four of us together—even though I couldn’t point to a moment when it happened. We’ve been worried about shifting to competing realities apart from each other, but I don’t think that’s been happening. Eight Point Seven, you are our Eight Point Seven, just in a new body. Weaver, thank you for letting us into your home. And Briar? I think you’re gonna be okay. You’re one of us now, and I’m going to rely on you just as much as them to help us solve whatever problem we’re barreling towards. Whatever happens, we stick together, okay? Our powers operate on a psychic level. I’m not worried about the abstract concept of identity tomorrow. If we wanna stay together, we will. We can call ourselves The Primes.”

“Others shifted versions of us are probably coming to the same decision,” Weaver!“Prime” pointed out.

“Yes, but it will be true of none of them but us,” Goswin said, knowing that it didn’t make a lot of temporal logical sense.

“I hope you’re right, Captain,” Weaver said.

Eight Point Seven only nodded.

“Thank you,” Briar said to him graciously.

“What was that thing you said to Leona Matic that one time?” Goswin asked Eight Point Seven rhetorically. “You better make like a jock and strap in. Shit’s about to get real.”

They shifted themselves back to The Nucleus, which for all intents and purposes, was the center of the universe. They were not the only ones there; not by a long shot. The place was chock full of their shifted alternates, some running around, others wandering, and some just standing there, some in fear, and some in determination. There were several other people scattered about who weren’t the same as the core four, including Ellie Underhill, as well as her friend, Trinity Turner. They saw a few instances of Cassidy Long, her mother Étude Einarsson, and her mother, Saga Einarsson. They were all about the same age. At least one version of Leona was here, and she was either teleporting around, or different versions were popping in and out of existence like virtual particles. She was stopping only long enough to whisper something to someone, and hear a response before moving on. They didn’t recognize everyone, though. The place was utter mayhem. No one knew what they were really doing, and no one was in charge. Or maybe that wasn’t true.

A catwalk extended from a balcony two stories above the crowd. Four people walked along as it grew longer and longer. They were not alternates of the core four, but entirely different people, and they did appear to be in charge. They didn’t appear evil, but they didn’t seem particularly friendly either. One of them was Tamerlane Pryce, but none of the other three looked familiar. A cursory glance around the room gave the impression that they did not have any shifted selves here, but were each one of a kind. It wasn’t totally out of left field that Pryce should be here. He was present on Thālith al Naʽāmāt Bida when the crew of the X González departed. He was there for a reason, but there must be a reality out there where he finished his work on the planet early, or was perhaps fired for sometimes being an insufferable tool. Where did these other three come from, though?

Pryce held up both of his arms, and slowly lowered them to quiet the rabbling crowd. They did not comply. He jerked his arms back up, and tried again, but still it didn’t work. He looked to one of the women to his flank, and held out his hand. She gave him an object that resembled a bullhorn, and that was exactly what it was, but not a regular one. The Time Shriek was a mysterious scream that randomly echoed across the lands at various points in space time. There was no predicting its appearance, nor anything to do about it. If it interrupted you while you were in the middle of something, you just had to stand there and wait until it was over. This device was evidently capable of summoning the Shriek at will, and even amplifying it. It scattered across the hall, pounding into everyone’s eardrums, causing them to grasp at their heads in pain, and forcing some down to their knees. “Thank you! It’s so kind of you to give me your attention with no incentive.”

“Why can’t we leave?” a version of Briar demanded to know from the floor.

“That’s a good question, random citizen,” Pryce replied, pointing down to him. “It’s because of my good friend here.” He placed a hand on the shoulder of the woman who didn’t give him the Time Shriek Horn. Iolanta Koval is a very powerful metachooser. None of you is in control anymore.”

Iolanta glared at the audience. She reached into her fanny pack, and pulled out some kind of fruit, which she bit right into, rind and all.

“Ha! She’s got an affinity for citrus. It’s a time traveler thing. You all get it. I’m sure you know me,” he went on, “but just in case one of you shifty mother fuckers is from a reality where I don’t exist, my name is Tamerlane Pryce, but to distinguish me from my Afterlife Simulation and Third Rail selves, please just call me The Elder.”

“There’s already a guy named Elder!” one of the Weavers called up to him.

“There are hundreds of people that share your name too, jackass!” Pryce snapped back.” He huffed. “Anyway, as I was saying, this here is Airlock Karen. That’s obviously not her real name, but everyone she thought she could trust on her ship started calling her that, so she’s decided to own it. Similarly, A.F. here adopted his name from his enemies, who never bothered to learn his real name either. He hopes to vanquish them one day, but for my part, I hope he fails, ‘cause they’re good people, but I’m not gonna get in his way. We’re a team, just like the four of you...and you...and you, and you.” He pointed at random groups. Was everyone here always in a group of four exactly, even when they weren’t the core defaults?

“What are we doing here?” a Goswin questioned.

Pryce looked down at him. “I want to join forces.”

“Yes? Go on,” the same Goswin urged.

“Yesterday, I moved a mountain,” Pryce said bizarrely. “I mean that literally. The four of us stood before it, and we made it disappear, only to make it reappear by the end of the episode—I mean, a few hours later. But we didn’t put it back where it belonged. It’s now two meters farther north. It wasn’t easy, but we got it done. Different crews have developed their powers differently, and some of you may have done something similar, or even more impressive. We can alter time and space on a level that no one in histories has ever enjoyed, and I believe that together, we can do even more. We can remake the future to our desires. Notice that I didn’t say whims. They’re not going to be pointless and silly. The mountain was just practice. There is a war brewing in the Sixth Key, I’m sure you’ve all at least heard about it. They call it the Reality Wars because five parallel realities have been forced together into one. Their respective habitats remain intact, but the stars have been consolidated, cutting their available resources by 80%. Can you imagine that? Can you imagine a friend sending you an uncompressed video on your phone, which suddenly dropped your charge from full to 20%? You’d be pissed. Everyone is pissed, and they don’t have a true culprit to blame, so they’re blaming each other. We can help them.” He paused for effect. “We can move them.”

Leona appeared next to Goswin!Prime. “Are you the ones who took Angela?” she whispered to him.

“Who?”

“That’s a no.” She was about to teleport away again.

“Wait. What does she look like?” Goswin asked.

Leona held up her palm. A small holographic photo appeared of a woman that he had never seen before. “A core crew was on our ship, and when they left, she disappeared along with them. She’s not here, so they left her somewhere else in spacetime, but if you don’t recognize her, then it wasn’t you.”

Goswin looked to the other three Primes. “Let’s find her. Just like Misha.”

They nodded. And just like that, Angela was standing next to them. “Oh, thank God,” she exclaimed, taking Leona into an embrace.

“Excuse me!” Tamerlane asked from his balcony. “What’s going on down there?”

“Sorry, sir!” Goswin!Prime answered. “She was just looking for a friend!”

Pryce looked over at Iolanta, and snapped his fingers at the primes. She peeked over the edge at them, and a second later, the whole crew was standing on the platform with the Elder, and the other self-proclaimed leaders. “You just summoned someone here, even with the Time Lid shut?”

“The what?” Briar asked.

“Is that a band, errr...?” Weaver asked sarcastically.

Pryce looked at Iolanta again. “Why are they able to do that?”

She took another bite of her citrus. “They shouldn’t be able to. Not here. Not now.” She shrugged, and tried to take another bite.

Pryce slapped the fruit out of her hand. “That’s your only job!” He pointed at the primes. “Focus on them. Stop them specifically from using their powers!” He faced the primes. “Bring me...a dancing monkey in a hat.”

“No,” Goswin decided.

“Okay, that’s fair,” Pryce admitted. “There’s ethical concern with that. Instead, just bring me a birthday cake.”

“No,” Goswin repeated.

“All right, you don’t want to steal from a kid, I get it. Just summon anything that isn’t already in this asteroid. Dealer’s choice.” He looked back at Iolanta. “Are you blocking them?” he reiterated.

“Absolutely. I can feel it,” she assured him.

Goswin sighed. He hovered his hand over the floor, and summoned Portrait of a Young Man, which was famously stolen by Nazis during the war, and never recovered. He held onto the frame to keep it from tipping over.

Pryce noticeably gasped. “How did you do that? You four didn’t even talk about it? That is the biggest issue within the crews. No one can agree on anything.”

“We’re in sync, I guess,” Goswin figured.

Pryce took the painting, and held it up for all to see. “Witness power! These four have accomplished the impossible: true neural synchronization! This painting has been missing for four hundred and fifty years, and now here it is. They barely gave it a thought. It was probably destroyed in the original timeline.” He gazed upon the Primes. “These versions will be our foundation. They—not I—will lead us into the future, and the past. They’ll stop the Reality Wars, and save all of mankind in the Sixth Key.” He figured that this choice would endear everyone to him.

“How ‘bout no, Scott..okay?” Goswin!Prime snapped back.

“What?”

“You seem to like references,” Goswin continued, “so no. Scotty, don’t.”

“I don’t think I saw that one,” Pryce admitted.

Goswin rolled his eyes, and looked back at his crew. “Don’t tell Scotty, Scotty doesn’t know.”

“Enough,” Pryce declared. “I know that I’ve been cracking a few jokes of my own, but I’m being serious. “We need you. Your powers may be limitless. And you don’t really have a choice.”

“I actually think we do,” Goswin suggested. “I believe that that is exactly what you’re trying to tell us, wouldn’t you say, kids?”

“Yeah, I agree,” Weaver!Prime said.

“That’s what it sounds like,” Eight Point Seven!Prime concurred.

Briar!Prime nodded. “Yep.”

Goswin stepped up to the railing, and looked out over the audience. “Do you all wanna be here? Raise your hand if you do?”

A few people raised their hands.

“Then be free.” Goswin!Prime swept his hands forward from his chest, and all but the ones with their hands raised disappeared. Goswin turned, and swept only one hand this time, causing the famous painting to disappear. “It belongs in a museum.”

“We’ll get them back,” Pryce promised.

“No. You won’t.” Goswin held his hand up again to facilitate his own departure, along with the other Primes, but this A.F. guy took it as a threat. He reached over with a huge compensation knife, and jammed it into Goswin’s stomach.

“What the hell did you just do?” Pryce questioned. “Iolanta, stop blocking powers. We need to get a medic here stat!”

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The Advancement of Mateo Matic: June 15, 2398

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Leona is about to leave after a long day at work when the internal investigator from a couple weeks ago steps into her office. He exhales, lowers her head, and pinches the bridge of her nose, wishing that she had just made her way to the elevator when she had the chance.

“I’m not here to take up your time,” he claims. “In fact, I’m here because I want to give you a heads-up about something that will be happening in the future.”

“What is your authority here again?” Leona asks, not expecting a direct answer.

“Authority Zero.”

“That is a band where I come from.”

“Where I’m from, it’s the freedom to do whatever I want,” he replies.

“Yeah. What do you want?”

“I have a team in Munich as we speak, who have been charged with acquiring a certain object under...shall we say, special circumstances.”

“They’re stealing it.”

“Well, yes...”

“They’re stealing it violently.”

“I can neither confirm, nor deny, the nature of the operation.”

She clears her throat, not wanting to give away the fact that three members of her team are presently in Munich, and they may or may not be involved in all that.”

“There are no more secrets between us,” the Authority Zero Internal Investigator lies. “We know your husband is there. We tapped him for this assignment, but he declined...also violently. We had to come up with an alternative.”

That’s why Ramses isn’t answering his phone. Mateo doesn’t know where he is, but he expressed his theories. “If they get hurt...”

“I take care of my team. I can’t guarantee their safety. We would have to put them in a padded room for that, and even then, nothing is perfect. The point is, Mister Abdulrashid—”

“Abdulrashid.”

“Abdulrashid.”

“Abdulrashid.”

“Abdulrashid.”

“Why can no one in the world pronounce that man’s name?”

“It’s because people in this country are...less enthusiastic about Arabs—”

She interrupts again, “he’s not an Arab, he’s from Egypt.”

“The point is that people around here do not generally associate with people from that part of the world. Pronouncing their words is just not something we find necessary to learn.”

“Ramses hasn’t experienced any racism in this country,” Leona notes.

“There’s a political reason for that. It’s a lot to explain, but people most likely assume he was relocated from the slums as a child. There was a huge push for that a few decades ago. Tens of thousands of children—mostly infants—were rescued from their parents, brought to civilized regions, and assimilated into the culture. Your friend is the right age to have been part of that. It’s interesting he seems to have kept his name, though. That’s not common. Or did he adopt it later out of reallocated loyalty?”

“I knew there were religious issues, but I guess I didn’t realize how widespread the racism was.”

“It’s not racism,” he defends. “It had nothing to do with race. Now, I’m not saying what they did was right, per se, but those kids were living in utter squalor. Their lives are better now. They’re better here. Our culture—across all religions—teaches scientifically proven idealistic life values, which they were lacking in their home country. Again, I didn’t participate in that, but you can’t argue with the results.”

Leona blinks. Racism. What he just described is racism, and he can’t see it. It’s xenophobia too. Because of Marie and Heath, the team was mostly prepared to just live here forever, but every day comes with at least one more reason to get the hell out. “Oh, I certainly can. You give me enough information, I’ll argue until the cows come home.”

“What cows?”

“It’s obviously just an expression. Is that all?”

“Ah, right,” he says. “The object that Mister—uh...what your friend will be securing for us will need to be reverse engineered when it gets here. That’s what you’ll be doing, probably at the start of next week.”

“What is it?”

“You don’t need to know that just yet.”

“Does it pertain to my work, or will it just be a distraction?”

“We hope it will help, actually,” he decides.

He has her by the balls, as Mateo once said. He knows about the team, and he knows about their connection to timey-wimey stuff. Or at least, he knows that they have a connection to something weird. The forger is aware of all this too, and God knows who else. Their only option now is to play ball. It’s the only way to protect Marie. She just has to hope they don’t know about that aspect of their lives. “What’s your name, if not Shady Corporate Authority Zero Interrogator?”

“Honeycutt. Senator Melville Honeycutt.”

Crap, that can’t be good. “It’s nice to formally meet you.” Now she really is going to have to fake being polite to him.

“I assume Leona Matic isn’t your real name?”

She adds more belongings to her bag. “No, it is. We didn’t think there would be anyone we would need to hide from.”

“Why did you need forged papers, then?”

“We required identities, not names.”

“I see.”

“What’s her name, the forger?” she presses, even though she really just wants to leave. “The one who is endangering my friends overseas?”

“Winona. Winona Honeycutt. I call her Winnie.”

Double crap. What is the wife or daughter of a senator doing as a forger in the seedy part of Kansas City? And what is a senator doing interrogating a suspect in what’s meant to be a semi-academic, semi-private laboratory? And how did they find out anything about them in the first place? “If you’re related, then you must know that I’m now pretending to work for SD6, and also that I’m apparently in charge of investigating her forging den?”

He dismisses this with a wave of his hand. “We set it up so that you would become the de facto lead investigator. They won’t find anything at the alleged crime scene, and you won’t implicate my daughter at any rate, will you?”

“No, sir. She’s safe. I just don’t know what to tell the agent and detective. I reached out once to tell them that my lead evaporated, and they have been calling me ever since.”

“I’m sure you’ll think of somethin’. Try to keep them out of it. They’re not part of the inner circle; you are.”

“Very well, sir.” She’s becoming more respectful by the minute. But of course, she still doesn’t trust them, so when she finally makes it home that night, after updating the group chat, she asks Angela to begin running some countermeasures.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: June 14, 2398

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Upon learning that this reality does not have the same sign language inventory as the main sequence, Marie thought it might be a good idea to teach it to Heath in case they ever needed to communicate with each other on the down low. It was a perfect idea, because under normal circumstances, such a language might not be viable. You either come up with a new language on your own, or somehow find one so dead, no one but you and your people know it. Drawing from a history completely removed from the current timeline is a pretty good workaround. The more the team learns about this world, the stranger it becomes. It makes no sense that the majority of the North Atlantic Isles don’t exist, yet English does. Yet American Sign Language doesn’t. Yet something called North American Sign Language does. Someone has to be making these decisions; mixing and matching parts of reality that they like, and leaving out the ones that they don’t. That begs the question, what the hell do these people have against the United Kingdom? And also, how does everyone in the U.S. explain the fact that the language they use is called English? Where does that word come from?

Anyway, Marie taught the rest of the team a few basic signs once they were sure that their superhuman group empathy was no longer a thing. They all now know the alphabet, even Mateo, and a few other words, like yes, no, and pasteurized milk. That last one is even better, because Louis Pasteur was never born, so these people just call it thermal sterilization. They also don’t have the Global Positioning System, instead opting to call it SatNav, which is ironically, the British term for it! So even if this detective figures out that Mateo is using some form of sign language to communicate with Ramses in the hospital hallway, and even if he somehow recognizes the letters to be G-P-S, he will have no appreciation for their combined meaning, nor be able to follow it as a lead.

Ramses flicks his finger in the air to let Mateo know that he understands, but he does it just as the detective is turning around, because he actually does notice something strange about Mateo’s finger movements, and his gaze. Ramses covers by itching his temple, and looking away coolly. Once he’s confident that the exchange has remained sufficiently secret, he takes out his phone, and logs onto the tracking system. Yes, one tracker is unaccounted for. It’s one of the microdots, and it’s presently on the move, which suggests that it has not fallen off onto the sidewalk. That is the problem with them being so tiny. To be hard to find, they have to be easy to lose.

Ramses makes two fists, but keeps his thumbs and pinkies out. He holds them in front of his stomach, and drops them down. Then he holds his palms upwards to make it a question. Stay?

Mateo makes a gesture, almost like he’s knocking on a door to reply with yes.

The detective sees this motion too, but by the time he turns around once more, Ramses is already walking away to track the location of the microdot. He doesn’t know who has it, or why, so he’s going to have to make a few educated guesses—and he’s going to have to do it all alone, so he doesn’t place Marie in danger—but he’s sure that it will all work out in the end.

By the time he catches up with the dot, it has pretty much stopped for the last ten minutes, suggesting that the target has made it to a destination, and is now moving about minimally. He looks around. This particular building appears abandoned, though none of the ones surrounding it are. It’s a relatively busy part of town. He feels all right just opening the door, and walking inside to do a little recon. He sneaks around slowly and quietly. Just because the dot is still a ways away, doesn’t mean there isn’t someone else closer. This place could have been packed with ne’er do wells, for all he knew. As he draws near, he starts to hear voices talking to each other. He can’t make out what they’re saying, but he can tell that at least one of them is upset. The rest are staying calm, so they’re not arguing against each other, per se. He will have to get closer to hear the conversation. Fortunately, he can make out a few words, so it’s not in German. Mission, contingency, and night shift stick out to him. Unfortunately, that’s all he gets.

He feels a blunt object pressing against the back of his head. He built these new bodies with a sort of spidey-sense, so it’s really annoying how this reality didn’t let him keep it. “Go forward,” the voice behind him demands in a transatlantic accent.

“Move ahead,” Ramses responds, still not complying. “Try to detect it, it’s not too late.”

“Huh?” she questions.

He can feel the gun drift from his head slightly, indicating that she’s loosened a little tension in her hand. He spins around, and pins her wrist to the wall. She tries to punch him in the face, but he blocks it, and kicks her in the chest. As she’s falling to her back, her arm slides out from under his hand, and he manages to snag the gun from her. He doesn’t point it at her on the floor, though, because he knows the ruckus has alerted the others. Instead, he backs up to get himself into a defensible position. The group runs in with their own weapons drawn, preparing to fire, but waiting for the go-ahead from someone.

The forger from Kansas City comes in from behind, not holding a gun. “Mister Abdulrashid.”

“It’s Abdulrashid,” he corrects.

“What did I say?”

“Something stupid.”

She sighs. “Lower your weapons,” she orders her team, all of whom comply immediately, without question. “It looks like we have the substitute we’ve been looking for. Thank you for coming, Mister...”

“Abdulrashid,” one of the men pronounces for her in a perfect accent. It’s nice to hear, even coming from a presumed enemy.

The forger smiles. “This operation is back on,” she announces to her people. She redirects her attention to Ramses. “You’re lucky we don’t need an NMA agent for this one, or we would have had to take Mateo out of the hospital while he was still trying to recover. This one does require skill, though. How are you with a sniper?”

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: May 20, 2398

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They asked the McIver family to keep what they learned about the true nature of reality a secret. The kids don’t know everything, and it looked like all the evidence was destroyed in the implosion that created an entire lake out of practically nowhere. It was going to be tough to explain to all the people who lived around there, and knew there was no such body of water, so they decided to go stay with their aunt and uncle in Utah for a bit until things cooled down. They always wanted to sell the land anyway. It’s not like they can manage to farm themselves, and they never really wanted to anyway.

Team Matic can’t be sure that they can trust these strangers, but when have they ever? At some point, concerning themselves with what might happen is just going to make living life even harder. If the government comes to E.T. all their asses, well...then they’ll deal with it then. For now, they’re going to stay at home, and try not to worry about anything at all. It’s a day of rest, and likely the last joint day off for a while. Leona postponed her return to work until next week, Ramses is newly unemployed, Mateo is still unemployed, Heath is already on sabbatical, and Marie and Angela are taking a personal day. They’re not just going to relax, though. They’re going to see the sites.

Moreso than the differences, it’s the similarities that this version of Kansas City shares with its main sequence counterpart that they find interesting, especially Angela. Marie felt the same way when she first arrived, but she’s grown used to it by now. The Fourth Quadrant was borne of the original, while the Parallel had a region that they called KC, but which did not resemble anything they had seen before. The Fifth Division seemed to not have anything on Earth at all, except for a small oasis in the middle of nowhere, at least part of which was holographic. It’s inexplicable and bizarre that this version should have the same World War I Museum and Memorial. It looks the exact same, and is in the same place, and this does not make any sense. WWI happened in the 1910s over there, but in the mid-19th century here; closer to the period of the United States Internal Conflict that the five aliens recall. Even just having the same city and state names is ridiculous. The countries, the oceans; none of it can be explained.

Something has to be driving these similarities, or let’s face it...someone. One or more of the Prestons are the most logical culprits, since they’re definitely capable of such things, but they’re not the only ones. Anyone they’ve met with such power has the potential to spawn alternate versions of themselves, if only through the help of others. Cassidy Long, the Repairman, or any one of the countless Jupiters, could also be behind this. They might be doing it for nefarious reasons, good reasons, or even with more of a neutral stance. Mateo realizes  now that he needs to make a special list of candidates. That doesn’t mean that it will help them get any answers, because it will be a shock to run into anyone they already know. Hell, even say, Vearden Haywood’s sister, Allison would be a noteworthy surprise. But it still makes sense to make a list.

Right now they’re standing in front of the Love Kansas City mural. “You didn’t tell us about this,” Leona almost accuses Marie.

“I didn’t know that the main sequence had one too. I died in 1816.”

“You’ve seen this before, though,” Mateo reminds her. “We came here.”

“I guess I forgot. What do we do with this information?”

Leona considers it for a long time. “What we do is all go on that trip together.”

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: April 12, 2398

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They could spend a lifetime comparing every little difference between the Third Rail, and the main sequence. The Beatles don’t exist, just like a certain movie, except no cognizant singer is going to revive the catalog. Geography is shockingly similar after considering how deep in the past the point of divergence must have taken place. They have evidence of this from the completely foreign botanical world. The trees and plants may look like the kinds they could find back home, but upon closer inspection, they’ve clearly evolved and been bred differently. Even the buildings have a slightly discrepant architecture. It took them a little time to recognize this, because they’ve seen variations before. Every world they go to—be it a planet, a virtual construct, a parallel reality, or even another universe—has had unique design schemes, and this one is no different in that it’s also unique. Now that the team has been here for a few days, they see that technology isn’t as stilted as they once thought. The people here seem to have advanced in some ways faster than others. You couldn’t call it steampunk, but it’s in that same vein.

As far as energy goes, the culture managed to pretty much skip over fossil fuels, and focus on renewable sources. Different regions have different strengths, but wind power is pretty popular. They also have no apparent problem with nuclear power. You’re never more than fifty miles from the nearest nuclear power plant. Despite these developments, space travel is practically non-existence. There are tons of satellites in orbit around Earth, but they haven’t even put a rover on Mars. From what little Angela was able to gather in her capacity as self-appointed team historian, war has been the number one issue globally. Civilization just survived World War VI not thirty years ago. Why haven’t they destroyed themselves in a nuclear holocaust? Religion. Yes, it’s religion that saved them, if you can believe it. All ancient religious texts speak of some kind of sun that’s compressed and trapped in a box, and the venerated few charged with containing and protecting it from evil. While atheism and agnosticism are recently on the rise, superstition regarding these sunboxes only increased once scientists realized that real sunboxes were within their grasp. Never before had a faith been so spot on in regard to something that might happen in the future, with certain sects being eerily detailed with their descriptions of how a sunbox might work.

Unfortunately, there was a major downside to this. Even though multiple religions provided people with the same prophetic warning about nuclear bombs, they failed to generate any other reason for unity. Different kingdoms, nations, and races glommed onto different denominations, and dig their heels in deeper when they perceive a threat from some other. That’s why they keep fighting, and why racism may be worse today than it was in the main sequence circa early 21st century. Angela and Mateo are even more convinced now that they are not the only time travelers here. At least one of them either created the reality itself, or capitalized on an opportunity to mould it to their liking. They may have always wanted society to be like this, or things just got out of hand. Regardless, the team feels compelled to fix it. It’s going to take them longer than any mission has, so they better prepare themselves, do their research, and take their time.

Microstory 1837: Foreign Fighter

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In 1991, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics broke apart into fifteen distinct nations, which thrived independently of each other to varying degrees of success for three decades. Russia was the largest of these by far, and maintained strong political power over the rest of the world. The rest developed their own governmental bodies, and systems of law. In 1994, inspired by these developments, a district of Russia called Sakhaido declared its own independence. Sitting about 400 kilometers from the island of Sakhalin, as a sort of second peninsula branching from the Kamchatka Peninsula, Sakhaido always needed to maintain some level of autonomy in order to function. It once belonged to the Empire of Japan, and still consists of a significant population of Japanese people. The Japanese language is spoken by 24% of the population. Much of the leadership of Russia at the time did not want to let Sakhaido go, since they felt it shouldn’t be necessary, but the president himself did not want to cause any civil unrest, and had to admit that it wasn’t worth using up resources, and damaging their reputation. Sakhaido prospered after that, forming its own democracy, and becoming a hub of international trade amongst the other nations in and around the region. In 2016, a new president of Russia took office, having built his political platform upon strength against both enemies and allies. Russia was meant to be the dominant force in Europe, and he wasn’t happy with the direction his neighbors were going. A few months ago, he decided to attack Sakhaido, but had no intention of stopping there. The rest of the world was going to learn who called the shots, whether he was their official leader, or not. He didn’t need to take Sakhaido over, or any other country. He just needed to make sure that someone was in charge who would do what he wanted. The invasion began.

Nations of the free world condemned the Russian president for his cruel and unwarranted attack on Sakhaido. They made political and economical maneuvers against him, thinking that he would back down when it started causing his people harm. But he didn’t care about his people. They had suffered so much up until now, and they could continue to suffer, as long as he got what he wanted, which was pretty much everything under the sun. The Sakhaidoans held their ground, maintaining a nigh unassailable border between them and the Kamchatka Peninsula, but they could only do so much. They were not prepared for war, they did not have the resources, and they did not have the help. Refugees fled to other countries, nearly all welcomed by Japan, Alaska, and even Usonia, but that didn’t solve the problem of how to save their homeland. Their military force was only so great. They needed additional support. They needed—I believed—people like me. According to my country’s laws, it was not illegal for me to temporarily join the army of another country, as long as the actions I took there weren’t treasonous, and I wasn’t planning on defecting. So that’s what I did. I went across the sea, accepted the gun they put in my hands, and fought for a bunch of innocent people who had never done anything for me. Because I wasn’t just fighting for them. I was fighting for democracy all over the globe, and for justice as a whole. I was fighting for peace. Not everyone was happy with my choice, and I returned home to find no parade, no thanks, no welcome mat. But that was okay, because I know I did the right thing, and this assassin they sent to kill me knows it too, whether he can admit it or not.