The Advancement of Mateo Matic: August 11, 2524

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It wasn’t until the next year when Mateo, Leona, and Angela could safely reactivate their tandem slingdrives. They technically could have left shortly before midnight, but they decided it was for the best. They left a message with the Vitalie who lived on Vitalemus, to relay to the Vellani Ambassador if she ever heard from again. She hadn’t, but had kept apprised of Goldilocks Corridor news, and no one had reported seeing them lately, so no one knew where they were at this point. With nothing left for them here, they made the jump, and returned to the beacon floating around in the space where Castlebourne once was. They weren’t alone. They quickly picked up comms from Ramses, Marie, Olimpia, and Romana. They only had to make a few jumps to rendezvous with each other.

“Gang’s all here,” Mateo mused.

“How did you get back here?” Angela asked the other half of their team.

“You were taking too long,” Ramses began to explain. “We decided to come back here to see if you were stranded after failing to track Castlebourne’s new location. The rest is obvious. We were just about to come find you on Vitalemus.”

“Did you put a pocket dimension in the buoy thinking Romana would be able to use it?” Leona asked.

“No, that didn’t occur to me,” Ramses replied. “It was just a failsafe if something went wrong. With no other habitable structure around here, there needed to be some way to survive, like if you had a stranger in tow with a less advanced vacuum suit, or no suit at all. As it turns out,” he went on while tapping a piece of the buoy that he had separated from the rest, “it was necessary.”

“Is someone in there?” Leona questioned.

“You’ll see.” That was a weird way to put it.

“Can we all go back to Castlebourne together now?” Mateo asked.

Ramses shook his head. “I’m afraid this was a one-way trip. Hrockas scrambled the tracker from his end. Where they are by now is a mystery. I could probably write an algorithm that could predict their movements using their last known location. The choosing one he’s using to push the host star around is powerful, but she has her limits. They can’t be all the way to the outer arm of the Milky Way, or something. But we would have to leave something behind to keep trying to track them...”

“Or I could do it again,” Romana volunteered.

“No,” Mateo countered decisively. “I don’t want you breaking your pattern ever again.”

“Do we really need to find Castlebourne at all?” Marie asked the group. “We were trying to leave it at one point.”

“That’s true, I remember that now,” Mateo affirms. It was the closest thing to home they had ever had, but it was always going to end eventually. It was supposed to end a long time ago, but they got sidetracked with all that Pacey-Underburg stuff, which kept them tied to Castlebourne for a bit longer.

“Do you want to try another aimless jump?” Romana offered.

“And end up back in that hellhole?” Leona added. “No, thanks.”

“It wasn’t that bad,” Romana reminded them. “I liked the outfits.”

“You could always wear that kind of outfit, whenever you want,” Leona said.

“True,” Romana replied. She shed her suit, and shifted her nanites to a 1950s-esque dress, not exactly like the kind she wore when they were oblivious and trapped in Underburg, but similar.

“Put your suit back on,” Mateo shouted.

Romana couldn’t reply in the vacuum, but she could still hear via conduction, yet she pushed the back of her ear forward as if she couldn’t even do that. After her father pointed at her with stern determination, she switched her suit back on. “Geeze, Papa Bear,” she joked. “Rambo’s got me covered. That man knows his way around a woman’s body.”

“Goddammit!” Mateo complained. “Don’t say things like that!”

“Okay, okay,” Leona jumped in, as she usually had to do when those two were at it. Romana knew how to push her dad’s buttons, and Leona knew how to put a stop to it, which was to change the subject as quickly as possible. “Let’s just go back to Earth. I’m feeling a little homesick. And it was home for all of us at some point, though not technically the same version of it.”

“That’s a good idea,” Marie concluded.

Ramses looked at his forearm readout. “My coherence gauge is in the Orange, where are you?”

“We just arrived, so it’s still Red,” Leona answered. “We won’t be ready to jump until nearly the end of the day, probably.”

“I’m doin’ a bottle episode!” Olimpia suddenly shouted.

“I was just thinking about that,” Angela said. “Not the bottle episode thing, that’s nonsense. “We should call it slinging. Why are we calling it jumping?”

“Seconded,” Romana agreed.

“All in favor,” Mateo posed. They raised their hands. “Motion passes. New lingo established.” He paused for a moment. “Great, that entertained us for all of ten seconds. What do we do in the meantime? And don’t say RPS-101 Plus. I don’t like playing in my suit. I can’t control my objects right.”

“You just say that because you consistently lose!” Olimpia teased.

“Mah-ri?” Angela began, “why are you looking around?”

“Oh, we just made a decision to go to Earth,” Marie replied. “That’s usually when God laughs and intervenes.

That was true. Everyone started to look around too, but found only space. The sudden intervention she was talking about didn’t usually happen when they were actively looking for it...kind of a watched pot never boils sort of thing, but it was still prudent to check.

“Do you guys realize there are three wars?” Angela offered. She opened the floor up to anyone, but no one responded. “The Exin Empire, the Sixth Key conflict, and those dragonfly aliens. I don’t know if you’ve realized this, but we’ve been switching between them. Once we close one chapter of one book, we start the next chapter of one of the other two books.”

Ramses glanced down at the piece of the buoy he attached to his chest. Only Mateo noticed, and he chose not to address it.

“Yeah, you’re right about that, aren’t you?” Leona asked rhetorically. “We just closed one of the books, but we don’t know which one we’re about to open, if either of the others.”

“I am curious about what’s going on with the Sixth Key,” Marie admitted. “It’s been a long time. I spent some years in one of those worlds.”

“So did I,” Romana said, referring to having grown up in ancient Third Rail.

“But the Ochivari are so fascinating,” Angela insisted. “We could end up in any universe, dealing with any new, unfamiliar culture.”

“Well, we might be able to trigger the Transit to show up if one of us makes a declaration that we want to fight in a cosmic war, or join the military,” Marie suggested.

“Let’s not do that,” Leona volleyed.

“Then the Sixth Key it is,” Angela responded. “Raise the sails! Navigate us to the aperture!” She pointed in a random direction. It was a little funny, but nobody laughed. They just fell silent for a time.

“That lasted us another five minutes. How’s everybody’s coherence? Mine’s still in the Red. Do we all have to be Green, or...”

“Maybe not,” Ramses explained. “I would feel safer if we were, though. I would feel even safer with Violet.”

“If you’re bored, we could just go into stasis for a few hours. It’s not bad in here. I found it easy to wake back up when they found me.”

“Well, yeah, Rambo knows his way around a woman’s body,” Olimpia echoed Romana from earlier.

“I want a divorce,” Mateo said, joking, but...clearly not happy for real.

The seven of them continued to hang out there while they waited for their coherence gauges to rise up to acceptable levels. They mostly held onto the buoy to stay close to one another, but occasionally, one of them would push off and float around. They could always return by utilizing their maneuvering thrusters, or just teleporting back. That was what gave Romana the idea to play hide-and-seek. It was a dangerous version of the game, which not everyone in the galaxy would be able to play. Because space was empty and black, the chances of finding someone just by the naked eye were incredibly low. They could use their heat signatures instead, but then detection would be incredibly easy. The only way to do it was for each hider to shut off their own life support systems, and stay in one place for long enough for the seeker to find everyone else first. They could still use their comms, but they would be untraceable. Some of them could withstand the cold for longer, and were better at hiding. Others were caught when they just couldn’t take it anymore. At this point, they could try to teleport away, but the seeker could always jump right to them wherever they ended up.

They played the game for a couple of hours before noticing that the same people were winning each time. It was always either Mateo or Ramses, which made this whole thing feel very unfeministic. Even though Ramses supposedly built their superstrates equally, it seemed as though the women got colder faster, just as they would if they were simply wearing business clothes in an office. The coherence gauges still weren’t Green for everybody, but they were sick of playing around, so most of them just took naps. They floated aimlessly there in the black, mostly apart, though Mateo and Olimpia held together like the two lovers they were. Leona was working on the self-destruct sequence for the buoy. Instead of bringing it with them, they were just gonna blow it up, so no one could have any hope of finding any information on it. It took a lot of time and work to engage the explosives. This was by design, so it couldn’t be switched on incidentally, or when the user wasn’t thinking rationally.

Finally, the last of them turned Green, and it was time to leave. Ramses woke everyone up with a calm, but crescendoing, song. They teleported back into a group, and magnetized their suits so they could watch the explosion together. It was a bit anticlimactic because of how fast and efficient it was, but still something worth seeing. They synced up their slingdrives, and with one final goodbye to the Castlebourne that was no longer there, they slung away.

They landed on the surface of what they assumed was Earth. They quickly detected a breathable atmosphere, and were able to recede their nanites into regular clothes. This did look like Earth, but perhaps one from long ago. Earth didn’t really have any cities anymore. They just lived in arcological megastructures, and some seasteads, if they weren’t just orbiting from space. They were on a street, though. The buildings were sleek and advanced, but just too dense for Earth in this time period. People were staring at them, including parents trying to hold their children close. A man approached them cautiously. “Do you mean us harm?” he asked.

Leona stepped forward. “Absolutely not. We’re travelers, attempting to return to Earth.”

The man looked over his shoulder at the crowd, and then back at Leona. “Never heard of it. How did you do that thing with your clothes?”

“Have you heard of other...” Leona trailed off. She slowly darted her eyes side to side, looking for the right way to word this. Unfortunately, the beginning of her sentence might have painted her into a corner. No, she could figure this out. The Prime Directive applied here until she determined otherwise. “...other cities.”

“You mean on the other side of the tunnels?” the man guessed. “Yes. We don’t interact with them, except to exchange some technologies sometimes.”

Tunnels. Leona looked up at the sky, or what appeared to be a sky anyway. She pulled a small swarm of nanites over her eyes, and used them as sensors. “Yeah, that was definitely a hologram, and they were under a dome. Goddammit, they were back on Castlebourne, and in some kind of simulation. Wait.

The man looked up at the sky too, trying to figure out what she was so baffled by.

The dimensions were off. This wasn’t one of the Castlebourne domes. It was too small. Not by much, but other than the ocean caps, and a few rare exceptions, all Castlebourne domes were pretty much the exact same skeletal design. Where would they be where people would be living under a dome, but alarmed by their use of nanite technology. She looked back at the stranger and breathed. “Have you heard of Proxima Doma?”

“Yes,” he replied. “We don’t know what it means.”

Leona looked back at the rest of the team. She just regarded them for a moment, trying to decide the best course of action. There was really only one. They couldn’t teleport, and they couldn’t explain their odd behavior. The locals wouldn’t understand, and it would break their worldview. “Run.”

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The Fourth Quadrant: Hard as a Rock (Part I)

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In the beginning, there was one gargoyle named Oliver Spout. But then his pattern spread to three others. For the four of them, every day at sunrise, their bodies would slip into a stasis bubble, which essentially sent them forwards in time however long was necessary to reach sunset. For the rest of the world, hours would pass, but for them, only seconds. The length of daylight shifted throughout the year, so they always hated winter more than summer. Things got a bit wonky when their, Kansas City, was copied into the Fourth Quadrant parallel reality, leaving two of them on the original nighttime schedule, while the other two ended up only experiencing daytime. They eventually became the Presidents and Vice Presidents of this new world, sharing responsibilities across the diurnal cycle. Half a century ago, a team of heroes came to their reality, and gave them the technology they would need to break out of their patterns. Their consciousnesses were transferred to new clone bodies, freeing them to live at all times of the day. It was after this that Andrei was born to Skyler Spout and Kostya Orlov.

They all assumed that Andrei would be born completely normal. After all, he was the product of two clones whose pattern had been supposedly successfully stripped of them after they were downloaded into new bodies. Unfortunately, some of his mother’s gargoyleness seems to have been hardcoded into her DNA. While she never fell back onto her old pattern, Andrei grew up to experience one of his own. He has some choice in the matter, but not always. While his family’s perceptions of time were being slowed down to a fraction of a fraction of a percentage of what it should be, his perception is altered by a very minute amount. It only slows him down to about 99% of realtime. But during this time, Andrei is as hard as a rock. He can’t move, he can’t be moved, and if he’s not lying down when it happens, he’ll become incredibly fatigued while he’s waiting to return to the fray. Unless someone is there to help him out.

Selma Eriksen is the Vice President of the Fourth Quadrant Earth. After Princess Honeypea transports them from their neighbor’s penthouse on a planet called Hockstep, she looks over to find that Andrei has become stuck in one of his bubbles again. This can happen when he travels to a new world, but not always. It’s difficult, if not impossible, to predict when he’ll get stuck, or for how long. They’re standing on the manicured grass next to a fast-moving stream or river. Boats are tied to the bank, but she doesn’t know what kind they are. They kind of look like old, wooden motorboats, except there’s no motor. They’re surrounded by flowering plants, non-flowering plants, shrubs, and short trees. From what they’ve been told, this is a nature preserve of some kind, so this whole place could be designed with intentional obsolescence to protect the wildlife. “Nuadu, can you help me?” Selma requests.

“What’s wrong with him?” Nuadu asks.

“He’s stuck in a bubble. It’s not good for him to be standing up like this.”

“Put him in one of the broads,” Honeypea offers. “I thought you might like to take the scenic route to the Citrus Inn. I didn’t know this would happen to him.”

“Why would we go to an inn?” Cosette questions. “We’re not staying.” 

“You’re not speaking with the Magnolia until he’s ready...and he’s not ready,” Honeypea explains. “Everyone into the broadfloats. Four per. One on each needs to steer the rudder in the back. It’s pretty intuitive.”

Selma and Nuadu lay Andrei down on the floor of the boat. Since he can’t sit up, no one else joins them. Selma keeps an eye on him while Naudu steers. The steering section is raised up a little, so he can see where they’re going while still seated on his little perch. The river takes them in the right direction, but he has to navigate around rocks, limbs, and little whirlpools. The two rows of seats before him could probably fit six additional people total, but there may be a weight issue. If this thing has a rudder, it can’t sit too deep in the water.

The inn is wooden and rustic, with no electricity, but it at least has running water. It has no apparent means of climate control, but no one feels that this is necessary. The whole world seems to be sitting at the perfect temperature. The beds are simple in design too, but the mattresses are modern and comfortable. They’re not animals. Princess Honeypea tells everyone to get settled, because it could be a while. The Pryce Tree is a unique lifeform, the origins of which no one here knows much about. Trying to understand his motivations and sense of time would be a waste of their time. Fortunately, they have been assured that they are not wasting it just by being here. The garden is located, not only in another spatial dimension, but also temporal. They should be able to pick up right where they left off when they return to the Sixth Key.

Selma wishes they could have just spent a few nights here before, back when they were being isolated to protect the timeline, and then gone back several months later after the danger had passed. No one else is bringing that up, though, so she’s not going to rock the boat. Something strange is going on here. The magical tree’s power is awe-inspiring, and if there’s some other entity out there that rivals its might, that could be a real bad thing, and they could be in real big trouble, as could all of reality. They just have to hope that something can be done about it.

They reluctantly retire to their respective new rooms, and try to get some sleep. Selma is sharing one with Andrei. He doesn’t like to come out of his time bubble alone. It’s not typically she who has to wait on him, but she’s all he has right now. His relationship with Ayata is still too new for them to spend the night together, even though there’s nothing romantic going on here at any rate as Selma chose this particular room for its two beds. When she wakes up to use the restroom, she passes by him again, and sees that the bubble popped at some point, but he’s still asleep. If he’s in the right position, he can sleep while he’s in there, but it’s reportedly agitating, and he prefers to be able to change positions, and get comfortable. She takes care of business, then goes back to bed, waking up with the eastern sun a few hours later.

Andrei is hovering over her with a cup of tea. “Get any rest?”

She’s still groggy. “I should be asking you that.”

“The answer’s yes. Thanks for taking care of me. I should have liked to see the sights on the way down the river, though.”

“I’ll remember that next time,” Selma replies. They have a decent rapport, but they actually don’t know each other all that well. In the Fourth Quadrant, the President and Vice President run for office separately, and once the election is over, they operate independently, living and working on distant islands. This is done for practical reasons. If something should happen to the President, the VP shouldn’t be there to suffer the same fate. The whole point is that she’s the backup. This is the most time they’ve ever spent together.

Andrei takes a sip. “The princess thinks that the tree’s about to talk. Best get dressed, and grab something to eat. They have citrus here.” Citrus didn’t exist in their reality, and that’s because it didn’t start out as a full-fledged reality of its own. It was a pocket dimension at first, and citrus fruits can’t travel between the dimensions. All the lemons, limes, and oranges exploded every time a new region was expelled to it, both on the trees, and elsewhere. Grocery stores were a mess. That was their biggest concern when they were negotiating for their interests during the Rock Meetings. The other civilizations had citrus because they were really just from another timeline that ran concurrently with the main sequence. Selma and Andrei were not super satisfied with the results, but they had little to offer their opponents. But if there’s a way to get what they need from here, without the help of the rest of the Sixth Key, they might end up in a better position moving forward.

Selma gets up and dressed in a tunic that she found in one of the dresser drawers. Wearing it isn’t a requirement, but most everyone else in the group made the same decision, because they’re soft and convenient. General Medley is still wearing his IMS. He says it’s versatile, but it looks restricting and itchy. She’s never worn one before. Again, the Fourth Quadrant was once only a collection of pocket dimensions. By the time it was upgraded to full reality status, space travel was too much trouble with no projected rewards.

While Selma and Andrei, and a few others, are still eating breakfast, Princess Honeypea walks into the communal area. “The Magnolia will see you now. I will escort you upriver to the Confluence.”

“Can those broadfloat things do that?” Kalea Akopa of the Parallel asks.

“We’ll take the airboats,” the princess clarifies.

They climb in, and speed back up the river, past where they first appeared, and into what has to be what Honeypea was talking about. It’s this big open area of water, where even from their low vantage point, they can see other rivers moving off in other directions. In the center is an island of roots underneath a giant tree. They really weren’t kidding when they kept calling him that. They have only ever seen him in his human form. Mysterious blue glowing fruits are hanging down from the blue leafed branches. At the base is a gravestone where monarch butterflies are fluttering about. They stop by a flat and level part of the arboreal island, and step out one by one.

As soon as the last person gets out, the boat drives away on its own, and the human form of the Magnolia appears. Tamerlane Pryce wasn’t a good guy when he was just a regular person, but this is just what the tree chooses to look like, for whatever reason. It’s not really him, though...not anymore. They were never given a whole lot of details. He steps forward. “I apologize for the delay, but I was seeking information. I know what our issue is now, but I don’t know how to solve it.”

“Is season two of our unauthorized reality show moving forward?” Andrei asks.

“I hope not,” Pryce replies, “but as it stands, I can’t stop it.”

“Who’s doing this to us?” Cosette demands to know.

“She calls herself The First Explorer. She claims to have witnessed the big bang, and while she did so through some form of time travel, I believe that she sees herself as the first being to exist in the whole universe. This universe, that is; not Fort Underhill.”

“What does she want?” Selma presses.

Pryce Tree takes a moment to respond. “She’s convinced that she’s at war with Fort Underhill and the Sixth Key. She perceives you as a threat. She’s more powerful than I am, I’ll admit that...but she’s not more powerful than me and The Nucleus.”

“The Nucleus is a place, not a person,” Nuadu insists.

“That’s what you think.” Pryce sighs. “Still, we won’t be able to do this alone. We need human agents to accomplish some of our goals. Any volunteers?”

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The Third Rail: Rocked Back on One’s Heels (Part III)

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Today is the day. It’s the final episode of the Rock Meetings. Once it’s over, the rest of the universe will be up-to-date on everything that happened to the reality representatives months ago. It’s been a frustrating experience, having to stay on a prison planet this whole time, but they’ve not been alone. Not only did a few of them forge new bonds with each other, across the proverbial aisle, but the whole group has stuck together. They’ve formed a support structure which will solidify their positive diplomatic relations moving forward, even more than the official discussions on the Vellani Ambassador ever could. There, they were coming at it from a sense of antagonism. Here, they’ve been free to be themselves, and just regular people. Cosette and Nuadu’s relationship has blossomed, as have Ayata’s with Andrei Orlov. No one’s getting married anytime soon, but things are going well. There’s a lingering question of how these relationships will hold up once they’re back where they belong. They’re literally from two different worlds. Will society allow them to be happy?

They’re all in one room now, in Andrei’s penthouse, just because it happens to be on top of the central tower of the building. If they need to meet at all, the typically choose here, and mostly only for this reason. This time, it’s for a watch party. It surprises them that it’s the finale, since the discussions were technically over in the last episode. The only part that the broadcast hasn’t shown yet are their goodbyes to each other. It was the whole thing. Everyone on that ship was required to shake hands with, or hug, everyone else. Which one a pair chose was at their discretion, but they had to do something to express cordiality and gratitude. Something along these lines had to be uttered as well, like thank you, or I respect your position. This finalization ceremony involved not only the handful of delegates with stake in the matter, but also the other related representatives, the crew of the host ship, and the mediators. It added up to 24 people in total, which resulted in 276 farewells. This alone would have made for a boring final episode, so that’s not all that’s happening on screen. While the farewells are going on in the background, final thoughts from the reps have been sprinkled in, through a mix of off-screen narration, and testimonial footage.

As the seek bar marker inches closer and closer to the end, it becomes apparent that Cosette’s words will be the ones to conclude the series. Ellie Underhill says one last bit about how happy she is to share her universe with the residents of the Sixth Key, and then the video transitions to Cosette sitting in the booth. The farewells are over, and it’s just her, smiling regally at the camera. The Cosette from the present day who is watching the playback doesn’t even recall what she is about to say here. “I think what we learned from these discussions is, not that we all have competing interests, but that our interests actually align. While each delegate came here to represent the interests of their own people, I believe we all realized that there is really no such thing. Each former reality was made up of a collection of individuals within communities within subcultures within larger cultures within worlds. No one has the right, nor the fundamental ability, to advocate on the behalf of everyone they care about, and only them. The only way to get anything done is to make the determination that all peoples deserve happiness and prosperity. When you only value what you have in comparison, or from the loss, of what others have, you end up with nothing of use, because you’ve lost the importance of working towards the greater good. There is nothing greater than all-inclusivity.

“I’ve heard a lot of people, in Delegation Hall, and from the public responses, saying that we’ve made progress, or sometimes that we’ve not made enough. But the truth is that the latter is closer to the truth, because we’ve not truly done anything yet. The true test will be in the implementation of our ideas, and the consequences that come from the social changes that we envision. It’s easy to talk about our ideals from a round table, and through interactive polls, but far more difficult to put in the work day in and day out. This is going to take time, and it’s an ongoing process, which will require tweaks, revisions, and a changing of the guard. I, for one, am excited about what comes next, but I’m not ready to call us a success. Maybe I never will.”

No one has ever heard these words before, except whoever was involved in the editing. As the cast and credits for this reality show roll, the delegates nod at Cosette. Nuadu pats her on the back. She doesn’t think that it’s that big of a deal In hindsight, she would have rather been given time to craft a more succinct answer to the Magnolia’s last question, but what’s done is done, and now it’s all done, and they can finally go home. Something else is happening, though. After the playback chevron marker reaches the far right end, it begins to spin. At first, it stays in place, rotating forwards, but then it begins to rotate backwards while moving back to the beginning of the seek bar. This is usually the graphic that runs when autoplay is on, and there’s another episode. But this shouldn’t be this case, as this is the finale. Or is it?

The Magical Memory Magnolia Tree that has taken the form of a man named Tamerlane Pryce appears on screen. He was part of the discussions, and responsible for recording and broadcasting them to the public, but he didn’t make very many appearances in the show. He wasn’t too involved in the negotiations either, since he considered himself an interested third party, and the supervisor. This must be some kind of bonus clip. It’s only a couple of minutes long. “That concludes season one of The Rock Talks. And now I present to you a sneak peak...of season two.”

“What the shit?” General Medley of the Seventh Stage exclaims.

A trailer for the second season begins to play, with the Magnolia as the narrator. “On a world...built for criminals and protected witnesses, a group of nine diplomats will find themselves trapped together in a prison of their own making. To protect the cosmos from a temporal paradox, they’ll sacrifice their normal daily lives as civilization moves on without them. They’ll have to learn to live together in paradise, unable to leave, but given all the tools they’ll need to live safely and insulated from outside influence while the greater population fights to protect their future from decisions made by the delegates in the past.”

This is all intercut with b-roll—including shots of the various worlds now crammed together in this half of the new universe—and quick out-of-context bits of dialogue. “I know how to raise an army,” Ingrid Alvarado of the Fifth Division says.

“You don’t know a damn thing,” General Medley says, making it look like he’s responding to Ingrid, even though those two comments were made weeks apart, and not even in each other’s company.

“I think I might possibly, in at least some ways, be falling for you,” Cosette says. While Nuadu’s back is to the camera, viewers can probably guess who she’s talking to.

More completely unfair, and highly edited, remarks are put on display for people to make assumptions about before the tree comes back. “Drama... Intrigue... Romance. Nothing will ever be the same. Season Two of The Rock Talks, coming September of 2449, only on MagnoliaTV.” The last thing is a live shot of the delegates. They’re all staring at the screen in shock. Andrei’s second-in-command, Selma Eriksen lifts her hand up, and begins to wave it around to make sure that—yep, this is definitely live.

Cosette stands up, and points to the invisible camera hidden somewhere by the screen. “Turn it off, now. End the feed.”

Maybe as a coincidence, or maybe out of obedience, the trailer ends, and the screen goes black. Ayata grabs the remote, and escapes from fullscreen. Comments from other viewers are flooding in. Everyone wants to know what’s going on, and whether this was planned, and if the subjects of this docuseries consented to more scrutiny. They did not. Cosette certainly doesn’t need her experiences on Hockstep to be broadcast for everyone to see. It is an invasion of privacy. They were all very personal, and she had no idea that she was being recorded. No one is above the law, not even a magical tree.

Cosette steps away from the group, and begins to talk into the aether. “I demand immediate audience with the Memory Magnolia. We need to talk about this season two bullshit right this instant.” She waits, but there’s no response. They don’t know if he’s listening to them right now, but probably. There’s a chance that he severed the connection, or it could be that he only turned it off for the nine of them. The rest of the universe could still be seeing all this happen in realtime for all they know. That’s why it’s such a violation. They have the right to know when they’re being watched, and when they’re safe and alone. Everyone has that right. It’s inalienable. “Answer me. Right now!” she insists.

No one else is trying the help, not because they’re apathetic to the situation, but because they trust her to handle it for them. The tree is mysterious and powerful. If he doesn’t want to respond, he’s not gonna respond, no matter how many people express their outrage at this travesty. Cosette continues to speak out, but nothing is happening.

“Maybe we should go to your pocket dimension?” Andrei suggests. He has spent a lot of time in Cosette and Ayata’s penthouse, in order to get to know the latter. “Do you think we’re safer there?”

“It’s not a bad guess,” Cosette replies, “but it’s probably pointless. I bet he can see us anywhere. He lives in another dimension himself. And he’s...a sentient tree. How do we argue with that? How do we fight it?”

“You don’t,” comes a voice from the entrance. It’s the Magnolia’s cohort, Princess Honeypea. “You also don’t need too.”

“Explain,” Cosette urges.

“That may have looked like the Pryce Tree, but it wasn’t him,” Princess Honeypea insisted. “We didn’t record you nine on this planet. It’s none of our business, and we wouldn’t dare risk the security of you, and everyone else living here. Another force is at play, and I promise to do everything in my power to get to the bottom of it.” She’s usually quite bubbly and delightful, but she’s very serious right now, and a bit unsettlingly stoic.

“What can we do?” Cosette asks. “How do we protect ourselves, and our pasts? Can we get this show cancelled?”

“At the moment, what you can all do is come with me,” Princess Honeypea offers. “Whoever is responsible for this, I assure you that they cannot reach you in the Garden Dimension. The tree will protect you.”

Cosette looks around the room to gauge everyone’s reactions. They don’t know what to make of this, but they seem to feel that Princess Honeypea’s idea is the only viable option. Cosette would have to agree. She looks back. “Okay, let’s go.”

They’re overwhelmed by technicolor lights, and spirited away to the Garden.

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The Third Rail: Rock the House (Part II)

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Generated by Google ImageFX text-to-image AI software, powered by Imagen 3

They have TV here. They’re able to watch the broadcast of their Rock Meetings, if they so choose. Each episode is about an hour long, and one episode streams per day. At this rate, they’re going to be stuck on this prison world for about eight months. Fortunately for the representatives of the five realities, they’re not in any of the prison facilities. It’s a big planet, and an entire small continent has been devoted to witness protection instead of incarceration. It’s a little odd, to protect people on the same planet as the people they may need to be protected from, but it’s not a completely wild idea. Back in the Third Rail, there was only one inhabited planet, so witness relocation programs always worked like this. In fact, witnesses were rarely ever moved outside of their respective countries. There are no boats here. Any prisoner who wanted to reach a witness would have to first break out of wherever they’re being kept, then build themselves a raft. It would take them months to make it across the ocean, assuming they didn’t get caught anywhere. On the other hand, if they have access to a spaceship, it probably doesn’t matter anymore whether they have to go to a different planet or not.

Some witnesses in the program are a little more dangerous than others, so the continent has been further broken up into cities. The representatives are in the most luxurious of them all, designed for VIPs, leaders under grave threat, and in hiding, and others who need a little more consideration. Ramses was right, the accommodations are pretty good here, but Cosette doesn’t regret insisting on bringing her personal pocket dimension with her. This is her home, and it’s where she feels the most comfortable. She has installed it over the door of one of the closets in her realspace penthouse. Ayata is the one living out there instead, serving as a gatekeeper for visitors or attackers, but otherwise taking a vacation from her duties as an assistant. That’s what she’s meant to be doing anyway. “Tea and seaweed crackers? It’s a local delicacy.”

They’re by the water, about 300 meters above the surface. Each tower sits on top of the base, which grants access to a dedicated elevator and emergency stairwell. Only the structure at the top contains living space. The towers are structurally connected to one another, but there is no passage between them. You would have to go down to the first floor, and walk across the lobby, to get to another tower. “Ayata, I brought you here so you could have a break, not so you could keep working for me,” Cosette tries to explain for the umpteenth time. I thought it was a pretty good excuse, since there’s always work to be done back on Earth, so we’re always so busy. There is no business to take care of for the time being. Just relax.”

“I don’t...like doing nothing,” Ayata admits.

“Have you ever tried it?”

“Not really.”

Cosette sighs. “Do you know where that seaweed comes from?”

“The ocean?” Ayata asks in a half-question, unsure if she’s taking the full meaning here, or not.

“That ocean right there.” Cosette points through the windows. They’re not exactly real windows. They are viewscreens which are showing what the real windows see from the penthouse. They would have to leave the pocket dimension to look through them for real. “Why don’t you synthesize a sexy bikini, go down there, and sun yourself on the beach? Maybe meet someone new.”

“Ambassador DuFour,” Ayata scolds.

“Not to breach sexual harassment policy, but I remember wishing that I had shown my body off more when I was your age.”

Ayata was born in the Sixth Key. She doesn’t know what the world was like before the Reconvergence. “You can be my age if you want,” she reminds her boss.

Cosette leans her head against the backrest, and tilts her chin to the side. “I think I’m done age-shifting. I deal with people from the Parallel and the Fourth Quadrant so much, and they cured aging ages ago. It’s just not really much of an advantage anymore. Maybe it never was.”

“So which age are you going to choose? This one?”

She’s presently expressing the mid- to late thirties, which is still a bit older than how Nuadu appears. “I think so. It’s a good middle ground. I’m old enough to be respected, but young enough to be accessible.”

“And you’re not unattractive,” Ayata says with a smile. “Not to breach sexual harassment policy.”

Cosette smiles back.

“This wouldn’t happen to do with a certain military man who lives next door, would it? The one who’s always coming over to do his rounds?”

“He’s checking the perimeter,” Cosette reasons. “He’s been trained to be a protector.”

“No, he’s been trained as a killer. Those are the kind of soldiers who rank up to high leadership positions. He only comes over to see you.”

Cosette scoffs quietly, and shakes her head.

“How about this? How about you age yourself to seventy or eighty, and ask him to stay for dinner. Cook him a real meal; not synthesized, and give the room some ambiance. If he’s responsive, and engaged in conversation, he’s interested in you as a person, not just for your looks.”

“Maybe he’ll just say no, and I won’t learn anything. It won’t even necessarily be because of my apparent age.”

“He can’t say no,” Ayata reasons. “You’re going to cook for him to say thank you for all he’s done. He’s on vacation, so he doesn’t have anything to do. If he comes up with an excuse, I guess that’s your answer.”

“I haven’t cooked in a long time,” Cosette reveals.

“Well, I’ll help you. I like doing things the old way sometimes. I’ll probably be in charge of ambiance too since your taste is a little...”

“Bland? Is that the word you’re looking for?”

“Hey, you said it.” There’s a ring at the elevator downstairs. They look over at the security monitor to see Nuadu waiting patiently in the lobby. Ayata smirks. “Heh, it’s kismet.”

“House, let ‘im up,” Cosette instructs. They continue to watch as the doors open, and let Nuadu inside. He rides up to the top, walks inside, and is about to knock on the closet door when it opens. “Nice to see you, Harbinger.”

“Ambassador-at-Large,” he replies cordially.

“Would you like to come in for some tea and seaweed crackers?” She’s suddenly struck with a sense of relief that she and Ayata stopped to talk about the crackers first, before diving into them. They still look all nice and untouched.

“I really shouldn’t stay too long,” Nuadu says apologetically. “I’m afraid I woke up too late this morning, and I’m a little behind schedule.”

This looks like a pretty good opening. “Well, perhaps you can return this evening for dinner? I’ve been looking for a good excuse to cook.”

“Yeah, that sounds great.” He says it with a bit too much enthusiasm, but he knows if he tries to backpedal now, the drastic shift in tone will only make him look even more eager. So he widens his eyes, freezes up, and waits for Cosette to continue the conversation instead.

“Great! No pressure, but think about what you like to eat, and text me a message later. Include your dietary restrictions, of course. Maybe within the hour?”

“I can do that, thanks.” He looks over at Ayata. “And will the lovely Miss Seegers be joining us?”

Ayata stammers a bit. “I have a date with the, uhh...God of the Sea...tonight.” She smiles awkwardly. “I’m going on a walk. My boss says I work too hard, and she’s making me take a break. Away from here.” Nice save.

Cosette hopes that her comment doesn’t make Nuadu uncomfortable. Perhaps he missed Ayata’s emphasis on the word I. “You don’t have to if you don’t want to,” she says to Ayata, under her breath, but obviously loud enough for everyone in the room to hear.

“I believe that you will enjoy the beach at night,” Nuadu adds. “There are some bioluminescent sea creatures that come out after dusk. I don’t know what they are, but Andrei Orlov of the Fourth Quadrant likes to watch them. Perhaps you could meet up with him.”

“Thanks, I’ll give him a call.” Ayata points over her own shoulder. “I gotta go into the other room now.” She points at Cosette. “Unless you need something first.”

“No, that will be all, Ayata. Thanks.”

Ayata nods reverently, then walks away.

Cosette waits until she’s gone before admitting, “I’ve been trying to get her to slow down for a while now. We just kind of had a tiff about it. She doesn’t really understand that she’s not here to work.”

“I get where she’s comin’ from,” Nuadu replies. “I’m still workin’.”

“But you know you don’t have to, right? The Tanadama installed automated sentries all over the place. You passed at least two of them on your way here from your tower.”

“I know, but I just kind of...like to see the people.”

Cosette nods. “Well, I’ll let you get back to it.” She points towards the door as if he’s just about to leave.

“Yeah, I’m gonna—” He motions to the side of him.

“Right, right. You always start in the...parlor.” Her voice softens in a gradient as the sentence goes on. She steps a little to the side so he can do his made up job.

He does what he needs to do, inside the pocket and out, and then he leaves to run a security sweep of the other towers. Or maybe he never does that, and he only ever comes here. Cosette has never asked any of the others about it, and they’ve not brought it up on their own. They don’t interact all that much. If they didn’t grow up accustomed to the isolation of self-sufficient living, the last week they’ve been here has given them the requisite experience. That was evidently a major issue in the Parallel and the Fifth Division. Avoiding congregating in large groups was easy in the former, and in some cases, vital to survival in the latter. As the more seasoned diplomat of them all, perhaps she ought to take it upon herself to make changes to that. They’re going to be here for so long, they should get to know each other better.

Night has fallen, and the hour of the date—or non-date—is quickly approaching. Cosette is putting the finishing touches on her decorations, which she decided to do in realspace, instead of her pocket dimension. She didn’t end up accepting help from Ayata, save for a few minor tasks, and some constructive criticism. If this was going to mean anything, it had to come from Cosette, or he may as well be on a date with Ayata. Was this a date? Would he say as much? She’s about to have her opportunity to gauge his feelings based on his reaction to all this. The mood lighting alone will be hard to ignore. There’s an elevator notification. He’s early, so she’s not quite ready. Instead of wasting more time on more matches, she uses one of the lit ones to light the rest, and it occurs to her that this is how she should have done it the entire time, and she’s kind of an idiot. How did people live like this in the past? She was going for a classic, rustic feel, but it has been a lot of work. Will he appreciate the retro look, or will he be super confused since his civilization has just about always had robots and spaceships. Oh my God, she’s thinking about this too much. Answer the door. Answer the door!

She races to the security panel. “Come on up!” She tries to hit the elevator button, but she fumbles. Then she fumbles again. “Goddammit.” She finally hits her target, then taps the intercom button again. “Okay, now! Sorry.” As she’s watching the graphic of the elevator fly upwards, she remembers that Ayata suggested she look like an elderly woman to see if he’s here for her, or for her looks. Now she’s not so sure if she wants to go through with that. He’s almost here, she has to make a decision. Will it just throw him off? Will it be too distracting? Her age-shifting is a choice, she’ll look like an asshole if she’s all wrinkly and gross. He’s getting closer. She’ll have no excuse, or will she? Can she come up with some believable reason? Can she do it in the next five seconds? Four, three, two, one.

The elevator doors open, and Nuadu steps into the penthouse looking at a 55 or 56 year old woman. He’s shocked, but maybe not bothered? He looks her up and down. “Wow, you look gorgeous tonight.”

“Do you really think so?” Though she compromised on the aging, she’s not come up with a plausible explanation for not being thirty at the oldest. She ought to make herself look as hot as possible.

“Yeah, that dress is beautiful.”

“Thanks, it’s conventionally made, not synthesized.”

“I can tell. It doesn’t look...too ordered; cold. If that makes any sense.”

She smiles. “Come on in. Can I take your coat?”

“Yes, thank you.”

They have a nice dinner together. Though the food is not synthesized, as she promised it wouldn’t be, she didn’t exactly churn her own butter either. The penthouse came equipped with a number of advanced cooking tools and machines which her people never invented in the Third Rail. Though it’s certainly too early to say that the two of them are in love, it feels safe to acknowledge that it was indeed a date. The way he was looking at her, he’s definitely interested in something more. At one point, she gradually started aging herself up, and he didn’t bat an eye. After they were done eating, they retired to the sitting room for tea, at which point she caught her reflection in a decorative mirror, and asked whether he even noticed that she was 75 at this point. She explained that it happens on its own when she’s not being careful, and he told her that he didn’t care. There’s definitely something between them, they just need time to explore it. Luckily, they have eight months for that.

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The Third Rail: Rock of Ages (Part I)

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Generated by Google ImageFX text-to-image AI software, powered by Imagen 3

Cosette DuFour is much older than she appears. When the temporal dam in her reality broke in 2399, she was on her deathbed. The doctors didn’t think that she would survive the night. A wave of temporal energy spread all over the globe, changing some people into something new, and giving them extraordinary abilities. At the eleventh hour, she was granted new life. Her body and mind were reverted to that of a newborn infant. She believes that this was no coincidence, and that time chose her specifically to absorb this kind of power. She was turning 100 at that very moment, and very well could have been breathing her last breath had the wave not miraculously saved her. It took a few days, but her memories started coming back to her, and she was able to muster up enough brainpower to age herself back up again. She wasn’t 100 years old anymore, but she wasn’t a baby either, who couldn’t string two syllables together. It was time to get back to work.

Cosette served as the longest running Ambassador-at-Large of the Global Council of Earth in what would come to be known as the Third Rail parallel reality. She was well-respected by members of competing religions, nations, and independent sociopolitical factions. That was how she made it to such an esteemed position, because the appointment-election angered the fewest number of people around the world. She retired from the job when she grew too weak and old, but after her physical rejuvenation, there was a rejuvenation in her support. The world had changed, and quickly changed again when reality quite literally collapsed, and the whole planet was shunted off to a new universe. The people overwhelmingly chose her to lead them in these difficult times. That was why she and her second-in-command were picked to represent the interests of the Third Rail population during the Rock Meetings.

Everyone thought that Carlin was in charge here, which is exactly how she liked it. She found it easier to allow others to believe that they had some control over her, and the rest of the room. She regularly employed this as a strategy in her past as a negotiator. In any good negotiation, all parties leave disappointed. But in a great negotiation, they all leave thinking that they came out on top. There was no one better in the world at making this happen than Cosette. When the realities combined during the Reconvergence, and she found out just how many people there were out there, she learned that her expertise extended above them as well. She continued to be the best of the best, and despite the fact that the Third Rail had the second smallest population of all, her people regularly won out over the opponents. They didn’t know it, though. They all thought that they had won, whatever they had negotiated, but the truth was that the Third Rail Earth held so much more power than anyone realized.

Time powers were the best thing to happen to the Third Railers, especially for the Ambassador-at-Large during her second term. Her age-shifting ability came in handy quite a bit, before the Rock, and during. Cosette sometimes needed to be taken seriously, so she turned herself into an elder, but she sometimes wanted to be underestimated, so she showed up as a teenager. Most of the time, she just wanted to feel healthy, which meant being in her mid-twenties. That’s how she is at the moment, back to where she feels more comfortable. She’s also finally back home right now, in her own personal pocket dimension that very few others have access to. It’s been a long time since she’s been able to place her head on her favorite pillow, and she certainly deserves the break.

The interdimensional intercom beeps. “Sir?”

There ain’t no rest for the wicked. Cosette lets out a frustrating sigh. Then she swings her arm over, and smashes the intercom button on the wall. “What?”

“There’s someone here to see you. It’s the representatives from the Parallel.”

“Tell ‘em to bugger off.”

“Um...you just did,” her assistant replies.

“Great, then it looks like we’re done here.” She turns over to her other side. “DuFour out.”

“They say that they have the tools necessary to access your pocket.”

“Let ‘em try,” Cosette offers. “Having the power to do something doesn’t give you the right to do it. It will still be breaking and entering, and I will be within my rights to protect my home by force. You’re in the Third Rail now, kids, and you’ll honor our laws.”

“They say—”

“Goddammit, never mind!” Cosette growls, and hops out of bed. She wraps a robe around herself, then reluctantly walks over, and out the door. “What do you want?”

“Um.” It’s the rep from the Parallel who wasn’t in the Rock Meeting. He is half of a duo who call themselves the Tanadama. They lord over their people like gods. It all sounds very sacrilege. “We were looking for the Ambassador?”

“That’s me,” Cosette explains.

“You’re not a little young?” the other guy questions. She can’t recall his name at the moment since she’s so tired and drowsy, but he was at the meeting instead, and is responsible for a profoundly huge army. 

Cosette grabs her assistant’s desk mirror. They’re right, she looks about eight or nine years old at this point. It’s only now that she realizes how big the robe feels on her. That’s the point, not for the robe, but for the bed. A king-sized mattress feels even more gigantic when she’s under four feet tall. Her body must have reyoungified itself automatically. “That’s a little embarrassing.” She transitions herself to age 24 instead. “There. Now what do you want?”

“You’ll have to come with us,” Ramses Abdulrashid claims. “You’re in the past, the Rock Meetings haven’t happened yet for the population as a whole.”

She looks over at her assistant, who confirms this, mostly with her eyes, but also a nearly imperceptible jiggle of her head. “Well, what are you gonna do about it, send me to the future?”

“That’s illegal on all worlds,” Ramses reminds her.

“Then I suppose you’re going to put me in protective custody?” Cosette asks, using air quotes. “I’ve heard many a dictator use that as an excuse to get rid of their political enemies.”

“I assure you, they are quite comfortable accommodations,” Ramses insists. “It’s important to prevent a paradox. The meeting only lasts a month. Then you’ll go back to your life. Just think of this as a long vacation.”

Cosette laughs. “Why is it I understand time better than you? The diplomatic discussions lasted a month from our perspective. We talked for about eight hours a day. We received regular input from our constituents during that time.”

“We really shouldn’t be talking about this,” Ramses urges.

“I’m trying to tell you that the talks last longer for these people than for us. The Magnolia Tree didn’t broadcast for eight hours every day. He broke it up into smaller episodes, to give people time to digest the information, and give well-thought out feedback. You’re gonna be putting us in isolation for a lot longer than a month.”

“Why didn’t you tell me that?” Ramses questions his General, or whatever the guy’s military rank is.

“I didn’t know,” Zima answers. “I suppose it makes sense. Looking back, it would have been practically impossible to sort through the public responses as quickly as they were coming in for us.”

Ramses shakes his head like there’s a bug in his hair. “It doesn’t matter. It may actually be even more vital now that you hide yourself away. Isolation is the only answer to this, again, since time travel is illegal everywhere.”

Cosette sighs. “I suppose you’re right. There’s a protocol for this. When leadership becomes unavailable, the next in line will step up.”

“We appreciate your cooperation,” Ramses says graciously.

“My primary assistant’s coming with me.” She faces Ayata. “You think your intern can handle the office while we’re both out?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Okay,” Ramses says. “What about your boss, Carlin McIver.”

Ayata can’t help but snort at the suggestion that Carlin is Cosette’s boss.

Cosette smiles at her, then looks over at the Parallelers. “Mr. McIver is not my superior. I’m his.”

“That’s not how I was to understand it,” Zima argues.

Cosette ages herself up into her eighties, and pats him on the head. “That was quite the point, sonny.” She goes down to her early forties. “Just let me go get dressed, and pack up my house.”

“You can’t take your dimensional generator with you,” Ramses tells her. “It’s a security risk.”

“Oh, I understand,” Cosette begins, “you thought I was asking. Let me say it slowly. I’m packing my house, and taking it with me. I had to spend a month in the garbage template dormitories that the Vellani Ambassador provided us. I’m not going through that again, now that I know it’s coming. I’ll be sleeping in my bed, in my house, and if you don’t want me taking it to your prison world, then I’ll just stay here. We’re not in the Parallel anymore, and you’re not a real god. You can’t tell me what to do.”

Zima holds her arm out to block Ramses from stepping up, even though the latter had no plans to do such a thing. “Could I please come in and inspect it, from a security standpoint? You have experienced security sweeps, haven’t you?”

Cosette closes her eyes, and nods her head at an angle. “I appreciate the need for caution.”

“First,” Ramses jumps in before they can leave. “We still need to know where Carlin McIver is.”

“The way I understand it, he stayed in Stoutverse.”

“I don’t know what that is,” Ramses admits.

“It’s another universe, not Salmoverse, or Fort Underhill.”

“Right, I didn’t get to that point of the story yet,” Harbinger Zima says apologetically. Yeah, that’s his military rank. Harbinger. What an odd choice.

“Are you sure he never returned to the Sixth Key,” Ramses pressed.

“It’s time travel, Mr. Abdulrashid. “No, I’m not sure. He could have been gone for trillions of years, only to finally return five seconds ago. I’m not in charge of his daily routine. He operates mostly independently. I have too many other responsibilities to worry about his whereabouts.”

“We don’t have to find him,” Ramses explains. “We just need to make sure that he doesn’t create a paradox. If he’s gone, it should be fine.”

“Great,” Cosette says before leading Harbinger Zima into her pocket.

“How expansive is this?” Zima asks once they’re inside.

“The interior is roughly 300 square meters. The garden is about 150. It uses artificial grass, and doesn’t have any real trees. If you’d like, I can turn off the holographic projections, so you can see it all at once after you sweep the rooms.”

“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” he decides. He begins to go through all the rooms, looking in closets, and under beds. He’s very thorough with it, making sure there isn’t any eavesdropping equipment, or people hiding in dark corners. She follows him the whole way, making sure that he doesn’t plant his own devices, or do anything with her belongings. Finally, at the end, he asks her to take him to the back. Once they’re in the simulated outdoors, he stares at the beautiful false environment, including the fake sky above.

“It’s overcast. Is it overcast outside in this area of your Earth?”

“It’s not based on real world conditions,” she responds. “I just like the gray. I find it to be a calming presence after a long day. It feels like the clouds are protecting me, even though of course, they’re not really there at all.

He nods, and continues to enjoy the view. “May I ask, ma’am, how old are you? I only ask because you have the ability to shift your apparent age. Verters are a rare breed where I come. Most applications for age-shifting are rejected due to the sheer number of requests. I’m not sure why they don’t adapt the process to mass-producible technology.”

“I had to go on a diplomatic mission in the 2430s without an FTL ship. They put me in stasis for a couple of years, so I reckon I’m 147.”

He nods. “Me too. How did I know that? It’s like I could sense a kinship?”

“I thought you people were all thousands of years old.”

“We keep making babies. My dad chose to make a new clone 147 years ago.”

“A clone? Are you just a younger version of him?”

“I am no less a son—and an independent person—than you are a daughter to your own parents. I don’t share his memories. I think he’s just a narcissist who likes the way he looks too much.”

Cosette giggles, hopeful that she isn’t being rude and inappropriate. “Are you satisfied with the security of this home? Can I pack it up?”

He stared at her for a moment. “I didn’t notice you, during the Rock. You were just a kid, and you never spoke.”

“That was by design.”

“I must say, I prefer you like this.”

“Okay.” That was a weird thing to say.

“Is it hard?”

“Is what hard?”

“To find companionship? You can’t relate to anybody? I mean, no one else is as old as you are. I don’t mean to say that you’re old. I mean, by a lot of people’s standards where I’m from, you’re super young. Not to say that you’re too young. But, I mean, you were a teenager when we met. Which makes it a little weird. I’m sorry I’m rambling, I’m just a little nervous around you.”

“What’s your first name?”

“Nuadu.”

“Nuadu,” she echoes. “I was married for seventy years. They died of age-related diseases. I haven’t even thought about dating since then, even once I gained the ability to shift my age. I’ve been too busy working.”

“I see.” He nods. He’s worried that he’s crossed the line.

“I suppose I can’t rule it out.” Cosette turns around, and places a hand upon his shoulder for a few seconds. “Come on. Your god-leader must be waiting. Let’s go to prison!”

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