The Advancement of Mateo Matic: June 24, 2109

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Mateo had his face buried in his hands. Literally everyone on the island was standing around in a jagged semicircle.

“It’s not that we don’t believe you,” Leona said. “We just want to understand. What were these buildings?”

“There were several of them,” Mateo tried to explain. Our mansion from Kansas City was here, there was a movie theatre-slash-video store. Téa, you were responsible for a clothing shop where salmon could jump in briefly and get what they needed to blend into their new surroundings. And Samsonite, you...you were a teacher. The Historian and The Archivist moved their operations over here. My God, why doesn’t anyone remember?” Probably more than any other emotion right now, Mateo was feeling furious. He didn’t imagine these last couple weeks. The buildings were real. Baudin was real.

“And one man built all of it? By himself?” Mateo’s once-father, Mario was likely exhibiting a healthy level of skepticism, but it just made Mateo more angry. This was coupled with the fact that Mario never did find a way to remember Mateo from an alternate timeline.

“Yes!” he screamed. “Because he has superpowers! Like so many of us do. I don’t know how he did it. He cut off his leg and jammed the bone into the dirt, and then a building would show up. Maybe he was just creating some sort of temporal bubble, I don’t know!”

“Okay, honey,” his once-mother, Aura tried to say. “You don’t have to yell. We can figure this out.” She didn’t remember Mateo as her son either, so hearing from her wasn’t all that comforting.

“Gilbert, Gilbert.” Mateo thought of an idea. “You have to remember him. You were him once. You possessed his body and you helped Meliora construct The Sanctuary.”

“What’s that?” Gilbert asked.

“It’s a special place that nearly all time travelers can’t enter. It was designed to protect humans who were in danger from people like us.”

They just looked at him.

“Oh, come on, you have to remember Sanctuary!”

“There is no Sanctuary.”

“Good, Gilbert. That’s good. You remember movies. So it’s not like you people can’t fucking remember anything!”

They were clearly not super happy about his use of foul language, but they could all tell that voicing their concerns would not be the best use of their time.

“Darko, you remember The Cleanser at least, right? He’s your brother...kind of.”

“We all do,” Horace confirmed. “Gilly killed him a few years back.”

“And The Warrior killed his sister, Nerakali, right?” Mateo asked. Whoa, that was weird. He remembered that happening, but could also remember experiencing a night without that happening. Maybe his friends’ weren’t the only ones whose memories were being messed with. He was being affected too. What else was he missing? Was this even real life? Does he even exist?

“Yes,” someone responded. He couldn’t even tell who it was since he was deep in thought.

So some things were the same, but others weren’t. “Saga, Vearden.” He stood up and approached the door-walkers. “You remember building the Colosseum, right? I mean, the replica. I experienced three tribulations there. Or was it two? I’m not sure if Glaston’s pocket dimension was part of that.”

“We do remember,” Vearden said. “Was this Baudin guy part of that?”

“No,” Mateo said. “I’m just trying to get a baseline.” He turned around and started pacing. “Xearea, how did we meet?”

“You forced your way into my house and protected me from killers.”

“Why were the killers there?”

“Apparently I piss them off in the future. I never really did learn why.”

“How long have you been on the island?”

She briefly shook her head, not understanding how he didn’t already know. “Well, I’ve been here ever since. That was, what, ten years ago?”

“What are you talking about?” Mateo questioned. “You’re the Savior! You haven’t been on the island, you’ve been teleporting around, saving people’s lives!”

“Mateo,” Leona spoke up again. “She’s been here. We’ve all been here. This is our island. You came her first in 2014. The rest of us followed over the course of the next few decades. Occasionally, they let us leave. Xearea was the last.”

Mateo closed his eyes, trying and failing to find patience. “So we’ve never been to Antarctica? Or Australia? Or Mars, or Iceland, or 1945!”

“You remember us going to 1945?” Leona asked, eyes wide.

“Well, no, I guess only Gilbert and I were there. But that’s what started everything in this reality. I killed Hitler—”

That got some eye rolls. Killing Hitler was not something you just throw out there casually and expect people to trust.

“I can see that you don’t believe me, at least not about that part.”

“Now, hold on,” Aura began, “that’s not fair. We are really tryi—”

“Zip it!” Mateo interrupted. “I can see now that someone somewhere somehow created yet another reality. This is not what happened for me. We’ve not been stranded on an island like...like...”

“Like LOST?” Saga suggested.

“Yes, like LOST,” Mateo agreed. He took a deep breath and composed himself. He was indeed finding his calm once more. If this was another reality, that meant it could be reversed. He didn’t know how, or who would help him, but he knew it could be done. “Darko, if we’re lost on this island, then we had to come with things from Earth. Like our clothes. Can’t you thread someone’s shirt, or something, and take us home.”

“My powers of object threading were turned off the moment I arrived,” Darko explained. “I’m stuck here too.”

So that was out. How convenient for whomever made this all happen. “Paige?” Mateo asked simply.

“I don’t have any pictures. My powers might still work, but there’s nowhere for me to go.”

Strike two.

“Saga and Vearden, these huts have doors.”

“They do,” Vearden agreed. “So what?”

“Have you tried walking through one and ending up somewhere else?”

“Why would that work?”

So apparently, Saga and Vearden weren’t door-walkers in this reality. They must have just been apported to Tribulation Island, and had no memory of being anywhere else. When they built the Colosseum, they did so here, so that explained why some things happened the way they did before, but not others.

Mateo sat back down on his log and scanned the crowd. Darko and Paige were their only hope. Everyone else was a salmon, and had no control over their patterns. Not that it mattered all that much. At best, they could get them back to Earth, but what he needed were answers. He needed to find a way to his reality. Or did he? Was this best? Who was to say say this reality was any worse than the other ones he’d seen? Maybe the only answer to this problem was to stop thinking of it as a problem. There were still a few things he needed to know, though, either way. “Who is Kivi Bristol?”

“You don’t remember me, father?” Kivi asked.

“I just met you yesterday,” Mateo replied.

“You’ve known me for years. I’ve been here the whole time too. I’m your daughter.”

He sighed again. “Same same, but different. Very well.”

She was holding back tears, but did a pretty good job of hiding it. Presumably she had all these memories of getting to know her father, but he had no idea. Was this what it was like to be his parents? Was this karmic retribution for killing Hitler and doing this to them? No, karma wasn’t powerful enough for this, not in the world of choosing ones. It had to be them. But who? Who was angry enough for that? With time travel, it could be anyone, even someone he had not yet met, like with Xearea’s attackers.

Everyone looked around awkwardly, not knowing what to say. It wasn’t until then that he realized that there was one face he didn’t recognize. Was this it? Was this the man who was doing all this? The man caught his eye and made a subtle motion for them to talk alone.

“Okay. Everyone is really stressed out right now, and I can see that the things I’m saying are upsetting everyone. Maybe I’m remembering an alternate reality, maybe I came from one. Maybe someone gave me false memories, or maybe it was just a dream. Regardless of the truth, I’m tired, and I feel like I need to be alone. Please...carry on with whatever you were doing on an island with nothing to do.”

They were hesitant, but everyone did eventually wander off, not quite sure how to deal with his problem. The stranger started heading for the treeline, looking back once more to make sure Mateo understood, but Leona was still there.

“It’s okay,” Mateo said to her. “I really am fine. I just need some time.”

“I’ve seen what these people can do, my love. When I told you that I believed you, I wasn’t just patronizing you. I don’t doubt for one goddamn second that something has been changed, and that the person who did it wants only you to remember. You can tell me anything. I promise that I’m on your side.”

“I can’t tell you how much of a relief it is to hear that from you, Leona.”

“Were I you,” she said.

“Were I you.” As she went for the beach, Mateo went off to catch up with the stranger, grabbing a pointy stick on a whim.

“You got my message,” the man said once he was sure no one else was around.

“You did this. You did this to me! To them! So what do you want from me? How have I slighted you that I don’t even remember, or haven’t even experienced?”

“It’s nothing like that. I’m not the one who screwed with your memories, but I know who did.”

“Oh, do you now? And how might that be? How come you and I are the only ones? I don’t even know you,” he spit.

“You don’t know me, but I know you. My name is Lincoln Rutherford.”

“What did you say?”

“I’m Lincoln. I too hail from an alternate reality. I was Horace Reaver’s security guard, back when he and Ulinthra were working together. My adopted daughter, Meliora accidently sent me back along with him.”

“They say you helped me. They say you stopped Reaver from hurting me many times, and that you protected my family too.”

“I did what I could. I wish I could have done more.”

“Did you ask people not to mention you to me.”

“I did, yes.”

“Why?”

“It seemed appropriate at the time.”

“That was Reality One,” Mateo tried to work out, “so to speak. You ended up in Reality Two, but then I went back to 1945 and created Reality Three, erasing everyone’s memories of Two. How come it is that you remember it?”

“I remember all realities. It’s my chosen one power. I see everything...except when it comes to spawn. That’s why I don’t always understand you, because Leona is in the way.”

“How convenient.”

“I suppose there’s no real way to convince you that what I say is true. I recognize that you’ve been tricked by both Zeferino, and Gilbert.”

“This isn’t about them. This is about me and you, baby. If you can tell me what happened, I may just start to trust you. Who’s responsible for this?

“It’s Arcadia.”

Of course.

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Protector

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Now that you’ve seen a few of these personalities, you can look them up and find out where they come from. They’re used in what’s known as the Keirsey Temperament Sorter. If you read a few of the descriptions, they might seem familiar. That’s because it’s closely related to the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, which is probably more famous, and older. Both of them do a great job of categorizing people into sixteen different types, however there are differences. I prefer Keirsey—not because he uses more creative type names—but because it focuses less on each bullet point for a given personality, and more on how those characteristics interact to form a whole person.

I’ve taken the test a few times and gotten different results each time. That’s why I ultimately created a seventeenth personality for the story I’m writing that involves these. I call it Consultant, and I will not be giving it its own entry in this series (partly because I don’t have the space). Basically, the Consultant role variant expresses personality traits from all other types. I don’t mean that they pick and choose a few traits from a few types; I mean all of them. After doing significant reading into these types, I noticed that I myself identified with a lot of them. I feel like a Supervisor, because I appreciate standardization and rules; but I also feel like a Teacher, because I’m creative and abstract. I don’t feel like I fit well into any category, but I’ve found that most people do. I know that sounds pretty  self-aggrandizing, but that’s not really what it’s about. This system works. Not one of the personalities is better or worse than any other—nor do they diminish the concept of individuality—but they are rather accurate and helpful in describing social interconnectivity.

I might be more like a Counselor than any other. Indeed; Counselors most closely resemble my description for Consultants, but I also tend to lean more towards the Protector variant. I have a deep, almost obsessive, need to protect the people around me. When I see someone crossing the street, I hope that traffic is slow enough to allow me to watch them, and make sure they get to the other side safely. I’ve developed a desire to learn medical skills, not so much that I could heal people, but so that—wherever I am—I know that someone can help alleviate a medical issue to some degree. Protectors do not necessarily contribute to the progress of society, they often let others handle that. What Protectors do is keep the world safe, so it survives long enough to enjoy social and technological change.

Still, there are other aspects of the Protector variant that do not effectively describe me. Protectors regularly perform other people’s jobs, and complete tasks that others don’t really want to do. Though I have a strong work ethic, if I don’t feel like a job really needs to get done, then I either won’t do it, or I’ll do it grudgingly. I kind of have a problem with motivation and procrastination, which makes me a little like an Inventor. Which in turn makes me more like a Consultant.

The Protector character in my story exemplifies all facets of the type. She steps up on her own accord to become second-in-command to the group leader, even though she was not selected. The two of them disagree with each other more often than they agree, but they both value each other’s opinions and perspectives. They have a great deal of respect for one another, and eventually fall into a healthy rivalry that supports the group’s efforts, because it promotes balance, and prevents closed-mindedness or tunnelvision. The Protector, however, is not as worried about the group’s mission, but is instead concerned for the people themselves. She always makes sure everybody has what they need, and schedules time to speak with each and every one of them so that she understands what their concerns are. She is always looking for ways to improve their situation, and I would say that she succeeds in her goals, even if only for a limited time.

Microstory 490: Crafter

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The Crafter is the resident computer expert. His mind can process massive amounts of data, which are exceedingly difficult for him to forget. Furthermore, he understands the concept of causality so well that it borders on precognition. He is extremely quiet and speaks only when contributing something he feels is important. In fact, he has spent entire strings of days not saying a single thing to anyone else. He often forgets how much smarter he is than others, which frequently leads to a gap in communication. He sometimes has trouble knowing what is important to say, because he assumes others have already came to the same conclusion. He regularly speaks in half-sentences that are either setting up—or finishing—a thought he had in his own mind. Whenever he finds himself in a new group of people, he usually attaches to one particular person. Most of the time, there is at least someone around who can sort of translate his thoughts for the rest. He doesn’t even always have to speak to that person for them to understand what he’s going for. In this latest situation, that person happens to be The Architect, whom he grows closer to than anyone he’s met before, including his family. Though he appreciates efficiency, he is flexible, and willing to accommodate other people’s needs. Rather, even when he has an idea of how to proceed, and can’t fathom doing it any other way, he can at least acknowledge other people’s perspectives. He works incredibly hard to make sure everyone around him is on the same page, even if it doesn’t seem that way to people who don’t “get” him. He has magnus degrees in data management, computational systematics, cognitive science, and linguistics. He has a sub-magnus degree in network security.

Microstory 489: Supervisor

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Right from the start, the founder of the renegade group could see that the one eventually known as Supervisor could be a great leader in her own right. Early on in the ordeal, she would submit to others, but she ultimately had little choice in whether people looked up to her or not. She ends up sort of falling into being responsible for managing the details of the day-to-day operations, while the other appointed leaders plan the overall goals of the group. Her focus is mainly on the short-term, and she finds herself drawn to directing the people themselves, rather than policy or outreach. Her honesty and high standards have gotten her into trouble in the past, but everyone now seems to find it refreshing, necessary, and a vital force for good. Unlike nearly everyone else, by the time military service came on her radar, she had only earned a technical certification in team management. As young and inexperienced, however, as she appeared to be, she is actually quite knowledgeable. She has already been through more than most people do in centuries. Her only true confidant is her partner, whose connection and relationship with her remained a secret for quite a long time. They did not join the military for the usual reasons, and it is these secrets that give her an advantage over their enemies. The Supervisor is the most dedicated and loyal member of the cause. When others begin to doubt their resolve, she interferes and reminds them what they’re fighting for. She believes in rules, but more so in people, and trusts them to either follow procedure accordingly, or come up with better ideas. It’s true that she likes to push her agenda, but that agenda always aligns with the greater good, and so she doesn’t limit herself to her own perspective. She might be the greatest unsung hero in the history of the universe.

Microstory 488: Inventor

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Like I said with the last one, some of these titles will be more literal. The Inventor is one of these. If ever something needs to be repaired, or built on the fly, she is your girl. She seems to know more about what’s going on than she lets on, frequently dropping hints as if under the assumption that people already know what she knows. She needs others to ground her so that she does not abandon a project in excitement for another one. Because of this, her workspace includes a number of half-done inventions that she finally finishes and uses later, but only when and if the need arises. She tends to reject traditionalism, preferring instead to look for new, improved, and especially interesting, ways of getting things done. She has a goal towards universal efficiency. Even if she doesn’t actually operate like this herself—often jumping into new projects without any sort of planning stage—her creations are designed to ultimately increase the end user’s speed and accuracy. Others like her for her ability to both be social while recognizing that not everyone is like her, but also know her to be absent-minded. The longer her friends know her, the more they accept her quirks, and the more they love her for them. She has magnus degrees in astrophysics, quantum dynamics, plex mechanics, radionics, and engineering, as well as a sub-magnus degree in matterology. She has studied a plethora of other subjects on her own time too without ever bothering to earn formal recognition for them.

Microstory 487: Healer

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All right, so I’m still not sure how I’m going to handle all of these personalities, but for now, this is what’s up. I’m going to talk to you about a character I’ve created who’s known the Healer.  A few years ago, I started writing a story set in another galaxy a very long time ago. No, really, it’s longer than you think—and I’m certain it’s much longer, and much farther, than that the events in that other galaxy you’re thinking of. Why’s they humans? Unlike that other franchise, I can explain...just not yet. Please note that these personality titles are based off a particular psychologist’s model. That doesn’t mean that the character who holds a given personality actually carries the most obvious job associated with it. That being said, the healer of this story actually is a healer. Just to add some level of mystery to this whole thing, though, I won’t name names. His life path was chosen for him at a young age. In fact, he was born on a planet that prides itself in contribution determination. Through genetic analysis, and early development testing, scientists have decided that they know what kind of person someone is going to grow up to be. And so they’re raised with that assumption in mind, and this pigeonholing is rarely challenged. For them, it seems to work, for no one more than for the man in question today. He is naive and excitable but was given little time for social interaction as a child. He can be a bit bipolar, switching from bubbly to down right mean, unable to tell the difference between lightheartedness and rudeness. Strangers will find him vulgar while his friends generally give him the benefit of the doubt. He has magnus degrees in neurobiology, physiology, cytogenetics, and diagnostics. He has a sub-magnus degree in robotic surgery. Magnus degrees are the equivalent to doctorates in this galaxy. They use separate terms to avoid ambiguity. They use separate terms in order to avoid ambiguity. This is something our planet ought to consider, in my opinion. Understand also, however, that people in this galaxy live much longer than we do, so the fact that he holds four magnus degrees isn’t as impressive as it may sound. It’s quite low for his age. That’s not to say that he isn’t intelligent, just that he ultimately dedicated himself to military service, which limited his educational pursuits.

Microstory 486: Composer

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I’ve spoken before on the fact that I ended up deciding that I wanted to do more series, and fewer standalone stories on this site. In reality, I don’t think I’ll really ever go back to the way it was in the beginning. Sure, the Dreams series will include a hundred different dreams, but they’ll still all be dreams. The problem with this plan is that the solar calendar doesn’t really make this easy. I end up with dangling remainders on both ends of the calendar year. This could be solved if we used a calendar that had 28 days in each of 13 months, but you people are too bloody superstitious. Anyway, these danglers are fine, because I end up coming up with something based on however many installment slots happen to be left over. And how many do we have this time? Well...14. I didn’t have any ideas broken up into 14 sections, but what I did have was a set of 16. This turned out to be perfect, because I could set aside two Saturdays to complete it, which helped with the mezzofiction math. Unfortunately, however, this meant I didn’t have room for an introduction, which I’ve discovered to be narratively important. If I don’t explain what’s going to happen ahead of time, I feel awkward, because I’ve just jumped into this weird new thing, and it never had a real beginning. So that’s what I’m doing here, instead of talking about Composers. Why would I talk about composers, you ask? Why because it’s a type of personality. Composers are observant artisan entertainers. They are creators, artists, inspirers. But they are also methodical, deliberate, and stable. They’re considered to be ever-present, choosing not to focus too much on the future, or dwell on the past. It is for this reason that, although I’ve discussed the future of this project, I cannot tell you what the other installments are going to be like. That’s mostly because I don’t know. But that’s okay, I’m not worried about it. Let’s just be here. Now.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: June 23, 2108

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The first thing that Mateo’s once-mother, Aura Gardner wanted to do was start planning the wedding. She barely let Leona and Mateo tell her the good news before her mind started racing with the color scheme and guest list. All Mateo could think of was how ridiculous that list would be. Leona, however, truest voice of reason, pointed out that it was no time to start preparations. “The average duration of an engagement,” she said in her teacher tone, “was about fourteen-point-five months when we first left our time period. I believe it has gone down since then, but still, that’s several centuries away from now for us.”

“You’re not seriously going to wait hundreds of years to tie the knot, are you?” Aura asked, horrified.

“Of course not,” Mateo said, realizing how normal it was for someone to be playing referee between their parent, and their love interest.

Leona put her foot down. “I’m not going to get married tomorrow just because that’s a whole year for everyone else.”

“No one is saying that either, honey.”

“We’ve never called each other honey. Don’t start now just because of the engagement. Marriage is a logical step, not a transformation of the relationship.”

“She’s right,” Aura agreed. “I mean about the wedding date. Not about her thoughts on relationship dynamics. I don’t know anything about that. I just got overexcited. I get overexcited. You need to take all the time that you need to take. We all understand.”

Leona took a deep breath and composed herself. “It won’t be in four hundred years, though, I promise you that. I just need time. It doesn’t just take months to do the actual planning. A lot of emotional exercises need to be completed.”

“We understand,” Mateo said, and in order to lighten the mood, he added, “honey.”

“Congratulations,” Horace Reaver said to them.

“Yeah, what he said,” Gilbert Boyce added playfully.

The four of them were the strangest group of people fate had ever brought together. Horace and Leona were married to each other in an alternate reality. Then he went back in time, unwittingly entering a reality where she fell in love with Mateo instead. Due to his anger, he tormented and chased after them, creating a tumultuous relationship with Gilbert along the way, and ultimately murdering him. Then Gilbert came back to life as an extremely powerful temporal manipulator, and began to torment Mateo as well, but for different reasons, while under the influence of another person’s soul, and at the behest of an even more evil person.

Gilbert later assisted Mateo in going back in time and killing Adolf Hitler earlier than he was supposed to die, which created a third reality where Mateo was never born, Leona was raised by the couple who were previously Mateo’s adoptive parents—which prevented her from having the chance to meet either Mateo or Horace—and Horace had no memory of their time against each other either. He grew up to become a better person, eventually falling in love with a man named Serkan Demir, who recently sacrificed himself to save pretty much the entire universe. And now they were all friends, their respective memories intact, and presumably all water under the bridge. Congratulations, was not a word he would have expected to hear from either one of these two outside of sarcastic sentiment. But here they were, happy for their loved ones' new lives, even amongst all this death and destruction.

Mateo thought about how, if they were able to learn to love each other, then maybe anything was possible. Maybe everything was going to be all right after all. “How are you holding up?” he asked.

“I’m fine,” Horace said truthfully. “Ask me again in three months, and he will have been gone longer than it was that I even knew him.”

“I don’t like missing your grieving process.” Leona placed a comforting hand on his shoulder, which he pressed against with his cheek. “I wanna be there for you.”

“We both do,” Mateo emphasized.

“It would be worse in reverse,” Horace commented. “Imagine a loved one’s loved one dying, but only seeing the survivor once a year while you move on faster.”

“I remember that,” Leona said, referring to the period of time shortly after Mateo’s parents’ deaths. It was years for her, but only days for him.

Horace slapped his hands together. “Let’s stop rehashing the past. It’s a new day; a new year! We should be celebrating. You two are finally freaking getting married!”

“Hear hear!” Gilbert cried, holding up an imaginary champagne flute.

Shortly after Horace and Serkan met, they encountered a young girl named Paige Turner. She accidentally accompanied them through a time portal, and ended up stranded in the 21st century. With no way of returning home—and no desire to—she remained in their care, as a surrogate daughter. That was decades ago, and though she looked younger than Mateo and Leona, she was practically an old woman. At the moment, she was walking up the beach with a girl who appeared to be anywhere between fifteen and twenty-eight, but she could have been older than all of them combined for all he knew.

“What are we celebrating?” Paige asked, noticing that they had all raised imaginary flutes.

“Hello, my dear,” Horace said. “These two are engaged to be married.”

“How lovely,” Paige said. “However, this is Kivi.”

The girl, who was apparently named Kivi, did an actual real-life curtsy, completely unironically.

“What do you mean, however?” Gilbert asked.

“I can’t speak for you, Leona,” Paige said, “but I would take a beat to consider marrying someone if I found out he had a kid.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Mateo Matic, meet your daughter, Kivi Bristol.”

“That’s insane, I don’t have a daugh—” Oh, no. Time travel. Time travel made everything weird and confusing. It was entirely possible that he had a child. She could be from the future, or the other reality, or by some other weird temporal power that he wasn’t even aware of. He was just about to accept her, knowing that understanding her was not a prerequisite to loving her, when he remembered something. “Bristol. I knew a Bristol.” He reached far into his memory banks. Way back when he was just a young one, Mateo spent a little time as a restaurant delivery boy. It wasn’t a biker bar, or anything, but their schtick was delivery via motorcycle, and so that’s what he did. He met a lot of interesting characters during that time, just as he had in other driving jobs, but one of them stood out. She was a very tall redhead with only her left ear pierced. She carried two cell phones with her, but he eventually learned that only one of them worked. The other was to make people think she was a federal agent, or something fascinating like that. She was always messing with people’s heads.

She was the personal assistant to this fellow who patented a singular and relatively small technological advancement that most calculators were using at the time. This allowed him to be filthy rich, and not have any responsibilities. He had always wanted someone to follow him around and do whatever he said, so that was her job. He also had this thing where he ate the same thing, from the same restaurant, every other day. It was always to be delivered at exactly 2:16 in the afternoon. She even stopped having to call it in, because Mateo just wrote it up on the staffing shift schedule whiteboard. It was on these runs, which occurred during the slowest time of the restaurant, where he got to know her. He told her about his dreams of becoming a hollywood stunt driver, and she talked about her dreams of being the first lawyer on Mars. No, she had no real interest in practicing law, nor any plans to apply to law school. And she knew that Mars colonization was a long ways off. But she hated attainable dreams. If you could actually do something, she would say, then why the hell wouldn’t you just do it?

Several months into the routine, her boss died from a heart attack, she moved away in order to live close to a summit named Bitch Mountain, New York—for what she referred to as “obvious reasons”—and Mateo grew tired enough of his job to just quit. And in all that time, after all those romcom movie moments, there was one very specific thing that didn’t happen. Not once did the two of them have sex. He would have remembered that. “Eseosie is your mother?”

“She was, yes,” Kivi answered.

“Eseosie Bristol,” Mateo confirmed.

“Literally the one and only.”

“Shock Bristol was your mother?” Mateo asked, using a nickname of hers he had never quite figured out.

“That’s right.”

“I can’t be your father then. Not that I’ve met any other Bristol anyway, but it simply can’t be me. She and I...”

“Were never intimate?” Kivi finished, clearly not afraid to discuss sex with a man she believed to be her father.

“We weren’t...no.”

“I know. She’s told me the names of every single person she’s ever been with. Yes, I am aware of how strange my childhood was. But believe me when I tell you that I know for a fact you didn’t make the list. I don’t understand either, but that doctor guy told us that he ran a DNA test.”

“Doctor Sarka?” Leona asked.

“Yeah, that was it,” Kivi replied.

“Gilbert,” Leona began, “do you have any way of contacting him?”

“I have a pager,” Horace piped up instead. “I’ll go look for it.” He started running off, but then stopped. He either realized that the moment did not require urgency...or running reminded him of his late husband, Serkan.

“Thanks,” Leona called out to him.

Mateo looked at her with his sad puppy dog eyes.

She looked back. “Stop freaking out. We’re still getting married. What kind of person do you think I am?”

A few hours later, salmon doctor, Baxter Sarka teleported to them and confirmed that Kivi Bristol was indeed Mateo’s daughter. It was just that no one knew how. If she had been conceived in an alternate reality, how would she be here now? Mateo wasn’t even ever born in this timeline. There were other forces at play, and Mateo couldn’t be sure whether that was good, or bad. The debate was not able to last past the day, though. When Mateo woke up the next day in 2109, he was in an incredibly rustic cabin, complete with no running water, heat, or power. He stepped out of this sort of door thing and looked around. The beach and treeline looked familiar, this was definitely Tribulation Island, but everything else was gone. None of the buildings that The Constructor, Baudin had built for them were anywhere to be found. He started asking people what was going on, but no one knew what the hell he was talking about. They had no memory of anyone named Baudin, nor of these supposed buildings. Something was wrong.

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