Microstory 1152: Micro

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Valentine Avalon Duval hated her real name. First of all, people would constantly tease her about being named after a holiday. Some more thoughtful people would assume she was named after the martyr, which was probably true, but they were no less impolite about it. Plus, all three of her names contained the string val, which her parents must have thought was pretty cute. The worst part came when kids started going to health class, and realized that her initials were VD. Many other people experienced this issue—even more had similar problems—but that didn’t make it any easier for her. Sensing her disdain, her parents started calling her Micro. She was a rather small child, and more importantly, she liked to sing, so it was more about her vocal interests. As she grew older, she began to find joy in computers, particularly in doing things she wasn’t supposed to be doing. If there was no easy way to find information, that was the kind of information she wanted. She chose Micro as her online alias, but of course, everyone assumed this referred to microchip, or perhaps a certain ubiquitous technology company. To combat this, she would embed a small microphone symbol in her work as her signature. The more she learned, the more people she met in the underworld, and the more people she met, the more dangerous her life became. She was never evil, but she certainly took her exploits too far. She would frequently use her skills to expose corporate corruption, but she wouldn’t steal any money, or hold their data for ransom, and she would never put individuals at risk. In her mind, people had the right to be safe, but not necessarily the right any and all information. She wanted to know all the things herself, but she didn’t usually reveal people’s secrets, unless those secrets put innocent people in danger. It was her achievements, and moral code, that drew the attention of Countervail. Here she was able to protect the rights and privacy of the average U.S. citizen, and make sure the government wasn’t overstepping their bounds. She would later to be read into the world of salmon and choosers, so she could help in even more ways. In earlier days, a time traveler was free to move about the world as needed. As long as they sufficiently blended in, there was little danger of getting caught. They could always escape pretty easily, unless the powers that be didn’t want that to happen. As technology progressed, however, anonymity grew more difficult, even for temporal manipulators. She helped cover up any inconsistencies. Rumors would always pervade the global consciousness, and she never had the power to stop that, but at least she would get rid of any proof that these people existed. All this work came to a head when she was abruptly taken from her world, and relocated to another.

Microstory 1151: Uhyiopa

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Many light years from Earth, there is a planet. This planet has slightly lower gravity, and slightly higher tidal forces from an orbiting moon. The planet itself orbits an adolescent main-sequence star, and revolves fast enough to produce a strong magnetosphere, which protects it from solar radiation, and maintains a breathable atmosphere. Though it did not produce evolved life, it is fully capable of supporting it, which is good, because it was chosen as a colony site for, not one, but two separate species. The Orothsew and Gondilak, through some bioengineering, evolved independent of each other on isolated continents. Because of the stronger tides, both species developed quite significantly before they progressed enough in a maritime respect to survive travel across the vast ocean. The Orothsew were more advanced, and quickly overcame the Gondilak, even though the latter were more difficult to kill. But this was carried out by the leadership, and though their laws didn’t allow them to do anything to stop it, the people did not want war. A rebellion formed, composed of both Orothsew and Gondilak, who were seeking a peace. The conquest for land was pointless, as there were plenty of resources to go around, and the differences between their species was irrelevant. One such of these rebels was named Uhyiopa. She did not actively recruit new rebels, but protected battlefield deserters, from both belligerents. These did not fight like most revolutionaries. Their main purpose was to show the world what it would be like if they all lived in harmony. The plan did not work completely, when a tyrant rose up and ended the war simply by declaring himself ruler over both nations. But her efforts, and those of her people, were not wasted. Two humans witnessed her actions, and respected her vision. When they were sent to the deep past to correct the world’s problems before they even began, they used Uhyiopa’s model as a foundation to help build a more productive civilization. She would not be born in this timeline, as much of its history was changed, but her legacy lives on in the billions of people who would come to find peace on Orolak.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: November 3, 2241

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It took some doing, but Sanaa did manage to warm up, and open up, a little to Leona. Leona did the same to her as well. They had more in common than they realized. Their hostilities towards each other, especially on Sanaa’s part, didn’t make a whole lot of sense to begin with. As it turned out, she struggled with meeting people who genuinely wanted to be her friend, and didn’t just want to use her powers. Lots of choosers were called upon to do jobs for others, but that was different, at least in her mind. For someone else, it was more of a skill that others valued. For Sanaa, she was really just the middlewoman, who people only spoke to so they could connect with those they actually liked. It was unclear whether people were turned off by her because of her attitude, or if she developed a bad attitude because she felt underappreciated. Regardless, she wasn’t an unpleasant person on the other side of her protective emotional walls, and Leona was getting to know that.

She spent the rest of 2240 in the waters. The great thing about the technology was that the most skeptical and reluctant individual will still adapt surprisingly quickly. And they required no body modification in order to thrive in it. Some random guy from the nineteenth century would be able to dive into one of these tanks, and spend an indefinite amount of time there with no problem breathing. It was quite peaceful in the water, except when she was being bombarded with questions. The colonists somehow got wind that she was partially responsible for the construction of their habitats just before they arrived. Of course Eight Point Seven did most of the work, while she wasn’t in the timestream, but they still considered her to be a worthy celebrity. Unfortunately, they wanted to communicate with her using the sign language they developed, which was designed to be used inside heavier water resistance, and slight visual impairment. That was really the only thing that would hinder the hypothetical nineteenth century man from thriving. His eyes would never truly adjust to the way light bent in the underwater.

Leona was a highly intelligent person, with knowledge from three separate timelines, but even she wasn’t capable of learning the sign language within a day. Despite her seeming misanthropy, Sanaa had picked it up already, and was able to interpret for her when the colonists wanted to talk. This solidified their bond, because now Sanaa didn’t feel so alone and overlooked. They were having so much fun getting to know each other that Leona didn’t realize midnight central was approaching. Even if she had, she probably wouldn’t have thought to break the surface for her time jump. There was no reason to believe anything strange would happen to the environment as a result of her sudden disappearance, or her sudden reappearance a year later. When she tried to exit the tank at that point, the waters followed her out. Her gravity regulator was malfunctioning, which acted to envelop her in her own little aquatic atmosphere that she couldn’t shake. It was kind of cool, but a little annoying.

“Can you modify my gravity field remotely?” Leona asked.

Hokusai was fiddling with her tablet, trying to solve the problem. “It’s having trouble connecting. Like, it will connect, but it won’t let me do anything.”

“And you’re sure you can’t open up the panel on my leg?”

“The water has already damaged your systems enough. It’ll make it even worse if we open the floodgates. That could render your legs completely inoperable, and because of your pattern, it could be virtually impossible to build new ones for you. You weren’t on your pattern when you got these ones here, right?”

“Yeah,” Leona answered sadly.

“Your body needs time to adjust, and time is something  you have far less of than most people.”

Leona tried to use her hand to scrape the water from her face again, and from her legs, even knowing it wouldn’t work. Despite the fact that the planet itself should have been exerting a greater amount of attraction than her artificial gravity legs, it was like trying to scoop the water from a bucket with strainer. “What if I got back in the tank, and then got out some other way? What if I got dressed, or I dunno, started to dance?”

“I don’t think we’re gonna find a home remedy for this. Just give me a minute. If I can only connect for one second, that will be enough to deactivate your regulator.”

Loa came in and walked up. “How do you feel. Can you breathe?”

“Well, I’m not technically breathing, since that’s what my lungs are for, but yes, I feel fine. I just don’t want to feel like this forever.” She redirected her attention back to Hokusai. “Heat?”

“No.”

“Cold. Maybe we could freeze it, and chip it off?”

“That would kill you. Just let me figure this out.”

“It’s not going to connect,” Leona tried to tell her. “It’s broken. You’re going to have to open up the panel, and switch it off manually.”

“No, I told you I can’t do that.”

“I’ll do it myself,” Leona decided. She knelt down to access the panel.

“Stop right there, young lady!”

She complied, secretly relieved that Hokusai stopped her. “If I wait until my next time jump, will that fix it?”

“It’s possible, though not likely. If I’m to understand your history correctly, you and Mateo once made a time jump while you were in a tent?”

“Yeah, it was weird. If we’re standing in a room, we don’t take it with us through time, but I guess the powers that be interpret tents like they do clothing.”

“How would they interpret a magical water blanket?”

“Good point.”

“How about you try sending an electrical pulse through the water; disrupt its tension?”

“Where did you get your degree?”

“In two thousand and twenty-four,” Leona replied.

“Now, that’s a good point.”

While it was true that Leona’s education and experience as a physicist and a science fiction buff combined allowed her to understand future technology to a higher degree than most, it only took her so far. She tried to keep up on modern advancements, but there were only so many hours in the day, and she just didn’t know how everything worked. She either understood the creative concepts based on her breadth of film knowledge, or the mechanics from her master’s degree, but if Hokusai tried to ask her for help with the new reframe engine, she would be all but useless.

“Where did Sanaa swim off to?” Loa asked. Perhaps she was merely trying to get Leona’s mind off her predicament.

“I dunno,” Leona answered. “Probably living her best life.”

“I’m right here,” Sanaa called up from the other side of Hokusai’s lab.

“What are you doing out of the water?” Loa asked her with deep concern. She ran over to help her carry this giant machine. It had wheels, but it sounded like they needed some lubricant. Tubing was dragging behind it.

“I’m fine,” Sanaa answered, though she was grateful for the help. “The gravity in this room is at one-point-four-g, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” Hokusai confirmed. “I need it higher than Earth gravity for some of my experiments, “but you had to walk clear across the dome, and it’s much higher out there.”

“Hashtag worth it,” Sanaa said. Once she was right in front of Leona, she lifted one of the tubes, and pointed it directly at her. Then she switched on the machine, and everybody watched as it sucked all the water from Leona’s skin.

“A wet-vac?” Hokusai asked after the deed was done.

“Yes,” Sanaa said. “I have demonstrated their weakness may be found from a less sophisticated approach. You are no longer capable of such thinking.” This was a near direct quote from an episode of the ancient series, Stargate SG-1. She was a good person.

“Thank you so much,” Leona said. “You’re right, we did not think of that.”

Hokusai sat Leona down in the nearest chair, and examined her leg. “Remaining droplets are continuing to stick to your skin. This is fascinating. You’re like a little planet, with your own gravity.”

“Are you calling me fat?” Leona joked.

“She’s not a planet,” Sanaa said. “She’s a star.”

Leona smiled. They were friends now. Who knew?

“I have a mini-tank over there.” Hokusai jerked her head in its general direction, but kept her eyes on Leona’s leg as she opened the access panel. “Get yourself right, and we’ll talk. I took a break from my reframe engine to build you something. It’s not a perfect solution, and you may hate it, but it’s an option for anytime you want to get out of the water.”

“What is it?” Sanaa asked, though her own weight was already getting to her. It was a miracle she managed to walk across the dome on land, lugging that huge thing behind her. Even though gravity here was a significant improvement, her time in the tank had lessened her ability to withstand even this high of gravity. It wasn’t the weight so much as it was the distribution.

“You’ll see,” Hokusai said, still working. “Loa can you help her?”

Shortly after Loa helped Sanaa into her tank to rest, Hokusai was finished repairing Leona’s gravity regulator. “Okay. You’ll be able to get back into the water, if you need to, or want to. Prolonged exposure, however, is not ideal. Obviously these are meant to be waterproof, but it’s not worth the possibility of a recurrence. We seem to have learned a little bit about your time jumps, which may make you feel worse about them.”

“I’m the kind of person who wants to know, even if it’s terrible.”

“I would need to study it more, but based on yours and Eight Point Seven’s accounts of earlier attempts, I doubt it would be safe to do so. It would appear that time doesn’t so much as open up for you as it opens you. My hypothesis is that microfissures form all over your body at midnight, allowing temporal energy itself to flood your system. In this case, it’s how the water seeped in as well. How these heal afterwards, I can’t say, but seeing as you’ve never heard any of this before, they don’t seem to be hurting you. Now, if you felt pain every time it happened—”

“I don’t technically feel pain, but Mateo and I both get real tired. We’ve gotten used to it, and the more sleep we’ve had, the better, but I still feel it every time.”

Hokusai tilted her head in thought. “Hmm. When your skin cracks open, perhaps you suffer a temporary oxygen loss, which drastically diminishes your energy. This could bad, incidental, or quite necessary. We’ve always framed your pattern as jumping forwards in time, but maybe time jumps aren’t possible, or aren’t possible for you. You could be placed in suspended animation in another dimension that doesn’t support diatomic oxygen. These are all just guesses, of course. I have no real idea what happens to you or Mateo when you disappear. I don’t even know if you and Mateo experience the same thing, or if your body relies on a workaround, since you weren’t born this way; you were made. Hogarth Pudeyonavic would understand it better. I’m more of a space girl.”

“Oh, you know Hogarth? Did I know that you knew her?”

“I don’t know.”

Loa walked back up. “She’s sleeping. Let’s wait to give it to her until tomorrow.”

“That’s not a bad idea,” Hokusai agreed. “I wouldn’t hate taking one last look at the power source.”

“No, I’m up!” Sanaa exclaimed through her mouthpiece.

“Why do you keep hearing us from so far away!” Hokusai shouted.

“Hello!” Sanaa shouted back. “Psychic?”

Hokusai went over to a half-door next to Sanaa’s tank, and pulled out something that looked like a fancy wheelchair. “I don’t know if you would prefer swimming to lying down, but if you ever wanna be dry, this will help. It’s a gravity regulator, but like I said, it’s not perfect. You have to be at a pretty steep incline to distribute your weight effectively, but one thing it has going for it is that it doesn’t require a medical procedure, so it shouldn’t interfere with your powers.”

Sanaa pressed both palms, and her face against the glass—I mean, polycarbonate window. “I love it.”

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Bungula: Breathing Space (Part IV)

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Brooke, Sharice, and Mirage are sitting around a table solemnly. The fight is over, but they are still feeling the trauma. Brooke is this close to deleting the memory from her brain, but she can’t, because there is work to be done.

Mirage finally speaks, “I think it’s important to—”

“Shut up,” Sharice interrupts.

“Nobody died,” Mirage manages to say.

“If you don’t shut your mouth,” Sharice begins, “you’re going to find out what my namesake did for a living before she became a civil servant.”

“Wasn’t she a lawyer?”

Sharice stands up threateningly.

“It’s fine,” Brooke stops her daughter from doing something else she would regret. “It was a billion to one incident. And Mirage is right. Nobody died.”

“They did die,” Sharice argues. “We’re lucky their respective consciousnesses were uploaded to an underground server. Plenty of fairly normal humans were in that dome. Had they been exposed, they would have been lost forever.”

“We had ample warning time,” Mirage reminds her. “The biologicals were rescued first.”

“You made me complicit in a tragedy,” Sharice complains. “Had this happened to Dome Three, dozens—if not hundreds—of people would have been killed.”

“It didn’t happen to Dome Three!” Mirage’s anger is growing. “It happened to Dome Four! If you would like, we can talk about going back in time to prevent it from happening, but what we’re not going to do is go back in time and make your worst fears come true. There’s no point in worrying about a past that never occurred. Life is dangerous anywhere in the galaxy, but in a colony, on a world that doesn’t naturally support human life, it’s even more dangerous. There is literally an endless supply of bad things that might have happened, or bad things that did happen, but could have been even worse. I take most responsibility for the meteor strike, but I won’t take all of it. I put you in charge.”

Sharice’s anger rivaled Mirage’s well. “You glorified 3D television set!”

Brooke has to hold her back, like this is a rap battle gone awry.

“I’ll disassemble you right now!” Sharice continues.

‘That’s enough!” Brooke declares. “Nobody is disassembling anyone, and nobody is going back in time. As terrible as this was, I don’t allow time travel. I don’t just mean that because I can’t do it myself. No matter your intentions, temporal manipulation is always bad. It’s caused so many more problems than it’s solved, and I stayed here to be free of it. Most of my family is off elsewhere, but Sharice and I made the decision to let them go, because their lives are just too insane and unpredictable. Mirage, if I ever hear you suggest that again, or if I even suspect we’re living in a timeline of your creation, you’re gonna regret ever becoming an avatar. The time you spent in that omniscience dimension has damaged your perspective.

“Now. That being said, there’s a reason humans developed technologies beyond interstellar travel. Our ancestors long ago started realizing how much it sucks to be a standard human. Humans die too easily, and they don’t come back, which is why we decided to improve upon ourselves, so we would be more resilient. Sharice, this could not have happened to Dome Three, because it’s fully encased in a lava tube. Dome Four wanted a better view of the sky, but that’s why there aren’t many fully organics in there, because it’s not safe. All colonists came here knowing their lives wouldn’t be easy. Earth is the safest place for any vonearthan. Or at least it comes with the highest chances of survival. I’m not saying they asked you to lose control of an icy planetesimal, and smash fragments of it into the side of their dome, but they knew you were dropping them in this orthant. Unfortunately, the process of seeding the planet with an atmosphere wouldn’t have worked if we focused our work on only one hemisphere, or something. Right, Mirage?”

“That’s right,” Mirage replies. “That may have worked if we were willing to wait centuries...”

“Why did we not just wait centuries?” Sharice questions. “Why are you so eager to get this done so fast? Is something coming? Is something about to happen. You’re obsessed with 2245, like all is lost if we don’t make it in time.”

Mirage’s silence is deafening.

Brooke nods for no apparent reason. “It’s time, Mirage.”

“What?”

“Yes, what?” Sharice agrees. “What are you talking about?”

“It’s time to tell her,” Brooke says.

“What do you know?” Sharice is feeling offended. “She told you some secret?”

Mirage emotes to Brooke, but they don’t exchange words.

“Fine,” Brooke resolves. “It’ll make her angrier hearing it from me, but if you don’t want to admit it, I will.”

“No,” Mirage stops her. “I didn’t realize you knew. It’s my truth to tell, so I better tell it.”

Sharice folds her arms impatiently.

Brooke actually had no idea what Mirage’s secret was, but she knew she wouldn’t give it up by request. Mirage had to think Brooke figured it out on her own, so she’d finally spill it. It was a tricky gamble, and it’s a miracle it was going to pay off. The problem is she has no way of conveying her gambit to Sharice, but perhaps that’s for the best, so her daughter can authentically express her surprise, and possible outrage.

Mirage prepares to explain herself. “In the year 1815, roughly seventy thousand people die in what history considers to be the most devastating volcanic eruption on record. Over two hundred years later, Meliora Reaver comes in possession of something known as the Muster Beacon. It’s capable of generating a massive portal, or thousands of single-serving portals simultaneously. Before this, Sanctuary was designed to save one person at a time. She would send her employee, also known as The Chauffeur to travel directly between Dardius and Earth, ferrying humans she felt needed to be protected from time travelers. Brooke, I know this is something you can understand. The Muster Beacon, however, was a huge win for her, because now she could save high numbers of people at once, without forcing Dave to cross his own timeline, and risk creating a paradox. Unfortunately, she and her team of scientists did not fully understand the technology. Early attempts resulted in nothing happening, but there was one time where it worked half way. They didn’t realize it at the time—and probably don’t even now—but they did manage to spirit away ten thousand would-be victims of the Mount Tambora eruption.

“Tens of thousands more died of related causes, but they couldn’t be saved, because the world would notice them missing. These closest ten thousand were pulled into a portal, but never made it out to the other side. They were, effectively, dead anyway. The Muster Beacon started functioning properly from then on, but that does the missing Sumbawa people no good.” Mirage closes her eyes in sadness. “I tried to rescue them myself. Bungula is destined to become hospitable in no later than four hundred years from now, so I figured that was the best place to put them. It looks like Earth, it has a good star, and...”

“And what?” Sharice presses.

“The Bungulans abandon it. I never did understand why, but they just up and leave, and vonearthans don’t ever come back.”

Brooke nods again. “It’s the life. They leave so that life can evolve on its own. Those bacteria you discovered are heralds.”

“No, but I told you that the bacteria doesn’t evolve.”

“Yes, you said that, didn’t you?”

“Okay, I didn’t see every single possible future. The point is that something went wrong on my end too. They’re scheduled to arrive in 2245 now, and there’s nothing I can do to stop it. I came down to your plane of existence, because I need this place terraformed before they show up, or they’re dead.”

“You’re trying to clean up your own mess,” Sharice notes. “And you? You knew about this,” she accuses Brooke.

Brooke sports a sort of hybrid smile-frown. “I did not. That was just my way of teasing the information out of her.”

Mirage should be upset by the trick, but she’s probably just relieved to finally be open and honest. “I should have realized.”

“Why didn’t you just tell us this,” Sharice asks.

“You heard your mother. She hates time travel. It’s bad enough that we accelerated the ammonia bombardment, and used dark algae from the future. If she knew the whole reason we were doing this was to fix a mistake I made when I thought I was a god, she might have put a stop to the whole thing.”

“You severely underestimate me if you think I would let ten thousand innocent people die just to feel morally superior,” Brooke says, saddened.

“I couldn’t risk it. They’re coming, in 2245. This world has to be ready for them. I don’t know how they’re gonna handle it. Will they realize they’re on a different planet? Will they freak out about it? Can we integrate them into society? This is just my only option.”

“Well, maybe it’s not ideal, but Sanctuary was going to reveal secrets about future technology to them anyway, so why didn’t you just build them a special dome?” Sharice proposes.

“I don’t know exactly where they’re going to land; if they’ll be the same distance from each other as they were when the beacon took them, or if they’ll be in one spot. Maybe they’ll be randomly spread across the surface. The whole world needs to be able to support human life.”

“It will,” Brooke assures her. “I don’t know the answer to your questions either, but if we can protect them from physical and emotional harm, then we have to try. The ammonia bombardment and factories are working. The atmosphere is thickening as we speak, the magnetosphere is holding, and the temperature is rising. By 2245, this rock will be ready for life. Though that does leave the question of what we should do with the colonists. I don’t think the Sumbawa would get along well with them. If they realize they’re on a different planet, they’ll probably form a whole religion around it, and the more advanced colonists hanging around would just make it too complicated.”

“Are you suggesting they actually leave?” Sharice asks. “Like they did in the other timeline that Mirage saw?”

“Perhaps.”

“We would have to tell them why,” Mirage reminds her.

“That’s not such a stretch,” Brooke says. “They already know something’s up, and we’re fooling ourselves if we think they remain oblivious. The absolutely most optimistic estimates for terraforming any planet within twenty light years of Earth is two hundred years. Life takes time. Nature does it several orders of magnitude slower. Nothing and no one does it in eighteen years. We have to face the reality that the world is waking up. Many vonearthans already know specifics about salmon and choosers, and more grow suspicious every day. They were never going to stay hidden forever.”

“I guess you’re right,” Sharice acknowledges. “As long as Beaver Haven doesn’t lock us up for our crimes, then things should be fine.”

“Yes,” Mirage agrees. “And the worst of it is over. Now we just wait for the atmosphere to fully form. The next few years will be mostly about monitoring and adjusting. We can start wilding the surface after that, just like they did on Earth a hundred and fifty years ago.”

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Microstory 1150: Braxton Cosworthy

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They say that everyone has a doppelgänger in the world, but even if that were true, the chances of two lookalikes meeting each other are extremely low. Yet, extremely low does not mean never. When he was still a baby, Braxton Cosworthy was placed at a home daycare with another boy who looked remarkably like him. To make matters worse, an apple juice accident led the supervisor having to redress half of the children she was monitoring. She foolishly chose to do so with identical sailor uniforms, which she would normally use for fun photoshoots. Braxton and Hyram were switched that day, and lived with each other’s families for nineteen months before the real Hyram experienced a medical issue, and the doctors discovered the error. Depending on how you look at it, this debacle was both fortunate and unfortunate. The two boys were immediately switched back, and reverted to their real names, which didn’t seem to be too hard on them, since they were still so young. It wasn’t too long, though, that all four parents began to feel a sense of loss they couldn’t quite understand. They were now with their real child, but they had bonded with the other, and now missed him deeply. After weeks of pretty much everyone being in therapy, a decision was made to form an unusual blended family. They pitched in on what was basically a mansion, so there was enough space to accommodate everyone, and then they just lived together. Braxton and Hyram grew up as brothers, along with their other siblings. The name thing remained a complicated subject, though. Despite their young age upon switching back, both Braxton and Hyram easily answered to the wrong name; the latter being worse at it than the former. Similarly, Braxton felt equally connected to his temporary name of Kaveda as he was his real name. He alternated between them randomly, making legal forms a confusing matter for others to interpret. Despite the complications, everyone was fairly happy and well-adjusted, and their love for each other was most likely a unique dynamic. Braxton was a racer, and a tracer, though he did not join the tracer gang, because they were a little too close to being a branch of law enforcement. He was a fierce competitor, however, and it got him into trouble once or twice. He made a healthy name for himself in high school and college sports, and spent the rest of his life running in 5Ks, 10Ks, marathons, and other things of this nature.

Microstory 1149: Téa Stendahl

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Literally in another life, Téa Stendahl was a tailor. She was originally born a man named Ed Bolton in the late 1700s. Years after the turn of the century, Ed jumped forward exactly one year, and there he remained for precisely three seconds, at which point he jumped forward again. He spent three minutes here, until it happened yet again. He continued to do this unwilling, both increasing the number of years he passed over, and the amount of time he spent upon his return. He would skip years according to the Fibonacci sequence, and spend three somethings (minutes, hours, days, etc.) there, before moving on. In the mid-20th century, he died in a car wreck, but he was an old man by then, and felt he had lived a decent life. He had eventually accepted his new pattern, and helped a lot of people along the way. He would never see is best friends again anyway, as they were traveling through time in the opposite direction, so it was all right that it was finally over. Except it wasn’t. Téa Stendahl was born a normal child, into a lovely family. She enjoyed fashion and sewing, but had no clue that this was not the first life she had experienced. As she grew up, though, she started recalling events that never could have happened to her. Her parents figured she just had a grand imagination, but they still sought help from a child psychologist. He was unable to understand what was happening with her either, but she eventually no longer needed his help. As time went on, she remembered more and more of her former life—or perhaps, more accurately, her former lives. While most jumps allowed him to retain all his memories, there was one thing that never stayed the same.

Bolton stopped going by his original name, instead adopting a new variation each time he jumped. In different time periods, he was called Ned, Teddy, Eddie, Edward, and Theodore. He could always remember the names he used to use, but was unable to revert to them at will. The people in charge of his time traveling were messing with his brain. They must have been messing with the minds of Téa’s new parents too, because her newest name couldn’t have been a coincidence. As the powers that be would have it, Téa was able to see her friends again. After they too were reincarnated, they suddenly jumped in the opposite direction, and met back up with her near the middle of the 21st century. They were surprised to find their companion with a new gender assignment, but not bothered by it. Téa felt that she was a woman, and it was unclear whether the powers that be transformed her on purpose, or if at least part of the reincarnation process was out of their hands, and subject to nature’s whims. Either way, she was happy. She later returned to her roots as a tailor, opening a clothing shop on an island on another planet, in another galaxy. There were others like the three of them, who were sent to various time periods, completing various missions. They weren’t always wearing the right clothing to blend in with the natives, so she was there to provide them with authentic clothes and accessories. They couldn’t just look like they should, like one might find on the set of a historical film. They needed to utilize materials and dye that could be found in any given time. Sometimes, her customers wouldn’t remember that they had ever gone to The Hub at all, instead believing they blinked, and were just suddenly wearing new clothes in the past or future. She even did this for the past version of herself, which was an interesting opportunity to gain rare perspective.

Microstory 1148: Mandis Romagna

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Many have questioned how psychic abilities fit in a world of temporal powers. There is a surprising amount of diversity when it comes to special abilities in the universe, but they all involve some kind of manipulation of time and space. This prevents certain theoretical abilities from taking shape. Nobody can fly, because flight requires an alteration in the laws of physics that don’t have much to do with spacetime, or a magical form of propulsion that simply does not exist. Similarly, no one is born with the ability to breathe underwater through some kind of mutation, though they may indeed be able to accomplish this through other means. If they could teleport breathable air from one location to another, then practically speaking, there would be no difference. Psychic powers seem to be a class of exceptions to this rule, and people have been studying the phenomenon throughout time. Are telepaths teleporting their thoughts to other people’s minds, and visa versa? This seems unlikely, because that’s not really how neurophysiology works. The prevailing theory amongst the few who have experience traveling between separate universes is that humans are naturally capable of establishing telepathic connections with each other. One universe has people who can fly, while another is full of demons and angels. They each have their own set of rules, but psychic potential is not just universal; it’s multiversal. Whatever the truth, Mandis Romagna is one of the psychics, though he does have his own specialty. He can’t read your mind under normal circumstances, but he can place you in a pocket dimension, which is designed to read your mind. More specifically, it’s designed to tease out your deepest fears. He became a target once people discovered what he could do, by those who would either use him to hurt others, or would hurt him to stop him from exacting the harm. Hoping to use his skills to interrogate their enemies, the government tried to force him to work for them, but soon found themselves suffering profound regret, when he immediately turned on his captors, and showed them their own fears instead. In fear of these fears, they decided to leave him alone, and let him pursue his life ambitions. He chose a career in mental health, helping others overcome their fears by facing them in a controlled environment. The dimension would read their mind, and create a scenario for them to get through. Over time, he developed the ability to manipulate these scenarios, raising or lowering the difficulty level at will, or pulling the patient out when the obstacles overwhelmed them. He was given the nickname of Jaydecaster, based on the practice of adding the name of historical figure, Jayde Kovac to places or objects as a warning to stay away. Mandis didn’t appreciate it, as he grew up knowing the truth about who Jayde Kovac was, but once the public started calling him that, there was really no living it down. At least he was still helping people.

Microstory 1147: Freeley

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The first of the New Gangs of Kansas City, starting around the year 2020, were the Gunbenders, and the Tracers. These two were inextricably linked to one another, ultimately sourcing from the same team, which arose to combat gang violence in the area. They were sick of all the death and danger, and they were tired of their elected officials not doing much to stop it. It was only later that they separated, but this was not due to ideological differences, or infighting. They felt it necessary to become two separate gangs, because one needed to focus more on exacting social change through public opinion, and legislation. The other were the boots on the ground; an enforcement branch, whose primary objective was to physically monitor the implementation of new policy. Their actions were generally illegal in the beginning, though the police did temporarily cede control to them, making their actions...still pretty illegal, since the cops did not have the authority to do this. Either way, the consequence of this was the emergence of new gangs. Most were merely extensions of completely lawful preexisting clubs, which were now adding a more criminal element to their activities. The two most prominent—the kind that were pretty much already gangs to begin with—were the Grammers, and the Taggers. The former were grayhat hackers, who originally provided technical support to the proto-gunbender-tracer alliance. The latter were just graffiti artists, who sought to fill the void left when the system of street gangs were gradually being dismantled. They largely operated alone, but when they realized law enforcement would rather let people tag a few buildings than deal with all the guns and drugs of yesteryear, they started organizing. Eileifr Blomgren was the one who saw this future. He was not the founder of the tagger gang, however. Just because he knew what the city was going to look like in a few years, didn’t mean he wanted to be part of it. He tagged for himself, and he liked to be alone while he was doing it. At the time, Eileifr was using an anglicized interpretation of his name, and drawing a unique design of a leaf to sign his artwork. Once the initial taggers started asking him to join, he decided to rebrand himself as Freilei, which was an anagram of his real name, hoping they would get the message that he was not a joiner. They continued pestering, though, mostly because they didn’t know how it was meant to be pronounced, so he anglicized again, and finally became Freeley. Still, he was proving himself to be one of the bravest taggers in the metro, and his signature piece came when he painted all over the front of a mayor’s private residence...while she was home. The leader of the taggers was on her way out, to attend an art cliché in Paris, so Freeley was the obvious choice to replace her. He soon discovered that maybe he was indeed a joiner after all.