C2IP Update.4

"I'm sorry, Professor. I'm still experiencing some residue from the shift."

"That's okay. Even the abnormal has been exceptionally abnormal of late. I was asking you the Ruffo-Haskins screening questions to determine what your Prime Version was prior to my experiment."

"Did you identify it? Wait, what experiment?"

"I transmitted a vector-feedback signal into the XXXXXXplex in order to generate a pulse of Continuity in the hopes of creating the conditions for one of the Dragons' to discover the source of the current Agenda War. And yes, I believe you had recently escaped some sort of facility in which you had undergone an Upgrade of some kind?"

"Yeah, that does sound familiar... And yes, it worked. Your experiment. Did Aki make it out?"

"His arrival seems to have been an iteration of an event that occurred earlier in one of the beginnings of the current Crisis, when he intervened on the Subway to thwart an Agent that was attacking Aqua. If I am interpreting the data correctly."

"So he's not here? Where is here, exactly?"

"We've gone Liminal. It's not ideal but it's the only way I've been able to maintain any perspective on the Crisis. Akimoto is one of the signals that I have had a great deal of difficulty tracking. His and Darius'. Oh, and Suki's."

"Who do you have a lock on, then?"

"Records show a number of intersections with Angst, Frank and Goner, Aqua too, all Upgraded as well. And Wraith, Dex and Callan appear to be in a parallel stream... There's also these sporadic but intense signals regarding someone named Summer. Everything has gone a bit bonkers, honestly."

"The War, like you said. The Metaplex is at war. The System vs The Counter-System vs The Anti-System."

"It's a good thing I know some truly excellent warriors," the Professor said with a smile. Maggie was handed a cup of tea.

"Thanks."

"I'll download you a copy of the most recent analyses and then we need to start working on what might be the most important question."

Maggie sipped the tea, glanced at the files downloading onto the tablet on the table in the cafe. "What's that?" she asked. The person seated at the table beside at her glanced over, then away.

Analysis One

Analysis Two

Analysis Three

"Whose side is Max on?"

FLASHBACKORFORWARDORSIDEWAYS

Max snapped a fresh clip into Joy then another into Pain. He blinked his eyes, steadied his breathing. The wall was cold against his back, and for a second he flashed on a vague memory of being in some sort of Dome, like a sci-fi underworld. Sometimes the flashes of alternate versions shook him to the core, left him dizzy and spinning. And other times they reminded him that he was a superhero after all. Max spun into the hallway and started sighting, squeezing, repeating, breathing. The guns sounded like a giant beating a drum, shattering the air, the arms and chests of the targets shattering, their black suits exploding in red, their sunglasses hiding eyes gone wide and empty. Max was graceful in the violence because he wasn’t really there; his mind was drifting in a vision of reciting poetry to a shining hologram of his one true love. The rhythm of the words and the rhythm of the weapons ended and the hallway was quiet, the LEGACY hit squad destroyed, Max breathing steadily.

Speakers imbedded in the walls crackled on. “That’s quite alright Mr. Cube. Even as you stand there reloading and no doubt indulging in some fancy psychic technique the nanofabric of the carpeting is absorbing DNA from the blood you have spilled and funneling into microtubes that will be launched into orbit, retrieved by one of our satellites, and bonded to alien-robot hybrid hunters we have in stasis. They will be set loose to track you down, all their superkilling talents infused with the vengeance of the guards you just killed.”

“That’s actually really cool,” Max said.

The speakers crackled. “… Um, sorry?”

“I said that’s really cool. How you’re doing all that stuff with all your crazy technology.” 

“You mean you aren’t scared by it?” the speakers blurted.

“You’re going to all that effort to customize an advanced multi-type team of assassins from space just for me. I’m flattered. And slightly insecure that I won’t live up to the hype.”

The speakers fuzzed and went quiet. Just then Max’s cell rang. The Professor’s voice barged in as soon as the phone flipped open.

“Max, while you’ve been battling LEGACY in their Tower Maggie had been targeted by another supervillain! I believe the villain may be in league with Morganfokker! Her name is-“

“The Cheerleader. I know her. We’ve actually met.” Max lit a smoke. 

“Max, this is serious! All the data I have on The Cheerleader indicates that she is an Omega Level- waitaminute… You’ve met her?”

“Listen Prof, I’m not surprised to hear Maggie’s going at it against DeeGee.” He inhaled, staring down at the carpet, imagining the tiny robots in the carpet gathering up the molecules of blood. It was beautiful in a way. Maybe when the alien-robot hunters finally caught him they could figure out a way to reprogram them or something. A way to give even a bit of these guards a second chance.

“DeeGee?!?! Max what are you talking about?”

“Maggie’s undergoing a ritual and-“

“Another one? She just got out of the Initiation Chamber?!?!”

“Calm down, Prof. She’s invoking the arcana of the High Priestess in order to attain a greater level of wisdom, self-understanding and inner peace. Sacred combat against her shadows and dark sides is part of the ritual. Maggie’s no doubt engaging the Cheerleader to serve as an iconic manifestation of that darkness.”

“Ahh…” The Professor went quiet for a moment and Max could hear the sound of typing and some beeping. “I’ve updated my file, but I still think we have a problem and that Mags might be in danger.”

Max pushed the button on the elevator. Getting out of the LEGACY tower would be a hard job, even with the initial hit squad stopped.

“Why’s that?” Max’s tone grew serious.

“Based on my readings Maggie’s psychic waveform is oscillating between her identity as Ms. Magenta and, if you can believe this…”

The elevator doors slid open. “Think who you’re asking.” 

“Well. Maggie, even as she is in combat with The Cheerleader, is phasing back and forth into a tiny little faerie named Misfit…”

Max stepped into the elevator. “Gotcha. I’ll give her a call.”

The cellphone signal sputtered slightly inside the shielded elevator. The Professor’s voice warbled, “Which one?”

Max flicked the cigarette through the closing doors. “Think who you’re asking.”

Instability - Prelude to Crisis

Max picked up the cellphone as soon as he heard 'Gotta Get The Job Done' by The Plastik Kyngdom. It was his ring tone for messages, alerting him that something was up. A series of long numbers appeared: 

Lat: 38.990156264858015
Long: -94.61059659719467
Temporal Instability: 88.89% 
Liable Crunch: 98.02%
3 Days and Counting. 

"Sweet Mother of all things ..." he muttered as he slid his phone across the table and showed the screen to Maggie. "We need to get there in a hurry."

"That's pretty damn high," Maggie replied. "The Professor sure about this?"

"As sure as toast landing on the buttered side once it's been dropped," he replied. He dialed #333 on his phone and sent it. It was the call sign for the team to gather pronto.

Whatever was going to happen in 3 Days was going to be big.

Continuity

Control says, "Current analysis of the newest Iteration of the Metaplex suggests that there are increased levels of Continuity occurring between events... That there are higher amounts of cause and effect... That things are starting to connect, to make more sense... Whether this is helpful or harmful to Max remains to be seen." 

The Professor says, “Don't pretend that this isn't all part of your design. Whatever your intentions, I have to believe that by achieving Continuity Max will finally have some peace...” 

Morganfokker says, “Continuity is the greatest of all lies, and the greatest of all traps.” 

Maggie says, “Maybe it means something finally coming true, for better or worse.” 

Max says, “I barely remember it now, being in the mansion, fighting that monstrous cyborg, and hoping that maybe it would be the thing... I was hallucinating messages from a television producer, or maybe the cyborg was the hallucination... I believed that if things worked out we would get picked up, if we were a TV series, or get to stay together if we were a team of supernatural warriors... I kissed a girl – was it Maggie? I hoped that the romance would make it count more, mean more. I wanted it all to mean something. To matter. I wanted Continuity more than anything. Now, sometimes, it scares me... I can't make up my mind.”

Season Finale Style

"So what time does the portal open?" Max shouted over the sound of gunfire.

"In approximately seven to ten minutes," the Professor's voice replied on the earbud.

"And when does the bomb go off?" Mags shouted as the bullets chewed up the edges of their cover.

"In approximately seven to ten minutes," the Professor said.

Max and Maggie looked at each other, shaking their heads and smiling.

Invocation 1

Trump pawed at the touch-screen on the cell. Making calls had gotten way easier for him with the change in technology; it was pretty tricky for him back when phones were still rotary.

"Coordinates Wheel-Judgement-Temperance," the voice answered.

"Hiya Professor," Trump purred.

"Oh hello there! Thank you for checking in. How is everything proceeding?"

"Maggie's still trapped, Max is still sick. Everyone else is laying low, sticking to their cover stories."

"Hm, I see. Updates please..."


"Suki is working in a pizza shop, Wraith is working at a movie theater, Darius is selling men's clothing, Callan is building furniture in a factory, Frank is doing market research, Goner is delivering pizzas - from a different shop than Suki's, Angst is washing windows, Aqua is working for a cleaning company and Dexter is harvesting wheat samples for an agricultural study."

The sound of typing on a keyboard. "And what about Akimoto?"

"He's here... I don't remember meeting him before. He seems quite strange."

"Imagine a collage of The 13th Warrior, The Last Samurai, Star Wars and The Terminator."

"Professor, I rarely get out to the movies and when Max downloads them I often fall asleep in his lap."

"Yes, of course. Well, the story is a rather muddled mix of a viking on a vision quest, training by ancient Japanese warriors, clothes inspired by the same plus an army surplus store and tropical tourists, a strange connection with version Citadel - if you recall that tale - a mysterious scar, a sprinkle of amnesia, and a dash of time travel. He's generally a lost soul, enjoys a mug of ale, and is relatively unfamiliar with modern technology. He also writes poetry."

"I can see why Max gets along with him so well."

"And how is he occupying his time while we wait for the window?"

Trump studied the movements of the large man on the rooftop of the brownstone, clear in the light of the full moon. "I believe, Professor, that he is attempting to cast a spell."

...

The Children of the Revolution (You Won't Fool)

Max lay back on the couch, feeling like a cliché. It reminded him of the Lab for a moment, a shiver, tried to steady his breathing.

"I guess it's always been a question of trying to figure out who is sending the transmissions," he said. "If it's Control or the Professor, or if it's Morganfokker. If it's an order, or an insight, or a delusion. Their voices often sound alike and the frequencies are always changing. So I try to listen and hope the only people that get hurt are people who need to get hurt.

"But lately I got one message, from one of them, The Professor I think: It's a question of trying to synchronize the inside of you with the outside of you with what's outside of you.

"I thought that if those were even each only a variable between say 1 and 10, the chances of having them all land on the same number at any given moment... I guess that's life as slot machine. But I figure it's closer to say a game of chess where only one combination of the 32 pieces is an accurate representation of how things are - the relationships between royalty and clergy and soldiers and such, be they desires and fears and drives, or whatever (Professor, Morganfokker, Control?) - and there's actually 3 boards you're playing on, against 3 different players. And you're supposed to get each board in sync, all 32 pieces in the same position, in the same move.

"And that's when it happens I guess. Has it happened to you?"

v.D& The Godhammer

The first crypitc messages that the Dragons are given by the Sage lead them to a hidden glade in an ancient Fae Wood, long ago ravaged by the Ashen Tradition. In this glade they find an orphaned Changeling girl - a human raised by the Fae, shaped by their magic. No Changelings survived the Storm and no one knows what this girl will one day become. Another mystery is the origin of the mighty enchanted weapon that she carries; Maighread names the girl The Godhammer, claiming the title is from a tale told in the time before the Storm. 'Hammer' becomes the youngest member of the Order, wielding her fearsome mallet with a skill beyond her years.

v.D& The Dragons

The new Order of the Dragon welcomes all wayfarers, wanderers and outcasts who devote their talents to helping the Free Folk. 

The Lady Dread fights for the Fae, who have been mercilessly hunted by the Ashen Tradition to be corrupted into vicious Ravagers. Her prowess in combat stems from her training as a Leafdancer.

Freeman is a former Child of the Pyre. Maighread bested him in battle and gave him the choice to die or repent. He now lends his arcane powers to the cause of the Dragons and seeks redemption for the harms he has caused.

The Faded Knight is the last surviving soldier of the Order of the Griffon. He had been imprisoned by the Red Cadre at a distant Keep. 'Fade' was rescued by Jorja the Fair and told to seek out Maximus if he wanted revenge against his captors.

The Dragons are sometimes granted aid by a mysterious apparition that they call the Sage. No one knows the Sage's origin or agenda, but his riddles and secrets have often brought the Dragons good fortune.

v.GB Francine

Two young hackers known by the handles 'The Professor' and 'Trump' were able to create a cloaked backdoor channel into Omega Station 6, the site of a secret cloning program. Over the course of three years, they slowly and delicately tinkered with the system and were able to re-program one of the clones. They left the combat and tactical coding intact but altered the motivation from obedience to rebellion. When the techs at the Station activated the clone she broke loose and escaped. Some time after, Mackenzie Cube located the clone and began guiding her in her new life as a renegade. The clone eventually chose the name Francine. 

Origin Stories

Sometimes The Professor finds you first. Cryptic signs and mysterious messages. Clues and riddles. Tuning you into the different frequencies that reveal secret worlds hidden in plain sight. The Professor gives you guidance.


Sometimes Morganfokker finds you first. Painful surgeries and terrible sacrifices. Injections and dissections. Implanting you with the knowledge that everything you know is a lie. Morganfokker tests you and experiments on you.


Sometimes Maggie finds you first. Her hand on your shoulder, gentle and strong. Standing watch over you while you stare in shock as the world turns to ruins around you and demons charge forth from your darkest places. Maggie protects you.


Sometimes Max finds you first. He makes a joke, tells you a story. He probably has some crazy theory about what's happening. One minute he's ranting, the next he's tearing up when you play him your favourite song. Max makes things stranger or more normal or both.


No matter who finds you first, or who comes next, to clean up the mess or bind the wounds or offer explanations, to make you feel better or worse about it all, once you are in it you are in it for good. The only way out is to get dead, and even that might not last – just ask Suki or Goner.


And, of course, because that's the way of things here, you could be found first a few times, by a few different people, different combinations, different versions, some you remember and some you can't but they're all still somehow yours. They're all still somehow you.


I was abducted from the Eighth Tribe on a planet far away from Earth by an army of Fokkerbots; Max rescued me. I also went to college and met a girl named Maggie who got me into role-playing games and introduced me to the Professor. I might have been part of a girl named Kitty. Sometimes I've been here since the beginning, and other times I'm the newest recruit.


My name is Tatterdemalion and one day I will tell you the story of how I destroyed the Metaplex.

"Beginning of a Beautiful Friendship"

If his calculations were correct.

If his calculations were correct this call would change everything.

Years of calculations. He had been doing this for so long - had he been a young man once? The development of the model of Noo-Mo-Omniism. The study of Plureality. The development of Omega Magic. Version Theory.

If his calculations were correct he would be making contact with the Prime Variable, the repeating cluster of data that recurred throughout all levels of the holoarchy, in all iterations of the fractal. The 'Cube', as he called it, a nickname referencing the act of raising a quantity to the third power, the transformation of something two-dimensional into something three-dimensional. That which transcends the plane it is drawn upon, like the way in chess that a Knight can move over/through other pieces who can only travel on the surface of the board... It made sense to him, anyway.

Years researching plexwave radiation, designing and building the Plexotron. And everything, and everyone, he gave up along the way. Carrying this desperate vision, this certainty that things could be other than what they are, this burden like Frodo carrying the One Ring to Mt. Doom.

If his calculations were correct this call had probably taken place dozens, maybe hundreds of times before, in different versions. It was a cause, an effect, a strange attractor. For him though, now, here, this call would mean the beginning of creating Continuity in a Fragmented system. The genesis of understanding. It would mean that the Cube would no longer be alone. And neither would he.

He took a deep breath and picked up the cell phone. Dialled the number calculated by the Plexotron.

Ring. Click. "Hello?" The voice sounded far away.

"Um... May I ask who I am speaking to?" he said.

Pause. "My name is Max."

"Max, this is the Professor."

Later in the Metaplex...

Fallen Six

Previously in the Metaplex... 

“Things had gotten strange. Even stranger, I guess. And they had gotten desperate. More fragmented than ever. Things were happening out of order. Max was experiencing different versions with a different team. One of them had died but they got her back. Then another was killed. The man they called The Professor was experimenting with something they called Plexotron technology, remixing events like they were music. And another man was hunting Max, a man called Morganfokker. 

“It seemed like everywhere we went Morganfokker was waiting, and people started to get hurt. Memphis, Precious, Summer, Amber... He got to all of them. As a way to get to us. And Max thought he had figured it out. Morganfokker was able to track us through plureality because we were a convergence. Our signals were amplified because we were all in sync. So the answer was to separate.

“We needed to hide, to go our own ways. Go to dark places, dangerous places. So that Morganfokker couldn't find us. It was the only way we could keep each other safe, keep other people from being used as pawns against us. That's why we broke into the Temple, fought our way to the final chamber. The Seven Lotus Portals were our way out. It was an escape plan. 

“We would keep seeking, keep trying to find a way to fight back, and hopefully reunite someday. In the meantime, no one else would get hurt. 

“Except that when we went through the portals we all ended up here, together. Trapped. And the Demon invasion had already started. So we did what we were used to doing, teamed up and fought back. And the invasion became a war."

Darius didn't have any answers about the Eyes, the Grids, the Gutters, what the world had been like before the Demons came. The Dragons learned what they could about the rules of this reality and helped build Frontline. They helped create Haven ("How old are all of you?" "Don't get me started about time and plureality.") They helped keep the Demons back long enough for the Arcana to start forging a new world amidst the ruins of the old.

He told Marshal about Aqua's Sacrifice, about Callan's Transformation, about Wraith's Curse, and about Dexter's Sickness. He told him about Maggie's Fall ("Dark Maggie, like Dark Willow, or Dark Phoenix I guess, if you want to go that far back - it must be a Magical Redhead trope." "I don't understand what any of that means..."). There were wins and a lot of losses. There were different theories about why they were here. Had something gone wrong with the Portals? Had Max made a mistake? Had Control tricked them? Was this what the world looked like without Morganfokker?

And then Darius told Marshal about the Disappearance of Max Cube.

Channel Plex: Mahjong

Max stood on the promenade deck; he was leaning with his back against the railing. His hand holding a red pen, writing along the margins of the script. 

Damn, these hacks couldn't write worth beans. He was constantly changing things, adding colons, fixing up the words here and there, and changing the details to make things more cohesive and clearer for the audience. 

"Finished yet?" Simon said as he approached. He was carrying two cups of coffee and offered one to Max. "You've been out here for over an hour. I figured you needed this." 

"It's not easy turning crap into gold," Max replied as he put the cap on the red pen and clipped it to the page he was editing. He accepted the cup and took a pull from it. 

"What's the scoop?" Simon inquired. "We shooting this scene today or not?" 

"We're three days late as it is," Max replied. 

"Logollos is dancing around the producers," Simon said. "He's working his magic in order for this movie to be finished on time." 

"Christ, we're over budget as well," Max said. "I hope to hell this doesn't end up as another Heaven's Gate fiasco." 

The ship chugged along the river as Max took another pull of the coffee. "Here comes The Professor now," Simon said under his breath. 

"Are you finished with the changes, Max?" The Professor asked. He was dressed in a windbreaker and had on a baseball cap that read Cube Productions. "We need to shoot the next few scenes now before the weather changes again. The lightning and the weather is a good mood-setter for this."

Between Here and There, Now and Then

He tapped the phone off and picked himself up from the ground; he felt like he was in a lucid dream. His mind swirling with images and afterthoughts that he couldn't place, what things were where. His body terraformed and his mind seemed to be sinking in the details of the phone call. A series of random waves from a voice. The Professor. Was it the Professor; a GMC come to life? Or had he always been there.

"I'm going mad," he muttered.

"Not really," Suki answered as she returned from a vending machine. She held out a chocolate bar like an offering. "You should eat."

"We eat here?" Dan said.

"We do," she replied with a smile. "You've been around the gaming table long enough to figure that out."

He had been reading psychology books about transcendation and scanning websites about the possibilities of opening doors to other worlds, other realities. That the currently real world he lived in was just a facade of imagery manipulated by his mind to offset his own desires of changes and remorse. He knew that he was either evolving or simply going mad. He preferred evolving since mad men were branded and exiled.

Dan opened the wrapper up and took a bite and it felt like heaven. His taste buds seemed to explode with flavour. Suki smiled.

"That's how I felt once I passed through into your reality," she noted. She sat down on a bench. "It's like being reborn, isn't it? Seeing worlds through fresh eyes and dimensions."

Still, something didn't feel right with Dan. It was like he was here but not here.

To Be Continued

The Professor addressed the latest team. The newest Dragons. It wasn't the first time the roster had been replaced, or recombined. He had worked with so many of them throughout the strange non-years of the Metaplex, the liquid time of plureality. All of the lost and the found, the warriors, the outcasts, knights and assassins, witches and spies. The different teams gathered and sent on their missions, and always The Professor there to guide them, to never really be a part of them. Except the times that he had been, or the times he was never there at all - though most of those he couldn't remember... 

Dexter, Wraith, Darius, Callan. Frank, Goner, Angst, Suki, Aqua. Akimoto, Tatterdemallion. Cromwell, Bern, Caden. Siltailus, Falador, Rickson, Cloak, Nurendemyr. The Kat, Misfit, Silver. Odin, Merlin, Kele-De. Mick. Marshal, Michelle, Nick and Jonas. Nick, Pat and Charlotte. Soma and Heresy. All the Travelers, the Blueberry Hill Gang, the Shelter Team. Bishop, Twofeathers, Trump. Pretty George. Maggie Magenta.

And now, Stone and Riveta, Donnelly and Mayganne, Scorpio. He had explained to them as much as he could, what he was allowed to, what he was able to. And what the plan was. Desperate and uncertain, but the only way the Professor could think to turn this situation around. It wasn't safe to contact Simon Light in any local versions - the Professor had had to quarantine him. But maybe if they went far enough around... Find him, some version of him, somewhere else...

There was no telling if any of them would make it, or who they would be. If they would remember or understand anything. If they would find him and reach him. If that would be enough of a convergence to change things. If this would save things or end them.

The Professor had briefed them. He had taught them all the mantras and visualizations that he knew for transferals. Had exposed them to specifically modulated energy fields. Had read them modernist poetry, shown them certain movies. Tried anything he could think of to help them.

And now he was going to send them into another world and hope that they would somehow return...

23rd Century Party People

Today's meeting was in a conference room in a downtown hotel. The Professor had a laptop set-up at the head of the table. Beside it there was another one of his strange devices - wires and winking lights and whirring parts. No one had asked the rumpled old man what these objects were for; there had been too many bizarre answers to other simple questions already. 

"Why isn't Susannah here?" Donnelly asked.

"It turns out that she's not a part of this. Not exactly." Things had continued to cohere, to synchronize, since everyone had been gathered. Or reunited. Some memories had become clear, while others were still cloudy, and others still pitch black. At each meeting the Professor had new files that he had compiled from whatever mysterious sources he had. A picture had started to emerge, but it was one of wavering lines and shifting colours and impossible angles, like a Cubist painting.

"Where is she then?" Riveta asked.

"I don't have the ability to remove her from this thread; it's not part of what I do. But I have made arrangements for her to be kept safe."

Scorpio studied the newest folder intently. LEGACY was mentioned a few more times in some documents, but there was still no record of him being in contact with Greg Logollos. Each night Scorpio thought about trying to contact Greg. He hadn't yet.

Stone resisted the urge to question the Professor, to ask what guarantees he could provide that Susannah was safe. He knew that there were none. From all the sci-fi technology, mutant attack dogs, and psychedelic metaphyiscs it was obvious to Stone that there weren't any certainties anymore. His training as a detective told him to keep asking, to keep digging, keep trying to solve the mystery of it all. His training as a soldier told him to keep quiet and follow orders.

Riveta seemed to be dealing with it all fairly well. Maybe because she had been in contact with the Professor the longest. It was almost as if she had somehow learned something from undergoing all this weirdness. Stone was so glad to have her back. He knew that they could get through anything together.

"So what's next then?" Mayganne asked.

Donnelly looked at the teenager he knew from his school. She had always been a quiet girl, shy, a little gloomy. Now she came to the meetings smiling and eager. School had never seemed a good fit for Mayganne, but this - whatever it was - had opened something up inside her. Donnelly knew that he still had to have a stern talk with her about breaking into that bank, but for now he was using her enthusiasm as a way to stay grounded amidst the chaos. He had wondered a lot lately about starting to pray again...

"Well," the Professor said, tapping some keys on the laptop and glancing at the device. "What's next is that we're going to try and change the world. Or one of them anyway."

Same Time Same Page

The Professor circled the table, handing out the file folders. 

"Hopefully some of the materials in these will start to generate trans-version connections," he said. "And you will all start to remember what happened." 

Riveta began scanning the contents of her folder right away. Police reports from some recent investigations she didn't remember undertaking. Photos of a diner that looked familiar. A picture of a man who she didn't recognize, but who had the saddest looking eyes she had ever seen. 

Stone sat beside her; he hadn't been more than a few feet from her since the night on the street, when he had found her again. When the impossible had started to happen. Except the impossible had started to happen some time ago, he was realizing now, as memories of certain crime scenes started to return.  

"Who is this man?" Donnelly asked. He held up his own copy of the photo Riveta was looking at.  

Mayganne studied her copy. "He looks familiar, sorta..."

The Professor had taken a seat at the head of the table. "His name is Simon Light. He is very important. Hopefully, you will be meeting him - again - very soon."
 
Scorpio tried to keep his breathing steady, trying one of the meditation techniques he was slowly starting to remember. Among the copies of police reports and photographs inside his folder, there were memos and press releases from the LEGACY Corporation. Many were signed by Greg Logollos. He glanced at the Professor... Did he know that Greg had been in contact with Scorpio? Recently? Or did they know each other already from before? It made Scorpio feel nervous, trapped. He wasn't sure who or what to trust.
 
Susanna stopped at a picture of an older woman holding a young girl on her lap. The older woman was holding a tattered pom-pom. The little girl was smiling.
 
The Professor spoke up. "Shortly I will be asking each of you to begin making notes on what the files mean to you, what you recognize, how they make you feel. My own picture of what happened is far from complete."
 
Stone looked at Riveta and smiled. He didn't care how weird all this was. She was alive.
 
"What we need to focus on right away," the Professor continued, "is the very grave threat facing each of you, and some other people who you may or may not know. Indeed, the very Metaplex itself is in danger."
 
"The meta-huh?" Mayganne asked.
 
"A threat from what?" Donnelly cut in.
 
The Professor adjusted his glasses.
 
"A man named Morganfokker."

Roads Less or More

Version Charlie Ten.7

Simon tugged his knee-length charcoal coat tight around him; the wind was chill today. He pressed the cell to his ear; there was lots of noisy traffic on the busy downtown street.

"They want to offer me the position," he said. "Should I take it?"
Simon reflexively scanned the faces of the crowd, glancing in car windows at the drivers, through shop windows at the clerks, always looking for someone he recognized. Trying to find the others. Except his memories of them were so staticky, he couldn't hold their faces or names, too much like a dream. And the man on the line was rarely any help. 

"I can't tell you that," the Professor said. "You know it doesn't work that way. At least for now." 

Simon sighed with frustration. "I'm just not sure if it's the right thing to do. Now, with everything being so different." He stopped briefly, thought he saw a woman across the street, red hair, something about her familiar... And was bumped into from behind, a careless teenager, no apology, strutting past with his crew. 

"I'll have to call you back," Simon said to the Professor. "I have to go check myself for bugs." 

"Now that's something I can help you with, Agent Light. You're clean." 

Simon gave the street another scan, this time taking his look upward, to the tops of the buildings, and to the sky above. He had gotten used to thinking of the Professor as being in a satellite, although he knew that wasn't quite the case. Or sometimes he imagined it like the Operators in the Matrix, but that wasn't quite it either. And a lot of the time, Simon had the dread suspicion that the Professor was only a voice in his head.

"Let me know what you decide about their offer. It may be significant, it may not be."

"It'll be a big deal to me either way," Simon said with a slight edge.

"Yes, of course Agent Light. I'm sorry."

Destination Salvation

Version Crimson C 

Riveta woke up in a strange hotel room. It was nice. A suite. She never could have afforded it on her salary. 

She tried to stay still, keep her breathing even. Letting the sounds of the room, the city beyond the curtained windows, come to her.

She was alone. There were whirring noises outside that she couldn't recognize. 

She sat up, took stock. Her clothes were folded on a nearby chair. Her service revolver was on the nightstand. And a cellphone. 

He had said things would likely get strange. Stranger. What was his name...? It seemed like a long time ago. 

The cellphone rang. She snapped it open, held it to her ear. 

"Good morning, Detective. This is the Professor."