[Audio]

[evervarying]

What the hell happened back there?

[Even without any video feed to give an idea of her expression, Ashley's obviously agitated, and three days in what is apparently an entirely new timestream hasn't done anything to help things make sense.]

Not the basics - I get it. Most of you were off time traveling. But where? How scattered were we all? What started it? Did everyone make it back, or are we still missing people?

[She already knows "back in one piece" is too much to ask for.]

I don't know about anyone else, but I really don't want to be caught with my pants down next time.

Comments

[audio]

[galacticheroine]

I don't know about everyone, but several of us ended up in what I'm assuming is the future of this place, if we don't figure out how to get the ship working again.

[audio]

[evervarying]

Tell me that's not the one with the tentacles.

[audio]

[galacticheroine]

I could tell you that, but I'd be lying.

[audio]

[evervarying]

Why do you think it has something to do with the ship? I don't know much about it, except that it spat a bunch of dead people out into Limbo.

[audio]

[galacticheroine]

That seems to be the one constant in a lot of these timelines, and it was in that... void. Plus, it's the thing that brought us here in the first place, and most of us aren't even from the same universes.

We've found some data on energy tracking and things that are over my head, but I think a lot of it points to us needing that ship to work so we can fix whatever's broken. Or at least try to figure it out.

[Audio]

[professorwolf]

[At his desk in the Outer Authorities' offices-- ironic, that-- Lyall goes for a slightly distracted-sounding reply while he jots down notes.]

As far as I've been able to gather from people, there were at least four groups-- one from the time when the domes were just in the planning stages during the war with Antiqua, one from even earlier than that before the war, one from the far future as Commander Shepard just said, and one from the ship itself before it crashed. There were I believe twelve of us in the wartime version of Hyperion, and I know at least one hasn't made it back. She vanished sometime before we were pulled back here.

[Details. He likes them, and he did at least try to keep tabs on the rest of the group from his timeline.]

As for what caused it-- I haven't the foggiest. If anyone does, I would love to hear about it. I can't figure anything that might serve as a warning for it happening again, either, except I suppose to pay attention to the ship.

[He also likes to talk. He's done now, though, he promises.]

[Audio]

[evervarying]

Who? And what circumstances did she disappear under?

[Does she sound suspicious? Hell yes.]

[Audio]

[professorwolf]

Natasha Romanoff, and I am under the impression she was captured by the local authorities. Either that, or she abandoned us. I couldn't track her scent very far-- I didn't know her very well, I'm afraid, and had very little to work with for knowing where she might have hidden.

We did lose two people since, under much more certain circumstances, but they returned to this timeline without any trouble, it seems.

[Audio]

[evervarying]

If she abandoned you, there's no reason she shouldn't have shown back up with the rest of us. I get the feeling the radius of whatever happened is a lot further than anyone could get on foot.

[Audio]

[professorwolf]

Agreed. Whatever pulled us into that place-that-wasn't even pulled in my aethographer-- this thing I am speaking to you on, the communicator from the ship. I didn't even have it on me at the time, it was downstairs in my room.

So. Either she did not make it back, or she made it back and into her pod again. Someone perhaps ought to make a list of who is missing and go check the ship for them.

[voice]

[hypospraying]

My first thought is to blame the Ship for sending us to different times. I was one of the people who was on the Ship when we disappeared for a day and didn't realize it. It's possible it's putting out some form of energy that we can read with instruments.

[voice]

[evervarying]

I doubt it, unless we want to wait for it to happen again.

[voice] ffffu, that should have said can't. never mind. /rolls with it.

[hypospraying]

I sure don't, that's for sure.

[Dying was not fun.]

[voice] there are some in development, maybe she heard about them?

[evervarying]

Me neither. I've already had enough existential crises for two lifetimes.

[They should drink to that.]

[voice] let's go with that. :D

[hypospraying]

That sounds unfortunate. Hopefully we can solve this mystery, though I'm a nurse, not a physicist.

[video]

[growingwild]

We were in Verdana's past - way back in the past, before they had the domes or anything. They were even still on good terms with Antiqua. And you ain't the only one that wants to know what in Lakik's name is going on.

[Briar paused for a moment]

Sigyn's gone. But I don't know when she disappeared - last time I saw her was before all this happened. She might have gone back to the ship. [Or he hoped she had. That was better than her getting lost in time or anything, at least]

[video]

[evervarying]

Do you know if anyone saw her while everything was going down?

[video]

[growingwild]

[Briar shook his head] No idea. I know she definitely wasn't in my timeline, but with all the other timelines we had...not to mention that weird place...

[video]

[evervarying]

I didn't see her there. But there was a lot of ground to cover.

[Video]

[standsentinel]

[Kaidan appears to be trying to get acquainted with the flat that some alternate-timeline version of himself decided worked better than underground. His comm seems to be propped up to keep him in pickup range as he works on checking over his armour while out on a balcony with a sea view.]

My guess is the Ship, and I have an omni-tool groaning under the load of an equation I need to hand off to Tosh about it.

From the way the AI described it, it sounds like you get... clusters, I guess I'd say, of possible realities or timestreams. It can jump through them, and we apparently all fell out of our home ones, so maybe it malfunctioned and shunted people into some banked coordinates. That's my working theory.

[Video]

[evervarying]

I guess that makes the ten thousand credit question "how long do we have before it does that again?" Assuming the easy answer isn't the right one.

[She smiles, though it looks a little strained.]

And the five thousand credit question is, did you get a sugar daddy while I wasn't looking?

[Video]

[standsentinel]

If I had to guess, I'd say that countdown running on the Ship has something to do with that. I need to get Salvation's AI back on li-- what?

[He looks behind him as if just noticing his new digs, and how different they'd look as a backdrop. Huffing a laugh, he shakes his head and leans back on his haunches to pick up one of his gauntlets.]

Ah, I think if there is one, it's me. After the weirdest conversation ever, along the lines of 'can you please tell me what I've been doing and where', it looks like whatever changed history means that I never moved underground. Makes sense -- I was only down there because it was better proof against bombing raids. Where did you end up?

[Video]

[evervarying]

Easy answer it is.

[Unsurprisingly, she doesn't look happy about that. Mostly because she can do basic math.]

I - haven't checked yet. Figured no one would begrudge me a few days crashing at the Flop until I managed to work out who to ask where I'm supposed to be living.

[Audio]

[genoshas_general]

I think we're still missing people. I'm not sure how, since people who died in our timeline are back to being perfectly healthy here.

Which may mean anyone we can't find isn't coming back.

[Audio]

[evervarying]

Maybe they died in Limbo. Or there's an upper limit to the ship's ability to regenerate damage.

[Her expression goes a little grim and distant.]

I can't think of what that limit would be, though.