[Fiction] Dealing under a New Sun [AU-IW]

[Jager]

Dealing under a New Sun

His body was aching, but his mind was wracked with a deeper fear. He had been taken away from his home – again. All those years spent putting some semblance of a life back together was wasted. The fear gave way to its companion, rage. He wanted to lash out and destroy. Rarely had Timeslip’s life been in so much danger as right then and it wasn’t even a danger directed solely at her, for she would have been a target of convenience, nothing more. Jager’s soul was in that much turmoil.

Strangely, it was her twisting ever so slightly in his grip that brought him back to sanity … to reality. Life equals hope and thus possibility, or so he believed. His body’s exhaustion was fully felt then. It was more an act of will that kept his hand a hold of Timeslip. Sure, he was stronger, but his hand shook and was unsteady. His examination of his captive showed she was in an equally sorry state. Now it was a matter if innate ability and recovery time. Those were two odds he could live with, he was confident. Worse, Timeslip’s body began to tremor and twitch. She needed her fix just to stay alive. In that way she was lucky. Jager had come prepared to trap his quarry if necessary and reached into one of his sealed pockets for a non-lethal dose of tabs. With his free hand he reached over and placed them into one of Timeslip’s hands. She took the much needed drugs giving credence to the stories that her jailors had kept her starved as a means of control. Jager didn’t worry about that now. He took the gifted distraction to transfer his grip to her elbow and then he sat up.

The view was both awe-inspiring and conjured up his most recent fears anew. It was indeed a foreign landscape that lay before his eyes. Not touch of the European architecture was present and the subtle but marked signs of an active polytheistic culture were everywhere. His eyes took in the scene and then the clues all came together for Jager –Inca World. Long had mentioned this world/destination to him. It was the place where Timeslip had felt most secure, and secure enough to leave her child.

It was a pity that such beauty was lost on Jager’s predatory mind. There were much here that in calmer moments he would have enjoyed, but that wasn’t’ were his mind was at that moment. He was still stuck in some capture-retrieve-export home mode and it was going to take some adjustment for that mindset to fade. After all, Jager was really terrified and that made him want to try and be in control.

Timeslip rolled over from her side to her back and felt the pangs of hunger subsided.

“We are going to see your daughter,” said Jager, “but then we are going back home. That was what you wanted remember?”

It didn’t take much effort to realize that Long must have told him about this area, but then it had been the world from Long’s viewpoint, and that also told volumes.

[Timeslip]

Pain was everywhere. Her entire body ached, and muscles spasmed uncontrollably. Where she was - when she was - made no difference; whatever the case, there wasn't a doubt in her mind that she was dying.

Then, something was pressed into her hand, something small and hard and round. Almost as a reflex, the trembling hand moved to her mouth... and suddenly, sweet, sweet relief rolled over her, as the missing nutrient was absorbed into her blood stream. Oh, her body was still one large bruise - a bruise that she suddenly realized was visible as her eyes fluttered open and she saw her condition. Red hair cascaded over her shoulder and her pale arms sported not black-and-stars but black-and-blue. So much quantum, she thought to herself; I used so much, I ran myself baseline-dry.

“We are going to see your daughter, but then we are going back home. That was what you wanted remember?” The words brought her vividly and painfully back to the here and now; the steely hand was still gripping her elbow as she sat up and looked at her captor.

"I see that my former husband has told you quite a bit," she offered dryly. "You're right, Jager, but not in the way you mean. I am going to see my daughter... and in doing so, I am going home. This is my home now," she said, even as the first sweet trickle of precious quantum came back to her node, and her pale Irish features were washed away in her trademark sweep of velvety cosmos. A voice once more possessed of a disturbingly out-of-synch echo added, "And I'm afraid that at least for the time being, it's yours as well."

She looked around, trying to get a bearing on where exactly they had come down. Buildings - close at hand and blocking out sight of the larger city - that were utterly alien to her erstwhile companion were like old friends to her, and the lush flowers and grasses that had partially cushioned the fall told her more. "I see we came down in the Temple District." She moved to stand, albeit painfully; with little real choice in the matter, Jager stood with her. "You haven't seen a thing yet... but you will." Standing changed the vantage point significantly, as openings set in surrounding walls in such a way as to enhance the sacred park gave them a window to the outside world.

Skyscrapers of steel and glass and a dark black material that might have been obsidian graced the sky to the east, intermingled with the tips of what could only be pyramids and hugely wrought stone temples. Above them, high on the western cliffs, loomed the great golden statue of Inti, every bit as massive as the more humbly clad Christ the Redeemer that stood in the same spot in another world, above a city both the same and different known as Rio de Janeiro. A helicopter, heard before seen, swept into view; even with the unfamiliar script on its side, there was no way that Jager could mistake it for anything but a news copter. People, clad in clothing that was a mix of Western and modernized native, gathered in increasing crowds at the edge of the park - and cheered when Timeslip waved to them.

"Welcome to Coricanchac, Jager. Welcome to Tawantin Suyu: the Incan Empire. Welcome to my home."

[Jager]

"Welcome to Coricanchac, Jager. Welcome to Tawantin Suyu: the Incan Empire. Welcome to my home."

Jager let go of Timeslip’s elbow. His inability to retain her in any kind of custody was a forgone conclusion.

‘Unless I want to take on a city of twelve plus million people all by myself with my quantum reserves just this side of vapors,’ he joked to himself. He gave a bitter laugh.

Jager looked up to the helicopter. They were going to want to know who he was and he wasn’t going to tell them. He viewed these worlds differently, not seeing them as separate, but somehow connected in some special way only the truest masters of Time could tell. Of course, outsiders had already come here and fooled around, causing what kind of unseen ripples. This kind of thinking was a distraction though.

“This isn’t over, Timeslip,” he whispered to her over the increasing din of the crowd. “At the very least I can tell the novas here what you’ve done, the oath you made, and how you’ve gone back on that oath. Our race is going to suffer for what you’ve done – no reason to not see you share in some of that suffering.”

It was clear to see that the people didn’t know quite what to make of Jager. He held no obvious godhead, nor had he shown any divine manifestations, yet … yet he was clearly something superior to human. Jager hadn’t started ‘playing normal’ yet. He was too tired for that game, but the predatory edge that would have frightened them away had clearly faded. Right now he was just a man; a nova man and then someone approached the two of them and began talking.

[Timeslip]

An invisible glare was leveled at Jager, but it passed as the starscape nova spoke to the people who had approached. Her tone, however, was a reassuring one, and the people did not make any aggressive moves toward her former captor; quite the opposite, as smiles lit up on their faces and they gave him what were obviously greetings.

"I've told them," she said after switching to a very quiet English, "that you are my good friend, and that your name is Kasachidur. As it means 'Hunter', it fits," she said with something between a grin and a smirk in her voice. "I've also told them that I've returned to stay, and that you are the guest of myself and the city. I'd recommend - really, really recommend - that you not do anything that would make them change their mind about your status here."

She reached out and took Jager by the hand, clasping it in what must have appeared to be a warm guesture; flashbulbs popped, and she spoke again to the crowd for a brief moment. To Jager, she quietly said, "We'll need to talk. Time to head home." With that, she led him upward into the sky.

[Jager]

“No worries,” Jager responded. “I have no intention of committing suicide just yet.”

He had no expectations of a reply and little need of one. This was a time to think and observe and observe he did. The old temples appealed to him with their stark wilderness carefully maintained around them. He knew without asking what the modern temples stood for and seeing them hardened the lines of his face.

“Too much like home,” he muttered.

Their destination was rapidly growing before them. Jager saw the devotion heaped upon the structure as well as its owner’s sense of self-importance. Of course, in his time and place, there would have been guards about as well and they were thankfully absent here. When comparing this place to Chicago, there was no real comparison beyond the bricks and mortar. The building around were built with a different aesthetic and there was an obviously superior spirituality here. It was a sensation … an environment that Jager knew he would have to adapt to if he was to survive here and succeed.

[z-Pachacamaq]

A brilliant sun blinked into existence at the entrance to the temple, rising into the air in a golden explosion of power. Pachacamac was fast, but even Timeslip was startled by how fast the golden form went from a distant smear of blazing color to the familiar form of her god-like friend. For Jager, seeing Pachacamac for the first time, it was like seeing Procyon in a strange, twisted and Incan-flavored mirror.

The body cradled to his was not Incan, nor would she ever be seen as such. She was also very familiar to Jager as she untangled herself from Procyon and smiled at her former sister-in-law. "Timeslip-ji, Pachacamac said you were back," Saori laughed, even as she offered the bundle in her arms to the other female nova. It was only after she'd passed Yokiko over to her mother that she looked at the other person there, and her eyes widened in fear. "Jager? Why are you here?"

"Is something wrong?" Pachacamac said casually, but there was nothing relaxed in his intense blue eyes. Still, there was a measure of calm and gravitas about the golden man, as solid as a mountain. "This is Timeslip's guest, is he not?" The subtle implication was that he'd damned well better be her friend.

[Timeslip]

"Yokiko," she whispered.

Upon seeing what Saori held, the rest of the world fell away for Timeslip. The trial, the flight, Jager's threat... all was forgotten. She took the small bundle in hands that trembled, almost in disbelief of what they held... then she pulled her daughter close in an embrace that, even without the benefit of visible facial expressions, could not be mistaken for anything other than pure, unwavering and unlimited motherly love.

"I'm here, baby," she whispered in soft tones to the tiny infant, a child who shared her mother's cosmic eyes and hair. "I'm here to stay, love."

[Jager]

The man-god of bronze and gold did indeed remind Jager of Procyon, but then he really didn't like Procyon all that much. At his core, the hunter was a monotheist and didn't banter about the mantle of spiritual godhood lightly. Due to the current circumstance and recent stresses, Jager couldn't even manage a decent smile when he saw Gu Saori.

"Amped was fine last time I checked," he quipped to the young Asian lady instead. "Otherwise I'm here on business."

He could only stare back at Pachacamac in response to his question.

'Of course something is wrong here, but I'm not really in a position to tell you the truth. No, I'm trapped here and my captors can either chose to put a nice face on it, or really make my life difficult. I chose the nice for now.'

Pachacamac's attention kept Jager from gaining any real depth out of the Timeslip-Yokiko reunion. Her words ate at him though. If she was here to stay he would have failed and his home would suffer.

[z-Gu Saori]

Saori gazed sadly at the man before her, sensing his distress. "Thank you for that news, Jager. I appreciate it," she said, nodding and giving him a grateful smile that she didn't entirely feel. As always, Amped's name made her body hollow out, until she felt empty.

Turning to the golden god at her side, Saori explained, "Jager is from our world. He's... with the Knights."

Pachacamac's eyebrow rose, but he said nothing about Jager's affiliations. "Welcome to Coricanchac, Jager," he said in a beautiful voice that was full of quantum-fueled warmth. "All who come in peace are welcome here." With an easy smile, he offered the blonde man his hand.

[Timeslip]

Returning to the here and now, Timeslip looked up from her daughter and took in the awkward situation.

"Jager's presence here wasn't exactly a planned encounter," she said in a profound understatement. "The trial went... badly. But now that he's here, he's my guest. And I suppose my responsibility, to some extent."

[Jager]

'Profound confusion, regrets, and everything in between,' Jager thought. 'Best turn the conversation to things most definitely nova then.'

Turning to the glimmering Sun-nova Jager smiled the most casual smile he could muster and said,

"Well, since no one has the immediate desire to determine that I actually can't fly ... how about we get something to eat? I missed breakfast and Timeslip's been eating flavored cardboard for the past few weeks."

Jager had little idea what Timeslip had been eating, but he decided that his embellishment would be close enough to the truth. Also, Jager was standing too close to Timeslip's young one and that didn't sit well with his plans and predilection to darker intentions.

Besides, what little he said had gut-punched Saori and was worth further investigation if for no other reason than to not remind him how far from home he really was.

[z-Pachacamaq]

Pachacamac's beaming smile would have fooled any baseline and most novas. Even Saori - despite her insider knowledge of Pachacamac's temperment and personality - wasn't sure that he was faking the sincerety that followed from him. But Jager knew. He knew because he did it just as easily, just as cleanly as the self-styled god was now performing it.

"Of course; I would be happy to be your host!" Pachacamac exclaimed, smiling broadly. "What kind of food would you like? I can take us anywhere we need or want to go on this world, and I like many kinds of food. If you wish to sample my native fair, I can promise you it will be the best fare you have ever tasted."

Reaching out, the golden nova offered his hand, even as Saori offered hers. The two novas smiled at one another before Pachacamac dropped his hand. Jager knew Saori; he'd probably be more comfortable accepting a ride from her.

[Timeslip]

"All things considered, I think your own table would be the best one, Pachacamaq. A secluded table," she said pointedly. "We have a lot of things to discuss," she added, looking at Jager.

What is this like for him? I know from what Long has said that our world wasn't his home; now, he's been uprooted again... and since both he and I are still here, it's pretty apparent that he can't go back there on his own. Wonderful work, Angie; you've ruined another life....

The infant in her arms moved, and she looked down at those stary, stary eyes. "I love you, little one," she whispered. I hope you never have to know the price of that love.

[Jager]

"I will defer to my hostess," he says nodding to Timeslip, but eyeing Pachacamaq steadily. Jager wonders just how far this guy is going to take his involvement in Jager's endeavors. Already they don't like one another, but their relationship has every indication that it will be getting worse. Then Timeslip speaks and Jager adds another line of thinking to his already troubled mind.

'All the better to destroy you alone,' Jager mused giving in to his paranoia over Timeslip's words. Jager nods to Timeslip's words but studiously ignores her infant. He still wants to succeed in this mission that had taken him so far astray, despite how badly things are currently.

Jager steps up and takes Gu Saori's hand with a "Thank you." He then adds, "It’s an unexpected and pleasant surprise to see you here."

[z-Gu Saori]

Saori smiled as Jager's warm hand slipped into hers, but it was not a warm expression. "I am here to stay," she told him softly, but her voice was firm and dared him to challenge her words. "Coricanchac and Pachacamac has welcomed me, and this is my home." Slipping her arm around him, she rose into the air a bit, waiting for the others.

"Yes, Saori is my guest and is welcome to stay here as long as she wants," Pachacamac agreed, nodding. "Now that Timeslip has been cleared of charges, Saori can come and go as she pleases - well, as Timeslip pleases actually." His beaming smile was directed to his starscape friend as he rose into the air and began to lead the way back to the palace. "Congratulations on your vindication, my friend."

[Timeslip]

With her unique nature, it was difficult to see the cloud pass before Timeslip's face, but perhaps her stars dimmed for a moment.

"There was no vindication," she said quietly. "I was not cleared. When the end came, and I knew that I would never see my daughter again, I ran."

She sighed, as the weight of the past ten months landed once more upon her shoulders. "Jager isn't here to visit; he came tried to arrest me, and my only escape was to bring him across." The Mistress of Time turned away from the others in a wholly inadequate effort to hide her shame.

[Jager]

There was more - much more that Jager could say, but he decided against it. Instead, he decided to see how the others took the news. First off, he expected an increase in the level of distrust toward him, but he was also looking for any other possible comprehension of the implication of Timeslip's action.

He also used to time to take in Timeslip's words and actions. His interest was twofold. First off, any sign of weakness was something he could eventually use against her and he needed every edge he could get here. The second was a sincere desire to better know this person his fate was now entwined with. Right now it was easy enough to see her as the selfish woman who had sacrificed the well-being of the One Race, but people are rarely that one-dimensional. Now was the time to see more about what made her tick.

[z-Pachacamaq]

Saori didn't hesitate; her empathic nature responded to the pain in her sister-in-law's face. She dropped back to the ground and released Jager so that she could give Timeslip a hug. "It's ok," she whispered in her ear. "It'll be alright."

Pachacamac's expression said that it may not be alright. His amazing intellect, while not nova-scary, was still powerful enough to piece together the likely outcomes for her abandoned homeworld. And while the glorious smile was gone from his face, all he said was, "We should discuss this in my home, where such things may be spoken freely and clearly."

There was a new wariness in his eyes when the sun-god turned to Jager. "You are my guest, and will be treated as such," Pachacamac said. "Until certain things are discussed, you will bring no harm to Timeslip, Gu Saori or Hideyoshi Yokiko. They are mine to protect, as are you, so long as you are here. And I will protect you, even from yourself. I know that you have important objectives, and they will be addressed, over dinner. Do we understand one another?"

Oh, Timeslip... what have you done?

[Jager]

"Do we understand one another?"

Jager nodded and added,

"Understood."

Jager showed no sign of regret for being part of Timeslip's distess. Whatever Pachacamaq felt about him, Jager wasn't going to play the villian here. In his mind, Timeslip had clearly done the wrong that Jager was trying to right.

At the same time, his own mind was at war with itself. He didn't want to count people as mere tokens to be manipulated for the ends of this mission. He desperately tried to push Yokkiko to the farthest reaches of his calculation. He swore to himself that he wasn't going to use the little girl to get at the mother ... not this time ... not again. He was not going to go back to being that man again.

[Timeslip]

Dinner came all too soon to Timeslip.

For a brief time, after her arrival at Pachacamaq's temple, there was a respite from the troubles that had followed her from one world to another; she sat with Yokiko in the gardens, shunning all company and just watching nature's interplay as the wind put the leaves on active display. The colours, the mingle scents, the small pool all reminded her of a better time, one that seemed as though it was lost behind the weight of millenia.

But before long, a priestess came to gently usher mother and child to the host's opulent table. Silently, she took her place; niceties were said by the golden god at the head of the table, but they fell largely upon deaf ears. Delicacies that would have enthralled a gourmet filled her plate... and every bite was like ashes to her tongue.

In a voice that bordered on meek, she finally broke the awkward silence. "All right. If things need to be discussed, let's discuss them."

[z-Gu Saori]

Saori put her chopsticks down, her eyes sad. She had seen this before; the beginning of an end. She had no faith, not even with all the accumulated power at this table, that anything positive would come of this situation. Despite herself, she turned imploring eyes on Jager, then on Pachacamac, her eyes filled with hope.

It was wrong to hope that Timeslip could be happy. It was wrong to wish that a murder got off scot-free. But it was what Saori wished for nonetheless.

"Do we need to recount the cost of your decision? Or shall we just jump to the part of what we must do, Timeslip?" Pachacamac asked, his voice as gentle as she knew this powerful man could be, yet it was also firm and immovable. He was an irresolute mountain, his face devoid of any emotion. Timeslip remembered all too well that not only does the sun warm, but it also burns.

Saori spoke up. "Explain them for me, please," she requested in her quiet voice. She was just trying to buy time, to give them more time to think of a way out of this for her sister. "I know that it is bad, but there is more than a simple miscarriage of justice here. Please, explain it for this unenlightened one."

"As I understood the situation, Timeslip's trial was the first of its kind in your world," Pachacamac stated, folding his hands over his plate, his elbows resting on the table. "It was to be a testbed, to prove that novas could police themselves without interference from baselines. With the failure of that testbed, it puts justice right back into the hands of baselines, who are not up to the task." Pachacamac looked tired, for the first time in a long time. "Personally, the issue shouldn't be one, and yet, it is, in your world. And in effect, Timeslip has ensured that baselines will continue to mete out justice."

He glanced from the starscape nova to the blonde Adonis. "Am I correct thus far?"

[Jager]

"Except for the fact that novas should be free to decide whose justice system they are under by the lifestyle they chose to live. Live amongst the baselines - remember to live by their laws."

Jager took a sip of his wine.

"Now Timeslip chose to live apart and I accept that. My issues are twofold. One - she killed another member of our race and was found guilty by a jury of our race for that. Two - as you said, novas have been shown to be incapable of governing themselves ... and those back home who can't plane-hop to paradise are stuck with those results."

His eyes go to Saori and then Timeslip.

"The powerful have gotten away with it and the weak will suffer for it."

[Timeslip]

"I think you both have more or less summed it up."

Her voice was an echo in a tomb, holding nothing resembling either warmth or hope; it was the voice of the defeated.

"The trial was a bad idea from the start, one of the worst mistakes I have ever made. I had hoped that a court comprised of novas could and would consider the relevance of self-defense without permitting Team Tomorrow to use their supposed authority - an authority granted not by their peers in the One Race, but by a largely powerless baseline organization - to trump the basic right to defend oneself in the face of deadly force. My hopes on this matter were ill-founded, and the court voted along depressingly political lines. When the court decided on a two-to-one vote that I was fully guilty of murder in the first degree, when it became apparent that I would be dropped into a dark Utopian hole and drugged into a stupor for the rest of my life, when I realized that I would never see my daughter again... I could not accept the verdict, and I ran.

"All I have truly accomplished is to ensure that there will be no justice for any nova there, not for a long time to come. Not for Excavator, not for me, not for whoever else may run afoul of the wrath of paper mandates and tin badges. Even had I stayed, even if the court stood, there would be no true justice for our kind, but just a thin veneer of nova self-governance atop a painful reality of baseline control."

Timeslip sighed in resignation; there was simply no fight left within her.

"Do what you must, Pachacamaq. Decide how you will deal with me. Just give me your word that Yokiko will be cared for."

[z-Pachacamaq]

"Always," Pachacamac replied, nodding gently. "Yokiko will always have a home here, as I promised you so long ago. And to be honest, it is not my place to 'deal' with you. This will have no effect on my world, and we have no extradition treaty with your world. So there is no reason for me to do anything to you."

Those blue eyes flicked to Jager, then bounced back to the starscape woman. "And I mean it when I say that this doesn't matter to me or my people what you have done. But it does matter to Jager, and to Saori. And it matters to you. You are the one choosing to damn your people, to ruin their first and best chance at judging themselves. Can you live with that? Can you bear the price, looking into your daughter's eyes, and know that when you teach her to be a good person, you will not have lived up to that example?"

Saori looked conflicted; relief and hesitation chased each other over her face. She wanted her sister here, but the price for that company, for that priveledge would be high. And worst of all, they would never pay it. Others would pay it for them; other novas, and their children, and all the future generations.

[Jager]

Nothing that's been said surprises Jager, but still his eyes lose two shades of blue as the looks around the table. He stops talking. Hell, he stops making noise at all. He just observes with those cold glacial eyes of his, keeping his own council.

What can he do? If Timeslip's regret is truly real and heartfelt, she will choose to go home. He can't force her. Saori is making doe eyes but doesn't have the motivation to make a true appeal on the matter. Pachacamaq has the real power here and then blatantly lies about his intent. Timeslip is a guest in his house and under his protection thus shutting the door on Jager ... yet claims to have no part in this matter. His words are a blathering pit of misleading truths meant primarily to make him look all honest and just, while he is neither.

Jager would grind his teeth if he thought it would do any good, but it won't. He has to be patient. He has to wait for some circumstance to arise that offers him that window of success. He maintains his calm and his silence because there is really nothing positive that can be said right now. He waits.

[Timeslip]

There was a long pause before anything more was said; when a voice did speak, it was the eerily echoing sound of Timeslip.

"I think," she said, choosing her words carefully in a quiet tone, "that my people are going to face disaster at my hands regardless of what I do from here.

"If I fail to return, the court fails, and it will be years if not decades before it is tried again. I do not believe that the current situation can hold for the requisite decades, or perhaps even years. The status-quo, a fragile thing at the best of times, will not be maintained, because trust - what little trust remained, at any rate - has been squandered.

"If I return, the situation may actually be worse. The unassailable authority of Team Tomorrow becomes etched in the stone of precedent... and Team Tomorrow serves baseline masters. That is not a step toward self-governance; it is rather an admission of oversight and policing of novas by a race not our own. I would miss my freedom, and I would miss my daughter, but more than either of these things, I would regret taking part in the surrender of the One Race."

The starscape woman looked up; despite the lack of visual reference, Saori, Jager and Pachacamaq could feel her look at them each in turn. "I face an impossible choice, with nothing but regret down either path."

[z-Gu Saori]

Saori was the next to speak; when she did, her soft voice couldn't have been heard by anyone not sitting at the table. "Whatever you think is best, Timeslip," Saori said, her eyes downcast. "I don't understand all the nuances going on here, but I'm glad you're here, instead of in jail."

"Emotional statements like that are nice," Pachacamac pointed out, "but they don't help us with the situation." Warm blue eyes settled on the starscape woman. "At its core, this is not about whether Team Tomorrow's authority is validated or not. It is about a woman, a sister nova, who is dead by your hand. While it doesn't impact my people, it is concerning to me. Will you kill someone here, and skip to another dimension? Will you destroy my executioner because you think she might hurt you, only to find that she enjoys her little games?

"A life has been lost," Pachacamac said, "a star in the heavens snuffed out. What will you do about that, Timeslip?"

[Jager]

Saori's selfish declaration saddens him slightly.

'Of course you are glad she's here to be your companion', he thinks. 'You're not left holding the bag back home.'

Still, Jager doesn't speak and keeps his own council. Again, no constructive purpose could be served by speaking his mind and this is hardly the time to weave deceptions.

His eyes remain their icy hue and he turns to looks to see how Timeslip responds. Pachacamaq's speech is a mixture of empty pleasantries and authoritarian steel.

'What really bothers him is how this might make him look bad,' Jager's thoughts point out. 'How typical.'

[Timeslip]

"What will I do about it?" Timeslip's tone changed; remorse did not leave, but was interwoven with threads of anger. "What can I do about it? Excavator is dead, and there is no power within my reach that I can use to fix that. I live with that knowledge every moment of every day... and I assure you, I feel each and every one of those moments - I see them, and know that she never will, and that I can do nothing to make things better.

"The dead are dead, which leaves me with the living... and even there, my options are just different flavours of pain. If I go back, my people suffer. If I don't, they suffer. And once again, I find myself unable to do anything to improve either option."

With something between a sigh and a huff, she pushed away from the table, standing. "So where does that leave me? You want to hear my plan, Pachacamaq? I have no plan, because I have nothing to offer, other than my own blood to appease the vengeance-minded vultures that thrive on tragedy."

Swivelling to face Jager, she said, "That's why you're here, after all: trying to make sure that I deliver the requisite spectacle. Have you really thought about the price that spectacle would cost? Have you looked past the immediate moment of pursuing your quarry and though about what happens when you do drag me back there, when Project Utopia is given the keys to the kingdom? There's an excellent chance that they're sterilizing us, Jager, all of their bullshit obfuscation aside! They're doing their level best to make sure that we have no future at all! And they would be handed authority over all of us on a silver platter containing my head."

[z-Pachacamaq]

There was a long silence; Saori's expression was a mixture of horror and dismay. "I think that there is no question of you returning there," Pachacamac said firmly, "not if that is even the slightest possibility." He didn't add that he'd wondered about the strange diverage in procreation abilities between the two worlds. That was a discussion for another day. Perhaps.

"Please, my friend, sit," he ordered gently. When Timeslip took her chair again, he continued, "But I ask these questions not for myself, but for your peace of mind. Guilt serves a purpose, but I fear that you will let the guilt eat you alive."

"I'm sterile," Saori said, her eyes closing. Pachacamac reached to her, taking her small hand in his. Nothing could be said right now on that subject, and so he waited for Timeslip to continue.

[Jager]

While his eyes remain locked on Timeslip, Jager addresses Pachacamaq.

“The choice to return … to her native dimension is still hers,” Jager says with steely determination.

“Timeslip, you don’t know what I’m thinking. You’ve never bothered to ask me before this moment, but since you have I’m going to tell you how I see it.”

“First off, if you had bothered to ask any half-dozen novas back home what the outcome would have been, you would have known the trial was a bad idea for you. I, knowing what its like to be caged, would have advised you to stay away. You didn’t ask. You didn’t stay away. What you did was let your ego make a situation worse … twice.”

“Secondly, you defense was a crock of shit on two points. Your mission for being there was a self appointed, ego-stroking idea … an agenda to be an Intervention Team of One, despite the fact that you have no specific facility to take said nova to and no experience in that kind of work. The Utopians have you on both points, but that doesn’t matter to you. You hate them and thus you decided to either confront them or beat them to the capture. You went out to capture that new nova based solely on your own agenda. That’s why you were there. Since no sane jury would accept your personal quest as legal justification, that was one leg kicked out from under your case.”

“Now, your rational of self-defense goes out the window. As someone who has been in a fair number of fights, I know that your reasoning wasn’t kill or be killed. It was fight or flight. Your ego kept you underground, in a confined space so that you could comfortably tell your self that lie. When the Utopians arrived, you could have left. You chose to stick with your personal agenda and another member of the One Race paid for it with their lives.”

Jager sighs then shakes his head.

“Timeslip, I know there is something rotten at the core of Project Utopia. I also know that the majority of novas still believe in the Project and its going to be a while before it can be safely brought down. I’ve devoted the past 14 years of my life to developing other ways besides Utopia for novas and baselines to get along. That’s what I am doing with the Knights … proving that the people of Chicago can make their own contract with novas without Utopia’s guiding hand. What that takes is time and trust and those are commodities you are taking away from every nova back in your home dimension by running.”

“Now, I don’t have a child I’ll be missing, though I have something close with Grey. I can only imagine what it would be like to never see your daughter again, but the reality as I see it is that you made a mess … a Geryon-sized mess. You took that mess and tried to make it better, but you really weren’t counting out the possible costs. Things went badly … as many could have predicted, and then you made that mess much, much worse. In about 36 hours I imagine that mess will be unfixable. Too much time will have passed and Utopia will have so condemned the trial process that you coming back won’t matter all that much. We may have less time than that.”

Jager pushes himself away from the table enough so that he can put his legs under him and stand up. Look to his host,

“Pachacamaq, thank you for the meal and your hospitality.”

“Gu Saori, it has been nice to see you again. I am sorry for your pain.”

“Timeslip,” he says with a nod then turns and walks for the exit. It appears he is walking toward the balcony he arrived at.

[Timeslip]

Timeslip watched him walk away, and sighed.

"He's right, in some ways," she said - perhaps to Saori and Pachacamaq, perhaps only to herself. "The trial was a terrible idea. And the little intervention team that the Casas put together wasn't much better." She sighed again. "We just wanted to get hold of this rogue nova and calm her down before Utopia did their usual stunt of throwing her into Bahrain; too many of the One Race who go there never return."

She watched the back of Jager as he stepped out onto the balcony. "He has a... relative. Grandchild, more or less? I don't know the exact dynamics of it, and they're more than a little temporally confused, but the child is important to him, and he may very well never see it again. I'd take him home... but as soon as I was across, he would drain away my temporal powers, and I would wind up in that dark hole under Bahrain, and Utopia would have their moral victory and turn it into a bludgeon that would club the One Race into submissiveness for a long time to come.

"You want me to have peace of mind," she said, turning to face her host. "You want this to not eat me from the inside. I'm not returning to that world, but whether I did or not, I do not think that I have the kind of armored soul that would be needed to have peace."

With that, the Mistress of Time wearily stood and walked slowly away in the same direction as the Knight.