01 | Video

[monster_san]

[There are a few clicking noises.]

Hm, modern technology is far too modern... [the video feed turns on, displaying a blonde Japanese girl who looks like she didn't mean to turn the video feed on, but she quickly replaces that with a wide, friendly smile.]

Hello there! Please allow me to introduce myself; my name is Fuu Hououji. I have read through the official pamphlet, but... I still believe that there's been some kind of mixup.

I'm not intimately familiar with American law, but I had thought that the minimum age to join a military service was seventeen, and I would have assumed that drafting foreign nationals would be out of the question... to say nothing of taking them out of the past.

I'll be looking for a Japanese consulate, but I've never been involved in a diplomatic incident before. I don't suppose anyone has advice?

Comments

video;

[amadaman]

[This is the most proper response he's heard to this in about a year and Ken has to laugh a little despite himself. He doesn't show her that though! The boy who shows up on her feed in this response is very... small. Like the age Hikaru Shidou usually looks, rather than the age Hikaru actually is.]

You won't find one here. Each city has an imPort ambassador, so you might be able to get in contact with the one in your city but that's about it.

It's a really strange world, but we're not technically from this Earth if we're from an Earth at all, in some cases. Citizenship gets muddled.

[monster_san]

[oh, he's cute! but precisely because of Hikaru she wonders if maybe he's actually her age. either way, though: also too young to be drafted!]

An Ambassador sounds like a step in the right direction. But is there at least a phone number I could call, or is that not allowed? After all, this operation is hardly a confidential one.

You mean, like a parallel universe? [how sci-fi...] I suppose that would explain why Russia is still the USSR... does Japan still exist?

[amadaman]

ImPort ambassadors are imPorts, too. They're on this network like you and me, so you'll be able to find them quite easily.

Yes, parallel. Japan does exist, but it doesn't have the same international relations as it did in my world. There's a number of people from Japan here, but most of them are from different versions. For example... have you ever heard of the city Iwatodai?

[monster_san]

I'm glad we have at least some representation.

Ah... better, or worse? I can't imagine any other country would be happy to have its people taken for a foreign agenda, even if it's a parallel Japan. [Iwatodai, Iwatodai... not ringing a single bell.] As for that name, I'm afraid it's not familiar at all. I suppose it is from "your" Japan?

[amadaman]

Fortunately, or unfortunately, our home worlds won't notice that we're gone. If we get sent back, we return to the time we came from, and if past experience is anything to go by, when we go back permanently, we'll forget about this place, too. It's a pocket.

[He doesn't like that part, but it's got to be said, and he says it without blinking.]

And yes -- it sounds like it's not a city that exists in any other version of Japan, and all the people I've met that know it have been connected to my friends and I in one way or another. Some cities exist across multiple worlds, but you get a town like that occasionally. There's been other things that pointed to that fact, too.

[monster_san]

That is a good thing, in my opinion. I wouldn't want my family to be worried about my disappearance--to say nothing of all the schoolwork I would miss.

[she's not so surprised by it though, since that's what happened when she went to Cephiro.

the forgetting part, not so much, and there's a brief flicker of displeasure across her face. that makes it seem a little pointless, at least from their perspective.]

It is a shame to hear that we'll forget, though. We could have told some physicists that their theories about parallel universes are correct... the divergence points must be quite far back in history for entire towns to be different, though.

[amadaman]

Entire towns, histories, the makings of the entire world. We don't know when they diverged or what they diverged from. I don't think this world has any real 'magic' of its own, but my world has supernatural things that are unknown by most people, too.

He shrugs and shakes his head at the new girl.]

You sound experienced.

[monster_san]

It looks like the technology of Miss Porter makes up for any supernatural deficiencies.

[She smiles a little when he mentions that.]

I have been to another world before, if that's what you mean. I remember my experiences there quite well.

[amadaman]

[Miss?]

You aren't the only person who's talked about that sort of travel before. It's strange. Most people are like you and remember their experiences.

And, um.

... Miss Porter?

[monster_san]

How odd... I wonder why Miss Porter decides to remove them. Though it's nice, in an odd way, to know I'm not the only one who's traveled between worlds.

[she laughs a little.] If the Porter is sentient, it wouldn't be very polite to use the word 'it'.

[amadaman]

... Did someone say it was sentient? Isn't it just a machine?

[monster_san]

The orientation pamphlet they handed me claimed that she is. Of course, they ushered me out of the room too quickly for me to try speaking to her.

[amadaman]

I see... So, wait, it's a woman?

Er, she's a woman?