1 ♡ audio (backdated to 11am, 2/14)

[dragony]

There's a number of new faces around here. But, in a way, we're all relatively new faces to this neighborhood. Maybe it would make more sense to say, this is a new experience for some, and an old for others. Isn't that right?

[ The voice speaking is a level, feminine voice: teenager, middling pitch, with words that are well-enunciated. While there is an accent—noticeably not American—it's caught in a threshold between others, and difficult to place.

It's hard to tell if she sounds bored, or if that's just how she naturally talks. ]

To get everyone on the same page, I thought it would be best to tell you how we came here, and what came before. It's something of a long story, though, and I'm not the best person to tell it, but better something than nothing. Right? Though, if you're not interested, you can skip the rest of this broadcast.

The "world before" this one, the one people mean when they refer to "the City," was Earth. Another Earth, similar enough to this one, and to the Earths you may have known—"the City" was their name for "New York City," if that means anything to you. At some point, a teleportation device was built, and on October 10th, 2008 by its calendar, and by this one, the "Porter" was activated, and brought the first "imPorts." At that time, it was controlled by an artificial intelligence in a suit of armor, but that being was later destroyed by the artificial intelligence of the Porter itself.

She calls herself Lachesis. Like the Fate.

For five years, she controlled our lives there. She determined who was imPorted, who was exPorted; who would return there with their memory intact, and who would not. If they would come back the same, or from some different history than the one we knew. She determined who was raised from the dead, if we died, and whose soul never came back. She could change the powers we were born with, and she could take them away. She could change our species, as it suited her. She's capricious, a fan of practical jokes and snide cruelties, and chess. Hers was the voice that welcomed us as "heroes."

Two years after it all started, she changed that world. Countries emerged, fully realized, emerged from nothing. The history of that world was rewritten; the memories of its inhabitants, too. The damage done by her enemies, erased. Those of us who were there could remember what the world was like, before she changed it, but we're the only ones who could.

After that, our shared enemy was Vulcanus. Others can tell you more about them, but they wished to take what made us powerful and use it to their own ends. Kidnapping, torture, genetic experimentation—that sort of thing. [ Though the content of the statement is serious, "torture" may as well be synonym for "toothbrush," for the easy, careless way she says it. ] But, when they could not... that is to say, "beat us," the way things were, they sought to gain power on other worlds, other dimensions. And we would follow them. Not by choice, and not with any sort of plan, but for months and months, you couldn't trust that placing one foot in front of the other would land on the same ground.

We're rather weary of traveling, I think.

In one of those worlds, we met her "sister", Clotho. But the third of them... you may have already heard. She destroyed that world, were we lived before. I don't... I'm not sure how it all happened, in the end, but in rescuing Lachesis, she saved us. Brought us here, to this world.

I can't tell you much about the state of this world, but there's two things I do know. One, large gatherings will almost always end in some chaos, so you should be prepared for that. And two, you can't trust people to act in anybody's interest but their own. The people of this world will not be kind to us for kindness alone.

[ There's pause enough that it might be mistaken for the end of the broadcast, before: ]

We should decide on names for all of these different worlds soon. This sort of thing will only get harder to explain later on without them.

Comments

voice.

[selfequipped]

When you say destroyed, do you mean just the world, or the dimension? How big was this on a larger scale? How did they explain the dimensional differences?

[As someone who's an old hand at this now, she knows these questions might be difficult to answer, but they seem important. Relevant. The fact that they weren't sent home, but sent to somewhere else, seems relevant, too.

But then, she hasn't exactly been keen to trust this. She won't ever be.]

[dragony]

I'm sorry, but I don't know. You'd have to ask one of the science-types for answers like that. I'm not sure how they're all connected; I don't have the head for that kind of stuff.

[selfequipped]

[That actually tells her enough. That means that kind of thing wasn't common knowledge.]

I don't either, actually. It's commonplace where I come from. That's usually the explanation for it, but I was wondering if they let everyone know. Or if we had any idea on the matter.

Thank you for the information regardless. It's going to be a great help for many of us moving forward, I'm sure.

[dragony]

Sure thing.

If there's anything else, I might be able to answer. It's only that I'm not so good, with the technical questions.

[selfequipped]

It's still technical, I guess, but did they magically know things about people when they popped in before? Like they do now, I mean.

[dragony]

[ There's a definite hesitation to answering. ]

It wasn't like this, no.

[selfequipped]

That could be for a lot of reasons. [She'll admit that.] Mostly tied to a governing body, anyway.

[dragony]

No, it was very... it was different. I'm not sure how to describe it, but it never was as formal as it is here. If you looked ordinary enough, an imPort could easily pass as someone native to that world, and no one would be the wiser. Sometimes, though, people would know who you were, or know things about you.

[selfequipped]

They would know? ... How would they know?

[dragony]

Tabloids, I'd guess.

[ Blatant lies, gentle evasive shrugs. ]

[selfequipped]

[Tabloids. That seems obvious, but why would anyone care? Or believe it?]

Guess they put more stock into that more than other people do.

[dragony]

Some here, some there. There's always someone willing to believe in papers like that, so long as they're published.

[selfequipped]

But who was leaking the information? Who was selling it? Wouldn't the imPorts try to keep that information from getting out, or am I being too optimistic?

[dragony]

Expecting us to act united... that is optimistic.

[selfequipped]

So someone was leaking it to cause problems. Got it.

[dragony]

I don't know why you'd expect better.

Most of us are human, after all.

[selfequipped]

I don't know. That sounds like a rather perfect way to inevitably inconvenience yourself.

[dragony]

[ There is a short pause. ]

... Have you ever met humans?

[selfequipped]

[There's a pause on her end.]

I try for optimism.

Generally.

[dragony]

You might want to work on that.

[ #zetsubo style ]

[selfequipped]

Trust me, I'm ready to revise my thinking. But someone's got to try to stick it out.

[dragony]

There'll always be someone. You don't have to worry so much about that.

[selfequipped]

And what's so bad about being that person? [Okay, so maybe she's not that ready.]

[dragony]

Not everyone has the fortitude for it.

[selfequipped]

I've been told cynicism takes practice.