sweeping changes

[mind_game]

Jane has finally been updated in all of the "extra" worlds with no Bells, Jarvises, or other routine visitors to the peal, and she is conducting template sweeps in them.

[Hey,] she tells all the Jokers and all the Bells. [There's a Joker in world number twelve who wasn't there before I crashed. Can't find him online at all, though.]

Comments

[inhispockets]

He skids to a halt so fast he nearly overbalances.

"You're what?" he demands.

[her_imperial_radiance]

"I said," says Elspeth, coming to a much more graceful stop, "I'm here to kidnap you."

[inhispockets]

"Fine," he says, "let's go."

[her_imperial_radiance]

"Jane, Aurum please," says Elspeth.

And then they are in front of a computer terminal in a clean white room, otherwise deserted.

"This is my world," says Elspeth. "It's more like yours than some, but we don't have a Gotham, it's the year 2060, there are vampires and werewolves, and my mother is the Empress Regnant."

[inhispockets]

"Yeah? So what'd you grab me for, anyway?"

[her_imperial_radiance]

"Because your template - fifteen-ish other times versions of you have come to exist that I and people I know have run across - you guys have lousy childhood situations, except the other one I also grabbed. Also, if I left you where you were, you were almost certainly on-track to eventually fall into obsessively unrequited love with a costumed superhero and terrorize a city for her - or possibly his, in that world - attention."

("Fifteen-ish" is accompanied by a largely cosmetic hint about what sorts of things could constitute "ish"ing a number of Jokers: the situations with daemons, Sue's fork, Aianon and Ansharil. It doesn't so much convey this information as that the "ish" represents actual ambiguity about how many of him there are in circulation, not ignorance on Elspeth's part.)

[inhispockets]

The boy considers this.

"So... what took you?"

[her_imperial_radiance]

Elspeth pats the Janepoint. "Our interworld transportation system, which also syncs up time between worlds, breaks sometimes. Before she broke, you hadn't been born. After she came back online, you were twelve."

[mind_game]

"But we think I'm fixed for good now," says Jane.

[inhispockets]

He eyes the Janepoint mistrustfully.

[mind_game]

"One of your alts is kinda my dad!" says Jane conversationally. "Well, sort of one of them. Sort of one of your alts is sort of my dad."

[inhispockets]

...He boggles.

[her_imperial_radiance]

"It's true," adds Elspeth helpfully. "There are a lot of alts going around. You won't be seeing much of yours until you're older though."

[inhispockets]

"Yeah? Why's that?"

[her_imperial_radiance]

"Because," shrugs Elspeth, "adult Jokers - that's the template name - generally have sex with each other, so it'd be weird if you met them before you were at least sixteen or so. You could meet their kids, though - there's more besides Jane. And one of them has a little brother who's nice enough, although usually they don't turn out well."

[inhispockets]

He snorts derisively.

[her_imperial_radiance]

"Hmm?"

[inhispockets]

"You tell me."

[her_imperial_radiance]

"I can only produce sourceless truth on an unreliable basis."

[inhispockets]

"Fine," says the boy. "So what now?"

[her_imperial_radiance]

"Well," says Elspeth, "you can live with me. I'm not sure where yet. I brought Harley up in a village in Québec, but your alts think you're going to be really obnoxious for a while, and the werewolves can be kind of volatile, so that doesn't seem like a good idea at least to start. Vampires aren't necessarily any better if you decide you want to push their buttons. I'd consider Denali, but I don't think you'd get along with Irina, and maybe not Kate either. So right now it's mostly between Nebraska and Isle Esme, but I'll have to ask my grandfather if I can have the latter for the next four-ish years. And of course maybe you don't want to live with me and would rather be dropped off in a randomly selected not-world-number-twelve's-Chicago location with some money and the local language. That can be arranged too."

[inhispockets]

(At 'really obnoxious', he grins.)

"What are you gonna do with me, if I live with you?"

[her_imperial_radiance]

"Probably depends on how fit for company you are and how soon, but at minimum there will be me, and my wolf Jacob, around, so probably no pickup soccer but we can occupy ourselves. I'm not sure what hobbies you've picked up at this point. Cooking and sewing are popular, though."

[inhispockets]

"What's your stake, anyway?"

[her_imperial_radiance]

"My stake?"