riverview | [ text | un: jkent ]

You sound like that's something you have experience with. This kind of thing doesn't exactly happen where I'm from... Just other worlds I've been to.

Kinda? I was born on an alternate world which collapsed so.

[ He shrugs loosely. ]

[Hold please.]

.... Collapsed?

[Give him a moment, he's getting his brain back after that one.]

They say one of the reasons we could end up here is because our world is destroyed, but-

[He hadn't actually talked to anyone that applied to. So far, the displaced and near death theories panned out, though.]

They also said accidents happen. I'm pretty sure the world I was living in before coming here is still standing.

[ He got new memories after all. That implies things are still okay. Plus, Jon feels he would know if his world got destroyed on him. ]

[okay, if he had another home before coming here it didn't add up, so he nods at that.]

The displaced feeling kind of explains why I'm here well enough that I didn't think about the other possibilities much.

[He felt very displaced in Attollo, it was a wonder he stayed there that long if this place existed, honestly. It did only get worse when his friends started disappearing though.]

Have you been here long?

Uhmm. . . four mouths?

[ Jon ticks the time off his fingers before nodding. ]

Yeah, it's been four months.

[Four months seemed to be the answer, Ed was starting to wonder if he'd disappoint someone in the future when they asked and it had been four months. Or maybe people only stayed here for four months before leaving, which didn't really mesh with the five year estimate they give during orientation.]

That's the longest answer I get. It's also the most common one... It's a little strange.

[but maybe he's going about this the wrong way.]

Do you know anyone that's been here longer than you?

[ Hmm. ]

My dad? And I think some of his friends were here a month earlier?

They got here a month before you?

[There's some thought that needs to go into that, it's possible the people that he'd asked before who were still here were on their fifth month by now - so it wasn't exactly an extraordinary answer. If he's right it fits into the pattern pretty neatly.]

Seems like there's been an uptick in new arrivals these last few months.

I think so? My dad was here and he had friends and stuff. That usually takes time.

[ Jon doesn't fully know and it shows. ]

Yeah, there's more and more people. Which is nice!

[Don't tell Ed friends take time, that's not how he operates.]

I wonder if it will keep up like this... Maybe there's a certain quota the portal is trying to meet.

I dunno if that's the portal or whether it's the rules this reality lives by. Portals rarely have that kind of stuff. They just pull people.

[He wasn't really serious about that part, but SURE OKAY KID.]

You seem to know a lot about this stuff.

[ Jon shrugs. ]

My world's kinda special. We have had portals and all kinds of crazy stuff for a long time.

Must make it a lot easier to adjust to.

[On one hand, Ed had a similar advantage having been to other worlds before, but on the other hand - those worlds had someone running the show and claiming to be in control of it all, so this was still different.]

It does, actually. But everyone here comes from different places so it's cool to hear new things. Like the aliens! The aliens are cool.

[ Jon is really into aliens. For personal reasons. ]

Aliens, huh?

[Not something Ed's really ever had to address before, but it occurs to him they're on the moon of some other planet so he shrugs.]

Aren't we all by default, technically aliens at this point?

[ Jon pauses as he considers this. ]

Yeah, I guess. But not the cool ones.

[Okay, he's laughing now.]

What makes them cool, exactly?

[Tell him about cool aliens, Jon. He's ready.]

[ Jon pouts. This should be a universal truth! ]

Cuz they travel in space ships! And they get to see different kinds of planets and animals. And there are . . . uhm, unusual . . . [ Give him a minute. ] . . . Unusual cultures!

[Well, unusual cultures was certainly a universal truth in this place. Ed's still smiling at how earnest he's being about all this, even though it did make him pause. He was pretty sure none of the pilots he knew considered themselves aliens, but if that was the pre-requisite for this kid he wasn't going to stomp on his world view.]

That makes sense. One of my room mates is an alien...

[By Jon's definition at least three of his room mates are aliens.]

My brother's also traveled in a space ship, though... It's how he got here, actually.

Wow, really?

Someday I'm gonna travel in space too.

[ Of course, in Jon's case, it's doable. Though he's never tried it, Jon knows Superman can move in space without an issue. ]

Yeah...

[Ed doesn't know all the details, and he's not sure he should be sharing them even if he did. Explaining the Gate would probably not be a good idea, so he's gotten used to referring to it as a portal between worlds. It just happened to make more sense here. He looks a bit more serious now.]

He did it- to follow me through some portal. Wound up here, instead. Me being here already was just a funny coincidence in all that.

A . . . portal and a spaceship?

[ It . . . does makes sense. Rift-energies could pull that off. Kathy would know more though. ]

So he wasn't looking for you?

Well- you know what you said earlier about your dad... Not really being your dad?

[He's trying to figure out how to explain this.]

I've been through other portals before, I haven't been on my home world in five years now. The theory is that we go back to whatever time we were taken from, if we go home-

[It wasn't really a theory for him, Ed had seen it again and again.]

If it all adds up, Al's from my future. So he followed me through a portal that I- haven't been through yet, to another world. When he got here the me he found wasn't the me he was expecting.

I've been gone five years, but to him... I never went missing in the first place. Which, I guess means I make it home eventually.

[He doesn't sound too thrilled about that.]

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject