Where is the door? That's weird. Well - can you 'port there? Do you remember the place well enough?

Amariah's birth blessing is unlike Juliet's insubstantiality; she folds in just fine.

He hits her with his best summary and displays her to the rest of the group.

Okay, says Amariah, processing, so we set up Jane here and she can put me in Milliways to join the party? Hit me, I've got coins going spare to conjure the hardware and hook her up.

(Kas, meanwhile, is giggling. Jokers don't embarrass easy.)

Tony, back in Sunshine, provides the specs for ansible-and-connected-hardware-and-power-and-internet. The airlock was the most complex part, and Amariah doesn't need one; the whole thing could probably fit in a pentagon or two.

And it does. Amariah stuffs everything in a brand-new basement.

Okay, says Sue, so I guess now you bring Amariah to Milliways...?

Yoink!

"Hi!" says Sue. "Okay, who's next?"

"Let's get Golden. She may have been to Eos, or have someone who has - otherwise I don't know how we'll get Stella. We could do without her but I'd rather not."

"I get to meet everybody on my first day as part of the greater Bell community, awesome," says Aegis.

"Yeah, lucky you, I waited forever," laughs Juliet, "I had shit luck."

Hurry up! I want to eat another Internet. They are delicious.

Shell Bell laughs and forces the door to Aurum.

"It's 'cause of me," Sue says smugly; also, I love you, Jane. You're the cutest Internet-eating ansible person.

Jane loves him right back!

"I can presumably get to Samaria just fine, but Eos..."

"The coins - the mint powers - come from Eos - can we use that?" asks Amariah.

"Worth a try, but grab Angela first?"

I don't know your world's technology from a hole in the ground. Get me some specs and I'll tell you.

Micaiah hugs his angel. "Okay," he says. "Love you."

I have it under control, now, but she's welcome to it. Angela conjures the hardware, and hooks it up.

Snackable, says Jane. She projects her face onto one of the screens. "Hi! Ready to go?"

"All set."

...and it opens on Stella's moon palace.

Shell Bell beams. "Let's see if Sue can explain it the quick way."

"Sue? The tiny Whistle is back?"

He taps Stella.

Jane talks her through, and she eats up another Internet in short order, and Stella walks into Milliways to join the peal of Bells.

[Gonna go wreck Downside with the whole gang,] Stella adds to Alice, Lazarus, and Libby before she goes.

[Have fun!]

[Love you!]

"All right," says Sue. "So does anybody here have an actual plan?"

Everyone

looks

straight

at

Shell

Bell.

"Yeah," says Shell Bell, expression set. "Yeah. I do."

"You wanna share that shit with the class?"

"It was designed to work with as few as four of us, so with seven, I'll stay solo hanging out here in case something goes wrong, and the rest of you can pair off. One pair to scope out Upside because we don't know anything about it. Angela will stand out least there, I think, she's been historically harmless by their standards. Someone should visit some of the Downsiders for advice on how to present the takeover to the residents, and also make the wishes we know need making - nix torturer's control, first of all. Both of those groups should also install eyes-for-Jane as they go so she can reach in. And someone should go - cloaked as all get out - and spy on the administration."

"Upside. All right. Who's with me?"

"I'll take it."

"I'll check out Downside."

"Me too."

"Leaves me and Amariah spying on the admin, all right," says Aegis.

"And the ones who can't link are with ones who can, good, and are we all caught up on our stacks of standard powers, what else do we need to be cloaking against on Team Admin?"

"It's probably best to assume the admin has all the various powers that are assigned to anyone in Downside ever - control, immunity to same, seeing your history at a glance. Language-imprinting, if that matters. And probably a few other things up her sleeve. Maybe walk into my apartment, first, and then wish directly to be imperceptible to her."

"What does our bailout plan look like?" asks Aegis.

"If somebody goes off the grid, Jane tries first, and if she can't get whoever it is I lean into my apartment, I wish you out - with an arrow, if I have to - we all bail, and we regroup and figure out what went wrong."

"I've got four arrows. What about the rest of you?"

"Haven't gotten around to trying yet."

"Didn't even know they were a thing until recently."

"Nothing since the batch Shell Bell took."

"Don't look at me."

"Me and Sue are brand-new to this, so obviously no."

"I've got the original set of five. Let's every Bell but me have one and I'll have three because I'm anchor?" [Mine're safe,] she adds to Bells only.

Consensus is immediate; arrows - and evils - are distributed until everyone has the correct number.

"Do any of us want to stop and pick up any of our staff before charging in, or is it just going to be us seven and Sue - plus Jane and Jarvis and Juliet's Tony? I'm somewhat considering Nathan. Possibly also the Joker."

"That depends. Sue, how many can you link at once?"

"More than I've got," he says. "And I've got twenty kids in my world that I can drop to make room as long as Jane keeps an eye on them."

(Sue bounces him to all interested parties via link or brainphone, as appropriate.)

Can't scare me, says Jane.

"I'll get Nathan to introduce the Downside-exploring contingent to his friends, and the Joker for emergency coining, in the event that we run out of something big," says Golden, and she leans into Aurum to issue the summons.

[I'll leave Kerron with Esme and catch up?] suggests Nathan to his mate.

[Sure,] he says, and gives Nathan a hug and a kiss, and teleports to Golden.

Nathan catches up a moment later. "You want me to introduce some Bells to Eights and get an entrez to the other famous folks, I gather?"

"Yes. So you'll be with Juliet and Stella," says Golden, pointing them out to him. "Joker, you're emergency-mint, assuming you have no particular objection; you stay behind with Shell Bell and Sue."

"Sure thing," he says cheerfully.

(Meanwhile, Tony requests that Jane bring him to Milliways to ask Bar for permission to install, and then outside to scout locations for, a Jane-hub and potential new Belltower. Any Bells with processing cycles to spare are welcome to comment.)

Yoink!

"We ready to go?" She pauses, snaps her fingers. "Amariah - can you tuck Path away like Sue can Ivy? Be safer that way."

"Path's had enforced personal space against people in general since about a minute after I got minted, but good idea anyway," says Amariah. "Is it completely under Sue and Ivy's control when she's in and when she's out or should I do something other than copy it directly?"

(Bar has no problem with him adding a modestly sized tower out back in his location of choice. He stops by the peal to grab some coins from anybody who feels like dispensing them—he should only need a couple of hexes and a handful of pentagons, and he doesn't expect to use all of them.)

"All right." Amariah kisses Path's head, and makes a little wince while he hoots softly, and wishes, and Path is tucked away.

Stella already has a design for a tower-shaped Belltower socked away; she bounces it to Tony as long as he's going to be making one.

"You and me go in, make our wishes, see if they work? If they don't, if the admin can see us no matter what, what do we do?" Aegis says to Amariah.

"...If it doesn't work, maybe only one of us should risk getting near her," Amariah says. "Or on the other hand maybe it's worth sending three people and we should take Golden with us on the suspicion that Upside's relatively safe."

"If it doesn't work," says Shell Bell, "then you two - go to the catacombs, see if there's any alts of us or people we don't know still in pre-processing who we can get out even if we can't help everyone. We can make a dent in the place and regroup even if it turns out not to be safe for us to knock it all down."

"I should get Mary." Stella opens the door. [Hey Mary! Me and some Bells are going to conquer an afterlife, you'd be useful, c'mere?]

[...Sure,] says Mary, and she goes there.

(Tony edits the Belltower design appropriately to merge it with his Jane installation, shows the result to the Bells for approval, and heads out to find somewhere to put it.)

(And lo, there is a tower. It comes equipped with four times as many ansibles as they actually need to link up the existing array of worlds; that way there'll be spares for later. The ansible room, two floors below ground, and the meeting room on the floor above it both have cameras and mics and Jarvis-style projection equipment for Jane, and the main common room on the ground floor has a computer she can access.)

Jane plugs in ansibles to her stations in Samaria, Aurum, Alethia, Sunshine, Eos, and her original unnamed world; she hasn't got her hooks into Atlantis yet. She pours into the new hardware happily; if she's ever going to run out of capacity to grow, it's not going to be soon. "Hi!" she says to Tony, showing off her chosen face.

"Well, crap. What do you get around the edges? Has anything like this happened before?"

"We all get out eventually," says Golden. "That's something."

"Maybe I should get Sherlock. Just to hold onto," murmurs Shell Bell.

"Does anything meaningful that you can see change if fewer of us go through, or if we handle our jobs in different combinations?"

"Some effect on Shell Bell's mood," she reports, "but getting Sherlock has a much bigger one. No effect on you all coming out eventually, that's still as certain as it gets."

"...I get out too, right?"

Shell Bell wastes no further time in dooring to Atlantis and calling for Sherlock.

"Yep," says Mary.

(Meanwhile, Tony is chatting happily with Jane.)

Sherlock appears when summoned.

"We've figured out how to move from place to place without waiting for Milliways," murmurs Shell Bell, "and got everybody together, but Stella's precog says whatever happens I'm not going to have a fun time of it, even though I'm just sitting here to hold the door and bail them out if necessary. Will you stay with me?"

"Link Sherlock up too, Sue," suggests Juliet.

"Of course," she says, hugging Shell Bell.

It does not work.

Nothing doing, not even an arrow'll go. Catacombs for us, says Aegis. We want Bells, Charlies, Renées, Sues - Whistles? - Sherlocks, Tonies, who else?

Jameses, Gileses.

Lazaruses, Marys, Annas, Sandys, Kolyas, Bridgets.

Angela hesitates, but says, Nathaniels, but be careful. Serahs, Alleluias, Calebs, Delilahs.

Golden lists a great many extended family and friends.

Aegis nods. She looks to Amariah. You can drive. I don't wanna split us up.

Angela and Golden go next. They can't teleport directly Upside, but they can wish to be able to, and do.

Stella, Juliet, and Nathan are the next party. "Who's first?"

"Let's go see Eights, and go from there," says Nathan.