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Twin
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It's a week or two before everything's nice and set up for searching for alts. All of the portals have been remade, spare mirrors have been created, and everyone that is allowed portal access gets a microchip. Even the gods. Rae accepts his without fuss, Perinixu - tolerates it. After a lot of questions. And a hefty donation from Cam in the form of another temple. Whatever, they managed it.

Cypress offers to do the scrying, but Prime shrugs him off. Which one of them is married and therefore has a wife to bang in his free time? Oh, right, yes, that's Cypress. Go, be free, twenty-something year old alt. Prime doesn't hate your happiness. (Much.) Now, if Prime gets married, they can divvy up the annoying work between themselves. But, not happening anytime soon, so he'll do it.

Exciting scrying happens. It involves lots of staring off into the distance and looking at places.

And then, he informs the various people arrayed around him in Pantheon:

"Found a set. A female Adarin, and a female Bell. Also a Zeviana and a - girl whom I don't recognize. And parents." Pause. "They're all living in the same house."

He dearly hopes they local Bell and Adarin are not siblings, that would make everyone uncomfortable. Oh, nope, look, the Bell and the Adarin just kissed. How quaint.

"Pretty sure they're not siblings," he clarifies. "Unless this is the plane of incest."
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"Okay. Well, send 'em a mirror and presently all will be revealed?"

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Meanwhile:

Mmmmm, kisses.
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Kiiiisses!

Look, privacy is hard to come by with seven people in the same house, they take their kisses where they can get them.
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But when Alli has the shower the Swan twins' room is conveniently empty! Kisses kisses kisses.

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Phix takes point on the letter writing. Beside the kissing pair appears a mirror wrapped in a letter.

Hi. Exciting magical happenings! There are lots of alternate universe versions of you in various worlds. If you activate this mirror (see reverse) you can talk to us and we can catch you up on whichever of the thousand possible questions are foremost in your mind. Possibly relevant: yes, you can come meet us in person. Yes, we have fantastic miscellaneous magical powers and are generally shareful. Some of us look just like you and you probably have very similar names to some of us too so you're going to need nicknames. As of the depositing of this note we are all hanging out waiting to see if you call right away but somebody will be monitoring the mirror even if you need a while. Welcome to the peal :)
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Adana's the one to notice the care package.

"... Is that yours?" she asks, peering at it.
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"Huh? No, doesn't look familiar. Maybe it's Alli's."

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"Maybe? Should we - check or something...?"

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"One sec. Alli! Did you leave a thing on my bed?"

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"No? Why would I do that?"

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"No idea, just checking." Bella shakes her head. "Not Alli's."

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"This doesn't seem like a thing Savannah would have, or leave on your bed as a joke, either. Huh. Do you mind if I...?" she motions to pick it up.

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"Go for it," shrugs Bella.

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Adana takes it, and -

".... Bella. According to this letter magic is real and there are other versions of us?"
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"...Uh?"

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"I'm confused," she says, handing the letter to Bella and then trying to figure out the mirror. "Is this some kind of weird practical joke...?"

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"...It's my handwriting."
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"Wh- that's creepy." Fiddle, fiddle -

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She activates the mirror.

"Hi," says Revival.
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Her alt does not squeak an undignified noise, by some miracle. But she does go very, very still.

"... Hi."
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Bella leans into frame. "Oh my god."

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"Ha! I knew it. Okay, someone who's actually been here longer than I have and is better at explaining things - help?"

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Phix takes the mirror. "Hi, I wrote the letter. The two of you make six each Bells and Adarins! Can you do cool stuff?"

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"Yeah, we're both twins, so we get twin stuff. ...Do you have twin stuff?"

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"We do not have twin stuff! Also, all Adarins have twins but if you have one too you're the only Bell with a sibling at all."

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"That's. Huh. Okay. Twin stuff is - when we turn sixteen, we get our basics, which basically puts us on par with an Olympic athlete and gives us an ability to talk to our twin from long distances away and also heal them, and then our bonus, which is a superpower. Mine's portals. Bella's is teleportation."

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"Ooh, keen. Over here in the Bell department we've got a witch and a demon and a healing god's acolyte and a spellbinder and a sphinx - that'd be me - and the Adarins have two mages and another spellbinder and a peryton and an angel."

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"We come with nicknames, fortunately, I'm Flicker and she's Conduit."

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"Nice. I'm Phix."

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"Hi, Phix. Um. The letter mentioned we could - travel there?"

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"Yeah, the mages can do interdimensional portals, you just need to pick where you want it. If Flicker teleports - well, how good's the teleporting?"

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"It's good, what are the constraints on where portals can go?"

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Phix hands the mirror to the nearest mage.

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That would be Cypress. He waves.

"Hello. Nearest mage. Portals - our portals, anyway - need a flat, stable surface to go on that is unlikely to break or be disturbed. They're permanent, as long as the surface they're on isn't broken. Also, we can disguise them as either a blank wall, or a painting, or something. Actually we recently got a security upgrade, anyone that wants to pass through the portals needs a very specific microchip. It's not necessary, but we had a problem a little while ago."
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"You can make permanent portals?"
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"Yes? If the wall it goes in is permanent?"

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"I have. Notes. Ideas, have you - are you using hydroelectric power, you can get some serious clean energy out of a clever portal setup and - and - I need my notes. Just - stay there, weird - white haired - mirror person, I need you for things."

And that is when Adana gets up and runs off. For notes.
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"Her portals," clarifies Flicker, "are not permanent."
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"I was getting that impression," says Cypress, amused.

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"Anyway, since I can teleport, if we're never going to need to get to the portal without me along or at least available for a half a second, I'd recommend putting it someplace really obscure. Since people other than me might want to make trips while I'm asleep or something, though, maybe it should be near the house."

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"That's up to you. Mages can also teleport, but not within half a second and not everywhere or, in fact, very casually, and I think all of us can fly through some method or other. Which, we can distribute among ourselves." Pause. "Also my wife can grant immortality and resurrect the dead."

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"How - fast - can - she - do - that?"
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"... Given perfect conditions, infinite materials, a pre-drawn out location - which, we have a person that can provide the first and a place set out for the second - one every two minutes. Or so. What happened?"

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"Yellowstone. Exploded."
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Cypress has gone native enough to take relatively little time to figure out what that would mean.

"Fuck. Right, okay, ash clouds - how bad are they, we have a person that can make anything, a person that can change anything, and we have access to twenty-second century technology, and various magic types with different strengths and weaknesses that all require some kind of time investment. How - was there an evacuation, how thorough was it, do you have places to put the people?"
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"There - there was an evacuation. They made a list of who saved how many people and we're on it... We ran out of places to put people. We had to stop because there was nowhere else for them to go, after the eruption. It's been less than a year so we're not at Biblical levels of famine yet but I do the grocery shopping in Europe just because I can, because it means fewer dirty looks from the neighbors at the store - this is why the Sanderses are here, Dad said we could bring friends when we had to leave Phoenix, so we're all crammed into his house - how fast do the maker and changer work? The caldera is - it's loosely similar to the historical Lava Creek tuff. If you look at a picture of how big that is. And the clouds are everywhere."

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"Okay, then - before we work on resurrection we need to prevent large-scale famine and create places for people to go, or we're just making it worse in the long-run. Cam, Adana? If you could? You know your skill-sets better than I."

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"Right, of course," says Revival, and she takes the mirror and motions for Cam to come over.

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"Ash clouds are more Adana's thing than mine but I can probably rehabilitate the caldera some. I make, she changes - I can't get rid of anything but she can turn the ash to air, albeit not that fast. I can also just straight-up make food in meaningful quantities if you know where it should go."

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"I can find out where to put it. And bring you there. I'll call the Junebugs. The caldera's still hot, I don't know if that's an issue for you."

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"Not a prohibitive one. We're indestructible. Does mean I can't put down, like, sod, right away, but I could put down some liquid nitrogen first, in places that look like they ought to be lakes, then just add water."

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"I bet," says Revival, "That we could pull off some glass domes, too. Have them built so that they funnel all of the ash that falls on them to one spot, and keep - things like crops from being smothered."

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"There is, already, ash everywhere - I'm not saying there's none still being produced but there are firefighting-suited Junebugs working on it."

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"... Okay. That's. I'm not useless but I don't have any clever solutions that aren't 'Cam is my endless coffeepot and I work 24 hour days to clear up ash.' Which, I can do, by the way."

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"I'm a little teapot, short and stout," Cam agrees. "Also a terraformer. Forrrrr half of the lower forty-eight. Why do we never send mirrors to perfect unsullied paradise worlds?"

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"Technically, the mirror to Hell was close. But. Yeah, we're going to be exceptionally busy."

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"Hell: Perfect Unsullied Paradise World," snorts Flicker.

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"Hell's pretty nice, it's just hard to get out of."

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"Heaven's pretty nice, too, but Hell has the giant tacky plane of gold. Heaven misses out on that."

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"Poor bereft angels."

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"So - diverting from the topic of Yellowstone, not that you shouldn't absolutely help with Yellowstone - are we all pairs?"

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"Spring and Prime aren't. Rest of us are. Usually it's girl Bells - all of whom look like you except Spring who is some sort of otherworldly brown ethnicity - and boy Adarins, who look like Cypress who you saw plus or minus the hair color. We found your world next because my angel didn't want to be the only girl Adarin."

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"Also it's smarter to cast a wider net in search requirements," defends Revival.

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"Of course."

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"Am I the only gay one?"

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"Only gay Bell. Zevs are always gay so far - yours?"

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"Also gay. Asked me to Homecoming but it turned out we have nothing other than being gay and liking Adana in common. And it made the 'liking Adana' part kind of awkward after."

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"Pff. So far the Adarins all the same - non-picky sexuality."

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"Good for you. I wonder just how badly her notes were buried... Adaaaana -"

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"Coming, coming! Sorry, they were really - buried under crap, I had to fetch Savannah to figure out where they were -" Conduit hurries back to the room with various notes on how to use portals cleverly clutched in her hands. She peers at the mirror. "Wheeere did the portal person go...?"

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"We're doing disaster relief, portals later."

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"... Portals later!" agrees Conduit. "How good's the -"

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"I can change anything into any other thing, my boyfriend can make any non-magical object, and neither of us need to sleep or go to the bathroom and are very unproblematically immortal. And Ice can resurrect the dead. Plus we have other stuff that's less easy to explain concisely."

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Blink, blink.

"Oh." Pause. "Bella. Our alts are really great."
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"I know."

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"How soon can you - make a portal here? Disaster relief's better if it's - nowish instead of 'next weekish' or something."

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"We can send someone over right now to make it. But we need to know where you want it, which is up to you."

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"And I could give rides to and from someplace far off but only if I'm around to do that. So maybe - back of the house? For that matter how long would it take you to expand the house with your magic powers, we're really crammed in here."

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"This is Charlie's house? I know what it looks like, if Adana will make some holes in some walls I can put an addition in the backyard with some spare bedrooms and storage space in about five minutes, no problem."

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"Yeah, Charlie's house."

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"I'm happy to put some holes in some walls, but I should probably show up to do that in the second group to not waste mana. Once the portal's up I can just go there by walking."

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"So we need to pick a spot for the portal that won't be messed with by renovations."

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"Put the portal right next to the back door, on the left as you face the house, and attach the addition to said back door and the wall on the right of it."

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"Sweetie, I think you can just show the mage that's doing it, you're the one that puts the microchips in people."

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"Yeah. Also, you guys should probably ask your Charlie just to be sure that it's okay to renovate."

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"Uh - yeah. How good are - Charlies at this kind of thing?"

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"Iiiiii don't honestly know, my Charlie has been dead for nearly a hundred years now and has known that I am a demon for most of that time - Phix?"

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"Won't be thrilled, but will cope," she says.

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"We could also just - move out. If they can make literally anything.... Houses are included. But - augh, then we have to deal with buying property -"

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"We have apartments here, actually. Already all set up."

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"Even if we moved out it'd be squishy in here. I don't think Alli and Savannah would share a room very well. And Charlie'll find out one way or another if we have as much traffic and intervention as we're talking about. I'll go - get him." She pecks Conduit on the cheek and goes looking for her dad.

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Conduit smiles at Flicker, then looks at the mirror. "Uh. There are - I should probably call the Junebugs, how am I going to explain this?"

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"You can wait to call them, and let us explain it," offers Revival.

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"What are the Junebugs and why are they called that?"

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"Oh! Right, um. Superpowered disaster relief, and people who help coordinate them. They're supposed to be called the 'Gemini Guard' but since the astrological sign shows up mostly in June, they got nicknamed the Junebugs to be cute. B- Flicker and I are junior members. They have a pretty good idea of what's going on, where, so coordinating with them would be great."

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"Nifty. How're you going to spin the alts thing? We are like extradimensional twins therefore powers?"

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"... That's clever, let's do that, unless we think of something better. I don't think they're likely to be snippy, anyway, if you're helping out."

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Bella appears back in the room. "Charlie doesn't seem to actually believe me but says we can hypothetically remodel the house with extra bedrooms and maybe a nice big storage cellar."

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"Cool. Okay. Then - mages, are you ready to send some people?"

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"We," snorts Mage Number One, "have been ready for a while now. Prime and Cam are going, right?"

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"That's the plan."

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"Okay. Let me just -"

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- And then there are two gentlemen in their bedroom.

"Hello," says Prime.
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"Hi. Uh, I will just - put you in the backyard."

Flicker flicker flicker flicker flicker. Now they are all four in the backyard.
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"That's convenient. Thank you. Where am I putting the portal?"

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"Wow, it is super ashy. Put the portal there," says Cam, pointing.

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"Sure. I'm going to make it switch between being visible and looking like an ordinary wall, do you want a specific word or should I just go with the boring standard of 'Pantheon'?"

He's addressing Flicker and Conduit.
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"...Pantheon?"

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"It has gods in it. Maybe we should install one of them here, they also do terraforming, but we'd have to ask how good they are at ash in the sky."

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"Pantheon is a fine portal password, I think."

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"Mhm."

Quite anticlimactically, he pokes the wall, and says in a deadpan, "Boop."

There is now a portal. It's not like Conduit's - it sort of shimmers and the surface of it looks like water instead of air.

"You'll need the microchips to pass through it. Otherwise, it will be like walking into a wall."
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"Any reason I shouldn't chip you in the thighs as is standard? Also, I can anesthetize, the chips are little but not quite little enough that you can't feel them starting to exist, but if being a twin here has weird effects..."

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"I think we're fine for standard chipping, and yes please on the anaesthesia."

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"Same, thank you."

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"Poof," Cam flicks his fingers at Flicker, "and poof." Conduit. "Want to get your Charlie so I can demo the making-stuff-exist thing and confirm the remodeling?"

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"Yeah. Be right back."

Flicker ducks into the house.
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"Right, I don't think I'm needed for anything else, then?"

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"You're all set, go catch up on your Monty Python."

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"... Catch up on his Monty Python?"

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"Apparently," says Prime dryly, "I need to lighten up. Have some fun. I'm working on it."

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"... Huh. Okay. Are you a - version of me...?"

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"Yes. No one but Cypress would believe it either, they needed a god to confirm. I'm the sardonic one."

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"He or Cypress will also do translation spells for you but that can wait until they've restocked on mana. It, unlike Prime's capacity for sarcasm, is not infinite."

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Conduit giggles.

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"Alas. If only we could transmute sarcasm into other things. We would be unstoppable, with me as your source of power."

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"It'd be pretty awesome."

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And here is Flicker again with Charlie. "Dad, these are our alternate universe and male counterparts, I think that's a me and that's an Adana. The me wants to renovate as discussed. Still yes?"

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"I'm Cam, or call me Revelation; that's Adarin, but call him Prime." Cam makes himself a strawberry with no leaves and eats it.

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Charlie blinks.
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Prime is going to go nap anyway, so. He makes little tiny illusionary fireworks.

"Hello. And now goodbye, I have a wonderful, delightful lady known as my bed to return to."

He waves, and then turns and walks through the portal. And now he is gone.
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"Sorry about him," Cam says to Charlie. "Iiii think I'll stick my head through the portal and get my girlfriend to help with the remodeling and also with the being convincingly alternate universe versions of them." He points at Flicker and Conduit, goes to the portal, says, "Pantheon", leans through, and says, "Aaaaangel?"

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"Coming!"

And then there is a second, winged Adana that's in her twenties instead of her late teens.

"Hello," she says politely to Charlie.
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"Charlie, this is my Adana. You can call her Revival. If you're still on board with making architectural changes today she will be knocking a door in the back of the living room over there to lead to same."

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"I... sure."
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"Okay. Let me check for pictures, and then I can make a doorway."

She checks for pictures, so she doesn't break anything. Then she eyes up the wall and makes a 'hmmm' sound, and adds extra supports so the house doesn't collapse. Then - there is a doorway. After some specifications, she adds foundation for her boyfriend to build off of, and then starts adding stairs down to a cellar, which she hollows out neatly. She's doing this carefully, the house is not going to collapse in on itself.

"All yours, Cam," she says, when she's finished.
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"Thanks, angel." He's much faster; presently there is a furnished extra wing of house, two stories, semidetached, with an extra side door.

"You like?"
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"Looks good from here. Enough rooms that Alli and me can quit sharing?"

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"I made six rooms, since the floorplan cooperated with that. And a spare bathroom. And you should be hooked up okay wiring- and plumbing-wise. It is weird that you have a twin, the rest of us Bells are only children."

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"That's more than enough. Bells, that's cute."

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"Campbell, Isabella, Iobel, Ayabel, we are Bells, we have a Belfry. Adarins don't have nearly so cooperative a name scheme."

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"It's very sad, we haven't been able to think of anything good, though. So we let the Bells have all of the fun of puns."

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"And before you ask, it's 'Adarins' because two of the first three are named that - there are now just as many Adanas, but I don't know if you'd have any luck pushing a switch. Other names are Edarial - Rain, goes with Katydid - and Darren - Max, goes with Phix."

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"That's - strange. Hmm. If most of us are - men then it doesn't make sense to try and change the name to something feminine. Even if they might go for it."

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"Which. Probably not."

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"But if you do think of a collective noun that is as adorable as 'Bells', the slot is still open."

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"I'll wrack my head for it. I mean, we could probably manage to pick something at random that's reasonably cute, but. That doesn't seem very accurate."

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"It does not. Oh well. Want to come back to the Belfry?"

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"Sure, lemme grab at least one of my sister." Bella flickers into the house.

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"...At least... one... of?"

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"Alli can split herself. Two copies of her, exact same personality, exact same memories - they're perfectly in sync until someone or something else unsyncs them. Then after - I forget how long, sorry, she can end it early if she wants - one of them joins back up into the other and Alli gets both sets of memories."

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"Huh, that sounds really useful."

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Here is Flicker again and one of, although possibly not all of, Alli. "All right, we're all set, unless you want to bring - Rush, I guess we'll have to start calling her?"

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"She'll want to come, I think," agrees Conduit dryly. She opens a portal to her sister and sticks her head through. She could twine her, but this is for her sister's travel convenience. "Hey, we have alternate universe selves with magic and they've shown up. Want to come meet some of them?"

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Savannah zips through the portal at superspeed.

"Yes," she says, immediately.
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"Hi, Rush, your alts will be so pleased to meet you." He does not add 'especially if you can tweak that trick so you vibrate'. "I'm a Bell, call me Revelation, this is Revival, my girlfriend."

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"Hello! Rush..? Oh, nicknames, got it, alternate universes and comic book shit. Yeah, that's the one you should go with for me, I already use it here. Occasionally." She bounces a little. "Can I meet my alts?"

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"Yes, but I have to microchip you first. You too, Alli - you keep inanimate objects when you split?"

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"Yeah. Wow, that would be pretty terrible if I didn't, like, hello, embarrassing."

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Conduit giggles.

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"That would be pretty bad. But you could keep sets of clothes in certain places and only split there?"

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"Whatever, not a thing I have to deal with. The wings are cool, do they work? Bella can only fake-fly."

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"Yep, they work."

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"Anyway yeah go ahead gimme a chip thing to go through the wall."

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"Done. Rush, you?"

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"Yes please!"

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"Done. Works like so. Pantheon." He steps through the portal.

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They all pile through.

Conduit looks around in wonder.

"... I see you've used the ability to make and change things quite well, nicely done," she says.
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"We try."

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"Hi! Welcome to the peal! Don't touch the soul birds."

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"Hi! ... Soul birds?"

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"That would be Path and I. Hello! We are birds and also their souls."

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Conduit blinks. "Oh. Okay, no - touching soul birds. Hello."

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"Hi. It's not that we don't like you, it's the soul thing."

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"Also, don't go to Chamomile unless you want a soul-animal. Cypress has gone thoroughly native but the rest of us avoid it."

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"Chamomile is a - place? Which portal's that...?"

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"That one, over there," says Max, pointing.

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"Okay, let's. Not go through that portal. Is there um. A list of character sheets or something I can peruse through so I can understand all of the. The stuff going on?"

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"Character sheets. Are all Earthborn Adarins into D&D?"

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"She has a point, we should have some kind of reference on the basics."

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"I've played a bit of it, but superpowers are kind of more fun, so I mostly focused on - .... Why are you looking at me like that?"

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"Help me convince the others to play D&D, we can have a giant game of alts and possibly also gods and like, maybe Idania if she wants to play, too."

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"... You get to DM."

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"I'm okay with that."

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"Brochures, maybe?" muses Cypress to Spring. "Or - I don't know, a book with different chapters for each world and sections on each person's personal history...?"

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"If everybody writes their own sections I will produce compilations in the preferred format of whatever recipient."

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"I don't think I knew you were into D&D," Flicker says to Conduit.

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"A little, but then I discovered the magic of superpower wikis. I spent so much time obsessively looking up things I might get that I kind of - aheh. Fell out of the habit of D&D."

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"You're adorable."

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"So, uh, I'm the only me?" Pause. "So to speak?"
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"You don't look familiar, sorry."

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"But I'm not the only me, riiiight?"

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Cypress lets out a long-suffering sigh.

"No. Upstairs, in the apartments - second door to your left. They're waiting."
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"Right then, bye Adana, bye Bella, bye Alli!"

And then she zips off.
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It's amazing, how every single Adarin in the room can have the exact same expression on their face - a 'trying very hard not to think about it' face. Except for one. Conduit blinks, confused.

"Waiting for what, exactly...?"
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Revival coughs.

"... Private meet and greet?"
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There she goes, now all of the expressions are matching.

"Okay then!"
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"It's weird how I am the only exception on the sibling-having front. All Adarins with twins, all Bells except me without."

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"I wonder if there are Allis without Bells."

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"There might be. We didn't know to look for you, before."

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"You could've looked for our parents? If the parents are the same."

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"They match, at least as much as we do - we're not positive about Spring, though, she hasn't seen them since she was six."

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"... Huh. It might be smart to look for parents, too, then, for - Bell siblings. Wait - are our parents the same?"

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"Rain's missing his Vernon. Birth parents seem to be mostly the same, except Rain and Prime are the only ones to have met them." Pause. "... I'm. Um. Sorry, but they're not nice people. Dad's way better."

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"Right, I need that stack of character sheets - how many of us are there, even? Both Bells and Adarins."

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"You make six, in both cases."

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"Huh. It - seemed like more, from the - all of the stuff and the histories that I didn't know about. Six seems small."

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"We pack a lot of history into each person. Haven't even mentioned my robot army yet!"

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"You. Have a robot army." Blink, blink. "Okay! Congrats!"

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"I have an alien robot army! On our colony planet!"

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"That's. How do you get one of those?"

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"You stumble across the leavings of an extinct civilization and field-promote yourself to the relevant military's rank of Senior Equipment Maintenance Specialist after repudiating affiliation with the Nystbli enemy scum, of course."

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"Oh, if that's all, Flicker, let's go window shopping for a robot army, they'd be quite useful," deadpans Conduit.

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"I can duplicate the robots if you want some and have a place to put them. There's one watching the - let's call them parole mirrors - on the dragon that tried to kill Phix."

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"You know what, I am rapidly seeing the wisdom in the character sheets or pamphlets," snorts Cypress. "Let's - try to take care of that quickly, please."

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"In our copious spare time?"

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"Well, before we collect another set, anyway."

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"Right, and - um, I'm okay with not hearing all of your relevant backstories and about your worlds for a while if it means the whole - Yellowstone thing is please handled soon? Ish?"

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"Right. Yeah. I think it might make sense to summon a bunch of angels to deploy versus ash. We can assembly-line it. I can make most of the circles, the various humans or close-enough can finish them, there can be signs on the walls explaining the deal - spend so many hours dealing with ash and a demon will make you a thing! - somebody escorts them to your world, which you need to name - the drawback of this is that we just installed the microchip system."

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Conduit raises an eyebrow.

"I can make portals. Want to see if it'll work between dimensions?"
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"Ooh, try it try it. For that matter -" She blinks. "...Well, I can't teleport to another dimension."

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Conduit pokes her head back through the portal, looks resolutely at a particular spot in the Swan backyard, and -

- opens a portal between dimensions.

"... Ha! I can."
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"Ah, lucky," sighs Flicker. "And useful. So, vast flock of angels?"

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"Vast flock of angels."

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"Right then, that simplifies things a lot. Do you want to go inform people about the flock of angels about to descend, or do we surprise them?"

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"It's... very unconventional for a twin power, honestly, the angels thing, but we rolled with one massive 'suddenly magic, whee' thing in the fifties."

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"Well. Okay, hopefully it doesn't cause too much religious upheaval."

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"That I think we can handle by just not calling them 'angels'. A bunch of winged people are going to show up."

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"Fair. But they might identify themselves as angels to onlookers. So."

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"We can include as the task that they should please not talk with the people from the - superhero twins world."

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"Let's just call it Gemini."

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"Agreed. It's easier that way, we've already got the theme going on, there. Gemini everything."

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"Mm. Should only people that don't have a tricky afterlife do the summoning? I've already done it, doesn't matter if I summon other things, but if, say, Cypress were to summon something - we have no idea how that would go, with his funky magic."

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"Uh, explain?"

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"In Inferno, our world, some daeva are ex-humans, like me and Revival. The way you get to be a daeva instead of a Limboite with way fewer cool powers is by being a summoner when you're alive. Humans from other worlds have not shown up in our afterlife quartet - yet - but it could still be that summoning daeva plugs you in to the system. So, if you have something you'd rather be than a daeva-possibly-with-other-stuff-pruned-away, you should not summon things - since Ice can resurrect people - but Max is already a done deal."

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"Unfortunately, that rules out me, the mages, the spellbinders - we already have enough to worry about with them - and, I suppose, the twins, because who knows how that works. The daeva can't. So we have Max who's already involved, we have Spring who can probably be re-blessed - though maybe someone should ask Rae to check pretty please if he can bless daeva. We have Idania, maybe, if the answer is yes."

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"I'll go see if he's around, and failing that, ask Idania." Off goes Spring.

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Rae's not around in his manifested form, but Idania's outside of her house, drawing out various runes and muttering to herself.

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"Hey, Idania, we need to know for reasons if gods can bless daeva, can you talk Rae into trying with Revelation or Revival?"

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"I can ask him to check if he can, he'll answer if he can or can't but isn't likely to actually bless either of them unless he sees a valid reason that they give him. Close enough?"

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"Yeah, if we can count on his can-I-bless-them detector working definitely for sure. The reason we want to know is that we want to summon lots of angels to get rid of ash clouds in the new world we just contacted, and people who summon daeva are known to turn into daeva after death, and so we want only people whose powers are recoverable if they turn into daeva doing that. That's basically me, and you, and Max who's already done it whether it'll interact weird with him being a peryton or not."

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"Ooo. Yeah, that's a valid reason." She addresses a sand vial. "Hey, Rae, people who summon daeva become daeva after they die. We're not sure how it messes with blessings or if they can be blessed. Want to test it on Adana and Cam?" Pause. "Yeah, that convinced him. Give him a bit, he'll come check."

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"Cool. Do you want to help with the angel flock thing if you can?"

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"Sure! If I get to keep my blessings, no downsides to becoming any sort of daeva. Actually a lot of upsides. Plus, helping."

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"Don't, like, commit suicide after summoning the angels, we don't know if this works for people who aren't from Inferno. But yeah, that's my thinking."

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"I wasn't planning to suicide, not to worry. It would be painful and upsetting for everyone involved."

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"Quite."

Back to the Belfry!
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Yay, Belfry!

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Rae shows up presently. He looks at Revelation and Revival and tilts his head.

"The blessings work fine on you both," he says without any sort of greeting. "I tested, to make sure my senses weren't off. The winds will now be helpful to you both."
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"I will refrain from the temptation to enter stunt flying competitions. Thanks."

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"It wasn't for you," shrugs Rae. "But you're welcome."

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"So, Spring and Idania and Max can summon angels - how long are you guys willing to spend finishing circles and making sure that the angels don't want anything I had better not give them and then dismissing them when we're done with them, should we call it good with three or call in other people?"

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"I'm good for - hours, but possibly not days unless it's strictly necessary. I may be able to enlist some of the priesthood and the junior faithful - it's not disease related, but it's a cleanup project."

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"Yeah, that will not fly with mine. Alas, my minions suck at minioning. And my boyfriend's a mage, that means he's out, right?"

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"Yes. Tricky afterlife plus ghosts."

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"Bleh. Well, I'm good with drawing things for a few hours, anyway."

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"Also fine with hours. We can enlist our dads if necessary. They'd be confused, but helpful."

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"I just had the visual of - legions of fathers. Descending."

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"Dads, moms, legions of nonmagical hirelings?"

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"I can afford nonmagical hirelings but I'd have to explain what they were doing, right? And my money's no good in your worlds, it's got daemons in the portraits of the dead presidents."

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"Bet we can grab the non-twin volunteers with the Junebugs once they realize what's going on."

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"Do the Junebugs have much access to non-twin staff? Also, extra layer of 'what the hell are you doing' if we have to disclose the 'you might turn into a magic wingy person' risk."

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"... Fair point. Mm."

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"I'm pretty sure," says Max, raising a hand, "That all of our dads are entirely nonmagical and would probably be fine with superpowers upon death. Er, Adarin dads, Bell dads I have no idea. But ours, definitely. So. Let's go get them?"

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"I think Charlies and Renées would probably help, under the circumstances."

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"My mom's disqualified, same reason as me, but I can get my Charlie, shall we all disperse and collect parentals?"

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"Let's. This is going to be interesting..."

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The final count, accelerated considerably by Flicker's ability to teleport within a given universe, is:

Five Verons (Cypress's, Prime's, Revival's, Conduit's, and Max's).

Four Charlies (Ice's, Flicker's, Katydid's, and Phix's).

Only one Renée (Flicker's) - the others being disqualified on account of being a witch, a spellbinder, and three different amounts of deceased. ("We could get back mine," Phix comments, "but I think she might want a little downtime rather than immediately meeting alts and summoning angels.")
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The Charlies look at each other.
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The Verons look at each other.

"Going to have to say it," says one, identifiable only by his possum daemon from the others. "Weirdest experience of my life. Both of 'em, even. And that's saying something."

"Same," shrugs another.

"Roll with it?"

"There will be weirder things."

And that seems to be the extent of their reaction.
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"I'm gonna... number you, so the angels know who to go to in order to be dismissed," says Cam. "I think the efficient way to handle this is to have you all in a line here near the Earth portal in Inferno, in front of a sign outlining the deal on offer. Me and Revival and Zane will be over here, I'll make most of each circle and you finish them. You ask the angel if it agrees to the printed deal, if it doesn't you dismiss it, if it does you say 'deal' and then it'll go through Conduit's portal - Conduit, you're going to want to put the Gemini end closer to ground zero - and then Revival'll clear the circle away and I'll replace it and you do it again. In a few hours angels will start coming back, us demons will give them things within the parameters outlined by the original deal, and they will go back to their summoners and you will dismiss them. This takes a minute of concentration per angel. If an angel wants to stick around and do extra ash-busting that's fine. Keep a checklist of how many angels you have summoned so we don't lose any."

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"We'll go warn the Junebugs and... can we get, like, air filtering helmets so I can take Conduit to somewhere above ground zero so the portal can have an end there?"

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"Yeah, of course. Now or after you warn them?"

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"After."

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"All right then. I'll need to re-make the portals, too, I can't keep them up forever. But I'll warn you before I drop and remake them, so it's not going to be a problem."

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"And I'll be a portal anchor. Yay, exciting!"

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"Anybody want to come along and - you know what, Conduit and Revival should come with me to talk to Junebugs, because it's an instantly obvious thing about alts to explain where the hell the angels will come from and because you can prove that they work."

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"Ha. Okay, sure. That'll be fun on the news, we'll be even more celebrity famous."

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"Pff. Okay. Ready to go now." She gives Cam a goodbye kiss. "... Well, okay, now ready."

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"Okay, off we go."

To Gemini with girl Adarins. Flicker flicker flicker.

The lady behind the Junebug office desk looks nonplussed by Older Winged Conduit.

"Hi, captain," says Flicker. "If you don't recognize me, I'm Flicker, this is Conduit, and this is Conduit's alternate-universe winged duplicate with different magical powers. Those magical powers are very good for ash-cloud-fixing. Conduit's going to put a portal over Ground Zero and lots of winged people are going to come in and turn ash into air."
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Revival demonstrates by turning air into bright glitter, throwing it into the air, and then turning the assorted glitter back into air before it hits the ground.

"It's likely that we'll also help with ash cover in other areas, but it's important to manage Ground Zero first."
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"I'm not really asking permission, I'm just warning you so that people who know more about public relations than us can handle that when large quantities of winged people pour out from a portal over Yellowstone."

"Uh," says the Junebug captain.

"Do you need any of that repeated or clarified? Do you want to forward us to your CO, your twin, or a specialist officer?"

"...I think I got it. Thanks."
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"Have a nice day," says Conduit, cheerily.

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Flicker takes Revival and Conduit to the portal, collects helmets from Revelation, and then says:

"Ready to go be over Yellowstone just long enough to put a portal?"
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"Yeah. Let's go unleash a flock of angels upon an unsuspecting world."

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Flicker kisses her, dons her helmet, steps through the portal, and brings her girlfriend to about a mile above the volcano.

There is smoke and ash everywhere.
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Yes, yes there is. Look upon this day and despair, smoke and ash, the angels are coming for you.

Portal!
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And back to the portal on Charlie's house!

"Iiiii need a shower. Or your alt's help, either way," says Flicker, doffing ash-encrusted helmet. "Reviiiival can all this ash get off me?"
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"Me too, please," agrees Conduit.

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"Sure. Shoo, ash, this is not your home."

She makes a shooing motion, and clears the both of them of ash in a smooth motion.

Then, because ash is leaking through the portal, she gets to turning that to air, too.
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"Okay! Angel assembly line time."

Angel assembly line commences.
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And a flock of angels was unleashed upon an unsuspecting world.

It was a pretty good thing, considering.
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The air-scrubbing angels do not engage with the public, as per their boilerplate agreement, but since power couple Flicker and Conduit have publicly taken credit, they get asked questions. And more questions. They are cheery and not very informative beyond:

"What did you do?"

"Sent a bunch of air-cleaning winged people through a portal."

"What were they doing?"

"Turning the ash into air."

"Where did they come from?"

"Well, the other end of the portal."

"Where did you find them?"

"It was pretty far away."

"Why were they helping?"

"I think I saw one of them take home a new espresso machine that a friend of ours got for him. I don't remember all of it."
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At some point during the flock of angels, Rae (without any sort of prior warning or explanation of what he's doing) retrieves a piece of chalk and finishes one of the Charlie's circles for him.

Absolutely nothing happens.

"Disappointing," he observes.