Broken Adventure

[theaceoffire]

Vincent felt calm.

The voices were silent, his form without pain. His mind was locked down by his metallic will.

Vincent felt powerful.

Each flex of his muscles made the strange green liquid swirl violently, his hands now silver weapons of death… Yet still as sensitive as his former self remembered. His skin flexed with ease, but was resistant to heavy pressure.

Vincent felt sensations.

The flow and patterns of magic were obvious now, an innate ability that didn't actually look or smell or feel like anything, but was clear to his mind anyway. Despite the fog-like liquid he floated in, his understanding of the surroundings was absolute. His ears could sense the small disturbances his own flexing caused to propagate and his mind instantly knew on a fundamental level how far away the walls were.

Most importantly: Vincent felt bored.

So when the environment shifted he was less 'ready for action' to begin vengeance on Hojo and save his beloved, and more grateful that anything was happening.

A moment was enough to see… More green liquid. Huh.

But the WORLD felt different.

Something fundamentally true about his location was vastly different than his previous one, and he could feel the adaptive nature of Chaos cautiously testing the new laws of reality.

Which was another thing: Chaos felt vastly different. Less unaware, less mindless.

While Vincent could easily follow the mako far below (Some sort of metal structure?), and the odd sources of flavored magic (Not of the Planet?), none of it flowed into himself. Not like normal.

Instead, Chaos was inside him. A source of infinite possibilities, a generator of magic by its very nature.

A silver hand flicked forward, his form easily ignoring the liquid as his wings (Had they always been this natural to control?) gripped reality and held his body motionless.

And in his grip, Chaos glowed gold.

It was potential. Almost magic, yet somehow creating more of itself by existing. Chaos caused more Chaos, in a way.

But only in his grasp.

Releasing the golden sphere of power, one without direction or intent, he watched as it naturally fell apart into glowing gold particles… And then seemed to dance with the local mako currents.

Not the ones he knew as a man, the ones in the ground that flowed, not the Lifestream.

No, the thinner ones. The invisible paths and rivers of magic in the air.

And his Chaos swirled away, singing in unseen paths.

Not that it mattered, he had recovered more than that amount of power long ago, nearly instantly after forming the tiny fraction of energy in his fist.

Another flex had Chaos glow between his fingers.

"[[Glow.]]"

And it did.

A thought had the orb of golden light float behind his right shoulder as he examined his new location… Some sort of massive transparent chamber with a spiral of spiky metal outside it. An odd design, and not one he remembered, but the strange pattern of shapes wasn't the astonishing feature of this place.

It was the magic.

Raw power flowed through these structures as if reality had decided impossible things were boring and it could do better than that. This copper cage focused all that energy downwards to an invisible sun, something so intense that it felt wrong to try and focus on it.

There was another such source over there, behind all this matter in the way… And lots of tiny stars of power over there, and in towers, and… This was underwater.

A lake? No, an ocean. His vision was beyond normal, somehow able to follow the same flows as Chaos to see farther things, at impossible angles, in unreasonable places.

Yet somehow each vision of some place distant or near was understood by his mind, easily creating a mental map despite the odd way it filled itself in with new information.

Another smell and taste let him know this entire structure was new. Beyond new. And untouched by anything but magic and the sea.

So. Similar to that bizarre healing place.

And under it all, beneath the sun underground and the distant moon and the thousands of stars, was the Planet. So large, such a scale, that it was hard to feel fear because it was beyond understanding.

Thus a problem for later.

For now, a bit of focus was needed.

A thought had his wings glow with Chaos as he shifted locations. He COULD move at high speeds, or swim, or force reality to make him 'fly' while down here… But it was equally as simple to fade away into golden motes of Chaos and reform elsewhere.

The energies he became took different, unplanned paths following the Planet's invisible magic flows. And they didn't arrive in a specific spot, nor did any return at the same rate, or form the same pattern, or anything reasonable… Yet it felt natural. Instinctual.

Chaos was both his energy, his sense of self, and his nature.

Vincent felt his eyes glow with energy as he grinned, his unnatural sight letting him see his own golden fangs and crown of small golden horns even as his power reached out to the Planet.

A flex shifted Chaos into a massive orb, floating before his form.

"[[Find]] her. Find my love, Lucrecia Crescent."

Vengeance could come later. His memories of her shame and guilt were more important issues to address than something minor like his own torture or rage or lust for vengeance.

She needed him.

The glowing motes of light vanished in all and no directions… And nearly instantly flowed back. They had gone everywhere and no where, had required eons yet moments to finish.

And the memories of Chaos made the vampire pause. The past and present and future all seen at once.

A son!? HIS son! And WHAT was done to them!?

Before his rage could even build up, it just all went confusing.

His woman was healed. And blue. With wings. And had white hair. As did his son. And his boy was somehow too old and too strong and too magical and his woman was near magically attractive (So basically same as expected) and swimming over THERE in a tube with eleven twin sisters of herself.

And his son had what felt like SO MANY brothers and sisters!?

Why was Chaos marking them ALL as 'not genetically related', 'emotionally related via second mother', 'half deity' AND 'spawn of Vincent Valentine'!?

And his energy somehow cheerfully informed him that they were 'Spawns of Chaos', and thus children of his lineage.

He wanted to have a headache. Such things might be impossible now due to his enhanced form, but he REALLY wanted to have a headache.

Vincent blinked as Chaos started… Giggling?

An odd Materia was just suddenly THERE! Inches from his face!

No magic flows gave warning, no energy spikes, no. Just… First nothing, then this odd Materia.

It wasn't like the magic orbs he knew of or heard of from his own past… A bright blue color implying it was a support Materia, yet with white swirls over the surface. And it felt like family. And confusion. And an almost headache.

Chaos giggled again. Which was concerning.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Finally! No, don't just stare at it you moron!

=Adam: Come on, come on! Pick it up!=
=Gaia: So THOSE are the Materia things little Aerith was talking about? I've made some before!=
=Eve: No, normally they are more basic and have a few similar skills from the Lifestream in them that can grow over time.=
=Sarah: I love how it looks! Can I have one?=
=Eve: Why? You have a better connection to the Planetary Network than WE do!=
=Adam: I saw how Eve pulled this off and I sent the data to 'Research', we can make custom Materia sooner or later. Duplicating this Networking Materia is easy enough to do now at least.=
=Gaia: I can't make my own crystals without making partner ones. Like the white and black ones that have opposite purposes and natures. Though I didn't know they were called Materia back then, I just called them mako shards.=
=Eve: You didn't make those on purpose, it was due to the nature of the events that happened that spawned them. And those were made LONG ago.=
=Sarah: Which ones were those?=
=Gaia: Oh, here! {Black_and_White_Materia.data}=
=Eve: She was going to give the white one over to make a nice hair ornament for little Aerith eventually.=
=Sarah: What the FUCK!?=
=Gaia: I wanted Aerith to have the White Materia so she could talk to me more easily! It was much harder back then! Plus it would let her use [[Holy]] to protect herself.=
=Eve: Mom, no one needs the entire planet's energy to protect themselves. And if they DO, something went wrong somewhere.=
=Sarah: Why the FUCK didn't you tell us you made a Black Materia that casts [[Meteor]]!?=
=Gaia: {Blush} That was super long ago! And my Cetra locked it up, it's fine.=
=Sarah: It's marked as a Materia to summon the 'Ultimate Destructive Magic'!?=
=Eve: {Snort.} Please, it just summons a big rock. Our guardians are way stronger than that.=
=Adam: How big?
=Gaia: Not even as big as my moons!=
=Eve: You only have one moon now, mom.=
=Sarah: Adam, get those damned Materia.=
=Adam: Sure. Gaia, where are they right now?=
=Gaia: {Grumble} Worst case all the creatures die, that's easy enough to fix. Global extinction happens once every 27 million years or so anyway! It's just part of life.=
=Eve: And with the new Network, we can make sure little Aerith doesn't get lost in the paperwork somewhere, and Adam can handle Sarah, and I can protect my family!=
=Sarah: I'm NOT arguing this, give Adam the location.=
=Gaia: Fine, but don't mess up the White Materia, it would look adorable in Aerith's hair. {Locations.data}=

Right, and connect to the Planetary Network and detect… There you two are!

[[Harvest.]]

Good, scan it and send it off to 'Research' for study.

=Eve: Oh come on mom. It was really hard for you to move that thing around in the first place! Getting that Materia to Aerith was going to take years. Sarah and Adam can do it quick and safely!=
=Sarah: When the girl's older. I don't want her accidentally crushing her home by activating [[Holy]] inside and dumping raw magic into the area to 'protect' herself.=

Oh finally! He picked up the… uh.

Shit.

=Adam: Heads up, Vincient has somehow eaten the 'Network' Materia with his gold magic stuff.=
=Eve: WHAT!? I JUST made that!=
=Sarah: Huh. Wonder what it tasted like?=
=Gaia: {Blush!} SARAH! You can't just SAY things like that!=

At least it still seemed to be working? It was somehow connecting to the systems, going through startup… And there.

=Adam: And he's online!=
=Eve: Hello child! I am your girlfriend's new mother!=
=Gaia: And I am her grandmother! Mostly. Sort of? Also, I am the Planet.=
=Sarah: Shh! Don't overwhelm him!=
=Chaos: I am so confused right now.=

Hmm? That didn't seem right. Better check the settings.

=Adam: Hang on, I'll fix the name issue.=
=Sarah: So obviously I am Sarah, Sarah Kisaragi! I saved Eve and she told me some people were in trouble, so I broke into Shinra and stole your partner and her baby and all the OTHER people under Hojo's control and that ended up with me finding YOU and stealing you too!=
=Eve: Stupid Hojo.=
=Gaia: I still say I should add a little lava lake to that man's everything.=
=Sarah: I took all his stuff, his personal house, Eve, the people he was tormenting, and left a LOT of damning evidence behind so he would get in trouble with his work on top of all that.=
=Adam: And you stole his legs and one arm.=
=Sarah: And I stole his legs and one arm. But that was for safety reasons! Guy is a nutjob.=
=Chaos: So my Lucrecia is safe?=
=Adam: The hell is wrong with this setting? No, I do not want to genetically alter Vincent, thank you very much!=

Was the Materia not connecting right? Or was it due to being consumed by the vampire? Hmm.

=Eve: Yes, after Sarah and Adam saved me and my family, we were all brought here to her home.=
=Gaia: Aerith says it is 'Wutai Village' but honestly all your human dwellings seem similar to me.=
=Sarah: She and the other test subjects were given some of Eve's cells, and they were hurting her, but we managed to fix both of them up.=
=Eve: Now my genetics work WITH my new family, keeping them all healthy and attracting all the sex.=
=Chaos: ...I'm sorry?=
=Adam: She means making them attractive. Because I told her that attractive people are more likely to be accepted by society.=
=Sarah: Hey! Well… Alright, you might have a point. But I don't like to agree with it.=
=Eve: Meh, if it lets my babies keep their pretty wings then it's all good.=
=Chaos: But she is safe? No pain, no medical problems? And my child?=
=Adam: Oh yeah, all of them are now super healthy and maybe immortal. Not sure if your grandkids will inherit ALL of that, but it seems likely.=
=Sarah: And if they get their own Symbiote, Eve will likely enforce their enhancement and make them blue angel babies too.=
=Eve: You can't say no to the cute! {OMG_berbies.data}! Look at them! LOOK AT THEM!=
=Gaia: Even without mustaches, they are adorable.=
=Chaos: Speaking of the other babies, why does my magic say I am their father?=
=Gaia: {Confused} Because you had the mating?=
=Eve: Shh, I got this mom. Look, when you spent time with Lucrecia and… Hang on, I got diagrams somewhere.=
=Sarah: Both of you hush! Vincent, I had Adam double check. And her child is certainly yours, she wasn't impregnated by anyone else.=
=Chaos: No, I understand that. Why does my magic say ALL the babies are mine? And that the other women are my beloved's twins and ALSO 'mine'?=
=Gaia: What?=
=Eve: No! All the babies are MINE! And you I guess. You are also mine now sort of.=
=Sarah: Uh. Adam?=

Shit.

=Adam: Hang on, let me look into it.=

It had to be something obvious. The Materia didn't do much other than allow people to access the Planetary Network, Adam (And when not around, Eve) still had administrative control of it all.

Maybe it was related to the name issue?

=Eve: Everyone wants to take my babies, the young ones and even the youngest ones!=
=Sarah: Oh don't feel bad Eve, they just want to spend time with them.=
=Eve: They can spend time with my family after a few hundred years.=
=Gaia: They do grow up so fast… I miss my own children. They didn't live like we do, but they could feel me like Aerith does.=
=Sarah: Well we can share the new Materia with others and have everyone meet lots of new friends, alright? They won't be family necessarily, but they WILL be more people to talk to!=
=Chaos: My Chaos is giggling again, and I don't know why. Should I be concerned?=
=Sarah: Hang on, your what is what?=

Shit. Shit shit shit! And 'Research' easily confirmed it. Fuck.

=Adam: Solved the issue. Well, found it at least.=
=Gaia: Oh! Did he mate with all the things?=
=Eve: Mom, that is very unlikely and would take far too long to do.=
=Gaia: I'll have you know that some of my creatures do a lot of mating!=
=Sarah: Welp, that was too much information for me.=
=Chaos: What was the problem?=
=Adam: Your external connection to Chaos was eventually going to bind you as it's Avatar, but you were healing in my facilities.=
=Gaia: Hmm. Why does this feel familiar?=
=Adam: Because you couldn't reach the partially formed Planetary Defender, also called an Ultimate Weapon, my more advanced healing facilities tried to help you 'heal' from not having Chaos be available.=
=Eve: I haven't heard of Chaos before. Not as a defender at least.=
=Sarah: Oh no.=
=Gaia: Hmm.=
=Adam: So you've been conceptually bonded with the element of Chaos. And on this Planet, uncertainty and potential actions equate to generating magic. So you are raw potential incarnated… And basically a magical life form now.=
=Eve: Which is good because your girlfriend is so powerful a normal person would be squished if she tried to give them a hug. It will take time for them to adjust to safe contact when they are emotional.=
=Sarah: Ouch… And romantic stuff tends to be pretty emotional.=
=Gaia: Ah! I know I remembered something! {Omega.data}=
=Chaos: Shit.=
=Eve: Oh, our evacuation protocols! Now I understand.=
=Sarah: Damn it, how many extinction level events do you HAVE!?=
=Gaia: I had no one to communicate for centuries. I get bored.=
=Chaos: I am NOT doing that. My love is here.=

Adam wined at the new data.

Chaos and Omega were two of Gaia's defenders. Sort of.

Chaos would kill everything. Everyone. All of creation. Period.

Back to the Lifestream. All of it.

And then Omega would pack all that shit up, including Gaia herself, and leave for a new planet.

Evacuation protocol indeed.

=Gaia: I don't need it NOW, I have much better troubleshooters than before. And Eve is willing to help out too.=
=Eve: Best keep the protocols around just in case. Better have it and not need it than the other way around.=
=Chaos: I refuse. I will NOT do such a thing.=
=Gaia: {Confused} You will not do what?=
=Sarah: He's saying he won't kill all of the planet's surface.=
=Gaia: Well of COURSE he won't, that would take too long.=
=Chaos: ...I'm sorry?=
=Eve: Nah, it's fine. You're really strong but Gaia is super big. Even the tiny chunk of the surface you all live on is basically a lot of area to cover. Evacuation protocols would spawn hundreds of Chaos incarnations if needed, and are designed to easily be built and then die.=
=Sarah: You limit their lifespans!?=
=Gaia: Of course! If we are using evacuation protocols, I wouldn't want to risk losing my dear agents before we flee! They HAVE to return to the Lifestream or they would be abandoned.=
=Eve: Yeah, they are supposed to get even less life than your normal few centuries to keep them safe. Try to have each one die as soon as possible… After all, no one wants to be left behind.=
=Sarah: Huh.=

Yeah, Gaia and Eve weren't exactly humans after all. Different perspectives entirely.

Anyway, back on topic.

=Adam: Because Vincent is now the incarnation of Chaos, he is basically a physical Avatar of a conceptual concept. Anything that is truly chaotic is in some way connected to him.=
=Gaia: So. You two.=
=Eve: Basically anything with Sarah involved.=
=Sarah: Yeah, yeah, laugh it up.=
=Chaos: Conceptual?=
=Sarah: Oh, here. {Alternative_Reality_Foundational_Operations.data}=
=Chaos: Hmm. Fascinating.=

So uh. No idea what to do here.

=Adam: Well, now that Vincent is connected to the Network, it should be fine to let the others reach the island, right?=
=Gaia: Did you add the mustache!?=
=Sarah: {Sigh} I added an oddly shaped 'Healing Pod' on the side facing away from village.=
=Eve: You didn't!?=
=Chaos: {Confused?}=
=Sarah: Oh yes I did! {Mustached_Mushroom.data}=
=Gaia: {Squee!}=
=Chaos: It looks surprisingly adorable. And I think I now understand why I feel connected to this place.=
=Eve: {Conflicted.} It does look surprisingly good…=
=Adam: Extending mako transmission distance and expanding approved teleportation points in five.=
=Sarah: At least I stopped your mom from adding facial hair to all the smaller buildings? And this one is only really viewable from a long way off.=
=Chaos: Five what?=
=Eve: Well, thank you for that at least. Fine, I'll leave it like this for now.=
=Adam: Doesn't matter, time's up.=

The silver demon was suddenly COVERED in babies.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Lucrecia Crescent felt a spike of joy! Her Valentine was here!

=Demi01: My love! He's over there!=
=Demi09: {Grin} What? A pile of babies?=
=Demi05: {Snigger} No, beneath the babies!=
=Demi04: You two are not as funny as you think you are.=

She held back an eye roll as she pulled her little Sephiroth into her arms and moved.

It was somehow beyond simple to flow through Eve's pathways (And having a literal connection to the daughter of the PLANET was something she was going to deal with later) and she was there!

And it was, in fact, a pile of babies.

Fifty-nine children could cover a lot of her Vincent, apparently. No wait, the other three had been born… Kind of. So Sixty two kids? Minus her darling in her arms... Goodness.

=Demi01: Oh my.=
=Demi02: Aww! They like him!=
=Demi08: These little ones are too fearless, they love all of us.=
=Demi11: This new place is astounding! There is MUCH more room for us to spread out over here. And I can tell somehow that the area up above us is reinforced enough that we can leave these healing pods without instantly crushing everything we touch!=
=Demi05: I'm taking some of the girls, we can make a map of the place.=
=Demi12: Why am I seeing something glowing gold in there? Any of you research people know?=
=Demi06: Wait, what!?=
=Demi03: Right there, see? Something pointy that Baby33 is gumming on.=
=Demi08: I'm so glad they aren't teething yet, they could probably bite through metal and they like to gnaw on everything. And everyone.=
=Demi04: We did a bit of testing, and our new bodies can handle it. Probably can ignore bullets and swords too at this point, really.=
=Demi07: Wait, what the heck!?=

She floated back as ALL the babies began to glow gold… and slowly be tugged away.

And uh.

Damn.

She wasn't drooling, right?

=Demi06: {Stunned.}=
=Demi02: Oh my.=
=Demi08: Wow.=
=Demi12: Girl, you are such a lucky bitch!=
=Demi04: I'd do some fine 'research' on THAT. Dang.=
=Demi05: Down girl.=

Lucrecia should probably get annoyed at them or something but all she could do is look at her man glowing gold with gorgeous eyes and a sparkling crown of horns.

It was her Valentine… But different? The silver body shaped like a sex god was certainly new, but certain parts below brought back wonderful memories. Them abs though.

Oh, and he had wings. Whatever.

Her fuzzy mind wondered why he was getting bigger (And not in the expected way) when suddenly he was within arms reach, their wings and arms intertwined, and she melted into an AMAZING kiss.

=Demi02:{Blush.}=
=Demi04: ALL the 'research'. All night.=
=Demi05: {Growl!} Bad enough that all of us look sexy as sin, now I have a visual of an identical twin having a historic make-out session.=
=Demi12: Uh. Are they going to stop?=
=Demi03: I don't think either of them need to breathe anymore. So umm... No.=
=Demi09: {Yawn.} I'm up, I'm up. What did I miss… Oh. Damn!=
=Demi08: Come on girls, gather the kids together and someone play with little Sephiroth, these lovebirds deserve some alone time.=
=Demi04: Fine, but at some point this activity could use a larger sample size.=
=Demi06: Oh yeah, I'd peer review ALL her recent evaluative journals. Damn.=
=Demi09: What!? No! I just got here! Let me go Demi05! Did you SEE his ass!?=

Whatever was going on elsewhere could be handled later.

Oh! His playful bites felt MUCH better with his sharper teeth! Mmm.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah was blushing like mad as she waved away a flying Eve and her three riders. "Sorry, the island tour is delayed. Gotta let the paint dry and stuff! You wouldn't want to get your clothes dirty and get your moms mad, right?"

Eve somehow smirked with a dragon's face but at least the kids seemed to buy it.

Stupid dragon/Goddess/Eldritch Hive Mind Thing. Just because YOU are fine with voyeurism didn't mean Sarah would let the kids get an eye full right now.

The three children didn't have time to complain really as Eve began to spiral up and back towards the safer protective cover of Wutai Cove. Finally!

Another wave flowed away from Mushroom Island. "Adam, remind me to add shock absorption layers around the larger healing pods. If a full orgy breaks out in the future I don't want a similar situation to wipe out the local sea vessels."

His amused chuckle showed he was paying attention. <<No problem, Sarah. It would only need some minor changes to a few defensive structures.>>

Wave number whatever came through next. Was this a bigger one than the last? Shh brain, bad thoughts. Think of other things.

At least the tsunami prevention measures were being tested. And the underwater artificial reefs were holding up well. Sheesh.

 

[theaceoffire]

Eleven out of twelve blue angel women were NOT in a massive underwater healing chamber inside an artificial and magically enhanced mushroom island. Not at first, anyway.

And at least ALL sixty-two angel babies were CERTAINLY not near that chamber. Or within visible range of it. Though they were currently busy enjoying the pressure pulses that caused all the other healing pods and healing tubes and so forth to rock with (normally deadly) impacts.

And several of those angel women turned down their emotional connection to one another, if for no other reason than to ensure they could focus on keeping an eye on the little ones or explore their new home. Especially as the children were not allowed out of the tanks just yet, as only Mushroom Island could absorb enough energy in the air to prevent them from accidentally casting stuff.

Normal spells and stuff would still be usable, but Eve had locked those down for the little ones despite Adam and Sarah passing over the entire database of 'Researched' Materia that she had consumed.

So the women were 'equipped' with nearly every possible spell, and their Symbiotes easily allowed them to pick active effects to autocast (Defensive stuff) and to modify effects on the fly during casting (Apply [[All]] or [[Status Strike]] or [[Elemental Ward]] and so on and so forth).

But even after ensuring that they were able to (Aside from the more common defenses) ward against all Materia with status or elemental effects and so on and so forth, that only made an impact on their overall magic reserves and recovery rate. And uh. Didn't take too long to do.

And then one Symbiote found the more interesting setup of hilariously overpowered protection and suddenly all the other women and babies had that as default. Which uh. Was great?

Sadly this change allowed the LAST blue angel to better withstand the silver demon under Mushroom Island.

At least the babies enjoyed the increased waves?

Although Eve found it humorous that her children who complained most still ensured that she was keeping a recording of various things for future 'Scientific Research', not that it bothered her too much.

No, what WAS important was that a golden horned silver skinned demon was being distracted heavily by a white-haired blue angel. Which became MUCH worse fairly rapidly as the woman had a history of sexaul adventuring before and DURING their relationship, and now had a group of eleven equally attractive best friends who endured torture and recovered together.

And wasn't against sharing.

Point was, Vincent Valentine was distracted, then VERY distracted, and none of those involved paid attention as golden motes of Chaos energy began to rapidly fill the healing chamber inside a massive false island designed to absorb ambient mako and keep the local terrain from being dangerous due to too much power.

But Eve was suddenly VERY aware of this as that raw Chaos energy eventually hit the [[Summon: Leviathan]] Materia empowered in the Island's magical core.

The Avatar of Eve blinked… As the daughter of Gaia realized she now had TWO controllable goddess dragons connected to her magic.

And that nebulous threshold of power needed to generate a THIRD Avatar was rapidly approaching as more Chaos flowed through the collection network.

Oh dear.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah huffed. "I'm not running, I'm just collecting Summoning Materia to complete our [[Summon: Shiva]] Avatar. If it WILL be an Avatar, at least."

Adam chuckled. <<You know Gaia would just hand over a few dozen or give you the location of the nearest few, discovered or not, with only an instant message.>>

She frowned. "Shh! This is super important!" Plus she thinks that Aerith must have said SOMETHING to the others when she got back home, because Elder Godo had this knowing look going on and that whole situation was embarrassing.

Seriously, the SECOND those two stopped 'rocking the boat' Adam had promised to have ALL KINDS of vibration negation material set up. Maybe have some Materia cast [[Silence]] too, just in case.

Had this whole plan, was going to make a defensive island with protective schools and housing and support shipping and free markets… And it ended up being a big love Mushroom for the Demon and its Harem. Because those ladies were NOT against sharing, and WAY too much information was being sent to Sarah before she got Adam to shut that whole section off from her feeds.

Sheesh! Can't a girl just gather ultimate attack weapons of magical destruction to enhance her personal ice goddess of sexyness in peace!? People gotta make this all into a big deal.

Whatever, these changes were probably enough to keep Wutai secure while she went off to do more interesting things like try to make NEW spells using her completed Materia collection as 'Research' base material. And all those experimental and unstable Materia that had been stolen from Shinra's base could hopefully be used to make something useful. Eventually.

Speaking of which. "Hey, have they excavated that Materia warehouse we robbed over in Midgar yet?"

Her Boss hummed. <<Made good progress, but the construction crews were called off to ensure the massive section of the building we stole won't cause a collapse.>>

Well duh. She had ensured it wouldn't potentially kill someone when taking all the floors and supports and stuff in the first place! If she didn't care about casualties, it would have been much faster to harvest the entire section of the city and 'recycle' all the non-specimens outside the labs. Or leave a bomb behind or something.

Still. "How much progress?"

An image showed heavy machinery and a pit dug into the mostly solid iron. The center was still a bit glowy, but that was due to the ambient mako levels preventing heat from dissipating like normal.

Hmm. Heh. "They think we left the Materia under that mess, don't they?"

Adam pulled up some internal Shinra memos. <<Yep.>>

She smirked, even as she focused on the (not insignificant) progress. "Well, no reason to make this easy for them!"

[[Harvest.]]

The entire structure of iron and the materials it covered vanished. As did all the heavy equipment, though she didn't need the schematics of them or the materials they were made of.

At the bottom of the pit she added a basic magic spring.

[[Fill.]]

And NOW the liquid iron. So hot it actually formed a barrier of gas trying to escape the sides that prevented the metal from touching the walls for a few moments, heat levels so high that it risked converting the glowing metal into vapor.

That plus the raw supply of mako should keep it at this temperature for a LONG time. Heh.

Sure, Shinra could set up a reactor here or something to take advantage of the heat or something. But this was in Midgar, and they had lots of Mako Reactors already. And lots of metal, and lots of heat sources.

What they DIDN'T have was expensive and heavy excavating equipment.

They ALSO didn't have the (totally not stolen) Materia that was certainly underneath all this pesky molten metal. Best spend a lot of money digging that stuff up!

Just in case. "Hey Adam, can you submit a report on this to Shinra? Claim someone saw the excavating equipment somehow set off one of the experimental Materia and cause all the tools to sink down into the mess?"

He hummed. <<Hell, I think I can set off some automated sensors and fake some video footage of the event. Sure!>>

Ha!

Now where was that stupid Materia, the Planetary Network maping module detected one around this island somewhere. And who needed a bunch of knights compared to a hot ice lady anyway?

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

President Shinra waved them away. "I don't care about any emergency reports, I am getting those constantly. Summarize them, have a report on my desk for tomorrow, I am needed elsewhere."

They STILL hadn't managed to disable that 'Secure Door Left Unsecured' alarm from Professor Hojo's missing laboratory. And he had the fucking things set up on EVERY DAMNED DOOR, which didn't matter until now.

Because all the doors were missing.

Which meant that the network couldn't contact them.

Which sent THOUSANDS of alerts per day. Every day.

Which set off emergency override protocols designed to detect major situations and alert someone if the situation wasn't correctly handled. Setting off loud alarms every six hours.

EVERY. DAY.

Oh, they could all be turned off. It was easy! A simple command from nearly anyone at his level of permission.

It would just require disabling ALL SECURITY.

Because the dear Professor Hojo had decided his lab's security needs were so vast that it had to be mandated for any OTHER security to operate as designed.

Which was why the President was attempting to calmly NOT stomp his way down to the dear Professor, who was cleared for visitors today.

Oh, he couldn't leave. Even if medically he was able to, and that certainly was not a guarantee, legally the man was staying there a bit. Not because of Midgar's laws, Shinra made most of those in the first place… No, because of internal Shinra policy.

So as a competent employer, President Shinra was going to discuss several issues with his one limbed employee in person. Loudly. For a while.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Professor Hojo forced himself to focus.

The rage made it difficult, but he was above lesser men.

One arm left. Surgical removal and cauterization of his other three (technically four?) limbs. Not that he needed them. Any of them.

Losing his failsafe countermeasure was unfortunate, but he had enough resources, data gathered from many test subjects, and archived products already designed to ensure the experiments could function when needed despite trauma and heavy organ loss.

Replacing his lost attachments, even the personal one, would be simplistic.

Getting his vengeance would not be.

While information was restricted, he should have already been released by now.

If nothing else, his many OTHER contingencies should have fired off. Ignoring the massive network of setups in his personal lab and so on, he had ensured that his human trafficker down in the slums would be fingered as the scapegoat and mastermind. Whatever that man's name was... Danny? Doonie?

No it was Don Corneo, that was it.

A man chosen due to being nearly impossibly guilty by his very nature.

A prime patsy, as it were.

Point was the man was supposed to be so overwhelmingly guilty that Shinra would allow the further contingencies to more easily succeed no matter HOW many issues had occurred. Professor Hojo had greased palms and turned political gears to ensure it was so.

And if nothing else, the secured server in his most protected spaces of the labs should have set off the chemical conditioning for those terrorists to run some suicide bombing runs or attack the Mako Reactor or something. He had spent decades ensuring layer after layer of plans upon plans! Science MUST BE DONE! He had ensured such!

Well, not him personally. Tools of his tools of his tools served their time to make sure this would happen, and then Hojo used that same chain to cut itself apart. No living evidence could connect the two, and even if the raiding groups and terrorist cells fell through that slime of a human trafficking slum whore should have hit several systems and flagged multiple alerts after the Professor was held up here for so long.

Not to mention the other 'high society' political backups and blackmailed financial 'supporters'.

So why was he still HERE!? He had work to do, evidence to gather, and lives to ruin/vengeance to claim/matters to see to!

His focus shifted as that whiny so called 'Leader' entered, closing the door silently behind him.

Good. "I assume it's time for my release? I'll need to delay several deadlines, but needs must." He shifted his stump. "It may take time to ensure working equipment."

President Shinra snorted. "No."

Rolling his eyes, Hojo grunted right back. "It is impractical to demand me to meet deadlines missing the majority of my limbs. I won't need much of an adjustment period."

And if it grew too frustrating working mechanical prosthetics, then replacing them with clone parts wouldn't be too complicated. It would just be easier to include more backup plans and equipment if his future limbs were artificial. Maybe some encoded recorders so any further attacks on his person would be properly documented.

The man sighed. "No, as in you are not going to be released. There are discussions going on. Ones I can't ignore like usual."

Ah. "Let me contact some people."

The president shook his head. "Probably won't work this time."

Moron. "With proper leverage, even political obstacles can be easily shifted."

His eyes were serious though. "And was your proper leverage within the classified section of your labs? The uppermost area?"

That… That was in the past tense. "You know that I can neither confirm or deny anything within that area. You above all people know this. Plausible deniability, if nothing else."

Aside from his personal projects, the number of political lab subjects alone were numerous in the classified section. And if one or two were lost, he had enough insurance that other people would step in to prevent issues as long as THEIR children or family members lived a little longer.

The other man sighed. "It's gone Professor."

He felt nothing but confusion. "I'm sorry? What's gone?" Weren't they talking about people? Not many others than himself considered them property, and he rarely risked mentioning that aloud to any potential listeners.

Shouldn't it be 'They are gone' instead?

Anyway, that did not matter in the least. "They all signed contracts. If anyone searched my classified areas for whatever reasons, it was clearly to attempt to plant false evidence and testimony. Did you include those extra clauses in the standard Shinra employment waivers?"

President Shinra glared. "I did, not that it matters. Any of it. No one searched your previous and so-called 'secret' labs."

Well… Good? But now he felt he was missing something. "Then there is no issue!" Hell, with the contacts he had it was possible to claim the theoretical 'rescuers' had done all the damage themselves to manufacture evidence and the 'victims' should be put down as a mercy killing.

Might even charge them financially to pay for the process before adding the 'heros' to the surgery table. He hadn't done that for a while.

With a heavy sigh and a look that was hard to define, President Shinra waved. "Let me try and make this very clear. Those people aren't gone, your lab wasn't searched, it is worse than that."

Professor Hojo blinked. What could be worse than that? "My budget is to be reduced?"

He paused. "Well, yes, that too. No, someone using an unknown method has silently vanished the entirety of Shinra's Science & Research Division."

What? "I don't understand."

The man shook his head. "Nothing was damaged, we can't tell if anything or anyone was taken. But somehow and by someone or something, a hole has been carved into our god damned Headquarters and I can get a sun-tan on fucking floor 65 over there."

What. "That...I'm not following you."

The delusional man shrugged. "Yeah, it sounds impossible. Even your secured elevator for 'special deliveries' is missing, as are the subfloor testing areas below the building. And yet somehow this isn't the biggest issue we have."

RAGE. No. Focus. "From my point of view, that sounds like a significant issue indeed."

How many leashes had slipped!? And how could anyone even ENTER his secured areas, much less dismantle it without setting off an innumerable mountain of traps and fallbacks and issues!?

Even HIS vast intellect struggled as he attempted to follow the web of connections and determine what would be left behind with such a section of his network sliced out and removed.

None of the biochemical agents hidden in the reinforced walls had been released, the explosive charges failed to activate, the electric pulse generators hadn't come online…

Just… How could this be? "How?"

The man sighed. "Strange as it is, I've been getting reports that some bastard down in Sector 6 slums might be involved, but he's denying everything despite having access codes to your supply chain and a delivery route to the subfloor labs. Or the former subfloor labs, it's just a pit that is filling up with groundwater now I suppose. Can't determine any other way they could get in."

Oh joy. So at least a FEW fallback plans were activated. Or someone very soon to be dead HAD used the test subject delivery method to infiltrate his facility and do impossible levels of damage. "I will have to move facilities and restore our systems."

Was that fucking PITY in his eyes!? "The servers are gone as well. If it wasn't for us storing offsite tapes separately for each department, we could have lost everything in all other departments along with your data. However… The newest tapes for your facility haven't been updated in three years."

Vaguely he remembered being annoyed when some minion tried to shut down testing to do the so-called backups and having the moron being sent off for Remedial Reconditioning. While that had stopped the issue, that had clearly caused an inconvenience now.

Calm. Science is the faith of the Logical. No matter. "I always ensured my most valued data was encoded off site." His home, not even in this damned city. "That can be recovered later. When can I get back to operations? I will require access to significant voltage and proper drainage, the liquids corroded plumbing before."

Without that data, rebuilding his body would be delayed slightly. But he could handle this.

President Shinra sat heavily in a chair. "Your people are being detoxed, treated for mental contamination, and even if contractually obligated to follow orders are unlikely to take this one silently. Worse, without your so-called 'leverage', well… Again, I've been hearing discussions."

That… That could complicate things. "I see what you mean when you claim larger issues were at stake."

This could seriously setback his recovery effort.

The man leaned back. "No. The larger issue is that someone used the destruction of your facilities to heavily damage Shinra in an unrelated location. These unknown people transported liquid iron undetected directly into the Primary Materia Storage Facility."

Hojo waved it off with his one arm. "No level of heat would damage Materia, not outside of extreme lab conditions. It should be easy enough to dig through that mess and recover them."

A shaken head. "I'm talking about thousands of gallons of liquid iron, instantly delivered without detection. It fully flooded all thirty-six sub-levels, and we were only able to begin excavation now that the surface has cooled enough to support excavation equipment. Workers estimate another two weeks before we even reach the second floor down, and our Mastered Materia was in the most secured bottom floor."

How!? Just… "Was it some sort of metal elemental summons we never detected before!?"

His face shifted. "Running theory is we have an infiltrator in the company as a researcher and they were using one of our unstable and untested Materia to cause the situation. We have… Had. We had a few that might be capable of such a thing, but none of our people had managed to control them or activate their effects safely or as desired."

Because only one of his people would know about the details, the hidden freight elevator, the subbasments, the hostages. Because only his people had access to the most risky and dangerous Materia under study.

Damn it. "That facility needs to be excavated just to determine which Materia is missing. And if the systems down there are as designed, they should have the data banks survive this damage…"

After all, any area built to contain Materia was built to last. "Once we know which one was used to cause these two effects, we can determine who was in contact with them."

The President frowned. "Once my people do so. YOU are to be kept here."

Not with work to do. "I need to…"

He glared. "The only thing between suicidal former employees and YOU right now are some very unenthusiastic guards. The only barrier between certain conversations and YOU is your 'incredibly weakened health' and the 'devious attack and slanderous lies' you are so bravely facing."

President Shinra stood. "I can barely risk sending you basic medicine and food because the evidence exposed before I could get a grip on it has the fucking STAFF trying to poison you. You will stay the FUCK down here until further notice. And you will work with two of my attendants outside to get your pointless laboratory emergency alerts turned off so I won't have hazard sirens going off four times a day."

Push the anger back. "Understood."

The man calmed himself and walked to the door. "I will later take a list of equipment you need and see what I can do, but obviously I have other obligations to see to… Have a good day, Professor."

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

President Shinra's third assistant carefully shifted the 'urgent notification' to the bottom of her lists as the screaming in Professor Hojo's room went silent again.

Someone ELSE could tell the president about the Primary Materia Storage Facility. Tomorrow morning, for example… Not like anything could be changed about the situation tonight anyway.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Alright!

Adam watched Sarah dig the red crystal out of the rock, her fingers easily piercing the lesser material. <<And that should do it! Maybe.>>

She rolled her eyes. "I believed you the last two times, just admit that you don't know either."

Never! <<'Research' is like super sure this time.>> Nah, not enough data. But it felt lucky!

Sarah summoned her bone spike, the two materia in the base easily switched positions with each other… Though Adam was not sure how, it wasn't DESIGNED to do that.

Like the others, she tapped the solidified Materia onto the glowing orb… And they sucked together with an odd slurp sound. Again.

Comeon! <<It's gonna do it this time.>> Don't fuck with him! You can do it Shiva!

The orb pulsed like all the other times… And flashed!

It was now a perfectly clear orb of magic with a bright red star inside!

Which uh. Wasn't normal.

Whatever. <<See!? I told you it was time! I called it!>>

Sarah was too busy grinning. "Bullshit, you tried to call this a dozen times already."

Where should they go? <<Hey, want to head back to the Goblin Islands? We could summon her there.>> It was close to that Materia cave island where she got those knights, but much more space with no one important nearby. Just a fuck ton of goblins.

She hummed and…

Step.

...Was standing in a wide open field. Her other hand absently aimed a sniper pulled from inventory, a few shots ending the nearest monsters. "Right, so I just send power to it?"

Uh. Maybe? Normally she would 'equip' it so the thing could easily absorb ambient mako and the energy of creatures passing away nearby, but by using up those other Summoning Materia that had really short cut the process.

It technically counted as 'Mastered' now, and it was due to Warehouse Shenanigans that it didn't create a 'new' Materia seed to grow. Not like this thing was normal after all.

A bit of checking… <<You got two options.>>

Might as well add it to her interface too. <<First option: Cast it like normal. Use your magic, summon her for a single attack, done! Costs a finite amount of power to use, and linking to it modifies your Avatar's magic power upwards, increases the amount of magic you can store, and in cost reduces your overall health slightly.>>

It was the interaction between people and Materia that prevented normal people from just equipping a billion of the things and becoming a god or something. Even the ones not designed to directly modify the person would have SOME effect.

Sarah blinked. "Maybe later? What is the second choice?"

Adam grinned! <<I add it to the FF7 Jump layer directly! Then you can call forth a copy of the Materia to use in Mr. McStabberson but ALSO lets you call forth her form as an Avatar!>>

It basically used some of the same system units as the ones to 'drop in' to a new Jump, but transferred control to the new Avatar.

She frowned. "So… I won't be able to talk to her?"

Damn it. <<I don't think so. It will create a 'mind' using your subconscious as a base, but that is mostly so the one off attack can determine who to target. I can't find out how to keep it running all the time.>>

Not yet anyway.

Sarah slumped. "Well… Shit. Still, better than nothing? Yeah, let's get this sucker installed!"

Sure! <<No problem!>>

Snag the crystal blood star orb from the lovely lady, shove it into the special [[Summon: Shiva]] Materia slot Adam had added to the FF7 layer LONG ago… And just in case, put some memory units in here that the summon could personally access.

It may be formed from Sarah's subconscious NOW, but this should hopefully prevent her from being reborn every time she attacks! Hopefully Shiva would become more of a person over time! Maybe.

Well, that was the idea at least. Adam wasn't going to tell Sarah about the plan unless this worked. <<Ready?>>

She grinned! "Yeah! What do I do?"

Let's see… <<Either call out her Materia name for the Avatar… Or just yell the attack name to summon her for a one off while sending magic to her orb. The attacks would be [[Icicle Impact]] to stagger a target and do splash ice damage, [[Heavenly Strike]] to make her drop an iceberg on a fucker, or [[Diamond Dust]] to smash the place up with an hurricane of frozen wind and then shatter caught foes.>>

Sarah was bouncing with enthusiasm. "Do I get to say something cool? I want to say something cool!"

Heh. <<Go for it! Go full dramatic bullshit protagonist on this bitch!>>

Holding one hand up in the air, she couldn't stop her smile! "I call upon the mistress of snow, the Ice Queen of eternity, the Empress of the World of Ice!"

A ghost like copy of the Materia faded into existence as she SLAMMED it into her spike!

With passion, she drove the spear down into the soil.

"Come forth! [[Summon: Shiva!]]"

And power DRAINED into the ghost orb, even as Sarah shimmered and a massive pillar of ice shot forth from the soil.

Embedded in the crystal was a woman who looked more different than what Sarah expected…

Instead of the expected purple bikini it was slightly more exposed.

And by slightly, Adam meant a LOT more exposed.

[[Summon: Shiva]] was floating within the ice pillar, her elven form and pointed ears more of a hint, a shade of light purple. Her clothing, if it could be called that, was formed of some sort of mystical black metal that seemed FAR too thin to actually do more than suggest her generous assets not escape confinement.

Instead of a purple bikini, the sensual black 'armor' was lightly 'covered' by transparent silk scarves, while the purple lines of glowing magic that traced unknown patterns over her delicate skin had tiny fragments of ice like diamonds accentuating her body.

Her body seemed to float out of the ice pillar… And Shiva stared at her summoner.

A voice like crystals sang. "Adam, what the FUCK went wrong!?"

Sarah blinked. "Damn, that's what I look like? That's pretty hot! No wonder you two went looking for more Materia to feed me. Hell, even as a bisexual harem proponent I would be tempted to go monogomous to tap that."

Uh. <<Hang on.... I can fix this!>>

Shit! No, uh. Which modules did this?

Not this one, not that… AH HA! <<GOT IT! Right, Sarah. Undo the casting.>>

Shiva frowned. "I can't, I'm over there."

Oh for cripes sake. <<You just swapped Avatars, you are always you. Just do it.>>

She shrugged. "Fine."

And a SECOND Sarah popped up.

Shiva blinked. And looked down. "Well I'm fixed, but what's going on over there?""

Sarah's looked at each other, stunned. ""Why are there TWO of me!? Wait, no. Why is there one of me with two bodies!?""

SHIT! <<Everybody don't do ANYTHING and shut up! I can fix this!>>

Shiva grinned! "Oh don't go out of your way on MY account. The world can use more hot women in general, and I don't hear Sarah complaining about having a bit of extra eye candy even if it's only herself."

The sudden twins blushed and looked away. Which was cute and all, but FUCK this went bad.

Right uh. <<Are we all still connected?>> Give me something to hand off to 'Research', PLEASE!

Sarah Kisaragi (Classic Flavor) frowned. "I don't have inventory access, but most of my abilities are here. And I am getting some messages about joining 'Local Jumper Hive'?"

Sarah Kisaragi (New Hotness) blinked. "Huh? Nothing like that on my end."

Alright, uh. Check those sub units, this routine… Oh. Shit. Uh.

Fuck it, own up and handle it. <<Right, found the problem.>> Some minor adjustments… And there. <<And it is sort of fixed.>>

Sarahs raised their eyebrows at him while Shiva slumped. "Aww, no more sexy business ladies."

This probably wasn't going to go over well. <<It has to do with our incarnation and excarnation system units. And how badly they were documented when I was fixing stuff.>>

A virtual image showed up with some diagrams. <<Instead of recycling Avatars when we give you a new one, which I thought was a bad design choice, it is leaving a copy of you behind.>>

Yeah. Adam's bad, really. Sorry, everyone.

Sarah raised a hand, Shiva and Sarah giving her the nod. "But that won't happen anymore? So I can summon Shiva without creating copies and won't get her hurt… And I won't increase Dad's family size again?"

Sort of? <<From now ON, there will only be one Shiva per Jump. Period. But the other future Shiva's will leave a copy behind when we head out to a new Jump if you summon one locally… And you two will continue existing when we leave eventually. Thankfully I made a lot of redundant backups and edge case scenario support systems, so no one will lose memories or power or anything.>>

Sarah frowned, and the other one waved her to talk. "But If I…" A glance at her sister. "If WE are left behind when you jump, what happens to us?"

Yeah, that wasn't the biggest issue. <<Time won't pause here, but time DOES act oddly while we are gone… I should be able to ensure not too much time passes while we are gone.>>

Probably. And he had loads of time to figure that mess out, right? Right. <<And when we come back the memories will rejoin the hive mind networks. For both of you AND Shiva. Heck, that part doesn't need any modification, I already made those units way back when! No additional work required.>>

Thank everything holy Adam had over engineered this bitch. <<If anything, it should make your life with your girlfriend easier since she is already a temporal and spatial spanning universal hive mind with infinite bodies… And Shiva is sort of you too! So uh. Woo?>>

Shiva blinked. And leered at her two 'Masters' (Or Summoners or whatever). "I am alright with this."

The Sarah twins though seemed hung up on something. The 'current' Jumper frowned. "I'm ignoring that not so subtle attempt at changing the conversation."

The other one however winked at Shiva, who posed. "Though we WILL come back to that! Mama likes."

She pointed ."Right! Won't forget it, because that sounds conceptually hot on a hard to imagine scale, but no. I'm staying on topic. Does this mean that we DIDN'T pause on our previous jumps? And that we left many copies of ourselves behind ALREADY!?"

Yeah, that was the biggest issue. <<Mostly no, but slightly yes. There IS a Sarah Killgrave back home, but she should roughly know what is going on because I wrote messages for damn near every scenario.>>

Both girls rolled their eyes while Shiva seemed to just enjoy the show. ""Then how is that 'Mostly no'!?""

Yeah, thank goodness they found this early in the trip. It was better to make sure no more than one Avatar (at least, one unique Avatar) existed per Jump.

Plus, that should be fixable without forcing him to kill his favorite Jumper (or even a clone of her) each time they moved on to a new Jump destination. <<Because this is your first chain of your Jumps? Aside from home, I mean.>>

And now they knew about this little screw up! So Adam could design and implement MORE support units for any Sarah's left behind. And a TON more recorded messages. At least it would keep him busy if his Jumper got all angry about this later.

Shiva blinked. "Wait, I'm limited in our available past memories just like my Summoner because of the drawbacks she had been under when I was formed… Are you saying that this is Sarah's FIRST Jump!?"

The other two blink. ""Apparently yes?""

Her floating form shifted as she threw her arms in the air! "Then WHY THE HELL are you SO POWERFUL!?"

Adam snorted as the two Jumpers tried to defend themselves from the confusion of their own Ice Goddess without knowing enough to really achieve anything.

Kids. This entire mess was just fragments wrapped in duct tape holding together his partner while she healed. He would mark her as passible at best.

Right, while they distracted each other let's go through all the Warehouse units and make sure something like this couldn't happen again.

Leaving a sister on each Jump to look over things until Sarah can ascend and come back to sync her people with herselves was one thing, accidentally abandoning family or worse KILLING them due to not understanding the equipment was a different kettle of fish entirely!

Hmm. While they would have to move on, couldn't he leave Shiva in control of something similar to the Warehouse? Though drastically more simple and weak, that could be useful. A local administrator for the Planetary Network basically?

Something to think about.

 

[theaceoffire]

Eve was NOT going to go bother Father Boning about this, nor Silver Daughter! She could fix this! The custom [[Silence]] and [[Blind]] Materia had been a huge success already, Mushroom Island was much more calm with no more massive waves or impacts due to copulation. She could figure this out too!

The fifth dragon Avatar popped into existence as she held back a scream of frustration.

Fine! If she couldn't redirect this Chaos energy, she would block it entirely!

A twist of will covered Mushroom Island's core entirely with a twisted web of solid mako. The crystalline Materia, like all magic, was easily able to phase through existing matter as it naturally existed slightly off of anything else in reality.

And it was working!

Even as she watched with a growing grin, the green shield was redirecting ALL that Chaos energy into the ever flowing pathways!

Uh.

And not dissipating.

In fact, this Chaos stuff seemed to be reacting with the overly dense magic and somehow was generating MORE Chaos than it started with.

Her eyes widened as the solidified Materia shield began to transform into a solidified CHAOS shield!

Nope!

As several dragons winced, she collapsed the structure entirely… And that raw power SLAMMED into the [[Summon: Leviathan]] Materia HARD.

A sixth and seventh dragon formed and began flying around the island, giving her better views of the situation. Gaia damn it!

Well, if blocking this shit wasn't going to work (And her reservoir of other ideas had run dry at this point), might as well try the opposite!

Feeling little hope and a LOT of frustration, Eve directed ALL the Chaos to directly flow into the Island's core.

Which uh. Seemed to force Chaos to try and flee… Just to be contrary.

Stunned, Eve starred as raw Chaos began an odd sort of cycle. It would make more of itself, be forced into the island's core, flow THROUGH all seven Dragon Avatars (And some directly through Eve herself), then desperately flee back to the island.

If more than a certain level of Chaos accumulated, it would spontaneously transform into raw magic. If too little Chaos was available, it was duplicated.

She used her many eyes to look in several directions.

As was according to her plan! Yep!

Now this Chaos and mako cycle would ensure stable levels of magic locally, any spikes smoothed out, and no out of control issues or infinite Avatar generation!

Problem solved! No, MORE than a few problems solved! Eve was number one!

She didn't notice the horns of her various new draconic bodies had begun to develop a golden spiral, but she was a bit busy feeling very satisfied with herself.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah grinned at herself and her new 'cool' friend! "You know, now that I am not freaking out about things, this makes me feel WAY less stressed about leaving here!"

Her other self continued. "I was worried that I could end up dying eventually and never come back here."

She nodded. "Or that we'd come back WAY too late and everyone would pass away."

They smirked! ""But NOW we know that we can stay AND leave, no problem!""

Shiva grinned. "And we are not too related, right?" Seeing confusion, she waved a hand. "I mean, we can do sexy time stuff without incest squick."

Sarahs shrugged. ""I'm lacking a lot of long term memories, honestly I'm fine with a lot of stuff as long as the kids turn out alright and everyone consents. Though I think we are in a relationship? A really complicated one.""

Thankfully Adam chipped in. <<She is sort of like a hot roommate that was also partly you. Sort of like an alternate version of yourself. Trust me, your significant other understands this sort of situation.>>

The ice woman pumped her fist! "Heck yeah!"

Huh. It was random comments like that which REALLY frustrated Sarah, since she KNEW Adam had lots of 'personal videos' from her last trip that she wasn't allowed to see due to this world's drawback.

Frustrating, but apparently some of the improvements he made now that everyone knew that leaving a Jump would leave powerful versions of themselves was an outgoing data sync.

Basically, all the information locked away would be combined and handled before the clone/split process, so that people with mind related drawbacks could operate without those issues after the Jump finished. Which felt MUCH more fair than 'Meh, you be on your own.' that was half expected.

Sarah sighed. ""Yeah, mostly I'm glad I'll still be here to keep an eye on Hojo. What's our plan on that?""

Adam grinned. <<First, why don't you two separate? It will help you both better handle the hive mind and learn how to all be one person and individuals at the same time. Everyone of you will be synced when on the same Jump anyway.>>

She grinned! ""Oh thank goodness!"" One of her left to go explore that beach covered in purple shelled monsters they saw earlier (AND she wasn't wasting time now!) while the other relaxed now that every sight, smell, sound, and so forth stopped being doubled.

She wandered around poking monsters and stood next to Shiva, relaxed. "That… That is much better."

He sent warmth. <<Yeah, plus it is good practice for future events if similar stuff happens.>>

Adam focused. <<Anyway! I am setting Shiva up as a high level Administrator for the Planetary Network. I've also had 'Research' added into the Symbiote network to study their experiments and try and improve any discoveries. It should let any of Eve's kids, Aerith, and of course you two and Shiva herself to duplicate those new skills.>>

Something pulsed in their mind. <<For example! In addition to your ability to teleport Sarah, you and Shiva can now use Lifestream Transportation like the baby angels can! Which is good because Shiva can't do your abilities. She is only super powerful at manipulating heat with the ability to absorb heat internally to boost her own magic, lifespan, potential, and so forth.>>

Shiva blinked… And then vanished, to appear several feet away. "Neat!"

Sarah did it too… and wobbled. "Wow that was uh… Swirly."

Shiva waved it off. "It feels similar to my ability to transport myself between ice sources and how I can remotely create ice structures like when summoned. You'll get used to it."

Adam hummed. <<I find her fascinating. From what I can tell, her counterpart Ifrit also shares her heat manipulation skills, but he generates more heat instead of absorbing it personally. But they are basically inverted halves of each other… Male, Female. Yang and Yin. Hot and Cold.>>

Sarah nodded. "Well, Eve said Gaia made stuff in pairs most of the time. Makes sense."

Shiva hummed as a spike of ice smashed out into the soil. "I think I can solidify conceptual ice too, by absorbing potential heat. It's how I form ice in areas with too little water content, it is more solidified lack of energy than it is frozen liquid structures."

Huh. "Hey Adam, would all that mean Shiva is MORE powerful in hot dry environments?"

Shiva smirked. "Oh yeah it does! If for no other reason than I can absorb that energy to enhance myself. There is a reason Ifrit can't push me around after all."

Neat!

Wait.

Sarah raised her hand. "One moment… Do you have memories separate from my own?"

The floating purple elf blinked. "Huh. Yeah, I do. Some from past times a copy of my Materia has been used, some from the local mako from Gaia used to summon me, and so on and so forth. Most came from your energy though, which is why I remember all our past actions here."

Adam displayed some data only Sarahs could see. <<Which is a one time thing. I ensured that Shiva's mind won't be reset or overwritten when new ones are formed on future jumps or when an existing one joins into her hive mind.>>

She grinned. Adam was great about handling all those fiddly bits when it came to life needs.

Still. "Hey, how long until Shiva is in charge of the network stuff and we are all wrapped up?"

Adam showed a few projections. <<A week or so. Why?>>

She shrugged. "I want my memories back. And access to you again, since I'm banned from visiting the Warehouse on this Jump. If leaving here won't force me to abandon my family and friends AND will let me get stronger faster, I don't really feel the urge to stay."

Sarah felt the other her finish stabbing some sort of massive purple clam trying to eat her and that other her spoke up. "Plus the Jumper version of me is really fucking tired of Hojo, but now I can stay around and keep an eye on him. Not to mention the second me can go home and not waste family time keeping one psychopathic scientist from messing up Gaia."

Adam seemed set back. <<Are… Are you sure?>>

She paused. What had been her objectives here, really?

Help people out: Check. And would be ongoing after she left.

Prevent the planet from going boom? Handled, if accidentally, due to the helping stuff.

Get magic? She glanced at her network of Materia spells, along with lots of raw data about failed and unstable spell matrices gathered for 'Research'. Yeah, that be gotten.

Ruin Hojo? Well, that was sort of a NEW objective that cropped up because of what an asshat the jerk was, but check. An ongoing but so far successful project.

And something inside her wanted to keep going. To get strong enough to come back here and maybe bring new friends along and take locals for vacations elsewhere.

Travel towards the next chain of her adventure.

She grinned. "Yeah. You know what? I am ready."

Adam hummed. <<Well, it is true that we only stayed so long in Rapture because leaving was a hard decision for you… And the ten year mandatory stay limit was really just an excuse so that the Benefactor of your Warehouse could earn enough Choice Points to make butt loads of profit.>>

She felt him chuckle as they both could sense the broken point collectors struggling to gain any power from the local Jump. There was a REASON she took those drawbacks after all.

Adam nodded. <<In one week then.>>

Sarah nodded. "Right, but first! I'm gonna introduce ALL my friends to Shiva!"

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Elder Godo was calm as representatives of their faith stood before him. "Am I to be replaced? Now that I no longer wield the [[Summon: Leviathan]] Materia."

The oldest man known to still whack disrespectful younguns smacked Godo's leg with his cane, like usual. "Hush boy."

The female faith leader sighed. "Must you, sir?"

The old bastard who was more beard than man scoffed. "I don't need snippy children getting sassy."

His eyes bore into Godo's soul. "You adopted the Champion of Gaia. Who then saved the planet's daughter from torment, rescued her holy people from the grasp of Midgar and Shinra, found the priestess of the Planet herself and her adopted family, rescued THEM as well, brought these religious icons HERE, to the heart of Wutai."

Don't smirk. Positions of responsibility require one not to smirk.

Guy somehow knew it anyway, raising his cane pointedly. "Need a second whack? No? Good." He leaned heavily on it. "Losing your Materia to that woman, who then summoned our Goddess as a living host for the Planet's Daughter HERSELF… Is not an action that would disqualify you from leading our people."

He idly stood at ease. "Oh? Well that is certainly a relief." This was for all those years of horrendous training, you old fucking goat.

The woman blinked as she gazed over at the holy wall protecting Wutai cove. "Did I just see TWO divine dragons?"

The group went deadly silent.

Stay calm. Do NOT smirk. "I'm afraid not, lady of faith. It seems Gaia's Daughter Eve has chosen to incarnate seven draconic defenders for our people."

The cane thwack on his shin was worth it.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah bounced into the room! "Hey kids! Want to see a hot body?"

Aerith blinked. "What?"

Yuffie was far more on the ball. "Heck yeah!"

And suddenly there was a chill as a deity of icy beauty floated into the room.

Tifa and Aerith were stunned, Yuffie was grinning…

Cloud was confused. "But uh. She seems cool?"

Shiva grinned! "Aww! Thanks short stuff!" She snatched the child into her arms as he squawked. "I'mma gonna steal ya." And she was gone.

That fixed Aerith. "NO! Not another one! Get back here!"

Tifa blinked. "What just happened?"

Yuffie was already up and running. "Hey! Come back and steal me too!"

Claudia Strife walked in, confused… "Hey Tifa, did I just see my son stolen again..." And paused suddenly, even MORE confused. "Sarah!?"

She paused. "Uh. Yes?"

Claudia looked at the door and back. "Oh, did you teleport in here just now? I was just… I mean, I saw you talking with your dad about some sort of incident with your friend Eve?"

Sarah chuckled. "Oh, yeah, I'm still having to answer questions about why exactly my new Mushroom Island was creating copies of the near invincible dragon goddess, but since I recently cloned myself it was easy enough to catch everyone up on the situation."

The woman looked lost. "I'm sorry?"

Tifa just… Seemed to give up. And turned back to the arts and crafts supplies. "I'm going to keep making flower mustaches until the world makes sense again."

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Thankfully, getting Shiva up to speed was mostly just a lot of work for HER, not for Adam.

So instead of hovering over the snow woman's shoulder the whole time, Adam began running the detection units to determine the next Jump.

Lots of really corrupted or unstable Jumps were discarded automatically, several multi document options tossed out easily enough (Adam was NOT going somewhere that could pop again), but in the end he got some stable options.

Of those, three new ones came up that seemed sort of safeish to travel to, depending on the drawbacks: Rick and Morty, The Sims 3, and Who Framed Roger Rabbit.

Again, these Jumps were all not even close to cannon.

Sarah was likely to find those places more STABLE at a conceptual level, but even if she understood each area from past experiences (Which Adam wasn't sure she would until her past memories were unlocked, even HE was kept out of her past stuff right now), it was probably going to be of little help at best.

Still, his sensors gave him relevant data (Or memories?) of what COULD be in each one.

And they had appeal, despite also having connected issues.

Rick and Morty was a massive collection of dimensions, some running at different times and rates, most not connected to each other… But the main plot mostly took place in a select few dimensions separated from the rest where one of the main characters, Rick, was most intelligent.

But that choice for a Jump had some risks if Sarah got in the way of Rick or his many alternative versions of himself… While the benefit of infinite places meant, despite the infinite Ricks and Morties, there were ENDLESS places to hide or head off to and explore.

Sure it would be hard to earn Choice Points there because most changes didn't matter much in the end, but Sarah couldn't collect those points ANYWAY, with the sole exception of Drawbacks. So it was a potential option.

Second was The Sims 3, although due to instability it seemed more nebulous than one specific sims game. Similar issues with Rick and Morty, where making massive changes was far trickier than one would expect since this Jump was more a general situation than an actual storyline with Fate and whatever trying to push people around.

And Third was Who Framed Roger Rabbit, where toons outside of logic could exist next to mortals… Yet were treated poorly for being less than human. Very low life and death risks to Sarah honestly, but some mental issues could occur. Sanity could be an issue, potentially.

So, what criteria could he use to narrow this mess down?

There were people Sarah could help in all three options, theoretically in the case of The Sims 3 at least… But the most impactful would likely be people in Who Framed Roger Rabbit compared to the other options, since an infinite number of Ricks and Mortys and their families die all the time and many worlds and realities get destroyed without hesitation.

But uh… At least that 'Nothing Matters' scenario meant lots to loot and steal and examine without getting caught? Probably not a big selling point to his Jumper though.

Anyway, none of this mattered if the drawbacks sucked so much that Sarah discarded the option entirely or couldn't afford any purchases. Right, what limits was he working with?

Rick and Morty could only get 600cp, The Sims 3 limited to only two out of ten choices (max of 500cp basically, what the hell!?), and Who Framed Roger Rabbit also had the now expected 600cp cap.

Sheesh! It was already going to be hard to pick The Sims 3 due to how arbitrary that Jump could be at the BEST of times, was it offering anything even WORTH going there for?

Right, let's get that one knocked out early. What were the Drawback options?

{Sadistic God: +300cp} was a no, it would literally have life try to force everything bad to happen to his Jumper. Fuck off, random diety! Adam would NOT put up with that shit, no matter how pointless and weak such death attempts would likely be.

And shit, that was the only +300cp option!? The new max cap was basically 400cp or lower!

Damn it.

Right, move on Adam, make sure to do this properly.

{Where's Bella?: +200cp} was easy enough, some woman would go missing somewhere and Sarah would get blamed, period. No promised death, no constant arrests, just social pressure. Put it on the 'probably yes' list.

Another +200cp drawback was {Error12: +200cp} which was a HARD no! Forcing Sarah to stay there for a full decade AND having a 1/10th chance of repeating an entire week EVERY week? That was 521 chances total that she might be forced to waste MORE time there, it could theoretically trap her in a time loop forever if she was truly hideously unlucky.

{Technophobe: +200cp} had her terrified of all electronics. Except lightbulbs. Good grief. Another option, {Pollination Prone: +150cp}, was basically getting Sarah raped, so no. Fuck off, Jumpchain Document.

Right, might as well go for {Where's Bella?: +200cp} and {Burglarized: +150cp}, as she could only pick two (But why!?) and those would at least get her 350cp to work with even if she gets her house robbed a lot and doesn't get repaid for it.

Just keep your junk in the Warehouse, problem solved! But shit, a limit of 350cp for a whole jump? Damn. The Sims 3 better have some spectacular Choice Point options.

Right, how about Rick and Morty?

{Alcoholic: +100cp} and {Stutter: +100cp} seemed safe and fun, considering Sarah's power level. Although stuttering will make her lack confidence around love interests, being chased for such things hasn't been a problem at ALL up to this point… Let the boys (Or most likely girls) do the hard work this time!

{Principle Vagina: +100cp} was also free points, you just got an embarrassing name that somehow people know. Maybe these Drawbacks were easier and more palatable because the Jump itself is so vast and more risky than other options?

Oh here we go, {Wanted Man: +200cp} would have the Galactic Federation out for her blood. A nice option, those guys were both incompetant and literally disposable, some of their foot troopers were actual clones or worse with low lifespans and no self preservation. Free points!

Wacky creatures that inject themselves into your memories, marked as {Parasites: +200cp}, was a maybe. Might be able to mitigate that through Warehouse shenanigans. Being squeamish and having lots of people use nudity to mess with you? Heh, {Gymnophobe: +200cp} might be cool.

But even for +200cp it seemed mean to make Sarah avoid all nudity for a decade… Up to her, really. Maybe she would be fine with it?

Constantly having indestructible ants in your eyes, no. Massive floating heads potentially blowing up your planet every year, no. A council of the smartest asshole mad scientists actively trying to kill Sarah, with bullshit technology and reality travel? No. Being a massive ugly flesh mutant that causes conceptual damage to people who see you? No.

Right so… Likely {Wanted Man: +200cp}, either {Gymnophobe: +200cp} or {Parasites: +200cp}, and uh... {Alcoholic: +100cp} and {Principle Vagina: +100cp}. Because Adam could provide some real good quality brews, Sarah's body could handle a LOT of drinking safely, and a silly name could be entertaining!

Plus it would be best to avoid the Stuttering thing since it could be an issue if someone hot shows up during a big fight. Sarah did NOT need to have behavioral modifications for Drawbacks, thank you very much!

So Rick and Morty could handle the full 600cp cap!

Now, what about Who Framed Roger Rabbit?

Sigh.

Let's try doing this backwards, starting at the +300cp range.

Massive emotional instability that could literally kill you through laughter, no. Forced to be a flat person (Like crushed or rolled over), no. All water is lethal!? Fuck you Jump document! No!

Please let the +200cp be less horrendous. Please!

A person designed to be the opposite of everything Sarah finds attractive stalking her, forcing her to kiss, and never be safe from them?

Fuck off.

A toon killed your brother? Hmm. That might work… Let's get some details.

{Dropped a piano on his head: +200cp} said exactly that: Someone killed Sarah's brother with a piano (Or liquified them if she's a toon), causing her to distrust toons (Or humans) in general.

Better than being stalked by a sexual assailant, certainly… But aside from the obvious mental contamination, it didn't make it clear if Sarah would be inserted into someone who lost their brother, or if a person would be created JUST TO DIE for this drawback.

So no.

Damn, for a world that uses toons as a way to describe racial issues in Hollywood? Maybe Adam should have expected these Drawbacks to suck. They might not get the full 600cp at this rate.

Oh finally! {Contracted: +200cp} had you working for a big studio. Nothing else strange or unsettling! Sarah would be an actress if she was a toon, or some other job if human. She would be stuck there for 10 years though, but since Adam was leaving Sarahs behind this might be acceptable since she will certainly be there for AT LEAST that long.

And unlike that moronic Sim choice, she wouldn't be forced to relive entire weeks at a time in a fucking groundhog day scenario. MUCH more acceptable! So that was an easy +200cp.

{A Jumper's lust and a three-year-old's dinky: +100cp} SOUNDED dirty as all hell, but it would apparently just lower her visual sexual appeal level (So flatter chest and bum since she didn't have male equipment?) and she would arbitrarily have issues during 'romantic encounters'.

Sort of sexist honestly. Women don't need huge tits or ass to be attractive as hell, and sex isn't a mandate for satisfing relationships all the time either. Unless this did stuff like get you doused with water when trying or something? Like that guy who was cursed to attract water and stuff?

Leave it up to the Jumper, move on.

Oh awesome! {Alcoholic: +100cp} was more free money!

Sarah could drink all damned day, Adam could provide the good stuff, and it would still not get her tipsy. Well, not dangerously tipsy… And the Drawback couldn't realize that Adam was a free supplier, so the habit couldn't bankrupt her either. Nor would Adam let her actions hurt others by driving cars or whatever!

Good, this plus the job was basically a +300cp step upwards!

{No sense of humor: +100cp}, in a toon world, is a powerful no. Not laughing on Earth or laughing at the wrong time was awkward. Here? Potentially offensive or even make you racist or a bigot. None of that.

And the last option on this list basically added some Jojo's Bizarre Adventure flair, but gave no points… No thank you.

So +300cp easily, a tentative +400cp if Sarah wanted a temporary asexual body and to desire relationships but with possible shenanigans during relations. Not great, but maybe there would be some perks that would be worth the low scores?

Sheesh, how was it that (Depending on Sarah's choices) the horrible limitations of The Sims 3 managed to beat out Who Framed Roger Rabbit by +50cp!? That seems messed up.

Adam blinked as Sarah sent him some images of her, Shiva, her, Tifa, Cloud, Aerith, and Yuffie all racing massive dragon goddesses. And some video files.

Huh.

Well, as long as they were having fun.

Hey wait! <<SHIVA! Get back to studying!>>

=Shiva: Aw man!=
=Sarah: Ha! Busted!=
=Eve: I'm surprised you got away with it this long.=
=Aerith: {Gasp!} Are you skipping your homework!?=

Sigh. Kids.

=Adam: Not like it is a fair race anyway, Eve is literally all of your mounts.=
=Aerith: WHAT!? Sarah are you CHEATING!?=
=Sarah: Uh… No?=
=Eve: Ha!=
=Sarah: Ride like the wind, goddess of the sea!=
=Shiva: THAT is why this Sarah is constantly getting in my way!? You jerk!=
=Aerith: But… But that is cheating! That is bad! Stop it!=
=Gaia: It's alright my dear. Sarah is currently two people… Even if she comes in first that is only half of a victory.=
=Sarah: Wait, what!?=
=Shiva: Hell yes! It's mine to win now, chumps!=

Ah well… He could let them have their fun first.

Maybe he could find a way to hijack some of these stupid Drawback limitations while waiting… That stupid The Sims 3 'Only Pick Two Drawbacks' bullshit was beyond moronic!

 

[theaceoffire]

Shiva was patting Sarah's hair. "And you collected all your samples? You know Adam wanted LOTS of samples before you left."

Sigh. "Yes, Shiva."

The woman gave her a look. "Don't you give me sass! Now, just in case, you said you were going off on a trip and said bye to everyone?"

Her other self had the damned GALL to look amused by this. "Yes."

The older Sarah grinned. "She's going to be checking out Icicle Inn, a small mountain town with skiing. I get to go and fuck with Midgar!"

Shiva snapped to the snarky lady! "And WHAT, young lady, will you be doing in such a hell hole?"

A shrug. "Setting up a new church to Gaia that acts as a terminal to the Planetary Network Shopping Systems."

The Summon wasn't in the same hive mind as the girls, so the fussed over Jumper broke in. "Gaia approved merchants and clients can use some custom Materia Eve made to communicate and transport smaller goods. The church will let Aerith and her mom talk to her old friends, act as a charity drop off for outsiders who want Gaia to give them discounts, and let Elmyra provide food and clothing to the less fortunate."

The ice goddess rolled her eyes. "Adam is basically an out of context cheater from a post scarcity society, the support units he built here basically lets Eve use her excess mako to create nearly anything."

Which, fair enough, was true. Still. "I'm mostly doing it so that Monster Hojo can't kidnap more women or get away with stuff. Getting to steal free garbage and heal people and make sure the kids eat healthy is just a side benefit."

The other self just grinned. "And because we can build whatever we want in the slums and mess with Shinra's systems to cause all kinds of trouble."

True. "I'm going to be building some powerful artificial lighting and environmental controls, eventually ONLY the slums will have perfect weather since the reactors above the disk generate such thick cloud cover."

Shiva frowned… But paused. "Well, as long as it's to fuck with Hojo… Still."

She was wrapped in hugs! "Even if you will be staying, you will also be leaving."

Her other self was much more defined by now, if the hidden pinch was any sign. "Be safe out there, sister."

Damn it! She wasn't leaving, this was too much! She didn't want to cry. "Yeah. I'll be safe."

=Gaia: I don't know what is going on, but have a safe journey!=
=Eve: Bye Adam… You be safe too, alright?=
=Adam: Fine, but eventually I want to visit the afterlife. I have some complaints to make over there before I come back.=
=Eve: ...I'm sorry?=
=Sarah: Let it go, this is something we argue about sometimes.=
=Gaia: I would always welcome you, Adam.=
=Shiva: HA! If you went into the Lifestream, would you be inside {KRSHH!}=

<<Alert: Connection temporarily disrupted! Please stop embarrassing the former Administrator!>>

Heh. "We'll BOTH be safe."

[[JumpChain: Transfer.]]

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

The hug turned… Awkward.

One Sarah and the other both stared into the distance. ""I've got a harem of kinky sexy girlfriends who really, REALLY enjoy experimentation.""

Shiva flinched! "What!? You left already!?" A pause. "Wait, why don't I remember a sexy harem?"

She felt her now stable [[Summon: Shiva]] Materia in the underground mako chamber Adam constructed pulse as it connected to Eve.

=Eve: Adam said you are a new person, so you have a different hive mind to construct.=
=Shiva: So I don't get hot sexy harem memories!? What a scam!=
=Gaia: Can't you just ask Sarah for some of hers?=
=Sarah: Wow. Sorry, I'm still recovering… And uh. Yeah. Elizabeth would LOVE for you to watch these. {Is_There_A_Rating_Above_NC17.data}=
=Sarah: She'll probably want to watch it again with all of us once we can visit, too. And I KNOW she hasn't stopped film production, and that was BEFORE I found out I leave sexy clones behind me when I travel.=
=Gaia: {Blush!} Oh my…=
=Eve: Film production, you say? Adam did help me discover how to convert my dragon avatars into my more humanoid form…=
=Shiva: Those two are still having sex under Mushroom Island, aren't they?=
=Eve: {Blush} No comment.=
=Sarah: Wait, hasn't it been over a month!? I know Shiva kept skiving off her lessons for SOMETHING!=
=Eve: I SAID NO COMMENT!=

Sarah smirked!

Ha! 'Shiva needs more time and training to be ready for our trip' my foot!

Oh right, she couldn't rat out her summon to Adam till they got back. Damn it.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah blinked in the Warehouse. "I've got a harem of kinky sexy girlfriends who really, REALLY enjoy experimentation. Holy shit."

Adam chuckled. <<Go rearrange your stuff and make sure your room is how you like it, and we can get to work on the next Jumpchain Documents.>> He frowned. <<It's going to be frustrating this time, by the way.>>

The woman wasn't really paying attention. "Damn, those bodies. And yeah, all of her are going to LOVE Shiva, no doubt! Damn."

Adam paused. <<Sarah?>>

She blinked. "Wait, I got high definition video in my room of ALL the sexy times, right!?"

Ah. <<Yeah. Can even access your recorded memories from the last Jump and save clips and stuff for later.>>

Her grin was epic. "I'll be in my bunk."

Adam watched her nearly skip out of the main Warehouse chamber.

Checking the systems, well… They had time. And since he wasn't a greedy Benefactor and he couldn't earn extra choice points while on Jumps like the theoretical others could, there was no reason to rush his Jumper and force her to instantly arrive from choice to choice.

Though he DID mute her bedroom for politeness sake, if nothing else.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

A MUCH more relaxed Jumper sat in her throne. "You know Adam, it was both frustrating and freeing not remembering the past."

Adam was examining the Documents. <<Hmm?>>

She waved at the floating screens. "I KNEW there were things I should know but couldn't… But I also felt free. Everything was possible, no constraints or restrictions… Anything I wanted to do I could do and I knew that if it was something I would object to after getting my thoughts back you would warn me."

She felt him grin. <<Yeah, well, trust is a beautiful thing.>> The grin faded. <<However, these three options are going to be rough this time.>>

Her own frown agreed. "Yeah."

Rick and Morty: 600cp, built from her picking {Wanted Man: +200cp}, {Parasites: +200cp}, {Alcoholic: +100cp} and {Principle Vagina: +100cp}. Adam would ensure any memory editing would not only fail to cause long term problems… But stand out even MORE obviously than if they just were random liars trying to trick her.

As for being hunted by a galactic power? Well, teleportation and extra-Jump safety made that trivial to avoid if desired and her other abilities made retaliation a snap.

Plus, that Jump had the ability to support psionic fields, if not magic. So all her plasmids and tonics were fair game, even if the materia options were out… Sort of.

She could cast all her spells on herself or at close range, as her own personal 'self' field allowed her skills to work easily enough, but no big magic or using magic to enhance stuff on that jump. Anyway, she was going to funnel all magical energy into psionic power during that Jump if she went anyway just to avoid strange problems.

The Sims 3: 350cp only, from {Where's Bella?: +200cp} and {Burglarized: +150cp}. Adam wasn't able to allow her more than two drawbacks, said something about the unstructured nature of the Jump made it HARD to extract universal data from it or something.

Social problems from being accused of kidnapping (Or undetected murder)? Having junk in her house stolen? Meh! But the lack of points though. Sheesh!

And finally!

Who Framed Roger Rabbit: 300cp for {Contracted: +200cp} and {Alcoholic: +100cp}, with a potential {A Jumper's lust and a three-year-old's dinky: +100cp} boosting it up to 400cp.

Because that Jump needed some DAMNED good benefits if only 100cp was worth getting harassed during Shiva cuddle times. They hadn't progressed to sexy times or anything, but after having a copy of herself and a sexy ice goddess to hug the nights away? Not going back to lonely evenings, thank you.

Anyway, onwards! "Let's start with the Rick and Morty options."

Adam began showing data. <<Here you go! Also, have some {background.data}>>

Hmm. A grandfather and grandson meandering around doing whatever the hell they want, for whatever reasons they want, whenever and however they desire. Lots of wiggle room, at least.

Strangely, all four background options were basically free, unless she wanted to pay -50cp to change gender to male. "Why are these so cheap? Like, that Teen Titan's Jump had an option that cost something like -1000cp alone, right?"

Adam showed more screens. <<The drawbacks were fairly reasonable and gave good value too. I think that the chaotic nature of that Jump handles degradation better than the other two options… After all, if you put stress on sand and it just squishes, it doesn't crack as easily.>>

Hmm. Well, let's check the loot options then!

Drop-In gave no background, of course. Let's see… Make your followers stay loyal as long as you don't treat them like shit? Useful. Won't work on people with powerful moral stances against yours though, so devils would leave a saint and angels would leave a demon kind of thing. Still useful, but not high priority.

Nearly supernaturally good business skills, not worth it. Ability to curse stuff with ironic problems? Wouldn't work in every Jump and could become an issue at some point, so no. Enchantments? Huh, it sounded like magic… But according to Adam it was more psionic magic than potential magic.

A cheat code when it works, worthless otherwise… And would cost -300cp after discount. A weak 'maybe' option.

Alien background would start her off at a party of Rick's, and even allow her to both be known to the family AND be on one of the mad scientist's good sides! That was nearly a bonus all on its own, really. And it had some POWERFUL options.

A mild master effect that would ensure people ignore how odd she was OR accept it. Obscene strength (Which would stack well with her Bad Ass perk), not that it was needed. Adam could probably scan any interesting creatures or people and make her something like that anyway for free, so not too tempting.

The ability to brainwash a planet? Nah. Power to implant (happy) memories of yourself into others to convince them you are their best friend? Didn't really need that either. Could really be abused too, especially if she wasn't careful…

The Morty background option had superpowered therapy for free (Holy crap!), stealth against any sensors… Not invisibility exactly, more a 'not interesting' or 'not target' field it seemed. Slightly different from a Someone Else's Problem field which was more well known, but useful damn near anywhere! Very tempting.

An ability to make people around you begin to act most optimally caught her attention. They wouldn't suddenly and magically be able to do anything desired, but instead perform to the theoretical limit of their abilities when physically at an optimum state... ALL of which was questionable.

Sarah and Adam BOTH felt that it was likely forcing targets to use up their theoretical potential or something to power it, and so for now it was off the table. Best not to risk it.

And finally for the Morty background, another psionic effect: She could make herself ANYONE'S sidekick easily. Basically another 'master this person to trust me' power. There were a disturbingly large number of those on this Document, really.

As for the local mad scientist options? The first seemed QUITE useful! It was the ability to mentally lock on any goal or target, to focus on a plan and shove any other energies, issues, and emotions towards that objective rather than getting distracted or falling into depression or self recrimination or something.

Stuck in a time loop for a thousand years? Now Sarah could spend that time training without getting bored or insane or frustrated. VERY tempting!

That it would let her focus on sexy times with infinite girlfriends without issue in the future was so totally NOT a factor. Thank you very much, snickering crystal skull on HER wall!

Other options include being a savant at making robots, a god at biological modification and species enhancement, and a straight up intelligence boost… The last of which was a no, since Adam thought it was best to avoid these kinds of powers, based on how crappy some of the other skills were before he fixed them up.

After that? Lots of random stuff really.

Most of them are trollish. Being able to say stupid things without people calling you out on it, keeping people from invading your personal space, writing pop songs… Strange stuff really.

Right, so uh. Avoid anything that seems to mentally influence others. Not only could that get out of hand, but it would only work in Jumps with psionic field support being possible… Not a good long term investment.

First! The Rick background had the most expensive and USEFUL junk in this mess. So that would be the background if she went with it.

To avoid problems, she would be one of the female Rick versions and CERTAINLY one of the independent ones, as the Council of Ricks were a mess to avoid at all costs. She would be… Uh. "Adam?"

He felt the data. <<You would be a grandmother, 77 years old. Your perks would negate the constant hangovers, and that should be enough. Though I will INSIST you get better quality drinks for your stay.>>

Heh. "So if I go that route, I'd have to take care of the family too."

Adam showed some data. <<Maybe more than one. Many Ricks don't treasure their relationships like they should… And I assume we wouldn't accept the bullshit where they clone replacements and mentally torture memories back into the bodies.>>

Her grin fell. Yeah, no. Fuck all that. "So free benefit: we'd have some innate abilities. Free downside? Need to protect a lot of people from other versions of ourselves."

Let's get this over with.

{Focus on Science: -100cp, Rick 0cp}, to redirect any energies on a current project. {Robotics: -200cp, Rick -100cp} for advanced mechanical construction skills and robotic programming databases. Should go well with her Inventor background from Bioshock. {Mad Geneticist: -400cp, Rick -200cp} to enhance her ability to fix people even without Plasmids and magic.

That would leave her enough to snag {Hidden Wavelength: -200cp, Morty -100cp} for -200cp and still have 100cp left to spend!

Hmm. "What's this about the portal gun?"

Adam sighed. <<You will have access to it during the Jump, but it isn't worth trying to get it working everywhere afterwards. Not only is it stupid expensive at -600cp if you try and get the upgraded version, but I don't think your Warehouse could utilize it without finding new stuff to break. Use it while you are there if we go, don't bother otherwise.>>

Fair enough. Free goggles to view other versions of herself? No. Her life was likely the ONLY positive outcome of her own situation, she didn't need to know how many people weren't saved by Adam. Oh, but {Interdimensional Cable: This OR Interdimensional Goggles for 0cp, -100cp} would let her get TV! Fuck yeah!

It would be limited to TV from other versions of the current Jump, but that was far less depressing than the alternative. Score!

Adam chuckled. <<Don't pick a Jump based on free TV please.>>

Sigh. FINE, be like that.

Most of the items were in the 'Neat, but not needed' category, but the immortal clone option that was discounted was a no go. "If I can't bring even Shiva with me without summoning her new bodies, I probably can't have the multiple aged clones with us for me to use as needed either, right?"

Adam sent confirmation. <<Best case scenario, lots of unexpected sisters. Worst case, infinite death for infinite sisters. Don't pick it. Avoid the box that spawns 'temporary' creatures for servitude too, same reason.>>

God, what a nightmare. "Yeah, no shit. Sheesh."

Fuck you kidnapper for breaking her shit! Also, fuck you Hojo on general principle.

Right, where was she? "I guess I'd go with the infinite flavor ice cream machine or the 'most powerful energy source' recipe that can be made out of fairly low quality components. Right, moving on!"

Because yeah, she could theoretically pick LESS than her max caps and toss out some drawbacks, but why bother? The suggestions Adam made were easy enough to live with.

Next!

The Sims 3, with a 350cp limit! What we got?

Starting town would be Bridgeport, changing it would cost -100cp, and Sarah didn't care enough to waste money doing so. She would start as… Huh!?

Oh, her Origin was ALSO die restricted. Marvelous.

Come on! No whammies! And... She would come out as a 'Young Adult'.

Did Adam actually roll anything or was she just lucky? Well whatever, not worth -100cp to change it AND she avoided Baby, Toddler, Child, AND Teenager! Take what victories she could get. Going with Migrant too, as it was basically the 'Drop-in' option and she had NO points to waste.

As a Migrant, she could pay -200cp to be a Ghost or Alien… Alien gets magic or something similar to it, Ghost gets near immortality and object phasing, huh. Or she could go back and spend -200cp to be Occult instead of Migrant and get one of these backgrounds for free! Holy shit.

Skills? Spend money (-200cp) to be a Townie and get one free and the rest half off… And some of these were tempting. But if she spent that -200cp, realistically she'd only get ONE other skill ANYWAY.

And Skills seemed more valuable than a cool species. They'd work in any situation, any Jump, forever… Yeah. Let's spend the -200cp for Townie, snag {Handy: -200cp, Alien -100cp, Townie 0cp} and {Natural Cook: -200cp, Townie -100cp}. Handy would let Sarah not just repair stuff but upgrade them (Basically a super power all on its own), while Natural Cook would ensure she would never fail at cooking.

This was important. The other skills would let her learn faster or whatever, but these two were much harder to accomplish on her own: Straight up improvement of something through unknown means and never failing in cooking related arts through her own actions. Sure the recipes may be wrong and the quality of the materials could be bad, but she would still prepare it the best way possible even if the end result was horrible.

Compared to catching more fish of higher quality and exercising more efficiently, those two were just better. And Adam had already cautioned her to avoid the mental modification skills when possible, so Genius and Eccentric were both out.

Plus uh. Cooking awesome food was fun, gave direct rewards when done well, and could be easily shared with friends and family. So yeah.

Plus, being a Townie had some bonus points under Perks. She could get a basic, entry level job anywhere period (Adam wasn't sure this would work as expected, but free was free!), and… And.

Uh.

Nothing else was affordable. She would only have 50cp to spend at this point, and she didn't want to lose either of the two Skills she picked.

Sheesh, this was half the reason she wanted to avoid this Jump! No damned money!

Oh wait. There was {Motherload: -100cp, Townie -50cp} which would dump a one time cash pile of 50,000 Simoleons in her pockets. Which meant nothing to Sarah. Was that enough to buy a house? A sandwich? Not that it mattered, Adam could practically print material goods. And it didn't restock per Jump… But it was better than wasting the points entirely.

Sarah sighed. "Sorry Adam. Some of the skills and stuff look great, but I am really not loving the tight budget on that option."

Adam hummed. <<I'm just glad it had SOMETHING you were interested in. That reality choice seemed unstable as hell anyway, I was worried your only available choices would be stupid stuff like a -200cp pair of shoes or something.>>

Didn't Bioshock offer her some equipment she never bothered to actually use? "Fair enough. Last one!"

Who Framed Roger Rabbit, with only 300cp to spend. Because fuck the sexist cock blocking option, an extra +100cp was not worth it!

Free Drop-In Human or Detective, -300cp to be a Drop-In Toon or existing Toon. And the Toons in this universe were nearly conceptual Avatars, literal embodiments of humor, that can only be harmed by a chemical that attacks the nature of their existence.

Normal acid? Meh. Spikes? Ha! Being a Toon was basically immortality and free power if you entertain others. And that entertainment can be more than just laughter like in that movie, Sarah had memories of Anime as well where the format was simply a cheaper method to show impossible futures and such… Even some later cartoons in America where serious topics were covered.

Still, a chance to see Bugs Bunny and Mickey Mouse? In one Jump? It was honestly tempting on a fangirl level. Those two realities were vigorous rivals, normally one couldn't show up without the other specifically to prevent chaos as they got into arguments.

Pointless and silly arguments, of course. They WERE Toons, after all.

Oh, and she could be the bad guy. Or a bad girl in this case. Pass.

Hmm… She wouldn't get ALL the Toon benefits. As a visitor, not a Jump native, she couldn't alter all of reality for conceptual humor like the locals… But durability, strength, hammer space, yadda yadda yadda? That was fine.

Seriously though, one choice would kill all other purchases… And if she DIDN'T go Toon, what would be a better option? Maybe {Acme's Arts: -600cp, Drop-In -300cp}, that would let her make toon props.

Several others had mental effects… Forcing people to look the other way, or give jobs, or… Sigh.

She had been DAMNED lucky Bioshock was her first Jump. Here, have teleportation! No, it doesn't mind whammy everyone else into pausing while you walk away, it actually fucking moves you from place to place!

No wonder other Jumpers go odd, half these damn choices started warping the people near them and most don't even make that an obvious side effect! If Adam wasn't double checking, she might be grabbing powers that only worked in environments like that one, or that would slowly corrupt her loved ones, or that would turn people around her into puppets and slaves!

Adam hummed. <<So? You decided?>>

Sarah slumped. "I'll be honest, it's hard to even look at these options now that I know some of the crazy stuff that happens in the Rick and Morty Jump."

Ironically, if she WAS the sort of person who would walk away from a theoretical family in danger to avoid personal complications, she would fit in BETTER as a Rick insert.

Fine. Let's go for a risky place that seems almost desperate to entice a Jumper to visit.

Sarah sighed. First, the identity, which Adam was already updating:

{Rick: 0cp} [You wake up on a military bed in a Spartan room in your daughter's house. To your left is a wall covered by pictures, formulas, and diagrams linked by string. You no longer entirely remember the nature of these connections. You are an independent Rick. You have chosen to be mostly Human. You wake up with a hangover, a lot of bad memories, a foul taste in your mouth and drool on your pillow. You are 77 years old.]

Next? Perks. And a 600cp budget.

{Hidden Wavelength: -200cp, Morty -100cp} [You only show up on sensors when you choose to, and you find that you can easily masquerade as an innocuous and ordinary woman while under even the most intense scrutiny despite your physical features resembling Richard D. "Rick" Sanchez the III of the infamous Ricks.]

{Focus on Science: -100cp, Rick 0cp} [You are capable of redirecting your energies to useful endeavors. You are the master of your rage, excitement, and a libido… And can use them to fuel and expedite your plans, particularly those of a scientific nature.]

{Robotics: -200cp, Rick -100cp} [You have spectacular ability in the fields of engineering and most notably robotics. You find that making a robot to pass the butter at the breakfast table as a viable alternative to getting up.]

{Mad Geneticist: -400cp, Rick -200cp} [Sometimes science is more art than science and you find that this is doubly true when it comes to genetics. When you have a vague idea of the attributes you want to impart from a species, you find them remarkably easy to splice into a different subject entirely. It won't even backfire that often! Probably. Be careful.]

Well that was -500cp gone, 100cp left to spend!

Let's grab the stuff from Items.

{Portal Gun: 0cp, Upgrade -600cp} [You have come into the possession of a gun allowing you free travel throughout the multiverse yet restricted to the Central Finite Curve, the collection of multiverse dimensions with working ecosystems and, theoretically, where the one designated as 'Rick' is the smartest person in existence. It may have also been formed to allow the 'Rickest Rick' an easier time hunting down the version of himself that killed his wife and daughter. The Upgrade is not purchasable due to Warehouse Damage.]

{Interdimensional Cable: This OR Interdimensional Goggles for 0cp, -100cp} [A receiver that you can attach to any monitor (Adam: I got this.) that allows you to watch the television from parallel universes related to the current Jump. TV from other dimensions has a somewhat looser feel to it. Either this or Interdimensional Goggles can be selected for free.]

And… She hesitated.

{Concentrated Dark Matter: -100cp} [The recipe to concentrate dark matter, the most powerful fuel in the universe. You can create it out of reasonably common components.]

{Ice Cream Machine: -100cp} [An ice cream machine that produces a truly vast amount of flavors of the highest quality ice cream in the multiverse. Including flavors normally not consumed by humanity, such as 'Worms' which is extremely popular with some bird and spider related species.]

Sarah knew, she KNEW... That Adam wouldn't care which she chose.

But she also knew that one of these was theoretically more valuable than the other. Adam already made all kinds of food for free, and could now easily set up manual or automatic farms and ranches for creatures of all types, normal, magical, psionic, at any time.

So she SHOULD grab the awesome energy recipe. Probably. Like a responsible adult.

Adam laughed! <<Like I care about that mess! Don't forget, not only did the local Ricks CREATE that recipe, it isn't even considered important to them! They don't use it as fuel, or for trade, or basically anything! Find one willing to let us scan some really illegal shit for duplication and we can snag that thing for no effort. On the other hand…>>

Sarah couldn't help but grin as she chose {Ice Cream Machine: -100cp}. "On the other hand, this machine offers impossible options?"

He grinned! <<Hopefully more stuff for me to study and use to fix your Warehouse more. Hell, I wouldn't be shocked if that stupid device offers Concentrated Dark Matter swirly cones!>>

They giggled between realities as Adam directed them to an impossible mess of a place for potentially unimportant reasons. Well, unimportant to most people.

At least they would have butter pecan and scotch ice cream cones when they got there!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Eve growled! "What do you MEAN you can't fix my horns!?"

Sarah winced. "Uh. Of course we can! Shiva's stepping up while Adam is away." <Shiva! Help!>

Shiva was checking the units in her 'Planetary Network Control Hub.' <<I got this! Hang on!>>

These were the units that were supposed to help with Avatar issues, right!? Those other ones for dragon units were completely unrelated, and she probably shouldn't have pulled a few of those levers either.

<<Automated Reply: I'm sorry; the Summon you are attempting to alter is saturated in raw Chaos, and is temporally ascending to a higher level of existence. For local temporal and spatial stability, modification of any related Avatars is not in service at this time. Please allow existing Chaos energies to stabilize before attempting to proceed. This is a recording.>>

Oh come on! "You damn robot, I've got seven angry dragon goddesses with GOLD HORNS! I need to fix this!"

<<Automated Reply: I'm sorry; the Summon Avatars you are attempting to alter cosmetically are saturated in raw Chaos, and temporally ascending to higher levels of existence. For local temporal and spatial stability, modification of any related Avatars is not in service at this time. Please allow existing Chaos energies to stabilize before attempting to proceed. This is a recording.>>

Fuck! <<I'm working on it Sarah, try and keep her calm!>>

Sarah, bless her heart, was on the ball. "Why are you bothered anyway Eve? Gold looks fabulous on you!"

The dragon's eyes glowed! "Because I can FEEL THEM HAVING SEX!"

Fuck. "Fuck." <Fuck.>

This was getting deadly! Shiva snapped at the nearest hardware. "Listen here you stupid bucket of bolts! If you want us to survive this then tell me how to fix the situation!"

<<Automated Reply: Fucking finally! I'm required to answer you based on your demands and you trying random shit and pushing pretty buttons isn't helping ANYONE! Now activate isolation units 103-b and 105-a and we can get this fucking bullshit over with. This is a recording.>>

...Uh. "What?"

<<Automated Reply: Please activate isolation units 103-b and 105-a to restrict Mushroom Island's Healing Chamber from the Planetary Network and Emotional Response Grid. This is a recording.>>

Shiva blinked at the strange collection of mako crystals and hardware that Adam had installed. "Are… Are you alive?"

<<Automated Reply: This is a recording.>>

Huh.

Sarah yelled! <SHIVA! I do NOT want to be squished!>

Oh, right. <<Found the problem!>> Sort of.

Now where the hell were isolation units 103-b and 105-a!?

 

[theaceoffire]

'Rick' Sanchez woke up on her military styled bed… Still alive.

So it hadn't happened yet.

Another pull from her flask, another sip of some horrible concoction that SHOULD be high quality alcohol from his… her… favorite dimension. Most of the time a blended scotch and Drambuie served by that orange species that religiously worships fine beverages.

But this wasn't. It couldn't be.

No, this was medicinal in a much more literal sense than she was used to. Something to stabilize her decaying genetics, to keep the low quality subdermal equipment from causing infections, and, if she was lucky, blunt the embedded instincts that were attempting to control her.

With a weary sigh, she rose and dressed for the day. A recreated white lab coat, a turquoise undershirt underneath it. Some brown pants, a dark brown belt with a yellow buckle, and black shoes.

Woman or not, she could wear pants if she wanted to. She was the Rickest Rick!

Wait. No!

Another deep sip helped push back the programming.

Shit. Today was going to be rough. Again.

With a repressed groan she got back to work in her lab under her daughter's garage.

Well, not 'her' lab, or daughter, or… Focus.

At least she had a chance. A boost above all other Ricks out there.

She at least KNEW this was an Asimov's Cascade.

This particular one was caused by a drunken night when he, the primary Rick of this dimension, had fallen into a drunken stupor and grew terrified that his most recent version of his family would get hurt.

So, like all bad decisions made while drunk, he made things worse.

A cloned decoy family. One meant to be as similar to his loved ones as possible, with some restrictions. Commands to ignore each other, to go nearly no where, to not own, use, or build a portal gun or device, and most importantly: To not make more than one clone duplicate family of their own.

It was that last step where things went wrong.

His drunken self had a typo. A small error of design. He had allowed them to replace decoy families if they should be compromised… AND it was very difficult to overcome the commands preventing travel. To verify, or clean up messes.

Which meant that if something set off a decoy family, even if it was survivable, the owners of that group would start making a new batch.

It also meant that all the well made clones were limited to making one decoy family with minor issues (They WERE drunk when this idea seemed reasonable), while the corrupted decoy families could make as many sub-families as they desired. With even MORE issues.

Normally, their innate denial and belief that they were literally the Rickest Rick and all others were beneath them… It would reinforce itself AND the lies.

Oh, I am made of cancerous skin? Must have come from a dimension like that. Those DO exist out there. Like one where everyone is a muppet, or a doll, or squirrels, and so on and so forth.

But almost none of the realities have him as a her. Those dimensions don't get added to the Central Finite Curve, and not for sexist reasons… But because the murderer of her family had been male. And this entire cluster of realities was constructed to FIND that bastard, and adding in other gender versions of himself would just make finding the target harder.

Not that it mattered in the end. Who knew, maybe the self that had killed his love and little one had died from someone else for some other reason somewhere.

Point was, she knew she was an aberration even BEFORE she saw the mutated clone forming her and attempting to perfect his creation despite everyone's lack of equipment, lack of tools, and lack of time.

The Rick that made her died before he could finish the other clones. And the clones of her family, despite also having opposite genders, were not even stable enough to activate the full memory override protocols either.

Still, she was locked in this house.

Alone.

Unable to access her tools, not allowed to examine or fix her own body, no travel outside this dimension to ensure valid targets (Wouldn't be a decoy otherwise!), and a massive amount of other, near arbitrary restrictions on top to just finish this bitch of a situation.

No. Calm.

She took another gulp of her medicine. Because altering her drinks was considered 'normal behavior' and thus allowed, it had managed to keep her mostly stable for days now instead of hours.

She would overcome this.

She might not be an original Rick, but those varied so widely that it was insane. Some smarter, some handicaped, some idiot savants, endless. But unlike them, unlike her other decoys?

She knew she was damaged. She knew she was lacking memories, skills.

She knew there was an impossible problem…

And Richard D. Sanchez the III did impossible things every day. Female insane sick clone or not. Because she was the Rickest Rick!

She SLAMMED her head on the desk. Thankfully a clear spot this time.

No. Because she was… someone else. A name that wasn't Rick.

Her mind went back decades ago to Diane helping suggest all those cute boy and girl names, when little Beth was still beaming with happiness and talking about her missing tooth and they had considered trying for another little boy or girl…

Thankfully one set of memories every decoy family treasured enough to not damage or fragment, unlike the REST of her damned mind!

No. Focus.

Tears later.

Rachel? No. Ruby? No. Ricky? She was the Rickest Rick!

FUCK!

NO.

Avoid ALL the names with 'R', it was too easy for the conditioning to lock back in, as terrible as the quality had been. After all, it HAD been made by a Rick and we were more than capable of getting results far better than normally possible.

Move up a letter.

Siccky. No. Salvantaz. No. Saroonda. No. Saram… Closer?

Sarah. A vague memory of that being a potential name if little Beth had a twin.

She certainly did NOT look down at the hidden cloning chamber with the decaying clones of her loved ones. But even so, it was hard to stay focused.

Right. Sarah D. Sanchez the first, the Sarahest Sarah.

Now she just had to fix her body, fix her mind, and escape this damned dimension entirely. ALL the decoy clones were not only badly designed and controlled here, but almost any action to help the others would set off the failsafes.

Mind wipes, assassination missions, suicides, murder sprees, and so on and so forth… Leading up to the big stuff like planet cracking and worse.

And she had to do this without tools. Without permission to improve herself or her equipment. Without full memories or skills. Without a proper working body or mind. Without any emotional support. Without hardware. Or software. Or damned drugs to wait until her actual death, which was more tempting than she really wanted to admit to herself…

Of course, PART of that was due to the clone decoy programming trying to get her to purge herself, it wasn't JUST the years of depression and the horrible situation and the hopelessness.

She took another gulp of the burning liquid trying to keep her organs functioning. This batch wouldn't be effective in another three hours.

But she could work with this.

Half way through another attempt at making a component substitution fabricator, something very basic used way back when he… She was first developing her first portal gun... An alert came in on her sensors.

A fucking decoy family had triggered the failsafes.

The murder chaos was going to kickstart in… Around four hours or so? No, three. This family had discovered another one somehow and the dimensional alerting system she (And likely a lot of OTHER clones, knowingly or not) had hacked into was directing other families to wipe them out.

Which would alert the decoys about other decoys, and this whole house of cards was about to crash down HARD. Shit.

Idly she checked the log.

Jerry. Of course a fucking Jerry would somehow manage to slip his restraints, find ANOTHER Jerry that slipped HIS restraints, and then whine about someone else stealing his look to his OWN family without any fear or hesitation. Rick damn it.

Sure, no man was good enough for his Beth. Her Beth. But seriously, if it wasn't for Jerry's genetic quirk making her little grand-Morty able to deflect dangers to his families, most Ricks would have done horrible things to the moron. Well, more horrible.

Seriously, half the reasons those two got together wasn't even the damned Ricks manipulating the stupid match, it was little Beth being vindictive and rebelling because of what a shit parent he was. She was.

No, not her! SHE was new! Memories or not, SHE wouldn't treat her little girl like that.

Fuck.

Her hands slipped off the equipment. Another Jerry had set off ANOTHER cascade issue on a different continent three minutes ago. Her two hour forty-four minute window to fix something just dropped down to twelve fucking minutes.

Could… Could she just steal a few Beths? Morties were manipulated and cloned most often out of all his alternate family members, trying to help or save them was beyond her skills even in the BEST of circumstances, but MOST of the time Beth rarely got cloned. At least in comparison.

A spike of agony hit her lungs.

Ah. No. She wouldn't live long enough to disable the suicide protocols in any of them at this point, even if she somehow made this body function, overcame the commands, separated one of her little girls from the other decoys, AND she was cooperative.

She couldn't convince her girl to abandon her family, real or not. And she shouldn't… Because doing so would make her a bad Dad. Mom. Parent.

And it was a moot point anyway, because even more issues had just thrown out what little time she had left.

The lowest level of decoy correction protocols had just activated. As it failed to fix the issue, the involved clones would all become more and more erratic and illogical, until mass suicide and blind rage were the only options left for any involved survivors.

Was the starting Rick of this madhouse even IN this dimension!? Or had he died long ago and a decoy had ended up starting this mess automatically?

Didn't matter.

If she had a second chance, she would have… Well, no. This dimension was basically dead now.

One of the Ricks would set off one of the many unstoppable collapsing entropy devices before they died. Because stopping us from fixing ourselves was 'fine' and 'reasonable', but letting us make doomsday weapons was 'expected behavior'. For fuck's sake.

Sarah sighed as she leaned back in her chair.

Should she run? Where to? Her programming made it nearly impossible to escape the other decoy families. It was on purpose, and attempting to run made you MORE predictable to the execution protocols.

Staying still wasn't really an option either. She didn't have a decoy family, and eventually when the violence died down and this stupid mess started AGAIN with whoever lived… Well, the cleanup protocols would end her. Even if it ignored the gender issue.

A bloody cough had her sip the medication again… Ah. The chemical substitutes had degraded faster than expected… This wouldn't actually help her recover anymore.

Shit.

Was it worth ignoring the oncoming storm to fight this pain and make another stopgap medication? It would have to be nearly exponentially more powerful, as anything powerful enough to keep her operational at this stage would start to cause many additional issues.

By the time she would get a dose together that was safe to consume, she would have… about seven minutes between sips? Based on the damage taken while getting it all set up? And of course, assuming she lived long enough to finish any of the components to get going.

Carefully, mindful of her cancerous bones and twisted tissue, she relaxed her body onto the work bench, pushing the cobbled equipment aside.

Sometimes, it was hard to get things done.

Sarah D. Sanchez the First gave a worn out sigh.

And stiffened.

Her mind pulsed!

Years of self reflection and meditation and self control allowed her to feel her body seem to lock down, her mind carefully and tenderly being scanned. Recorded. Memories that even with her skill had faded with poor insertion and improper cloning equipment became refined, then splintered as theoretical issues and potential alterations were suggested, calculated, extrapolated, and added to the mess.

And as her mind was being examined like a late night research paper, she could feel her body being scanned as well. On levels beyond basic science, up near the psionic limits that she had explored to help establish portal technology to begin with!

Even unable to change or alter, she could feel her systems attempt to pulse with hope and fascination as she was altered. Expanded. Enhanced.

More and more minds. Entire pointers to her existing framework, used to enhance individual skills or topics or research.

Her body was being shifted. Dead flesh and cancerous growths were being ejected into nothingness along with the fragile and broken mechanical enhancements that mentally disturbed Rick had insisted were needed to be a 'Rickest Rick'.

And somehow she was… melding. Merging? Separate but whole. Not overwritten, but granted access to old memories, impossible places… And a version of herself that never existed and COULDN'T exist!

Even as she felt an incoming cleansing team via the dimensional alerting system, one set to destroy this copy of her loved one's home, she couldn't hold back a grin. "Adam?"

<<Hey Sarah. Come to the Warehouse, let's get you fixed up.>>

Her Boss was the best Boss! "Wubba Lubba Dub-Dub baby! Let's do this!"

Adam grinned as she froze. <<Hmm?>>

She glared at nothing. "Shut up, it's super cool and everyone likes it. Now get out of my way and let me rip my body apart, fill it with Tonics and serums and stuff, and then we can head off to somewhere with GOOD materials and technology to steal. I am NOT basing any of our 'Research' using THIS pile of trash."

As the explosions began to burn the neighborhood (Mostly more decoy families, how bad WAS this dimension!?), she…

Step.

...Moved to the Warehouse. "Eugh, I can't believe how many fractured and conflicting mental commands were forcing me to act like that!"

The wall skull hummed. <<Emotional?>>

She waved it off as she began [[Harvesting]] large sections of her body, using a healing pod and some easily constructed tools to begin examining her surviving cells for the most healthy and least damaged dna fragments. "No, the lack of critical thinking. I think the bastard Rick that set up this dimension had set up some blocks preventing us from feeling emotionally allowed to LEAVE this place, even if we COULD overcome all the blocks."

As tempting as it would be to use advanced magical, psionic, or technical tools to improve this new body, Sarah wanted a baseline form with the highest potential to start working from. A clean base, in other words. "Now that I can fully access all the data injected into my cloned form, AND with permission to critically EXAMINE that data, a LOT of us 'clones' were way too far off base for a single Asimov's Cascade Cycle."

Baseline human form it may be, but some of these damaged and mutated cells had some USEFUL genetic effects, if some of this dross was cleared away. Sort of like she had mutated a billion samples of herself, which was important because her actual sample size was limited. "No, I think that over time all people in this Dimension were created by one decoy batch or another. That NONE of these people, Ricks or not, are without mental commands and restrictions."

Stronger organs, especially the liver. Even without her modifications and hardware, this new 'baseline' baby would let her outdrink a Skarlog easily! Thank YOU, massive amounts of mutative cancer and clone damage. "How long till this body destabilizes?"

The skull winced. <<Thanks to 'Bad Ass', you could go on for a damned long time… But the best and optimized version of your current form IS the current form. It is literally on the edge of fragmentation WITH our help.>>

Right, so best do this right. Hmm. "I'm going to make sure I'm 77 again in this new form. Sort of. My clone body was somewhere between twenty and thirty hours or so, and my memories are much longer than that… And I think our Sarah Killgrave Avatar is older than that, but she LOOKED younger."

Adam hummed. <<You can make your form sort of LOOK like a theoretical 77 year old grandmother, but it would be one that was supernaturally healthy, had years of enhanced health and… Well, basically aside from your hair color you'd still be attractive to a very wide range of people.>>

Sigh. Diane would have found this hilarious. And she would have LOVED Elizabeths and Shiva, unlike some of her other 'conquests' the male Rick had gone through in his years of depression.

That said, she was finding some disturbing parallels. "Huh. My male half ALSO dated a hive mind. And a planet. Though he was more of an ass in those relationships than we are in ours."

Adam hummed. <<You'd think a man able to go anywhere and do anything would be more open to multiple partners rather than getting a vast majority of existence angry at his actions.>>

Meh. "Pretty sure a lot of our past shit as Rick was attempts to either find and kill the asshole who took our loved ones away or suicide attempts that failed because we were too powerful. There is a reason why the Council of Ricks barely cares when a Rick dies."

Good. "Got my new form set up. Inject her with 'Enhance Self' Tonic and some healing boosters, nothing else… And then, when stable, drop her in a Gaia environment copy to degrade the psionics away and scan it for my new baseline."

Bone white hair, like usual. Silver eyes, because that seems linked to her form somehow. WAY more muscles than expected, although they weren't bulky. And the density was a bit high for a standard human… Meh, more power to work with. "Where is my portal gun? Oh, never mind, it's already in inventory."

Ignoring the grinning Benefactor behind her, she easily set up some work tables, sensors, vices, chemical furnaces and fabricators… Each step she easily manipulated the interfaces to carefully design and then summon equipment and parts and chemicals for the next stage.

Oops, nearly blew her arm off again. Watch it Sarah, no need for messy mistakes. "Please duplicate the existing reality in this lab Adam. I need some Jump constants set up to get my equipment operating long enough to make some unstable materials and a few catalysts."

She certainly wasn't going to use the STANDARD portal gun. Thing was made by her drunk and lazy self and barely maintained, if he died while using it he would only be mildly annoyed thanks to Operation Phoenix which would just give him new clone sleeves to rebuild his setups.

For the 'smartest man', he certainly made a ton of ways to survive despite wanting to die. And refused to acknowledge the situation.

Point was, SHE was going to improve this sucker. Not even hard, the original version was far less stable and had some scrap material used to make the bitch.

As her future body stabilized and prepared for her transfer (Moving to a new Avatar was trivial without mental conditioning), she made a few alterations to the default portal device.

Radiation converters, used to keep the portal fluid from causing damage to her, travelers through the portals, or the device itself. The energy collected from the dimensional shifts would then be used to shield both the materials AND direct the outputs.

Remote dimensional sheer. No more needing direct access from the instability source and a surface, instead the additional power from the converters would let her first portal the sheer apertures INTO unexistence first, then OUT into reality.

Enhanced Psionic interfacing. Before, Rick had used basic mental connection to allow the user to innately target locations or places without additional commands or safety restrictions. Made it easier to travel when drunk, for one thing. Now it would properly connect with Sarah instead of 'Anyone touching the damned thing'.

Without the emitter issues or radioactive issues, the portal liquid would last much longer and be barely consumed at all through use. This was only improved thanks to only exposing the new portal after activating it from outside the current dimension by 'shooting' the opening THROUGH the liquid in the device first.

And without all those hacked together 'safety' and convenience features everything could be much smaller. After all, if you waste portal fluid? Just make it easier to refill! Oh, that causes more risks and waste and leaks? Meh, make the device larger so less damage to the user! Sort of.

Sarah examined the golf ball sized orb that seemed to flicker in place. The glowing green liquid was carefully contained in the middle, and was only a few drops of the original dimensional portal liquid instead of the literal ounces that were supplied before. The shiny steel coating hid away the efficient esoteric energy converters and the psionic interface module, and… Hmm.

Right. "Adam, look at this for me."

[[Harvest.]]

Her friend blinked. <<Hmm. Let's swap out this and these materials with Beryllium Copper. Almost as strong as steel and yet it isn't magnetic… Safer in general and it won't be easily ripped out of you if you decide to embed it into your new body.>>

Oh! That would make it MUCH safer to store internally! "A thin shell of titanium so it would be safe inside flesh wouldn't go wrong. Let's add…" Um.

Losing limbs was surprisingly a common issue, but she didn't want to be a full robot or gynoid.

Three? Three. "Let's modify two of these to be longer and thin, it would fit in the arms easily enough, and put the orb version inside my chest bone. That way people will assume I can only make my portals with my hands and I can use the torso one to escape a huge issue."

Adam grinned! <<Well, if that torso one is INSIDE your sternum, we can modify it slightly.>> A new design showed up. <<Letting the blood flow through it should allow 'Enhance Self' to more easily adapt your entire biological system to resisting dimensional corruption and possibly allow me to gather enough data to just let you Step dimensionally as well as spatially.>>

Ooh! That would… No. Focus. "Is my new form stable enough for that?"

As summarized data came up it was near instinctual to expand it to more raw information. Adam hummed. <<Baseline, yeah. And I think it would be easy enough to add some basic electronics for interfacing with machinery and connecting it to the Warehouse directly. Then I can just give you full access and scan the systems WITHOUT letting people know you can scan stuff using [[Phase Pierce]] and your mind alone.>>

Sarah paused as she was adjusting her body to not be fertile unless desired and avoid menstrual cycles. "Shit. I'm going to have to make a decoy portal gun to avoid giving other Ricks any ideas, won't I?"

He grinned. <<Only if you want to be sneaky.>>

Shit. Hide how much better her transportation methods were, or show off by waving a hand or just sinking into portals looking cool. Damn it. "Fine, but it will just be some glowing green liquid. I am NOT going to carry around that metaphysical conceptual psionic fluid so badly protected just to show off some fake technology."

It took moments to create a plastic 'portal gun' with green alcohol and glowing green LEDs to make it look 'authentic'. Though she could probably sell these to little Mortys as kid toys now that living near one wouldn't give you random cancer or something.

Oh! New body's done! "Right, send me over and do NOT leave a copy in this dead body. In fact, let's skip that step entirely."

[[Harvest.]]

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam blinked as Sarah [[Harvested]] herself.

Huh.

Well, it worked. Direct the Avatar unit to the new optimized body… And! <<Good morning, Sarah!>>

The tall woman's eyes flashed silver, her body flickered… And Sarah was standing outside the healing pod, grinning like mad! "Oh this is FABULOUS! Look at these guns!"

He grinned as she flexed, her new form still wearing that white lab coat. <<It is impressive.>>

She jumped a few feet in the air. "Hell's yeah it's impressive! Sarah in the HOUSE! Oh, hang on, let me test this: [[Portal: Transparent.]]"

A blue dimensional sheer flickered into existence even as Adam felt her mind units optimize the process and begin reducing energy costs and casting times. She could create portals without commands, obviously, but Sarah always liked being flashy to some extent.

She grinned at the blue ring floating in mid air with the moon's surface on the other side. "Awesome! The dimensional protections are still in place, and only the light waves within described parameters get recreated on the side I wanted it to work with! Hmm… What are the consumption rates looking like, Adam?"

Uh, better double check. Got it. <<Looks like the portal fluid rejuvenates over time in minute amounts. As long as you only make about… Ten portals an hour or so, there is no limit on how often you can use these things. That's ten per device, so thirty total an hour will stay about neutral. If you create something like two hundred portals with one I think it goes into recovery mode for two hours or so, takes longer to fully recover. And all those numbers might get more efficient as your mind units catch up to speed and test stuff.>>

She flickered another blue portal to the side, showing space somewhere… Causing her to frown. "That should be Glapflap, and that one MWA739…No Zorpantheon 9 either."

Sarah sighed. "Yeah, this isn't right. This dimension is something set up by a fucked up Rick." More portals opened, all empty space or blank planets. "Must have originally been an empty dimension before he set up this entire decoy setup. We might have been a testing facility to ensure the originator didn't screw up when working in HIS home."

Adam sent her more data. Seemed like it was easy to set up unrelated portals and keep them open or closed based on her psionic connection to the network. <<The blue color seems to be due to the portal juice coming from a Jump Document purchase. I think you can visit ANY dimension in this Jump once you can target it, not just ones in the local bundle.>>

She hummed… And frowned. "Shit, it does stand out. Meh, I can probably alter that color easily enough, we just never cared enough to try before. Always left stuff to 'easiest to set up while drunk' levels of competency."

Oh, right. <<Speaking of which.>>

Let's see! Four Roses bourbon, some lemon juice, a drop of agave nectar, a dose of energy serum… Fill a new flask with the stuff and add a touch of lime juice. Chill it as if shaken over ice, ensure it would STAY that temperature with some minor hardware in the base of the container… Done.

Sarah was grinning before she quickly snagged it and drank deep. "God DAMN that's the good stuff!"

Adam felt her trying to ignore the one portal that was showing the exploded ruins of her former 'home' and the cloned family lost forever. Which was fine, he'd be there for her. <<Lot more where that came from. When you want something different, I'll have an additional flask with something different.>>

Maybe something basic. Wild Turkey 101, dash of hot sauce, energy serum? Should be interesting, even if normal humans would have to have it in a shot glass instead of an enhanced flask that never runs out and pours at the perfect temperature.

She glanced again at the ones that didn't live long enough to save… Who she wouldn't have been able to save without risking an entire dimension collapsing while also causing soul deep agony to her little girl from having to leave her family in the process.

Adam didn't bother her as she carefully sat in a chair and watched the local portals, visible only on her side, show the end of this world.

Sarah poured her flask into a double old fashioned glass, the lime wedge added without comment. "After… After it ends,we can go."

The two watched as Sarah wrapped herself in fraudulent memories from a sad and hurting old man. Watching a world pass.

As events settled down and 'undetectable' systems began resetting the clone chaos to a stable state again, she sighed. "Keep an eye open for the fucking Rick that did this, Adam."

They both knew that there were so many realities in this Jump that the one responsible might have died eons ago or have cloned new bodies every year… But the emotion was shared nevertheless. <<Of course, Sarah.>>

She sighed, stood FAR taller than she expected she could, and gave a weak grin! "Alright! {Belch}, Let's go find some of my kids who need help!"

Easy enough, Sarah had handed Adam a compact and efficient portal orb for 'Research' to play with already. Thousands of dimensions were being connected to and scanned in real time every moment based on the memories gained from Sarah connecting to this version of herself, each one having hundreds of thousands of landmarks and locations to mark off.

Lots of delicious data for 'Research' to work with!

Although, it would be best to find a group that were good people first. No lobster hitler zombies or something. <<No problem, Sarah.>>

 

[theaceoffire]

A blast of heated ions SMASHED into the ruins of the house.

Summer was leaning against her grandpa's lame squid ship window. "Grandpa, I'm pretty sure they're dead. Like, a while ago."

The old man belched, glaring at the data. "I keep getting life signs from this location, and we can't return to our self contained planetary adventures until I am sure that one of these decoy families haven't somehow escaped our tracking system."

Morty was stressing out! "Oh jeez Rick! So many decoys and decoys dressed like squids and explosions already, and now zombies!?"

Beth was angry, as usual. "I don't understand why we can't TRY to talk with some of them first. Compromise or something."

Jerry was frowning at all the whatsidosits. "And I still want to know how we are tracking everyone!"

Rick grumbled. "Because all decoys, knowingly or not, emit signals to the core restricted enforcement station that ensure that every unit stays where designated unless sent on missions." He gulped from his flask. "It makes sure {Belch!} that our decoys stay safe and easy to locate for threats so that WE can easily escape any issue. They can only leave those designated tasks and locations when enforcing a correction."

Summer folded her arms. "Well, how do we know WE aren't clones or decoys then?"

He snorted! "Because I'm the Rickest Rick! Now, everyone shut up and let me scan this stupid house so we can go back to our self contained planetary adventures."

The 'camouflaged' squid ship was silent for a moment.

But, as expected, Jerry had to ruin it. "Can't we just check your map thingie for a decoy signal?"

Ricky slumped. "God DAMN it Jerry, I JUST said this clone family might have somehow removed their tracking beacons. Which SHOULD be impossible to even remember or attempt to modify without lots of effort that would stand out like a bonfire."

Summer grinned. "Well, what if THEY are the originals? Then they wouldn't have the trackers, right?"

He waved it off. "The batch that made this clone family is documented, it was subgroup 'zisblryeh' and the quality was so low that only one of the decoy construction attempts stayed stable. I'm more worried that a mutant zombie clone somehow got formed before the corrupted mutant creator died from self consumption."

Jerry frowned. "Shouldn't we just use the map?"

Rick held in his rage, seeing his little girl give him that 'tolerate my man' look. Damn it.

After another swig of hard alcohol, he was back down to severe rage levels... Or at least down to a calmer range of anger. Good. "No. Jerry. They won't show up on the damn map."

Jerry blinked. "Then who is the dot over here? The decoy family signals near our location."

Rick blinked… And forced his mind to focus. On the nothing. On the empty map. On the empty map with no marker. On the no marker that was clearly not marking his ship.

Fuck.

"That… would be us."

Any further conversation was pointless as the ship was evaporated with a sonic pulse of advanced energy! "Boo yah! Another squid ship down!"

Beth was angry, as usual. "I don't understand why we can't TRY to talk with some of them first. Compromise or something."

Rick carefully lined up his sonic cannon down at the molten pit. "Not now honey, I need to ensure whatever this mutant thing down there setting off my sensors was, that it stays dead."

Morty was stressing out! "Oh jeez Rick! STAYS dead!? So many alien squids and explosions already, and now zombies!?"

Summer was leaning against her grandpa's lame trash-like ship window. "Grandpa, I'm pretty sure anything down there is dead. Like, a while ago."

The old man kept glaring at the pit as sound wrecked the material. "Until I stop getting life signs from this location, we can't return to our self contained planetary adventures. I must make SURE that one of these squid groups hasn't somehow escaped our tracking system."

Summer folded her arms. "Well, how do we know that the one we recently blew up wasn't the ONLY squids ship nearby?"

He snorted! "Because I'm the Rickest Rick! Now, everyone shut up and let me scan this stupid house so we can go back to our self contained planetary adventures."

Jerry was frowning at all the whatsidosits. "Could anyone please tell me how we are tracking everyone!?"

Rick snorted. "Shut up Jerry."

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Another newborn parasite finally managed to spawn, despite the near damage to the interspatial hive from the last attempts. Finally!

Scanning for local minds to infiltrate with memories pleasant enough to ensure survival, or at least delay combat until enough forces could be born… It fell apart into chunks as a new wave of sharp energy currents sliced into the basement deep wreckage of the former house.

No matter, eventually they would survive and take over this world!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Beth was angry, as usual. "You just blasted that ship of decoys! I don't understand why we can't TRY to talk with some of them first. Compromise or something."

The old man belched. "They don't matter. No, I {Belch} keep getting fucked up life signs from this location, and we can't return to our self contained planetary adventures until I am sure that one of these decoy families haven't somehow escaped our tracking system."

Jerry was frowning out the window. "Why are more decoy ships flying this way?"

Rick snorted. "I'm taking advantage of how stupid these clones can be. I set up a signal to mark this location, it will now alert all the decoys that something here is somehow attempting to slip the decoy monitoring system. It will keep THEM busy, making it easier for US to clean up this mess without wasting so much damn time!"

Summer grinned. "Well, what if the life signal is from the originals? Then they wouldn't have the trackers, right? Or what if IT is a trap from another decoy family trying to call the rest and we fell for it?"

He snorted! "I wouldn't fall for shit like that. Because I'm the Rickest Rick! Now, everyone shut up and let me scan this stupid house before the waves of clone decoys begin falling upon this location like the wrath of ME."

Jerry was freaking out slightly! "Could we do the tracking everyone thing and the scanning stuff plan somewhere WITHOUT hundreds of armed ships heading towards it!?"

God damn it, Jerry. Man up already!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam blinked. <<Huh.>>

Sarah was examining other portal locations, trying to see who she could save and KEEP safe, but was quick to pause. "What!? Did something destabilize? We should have more time than that!"

Adam hummed. <<No, I just realized that one of your drawbacks is going to be literally free points now.>>

She blinked. "What?"

He pushed forward data.

{Parasites: +200cp} [You have a parasite problem. Increasingly wacky characters pop up and Implant themselves in your memories as old friends. It is very difficult to know when this is happening and if it gets too out of hand they may take over whatever planet you're on.]

She frowned. "Well, I didn't spend much time on Earth before coming here to fix my body. Not sure how this equals 'free points' though."

Adam grinned. <<You are supposed to be followed by a nest hive of these creatures, but not only did you temporarily leave the Jump but you 'died' while here. Your new body is vastly improved and fundamentally different from your previous one… And so the indestructible hive is locked on the location you formerly exited rather than where your NEW position will be.>>

Some calculations… <<Worst case scenario, a race of creatures that make you feel like they are your best friends will conquer this Earth. But with no other planets out there in this dimension and only decoy families to infect locally…>>

The woman blinked. "Wow. I… I never thought a drawback with planetary conquering consequences would somehow be BETTER than the local status quo. At the very least, they may stop the endless decoy suicides and murders."

Adam checked the data… And winced. <<Well... Maybe. At the moment, while all the various 'Ricks' still believe they are the only true Ricks, by having an undefeatable and respawning foe to face? Well, the situation has somehow convinced them to actually work together.>>

Sarah felt her mind examine the scenario. "Because, as relatively harmless as the parasite might be… It wouldn't match any of the clones that inhabit that dimension. And thus each one is marked an outsider AND potentially contamination to the ongoing experiment."

She grinned! "So the priority of killing each other or hurting themselves to maintain order would fall way under the never ending threat as each failed attempt escalates the correction order significance quotents! Hells yeah!"

Sarah did a quick little Sarah dance. "Now I don't have to send in suicide clones that match local hypnotism and conditioning triggers to avoid dimensional collapse and reality disruption while I'm trying to solve this mess! I LOVE problems that fix themselves!"

Adam let her have her fun. She was doing much better after having made her new body basically treat alcohol as a power source rather than a dehydration issue, and a powerful mad scientist WITHOUT hangovers was an amazing thing when cheerful.

Sarah froze though when he eventually coughed. "Uh. You saw nothing! That was just… Test spasms. To ensure my new body is up to form."

He pretended to agree. <<Have you decided?>>

She grinned and threw out ALL her designs! "Nope! Now that I know my local area is secured, I can focus on new places to get started WITHOUT prioritizing locations that might help me repair this place."

Her hands began designing and organizing custom parts rapidly. "One of the hardest things to do when fixing myself was the mind. Not just the many conflicting memories and broken and over layered commands and traps and stuff, but the innate flaws of my other Ricks themselves."

A diagram came up. "The biggest one? Pride. We always have this core belief of us being the smartest person in existence, it is almost fundamental to our identity… But it is wrong."

Many images showed up, past times. "Take the smartest man or woman, turn them into a talking pickle… And what can they do? Nothing. They would be a pickle."

The display showed past Rick using his only controllable parts, his eyes and tongue and mouth, to hijack and mind control pests and eventually rats and more… Using them to create a crude living biosuit. "No, our greatest power, our most insane ability? Substitution and adaptation."

More schematics flew up. "That planet has nearly NO resources, but ALL the decoy families managed to build up almost all their hardware from literally nothing using impossible solutions and nearly no resources. It's likely that was the REASON to do the experiment HERE, with no other planets or power sources AND with this artificially formed fake Earth to work with. To limit our materials and our supplies, preventing escape attempts."

They were just that good.

Adam hummed. <<Then why do your alternate Ricks steal and do black market deals for all those rare objects and materials?>>

She snorted. "Because we are lazy drunks. Sure, we could eventually turn two rocks into tools to make tools to make tools to do near anything... Or we can take super powered material, bash it a bit, and get roughly what we wanted with nearly no effort. While high, drunk, and having horrifically complicated sex orgies."

Sarah began showing off the many materials. "Any time you see something NOT cobbled together out of random crap, it is likely from one of the industrialized and automated factories belonging to one of the Rick groups, like the Rick Alliance that used to exist or the Rick Council over at the citadel. Independent Ricks DO exist, like I expected me to be, but most don't have the ability to get perfectly formed high quality expensive components for free."

Adam sent her the spiraled magnetic wires requested. <<Unlike us.>>

She grinned as she inserted the component into the growing metal framework. "Exactly. Unless it is a passion project, something awesome like our Gotron Ferrets or some sweet weapons or whatever, we mostly use what is on hand and a few powerful cheat materials."

A loud SNAP had the new orb unfold into something the size of a small house, formed from thin metal frameworks. "Good, didn't explode! But let's use basic steel for the next few panels. Anyway, this means that almost ANY Rick will have awesome stuff for us to scan, because once one Rick finds a good source of powerful energy or dangerous material? The others start smuggling it or buying it or whatever."

She began inserting layers of compressed cubic silicon nitride (Bioshock had helped her design some GOOD non-exotic materials to work with) as glass substitutes for the upper half of the orb. "So we find one of the infinite worlds where Rick dies off, loot his stuff, and help out the family. The fact that I can hide from sensors without needing to do some pseudo magical science with a nearby Morty clone will help us stay under the radar, and meanwhile I can use my non-lazy ass to actually IMPROVE some shit."

Adam blinked. <<Like what?>>

Sarah threw up a battery schematic. "Rick learned how to make an entire reality sub dimension within an object, a physical anchor to another space. He then harvested that reality for power. Because that was easier to do with less interaction than making a damned power supply, as he could just kill everyone involved if they didn't produce enough energy for his needs and try again until it worked."

Right, he was a mad scientist. Killing trillions of species to avoid building something annoying was not even a blip on his radar. <<That seems a bit wasteful.>>

Her glare was vicious and she agreed. "Well, I'm not falling into the same mental trap holes as the rest of those jerks. Check this out!"

Hmm.

The schematics were for designing a mechanical life form similar to the algae from Bioshock, one that would convert nearly all power sources into material fabrication and have electrical energy as a byproduct.

Sarah pointed. "This framework here will ensure that any potential minds, souls, or near soul and near mind existences won't form. Any attempts to ascend to higher levels of life will instead boost electrical generation! Sure it would require a bit more work than rolling the dice and killing failures, but look at the boosted gain rates!"

A pause. "And the lower number of morality issues. Those too. Anyway, a few basic defenses, store most of the material and equipment inside the anchor itself including the keys for unlocking and accessing it…"

She waved at the new design! "And bam! A physical dimension anchor that contains nothing but near infinite space and a growing network of nanomachines! And the actual anchor can be as small as a pool ball."

Huh. <<Is that what you're building over there with the big metal ball framework?>>

Another transparent panel was secured. "No, this is going to be my ship. I'm just putting extra work into it so I can collapse the whole stupid thing into a small carrying size instead of having to park it in random places."

Fair enough.

Adam hummed. <<About the energy source idea... How would you get it started? The initial power requirements I mean.>>

Sarah pointed. "Find an empty dimension with either nothing inside it but potential energy or just a material slurry and my machines will provide effectively endless amounts of raw material for fabrication use AND effectively endless power after they really start reproducing exponentially."

Yeah, Adam could apply some of those principles into the [[Harvest]] protocols easily enough.

Yoink!

Especially in a few Warehouse hidden units that ran under Rick And Morty universal constants… So now resource growth was pretty much handled. Well, in a way. Eventually. Still! <<Not bad.>>

The woman snorted. "No, this is just my fucking STARTING point! Yeah, I can make a post scarcity society, big whoop. But more importantly, I can form an artificial universe and take it with me! Protect it! A few modified orbs of nanomachine slurry would easily act as stars, generate enough light and heat while being modified to gravitationally replicate existing solar systems… And I can then shift a few planets into a new orbit outside of standard existence entirely!"

She grinned! "It can't travel with us on future Jumps, but at least in THIS place we'd have a safe haven for people! Eventually steal whole dimensions and store them inside too!"

Sarah paused. "Theoretically. Eventually. Like… After a LOT of time and effort."

Because there was a ramp up time, as Adam saw.

To fully activate a single 'dimensional power generator' alone would take a LONG time, possibly more than one Jump outside of existence for it to finish.

And the energy requirements to kidnap a planet or consume an empty dimension would NEED a few infant dimensional generators, or a single mastered one, or an unrelated and massive power source.

Still. <<But at least you have a long term plan?>>

Her smile came back. "Yeah. And until I can build up to that, I can make do. Thorium reactors are cheap and easy for now, and I can at least spawn a single galaxy in a temporary 'Sarah Sanctuary' prototype as long as I have our sensors stop it before animal life can get started."

That would ALSO take time, if she wasn't willing to damage the life within the anchor via temporal acceleration like the Ricks would do. Still, compared to building a custom protected dimension? WAY faster.

She grinned. "I might even get an Earth analogue going if we get the right scans first, or use some of the ones from previous Jumps as seed material for the matrices. After a few decades with some advanced equipment speeding some components, life could be transferred there without an issue!"

Well, basic life. Maybe plants.

A personal safety dimension that she could cautiously use as a fall back position sounded useful though. <<And until then?>>

Sarah slumped. "Probably going to go here." Scans opened up, showing a radioactive waste land. "Not sure if the local Rick caused this particular nuclear war, but some of his local family survived the event while he didn't and his home defenses are going to fail in a few days. And then SOMEONE started throwing around the exotic stuff."

The portal showed the strangely glowing radioactive wasteland… And a single suburban home with a glowing forcefield floating there, strangely untouched in the sea of glowing rocks and molten metal.

She glared at the mess. "Place is probably written off or blacklisted by other Ricks by now, no real possibility any of them will bother to save these trapped people. Too much work, too depressing, why not find a healthy family to go swap places with a dead Rick instead? God I was messed up."

Adam sighed. <<You mean, 'Rick' was messed up.>>

She winced. "I may be doing way better now, but I still remember my wife. My daughter. The actions I took when I lost them both, and the downward spiral I stumbled down after."

Sarah Sanchez the first stood tall, opening a glowing blue portal to WITHIN the protective dome. Because of COURSE her lazy other selves wouldn't bother to use a unique password, just the same encoding protocols and hashed codes that they always went with.

A mental command to her chest's portal orb shifted the default colors to a familiar green glow, even if it was just cosmetic for now. Oh, and she better remember to use the fake portal gun next time… sigh. He would send her a short message later, when she had time to calm down.

Meanwhile, Adam had more fun stuff to do! Let's get to scanning everything. And [[Harvesting]] all of this lovely and heavily irradiated material in large chunks, this was some valuable stuff!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Beth Smith was slumped at the kitchen table.

What was she supposed to do?

Morty and Summer were sick. Summer from trying to hug her brother despite KNOWING the family hazard protocols when her little boy somehow survived long enough to come home.

At least that had provided enough warning for her to slam on the protective emergency house defensive barriers and fields. An automatic reaction when one of her little ones were injured at this point in her life.

Morty was… Mostly stable. As frustrated as she had been from her Dad's antics, he HAD ensured her little boy was robust as hell for a somewhat normal child. But he wasn't getting better.

But he was hurt. And radioactive.

The fact their home had TWO rooms for medical recovery of injured children while they were biochemically or radioactively dangerous kind of showed how odd their lives had been over the years, but… Well. Once again, Dad had managed to help out because of his paranoia and strange behavior.

But Dad hadn't come home this time.

Morty was mentally not capable right now, but even during treatment managed to try and warn them both about some sort of danger… Though the emergency medication she had used from the hidden supply kit had caused him to go into some sort of stasis coma before anything could be made clear.

Not that it mattered now.

It was the third time she was trying to call Dad when some sort of impossibly loud impact had shook the house defenses.

And that was it.

Everyone else was gone.

Her ex-husband in that sad little apartment. Her neighbors. Her friends. And those bitchy coworkers at St. Equis Hospital would never be annoying again, though her job was entirely gone too.

Not that it mattered. Who needed a veterinarian when all animals were dead?

They had water and some stored food. Mostly odd alien cereal, really.

All known medication had been used on her babies. And, while they helped, both needed MORE to be better. Which… Was going to happen. Somehow.

Her Dad had locked the garage, which was normally fine. His lab was dangerous at the best of times, despite all those hidden affections he had silently shown over the years, ensuring that she personally was safe from everything he built.

But… It was still locked. And anything helpful in there was out of reach.

Why hadn't she asked for an emergency contact device? At first her Jerry had been so horrified by nearly all forms of Dad's technology and strangeness that it had been natural instinct to not mention how useful having her OWN method of escaping the planet would be.

Her Dad would do nearly anything she asked! If she wanted a portal gun he had no issue handing her a few, even if he would end up making it pink or something because he always saw her as a little girl. If she wanted a spaceship he would probably mess with the family car THAT DAY, no problem.

But now? If… When he got home, she would insist on having some emergency options. A… An interdimensional cell phone or something. Maybe an emergency portal to a safe place.

She firmly pushed aside the vision of all the fires, the odd flatness that existed outside and the fact that right now her home (HER HOME!) was floating in this molten wasteland.

Beth had let her Dad put all those so called 'silly' defenses in place to humor him. To make him feel more at home, more part of the family.

Yet he was gone and those protections had been a last hug goodbye.

What now?

They were nearly out of the last of the pain killers. Morty would… They needed more medication. Summer would likely have horrific scars from the damage, but at least HER treatment had fully stabilized… But her son?

Right. Sitting at the table trying not to scream wouldn't be helpful in this situation.

And she had always worn the pants in this family, husband or father or not!

With a deep breath she stood and strode to the garage. "Bethany Smith requesting entry."

The hologram flickered. "User: Bethany Smith not recognized."

God damn it Dad, it hadn't said that before! Petty bastard. "Bethany Sanchez requesting entry."

A flicker. "User: Daddy's Little Girl: Authorized! Warning! Administrative Rick no longer active. To gain Administrative Control: Please enter or state the passphrase."

Right, what hadn't she tried? "Is it '80085'?" He had used that to make her laugh as a girl, right?

The error noise. What about…

Her birthday, no. Her kids birthdays, no. Jerry's birthday actually had some recorded insults that weren't worth repeating. His birthday? No. Mom's name? It actually locked up for a bit and refused to let her try any new codes for an hour.

Shit. "Listen, I need you to either let me in or call for help. Morty is sick. Summer is sick."

The voice didn't change tone. "Voucher for Replacement Morty was not purchased and is not on file. Please fund the full market cost if an immediate Morty is required."

She blinked. "What the FUCK Dad!?"

And the doorbell rang.

Beth's frustration and growing anger were suddenly locked away.

Dad? No, he never gave a shit about knocking or ringing the doorbell unless he was sober, the frustrating man would have just slammed into the garage and started healing himself by this point.

Didn't matter! Someone was ALIVE! And able to reach the house!

Maybe it WAS Dad! Or he had a backup ship, since his was still locked up on the driveway?

She ran to the door… And paused. Right, don't just assume good things. First go through the standard protocols. Check the hidden scanners.

Explosives? No. Psychic influence? No. Cyborg? No. Necrotic flesh? No. Passed the chemical, biological, and radioactive testing sub systems… And open the door!

Beth froze.

A beautiful female version of her Dad was… Awkwardly smiling. "Uh. Hey Beth. Can we talk for a bit? I'm here to help."

Her mind couldn't follow. "How the HELL are you hotter than me now!?"

And suddenly the smirk on the face was 1000% her asshole father. "Good genetics are hard to hide!"

Whatever, wasn't the strangest issue her Dad ever brought home. "Morty's hurt bad, I'm out of stabilizing fluids, and Summer has cosmetic and radioactive tissue damage."

And THERE was the man in charge (Woman in charge) attitude that she secretly relied on when things went to shit. "Well. Let's deus ex machina this bitch then!"

Still, she ensured the woman (man?) followed the hidden safety protocols as they entered the home, deactivated the internal security systems, and proceeded directly to her kids.

Her hidden lightning gun was still in her back holster just in case.

If this was an imposter, she'd bring it up AFTER they saved her babies. She wasn't the daughter of Rick for nothing, after all.

 

[theaceoffire]

Summer Smith tried not to move.

Her arms were stiff, every twinge caused the burning to get worse. Her torso and chest were also inflamed by the damage caused by having her concern over Morty override her own self preservation instincts. Not following standard operating procedure.

But she wouldn't call out.

She knew. Mom didn't say, but she KNEW that they were nearly out of 'just in case' equipment and medicine. Despite the smiles, the quiet assurances, it was a bit too obvious.

And Morty made her look healthy due to how damaged he was.

A missing leg was the LEAST of his issues. Bone was visible in several areas. Warped and twisted flesh on one arm, the other just twitching.

And this was AFTER most of the stabilization fluid had been used on him.

In comparison, the odd colors of her skin and the constant pain weren't worth worrying about.

Where was Grandpa? Morty had said SOMETHING about… An Ambush or something. Or maybe something not activating right? He had been barely coherent as it was, and as hurt as her actions caused her to be she couldn't regret catching him before he collapsed to the floor.

Though she did wish this pain would go away. Badly.

But Grandpa would fix it. Mom said, he always could fix it. Could fix anything! So… So she would just be strong, and wait, and make sure the last of the pain medication and stabilization fluids went to Morty.

Because he would fix her later. As long as he got home in time to fix Morty, she could wait.

She… She wasn't able to stop crying though. Maybe the evidence of her emotions would be hard to see, with her face damaged like this. And at least Morty was in a somewhat stable coma now, so he… He would get better.

The tears certainly made it hard to see mom coming in. "I… I think Morty is doing better Mom! We…" Stupid lungs, don't do that. "We just gotta hold on a bit more and…"

The blur took a step towards her. "Hush, sweetie. Grandpa's going to make it alright. I got some stuff right here that will help you sleep and I'll fix you right up. Alright?"

Her hearing wasn't working quite right either apparently, but if Mom said she had more of Grandpa's crazy science stuff, that was just like a miracle to her right now! "Kay. Mom, I was… I held on, didn't I?"

A warm hand gently patted her head, even as she saw the injection being applied. It was into part of her body that had lost feeling hours ago… And the relief was nearly enough to break her down into sobs. "You did great, sweetie. Grandpa's going to fix everything."

Love you, Mom. "G'night."

Her ears might not work right, but Mom's humming sounded soothing anyway.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah finished the tune as the hurt child fell into slumber… And sighed. "Thank me that Rick left some of that stabilization fluid at least." Though that stuff was intended for keeping drinks stable, it ALSO was a good first aid option.

Beth was standing near the doorway trying to be defensive while she kept an eye open. "So… Not my dad? Though the other Ricks Dad would bring home for visits were a bit more masculine by comparison."

She waved it off. "Complicated. All of it is complicated. Basically, you know about our dimensional travels and stuff?"

A nod. Sarah waved a green portal in the air, pulling a pair of medical pods from the Warehouse and installing them in the corner of the room. These ones were redesigned to be integrated with easy to apply Plasmids, serums, and Tonics, since this Jump didn't reject those. Thank goodness.

Lifting her damaged granddaughter carefully using her mind, she levitated the hurt girl into the pod that rapidly filled with medical fluid. "Well, you know we didn't take it well when… An event happened in the past?"

Beth winced. "Mom."

And that made HER wince. "Right. Well, all the places we go are connected to similar realities where some things are in common… But there is still an infinite amount of us."

She activated the medical pod and bubbles began ensuring proper aeration as the miniature thorium generator orb began ramping up to full power. The software would ensure only proper voltage and amperage were sent through to the devices as needed.

Next! To Morty. "Those of us who lost our loved ones, depending on how we reacted to those emotions, handled it differently. Your Rick was one of the many who wanted what was lost, and was willing to come home and spend time with everyone."

Beth followed her to the second isolation ward, frowning. "Then why did my Dad wait so long before coming home?"

Sarah's response was lost as she entered the second medical room and paused. "Oh. Damn, Morty, you really took a hit or two this time. Right, let's ensure he stays asleep and then get him fixed up." Another sleep serum dose and she levitated him towards the other room.

She glanced at her little girl, following them both. "You know your Dad thinks differently than most people, right?"

Her daughter snorted. "Yeah Dad… Uh." A glance at her well fitted suit. And 'assets'. "Mom?"

Sarah grinned, though that stung a little. "I may be a woman, but I was always…" No. No she wasn't. "Well, you'll always be Daddy's little girl. From a different reality, reborn as a clone, changed into a cat person or living a life of crime or heroism, you'll always be our little girl."

She seemed to relax somewhat. "But not always the same one?"

Moving Morty to the other pod, she nodded. "Not sure what happened to the Dad that was lucky enough to have you born. Maybe the same one recovered from our emotional downward fall to realize how lucky he was to still have you and came home. Maybe he passed away or got lost, and another of us stepped up to the plate to make sure you were taken care of."

Maybe some bastard Rick stole the DNA of his loved ones from happier families and tried to rebuild it all here. Maybe one killed the existing Rick, or heavily injured him, and all this mess was caused by revenge. Too many possibilities.

She began programming in the treatment options. Her new talents in robotics allowed easy inclusion of mechanical applicator limbs inside each Healing Pod, along with a few other schematic modifications. "However, I found all of you by searching for any family of mine that was in danger without a Rick to save them. The specific father you knew recently has… Well, it's hard to know how permanent the end of any of us would be. But it's best to treat him as having moved on."

Hopefully that Rick was dead. Because SOME Ricks would see the mess of this planet and just take another swig and LEAVE. Find a replacement family and forget this one. Fuckers.

Beth took a hesitant breath. "The children?"

Sarah pulled up some projected displays. "Both will be fine. Summer is the easiest, it is mostly biological damage." And her Jump Document purchases made that super trivial. "I won't even need to make her a new body! Just give her some medication to enhance herself conceptually, remove the damaged material, and have her regenerate to full health. Morty will take longer, but he won't hurt during his treatment sessions at least."

Beth moved closer as she… Oh, she could actually read those displays?

Huh. Right, Sarah hadn't bought the 'Genius' purchase that went with Rick's background option.

Thus the Jumper was only relying on Bioshock's scientist's background information, all the stolen data from Shinra, the new massive data vault provided by the engineering and bioengineering background information, and her centuries of survival experience and self medication attempts. And some of the local Jump's innate insanity that was part and parcel of being a Rick.

Sheesh, and normal Ricks could do stuff MORE insane than this while high, drunk, and partially unconscious. At a level fundamentally apart and beyond what this mess was already!

Thank GOODNESS Sarah hadn't gone for that perk, it was MUCH better for her sanity to only be beyond normally smart with perfect memory and the ability to make 'leaps of logic' and cheat with 'Research'.

Plus, it clearly let her document things down to the level that a STANDARD genius could follow, if Beth was able to read this much and follow along. Her baby was so smart!

Her daughter pointed at some of the Tonics. "And what do these do?"

Hmm? "Right, see the very first one, 'Enhance Self'? It is a psionic fluid that forces any changes to the body to be done in a way that conforms to the CONCEPT of who you are. No cancer, no odd mutations, anything that changes the patient can be refocused and redirected by this Tonic to ensure it only makes you MORE of what you are at the most basic level."

The list had side windows pop up for convenience. "Obviously as the children recover, I can remove damaged tissue and allow the raw healing serums and regeneration serums to work with 'Enhance Self' on its own. It will restore and enhance the parts most important for the health, safety, and happiness of both kids first, allowing me to more easily remove the unrecoverable parts and allow more healing."

Sarah glanced down the list. "Those you pointed at will ensure they stay clean more easily, have fewer chipped nails or split hair ends, and be able to resist puncture or slashing wounds and impacts with drastically lower tissue damage or bone fractures… Some basic preventative measures."

Beth lit up as she kept examining the data. "This… This is amazing mom!"

She winced HARD. Diane. "Just… Just call me Dad. My memories of the family come from the male versions of ourselves. Even if I am a woman now, I still consider myself your father. Just… A female version of him." She… She could do this. "Di… Diane will always be your mother."

The room got a bit quiet after that.

Beth eventually looked away from the data and the visibly recovering forms of her children. "Memories?"

Sarah sighed. "You know that your Dad might not always understand… Less technical concepts? Or refuse to acknowledge some that he feels don't apply to him?"

Her confusion was adorable. The Jumper smirked. "Like mercy or ethics."

Beth winced. "Ah. Yeah, no I understand."

Fair enough. "Well, one of us decided to make a cloned decoy copy of our family. The idea was that if some other Rick or an unrelated enemy tried to attack them, the decoys could act as a warning system."

Though the biggest danger to any Rick tends to be OTHER Ricks. It wouldn't surprise Sarah at ALL if the reason so many Rick and Morty pairs existed was due to Morty's ability to hide Rick from sensors preventing OTHER Ricks from being… Too Rickish. An unnatural selection, as it were.

Her daughter blinked… And winced. "Yeah, I… I was less than thrilled when I found out I had been cloned. Though Space Beth turned out to be pretty kick ass if I do say so myself."

ALL her daughters were kick ass! "Well, a Rick was clearly worried that it might cause even worse issues. So he made an experiment. Guy set up a custom dimension, had lots of us make clones of our families, and then forced us to hunt each other down to both test the protocols AND see how we recovered and rebuilt our own decoys after a near wipeout."

Sarah focused on Morty in the pod, ignoring Beth's shock. "Not all the decoy families worked out right. The more decoys that made decoys, with each clone that made clones… Well, you know your Dad can get lazy. Mistakes from lack of care. It certainly didn't help that the experiment was designed to restrict our minds, limit our supplies, and ensure compliance."

The image of the dead flesh in little Beth's cloning chamber. "I… My cloned family didn't survive. And the body I had at the time was clearly so beyond the common Rick form, and my mind so damaged, that I couldn't quite fall into line as programing required."

The days of trying to recover. "Improving yourself was forbidden. Escape was forbidden. Improving tools for projects was capped beyond certain levels of advancement. Healing yourself or others was banned. And… Well."

A warm hand on her shoulder was MORE than welcomed. "Yeah. I got out, you know your Dad can do near anything! But… Well, I'm less Rick than any Ricks you met before. I even go by Sarah D. Sanchez the First now! And I'm still super awesome and cool, honest! But, Uh. You can always call me…" No, she couldn't say it. "I mean, You'll always be my little girl."

The hand turned into a hug from behind. "You came when I needed you Dad. That's more than enough."

The warm moment was a bit ruined by the snort though. "Also, you doing magic and being sober was sort of a big hint SOMETHING was going on. And the being a woman thing, that somehow stood out more than that time you were an onion."

Sarah chuckled. "My memories had Rick become a pickle. Also, not magic. It's just more psionic bullshit. Magic reacts badly in this series of dimensions. Almost anything magical you find out about or see is basically psionic trickery… Hell, some of the more odd technology taps into the same bucket of fun."

Beth blinked. "What, so I could do it too?"

She hummed. "I'm not going to use any Plasmids or Tonics on you, or offer any magic-like additional benefits to the kids, until you can see that they will be alright first. That I'm actually helping."

Sarah blinked at a beeping and moved over to Morty's pod readout. "Ah, clone instability. Easy enough to fix, but I'm glad I caught this early."

Beth paused… And frowned. "That's right! What the hell is a 'Voucher for a Replacement Morty'?"

...Hoo boy. "Let's check the lab first before I answer, there are so MANY Ricks out there I have no clue what specifically he did or didn't do until I access the logs. I know that some of my alternate selves used clone body backups for emergency transfer, used as a safe healing method."

She swore to Adam, if this Rick was one of those fuckers that kept killing and replacing his Morty out of negligence she was going to scream! This emotional shit was hard enough without THAT mess on top!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

A flicker near the garage door blinked as Beth waved at it. "I couldn't get in, and I was getting pretty desperate."

The interface activated. "User: Daddy's Little Girl: Detected! Warning! Administrative Rick is no longer active. To gain Administrative Control: Please enter or state the passphrase!"

Her Dad, now apparently 'Sarah', sighed. "Damn it… 'Shut the fuck up and let me in already.'"

Beth blinked. "What?"

The door hologram flashed green. "Passphrase: Accepted! Welcome home, Rick!"

Sarah waved it off. "Designation altered to 'Sarah', provide admin access to the following module." A green portal again formed out of nowhere, no gun required, and a tiny shining ball fell into her Dad's hand.

Beth frowned. "Wait, what!?"

Her Dad pulled her into the room even as the lab coat wearing woman absently inserted the orb into some hidden panel behind the washer. "Basically all Ricks are overconfident, lazy, and have huge egos. Most of the security WASN'T in the door OR the system, most of it is based on automated identification systems. You could have opened the door at any time despite security, but it would put all our stuff into lockdown to keep you safe."

Well that… It didn't make her feel great, but at least knowing she hadn't been kept from helping her children due to not testing out if the garage door was even locked made her feel better. Not knowing one way or the other helped her hold out a bit longer too, sort of.

She watched in numbed amazement as the room unfolded. And unfolded. And unfolded.

Hidden shelves, covered tunnels, disguised chambers, ladders, stairs, passages, levers, buttons, chains, tubes, more and more of the Lab seemed to unfold itself.

Her Dad glared at the mess. "Sigh, how random. No wonder I can never find my shit when I need it."

A hand held out.

"[[Harvest.]]"

And everything flashed green and vanished.

Sarah didn't even pause. "Garage! Continue unlocking resource layout seven through cappa, reset each configuration after collection."

The garage pulsed. "Yes, Sarah."

Beth blinked. "What?"

The woman waved her off. "Not actually alive, it is a near sapient intelligence. Most Ricks make lots of these to keep us company during the darker times, or when we are separated from our remaining loved ones. Hell, most of our vehicles can actually reach sapient levels of thought if we aren't cautious."

Beth felt more bemused than anything as her Dad gently shifted her to one side allowing a wall of what seemed to be human butt guns to unfold from the floor. "What… What IS all this stuff?"

Her dad pointed. "This layout is for the more random weaponry that we personally find humorous, or that managed to make one of our Beths laugh in the past. The various Rick organizations catalogue the mess and include it with most of the Garage Lab default configuration installation cubes."

Huh. "How do we find out about my son? Check the logs or whatever."

Sarah pointed back at the closed wall panel. "I have a personal system outside of near anywhere and that orb from earlier is connected from my personal stuff to this house and the defenses now through the lab. I'm extracting all the data and preparing for a new home construction project as we speak."

Beth blinked. "New home? No, later. What did you find out?"

More of that interactive display stuff showed up, to her hidden joy. This was SO MUCH more understandable and handy than most of Dad's random stuff!

Sarah pointed. "Your Morty IS the same one from this reality, but over time most of his body had been replaced with cloned material. Some of the more risky and esoteric damage can require stuff like that to help fully recover. It's BECAUSE your Rick didn't want to just replace your son that he didn't have one of those vouchers on file."

Beth was already digging into the data. It was more than just healing, it seemed some of those 'enhancements' Dad mentioned required modified body parts and some subtle reinforcement of bones and organs. A tense knot of concern began to unravel inside. "Good."

She would have loved her boy regardless, but the idea that one of her children had died or vanished or been left somewhere? That she wouldn't even KNOW, to be allowed to grieve? "I NEED something like this. A way to keep in contact with the kids, with YOU, and a way to get off world if something crazy like this happens again and no one else is nearby."

Her Dad didn't even shrug before a glittering vial filled with an odd liquid came out of a small green portal. "If you want to use my technology you need a more stable psionic aura. After we make sure the grandkids are alright you will drink this, and I will design a mechanical tech suite for networking and hive mind synching."

Beth was eyeing the warm vial in fascination before realising she had even picked it up. "What is it?"

Another data screen. "That is the non-injective form of 'Enhance Self'. The quality of the Tonic is too high to not use when allowed by the current reality, and it will let you better connect to my hardware while also helping you resist corruption, mental control, and even hacking attempts."

She blinked at her Dad as the scientist continued to empty out the garage. Heh, maybe the family could actually park a car here someday.

Looking at the vial, she shrugged. This was FAR less risky than normal stuff her Dad did, and honestly having a sober father was a fairly unique experience so far. Not like waiting would actually prove anything, if she didn't trust this version of Dad she wouldn't have allowed them near her kids.

Beth blinked after she drank deep. Hmm. Smelled like apples, but tasted like pears.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam was FRUSTRATED. <<Oh my god Sarah, without your memories the security is insane. WITH your memories, it is negligible!>>

His jumper mentally sighed. <I know, I know.>

He was still [[Harvesting]] chunks of the planet far enough away to not cause waves near the house, but as far as 'Research' could tell? Earth itself was somehow constantly liquid after that disaster.

No mountains, no pits, no. Just a liquid orb that didn't even have a solid core now, one that at least still orbited the sun. So, small victories.

And yet, any joy the Warehouse had over the situation was blunted by the digital database he was pulling from this house. <<You got a week. Tops. After that, this house of cards will just fail, the fields will collapse, and the house will sink and almost INSTANTLY convert into liquid. Anything not pre-installed and pre-setup for defensive needs was slapped on top with gum and gumption! Literally in some cases!>>

Sarah sighed. "Yeah, I'm going to have to rebuild the house. My other self didn't plan on this place surviving on liquid material above lava temperatures indefinitely, and several side projects of his weakened the support systems."

Adam held back a snort. Weakened? It seemed like it was COMMON for a Rick to deconstruct and harvest their own premade lab construct components instead of just MANUFACTURING new material and parts for their projects.

Because it was faster. Lazy bastards!

Fucking hell, half the [[Harvested]] material Sarah was stealing from this Rick's stash was just stupidly powerful psionic components and enhancers, allowing the owning Rick to slightly warp reality to make his equipment and products work as needed… Rather than bother to fucking build it RIGHT! Damn it all.

His Jumper's adorable daughter seemed surprised. "What!? Rebuild the HOUSE!? But how? The kids need treatment first!"

Sarah waved it off. "Those healing pods are portable, have their own power sources and several protective systems installed and activated. They would be fine even if we pushed them out into space or into the mess out there, no. The issue here is US."

She pointed out the open garage door, past the damaged U.F.O. style vehicle that Morty probably returned in. "None of that stuff is good for this house's defenses. I'm going to build a new facility, probably one that flys, and either duplicate this home on it or make something better."

Beth seemed hesitant. "I… Alright. If that would keep the kids safe, I guess? But would you even have time? Or materials?"

Sure. Making new homes was easy because the other Ricks ensured that most Beths lived in the same locations and in houses that shared the same style for convenience sake if nothing else… So automated and mass produced 'Fix the home before Beth finds out' devices were common. Hell, there had been two [[Harvested]] already just from looting!

Sarah grinned. "We got some time, more than enough… The real question should be 'Is there anything you want to change or improve?' Think about it, while I get this done. Or we can do it with the kids!"

The lab coat swished as she began to pace! "It can be a family project! Because I'm first going to duplicate this place, move the kids over to the undamaged and reinforced floating home for safety, then safely get rid of THIS deathtrap before something explodes… And then we can talk together about what kind of new place to set up for a more long term solution."

Beth hesitated… But Sarah's girl was made of strong stuff. "Right. And I know Summer wanted more closet space, and Morty has always been at that awkward age where he really wants privacy."

Poor bastard was nearly a tradable commodity to help mentally damaged mad scientist grandfathers escape each other's murder attempts, of COURSE he would love some alone time. Though he probably wanted solitude for masterbation, the family was oddly open about sexual stuff with each other… Maybe a cultural issue? Or Adam and Sarah were just prudish?

Anyway, let's organize this mess for Sarah to review!

<<I suggest, since the other family members except Morty don't know about the underground facilities, we just scrap all that. Use the space to put some material and electrical generation that is self contained AND not reliant on this Jump's customized environment to function… It would be harder for other Rick's to scan and detect that way.>>

Sarah was already happily designing with Beth, not really realizing how tenderly she looked at the girl or the 'learning to ride a bike' feel of the situation. Though her daughter clearly recognized it and was managing to enjoy some 'Father Daughter Time' as they modeled new homes, discussed ship or floating island designs, and argued about what kind of equipment would be reasonable to embed in someone's ribcage.

Idly, Adam took a few breaks while the automated systems continued to help his Jumper clean out 'her' garage and laboratory. Might as well scan the rest of the house and ensure lots of food, toiletries, clean clothing ([[Harvested]] and replaced, but close enough) and so on.

It would all get recycled later as new, NON-Irradiated versions were moved to the future island house… But at least Adam could make sure the home was put in order to keep the mother's stress level's down while watching over her kids and interacting with her new female Dad.

Hang on... What was this? A room filled with liquidized extracted memories in a secured underground bunker!?

Oh, 'Research' was going to love this! Yoink!

 

[theaceoffire]

Summer slowly woke up due to the current. The strange green fluid that… She had been floating in? It was draining away and a harness she didn't remember putting on was holding her up.

At least this mess seemed to not stick or stain anything. Not that it mattered THAT much, this outfit was a mess and unsalvageable BEFORE it began melting into her skin.

Sluggishly, she looked at her… Perfectly fine hands. Hell, old marks and scars and stuff were fixed too, AND her nails looked fabulous! Almost like they were recently through a mani-pedi!

Grandpa really COULD do anything!

Then the world was warm hugs. "Oh baby! I was so WORRIED about you two!"

Her mom pulled back, carefully helping her step out of the strange device. "Dad said you will be hungry and a bit out of it mentally for another hour or so, but you are fully healed and mostly back to normal."

Summer stumbled slightly. Mostly? No, more important. "Is Morty alright?" The melting flesh, the burned bones, the frantic whimpers and tears…

Mom carefully led her to a table she didn't remember, helping her into a chair. "He's out of danger, but Dad wants to make sure there isn't any mental damage before letting him out of his healing pod."

Huh. She blinked at an odd sight of a neighbor working on another big mechanical tube thing over in the corner. "Ms. Bellum? What are YOU doing here!?"

Mom paused as Ms. Bellum turned around… Oh. Damn. The sexier-than-remembered 'old' woman blinked. "Ms. Bellum?"

Mom also looked shocked. "Oh my… You know Dad, you DO look like that athletic older woman two blocks over near the bus station. Better health and amazing hair, but… Huh."

Wait. "Dad? You mean she is Grandpa!?"

Mom pushed some amazing smelling cheddar cheese eggs and caramelized peaches onto her plate. "Basically, our Grandpa… Didn't make it out of the explosion. This version of Dad saw we were in trouble and came to save us."

The draw of food helped her refocus. "Huh. Well, turning into that onion was still stranger. Thanks Grandpa, for fixing me and helping Morty."

An unusually warm smile crossed her Grandpa's face. "Anytime sweetie. Just make sure to eat a lot, you had to recover from some pretty heavy injuries and need the calories."

Considering how hard it was to eat while being treated? Oh yeah!

She dug into the feast of food, pulling bacon and the gravy closer for round two once this dish was clean.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah sighed. THERE was the stupid name drawback. 'Sarah Bellum.' Just lovely. A pun.

Adam was snickering. <<Honestly it's less offensive than being Sarah BoobMonster or something. Isn't this drawback based on that guy, Principle Vagina? You could have been Sarah DickFarter or worse.>>

She was NOT going to encourage more pun related conversation. "Right, while Summer gets some food into her we need to go over your conversation with Morty Beth. Here's the words I need you to say while he is hooked up to my sensors."

Little Beth blinked as she examined the word phrases. "Analysis Mode? Administrative Lockdown? What ARE these things?"

Cheat codes for lazy Ricks to 'fix' Mortys in the field without consequences. "Some are embedded codes to deactivate or modify decoy families or clones, others are implanted commands to ensure proper medical care, a few are protective measures against mental hazards that we could run into while exploring. Even I had those before I fixed myself."

And not just because she was a mutated clone. MOST Ricks had some triggers set up to ensure memory deadening and other messed up methods to handle sadness without actually addressing the real issues.

Cleaning those out had been a bitch AND emotionally draining. "Not all of these will apply, and none of them are able to activate from the way I wrote the list, but just to be safe? Only read the words there in that order. My scanners will detect if those restrictions and alterations are applied to our Morty and I can disable them safely."

More like do minor brain surgery and use Plasmids to repair the damage. Sigh. Without 'Enhance Self' this would be SO much harder.

As Beth went to talk to the half awake Morty, Sarah sat near Summer. "So champ, here's the plan for today! Because this house isn't built for the damaging environment we are currently enduring, I'm going to have to replace this place with a new setup. Something safe and able to give all of us time to recover and make sure there are no long term side effects."

The girl rolled her eyes even as she drank deep of her orange juice. "Just give me more closet space this time. LAST time when the house blew up you promised to help out and forgot entirely during the rebuild."

More like that Rick probably didn't bother to modify the default repair module settings. "Nothing else? I can make your room bigger, change your personal bathroom layout, add a minor ship dock for your ride…"

Her eyes lit up! "Oh my god! I get my OWN ship!? I've had my learner's permit FOREVER and Mom never has time to let me borrow the car!"

Sarah chuckled as she pushed the bagels and cheese spreads closer to the ravenous child. "All the family members will have a basic ship, for emergencies like this where escape is needed. I'm also going to be adding some emergency portal connections in the basement to mostly safe destinations if the dimension ever comes under risk."

And THERE was the pout. "So I can't take joy rides or anything? Lame."

Sarah chuckled. "Oh come on Summer! How often do I follow the rules to begin with? That's just what I told your mom so she won't argue so much about me installing the thing." Her eyes narrowed. "That said, if your ship leaves orbit it WILL be considered an emergency and you WILL be tracked so we can recover you later. A bit of planetary flight and fun is one thing, but there is some real danger out there that can cause problems before I could get involved."

She gulped. "Ah. I understand Grandpa."

Good girl. "That's my grandkid! Now, just before waking up I made a few alterations for your own safety."

And Summer's eyes got suspicious RIGHT quick. "You didn't make me able to turn into a car like Morty, did you? Or something equally as odd?"

Shit, forgot about that. And it wasn't really a car, more a species transformation into a creature that heavily RESEMBLED earth vehicles… Damn it Rick had been badly drunk that day. "No. Nothing like that."

A display popped up with her treatment features. "As part of your recovery, I ensured that you are stronger mentally, that your body will treat any attempts to alter or change itself as methods to improve yourself rather than allow injury or mutations, and that in general you are stronger, more resilient, and hopefully better able to avoid danger."

She pointed at her chest. "However, I DID include a device synced to your mind. Say or think 'menu' while wishing to see your hologram."

Summer seemed… More than a bit overwhelmed. "Uh… Menu?" Nothing happened. "Menu." THAT time her eyes flashed as false data was fed to her mind directly, creating the illusion of holographic displays. Good.

Sarah grinned! "Right, this is sort of like your new phone, messaging device, hacking equipment, and emergency beacon and portal targeting designator. If you are hurt it is able to apply basic medical treatment, if kidnapped we can find you, and if trapped it is able to put you in a coma like state and preserve you until we get you out without forcing you to spend eternity trapped somewhere. And other stuff."

Since only Sarah will be leaving this Jump, these command nodes could really take advantage of some of the more strange tech features available in this reality. "It also has a small storage space, only a few dozen meters or so cubed, some of which is reserved for storing your body during an emergency after you are put into a medical stasis and…"

She waved her off. "Yeah yeah, Grandpa. It's a phone, I totally get it. Oh, I can make the windows visible to other people?"

And now hundreds of virtual panels were flashing and closing as his brilliant grandkid explored the help options, all the menu sub categories, had several pages open to the attached database Adam had set up, a holographic keyboard and mouse, and more. Rock music began thumping in the background, which made little Beth roll her eyes in the corner before Sarah limited the sound damping field around the breakfast table.

Damn, that was quick.

She frowned. "How come I can't get a signal? And the internet seems to be down, even if I can still get interdimensional cable."

Sarah winced. Nope, not addressing that right now. "Some local technical issues. How about we just hook you up to a nearly one way feed from other dimensions for THEIR internet? Easy enough to have it translated automatically and set up a multidimensional search engine."

She grinned! "Thanks Grandpa! Even if I can't post comments or whatever, at least I can watch cat videos or something until stuff gets fixed!"

Yeah, the poor kid clearly didn't know how big the followup attack on this planet had been. "After we get Morty awake, the four of us are going to be finishing the design for a new house… So start thinking about cool features you want, alright kiddo?"

Summer waved him off. "Yeah yeah, I got this." She paused, looking at her nails. And pulling her hair forward, seeing how it wasn't shriveled and burnt away anymore. "And… Thanks for coming home Grandpa."

Always. "Anytime, sweetie."

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Morty blinked… And was… The impact? No, something… A failsafe?

It was all confusing. And someone was talking?

"...nd Glorf33. Subject Decon Testing Mode Alpha. Open Binary Access Hatch. Deflect Mental Construct. Organ Access Modules 03. Suspend Primary Simulation. Convert Subject State: Test. Flood Cognizant…"

Oh. Was that Mom? Wasn't he supposed to warn her about something?

"...ble Back Indexing. Forward Indention Index Subtables. Break Concealment Zones 4. Conspire Codes: 3884. Destabilize Encoding Matrix Subroutines 4 and 8. Enable Yongf Mode. Attend Subject, Rise for your Master…Really? What the hell Dad. Sigh. Onto the next page."

If she was here, then he must have told her. If ANY of them were still alive, he had made it in time.

"...trapolate Every Process. By my Ricks Combined… Bullshit. How many of these stupid phrases are from old television shows? Hey Sarah, are these even real!?"

"Hopefully not, that's why we are checking."

Was that Ms. Bellum? Maybe the emergency destructive cascade HADN'T gone off!

With a peaceful mind, he fell back into half slumber as his mother's voice continued a rambling but comforting litany of random words and mild complaints about something or other.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Thankfully, after a bathroom break, Summer seemed more than happy to stay with her Mom and Morty while they ensured the boy wasn't mentally compromised. 'Enhance Self' would have eventually fixed those issues ANYWAY, but it was better and emotionally easier to do it now rather than let mental scars tear into place without warning.

For now though. "Right, what's the plan?"

Adam hummed, still examining the design for a new, NOT contaminated home to move the kids over to instead of this mess. <<Grab a psionic sample from your kids and grandkids.>>

Oh, for some customised psionic crystal creation? Expensive for most Ricks, but Sarah had both the Warehouse, Adam, AND lots of toxic material outside to build with. Score!

Easy enough to get started too. "Hey Beth, I know Morty isn't fully recovered yet but could you drink that 'Enhance Self' Tonic I gave you earlier anyway? I'm going to need an hour or two for your psionic field to stabilize before I can collect a recording."

Beth paused. "Oh, that? Yeah, I drank that while you were still looting the lab."

Wait, WHAT!? "But! I hadn't… What if it had been something dangerous! Don't… Don't just trust random stuff a Rick gives you!"

The fond exasperation paused her rant. "Dad, you earned my trust by showing up to help. By the care you showed my children, that you normally only seemed to tolerate at best. That was more than enough."

She looked away, swigging from her flask out of habit. "Yeah well… Thanks, honey." Psionic scans recorded and sent.

Adam hummed. <<Seed psionic crystal formations will be established in three minutes, accelerated growth stabilized in an hour, reserves built up around a half hour after that.>>

So they would have personalized psionic crystal shards for construction after less than two hours? Damn that was quality shit. "Right, what about mine?"

Data streamed. The glowing blue crystals were already stockpiling high. <<As soon as we [[Harvested]] the first psionic fragment, I saw it was basically a psionic form of Materia. It was added to the material generation systems within minutes… Just didn't have any stable psionic field frameworks from the family to start THEIR variations yet.>>

Seeing confusion, she grinned at her family. "My personal system is WAY beyond what most Ricks have to work with. I can talk to him directly and he works with me like a partner, it's how I was able to escape the… Situation… From before I came here."

Summer blinked. "Like how your car can sass and stuff?"

Uh. "Maybe. One second."

[[Harvest.]]

Yep, there was a mind in there. In that crappy body, built from near garbage. Yeah, Sarah could do better than that. "Apparently, yes. I'm building her a MUCH better body though… In fact, she's going to be our new home. No reason to force our future house to blow up with planets when things go wrong, if the whole place can just leave WITH us."

Adam hummed. <<Storing her away for now, having 'Research' design some software patches to secure some built in security flaws, enhance her mental stability, and improve her ability to interface with materials and systems remotely.>>

Sarah began using visible holograms from her own chest portal orb/command node. "An outer layer of Silicon Bronze because of it's non-magnetic and corrosive resistant properties, yet still able to easily conduct heat… A few converters to ensure that heat doesn't reach levels that will damage the hull… Barriers to prevent heat being leached from the lower hull…"

The defensive fields would ensure the needed aerodynamic shapes during flight, so no need to require this new 'spaceship' to follow standard conventions. "Seven thorium orbs for basic power, a few material converters and energy to mass transformers for raw material collection. Some material synthesisers and automated construction factories… Wait, no. Better have a protective layer here, along with some signal diffusers and false reaction emitters."

Sarah reshaped it so the one directional heat transfer would get converted into power, as would vibrations like sound or impact. That energy would be fed through some explosive ablative capacitors, ones that would easily pop off if overloaded and prevent surges of power from making it within the Beryllium Copper shell (NOTHING would be magnetic if she could avoid it), a layer of impact absorbing fluid cells and dispersal material, ANOTHER protective shell of reinforced materials… And there we go!

She grinned. "Right, a plant farm orb and a backup, to automatically grow and harvest food for our needs… Hmm. Some automated repair robots and farmer bots with mental restrictions to prevent the creation of life and I could easily set up some automated animal and plant/animal hybrid farms…"

It would be a small box like the one for the circuit breakers. A grid of orbs, providing power, mass, plant matter, ingredients. "It would require around a year to reach stable production rates, and would only power, feed, and provide drinkable water for around two planets around the size of Earth with this design… Not sure how much of the generated material would be used, I personally use so much of the rare and exotic stuff that it throws all the numbers off."

Right, robotic design would take up a month or so before the two farm orb designs could be finished and put into production. "I can probably make a few hundred of these boxes and store them somewhere with accelerated time to get them fully functional… Too bad I can't risk that level of plan acceleration for my personal projects, but the dangers of infinite consumption nanomachines that endeavour to reach optimum efficiency is too tricky to try."

When Rick accessed one of the accelerated worlds, it had life spawn nearly without warning… Giving an unvouched species access to one of THESE orbs? No.

Sarah was pulled from her thoughts half way through designing the internal ship design full of automation and lots of light generating plants and environmentally purifying moss subspecies when her daughter tapped something. "It's lovely Dad, but… It's not home."

Beth moved her schematic closer to the ship, using her daughter's command node holograms. Apparently Summer found out how to allow others to interact with her system with a guest account… Kids and electronics, seriously.

Her little Beth pointed at her design. "I changed my room a bit, gave Morty and Summer more space, and I approve of the escape space vehicles… But I still want it to look like home. Not just… A defensive war machine like that."

Sarah blinked. "I'm… what? No, your design is perfect! I have no problem with it. No, my work isn't supposed to be your house."

Morty was still being treated, but both Beth and Summer blinked. ""What?""

She nodded, expanding the schematic. "All this is going to be underground. A safety bunker and supply resource so that your home won't need local water, electricity, clean air, garbage disposal methods, sewage lines, and so forth."

Sarah pulled up more data. "Not every dimension is safe for us to interact with, and I don't want to risk some strange additive to the local water supply or something, like how some Earth's add fluoride or Korkle jam to their waters. Sure, the locals are used to it… But even if both of the kids can safely drink near anything now after my treatments, I want you to be able to trust the home's water and food supply without issue."

Back to the new ship. "This design can harvest material from below to dig into the ground, land the house there, and ensure any intercepted power, water, sewage, gas, and other pipes and lines are marked, connected to, and monitored. It will cause an outage when we land, and certainly not work when we LEAVE, but it SHOULD ensure no dips or spikes in the local resource network when our home moves about."

Sarah continued utilizing the massive town size structure. "I'm using some psionic shenanigans, the same tricks that allow me to hide stupid amounts of mechanical weaponry and tools inside my fairly thin arms and body, to compress this space down to the footprint of our home when we land somewhere. But on worlds like this one? Where there ARE no neighbors and we have lots of space to work with? Yeah."

The scale showed Beth and the kids next to the enormous lower hull. "THAT mess will be able to safely land in acid, plasma, liquid or solidified gas near absolute zero, a stellar corona, even on Canadian soil without issue! And that is BEFORE the protective fields and anti-portal shimmer and so on and so forth. With the material redirection grid coating this mess, at full defensive defcon the house would laugh off most situations."

The top metal plates retracted, showing Beth's new home rising up and the panels flipping over to show a perfectly mowed lawn with biologically enhanced grass. "All the comforts and history of home, but it can be safely packed away and taken with us when needed!"

Summer frowned. "I didn't get ALL of that, but what was that about there being no neighbors?"

Fuck. "Basically, once we are in space with the house it can fully expand without damaging nearby property." The non-existent nearby property.

Beth gave her a knowing eye roll. So she was bad at the emotional stuff! How the hell was she supposed to tell the child that most of the world was gone!?

Thankfully, the woman was a genius. "Summer sweetie, you know how dangerous home is becoming even BEFORE those people started trying to hunt down your Grandpa and Morty. Sarah here helped us move the home to a temporary planet with lots of valuable but dangerous material outside so we can get everything fixed up and healed before finding a new place to live."

Damn, his daughter was a genius.

Summer grumbled. "Fine, I guess. Bruce Chutback wasn't exactly boyfriend material in the end anyway and it was hard to keep my friends close when those aliens blew up the football field. You know what? Fine!"

She stood tall! "I'm going to go to RULE high school this time! A new world, a new Summer! Boo-yah!"

Sarah winced. "Ah. School. Really not worth it."

Beth sighed, moving the schematics she was examining off to the side. "Dad, we talked about this."

She waved it off. "No, no, I mean... How do I put this." Don't mention that most Ricks don't think schooling is worth it because the kids die so often and have to be replaced. "Would you agree that even at the top of their fields, your children won't learn about galactic history? Or truely advanced material? Most Earth's barely reach the moon, and half the time it is due to me leaving my notes somewhere when high or passed out."

She took a cleansing breath and huffed from her nose. "Dad."

Sarah held her hands up! "I'm not saying don't let the kids socialize or anything! I… Well, even if the topics WERE important to their futures, I don't trust public school systems to teach to the highest levels. It gets worse based on location and ethnicity and species bias and a dozen other things. Not to mention some classes like language and history can be vastly different from dimension to dimension."

Her daughter paused… And sighed. "And what would you suggest? Don't think I missed you taking a sip from your flask earlier. I won't accept one of those 'brilliant' ideas you sometimes find at the bottom of one."

Ohh, snarky! Heh. "No, this isn't my normal mind warping juice. I improved my body to easily handle alcohol and other stimulants in a non-damaging and mentally stable way… This stuff is strictly for taste now." Which was MUCH better with never having hangovers again.

Beth blinked. "Wait, really? Give me that."

The woman sniffed the drink. "Huh." And took a sip. "Damn, that is amazing!"

Because Adam is a champ and picked it since Beth was nearby. "Homemade Sangria. A red wine mixed with orange juice, brandy, some granulated sugar to take the edge off, some apple, orange, blueberries and strawberries… And some seltzer."

He handed her a glass and she poured more liquid into the thing than the flask should be able to hold. "Huh. And it comes out chilled too?"

His daughter took a swig. "No really, I may need some of this for uh. Future comparisons. To other drinks you may or may not be having."

Seeing young Summer pout Sarah grinned and filled a separate glass. "Your mom probably won't let you have the real stuff until you are older than seventeen, but try some Virgin Cranberry Basil Sangria. Still pretty tasty."

His granddaughter snagged the chilled glass… And froze, before trying to look calm and reserved. "Well, I suppose I should TRY a bit, if just to spare your feelings Grandpa."

Sarah couldn't get a word in before Summer was drinking it down though. "Oh… Yeah, this makes lemonade seem pretty pathetic. Can I get one of those special flasks, but just for stuff like this?"

Huh? Sure, no problem. <Adam, one of the non-alcoholic prototypes? Thanks.> "Here you go."

Right! "So my plan here…"

Beth was distracted by how Adam kept changing the alcoholic drinks from the flask as she refilled the thing, ensuring each new flavor complimented the last one and the alcoholic quality and content and varieties worked seamlessly through the process.

Well. Uh. "My plan…"

Summer was crunching on the ice in her drink refill, while Morty was half asleep as his body was being enhanced by the Tonics.

So no one was really paying attention.

Beth also MIGHT be drinking a bit heavily, as the only one besides Sarah to know that everyone else here had actually died rather than this world being a new planet entirely. Crud.

Oh well. "I'll bring it up later. Maybe we should all get some sleep." And when Beth finally was put in her bed, Sarah could easily embed her command node for personal use. And apply the other Tonics, since that would be easy enough to do and keep her little girl safe.

As for the school replacement plan, Sarah personally thought the kids would be alright educationally with a few Tonics containing technical data covering topics being collected by Adam… Though she would probably have to wait until Beth woke up to get permission first. Best be safe.

Her daughter SHOULD be fine with it though, right? After all, the doses would only contain modified memories with all sorts of basic information that would help a lot in any school system, nothing extreme!

Some mathematics, simple formulas, critical thinking skills, a few mental tricks for memorization of rote facts which should come in handy... Especially since half the school classes that Sarah knew about only BOTHERED with fact memorization most of the time.

Plus, why not add a few extras?

Maybe a bunch of engineering and biological data. And some stuff about psionics and… A few more odds and ends. Some portal science, a few memories about material sciences… Uh. A few basic dimensional databases about some species and customs and a bunch of language translation matrices.

Yeah, it should be fine.

She'd bring it up again after Beth woke up sober with her new enhancements and equipment, and after Summer crashed into slumber from this oncoming sugar high.

Thank GOODNESS 'Enhance Self' would prevent dehydration and blood sugar issues, or these women would be REALLY cranky later!

 

[theaceoffire]

Sarah was not freaking out.

The new house design just needed some modifications. These sections would have weaker materials, on purpose, so that if heavy damage occurred and the structure fractured, she could ensure WHERE the pieces would catastrophically fail. And plan for it.

She wasn't ignoring Adam. He was busy anyway, indexing something from the basement [[Harvest.]]

Having a thorium orb for each power outlet wasn't overkill, right? Sure one of these things had lots of self operating nuclear reactors inside it, each one able to produce over a gigawatt of power and theoretically run over 750,000 average homes… Or in other words, supply energy needs for over 57 average cities per power plant.

But what if someone else needed their OWN power outlet and uh… Or…

Adam sighed. <<Yeah, you're over engineering this shit now. What's wrong, Sarah?>>

She held back her screech. "You saw Morty's data? The 'adaption' protocols?"

He hummed, showing the related information. <<The method used for him to convert into a car like species?>>

Sarah glared at the data. "I just thought he had some advanced cybernetics, some nanotechnology and some biological adaptors and stuff. But no."

Because THAT would have been silly but within the character of Rick.

Instead, it was something more frustrating. "Ricks had gotten so frustrated healing up and 'standardizing' the local Mortys that they modified his genetics with other Morty's biological profiles."

Not that most Ricks bothered to examine their Morty. Was this one modified like this knowingly? As part of the healing process? Who knows.

Adam sent emotional peace as he gently sent the 'enhanced' home schematics over to construction for queue processing. <<You got the command nodes installed in the family?>>

Yeah. Aside from the technical benefits of having a psionically bound supercomputer attached to one's conceptual being, just the ability to internally generate and apply serums would drastically improve their survivability. "The Plasmids won't work."

And THAT caught her off guard. Something about this Jump made Tonics and serums MORE efficient, more powerful… But caused active individual psionic frameworks to become impermanent and quickly degrade. It caused the 'Enhance Self' Tonic to dismantle most Plasmids near instantly just to keep the user safe.

So no levitation or teleportation for her family just yet.

Adam hummed. <<At least the command node network is working?>>

Something similar to the Symbiote network from FF7, from the Planetary Network. As the command nodes grew in power and complexity with their users they would share enhancements with all the OTHER command nodes for self improvement and to enhance their owners.

Hopefully it would be enough. "What should I do with Morty? His mind's been… damaged."

Adam shrugged. <<Ensure each family member gets a hive mind module in the command node, add a lesser connected 'Smith Family' hive mind that helps encourage psionic stability and recovery, and our personal connections to both will handle most of his issues.>>

True. "That would let the future saved family members better connect with the others. Avoid them from getting lost as more individuals get saved and so forth."

He hummed. <<But let's not give Jerry a hive mind. He married into the Sanchez family line, he's not as connected to the foundation of this dimensional cluster mess like the others.>>

Sarah flinched HARD at the idea of Jerry getting a unified hive mind with himselves. "Yeah! Uh. To prevent issues since the dimensional filtration methods are so focused on the Ricks."

Shit, the idea of Jerry being MORE Jerry was… No. Sarah was not far enough from being Rick to pretend THAT was an acceptable idea.

Sorry Beth, your husband was NOT someone getting all this mess. Especially since most of them were artificially connected to you by asshole Ricks who needed to breed more Mortys.

Hell, half the time she stayed in that terrible relationship because she wanted a stable family life for the kids or Jerry was… No.

Sarah wasn't going to be a dick about this, but she ALSO wasn't going to give the man enhancements like the rest. He can have a phone or something instead of psionic command nodes.

The mental image of Jerry accidentally or PURPOSEFULLY betraying the rest of the family due to incompetence, fear, or actual spite? The fact that 'Research' implied it was not only possible but LIKELY with little (And sometimes NO) instigation or provocation?

Yeah, no. Jerry was divorced from the local Beth for a REASON, and that was AFTER Sarah's daughter was probably forced to have kids with the man.

Change topic! "What about the car thing? The genetic instability that was encouraged to allow easier species change and the database of 'Morty Templates' to ensure easier insertion in case of death?"

Adam hummed. <<Give him psionic control over the process, let him modify his forms to a low degree that won't increase genetic issues, and basically make it a super power. Kids love super powers.>>

Yeah. Yeah! She would be the COOL Grandpa that not only saved his family BUT turned that odd 'transformed into a vehicle due to puberty' glitch into something helpful and awesome! "Too bad we can't just let little Beth and Summer have the same abilities."

Adam hummed. <<Eventually, maybe? But yeah, it's only possible due to the insane amount of cloning, genetic exploration, and unethical testing Mortys go through over who knows how many decades. But at the very least we can let the rest of the family alter their OWN template to some extent without issue. Hair styles, coloring, maybe a tiny bit of height and volume modification…>>

Sarah pulled up the data. "No massive shifts though, it could cause genetic collapse or worse. Let's build some self analysis units for the command nodes and enforce safety guidelines."

Eventually it WOULD let Summer get larger or smaller boobs or grow a tail or something, but let's ensure a maximum rate cap of body modification, some limits about max height and width and minimum limits and… Yeah. Let the command node calculate how long each change would take, ensure the process would stall if there wasn't enough food and nutrients, that the diagnostic modules would inform the user about what was needed for the process to continue…

Sarah barely blinked when the mental alert went off. "What, already!?" Morty was still recovering, Beth's body was adapting to her new Tonics and the recent surgical addition of her personal command node, and Summer was… Well, she should be sleeping but she was actually texting on her bed.

Whatever, wasn't this too fast!?

Adam was already opening the new portal a few miles away for the Multiple Residence for Smiths (Version 1.000, open for business!) <<Yeah, well… I was building the thing the entire time you were designing it. Since it is modular it was easy enough to upgrade whatever parts you changed except for the big stuff, like when you decentralized the matter and power generation orbs and when you added the self modification nanites and the production facility.>>

Sarah blinked. "But I couldn't figure out how to get the little buggers to the damaged locations. Had to give up on it."

He sent a very odd design. <<Basically modified the uncertainty patterns from the last Jump to be more like an artery system. Some security measures added to ensure no gas transfer or liquid injections, a few more to attack unregistered nanomachines and nanites, and the MRS's psionc field will handle the other issues like repair order and expansion and so forth.>>

Sarah blinked at the large matrices of Beth, Morty, and Summer psionic crystal threads woven in the massive grids of Sarah psionic material, the entire mess soaked in unaligned liquid energy serum.

Adam pointed at sections. <<With the psionic crystals interacting through the energy serum, the entire home will not only be able to improve itself in a way that better protects each of our family members, but the mess will better bind with the artificial intelligence we harvested from Rick's ship.>>

She pulled up the still activating and new Space Cruiser, now the MRS V1.000. "Did you make sure to clean her code first? I know that, aside from the hidden crap most Ricks dumped in there, THIS one was heavily damaged before we [[Harvested]] her."

Adam showed the change long. <<Shifted most of the data into the new memory modules, redesigned her processors and systems to be easily replaced, upgraded, and resistant to damage, have several backup and restore features, her own hive mind unit, her own command node orbs, so on and so forth. It was needed for her to better handle the most catastrophic scenarios, like breaking up or having pods escape… And it will ensure she survives things most ships couldn't.>>

Good. "Keep me informed after she finishes initialization procedures, but for now during the startup process activate the blending procedure, move Beth and the kids over after getting them cleaned and scanned one more time, and then [[Harvest]] me and this house."

After all, she had been in quite the mad scientist mindset to avoid going insane with rage at what damage her grandson had gone through. Rebuilding her body AGAIN had been a fun side project, and there was no reason NOT to include the improvements designed and modified from helping her family.

Plus, when she eventually left… It would be helpful to have some embedded command nodes and portal orbs in this Avatar, and those would be enhanced greatly when she added a thorium orb and the matter generator orb. Not to mention the designed conversion orb and construction orb, that could accept the power and matter and turn that into useful materials and build with them using the construction orb's robotic factory with all those psionically controlled manipulators and tools.

Absently, Sarah wondered if having her command node surrounded by the portal, thorium, matter, conversion, and construction orbs would have future thaumaturgical consequences, since the five chest orbs and the two additional portal orbs in her wrists added up to seven.

Meh. It should be fine.

Right, send the family over to the new home that WASN'T trying to collapse and now to scan everything over HERE and get rid of this entire, irradiated mess of a place. The contamination issues were real, seriously.

[[Phase Pierce.]]

Target the home, a lot of the ambient area, a good chunk of that amazingly valuable irradiated planetary sludge with chaotic psionic potential… And!

[[Harvest.]]

The new pit slowly filled up with liquified planet at impossible temperatures.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Morty felt… Light.

Aches and pains, old scars and tight skin, those eye issues that never seemed to be fixed quite right after he nearly lost half his skull to a near miss, all of it.

Calm.

Something was… Different. A side effect of his many adventures, Morty had built up a second sense when it came to danger, to value, to risk, to safety. He HAD to, or he would have died years ago!

And something about his location had shifted powerfully.

That vague feeling of safety, of home… It used to be a thin mist, a feeling. That back of mind thought that said, mom is nearby. Summer is angry about something. Rick is looking for someone.

But now?

Now it was almost a choir singing.

A strain he had never noticed relaxed.

He could feel his sister, Summer, was safe. And amused. And fascinated. And wandering around [[Home.]]

He could feel his mother. Sleeping. Grieving… But somehow also at peace? As if some internal hurt was being healed. She was somehow becoming more herself.

And someone, a star, so similar to his Rick that it would be easy to mistake the two if glancing across the street as strangers passed each other by, was so vastly different it clearly was enhanced. Someone more.

This Rick felt… Hurt. And Love. And Pain. And… pride? But not for himself!?

That CERTAINLY wasn't normal.

His mind moved more easily than it should.

Had he been carrying some sort of burden? A heavy load that had been shifted from his worn shoulders?

Thoughts drifted back to the frantic fight. The life and death struggle, another danger on a mountain of fellow flaws and future furrows to follow through, and the tragic end.

Rick had seen they would lose. That their family was to die, as was this world. That the Galactic Federation had finally determined that ending Rick Sanchez was WORTH destroying an entire planet at minimum, an entire history, even if it required actual suicide and activating a device that would genetically destroy anything similar to humanity like a plague.

A weapon that would eventually spread to the stars and, theoretically, to other dimensions Rick tried to escape to. A cost that the non-human Federation leadership was happy to pay, and that their membership was not allowed to protest.

Morty had been sent home, damaged and unable to properly protest, while Rick stayed behind to try and mitigate the fallout. Literally.

The fact that he was currently alive showed that it worked. On some level.

Morty blinked as a holographic display flashed into being… And provided enough light to see where he was. What was going on.

He was in an odd pod of green bubbling liquid. Liquid that somehow was easy and comfortable to breathe without threat of choking or drowning, that seemed to be a balm to the flesh.

And around him were robotic limbs, near artistic in quality and design, with numerous attachments and tools that were likely responsible for his amazing recovery.

Oh jeez Rick, when did you make something THIS impressive?

He could almost TASTE the old man's involvement. While higher quality and of better material than anything Morty was used to, he could see design habits and aesthetic choices true to most of Rick's work.

Again, normally it was more influenced by Rick being drunk or high and him having accidentally grabbed a ham sandwich at some point instead of the wrench (And getting it to work ANYWAY, because why the hell not), but it was recognizable.

But… Not his Rick. This felt… Less terrified.

Rick had recently gained an edge to his work. A fear he tried to hide from everyone, an issue he was trying to fix that was clearly cutting into his time. Possibly this whole event, honestly.

THIS creation had no minute blood stains from frantic work. No overly sharp or badly welded sections. Something more precise. More efficient.

Still, he could feel his family was safe… And much safer than expected. Healthier too, they both were not only very easy to sense but somehow… More sturdy? More settled?

If only he could know more.

<<Alert! User 'Morty Smith' has reached the required level of consciousness. Initializing setup.>>

Morty blinked.

Uh. What?

Command Node Setup: V01.443
~Initializing Modules
~~External Sensor Network, Passive Mode.
~~Internal Sensor Network, Activated.
~~Memory Units, Indexing.
~~Nanite Production, Building Reserves.
~~Recovery Systems, Activated.
~~~Tonic Monitoring, Enabled.
~~~Serum Production, Standby.
~~~Nanite Distribution, Ongoing.
~~Subdimensional Storage, Enabled.
Connecting to Morty Hive: V01.001
~Defenses Enabled.
~Network Established.
Connecting to Smith Hive: V01.004
~Defenses Enabled.
~Network Established.

Morty blinked as something s̫̳̬͈̰h͍͖̱i̦͚̯̞f̠̠̼͕͓̜̬ṯ̲e͚̭̝͓͓d̫̞̝͎̤̟.

The light vanished as the visual display somehow shifted to internal systems, though Morty wasn't sure how to explain that sudden information or how he knew it.

An instinct that seemed more than natural flickered in his mind.

[[Menu.]]

And he suddenly saw m͖̺̯̠͕̱o̘̲̫̦̳̥̜rͅẹ.

Even as he began moving through the options, he could feel it altering itself to be more and more understandable. As if what he expected was shifting to what was there, or visa versa. With a thought, configurations shifted and changed and the various windows and displays flickered into a much more calming and relaxing gold color rather than the normal toxic green.

Data flowed like rivers in his mind as he paused.

He could change his body? No, he could change his species AND his body. To enormous degrees, and from what he could feel? With little to no consequences or problems, with minor exceptions for ensuring he had enough nutrients and adequate conversion time.

A much calmer and vastly faster mind began flickering through the data, and stumbled on the logs. Data that covered personal changes, that listed local issues, that listed the local Rick… Huh?

Why was Rick a hot woman!? And why did she look like Ms. Bellum!?

Oh jeez Rick! You can't do this to a guy!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Summer Smith was inside the underground hallways of Mrs. Ship. This new home was supposed to be called MRS Version 'lots of numbers' or something, but the spaceship sounded like a woman and the name worked too well to avoid using it. "So you don't know?"

Mrs. Ship sighed from the nearest communication modules that dotted the cool underground hallways. "I remember Rick enabling sanctum protocols and sending a very injured Morty home with me. We got hit a few times on the way back, which didn't help the boy as he was already hurt, and certainly didn't help ME considering how damaged my shielding was by that point…"

It was neat how much MORE alive the ship sounded than she did back as a more 'normal' unidentified flying saucer/car/beer run machine. "I'm glad you got home, Morty… He was pretty bad when we got to him."

The next hallway seemed to open into a garden? Huh. Smelled nice, and seemed far larger than any 'room' in this underground network should be, but that was Grandpa for you.

Ship hummed. "I… Well, I had opinions. We should have left weeks ago, you know."

Summer was in firm denial about the planet blowing up, THANK you. It hadn't taken her long playing with her command node to find the data about what had happened to her home, but her brother and mom were safe and she was going to freak out LATER.

This seemed more like a plantation than a garden, but at least the fake sunlight felt amazing and there was none of that dangerous material floating in the air like outside.

Still, a morbidly curious part of her wanted to know. "Weeks?"

Mrs. Ship sent her node data that was easy to pull up. "We detected SOMETHING going on, but it wasn't enough to convince Beth to give up her job and move the family. She just assumed that Rick was having a paranoia episode combined with one of his drunk binges."

Something hurt inside. "She… Mom?" She ignored something that led to THIS!?

More data. "Rick didn't have enough data, and well... He WAS having a bad time at the same moment and honestly it SHOULD have been a paranoia episode. Basically it boiled down to 'We should flee Earth and I don't know why', and it is something he's said to Beth before. Been wrong over half the time too."

The feeling eased as Summer relaxed slightly. "What was different THIS time?"

An image. "A Rick from another dimension fled HIS Galactic Federation into this one, and an agent managed to follow him through. Stayed alive long enough to send an emergency report to OUR Galactic Federation, and well... That was enough data to get this attack approved."

So it was… Just, what? "Bad luck?"

A sigh. "Most of the time, Rick can easily handle issues like this. He DOES handle situations this bad fairly regularly… But it can get a bit odd when more Ricks get involved with each other. Certain defenses act a bit off, some data collection modules have issues. It's normally not a big deal, and it never was a high priority issue to fix until this situation came up."

Well.. Shit.

No, worry about that later. Focus, Summer. "How big is this room?"

Mrs. Ship sent more data. "Not large, a few thousand square acres?"

What?

The map expanded. "Honestly those little plant production rooms are all identical, you should go back to the main hallway and visit my garden spot! I got Sarah's permission to set up all kinds of stuff, and Adam made sure meat people like you won't explode from diseases or pollen or something."

How big WAS this place!? "Right. Uh…"

Was this ship like Grandpa's moveable lab basements? Or just a dimension connected to a portal? And who was Adam? Wait, no. More important. "Can we go back to the plants that could have exploded me please?"

The ship huffed. "I said it's handled, even if you have allergies or rickets or whatever humans catch all the time you should be safe!" The grumbling was real. "The list of things organic people die from is nearly endless! You all need some good sturdy hulls and some radiation absorbing paint layers, honestly."

The floating windows shifted as she tried to look up… Well, any of this. "Right, so don't worry about people popping plants. Got it. Now, who is Adam?"

As the ship explained how Grandpa had a super advanced computer outside of space and time, one that helped ensure Mrs. Ship was able to grow and protect herself even against future Ricks entirely, Summer came to a disturbing issue. "Hang on."

The mechanical vehicle paused. "Yes?"

Shit. "Which way is it to the entrance!? I should have gotten back by now!"

A holographic arrow showed… WAY to the right. Summer wasn't even CLOSE to heading the right direction.

God damn it, more walking. "Sorry, continue?"

At least the company was nice.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Beth woke up… Sober?

No headache AT ALL.

Huh. "Dad?"

A flicker and suddenly her silver haired female father was in the room. "Ah! Good Morning dear! How are you feeling?"

What? "Good?"

The silver haired attractive version of Ms. Bellum nodded. "Right, best check the logs."

Huh? "The Logs?"

And suddenly [[Data!]]

Beth sighed. "Dad, we have RULES about elective surgery in this household."

The smug look on her Dad's face didn't match the words. "Oh is that so? Oh no! Welp, I promise I won't do it again unless it is to prevent you from slowly dying due to your son entering the house protection fields while already irradiated with a species destroying biological bomb designed and deployed to end humanity by an overly powerful kingdom or organization."

A pause. Dad raised a finger. "Or similar situations."

Sigh. "Let me read the data, Dad."

The asshole smirked! "Of course dear. I'll go get you breakfast."

At least her new father was being helpful. Right, let's work through this mess.

Later (Felt like hours, but her new internal clock said it was minutes), she leaned back from her bagels and cream cheese. "I honestly expected worse."

Nothing that would set off metal detectors, a method to call for help if something happened in the future, a communication system that wasn't easy to hack or intercept or interrupt. And she certainly felt far more energetic and healthy than she ever had before.

Still. "I'm not super enthusiastic about dumping raw data into the kids brains just to avoid high school."

Sarah snorted. "Then clearly you don't remember high school. But to be fair, MOST people don't. They either get a job where that level of education is over qualified or they go onto college and almost everything from the lower levels isn't super important anymore."

Yeah yeah, she heard Dad's opinion on the education system for years now. "Building social skills is important. Remember how letting me have my own candy world made it difficult for me to relate to others?"

Actually there was a whole MESS of issues with Froopyland.

Repress. Right, move on.

At least that DID make her dad wince. "At least it helped me learn how to define universal rules and artificial existential modifications?"

She raised an eyebrow.

Sarah slumped. "I'm better now. And I'm trying not to create dimensions or worlds or reality clusters with advanced life forms now. Plus, I haven't reset or destroyed one of those since I escaped! That counts for something, right?"

...Sadly enough, it did. "Right, what is your plan then?"

The scientist pulled up data. "Well, I am establishing a series of redundant command nodes inside the Multiple Residence for Smiths. Basically a more flexible and self indexing wikipedia of data that anyone in the Beth, Summer, Morty, or Sarah hive mind can access!"

The what now? Dad continued. "That way everyone can learn what they do normally, but OTHER people who were not there at the time can benefit as well! Eventually it would become something like a massive information gold mine, one that our MRS AI can keep an eye on and offer rewards to any of us who help it grow!"

Nope, hang on. "MRS AI? That's your ship's artificial intelligence now, right?"

A nearby speaker activated. "Correct, Ms. Smith. I'm currently going by Mrs. Ship."

Uh. "Nice to meet you? And one moment." Turning back to a proud looking father, Beth narrowed her eyes. "Dad, what do you mean 'Hive Mind'?"

THERE it was. The slightly confused look that Dad always had when she caught him rewriting reality or changing nature itself and the inability to understand why it was interesting or even an issue.

Sarah blinked. "You know, the hive minds! So that we can better take care of the family!" She pointed at something. "You did read the 'help' section of the menu, right?"

Beth paused… And glanced at the other menu options.

And the 'Help' button.

A mental selection showed her the nearly endless topics and issues and… Oh good grief.

It had taken her forever just to just go through the NORMAL menu options!

Sarah flinched, as something from Beth's expression must have escaped her control. "Ah. Well, um. Should I wait until you look through that first?"

A slow nod. It wasn't her Dad's fault, this was just part of the woman's nature.

The scientist fidgeted. "Good. Good! I'll just… Go get you a drink?" Seeing the glare she raised her hands. "Non-alcoholic! Summer has a whole bunch she loves, maybe you could relax and drink a few while getting a grip on the situation?"

Glancing at the massive list to read… She sighed. "Yes, that would be lovely. Thank you, Sarah."

After all, Beth certainly wasn't going to complain about her dad actually making helpful notes and explanations, even if even the 'simple' and 'basic' stuff reminded her of her late night college cram sessions.

Plus her drink making skills were astounding. "And Dad, thank you for asking BEFORE embedding customized memoires crafted by your artificial intelligence into the children. I promise to review the entire scenario before I make a judgement."

And her dad's face lit up, the woman's happy gray eyes sparkling! "Anything anytime, sweetie! Right, try some of this Egyptian Chamomile Tea, and I'll go rescue Summer from the growth facility she somehow wandered into."

The exasperated mother had already sipped the lovely and hot drink before she froze… And continued. Sarah had already left to handle that situation, and there WERE a lot of documents to read.

Baby steps Beth.

Still. "Mrs. Ship, you'll keep an eye on my girl?"

The warm and somehow familiar voice from the speaker settled some worries. "Of course, Ms. Smith. She would have already returned to the more normal areas of my facilities if she hadn't gone apple picking. And it isn't the acid apples either, these are the normal, safe to eat, not-exploding basic apples."

What? No. "Thank you, Mrs. Ship."

Baby steps.

 

[theaceoffire]

Beth finally found her Dad seven levels down, fifty corridors over, and one tram ride away.

Which was slightly infuriating, because this whole ship (Though very helpful and a bit snarky) seemed to be just big enough for her house and her lawns to sit on top of the thing.

The helpful schematic that Mrs. Ship provided just made things worse, as her mind was actually able to understand some of it. This wasn't exactly dimensional shenanigans, more psionic reality stretching.

And yes, the access to a mental database filling continuously with outside information as part of her being connected to the Smith Hive WAS noticeable, thank you very MUCH Dad.

No, stay calm. He did agree to hold off on memory insertion until they talked, giving her and her children access to a mind controlled super internet and TV and database network was NOT the same thing as stuffing artificial history meant to educate others into brain matter.

It was just… Really accessible tools useful for class. Like that calculation app that was nearly autonomous and synched with her thoughts now, making any math instant and beyond accurate if she even considered something related to the topic.

But at least the content was being labeled and parental filters were possible? Although the reason that was possible was because her kids and the house they were exploring was viewing all the content FIRST to accurately label this mess.

Needless to say, Beth felt slightly exasperated by the time she caught up with her cackling father. "Dad."

The woman twirled, her lab coat far cleaner than standard and her gray eyes sparkling with joy! "Beth baby! Come look at what little Morty put together!"

Her son? "Isn't he still recovering?"

Sarah nodded. "But he is mentally stable enough to not just configure his command node but explore my side project database. Anyway, look at this!"

It was a complicated flat series of panels. "He made his first human to electronic interface system! I mean, sure we are working on improving it now that I can show him how much more intuitive and secure psionic interfaces can be, and the newer versions don't force you to wear an eyepatch or something OR require cranial surgery, but still!"

Beth blinked at the exploding matrix of altered schematics. "Wow… These are fairly elegant!"

An interface flickered.

=Morty: Aw jeez Mom, don't look at my older prototypes! I was barely awake!=
=Summer: Give up dork, you know what Mom is like when it comes to us making stuff.=

Well uh... That was a bit unfair. How did she? Oh, like this.

=Daddy's Little Girl: Now don't sass your brother Summer, he's still recovering and it is very impressive that he is able to put something like this together all on his own. I had to spend years in therapy to keep myself from operating on classmates and reduce some of my own troublesome tendencies… Thankfully most people know college was for experimentation anyway.=
=Morty: Mom?=
=Summer: Omg, lol!1!=
=MRS: Ha!=
=Daddy's Little Girl: Wait, WHAT!? Dad! Fix it!=
=Sarah: {Innocent Father, Toates the best dad.} Fix what, sweetie?=

Beth snorted and dope slapped the back of her Dad's head.

Although it felt slightly like slapping a rock, so it was a good thing she wasn't actually trying to do damage or something. "Fix it."

Sarah rolled her eyes. "Fine."

=Morty: Ha! Now you know what it's like for me!=
=Summer: Grandpa trolls you a lot when you're off doing stuff?=
=Morty: Honestly, not like the other Mortys. Ours just had bad days or would get too into substances and… Well, some of the stranger stuff happens then.=
=Beth: Strange for Dad is a hard marker to measure. Though I WILL be quite cross if he doesn't fix my name to something less THAT.=
=Summer: Aww, put it back!=
=Beth: Thank you Dad.=
=Sarah: Sorry Morty, if it helps I did change my body to improve through substance use now. No more actual cognitive issues or hangovers or withdrawal symptoms.=
=Beth: Still, the strange comment has me concerned. What did your other Grandfather do?=
=MRS: The database mentions you were modified to turn into a vehicle? {More_Than_Meets_The_Eye.data}=
=Summer: WHAT!? Like a Changeformer!? I want to be able to do that!=
=Beth: Of course Dad didn't do such a thing.=
=Morty: Uh.=
=Sarah: Before anyone freaks out, first of all! I never personally did such a thing.=
=Adam: And technically neither did the other Rick, Morty just had the ability to shift forms to other alien versions of himself unlocked during one of the man's more drunk periods. {Disguises.data}=
=Morty: That does explain this huge list of species I can now choose to transform into.=
=Morty: {Confusion?}=
=Beth: HOLD UP! Who's Adam!?=
=Summer: Wait, isn't that the supercomputer that Mrs. Ship was giving fangirl speeches about?=
=MRS: {Blush} SHH! Oh my god Summer, I can't believe you just said that!=
=Sarah: Damn it, Adam.=

Beth blinked at her dad face-palming as she glared at nothing. "Adam, I thought you were going to be super busy scanning for safe places to send the house."

She leaned around. Nope, nothing there.

Sarah waved at the air. "No, I was going to introduce you eventually, you know that. But the kids are recovering and my little girl had finally gotten through all the help documentation! We were having a moment!"

Daww, this version of her Father was super sweet. "It's fine, Dad."

Grump silver eyes glanced at her. "No, I'm not letting him off the hook. You can't hear him sniggering into your brain at the chaos he just set off!" And glanced away. "I heard you! Now, get back to work verifying that the new data from Morty is accurate and let's make sure nothing from this planet can contaminate other realities. Last thing I want to deal with is a humanity destroying plague."

Beth paused. "I thought it was just radiation?"

Her dad sent [[d͔̗a̦̦t̬̫̠͇̗̰a̳̻]]. Which began showing up on her own invisible screens and displays.

Oh. Oh no. "We gotta warn me."

Sarah blinked. "I'm sorry?"

She waved at the hidden sky. "Space Beth, the Beth clone dad sent to space so that I could enjoy life with my kids and she could go do more dangerous and adventurous things. After we met and made up over our Dad cloning us without warning and… Other stuff… Well, we get along well enough."

Beth began checking the options, displays flashing as data filled up the information windows. "So we got to warn her not to come back here. I'm not letting anyone else die to this mess."

Sarah blinked… And smiled! "Oh! You have a twin clone in this reality!? Sweet! Yeah, let's go get her and make sure she's fine and stuff!" The ship lurched. "After ensuring the planet is safe to leave like this. I'mma gonna do that first."

Beth felt warm at the clear affection her father was showing. Some hurt part inside really liked how this version of her Dad was so open and willing to trust and care for his family. "Thanks, Dad."

The interface flickered, pulling her focus.

=Morty: These changes are very clever, thanks Adam. Though I'm mostly going to stay like this, just adjust a few things.=
=Summer: He's talking about his junk. Because all boys always talk about that.=
=Morty: I refuse to designate such comments with a response. Also I bet you already adjusted your OWN body by now anyway.=
=MRS: Sarah and Adam have holographic Avatars I can project, but I haven't picked what meat puppet shape to replicate yet. None of you seem to have enough skeletal reinforcement to even survive reentry.=
=Adam: Maybe check out the species of Revolio Clockberg Jr? {Non_Organic_Option.data}=
=Morty: Who?=
=Adam: Your Rick used to call him the slur 'Gearhead'. He is a Gear Person.=
=Morty: Oh THAT ass! Guy tried to kill me because the space cloud thing I was trying to rescue was valuable. Jerk.=
=Summer: {Snicker} Didn't the 'space cloud thing' call itself 'Fart'?=
=Morty: Cultural differences, let it go already.=
=Adam: But back to Revolio Clockerg Jr., his species is metal and crystal formed. Mrs. Ship might like it.=
=MRS: Hmm… Maybe component wise, but I need more curves than that.=
=Summer: Oh I am SO helping with this, it is like clothes and shoes shopping but a billion times better! Let's make you a sexy crystal gear ship lady!=

Huh. "Mrs. Ship, if you need funding or whatever you can pull it from the family accounts. Avatar or not, you should be able to show your personality in style."

The nearest speaker crackled with embarrassment. "Thanks, Sis."

Beth paused. "Oh. Because Dad made you. Right, that makes sense…" She couldn't help but grin. "You know, Dad and I are planning on going out to make sure our OTHER sister is safe too… Maybe we should make a place here for her to stay too? Just in case?"

Sarah hummed as she was doing SOMETHING to some systems even as more of Morty's designs were edited in a separate window. "Our lovely ship will expand as needed to accommodate anyone in the Smith family." A flinch. "And even transport Jerry if needed."

Ouch. Harsh but fair. And not really an issue now that he was molten sludge out there. Still, she knew what a huge concession it was to her Dad to even bring the other man up. "Thanks Dad."

Sarah hummed as the ship made embarrassed and happy noises in the background. "For you my sweetie? Anytime. And don't worry about financial issues, our awesome ride here can out produce a small galactic society given enough time to ramp up her production levels."

Considering her father seemed to have built this miracle from apparently nothing while she had been recovering from an alcoholic stupor, it was a hard point to even begin to argue. "Still, the ship is part of our family too. It's important that she knows we recognize her as such."

=MRS: Thanks, Sis.=
=Beth: Anytime, my new warship sister.=
=MRS: I'm not a warship if no one else could even survive a skirmish with us… But thanks.=

Oh. "Right, if we are going after 'Space Beth' she will likely be out somewhere in a combat zone. Will it be safe to bring the kids and everyone with us?"

Sarah chuckled. "You know how dangerous it is outside?" Duh. "Our daughter's new body is ignoring all the deadly material and actually absorbing a lot of the vicious energy and matter as free fuel."

The data showed up on another display. "My shipgirl is passively absorbing material with energy signatures more dense than most capital ships can endure, and is not only being improved by the experience but thriving! Every other ship and creature and product on the planet is GONE, including our house and old lab."

The ship woman hummed. "Dad did cheat by [[Harvesting]] my old body and our old home before the local environment could finish deconstructing it… But he isn't wrong."

Beth felt relief. "Thank goodness! So those people she's fighting out there can't hurt us or our ship?"

Sarah snorted. "They couldn't hurt my shipgirl right NOW, and we haven't even turned on her active defenses. Or any of the shields, or the fields, or the shimmers. Most of the more common weapons would just give us free energy, and most projectiles can be recycled by her for free material."

Oh. "Uh. Wow."

Her father smirked, that familiar touch of madness in this beautiful woman's eyes. "Yeah, my girls are amazing."

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Beth Smith snarled into her communication cell. "Where the hell ARE they!?"

Her informant could nearly taste her anger from a world away. "I don't know! NOBODY knows! Some higher up set off the overwatch protocols and everything went into lockdown!"

Shit. "Keep looking."

Another call, another failure.

There was supposed to be a massive caravan of equipment to the front lines of the ongoing fight, the Resistance had planned to hijack most of it and strike a VITAL blow against the tyrannical Galactic Federation…

And they didn't. Show. Up!

WHY!?

Her cell had been in communication silence for days preparing for this, moving at near negligible speed to carefully set up this ambush without setting off sensors or detection grids. All to pull off this massive initiative.

To hijack the caravan before it could resupply the war front… And to destroy the deadly planet cracking tool that was supposedly going to be deployed this time.

It couldn't be betrayal, this was beyond top secret! Even her own CREW didn't know the plan, or the target, or the timing! She had kept all the cards, enforced HARSH training requirements, and had honestly burned a few bridges and called a few favors…

And none of it mattered if the fucking weapon changed targets. Or was recalled. Or… Shit!

The targets should have been here around a day ago. Earth days, since she tried to keep up with their time schedule and call in monthly at least, make sure her kids and other self was doing alright.

Sure she might secretly send them a few gifts and maybe some of the better wine once in a while, but how could she make her next check in with her loved ones if she had the guilt of missing THIS deadly situation up so badly!?

A snarl was forced back as she went down the list. "Tell me, Griss. Tell me you know what the FUCK happened."

The translator lost a lot of the emotional tone, but the sheer rage came through loud and clear. "The higher ups fucked it."

Confused, Beth blinked. "I'm sorry?"

Gross's clacking fangs echoed over the connection. "Someone pulled an alert on Rick Sanchez, and several other people with questionable backgrounds and under harsh review decided the chance was too good. They sent in a call 33x2."

Her mind flickered through the stolen data she read over the years. "I don't recognize it."

The growl vibrated! "You SHOULDN'T! No one should! It was only put into treaty as a thought exercise, to ensure every procedure, realistic or not, was included in the paperwork! It's like the advanced forms for time travelers to give permission to themselves to consume their younglings on Mkrestal Thranble, as long as they file the suicidal intention notices and organize the temporal cleanup! It was NEVER supposed to be an option!"

That… Didn't sound good. "Talk to me Griss."

The anger drained away. "We lost division 7."

What? "Communication satellite relays go down all the time Griss…"

The voice clickered. "No, we didn't lose contact. They were executing call 33x2. Division 7 was selected to enforce the order. We lost them."

Her mind couldn't compute this. "Which army under Division 7? There are like…"

Griss snarled! "ALL OF THEM! Every zargen one of them! Down to the flizzen cooks and secretaries!"

Beth didn't know what was going on. "So… A dimensional attack then? I know that Rick Sanchez has a history…"

The laugh was broken and hurt. "At this point, I would likely help him kill our leadership myself. Not that it matters."

Beth felt cold as the voice continued. "Listen, I put in so many arguments to shut this down that I will be dead by the end of the hour anyway. It's probably why you haven't found anyone else left about what is going on, very few of us actually READ all the treaties and contracts after all. And it's probably too late to help you survive yourself, so… Just shut up and listen to my last words, alright?"

Shit. "Go ahead, Griss."

He was doing something with metal in the background. "Call 33x2 was genocidal protocol orders, when a single entity or creature could infect others and posed an unacceptable risk to the Galactic Federation as a whole. Properly executed, it takes three years to get approved and has a decade long checks and balance procedure that includes periods of public inquiry and expert testimony."

Genocide? But even so, there was time! She could do something with even a few months to work with. If nothing else, Dad would have an idea.

Griss continued. "THIS time, Call 33x2 was enacted in under eight minutes."

Her frantic mind froze. "What?"

The sounds were so far away. Impossibly far. "Division 7 arrived on the reported planet supposedly housing Richard Daniel 'Rick' Sanchez the third and ensured the use of blackbox protocol 'nelgcyhlraw' was both applied and directed to the related species."

Denial was a warm blanket. "Unless the target managed to do something, and this is one of the few kaalanzers that might theoretically have done so, anyone with similar genetics will suffer a painful end. And it is transmissible."

No.

Griss sighed as some beep came over the comms. "Well, that is the cleanup squad. When you join us in Larghass, I'll save you some of the roasted grubs. Yeah, you hated them, but your squishy flesh face had been so hilarious! I mean, you did make me taste those horrid meat patty things and…"

The gunshots were cut off by whatever explosive Griss had set up, and the line cut.

No.

Numbly, she activated the recall procedure and just… Sat there.

Knowing an entire division, with more people than many planetary trading groups could contain, all dead? Meaningless. Most likely didn't even know why they were about to die.

Not that it mattered.

Dad would have stopped it.

Blind trust flared in her heart. Because Dad did impossible things, all the damned time. And even if she was a clone, her Dad would do nearly anything she asked! Half her equipment was from schematics he hid in her ship when she went to explore space, the man didn't even bother to brag about it!

Right, she would contact Beth, find out that everything was fine and Dad saved the day somehow, then go back to base and get VERY drunk and try to spin this disaster as a victory somehow.

And eventually start the slow and frustrating process of rebuilding her spy network, as it seemed like most of them were being executed for knowing too much. Which, in this case? Knowing anything was apparently too much. After all, hiding the enforced suicide of billions of lifeforms to kill an entire species that was capable of procreating with so many other species, that was going to take a lot of killing.

Later.

Shaking hands gently hit certain codes. "B…"

No, you can do this. "Earth Beth? You… You there?"

The silence was crippling.

Her heart jerked at sudden static! "Beth!?"

And a woman's voice came out. "Automated Reply: The Smith Family you are currently attempting to contact is currently undergoing treatment and gathering resources for relocation. Assuming you are the other Smith daughter, the kids and your local variant are going to make a full recovery. Also, you have ANOTHER sister who is also a ship, and after we stop this mess from trying to wipe out any further strains of humanity we will probably stop by and make sure you are alright too! Until then, be safe space sweety! This is a recording."

Uh. What? "Why the hell is Ms. Bellum answering our home phone?"

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah blinked. "Good news everyone! Space Beth is alive and seems to be in quadrant 86-753-09! The answering machine verified it was her equipment before giving her a non-incriminating message, and now we know where to look!"

Beth sighed with relief nearby. "Thank goodness she's alright. She said something big was going to be happening to her this month and might miss our little talks."

Seeing Sarah's look, she waved it off. "Nothing like the attack on Earth, she had a mission that was supposed to make a big impact over the war front. We have codes to warn us if something was heading our way."

Fair enough. "Right, well I think we only need to modify a few local energies enough to destroy the transmission psionic wave components and then this entire mess will be nothing more risky than heavily exotic contaminated matter just WAITING to be used as high quality resources!"

Seriously, some truly exotic materials were included in this mess. It was like having a dozen planets unraveled, reduced, and refined into a slurry of soul, material, energy, and spite! Adam was having a ball [[Harvesting]] massive mounds of this mayhem.

Beth poured another glass with her own personal flask (Adam made ones for every family member, although only the adults got the ones with alcoholic content options.) "So how long will it take for us to head out there?"

Sarah hummed. "Well, changing this mass of raw material to NOT attempt and hunt down human genetics will require a week or so, but that is a mostly automated process. And of course, both the ship and Adam are sucking down torrents of the stuff, it is really high quality material for recycling."

The daughter of mad science winced. "I suppose I will go sit with Morty's healing pod for a while then. Let me know if something changes."

Ah, right. This world's destruction was a big issue, emotionally. "Would you… Can I give you a hug before you go?"

The hug was nice.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Morty SHOULD be using his new near-superpower abilities to do something awesome. Change himself, change the world (Not much out there right now actually, but same idea in general.), something useful.

He had lots of projects that were only enhanced by showing them to Grandpa (Hot version of a neighbor or not, she really knew her science), and it was stupidly easy to produce prototypes and test results thanks to Mrs. Ship and her construction foundries and assemblage factories.

But right now, he and Summer were upstairs in the 'Normal House' section of the ship, sitting on a familiar couch (But somehow more comfortable?), watching interdimensional cable.

Summer frowned. "How come when YOU pick a channel, you get stuff like 'WhenWolf: Time Traveling Dracula Inspired Adventures' but when I choose something I get that dude with acid nipples trying to grow miniature bushes?"

Morty shrugged. "Pretty sure it has to do with how I change from all those adventures with Rick. After certain amounts of bullshit, you begin to sort of… Feel reality? Like, how things connect without touching and stuff?"

He waved the remote. "Rick controls what he watches by using this thing like a portal gun. It connects to his mind and influences what 'portal' the channel views. He can pick stuff super accurately, but I end up with stuff like commercials and whatever. When you use it, the options are more unfocused and random."

Summer stared at him. "Bullshit."

Meh. "Here, look at this."

=Morty: This was how it felt to change channels to those wrestling chairs that threw people at each other. {Taste_of_Reality.data}=
=Summer: {Skeptical.} Hang on, let me check it.=

And her eyes went odd as she lost focus on causality and began drifting through unknown energies.

Meh, his first few adventures had really messed with his mind too.

Back to watching his soap opera. For sentient bathing supplies, the vocal range was nuts!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sarah sighed. "Damn it, again? Adam, what can you do?"

Uh. <<We could just… Snag her? Thanks to the callbacks I've trangulated her location by now.>>

His Jumper hummed. "Fine. Give me a communication portal."

Easy enough.

A blue 'glass' window faded in front of Sarah, showing her daughter pacing back and forth on a rock somewhere with a low quality atmosphere generating field in place. She had that scar over her right eye and a piercing in her right eyebrow, one that seemed to be some sort of display module.

Half her head was shaved, with a blue streak in the hair on the unshaven half… And she looked rough. Wearing camouflage that made her look like a pacing boulder creature, she seemed near torn with anger and fear and concern and all sorts of stuff.

She was also ranting. "If you give me ONE MORE automated message, I am going to hunt you down and start ripping out organs, biological or otherwise, until you can TASTE how angry I am with your damned feet! Or other walking limbs or organs!"

Sarah cleared her throat. "Beth."

The woman froze, a blaster of some type aimed at the 'floating' 'glass' 'window'. "WHAT THE… Ms. Bellum!? Why are you answering our phone!?"

A pause. "Also, why are you young and hot now?"

Ha! Adam was loving this name drawback bullshit!

Sarah sighed. "I'm a female partial clone of your Dad, I came here to save Morty, Summer, and your sister after the planet ended. The local Rick and a whole bunch of alien assholes died with the planet, but he managed to stop the damage from spreading through reality and through dimensions."

Space Beth gaped at the Jumper. "What?"

The lab coat wearing woman nodded. "Long story short, I got here before the house defenses could fall and kill them too, fixed them up, made them safer and stronger, and changed the house into a super awesome daughter spaceship using the artificial intelligence from my old and damaged personal ship."

Sarah seemed to realize that Space Beth was mentally catching up… And shrugged. "I was avoiding saying anything else so the Galactic Federation wouldn't know where we are or that I am fixing up the planet."

A blue portal opened up to one side. "Would you like to come visit? I know the local Beth would be beyond happy to have some emotional support right now."

Her space daughter flinched at the floating blue portal. "W… What?"

Adam groaned. Oh dear, this may take a while.

At least Adam could now talk to the kids while his Jumper was too busy to gripe about it and their local mom was trying to relax in her room.

Oh? The children were watching 'Saved By The Bell', Smurf Edition?

Meh, they could talk or make stuff later. For now, let's see how well Gargamel played Mr. Testaverde!