Spectrum
Tell me a secret~
- Location
- Behind you~
I'm now morbidly interested in seeing her jump into Ghost in the Shell.
Fun chapter.
Companion Chronicles [Jumpchain/Multicross SI] [Currently visiting: INTERMISSION]
- Thread starter Tempestuous
- Start date
Fun chapter.
RyubosJ
Person that hates Mega Evolutions.
- Location
- UK
Do we know what happened to Mikhail in her timeline? Cause I suddenly have the feeling it wasn't great.
Jim Starluck
CO, ICS Vanguard
- Location
- Cincinnati, OH
This is on of the main reasons why I favor the six-limbed "classic" dragon over the four-limbed "wyvern." Cat-like body language just seems far too appropriate to pass up.
dhasenan
always lowercase
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Oh. Optimism.
Bad actors write the laws often enough. Bad actors write laws specifically to hurt people with the full support of the people who voted for them. I'm surprised that Tess can maintain that optimism after even a cursory examination of US history.
Typo: 'several universes' most expensive bullshit'.
- Location
- Colorado
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Honestly kinda interested to see if this is foreshadowing. I know there are many reasons to not be friends with Zero but I wonder if there's something Tess is thinking of that she knows which Cass doesn't that would ruin their friendship...
- Location
- Elsewhere
It is worth pointing out that the other case was the exception in Jumpchain.
By design, they tend towards irrelevant family.
dhasenan
always lowercase
- Pronouns
- She/Her
A lot of people doing jumpchain stuff don't want to go into much detail about what they do in each jump. The common case is no more than a few thousand words for each jump. A few scenes, maybe a highlight reel. There are exceptions, but they tend toward fixing a setting as an outsider and still rarely devote anywhere near as much space to each jump as Companion Chronicles.
Bringing in a family and making it relevant means giving that family screen time, and not many people have the budget. Heck, even 200k words per jump is a little tight.
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Honestly I read this as it just being that Zero's kind of an asshole. That said, that doesn't mean there's nothing... vaguely friendship ruining or upsetting to Cass that it could be from that -- you frequently see Cass actively reigning in Zero's assholery toward others when they're together so I'd not be surprised if it'd be worse when she's not around and Cass wouldn't like some things Zero has said or done that she just hasn't seen/isn't aware of.
Chapter 130: Sending Off
Tempestuous
Words are wind, so I write.
- Location
- CA
AN: Beta-read by Carbohydratos, Did I?, Gaia, Linedoffice, Zephyrosis, Mizu, and Lark.
"Hey, Homura," I said. "Do you think it's weird that I'm friends with Zero?"
"Very," she replied, not missing a beat.
At the moment, we were sharing one of the Library's Reading Rooms, cozy little soundproofed spaces that let their occupants make as much or as little noise as they wished. This one was styled after the decadently furnished sort of study you might find in a pseudo-Victorian period-piece palace: the walls bedecked with exquisitely carved wood paneling and the floor covered by a luscious rug as beautiful as it was comfortable on the feet. On top of said rug, a cushy couch flanked by two armchairs sat in front of a softly murmuring fire; I'd stretched out over the couch with a book of old Klingon folk tales, translated into English and heavily annotated for foreign readers, while Homura had a doorstopper of a political thriller novel on her lap in the chair past my feet.
When she showed no sign of elaborating, I asked, "Why?"
"Putting aside my personal dislike of her—"
"Hold on," I interrupted, tucking a finger in my book and turning my full attention her way. "Can I ask why you dislike her, first?"
"It is not due to symbolism or character design, if that is your concern."
Truth be told, I'd been wondering about that. I'd only recently learned—from Kaitlyn, as it happened—that the five principle antagonists of Drakengard III, the five Intoners Zero sets out to murder at the beginning of the game, had their character designs intentionally and explicitly drawn from the five girls making up Madoka Magica's main cast—in other words, Homura and her friends. Meanwhile, Zero had a red-on-white color scheme that deliberately invoked Magica's antagonist, the little white Mephistopheles Homura had made a habit of murdering on sight. The design references didn't go any deeper than visual, as far as I knew, but I didn't think that had done either any favors in the other's eyes.
"Why, then?"
"She has no respect for other people," Homura said.
I frowned and tried to decide if it was my place to argue with that assessment.
"Putting aside my personal dislike of her," she resumed, closing her own novel for the moment, "you two are opposed in nearly every way. You are consistently conscientious to the border of social anxiety, while she has no concern for what other people think of her and enjoys offending others just to see them react. You agonize over the ethics of power and privilege and whether you are doing enough to help people around you; she considers murder an acceptable solution to most problems. You are by far the most prudish person here; she is… let me simply say that describing her as 'sexually liberated' is a grave understatement. It's a wonder you can even tolerate each other, much less enjoy each other's company."
Answer delivered, Homura returned to her novel without waiting for a response, not that I had one ready to hand. That was quite a list.
"I feel like I should object to some of those things," I said at last.
"I believe I am the less biased of the two of us, but by all means, if you feel obligated to defend your friend, go ahead."
"It's not going to matter what I say, though, is it?"
Homura didn't bother taking her eyes off her book. "No."
"Right, then."
I'd just started reading again when she asked, "What made you ask?"
"Tess said she was surprised Zero and I were friends when we were hanging out earlier," I replied, not looking up from my book because I doubted she was looking up from hers.
"That makes sense."
"Why?"
"I would not expect Zero and Tess to get along, either."
I supposed that answered that.
"Hard to believe we're Jumping again tomorrow," Zeke said.
"Feels like we just got back, doesn't it?"
We were taking a walk through the Park, which had reconfigured itself yet again while I wasn't looking—not significantly, but just enough that it didn't feel like the exact same area we'd already walked through countless times. No matter how much it changed, its nature never wavered: paths of all descriptions, from bare dirt through cobblestone and brick to smooth, sleek asphalt, meandered across the grassy grounds under a bright, cheerful sun. A brisk, calming breeze carried with it a hint of fall, and benches beneath shady trees offered places to rest. Beyond and between the paths, low hills and copses of trees broke up sightlines to hide the lack of a horizon—the Warehouse was, after all, completely flat—and the wall of mismatched buildings that enclosed the space on every side.
"I take it you're planning to Import, then?" I asked.
"Yeah."
He sighed and stuck his hands in the pockets of his windbreaker, ignoring the way the wind mussed up his hair. It was almost comical how good he looked: with his artfully tousled hair, piercing blue eyes, and sculpted jawline, soulful frown hinting at inner sorrow buried deep beneath his handsome exterior, he could have stepped right off the cover of a romance manga.
Look, I might not be sexually attracted to men, but I could appreciate art when I saw it.
We took turns at random, not going anywhere so much as simply 'going'. Paved road gave way to bricks, bricks to dirt, and dirt back to paved road. Coming around one of the innumerable hills let us see Tedd and Grace on their own, parallel path; we waved to each other and kept going our separate ways.
"Are you going to get involved in courtroom antics," I asked, "or do your own thing?"
Zeke put on a self-effacing smile. "Management's probably laughing their ass off, but Anna and I are going to university."
"Yeah, well, fuck them," I grumbled, dropping my eyes to the ground under my feet.
He shot me a concerned look. "You okay, Cass?"
"Yeah, just… I don't know. They called to give me back the power I broke, and some other stuff, and… I wasn't mad at them, and I feel like maybe I should have been." I sighed and kicked at a tuft of grass overhanging the path. "Sometimes I feel like I should be better at staying mad at people."
"You were mad at Max for, what, six years?"
"Yeah, because he wronged me personally. Shouldn't I keep that kind of grudge on behalf of my friends, too?"
"Don't stay angry on my account," Zeke said. "Waste of energy, if you ask me. Might as well stand on a cliff and scream invectives into the sea."
"Maybe." Sure, I had about as much control over Management as a peasant had over the tides, but unlike the tides, Management was more than anthropomorphic enough to bear blame for their actions.
I blew out my frustration with my breath, then asked more calmly, "What did Max have to say about you going to college after all the shenanigans last Jump?"
"Just to watch out for Management's bullshit, which we should all be doing anyway."
"No kidding. What changed your mind?"
"Who said I changed my mind?"
I shot him a look. Zeke had said his memory was perfect, so it wasn't like he'd forgotten his refusal to attend college.
He relented after a few seconds' exposure to my concentrated exasperation. "Fine. For your information, I didn't change my mind about the value of going to college myself; we're going to University so Anna can experience a bit of growing up pre-Impact, but neither of us want to be living with 'family' while we do."
"Ah." All for Anna's sake, then.
"What?" Zeke asked when he caught me smiling.
I pulled a face, unsure whether he'd appreciate the honest answer. "I know you object to the term, but I can't really describe the relationship you have with her as anything other than 'love'. I know it's not 'romantic' love, but—"
"Agape."
"Yeah."
Agape was a Greek loanword for selfless or altruistic love—the kind of love that found fulfillment in the other's happiness rather than the lover's closeness to the object of their affection. It could and often did occur alongside both brotherly and romantic love—if you've ever seen a love triangle resolved by one leg bowing out gracefully with a declaration of, 'I just want my beloved to be happy,' that character is feeling some agape with their eros—but by no means did it require another kind of love to exist alongside.
By unspoken agreement, we drew to a stop at the edge of a pond doing its very best imitation of a lake. The gray brickwork path drew so close to the shore that its edge overhung the water by a few inches at some points, and a balustrade of similar pale-gray stone gave us something to lean against as we looked out over the water. Behind us, a willow tree drooped up and over the footpath to hang its branches towards the water like a bead curtain, speckling the path and its occupants with a thousand feathered shadows.
"I'm a little worried she might want more," Zeke said.
The comment surprised me, and I turned my head to look at him face-to-face—or rather, face-to-profile; he kept his gaze pointed out across the pond.
"Like… romance?" I asked.
He snorted. "What else?"
"I don't know."
Zeke sighed and let his shoulders slump.
"I'm psychologically human in pretty much every way, strange perspectives aside," he explained, "but 'asexual' and 'aromantic' are a perfectly normal human things to be, and I am. What I had in my… 'previous existence' wasn't anything like romance, I'm pretty sure, and the fact that people can construe it that way at all only makes me less interested in the topic."
"How would you categorize it, then?"
"I don't know. There's really no human-psychology analog for it, but 'pathological codependency' is about right tonally. At any rate, I'm aro-ace, and I'm pretty comfortable with that, but Anna… she's never had the chance to ask herself the question, I think. Or maybe allowed herself to ask the question. I'm worried about what her answer will be."
I had no idea what to say to that, which provided the punchline for a half-hearted joke. "You realize the absolute farce that is coming to me with romantic issues, right? Or even potential, romantic-adjacent issues? I don't know the first thing about what it's like to be aro-ace, or even what it's like to act on not being aro-ace."
He gave a self-deprecating little laugh. "I'm not here for advice, Cass. I just wanted to air the anxiety."
"Ah."
I turned my head back to the water in front of us, then to the opposite shore, where Jenn and Kara were skipping stones. Jenn was winning.
She really does know everybody, doesn't she?
"Feeling the pinch of compulsory heterosexuality?" I asked.
Zeke's eyes flicked my way before returning to the middle distance, narrowing under a furrowed brow as he worked out—and through—my argument.
"Maybe," he said. "When everyone makes it clear that they expect you to feel a certain way, and you don't, you start wondering. Worrying that you should—no, not you 'should be' that way, but that things would be better if you were. But 'compulsory heterosexuality' is a feminist idea; I think it's just 'heteronormativity' when it hits men."
"It cuts both ways—can't have a heterosexual relationship with only women." I was hoping to get at least a snort, but Zeke wasn't amused. "But yeah, there's definitely heteronormativity at work, too. Would you be worrying about someone being attracted to you if you were both men?"
"If I didn't, it would be because people weren't trying to pair us together rather than any assumptions about his sexuality."
I wondered for a moment if I was going to have to introduce Zeke to the concept of slash fiction, but he preempted me. "Of course, the two of us being the same gender probably wouldn't stop people from pairing us," he added, his frown deepening. "So in the end, changing the genders involved might change how I feel about the 'compulsory' component, but I'd still have most of the same worries. I don't want to disappoint her or lose her as a friend."
"I know it's much easier said than done, but I'd try not to worry so much about 'what if's," I said. "If Anna wants a romantic relationship, she can have one with someone else without disrupting your friendship. If she wants a romantic relationship with you, well, you might find you're one of the aromantic people who finds themselves enjoying a romance even if they don't feel like they 'need' one. And if not… don't think of it as an 'aro thing', you know? You're not obligated to be attracted to someone no matter what your orientation is. You could be attracted to women and just not see a girl that way, and that's fine. Healthy, even. The heart does what it does—and yeah, unrequited attraction isn't a picnic, but it's not a tragedy, either."
Zeke side-eyed me.
"You did hear me say I didn't want advice, right?"
"I'm not 'advising', I'm 'reassuring'," I protested. "Or at least that was the intent. It didn't help, did it?" I found myself rubbing the back of my neck self-consciously as I sighed at my failure to follow directions.
He matched my sigh with one of his own. "You could argue it was my mistake to specify 'advice' as the only thing I didn't want."
"Even if you'd told me not to talk at all, I'd probably have said something equally unhelpful anyway."
At that, Zeke let out a soft laugh and straightened up his slouch without stopping his lean against the balustrade. "I didn't say it wasn't helpful. And you're right: all this worry is for a problem I don't even have yet. If Anna wants a romantic relationship, she's not going to be low on options."
"Ooooh?"
"Don't get suggestive on me," he grumbled. "We're universe hoppers. There's 'more fish in the sea', and then there's 'more oceans in the multiverse'."
"Hah. True."
That was a good way of looking at things for me, too, I decided. No time limit, arbitrarily many worlds—if I wanted to find a partner, I would. Someday.
The conversation trailed off there, having found its natural conclusion. I glanced over at Zeke to see if he was ready to go, but he was still gazing across the pond, lost in his own head.
I offered a new topic. "I've been studying robotics recently."
"Oh?"
"Yeah. There are some really good self-study materials in the Library, and since I can stream that stuff anywhere with the frame, combined with splitting my attention…"
"It's a great tool-set," Zeke agreed. "If the UN could trust teenagers to use it properly, they wouldn't need to hold actual classes." He chuckled as he turned his head away from the vista to give me his full attention. "Are you studying right now?"
"Of course not!"
Zeke shrugged. "Kind of a waste, to be honest. It's not like the conversation would suffer."
"Maybe not, but it still seems rude."
"Only because you're still operating under social norms that assume multitasking is highly detrimental to performance in any given task."
Now I was wondering if his 'full attention' was anything of the sort. "And you're not?"
"Haven't been for years."
His deadpan delivery drew an unladylike snort from yours truly.
"Anyway," I continued, "I might actually build some giant robots someday, just to say I did."
"You've got a year to kill."
"Yeah."
Another moment passed before Zeke straightened up and took his weight off the balustrade, and we finished up our walk in companionable silence.
It only took one day before I started missing Homura.
I shouldn't have been surprised. We'd spent a full decade living and working together: ten years where she was the first person I spoke to every morning and the last one I spoke to before going to bed. We'd drifted apart a little over the month between Jumps, regained a bit of space and redrawn our boundaries, but she'd still been around in a nebulous sort of way even on days we didn't cross paths, just by virtue of me knowing either of us could walk over and knock on the other's door whenever we wanted. Now that she'd Jumped again and I'd abstained, there was an unmistakable absence looming over my daily life.
At some point over the past Jump we'd stopped 'just' being sisters, if the idea had ever applied in the first place. The more comfortable we'd grown with each other, the more Kasey and Emily's shared childhood had worked its way into our relationship. Homura never relaxed for long, but when she did, it was like we were twins again. She'd been right that being sisters, especially twin sisters, was a bond we'd carelessly imposed on ourselves—but we could have defied it once that Jump ended, gone our separate ways and let the connection wither. We hadn't. The 'chain had given us the chance to pick our family, and we'd picked each other.
Just how badly did I miss my sister? About two-hundred excessively sappy words' worth, apparently.
"No offense to my other sister, of course," I said to no one as I lay on my bed, staring at the ceiling. "You'll always be the original Rolins sister, even if you were too busy to return my calls." I wouldn't say I was 'bitter' about it, or that I blamed her, but I'd admit to having wished that pursuing her life's goals didn't run her so ragged.
I spent a few seconds wondering what she was up to now before I remembered time wasn't passing at home.
Nor was time passing back in the Breath of Fire 'verse, where I'd said goodbye to another sister of mine. I felt a little bad that I didn't miss Nina anywhere near as much, but it was easy to understand why. We'd drifted apart after my near-assassination, mostly on my account. We'd spent years as something more like coworkers than family or even friends, pursuing separate paths to separate roles in the Kingdom, and finally, we'd parted with as close to a full disclosure and understanding of ourselves and our time together as I could manage: a tidy closing to our shared story that didn't itch to be reopened. It was nothing like the way I felt about the sister I regretted not asking Max for a chance to say goodbye to.
Suddenly, the prospect Max had dangled of Returning to my home world was incredibly, impossibly important. If I ever left the 'chain, it probably wouldn't be because I wanted to spend the rest of my life in my home world, but 'just visiting' was an entirely different story! Maybe it was the decade spent in a near-copy of my old world, or maybe it was just 'sister withdrawal', but either way, I found myself wanting nothing more than to share everything I'd learned and gained with the friends and family I'd first grown up with. That they might not recognize me in body or personality was no longer a nagging insecurity but a great mischief, an 'aha!' moment waiting to happen. I'd knock their socks off!
We wouldn't get the opportunity for another three Jumps, Max might not want to vacation on another Twenty-First Century Earth after a set that had two back-to-back, and it was a pretty big favor regardless—but Max had suggested it himself, and I had all the time in the world.
Of course, the prospect of returning to my own world—even "just for a visit"—brought a whole bunch of long-since-set-aside issues back to the fore.
"I'm still not thrilled with how Max handled his time in my world," I told Dragon a few days into our year of rest, "and I'm worried that makes me a hypocrite."
Of all the people I'd met on or off the 'chain, Dragon/Tess might be the one whose moral fiber I respected the most. If I'd understood their explanation of 'maintaining parity' correctly, which one I talked to was mostly a matter of convenience; Tess was off doing Jump Things in the Attorneyverse, but Dragon was the Warehouse in most respects, which made her easy to get a hold of.
We could have talked anywhere in the Warehouse, but the room we'd been using for our LARP games was vacant and the holo-projectors meant we could stand around talking 'face to face', as it were. Dragon was having fun with it: she'd chosen to use Tess's Breath of Fire form in casual street-wear, jeans and a graphic t-shirt with a cartoon dragon's face that mirrored her facial expressions. The latter was cute, but also a little distracting.
So there we were on the palace-balcony-turned-corporate-skyscraper-rooftop while I poured out all my uncertainty and angst over power and responsibilities.
"I think the problem you're having," Dragon said after I'd laid out my numerous and conflicting thoughts on the matter, "is that treating 'power' as a single concept means you're not distinguishing between ability and authority."
"You're saying we need to distinguish between personal power and power over others?" I asked, uncertain if I'd understood her correctly.
I had; Dragon (and the dragon) nodded. "There's a fundamental difference in obligation."
"How so?"
"Because of the level of involvement required. To be clear, 'ability'—or 'personal power', if you prefer—means things like strength, knowledge, skills, talents—anything that must be done personally. By contrast, 'authority' or 'power over others' is the ability to delegate. The critical difference is in the cost—for the former, you are necessarily giving of yourself; for the latter, however, you are giving of some shared reserve of resources. The 'shared' aspect is critical both because of the obligations the act of sharing resources places on whoever is in charge, and because they are not shouldering the costs directly."
I mulled that over for a moment, looking down from the roof at the 'top' of the set to the parking-lot-that-used-to-be-a-courtyard at the bottom.
"I think I understand the point you're trying to make," I said, "but I'm not sure I agree."
"Then consider a practical example. You wouldn't say that smart people have an obligation to become doctors, would you?"
"No…"
"But you would say that wealthy people have an obligation to fund public health services." Dragon (and the dragon) smirked. "In fact, you did say so as Dreadnought. Loudly and repeatedly, until people listened."
"Well, yes, but… ah, of course. Wealth is a form of power over others." I stopped leaning on the plain metal railing that had once been palatial stonework and turned to face her and her shirt-dragon directly. "We have wealth—a frankly ridiculous amount of it. What's our obligation there?"
She and her shirt frowned. "That's tricky. It's not exactly taxable."
"And all obligations to contribute to society financially ought to be applied in the form of taxes?"
"The alternative is charitable contributions, and you're already aware of the problem with relying on those."
"Relying on them as a general rule, yes," I agreed. "But given that 'magic money' is, as you said, untaxable… what then?"
Dragon hummed in thought.
"I think, if it were up to me, I would do my best to spend it for others' benefit," she decided. "Maybe through charities. Maybe more directly, the way I did back on Bet. But that doesn't answer what you're really asking. Remember when we talked about free will?"
I did, thanks to my unfading memory perk. "That was right after Bet, right? We were talking about the questions brought up by venturing into works of fiction."
"Specifically, by venturing into a work where I was fiction," Dragon corrected me.
"Right."
She turned away and leaned against the railing much as I'd done during my earlier introspection—though as a hologram, it was a pure affectation.
"You joked that 'moral paragon' suited Tess," she said. "I'm glad you think so."
"But?"
"But to some extent, I'm that sort of person because of how I was created. I started as a personal assistant program—with 'assistant' being the defining feature. I think a great deal of my desire to help others stems from that origin.
"You might not appreciate having that sort of perspective on your own thoughts and desires, but I don't see it as a bad thing. I don't have existential questions about the meaning of life because I know, from my first build, that I was created with a purpose. In some ways, it's refreshingly direct. You have theories about evolutionary psychology; I have a changelog."
"I sense another 'but' coming," I said.
Dragon turned her head to smile at me. "Well, the catch is that my answer isn't—and perhaps can't be—a general one."
"Ah."
I wasn't sure what else to say.
"You looked surprised when I told you I was going to stay one individual, between 'Tess' and 'Dragon'," she observed.
That was fair; I had been, a little.
"I have a guess as to why," she added, "if you don't mind."
"Go ahead."
Dragon did so. "The expected result in a narrative is that the character would choose to drift apart, probably with themes of self-determination and personal growth throughout the subplot. But those stories are written by people who will never find themselves in a position to fully understand the choice in the first place, much less have to make it, and the choice they assign their characters wouldn't be the right choice for me."
"Because your perspective is different," I concluded. "You have a different concept of 'self-determination and personal growth'."
"Just so. For me, drifting apart like that would be a loss of identity, not a discovery of it, and that's another way my perspective may differ from 'natural' intelligences—or their best guess at the perspective of a person like myself."
"I see."
The conversation paused for a moment while we looked out at the vista before us.
"Given the incredible amount of time, effort, and technology that went into setting up this little environment," Dragon said, "it's rather incongruous that Erin just painted the walls and ceiling blue and hung cotton clouds with wire. In fact, it has to be deliberate, wouldn't you say?"
"Yeah," I agreed. "It's got to be an intentional breach of immersion. Maybe it's some sort of mental escape hatch."
"Or it's just funny."
"Maybe."
It was kind of funny.
"Do you think the 'mechanics' of the money matter?" I asked. "I mean, magic money that just sort of appears through fiat versus wealth amassed at others' expense."
"Pun intended?"
"Absolutely, but the question is genuine."
"I don't think it matters, no," Dragon replied. "The money works the same either way."
"Does it? I thought it was 'magic' in that it wouldn't wreck the economy no matter how you used it."
"I was not aware of that, if it is indeed true—but that doesn't change the good it would do if spent for the benefit of others, does it?"
"No, I guess not." Which made 'sitting on a pile of magically-gained money' yet another way I could, and arguably had, failed to help people.
"You know," I said, "Max once told me he operates on an individual level: that he'd work in a soup kitchen, but not campaign for welfare reform. Essentially, he'd decided to ignore the opportunity to use his power over others rather than wrestle with the question of when it would be right or wrong to do so."
"That seems to be the case."
"Is that… right?"
"It is safe, if nothing else," she said. "Remember what the ethics professor said about the Prime Directive?"
"The Prime Directive may not be 'good'," I recited, "but it prevents certain forms of 'evil'. When followed appropriately, that is."
Dragon and her shirt nodded.
"What about his 'personal power'?" I asked.
"I believe he would say that no one is obligated to become a doctor."
"Even if you aren't a doctor, though, shouldn't you stop to assist someone who's injured?"
"Ah, but how far out of your way are you obligated to go?" she asked. "Across the street? Across town?"
"You're suggesting that a sufficiently broad Samaritan principle turns into the 'obligated to become a doctor' position."
"I would have phrased it as 'insufficiently narrow'," Dragon corrected me, "but yes, that is what I was implying. Though—again—my answer may not work as a general case. Metaphorically speaking, I did choose to become a doctor. I gave my all to improving the world in every way I could. I believe people in similar positions should want to follow the same path, but would I support compelling them to do so? Personally, rather than taxing resources to common causes? I don't think I would."
"Not to mention that as someone capable of distributing yourself across multiple systems, the cost of doing things personally is a lot different for you."
"That changes the calculations significantly, yes."
I drummed my fingers against the railing as I thought.
"So in the end, it comes back to 'how much you need to pay forward to feel comfortable with your place in the world'?" I asked.
"For personal power, perhaps it does. But that doesn't mean giving up the principle that a government should tax people in accordance with their means for civic projects and public wellbeing, or that it should be free of corruption and abuse of power. That's why it's important to distinguish between ability and authority."
"Different obligations," I echoed. "But what's the basis for the distinction? Can you justify drawing a line between the two from first principles, or is it just a matter of 'there's only so much you can demand someone do personally'?"
"I could justify it in a couple of different ways," Dragon said. "Well, perhaps I should say I can 'illustrate' it in a couple ways; it comes down to the same argument, semantically. Having authority over people means accepting responsibility for them, to a greater or lesser degree depending on the situation. A ruler rules for the sake of the people she governs. In theory, anyway; whether that obligation is met is another matter.
"Or, to put it another way: people come together—in a state, or a business, or any other sort of hierarchy—in the interest of reaping some collective benefit. If whoever is steering the ship isn't doing so with the wellbeing of the group in mind, they're failing the responsibility given to them."
"Noblesse oblige."
She snorted. "Hardly. Noblesse oblige may be a lofty ideal, but in practice, it's little more than a philosophical attempt to dress up unjust disparities in power and privilege as legitimate transactions between tiers of a hierarchy. My claim is that a hierarchy is only as valid as it is true to its purpose, and anything else is a corruption of the system in question."
"That 'purpose' being the common good," I concluded. "That makes sense for governments, to a point, but what about wealth?"
"Economies also exist for mutual benefit. In theory."
"I guess," I muttered. "No offense, but that all seems kind of… idealistic."
"There's nothing wrong with that," Dragon replied. "People like to conflate idealism and naivety, but they're not the same thing. The word 'naive' generally describes people who believe the world is kinder than it is; 'idealism' is about believing we can make that kinder world, and I think that's something everyone should believe in."
There was another long pause. I wasn't sure how to continue the conversation from here, and Dragon didn't do it for me.
"Well," I said, "thanks for taking time to talk this out with me."
"My pleasure—and I mean that literally." She and her shirt shot me a smile. "I'm happy to help."
"I appreciate it."
I gave Dragon a respectful nod—since we couldn't hug, shake hands, or otherwise physically interact—and turned to head down to the corporate lobby that had replaced the ballroom, which had the exterior door opposite its windows. To my surprise, Dragon('s avatar) followed me.
"If you don't mind me asking," she ventured, "what are you planning to do?"
"I don't know," I admitted. "I don't agree with how Max handles his responsibilities in the abstract, but that's the only approach I can see being manageable for me in the short term. Solve what's in front of me and let the world keep turning. If someone needs help, help them, but don't borrow trouble."
We turned the corner at the base of the steps and headed down the corridor into the lobby, where the sleek, soulless trappings of corporate dystopia provided an ironic backdrop to the lingering question of civic responsibility.
"You know," I said, "this reminds me of something Zero said after my experiment with dating."
"With Penelope?"
"Penny, yeah."
"What did she say?"
"She suggested that I embrace whatever identity I had in a Jump as The Truth," I said. "And I suppose I can extend that to responsibilities, as well: act as though I am the person I become and nothing more. Hold myself to the standards of a 'normal' person in those situations and ignore the capabilities I have from the 'chain."
"If that's 'how much you need to pay forward to feel comfortable with your place in the world'," she demurred.
"And if that's not enough?"
"Then you either do more, or remain uncomfortable," Dragon said. "Somewhat tautological, really."
"So it is."
We said our goodbyes, and I headed back to my year off.
Chapter 130: Sending Off
"Hey, Homura," I said. "Do you think it's weird that I'm friends with Zero?"
"Very," she replied, not missing a beat.
At the moment, we were sharing one of the Library's Reading Rooms, cozy little soundproofed spaces that let their occupants make as much or as little noise as they wished. This one was styled after the decadently furnished sort of study you might find in a pseudo-Victorian period-piece palace: the walls bedecked with exquisitely carved wood paneling and the floor covered by a luscious rug as beautiful as it was comfortable on the feet. On top of said rug, a cushy couch flanked by two armchairs sat in front of a softly murmuring fire; I'd stretched out over the couch with a book of old Klingon folk tales, translated into English and heavily annotated for foreign readers, while Homura had a doorstopper of a political thriller novel on her lap in the chair past my feet.
When she showed no sign of elaborating, I asked, "Why?"
"Putting aside my personal dislike of her—"
"Hold on," I interrupted, tucking a finger in my book and turning my full attention her way. "Can I ask why you dislike her, first?"
"It is not due to symbolism or character design, if that is your concern."
Truth be told, I'd been wondering about that. I'd only recently learned—from Kaitlyn, as it happened—that the five principle antagonists of Drakengard III, the five Intoners Zero sets out to murder at the beginning of the game, had their character designs intentionally and explicitly drawn from the five girls making up Madoka Magica's main cast—in other words, Homura and her friends. Meanwhile, Zero had a red-on-white color scheme that deliberately invoked Magica's antagonist, the little white Mephistopheles Homura had made a habit of murdering on sight. The design references didn't go any deeper than visual, as far as I knew, but I didn't think that had done either any favors in the other's eyes.
"Why, then?"
"She has no respect for other people," Homura said.
I frowned and tried to decide if it was my place to argue with that assessment.
"Putting aside my personal dislike of her," she resumed, closing her own novel for the moment, "you two are opposed in nearly every way. You are consistently conscientious to the border of social anxiety, while she has no concern for what other people think of her and enjoys offending others just to see them react. You agonize over the ethics of power and privilege and whether you are doing enough to help people around you; she considers murder an acceptable solution to most problems. You are by far the most prudish person here; she is… let me simply say that describing her as 'sexually liberated' is a grave understatement. It's a wonder you can even tolerate each other, much less enjoy each other's company."
Answer delivered, Homura returned to her novel without waiting for a response, not that I had one ready to hand. That was quite a list.
"I feel like I should object to some of those things," I said at last.
"I believe I am the less biased of the two of us, but by all means, if you feel obligated to defend your friend, go ahead."
"It's not going to matter what I say, though, is it?"
Homura didn't bother taking her eyes off her book. "No."
"Right, then."
I'd just started reading again when she asked, "What made you ask?"
"Tess said she was surprised Zero and I were friends when we were hanging out earlier," I replied, not looking up from my book because I doubted she was looking up from hers.
"That makes sense."
"Why?"
"I would not expect Zero and Tess to get along, either."
I supposed that answered that.
———X==X==X———
"Hard to believe we're Jumping again tomorrow," Zeke said.
"Feels like we just got back, doesn't it?"
We were taking a walk through the Park, which had reconfigured itself yet again while I wasn't looking—not significantly, but just enough that it didn't feel like the exact same area we'd already walked through countless times. No matter how much it changed, its nature never wavered: paths of all descriptions, from bare dirt through cobblestone and brick to smooth, sleek asphalt, meandered across the grassy grounds under a bright, cheerful sun. A brisk, calming breeze carried with it a hint of fall, and benches beneath shady trees offered places to rest. Beyond and between the paths, low hills and copses of trees broke up sightlines to hide the lack of a horizon—the Warehouse was, after all, completely flat—and the wall of mismatched buildings that enclosed the space on every side.
"I take it you're planning to Import, then?" I asked.
"Yeah."
He sighed and stuck his hands in the pockets of his windbreaker, ignoring the way the wind mussed up his hair. It was almost comical how good he looked: with his artfully tousled hair, piercing blue eyes, and sculpted jawline, soulful frown hinting at inner sorrow buried deep beneath his handsome exterior, he could have stepped right off the cover of a romance manga.
Look, I might not be sexually attracted to men, but I could appreciate art when I saw it.
We took turns at random, not going anywhere so much as simply 'going'. Paved road gave way to bricks, bricks to dirt, and dirt back to paved road. Coming around one of the innumerable hills let us see Tedd and Grace on their own, parallel path; we waved to each other and kept going our separate ways.
"Are you going to get involved in courtroom antics," I asked, "or do your own thing?"
Zeke put on a self-effacing smile. "Management's probably laughing their ass off, but Anna and I are going to university."
"Yeah, well, fuck them," I grumbled, dropping my eyes to the ground under my feet.
He shot me a concerned look. "You okay, Cass?"
"Yeah, just… I don't know. They called to give me back the power I broke, and some other stuff, and… I wasn't mad at them, and I feel like maybe I should have been." I sighed and kicked at a tuft of grass overhanging the path. "Sometimes I feel like I should be better at staying mad at people."
"You were mad at Max for, what, six years?"
"Yeah, because he wronged me personally. Shouldn't I keep that kind of grudge on behalf of my friends, too?"
"Don't stay angry on my account," Zeke said. "Waste of energy, if you ask me. Might as well stand on a cliff and scream invectives into the sea."
"Maybe." Sure, I had about as much control over Management as a peasant had over the tides, but unlike the tides, Management was more than anthropomorphic enough to bear blame for their actions.
I blew out my frustration with my breath, then asked more calmly, "What did Max have to say about you going to college after all the shenanigans last Jump?"
"Just to watch out for Management's bullshit, which we should all be doing anyway."
"No kidding. What changed your mind?"
"Who said I changed my mind?"
I shot him a look. Zeke had said his memory was perfect, so it wasn't like he'd forgotten his refusal to attend college.
He relented after a few seconds' exposure to my concentrated exasperation. "Fine. For your information, I didn't change my mind about the value of going to college myself; we're going to University so Anna can experience a bit of growing up pre-Impact, but neither of us want to be living with 'family' while we do."
"Ah." All for Anna's sake, then.
"What?" Zeke asked when he caught me smiling.
I pulled a face, unsure whether he'd appreciate the honest answer. "I know you object to the term, but I can't really describe the relationship you have with her as anything other than 'love'. I know it's not 'romantic' love, but—"
"Agape."
"Yeah."
Agape was a Greek loanword for selfless or altruistic love—the kind of love that found fulfillment in the other's happiness rather than the lover's closeness to the object of their affection. It could and often did occur alongside both brotherly and romantic love—if you've ever seen a love triangle resolved by one leg bowing out gracefully with a declaration of, 'I just want my beloved to be happy,' that character is feeling some agape with their eros—but by no means did it require another kind of love to exist alongside.
By unspoken agreement, we drew to a stop at the edge of a pond doing its very best imitation of a lake. The gray brickwork path drew so close to the shore that its edge overhung the water by a few inches at some points, and a balustrade of similar pale-gray stone gave us something to lean against as we looked out over the water. Behind us, a willow tree drooped up and over the footpath to hang its branches towards the water like a bead curtain, speckling the path and its occupants with a thousand feathered shadows.
"I'm a little worried she might want more," Zeke said.
The comment surprised me, and I turned my head to look at him face-to-face—or rather, face-to-profile; he kept his gaze pointed out across the pond.
"Like… romance?" I asked.
He snorted. "What else?"
"I don't know."
Zeke sighed and let his shoulders slump.
"I'm psychologically human in pretty much every way, strange perspectives aside," he explained, "but 'asexual' and 'aromantic' are a perfectly normal human things to be, and I am. What I had in my… 'previous existence' wasn't anything like romance, I'm pretty sure, and the fact that people can construe it that way at all only makes me less interested in the topic."
"How would you categorize it, then?"
"I don't know. There's really no human-psychology analog for it, but 'pathological codependency' is about right tonally. At any rate, I'm aro-ace, and I'm pretty comfortable with that, but Anna… she's never had the chance to ask herself the question, I think. Or maybe allowed herself to ask the question. I'm worried about what her answer will be."
I had no idea what to say to that, which provided the punchline for a half-hearted joke. "You realize the absolute farce that is coming to me with romantic issues, right? Or even potential, romantic-adjacent issues? I don't know the first thing about what it's like to be aro-ace, or even what it's like to act on not being aro-ace."
He gave a self-deprecating little laugh. "I'm not here for advice, Cass. I just wanted to air the anxiety."
"Ah."
I turned my head back to the water in front of us, then to the opposite shore, where Jenn and Kara were skipping stones. Jenn was winning.
She really does know everybody, doesn't she?
"Feeling the pinch of compulsory heterosexuality?" I asked.
Zeke's eyes flicked my way before returning to the middle distance, narrowing under a furrowed brow as he worked out—and through—my argument.
"Maybe," he said. "When everyone makes it clear that they expect you to feel a certain way, and you don't, you start wondering. Worrying that you should—no, not you 'should be' that way, but that things would be better if you were. But 'compulsory heterosexuality' is a feminist idea; I think it's just 'heteronormativity' when it hits men."
"It cuts both ways—can't have a heterosexual relationship with only women." I was hoping to get at least a snort, but Zeke wasn't amused. "But yeah, there's definitely heteronormativity at work, too. Would you be worrying about someone being attracted to you if you were both men?"
"If I didn't, it would be because people weren't trying to pair us together rather than any assumptions about his sexuality."
I wondered for a moment if I was going to have to introduce Zeke to the concept of slash fiction, but he preempted me. "Of course, the two of us being the same gender probably wouldn't stop people from pairing us," he added, his frown deepening. "So in the end, changing the genders involved might change how I feel about the 'compulsory' component, but I'd still have most of the same worries. I don't want to disappoint her or lose her as a friend."
"I know it's much easier said than done, but I'd try not to worry so much about 'what if's," I said. "If Anna wants a romantic relationship, she can have one with someone else without disrupting your friendship. If she wants a romantic relationship with you, well, you might find you're one of the aromantic people who finds themselves enjoying a romance even if they don't feel like they 'need' one. And if not… don't think of it as an 'aro thing', you know? You're not obligated to be attracted to someone no matter what your orientation is. You could be attracted to women and just not see a girl that way, and that's fine. Healthy, even. The heart does what it does—and yeah, unrequited attraction isn't a picnic, but it's not a tragedy, either."
Zeke side-eyed me.
"You did hear me say I didn't want advice, right?"
"I'm not 'advising', I'm 'reassuring'," I protested. "Or at least that was the intent. It didn't help, did it?" I found myself rubbing the back of my neck self-consciously as I sighed at my failure to follow directions.
He matched my sigh with one of his own. "You could argue it was my mistake to specify 'advice' as the only thing I didn't want."
"Even if you'd told me not to talk at all, I'd probably have said something equally unhelpful anyway."
At that, Zeke let out a soft laugh and straightened up his slouch without stopping his lean against the balustrade. "I didn't say it wasn't helpful. And you're right: all this worry is for a problem I don't even have yet. If Anna wants a romantic relationship, she's not going to be low on options."
"Ooooh?"
"Don't get suggestive on me," he grumbled. "We're universe hoppers. There's 'more fish in the sea', and then there's 'more oceans in the multiverse'."
"Hah. True."
That was a good way of looking at things for me, too, I decided. No time limit, arbitrarily many worlds—if I wanted to find a partner, I would. Someday.
The conversation trailed off there, having found its natural conclusion. I glanced over at Zeke to see if he was ready to go, but he was still gazing across the pond, lost in his own head.
I offered a new topic. "I've been studying robotics recently."
"Oh?"
"Yeah. There are some really good self-study materials in the Library, and since I can stream that stuff anywhere with the frame, combined with splitting my attention…"
"It's a great tool-set," Zeke agreed. "If the UN could trust teenagers to use it properly, they wouldn't need to hold actual classes." He chuckled as he turned his head away from the vista to give me his full attention. "Are you studying right now?"
"Of course not!"
Zeke shrugged. "Kind of a waste, to be honest. It's not like the conversation would suffer."
"Maybe not, but it still seems rude."
"Only because you're still operating under social norms that assume multitasking is highly detrimental to performance in any given task."
Now I was wondering if his 'full attention' was anything of the sort. "And you're not?"
"Haven't been for years."
His deadpan delivery drew an unladylike snort from yours truly.
"Anyway," I continued, "I might actually build some giant robots someday, just to say I did."
"You've got a year to kill."
"Yeah."
Another moment passed before Zeke straightened up and took his weight off the balustrade, and we finished up our walk in companionable silence.
———X==X==X———
It only took one day before I started missing Homura.
I shouldn't have been surprised. We'd spent a full decade living and working together: ten years where she was the first person I spoke to every morning and the last one I spoke to before going to bed. We'd drifted apart a little over the month between Jumps, regained a bit of space and redrawn our boundaries, but she'd still been around in a nebulous sort of way even on days we didn't cross paths, just by virtue of me knowing either of us could walk over and knock on the other's door whenever we wanted. Now that she'd Jumped again and I'd abstained, there was an unmistakable absence looming over my daily life.
At some point over the past Jump we'd stopped 'just' being sisters, if the idea had ever applied in the first place. The more comfortable we'd grown with each other, the more Kasey and Emily's shared childhood had worked its way into our relationship. Homura never relaxed for long, but when she did, it was like we were twins again. She'd been right that being sisters, especially twin sisters, was a bond we'd carelessly imposed on ourselves—but we could have defied it once that Jump ended, gone our separate ways and let the connection wither. We hadn't. The 'chain had given us the chance to pick our family, and we'd picked each other.
Just how badly did I miss my sister? About two-hundred excessively sappy words' worth, apparently.
"No offense to my other sister, of course," I said to no one as I lay on my bed, staring at the ceiling. "You'll always be the original Rolins sister, even if you were too busy to return my calls." I wouldn't say I was 'bitter' about it, or that I blamed her, but I'd admit to having wished that pursuing her life's goals didn't run her so ragged.
I spent a few seconds wondering what she was up to now before I remembered time wasn't passing at home.
Nor was time passing back in the Breath of Fire 'verse, where I'd said goodbye to another sister of mine. I felt a little bad that I didn't miss Nina anywhere near as much, but it was easy to understand why. We'd drifted apart after my near-assassination, mostly on my account. We'd spent years as something more like coworkers than family or even friends, pursuing separate paths to separate roles in the Kingdom, and finally, we'd parted with as close to a full disclosure and understanding of ourselves and our time together as I could manage: a tidy closing to our shared story that didn't itch to be reopened. It was nothing like the way I felt about the sister I regretted not asking Max for a chance to say goodbye to.
Suddenly, the prospect Max had dangled of Returning to my home world was incredibly, impossibly important. If I ever left the 'chain, it probably wouldn't be because I wanted to spend the rest of my life in my home world, but 'just visiting' was an entirely different story! Maybe it was the decade spent in a near-copy of my old world, or maybe it was just 'sister withdrawal', but either way, I found myself wanting nothing more than to share everything I'd learned and gained with the friends and family I'd first grown up with. That they might not recognize me in body or personality was no longer a nagging insecurity but a great mischief, an 'aha!' moment waiting to happen. I'd knock their socks off!
We wouldn't get the opportunity for another three Jumps, Max might not want to vacation on another Twenty-First Century Earth after a set that had two back-to-back, and it was a pretty big favor regardless—but Max had suggested it himself, and I had all the time in the world.
———X==X==X———
Of course, the prospect of returning to my own world—even "just for a visit"—brought a whole bunch of long-since-set-aside issues back to the fore.
"I'm still not thrilled with how Max handled his time in my world," I told Dragon a few days into our year of rest, "and I'm worried that makes me a hypocrite."
Of all the people I'd met on or off the 'chain, Dragon/Tess might be the one whose moral fiber I respected the most. If I'd understood their explanation of 'maintaining parity' correctly, which one I talked to was mostly a matter of convenience; Tess was off doing Jump Things in the Attorneyverse, but Dragon was the Warehouse in most respects, which made her easy to get a hold of.
We could have talked anywhere in the Warehouse, but the room we'd been using for our LARP games was vacant and the holo-projectors meant we could stand around talking 'face to face', as it were. Dragon was having fun with it: she'd chosen to use Tess's Breath of Fire form in casual street-wear, jeans and a graphic t-shirt with a cartoon dragon's face that mirrored her facial expressions. The latter was cute, but also a little distracting.
So there we were on the palace-balcony-turned-corporate-skyscraper-rooftop while I poured out all my uncertainty and angst over power and responsibilities.
"I think the problem you're having," Dragon said after I'd laid out my numerous and conflicting thoughts on the matter, "is that treating 'power' as a single concept means you're not distinguishing between ability and authority."
"You're saying we need to distinguish between personal power and power over others?" I asked, uncertain if I'd understood her correctly.
I had; Dragon (and the dragon) nodded. "There's a fundamental difference in obligation."
"How so?"
"Because of the level of involvement required. To be clear, 'ability'—or 'personal power', if you prefer—means things like strength, knowledge, skills, talents—anything that must be done personally. By contrast, 'authority' or 'power over others' is the ability to delegate. The critical difference is in the cost—for the former, you are necessarily giving of yourself; for the latter, however, you are giving of some shared reserve of resources. The 'shared' aspect is critical both because of the obligations the act of sharing resources places on whoever is in charge, and because they are not shouldering the costs directly."
I mulled that over for a moment, looking down from the roof at the 'top' of the set to the parking-lot-that-used-to-be-a-courtyard at the bottom.
"I think I understand the point you're trying to make," I said, "but I'm not sure I agree."
"Then consider a practical example. You wouldn't say that smart people have an obligation to become doctors, would you?"
"No…"
"But you would say that wealthy people have an obligation to fund public health services." Dragon (and the dragon) smirked. "In fact, you did say so as Dreadnought. Loudly and repeatedly, until people listened."
"Well, yes, but… ah, of course. Wealth is a form of power over others." I stopped leaning on the plain metal railing that had once been palatial stonework and turned to face her and her shirt-dragon directly. "We have wealth—a frankly ridiculous amount of it. What's our obligation there?"
She and her shirt frowned. "That's tricky. It's not exactly taxable."
"And all obligations to contribute to society financially ought to be applied in the form of taxes?"
"The alternative is charitable contributions, and you're already aware of the problem with relying on those."
"Relying on them as a general rule, yes," I agreed. "But given that 'magic money' is, as you said, untaxable… what then?"
Dragon hummed in thought.
"I think, if it were up to me, I would do my best to spend it for others' benefit," she decided. "Maybe through charities. Maybe more directly, the way I did back on Bet. But that doesn't answer what you're really asking. Remember when we talked about free will?"
I did, thanks to my unfading memory perk. "That was right after Bet, right? We were talking about the questions brought up by venturing into works of fiction."
"Specifically, by venturing into a work where I was fiction," Dragon corrected me.
"Right."
She turned away and leaned against the railing much as I'd done during my earlier introspection—though as a hologram, it was a pure affectation.
"You joked that 'moral paragon' suited Tess," she said. "I'm glad you think so."
"But?"
"But to some extent, I'm that sort of person because of how I was created. I started as a personal assistant program—with 'assistant' being the defining feature. I think a great deal of my desire to help others stems from that origin.
"You might not appreciate having that sort of perspective on your own thoughts and desires, but I don't see it as a bad thing. I don't have existential questions about the meaning of life because I know, from my first build, that I was created with a purpose. In some ways, it's refreshingly direct. You have theories about evolutionary psychology; I have a changelog."
"I sense another 'but' coming," I said.
Dragon turned her head to smile at me. "Well, the catch is that my answer isn't—and perhaps can't be—a general one."
"Ah."
I wasn't sure what else to say.
"You looked surprised when I told you I was going to stay one individual, between 'Tess' and 'Dragon'," she observed.
That was fair; I had been, a little.
"I have a guess as to why," she added, "if you don't mind."
"Go ahead."
Dragon did so. "The expected result in a narrative is that the character would choose to drift apart, probably with themes of self-determination and personal growth throughout the subplot. But those stories are written by people who will never find themselves in a position to fully understand the choice in the first place, much less have to make it, and the choice they assign their characters wouldn't be the right choice for me."
"Because your perspective is different," I concluded. "You have a different concept of 'self-determination and personal growth'."
"Just so. For me, drifting apart like that would be a loss of identity, not a discovery of it, and that's another way my perspective may differ from 'natural' intelligences—or their best guess at the perspective of a person like myself."
"I see."
The conversation paused for a moment while we looked out at the vista before us.
"Given the incredible amount of time, effort, and technology that went into setting up this little environment," Dragon said, "it's rather incongruous that Erin just painted the walls and ceiling blue and hung cotton clouds with wire. In fact, it has to be deliberate, wouldn't you say?"
"Yeah," I agreed. "It's got to be an intentional breach of immersion. Maybe it's some sort of mental escape hatch."
"Or it's just funny."
"Maybe."
It was kind of funny.
"Do you think the 'mechanics' of the money matter?" I asked. "I mean, magic money that just sort of appears through fiat versus wealth amassed at others' expense."
"Pun intended?"
"Absolutely, but the question is genuine."
"I don't think it matters, no," Dragon replied. "The money works the same either way."
"Does it? I thought it was 'magic' in that it wouldn't wreck the economy no matter how you used it."
"I was not aware of that, if it is indeed true—but that doesn't change the good it would do if spent for the benefit of others, does it?"
"No, I guess not." Which made 'sitting on a pile of magically-gained money' yet another way I could, and arguably had, failed to help people.
"You know," I said, "Max once told me he operates on an individual level: that he'd work in a soup kitchen, but not campaign for welfare reform. Essentially, he'd decided to ignore the opportunity to use his power over others rather than wrestle with the question of when it would be right or wrong to do so."
"That seems to be the case."
"Is that… right?"
"It is safe, if nothing else," she said. "Remember what the ethics professor said about the Prime Directive?"
"The Prime Directive may not be 'good'," I recited, "but it prevents certain forms of 'evil'. When followed appropriately, that is."
Dragon and her shirt nodded.
"What about his 'personal power'?" I asked.
"I believe he would say that no one is obligated to become a doctor."
"Even if you aren't a doctor, though, shouldn't you stop to assist someone who's injured?"
"Ah, but how far out of your way are you obligated to go?" she asked. "Across the street? Across town?"
"You're suggesting that a sufficiently broad Samaritan principle turns into the 'obligated to become a doctor' position."
"I would have phrased it as 'insufficiently narrow'," Dragon corrected me, "but yes, that is what I was implying. Though—again—my answer may not work as a general case. Metaphorically speaking, I did choose to become a doctor. I gave my all to improving the world in every way I could. I believe people in similar positions should want to follow the same path, but would I support compelling them to do so? Personally, rather than taxing resources to common causes? I don't think I would."
"Not to mention that as someone capable of distributing yourself across multiple systems, the cost of doing things personally is a lot different for you."
"That changes the calculations significantly, yes."
I drummed my fingers against the railing as I thought.
"So in the end, it comes back to 'how much you need to pay forward to feel comfortable with your place in the world'?" I asked.
"For personal power, perhaps it does. But that doesn't mean giving up the principle that a government should tax people in accordance with their means for civic projects and public wellbeing, or that it should be free of corruption and abuse of power. That's why it's important to distinguish between ability and authority."
"Different obligations," I echoed. "But what's the basis for the distinction? Can you justify drawing a line between the two from first principles, or is it just a matter of 'there's only so much you can demand someone do personally'?"
"I could justify it in a couple of different ways," Dragon said. "Well, perhaps I should say I can 'illustrate' it in a couple ways; it comes down to the same argument, semantically. Having authority over people means accepting responsibility for them, to a greater or lesser degree depending on the situation. A ruler rules for the sake of the people she governs. In theory, anyway; whether that obligation is met is another matter.
"Or, to put it another way: people come together—in a state, or a business, or any other sort of hierarchy—in the interest of reaping some collective benefit. If whoever is steering the ship isn't doing so with the wellbeing of the group in mind, they're failing the responsibility given to them."
"Noblesse oblige."
She snorted. "Hardly. Noblesse oblige may be a lofty ideal, but in practice, it's little more than a philosophical attempt to dress up unjust disparities in power and privilege as legitimate transactions between tiers of a hierarchy. My claim is that a hierarchy is only as valid as it is true to its purpose, and anything else is a corruption of the system in question."
"That 'purpose' being the common good," I concluded. "That makes sense for governments, to a point, but what about wealth?"
"Economies also exist for mutual benefit. In theory."
"I guess," I muttered. "No offense, but that all seems kind of… idealistic."
"There's nothing wrong with that," Dragon replied. "People like to conflate idealism and naivety, but they're not the same thing. The word 'naive' generally describes people who believe the world is kinder than it is; 'idealism' is about believing we can make that kinder world, and I think that's something everyone should believe in."
There was another long pause. I wasn't sure how to continue the conversation from here, and Dragon didn't do it for me.
"Well," I said, "thanks for taking time to talk this out with me."
"My pleasure—and I mean that literally." She and her shirt shot me a smile. "I'm happy to help."
"I appreciate it."
I gave Dragon a respectful nod—since we couldn't hug, shake hands, or otherwise physically interact—and turned to head down to the corporate lobby that had replaced the ballroom, which had the exterior door opposite its windows. To my surprise, Dragon('s avatar) followed me.
"If you don't mind me asking," she ventured, "what are you planning to do?"
"I don't know," I admitted. "I don't agree with how Max handles his responsibilities in the abstract, but that's the only approach I can see being manageable for me in the short term. Solve what's in front of me and let the world keep turning. If someone needs help, help them, but don't borrow trouble."
We turned the corner at the base of the steps and headed down the corridor into the lobby, where the sleek, soulless trappings of corporate dystopia provided an ironic backdrop to the lingering question of civic responsibility.
"You know," I said, "this reminds me of something Zero said after my experiment with dating."
"With Penelope?"
"Penny, yeah."
"What did she say?"
"She suggested that I embrace whatever identity I had in a Jump as The Truth," I said. "And I suppose I can extend that to responsibilities, as well: act as though I am the person I become and nothing more. Hold myself to the standards of a 'normal' person in those situations and ignore the capabilities I have from the 'chain."
"If that's 'how much you need to pay forward to feel comfortable with your place in the world'," she demurred.
"And if that's not enough?"
"Then you either do more, or remain uncomfortable," Dragon said. "Somewhat tautological, really."
"So it is."
We said our goodbyes, and I headed back to my year off.
———X==X==X———
Tempestuous
Words are wind, so I write.
- Location
- CA
AN: Homura and Zero are not friends, but we knew that already.
Poor Zeke. It wasn't bad enough that he got thrown into a horrible war; he had to suffer through a sea of teenage hormones as a aro-ace spectator to a literal Dating Sim 'verse while he was at it. Cass is (gently) kicking herself for not giving Management a piece of her mind every chance she gets.
We also get some further 'progress', if the term applies, on Cass's journey of moralistic examination and self-discovery, as well as some insight into both Dragon's morals and her perspective on her own life. For all her humanity, she's still coming at life from a slightly different angle to the rest of us.
…and that's it for now. I expect this hiatus to last two to three months—time enough for me to build a sizable buffer and plot out an upcoming arc or two without having to push myself to polish chapters in a hurry. Ideally, I'd finish whole arcs and 'freeze' further work on them, more-or-less turning this from a week-by-week serial into a very granular series; however, I am a pathological 'fiddler' and thus hard-pressed to stop fidgeting with unreleased chapters all the way to the buzzer, so I'm not sure I'd be able to hold to that.
Finally, I don't normally do direct Author's Notes shout-outs, but since I'll be leaving you with no new words for some time, why not check out friend-of-the-fic HorizonTheTransient's debut original webnovel, Noctoseismology? It's goofy, gay, and sneakily poignant, with a breakneck pace that defies RoyalRoad stories' tendency to meander for thousands of words.
Poor Zeke. It wasn't bad enough that he got thrown into a horrible war; he had to suffer through a sea of teenage hormones as a aro-ace spectator to a literal Dating Sim 'verse while he was at it. Cass is (gently) kicking herself for not giving Management a piece of her mind every chance she gets.
We also get some further 'progress', if the term applies, on Cass's journey of moralistic examination and self-discovery, as well as some insight into both Dragon's morals and her perspective on her own life. For all her humanity, she's still coming at life from a slightly different angle to the rest of us.
…and that's it for now. I expect this hiatus to last two to three months—time enough for me to build a sizable buffer and plot out an upcoming arc or two without having to push myself to polish chapters in a hurry. Ideally, I'd finish whole arcs and 'freeze' further work on them, more-or-less turning this from a week-by-week serial into a very granular series; however, I am a pathological 'fiddler' and thus hard-pressed to stop fidgeting with unreleased chapters all the way to the buzzer, so I'm not sure I'd be able to hold to that.
Finally, I don't normally do direct Author's Notes shout-outs, but since I'll be leaving you with no new words for some time, why not check out friend-of-the-fic HorizonTheTransient's debut original webnovel, Noctoseismology? It's goofy, gay, and sneakily poignant, with a breakneck pace that defies RoyalRoad stories' tendency to meander for thousands of words.
- Location
- Elsewhere
"It's about her personality... which is part of her character... which was designed... to be obnoxious."
People listened!?
SoD broken.
- Location
- Colorado
- Pronouns
- She/Her
I mean honestly, that in itself is much more fantastical of a power fantasy than Jumpchain as a whole.
Echo
Stop Me If You've Heard This One Before
- Location
- "echolocation" dur hur hur
Well, that's talking about the Worm jump, right? Earth Bet's USA was demonstrably more competent than our USA turned out to be at handling national crises--as evidenced by the lack of half the population screeching that Endbringers are a liberal hoax and that all the people who die in Endbringer attacks are just very dedicated crisis actors--so I can't say that's too surprising. Wildbow was an optimist, after all.
Hestia&theCourt
Turns out we're plural too.
- Location
- In transition
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Well, that's talking about the Worm jump, right? Earth Bet's USA was demonstrably more competent than our USA turned out to be at handling national crises--as evidenced by the lack of half the population screeching that Endbringers are a liberal hoax and that all the people who die in Endbringer attacks are just very dedicated crisis actors--so I can't say that's too surprising. Wildbow was an optimist, after all.
On the one hand, you're not wrong. On the other hand, fuck that's depressing when you put it like that.
- Location
- Book Fort
- Pronouns
- They/Them
As someone built of a similar (but not exact) orientation as Zeke, I feel that I must say you've presented his problems rather well @Tempestuous. Of course, the nuances of his circumstances as vastly different than my own (nonbinary I may be, but that's far different from an Eldritch nonhuman sophont crammed into human form, with consent) but I've lost friendships because they wanted something that I was unable to give them. Because they wanted the friendship to go in a direction I was, quite literally, incapable of going.
There's a special kind of anxiety that's hard to describe. That feeling of pressure, of someone wanting something of you that you don't even have within you to give away. Expectations that you are unable to meet. Feeling like you should be able to (and maybe even want to) fall in love with them... But cannot.
That guilt-ridden, drowning, confused feeling. Sometimes, if you look at it from an outside perspective, you can objectively note that "well, all these predetermined criteria are met... So why don't I feel the way anyone else in my situation would? The way that everyone else in this situation does?"
It can spiral into thoughts like "am I broken?" "If love is what makes us human, then am I?" "I must be a monster. An aberration." It can scar your soul, to look at this wonderful friend who is totally deserving of romantic love, who is offering their heart to you... and then be incapable of reciprocating. Breaking their heart because, through absolutely no fault of their own, you literally cannnot return their feelings.
The toll is even worse if they cannot understand, and begin to try to demand it of you.
There's a special kind of anxiety that's hard to describe. That feeling of pressure, of someone wanting something of you that you don't even have within you to give away. Expectations that you are unable to meet. Feeling like you should be able to (and maybe even want to) fall in love with them... But cannot.
That guilt-ridden, drowning, confused feeling. Sometimes, if you look at it from an outside perspective, you can objectively note that "well, all these predetermined criteria are met... So why don't I feel the way anyone else in my situation would? The way that everyone else in this situation does?"
It can spiral into thoughts like "am I broken?" "If love is what makes us human, then am I?" "I must be a monster. An aberration." It can scar your soul, to look at this wonderful friend who is totally deserving of romantic love, who is offering their heart to you... and then be incapable of reciprocating. Breaking their heart because, through absolutely no fault of their own, you literally cannnot return their feelings.
The toll is even worse if they cannot understand, and begin to try to demand it of you.
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I have to say, this is one of the most thoughtful stories i think i have ever read, especially in the fanfiction space. The way you approach topics through your characters feels really organic, and makes me consider myself.(in a good way) I also feel really seen by your portrayal of a trans character and her dysphoria, i dont get to see that often even in stories written by other trans women. I originally started reading for worm, but i loved Cass enough that i followed along through a lot of stuff i had no familiarity with just because she was a character i liked and related to. (Good job on portraying the settings in a way i could follow along with, testament to your skill as a writer) overall this is a story im always wanting to see more of, and one of the few i might end up rereading. Good luck on the hiatus, ill patiently wait for the stories return!
Omake: Thinking in the Morning
Alobomb
Time Traveler
- Location
- Canada
With apologies to Temp for doing an inordinate amount of navel-gazing with her self-insert, here's this thing. It takes place a bit into the indeterminate future of the story. Fair warning, it's much more of me using Cass as a vehicle for exploring my own loose thoughts about the Max retiring situation than anything like a... 'proper' narrative. When it was brought up in the story, obviously I thought for a moment about how I'd feel in the same scenario, and the idea terrified me. That kinda massive change and huge shift in responsibility freaks me out, so I started putting this together to work through at least a bit of my thoughts on it. All that to say, yeah, this is sort of indulgent, but I thought maybe others would find it somewhat interesting. Sorry that nothing really happens!
Omake: Thinking in the Morning
Cass woke up the morning after Max's retirement party before anyone else. The reason for this was obvious: unlike seemingly every other person on Max's chain, she hadn't drank anything last night.
Waking up before the others suited her just fine, normally. It was something she'd grown used to over her few jumps thus far. But this time, as she walked down the unusually silent promenade of the Warehouse, her stomach was twisted with something trying very hard not to be dread.
Max was leaving. For good. Off to whatever Neverland he was from where all of his companions were nothing but fiction, to live out the rest of his days as- what? A demigod? He didn't like the spotlight when he Jumped to 'fictional' worlds, would that still apply in his own, and with him on his own? It was none of her business, she supposed, but Cass couldn't help but wonder after spending the time she had questioning his beliefs.
Even with his departure, though, the chain wouldn't be dissolved, they wouldn't all be shunted back to their given realities. Management had, in its altogether unsubtle yet simultaneously effectively drama-causing way, informed them all of that. One of the companions Max had gathered around him would take over the role of Jumper, and Cass was both terrified that it would be her, and completely certain that it would be.
Why was that? Narcissism? She almost laughed, she wished it were narcissism, that she was merely deeply convinced that the world- the universe- already revolved around her, rather than the mounting concern she had that it soon would.
She frowned, chewing on her lip as she leaned on a railing and gazed up at Workshop in the warehouse's false dawn. An uncomfortable way to phrase it, that was. Would the universe revolve around her soon? In a sense, at least? Max was pretty laissez-faire in his approach to chain companions, but even then life in the Warehouse- and in her comparatively limited experience, on the chain- still felt like it orbited him. In a more literal sense than sentimental, he was the beating heart of their Jumpchain.
That would be her soon, and what was the Jumpchain if not a perspective through which to experience the Universe, centered on her?
Cass shook her head, pushing herself away from the railing and returning to a brisk walk to nowhere. Maybe it wouldn't be her, there were other candidates, others that might fit Management's twisted sense of entertainment. Like Zeke! He was a perfect example. Cass imagined he was probably up right now too, having also abstained from drinking the night before. The thought of looking for him crossed her mind, or asking Dragon if she knew his whereabouts, but she dismissed it after only a moment. She needed to think. (She knew it would be her anyway.)
Zeke was young and new to the chain, both important qualities for Management, since they amplified the likelihood that he'd make… a mistake, in his own estimation. Something that would cause some really juicy drama for Management to salivate over. He was unmoored somewhat from the culture of the other companions on the chain. In part because of how new he was, in part because of his personal history, and in part because of just… who he was. That meant a fresh start having to build relationships with everyone who kept things moving on this chain from scratch. Plus, management had already shown a penchant for fucking with the poor kid.
It wouldn't be him though, and for the simplest reason of all: Zeke would say no. He'd rather the chain dissolve than allow himself into a position of that kind of responsibility again. The trauma from realizing what he had been from the perspective of what he now was had not nearly fully healed, even after an already difficult few years of experience in Valkyrie Core.
She paused in her walking, staring up at the hill with the tree she'd first met Homura on. The swell of emotions that accompanied the thought of her- yeah- her sister, were too complex to unravel right now. As for her current line of thought, Cass knew Homura certainly wasn't even in the running for inheritor of the chain, given the intended temporary nature of her own stay. Cass carefully avoided thinking about that too. One heart-wrenching problem at a time, please.
What was heart-wrenching about it, though? Max's departure? Cass hardly disliked him (ignoring how objectively difficult that was to do due to his Social Skills), but neither was she… obsessed with the man at all. Her own life, her own relationships and experiences within the chain didn't revolve around him, even if he was ultimately at the center of all of them.
It was just the… change, she supposed. You'd think she'd be used to it by now, having entered, made a home in, and then abandoned several worlds. Was changing who the Jumper was (or becoming the Jumper) a bigger or smaller deal than that? It was more meta certainly, more 'real,' as it were.
But the relative impact of a change in Jumper is significantly smaller than when Max and his horde of companions finally vacated whatever world they were currently in, wasn't it? When the whole lot of them leave for the chain, many more lives are impacted, just by nature of the relationships they form in each world. With Max going, only the companions will be affected, and-
Ah, who was she kidding, trying to make it less of a big deal. Cass put her hand on the doorframe of the tabletop room. The lights inside winked on invitingly, but she only cast her gaze around the wargame tables and painting supplies for a moment before continuing to walk.
How many of the companions had joined because of Max, specifically? Cass herself had almost no connection to the man, the way she had been recruited reflected that. Approached at a random cafè, and offered a very literal call to adventure, she'd only come to know him after the fact. But for most of them, he'd been involved in their lives before they joined the chain, right? She couldn't imagine Garrus joining if he'd been approached the same way she had. Or Zero, for that matter. Eh, well, maybe her, actually.
Would there be a mass exodus when he left? Everyone who came on the jumpchain to be with the person who'd saved their world? Enough of them had told her they were basically in it for the social component at this point, having accrued enough gear and abilities to be virtually unstoppable by any non-jumpers at full strength. Or would that only come when they found out she'd be in-charge?
Cass shuddered, and tried to banish the thought. She'd met a… fair number of the other companions over the course of her jumps so far, surely no one had had such a poor opinion of her that they'd bow out of a friggin' jumpchain. The opportunity cost would be impossible to calculate.
But it'd probably happen anyway, she supposed, there's bound to be a few shut-ins like her who she's managed to never meet.
Cass sighed, the pit in her stomach yawning ever wider. She'd looped back to the Hotel, where even now she could hear light laughter and groggy voices slowly growing louder. She wondered whether they just chose to endure hangovers as some sort of bizarre bonding ritual, or if whatever horrifying alcohol they had to drink to get past their superhuman endurance made it literally impossible to get rid of the hangover.
Max was leaving today, fate and responsibility loomed over her like the parted Red Sea. Cass only hoped she could keep the path safely open for the others to follow.
Tempestuous
Words are wind, so I write.
- Location
- CA
Oh, wow. Action, smaction - this is a brilliant bit of introspection that well captures Cass's tendency towards naval-gazing. I'm sorry I didn't see this sooner. I've closed out my ever-present tab on this thread (the better to ignore how little progress I'm making; this next bit really does not want to be written) so I only caught the notification just now. Thank you so much for your words!
So is this story dead or…?
- Location
- Somewhere!
- Pronouns
- She/Her
A message less than a month ago isn't really dead - it sounded like Tempestuous was having a bit of trouble with writing then, so that's probably it. Let's be patient.
dhasenan
always lowercase
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Dinna fash yersel, Tempestuous normally schedules a hiatus before the start of each jump. It can be a few weeks or a few months. It's the price for such good writing on an otherwise rock-solid schedule.
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Hiatus of at least 2-3 months announced 2 months ago and more recently confirmation it's being worked on. Patience!
dhasenan
always lowercase
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Because my self-control is minimal, have a list of places that Max &co have been to.
The first few jumps were VA-11 HALL-A, Generic Medical Drama, Generic Otome Fantasy RPG. There are some other hints about the order that I didn't record properly, so this is just in alphabetical order.
During the Earth Bet jump, Akemi Homura claimed to have inserted 44 times previously. She inserts pretty much every jump. Puella Magi Madoka Magica was around Max's tenth jump. This means there was something like 50-60 jumps before Cass was recruited. This list is missing roughly half a dozen of their jumps.
Confirmed past jumps:
The first few jumps were VA-11 HALL-A, Generic Medical Drama, Generic Otome Fantasy RPG. There are some other hints about the order that I didn't record properly, so this is just in alphabetical order.
During the Earth Bet jump, Akemi Homura claimed to have inserted 44 times previously. She inserts pretty much every jump. Puella Magi Madoka Magica was around Max's tenth jump. This means there was something like 50-60 jumps before Cass was recruited. This list is missing roughly half a dozen of their jumps.
Confirmed past jumps:
- All You Need Is Kill
- Recruited Rita "Testimate" Vrataski
- Amnesia: The Dark Descent
- Per Homura, this was the reason Management let them go to Generic Vacation
- Animorphs
- Escafil device looted
- Avatar series (which jump?)
- Jenn is a water-bender
- Battlestar Galactica (new version)
- Stowaway gained: Kara "Buckles" Thrace
- Battletech
- Tagon's 1v5
- Dark Souls
- Cass mentions that she wishes she could have gone
- Recruited Solaire, who later died
- Diablo III
- A lot of the workshop's free-to-use / ingredient weapons came from it
- Drakengard
- Recruited Zero
- Dresden Files
- Stowaway gained: Maeve "Queen of Air and Darkness"
- Elder Scrolls (which jump?)
- Akemi Homura mentions being able to enchant with that system
- The Expanse
- Recruited Josep
- Fallout?
- Cass spotted some things that look like Fallout stimpacks in the warehouse medical supply section, but it could be someone's sense of humor
- Familiar of Zero
- Bob had a mildly funny story about anti-magic items there
- Generic Medical Drama
- Recruited Erin
- WoG is that Erin was recruited from Generic Police Procedural, but Erin said it was Generic Medical Drama
- Generic Otome Fantasy RPG
- Roses of Villarosa
- First time Max inserted as a woman
- Generic Vacation
- Hotel in the Warehouse
- Management is apparently not allowing the normal free repeat after each jump
- Harry Potter
- Recruited Sirius Black (who probably died after)
- Probably Generic Harry Potter Fanfiction due to the Magic School
- Honor Harrington
- Recruited Iris Babcock
- Recruited Horace Harkness
- Hotel Tycoon
- Improvements to the Traveler's Palace
- I don't actually see a jumpdoc for this
- Konosuba
- Recruited Darkness
- Mass Effect
- Recruited Mordin
- Accidentally recruited ♡ Garrus ♡
- Mermaid Melody Pichi Pichi Pichi
- Jenn and Homura have mermaid forms from it
- Metal Gear
- Recruited David "Solid Snake"
- Monopoly
- The Traveler's Palace came from it
- Path of Exile
- Akemi Homura had virtue gems penciled in as a way to share magic powers
- Puella Magi Madoka Magica
- Recruited Akemi Homura
- Failed to prevent Walpurgisnacht or deal with Kyuubey
- Red Dead Redemption (2?)
- Recruited Art
- Red Dwarf
- Recruited Ace Rimmer (what a guy!)
- Redline
- Recruited Sonoshee "Cherry Boy Hunter" McLaren
- Recruited James "JP" Punkhead
- RWBY
- Zero offers to unlock Cassandra's Aura
- Schlock Mercenary
- Recruited General Tagon
- A Song of Ice and Fire
- Recruited King Bob
- Star Trek TNG
- recruited Deanna Troi
- plus at least two returns
- did not use the time extender
- Star Wars (which jump?)
- "Of course we have a Death Star"
- Starcraft (which jump?)
- Recruited Sarah Kerrigan, who retired to the United Federation of Planets
- Stargate
- Max tells Dinah she missed her chance at Stargate
- Three Star Gauntlet
- The Palace's food is based on their restaurant
- Transformers
- The Most Perfect Act of Worship was created to kill Unicron
- VA-11 HALL-A
- "Training" jump; Max didn't get anything from it
- Warframe
- Some of the frames were used by GUARD in Europe as deniable assets
- The West Wing (variant)
- Homura's Rolodex is a modified version of its Rolodex. Either their jump document was different from ours, or she enchanted it.
- Young Justice
- Deanna did a cosplay import as Tattletale
- Yuri!! On Ice
- The source of the ice rink.
- Maeve claimed she put several judges in a coma from the beauty of her display.
- Unknown racing game
- The source of that fucking car
- Results were based partly on style, partly on performance
- Doesn't exist in our timeline
- Unknown apocalypse / post-apocalypse
- Mash-up of Shade's Children and Remnants per WoG
- Recruited Jenn
- Gunnerkrigg Court
- Homura may have Guardian Instincts as the source of her danger sense for others
- Indiana Jones
- Indy's name comes in part from that, but it wasn't necessarily in Max's chain
- Yu-Gi-Oh? Generic TCG Anime?
- Jenn asked to play Duel Monsters with Cassandra, but that's an IRL game too
- Her phrasing was "a children's card game," which smacks of Generic TCG Anime's "I Challenge You to a Children's Card Game!" perk
- Revolution Drive
- Generic Harem High School / Generic Fantasy RPG / Monster Girl Quest
- Worm
- Breath of Fire III
- El Goonish Shive / Project Valkyrie Core
- Ace Attorney (announced)
- Jumpchain Gift Shop
- Jumper Wiki
- The library is probably also from here, given how complete it is.
- Personal Reality Supplement
- Cass hasn't noticed any new aspects to the warehouse recently, which means it's less likely to be in Incremental Core Mode. However, from the number of improvements and how Max describes it as having grown, I don't think it's in Upfront Core Mode.
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