Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

There was a phone on his desk.

It wasn’t his.

His first thought was it might be mom’s, but it didn’t have her wallet-case, and it was a bit too small to be her phone. Besides, it was from a brand he didn’t recognize. Maybe some foreign one? Still, if he’d found it on the street, he’d see if there was a number he could call, but if it had ended up on his desk…

Well it wasn’t like he was important enough for someone to send a bomb to his house. He picked up the phone and pressed the on button on the side. Maybe he’d accidentally picked up someone’s phone and forgot about it. 

It wasn’t locked, and the main screen had a default background. Aside from a couple of basic apps there was a messaging app he didn’t recognize. Something called VeilChat.

He’d seen a few different messaging apps, but this one was unfamiliar to him. Still, if this was someone’s phone he might as well check it out to see if there was someone he could reach out to.

There was only a single group chat, and no other contacts. Now that was strange. No parents, or friends, or anything. Well, he might as well see if anyone in the group chat might know who this phone belongs to.

H37rA3d30c: I found this phone on my desk, does anyone know who it belongs to?

He didn’t get a response for close to fifteen minutes, and he’d almost forgotten about the phone, as he had to finish up this one essay on Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, but his phone pinged as he had finished a section about the opening chapter. He’d check out more about the phone later, but it now looked like someone else was online.

Lord Arvansberg had proven to be a more challenging opponent than he had expected.

Usually, he’s able to keep his opponents off guard with his attacking moves, but Lord Arvansberg had put up one of the strongest defenses he’s seen so far. Especially with his knights…

He opened the hidden drawer he stored the money he won in, fingers dragging along the edges as he pulled it open.

And sitting atop the money was a phone.

It wasn’t any old phone either, it looked like that one brand that Braden was using where they removed all of the buttons, but it looked more modern still. An experimental piece of technology? Additionally, it was in the hidden drawer. Granted, it wasn’t that hidden, so maybe the phone being slipped in there was proof enough he needed to upgrade.

But how did it get there?

The clubhouse had security cameras, but he had some of his own installed, on a closed loop separate from the rest, because no system was 100% accurate. Flicking through the camera's views briefly to see if he could see a figure revealed nothing in the hour and a half he had been gone. Perhaps the footage had been looped somehow, but it was separate from the main system so someone would have to get into his room…

Someone had already been in his room, otherwise this phone wouldn’t be here.

He picked it up and placed it on his desk, throwing the bills he acquired into it and then closing the drawer, giving him more room to stare at this new device. There would be only one reason why someone would leave a phone here.

He was to call someone.

And any organization that had the reach to drop off a phone into his room unbidden would only exert that effort for one reason. No vindictive noble would let their wounded pride drive them so far as to do criminal acts on this scale.

The phone vibrated in his hand.

He threw it onto his bed while scrambling into the closet. Of course it was a trap.

But instead of the explosions he was expecting, there was only silence.

He waited.

One minute turned to two, then five, then ten.

At fifteen minutes, he concluded that whatever it was, it wasn’t meant to be a detonation. No assassin would have their explosion set to such a time-delay for something like this. The phone had landed screen side up on his bed, where he could see it lit up with a message from someone, asking an… interesting question. Their name was a code, and this could still be a trap, but to have something so convoluted?

There was still a lump in his gut as he typed out a response.

Cd3ges7M8W: I found this phone in one of my desk drawers. I don’t know who this belongs to either.

He got a response faster than he had been expecting, but it was not from the original person.

Another day, another slow walk home, the stinging sensations of healing injuries playing in the back of his mind. The only thing he was thinking of right now was the math test tomorrow. Despite how much he studied, it really wasn’t looking well. The one mid-tier deciding to whip sparks his way had not been fun either. At the very least, it was Friday tomorrow. Although the idea of encountering Sparks again was not fun. He might as well get started on the science project. Maybe having an idea before Monday might be good.

There was a phone sitting on his kitchen table.

It wasn’t his or Sera’s, as far as he could tell, but who knows. He turned it over to see the brand was unfamiliar, and it didn’t have a passcode. In fact, signing in, there were only two messages, fifteen minutes apart. One person finding it on their desk, the other person finding it in their desk. Who were the people on the other side? And what did the codes mean in the first place? It was a mystery, and one he would get to the bottom of. The phone only had a single app on it, VeilChat, and no other contacts were loaded onto the phone. There were menus for settings and the like, but he would check them later. Right now, he had to gather more information.

0u4Nd0x1rY: I found it on my kitchen table. Who are you people?

Today was a good day.

Primarily, because there had been a school field trip. She hadn’t told her dad about it, primarily because she knew the three of them would be going. Sure having to go to school for an additional day kind of sucked, but it was a small benefit. Most of the orbiters weren’t as bad, as they would usually go rag on their regulars, or were at the field trip, or were actually doing work.

And it was Friday, so that means that the weekend was open. Aside from working on the costume, there was nothing she actually had to worry about now.

There was a phone sitting on her nightstand.

It was one of the newer style phones, but it was definitely sleeker than any of those. Her mind almost jumped to Tinkertech, but that didn’t make much sense. And why had this phone ended up on her nightstand. It wasn’t from her dad, it looked too expensive for something like that. And the fact it was on her nightstand was worrying. Maybe she’d grabbed it accidentally?

She opened it up and aside from settings there was an app called VeilChat. This was starting to look like a prank.

The chat had three other people, with coded usernames, each of them asking about where this phone had come from. It might still be a prank, but it was more confusing now than normal.

53z3543t9m: I found it on my nightstand. All your names are in code for me.

Chapter Text

Unnamed Group Chat

[16:44]

0u4Nd0x1rY: Idk who tf any of u r, but I hate these codes.

0u4Nd0x1rY has changed their username to John

Cd3ges7M8W: Is that your real name?

Cd3ges7M8W: Cybersecurity is important. Especially since we’re strangers to you.

John: Don’t really care.

John: I probably don’t know any of u anyways.

Cd3ges7M8W: Still, it’s not a good habit to get into.

Cd3ges7M8W has changed their username to BlackKing

H37rA3d30c: Black King? Interesting Choice.

BlackKing: It’s my favorite chess piece.

H37rA3d30c: Huh, I don’t really have a favorite chess piece.

John: Neither do I. Y a fav chess piece?

BlackKing: Why not?

John: as good a reason as any i suppose

H37rA3d30c: has changed their name to Viridian

Viridian: Thought about it for a while but thought this fits best.

John: Why’s that?

Viridian: Green hair.

John: Ah that makes sense.

BlackKing: Wait, what?

                 You say that as if it’s normal.

Viridian: I mean, it’s not the most common.

John: Yeah. Surprised u havn’t seen it b4.

53z3543t9m: There’s like 3 people I heard of that have green hair.

                      Kind of narrows down who you might be.

53z3543t9m has changed their username to Sunbraid

Sunbraid: asked my dad for a username and he suggested this.

Viridian: Sounds pretty cool!

John: So why were we given these phones in the first place?

BlackKing: I don’t really know.

                There’s bound to be a reason.

Viridian: If there was, you’d think whoever gave us these phones would tell us.

John: Probably.

Sunbraid: We’ll figure it out later.

Viridian: Of course!

              I did want to ask you guys about your favorite hero.

              I heard it was a pretty good way to get to know ppl.

Sunbraid: Huh, not sure I really have one. I’d have to think about it.

John: None of them.

BlackKing: Superheroes? Like from comic books?

Viridian: No, like the real ones?

BlackKing: Interesting

                Wait, this might seem like a weird question, but what’s the current year?

Viridian: 2267 CE

Sunbraid: 2011 AD

John: 778 ARY

BlackKing: and 2017 ATB for me.

John: So? Y’all just got it wrong.

BlackKing: no, i think it’s something else

Viridian: Alternate realities? As crazy as it sounds?

Sunbraid: Oh that makes sense.

Viridian: ??????

Sunbraid: not sure exactly how long it’s been, but Prof. Haywire opened a portal and now I get to enjoy two realities worth of remakes and sequels.

John: So you know who might have given us the phones?

Sunbraid: Not really. The guy who broke everything open is dead now.

BlackKing: Still, the answer might lie in your reality. There aren’t any powers in my world.

John: Probably. Never heard of an ability that could cross realities.

Viridian: Same here. No quirk that I know of can do that.

BlackKing: Well maybe the three of you can see if you can track it down.

[06:33]

Viridian: I'm wondering if the days are the same for everyone here. It’s Saturday for me.

John: yru up at 6 on satday?

Viridian: restless really. You?

John: morning run. U might wanna try it.

Viridian: Maybe. Doesn’t sound like the worst idea.

[11:57]

BlackKing: It’s Saturday for me as well.

Sunbraid: same here.

Viridian: So if it’s the same day of the week, what about months? Assuming it’s a similar calendar.

BlackKing: Early August here.

Sunbraid: April 2nd here.

John: Middle of March here.

Viridian: And the third week of february here for me

John: So everyone here has a different month, but the same time of the day and day of the week.

BlackKing: Interesting. Thought we would be the same week and month.

Viridian: Well either way, it’s kinda cool.

Sunbraid: Maybe the timelines are shifted a bit I don’t know

                Still weird we all have the same months.

Viridian: The timelines diverged later maybe?

BlackKing: That makes sense.

[13:37]

John: So how are you guys planning to hide the phone you use here?

Sunbraid: Haven’t thought about it that much.

Viridian: I mostly just keep it in my backpack at school or in my room.

              I tried to see if I could download other things onto it, but the software seems incompatible with the apps I tried.

BlackKing: Huh. I have tried similar things.

                 And I mostly just keep it in my room. 

John: Yeah I tried signing on to wifi and downloading apps, but neither worked.

BlackKing: Huh, I’ll have to look into it.

Viridian: And I tried searching for VeilChat on the internet but I haven’t seen anything.

Sunbraid: Another mystery on the pile I suppose.

BlackKing: I’ll see if there were similar events. Maybe something like this has happened before.

Viridian: I’ll do the same thing.

John: Same here.

[20:24]

Viridian: have we thought of a name for this group chat, I feel like it should have a name.

John: Probably should.

Sunbraid: The Dimensional Space

John: Actually that sounds pretty cool.

Unnamed Group Chat has been changed to The Dimensional Space

BlackKing: A bit on the nose, but sure.

Chapter Text

The Dimensional Space

[07:44]

John: So y do y’all think this entire setup was created?

Sunbraid: A prank? Or something more? It’s hard to tell. 

John: Nbdy reached out 2 us so it’s hard 2 say.

         Unles u got a msg I didn’t

Sunbraid: Nope, no message from any1.

BlackKing: Yeah nothing here as well.

John: What y’all doin awake at 7am?

BlackKing: Could say the same abt you

John: There’s a church right by my apt, the bells start at 7:30

Viridian: That’s allowed?

John: idk, but it’s been going on since I moved.

BlackKing: Check with your town council and maybe some of your neighbors.

                 You might be able to organize something.

John: Not a big deal really.

         sry for waking u up.

Sunbraid: You didn’t wake me up, I needed to head out for a morning run.

Viridian: Same here.

BlackKing: Can’t believe I joined a group chat with a bunch of exercise nuts.

[13:25]

Viridian: Do any of you guys have studying tips? Studying for entrance exams and feel like a new technique might help.

BlackKing: Is there someone you could at least teach to? Sibling? Parents?

                 I heard teaching other ppl is the best way to learn yourself.

Viridian: … maybe. My mom’s pretty busy and I’m an only child. Dad’s been out of the picture for a while.

BlackKing: Well try it out.

Sunbraid: Didn’t you say it was February?

               Are the exams in February?

Viridian: It’s unique, but that’s what a hero high school is I guess.

BlackKing: good luck.

Viridian: I still have a week, but thanks anyways.

Sunbraid: Wish there was something that organized here.

Viridian: Do you not have a national heroics organization?

Sunbraid: Sure the PRT, Protectorate, and Wards exist, but they don’t have schools or anything.

               There’s rumors of a boot camp in Arizona, but aside from that, there’s not much.

Viridian: How many heroes are operating in the USA, bc here there’s like 60 thousand American heroes.

Sunbraid: Damn.

                I don’t think there’s that many people with powers in the entire world here.

                There might be a thousand heroes in the Protectorate.

Viridian: That’s… really not a lot.

[20:14]

BlackKing: I actually did figure out something this app had.

BlackKing has offered a chess match.

John: Nope. Not accepting that.

         New Texis hold-em, however…

BlackKing: Never heard of that. I know of Tudoria hold-em. Might be the same game.

Viridian: It’s called Texas hold-em here.

Viridian has accepted the chess match.

Viridian: Wonder if chess works the same way.

[20:27]

Viridian: Wow. That was pretty one-sided. Congrats though.

BlackKing: Different strategy, I’m surprised it worked so well.

Viridian: Could be different realities play differently. Still weird the rules are the same though.

BlackKing: Something to think about in the future.

[11:43]

BlackKing: Huh. Well it might be a while, looks like something’s come up.

                 Ever have one of those moments where you do something reckless?

Viridian: Yep! That’s how I got recognized by a pro hero.

Sunbraid: Not yet, but I might sometime soon.

John: A couple of times, sure.

BlackKing: Well I did that, and now I am stuck in a moving truck.

Sunbraid: How are you stuck?

BlackKing: Well the people driving it haven’t seemed to notice me.

                 And they don’t seem the type to stop.

Viridian: Maybe you can break a door open or something?

BlackKing: Not a lot in here to do it with.

                 Door’s unlocking… gotta hide.

John: Good luck I guess.

Sunbraid: Well, it’s not like there’s anything we can do.

Viridian: What happens if the phone is destroyed, you think?

              Does it replace itself or do we just lose access forever?

John: Might find out soon, just avoided getting beat up by some guy with energy claws because I didn't want to do her homework.

Viridian: Yikes! Thankfully doesn’t happen here, although I try to stay outside of everyone’s way.

              Even though you’re not really allowed to use quirks here, it still happens.

John: Damn. Wish that was a rule here.

         Might prevent me from going to the school nurse every other day.

Sunbriad: Imagine having a school nurse.

               At least powers are so rare I’m probably the only one in the school with them.

Viridian: As opposed to me, where I’m the only one without them.

              Though I might be getting some soon.

John: Well hope that goes well.

         Also same about the powers thing Viridian.

Viridian: Well I gtg back to class.

Subraid: Same here. 

John: Hopefully we hear back from BlackKing.

[16:04]

Sunbraid: I figured out how to see who is online.

               And when they were last active.

John: oh there it is.

         Looks like it’s been a while since he was online.

Sunbraid: Well it’s not like we can do anything abt it.

John: Indeed. We’ll just have to wait and see.

[17:44]

BlackKing: Sry about the long wait, family issues.

Viridian: Well I hope it worked out well in the end.

BlackKing: Kind of. Learned something new so that’s good at least.

John: What abt the truck thing?

BlackKing: Turns out they were more understanding than I guessed. They dropped me off.

Chapter Text

The Dimensional Space

[19:07]

Viridian: Sunbraid, you mentioned your powers, I’m curious about what you can do!

Sunbraid: Just control bugs, nothing really that good.

Viridian: Well it depends on your level of control.

John: More specifically things like range, bug amount, and precision.

Sunbraid: Well I don’t know the exact range, but on a good day I can cover a few city blocks.

               And I do have decent control, and I haven’t tested how many I can control, but it has to be quite a lot.

John: If the range is big enough you don’t worry about it, that makes it pretty powerful already.

Viridian: And define decent? How much control do you have?

Sunbraid: I can control individual bugs, specific types of bugs, or a whole horde, but I can’t give too many separate orders.

               Only so much I can do.

John: Still sounds pretty powerful.

Sunbraid: Well when there’s city destroying monsters and heroes that can destroy city blocks at a time, it’s not that great.

John: … huh, despite more people having abilities here it seems like it’s on a different scale than here.

Viridian: Same! We don’t have any big monsters here, and there’s only one hero I know of that strong, All Might! The no. 1 hero of Japan!

Sunbraid: Wait, you live in Japan?

Viridian: … yes?

Sunbraid: I hope that Japan fared better in your world than in mine.

Viridian: Well it has the lowest crime rate in the world, so I guess so.

              What happened to Japan in your world?

Sunbraid: One of the city-destroying monsters, Leviathan, attacked Japan and submerged the entirety of Kyushu into the water.

                Japan never really recovered from it. 

BlackKing: Damn.

                 And I thought Japan got screwed in my timeline.

Viridian: ????

BlackKing: Invasion and occupation by a foreign empire. They even renamed it to area 11.

                Since then, much of the local population has been forced into ghettos or out of the colonial cities, which destroyed much of the original cities.

Viridian: Are you there?

BlackKing: Right now, yes.

John: Japan? Where’s that?

BlackKing: Off the coast of China… 

John: Never heard about that either.

BlackKing: Our worlds really are distinct then.

John: It seems like the rest of you three have much more similar worlds.

BlackKing: Maybe, all I know is that Japan exists for the three of us, but that might be it.

Viridian: Well, once I find out how to send pictures with this app we might be able to compare world maps.

[20:07]

Sunbraid: Didn’t you guys say you don’t have powers? How do you know how to break down a power’s effects so well?

Viridian: Well I’ve always studied powers, and I’ve gotten pretty good at it.

John: Learning how people’s powers work means I can better break it down to fight against them.

Sunbraid: You fight people with powers when you don’t have one? Damn.

John: It’s not like most of the people here have powers like yours. Most people just have like a little bit of super strength or maybe they can shoot some projectiles or something. 

Viridian: Sounds pretty similar! My classmates can stretch out their eyes or fingers or make flowers fall from their hair.

John: Huh. Seems like powers have different bases in our world.

Viridian: So you don’t have any people with all sorts of hair colors or horns or whatnot?

John: Horns, no, but hair and eye colors, sure. My friend’s naturally got purple hair.

Sunbraid: Huh, that might be because of how many people in your world have powers. 

Viridian: Probably, that’s the prevailing theory at least.

John: As far as I can tell, people have always had different hair colors.

Sunbraid: So powers have always been a part of your world?

John: Seems like it. Hbu?

Sunbraid: About 40 years. 

Viridian: Wow! That’s not a lot of time. It’s been about 200 years here.

John: Maybe that’s why so few ppl have powers in your world.

Sunbraid: Well, people in your worlds are born with their powers, I assume?

John: Sort of. They usually manifest around the ages of 5-7

Viridian: It’s a bit earlier here, they usually appear when you’re 4.

             What’s it like for you?

Sunbraid: It’s… not something good.

               Think about the worst day you’ve ever had.

               Then remember that one in a million people get powers.

John: Huh. That’s… interesting.

Viridian: Yeah…

[20:41]

BlackKing: There’s more options on this phone.

                 What are all of these faces?

John: You mean emojis?

John: Like this 🙂

BlackKing: Yes, those.

John: Is this your first time using a smartphone?

BlackKing: Yeah? It’s not like they are that common here.

Sunbraid: Same here, some manufacturers had started making them.

                I thought it was Tinkertech at first.

BlackKing: Tinkertech?

Sunbraid: Some people here have powers that make them able to build super advanced technology.

Viridian: We don’t have people exactly like that, but some people have quirks making it easier for them to make technology.

John: Huh. Well I definitely learned a lot abt ur worlds.

Chapter Text

The Dimensional Space

[Tuesday 12:07]

Viridian: I got some good news, everyone!

John: What’d you hear?

Viridian: So apparently a charity has started a beach cleanup drive on the beach I was cleaning.

BlackKing: Nice, good to hear.

Viridian: I didn’t take a picture of it, but it was basically covered with trash and thrown-away appliances, stuff like that.

              It’s a relatively small beach that had trash wash on shore.

              So ppl kept dumping there and it basically became a dump.

Sunbraid: Kind of sounds like the part of town with all of the rusted ships.

John: How did that happen?

Sunbraid: Businesses dried up, so quite a few of the companies that did import/export just dropped the ships off on the coast. So now we just have a bunch of rusted ships on ⅓ of the shore. The only reason it got cleaned up at all is some of it was visible from the Boardwalk.

BlackKing: So only the places where the tourists and other rich people visit.

Sunbraid: Exactly.

Viridian: I was about to ask why the heroes didn’t help clean it up but then I remembered what I’ve been doing for the past 10 months.

BlackKing: Think there’s something similar in the Yokosuka Ghetto, although I don’t know for sure.

                 No profit in moving the boats, I suppose.

Viridian: Yep. Sounds about right.

John: Huh, I don’t think there’s anything like that around here.

         I’d have to go to a coastal city to check.

The Dimensional Space

[Tuesday 12:44]

John: Can’t believe I’m witnessing a battle over chocolate cake.

Sunbraid: what’s the specifics of this chocolate cake?

John: Triple Chocolate. Pretty damn good the 1 time I managed to snag a piece.

         There’s only a limited amount made, and I missed it this month again :(

Sunbraid: What kind of fancy school do you go to where that’s an option.

               Never seen anything like that the few times I got a school lunch.

John: I mean, it’s technically a public school.

        Had to study like hell to get in tho.

Viridian: Yeah I can see a fight breaking out of that was an option.

             Wouldn’t last long though, it would get broken up pretty quickly.

John: Imagine having teachers who would break up fights.

Viridian: No, the teachers wouldn’t get involved.

             But our school’s head of security has a provisional hero license so he usually breaks it up.

Sunbraid: And I just have the normal school fights. Try to avoid them most of the time.

BlackKing: Don’t think my school ever had chocolate cake like that.

                 The staff don’t like serving unhealthy foods at lunch.

Sunbraid: Staff? What kind of fancy school do you go to?

BlackKing: One of the better schools in Japan

Viridian: Cool. 

The Dimensional Space

[Tuesday 13:46]

John: New things in my life: arm broken by stoneskin dude.

BlackKing: Is this something you have to deal with regularly?

John: Pretty much, yeah. Had to avoid a fight over… I think it was a pen? Either way, when someone with laser powers fights someone with superstrength+more, you get half of Wallik hall being torn through.

         And that’s when I ran into the stoneskin guy.

BlackKing: Wow. If someone blew up parts of a school here they’d definitely be sent to jail.

John: Imagine…

The Dimensional Space

[Wednesday 12:27]

Sunbraid: Have you guys needed to charge this phone? I’d thought the battery was just stuck at 100% and ti would die at any moment, but it hasn’t.

Viridian: Huh, I hadn’t realized that. It doesn’t have a charging port or anything.

Sunbraid: That makes me think they are Tinkertech more and more. Having some sort of high-energy source definitely means that it’s something beyond what we can build.

John: Yeah it has no ports or anything. Strange.

         Another mystery to add to the pile ig.

Viridian: So about those guys who destroyed parts of the school. They got in trouble at the very least?

John: Maybe. They went to the principal but who knows at this point.

BlackKing: Well good luck.

Sunbraid: they likely just got a warning. If they feel comfortable enough to destroy walls like that they know there’s not going to be serious consequences.

John: Probably. How’d you guess that?

Sunbraid: ppl with power get away with shit. Doesn’t matter the timeline it’s all the same thing.

Viridian: Pretty much so, yeah.

BlackKing: Yep, that’s exactly how it works.

The Dimensional Space

[Thursday 18:41]

Viridian: There was a new hero debuting today, they had a pretty interesting power.

              They seemed to have some sort of wave-based power.

John: Were the waves visible on generation, or were only the effects visible?

Viridian: They were bluish and translucent, they did no damage to buildings or most people, but the few villains there looked fearful and eventually collapsed to the ground. Think that might be a secondary ranged attack with the quirk.

John: The waves are likely for detection. Shame they’re visible in that case. And once this hero finds who they are looking for they can do things to them. It probably builds up over time with each wave. There might be a secondary shot but it doesn’t feel likely.

Viridian: Interesting. Where’d you pick up those skills?

John: Well when you have to fight people with powers, you have to break it down as fast as you can.

         It’s always a good skill to have in your back pocket. How about you?

Viridian: I’ve always been interested in quirks, as there’s so many unique ones it’s difficult to see any similarities.

BlackKing: Same thing applies with people, not just their powers.

John: Like learning how to piss people off? Taunts and shit like that?

BlackKing: If that’s what you want, sure.

                 But it can be useful to learn about how to defuse situations, too.

John: I mean, supposedly, but most of the times people just want to be a bully.

Chapter Text

The Dimensional Space

[Thursday 20:51]

Viridian: So I figured out something that might be useful.

John: What’d you find?

Viridian: I think I figured out how to transfer images to this phone we’re using.

Viridian has sent 4 files

John: I’ll see if it works. Hopefully the files are compatible.

BlackKing: Same here. I’ll try it out myself.

Viridian: I’m not as good with programming as I’d like, so if these don’t work for everyone I’ll have to tweak it maybe.

John: Huh. It’s not working for me. What’d you search for?

Viridian: File conversion data.

Sunbraid: I don’t have a personal computer or smartphone or anything, so I won’t be able to test this for you.

BlackKing: I’lll have to boot it up in secure mode so I don’t get viruses.

The Dimensional Space

[Friday 7:47]

Viridian: Hopefully the files worked well enough.

John: My laptop refused to open these files, and I haven’t found a file converter that accepted them yet.

BlackKing: I got it to work somewhat for me. I managed to access the settings.

                   I did it from the third file you sent.

John: Once I get it to work, I’ll try that.

Sunbraid: Might have to go to a library computer to see if it works. 

BlackKing: See if you can get it to work from the phone.

                   You might get in trouble with the library if you download files.

Sunbraid: Good point.

The Dimensional Space

[Friday 10:20]

Viridian: Well the school closed down due to a villain attack nearby, so that’s fun.

John: Did your superheroes manage to defeat the villain?

Viridian: Yeah. I’m pretty sure. But they had some sort of earthquake quirk so quite a few buildings were destroyed.

John: Well hope it ends up well for you.

Viridian: yeah…

              So how abt you?

John: There was a hero that died in a city close to me.

         Another target of terrorists…

BlackKing: It might be because you don’t have a critical mass of superheroes.

                 If there’s only so many in your world, they won’t have power.

Viridian: That makes sense. That’s how heroes started in the USA, and eventually here in Japan.

              Only when there was a few thousand vigilantes nationally is when it picked up.

John: And there’s only like thirty vigilantes across the country, and they’re being hunted down by terrorists.

BlackKing: Why would terrorists want to kill vigilantes?

John: I don’t know. Maybe the vigilantes disrupt their other cells or something.

BlackKing: I’m still suspicious. These superheroes have to be pretty powerful, right?

John: Think so. Most of them are apparently high-tiers, some of the strongest people.

Viridian: Has the government there said anything abt these terrorists?

John: Aside from an identifier name, nothing really.

The group chat between realities had been something he had not been expecting. The mysterious phone he suspected at first was an assassination attempt had proven to be something else. These people could still be lying, but his laptop had conniptions when trying to download the files Viridian had sent, not recognizing the file format, eventually converting them into a text file that worked well enough. And their reactions and descriptions of the world had seemed genuine.

It was something nice to think about, at the very least, distracting from the fact he had to figure out a way to get Suzaku off of the false murder charges he was currently facing. His uniform wasn’t available yet, and from what he’d heard Suzaku would be paraded in front of crowds Tuesday night… the timing was getting a little tight, but he still had some time, especially since he was expecting the call today.

“Hey Lelouch, I’ve never seen you so interested in your phone. Found some sort of lady friend?” Milly teased from behind him and how did she always manage to do that? She walked in heels half the time! Thankfully he didn’t have it out right now.

“No, it’s just I found something interesting.” He replied.

“Well, alright, I’ll trust you now.” Milly replied. “But I do need you to check on the budget, the horse riding club was complaining about not having enough money.”

Of course they would. He’d have to see if he could squeeze more water from the stone…

The Dimensional Space

[Friday 14:43]

Sunbraid: So Viridian, you’d mentioned wanting to be a hero, right?

Viridian: Yeah, I’m hoping.

Sunbraid: What’s your costume design looking like?

                I’m feeling like I’m missing something with the design…

Viridian: The design I thought up was mainly green with white stripes along the sides.

              It’s a more lighter green if that helps.

John: Even here some of the vigilantes here have bright costumes, especially the daytime ones.

Viridian: Do you have a costume ready?

Sunbraid: Mostly. I’ve got to finish it up with the things I couldn’t make myself.

John: You made your own costume?

Sunbraid: Spider Silk.

John: Ah.

BlackKing: That should work out well enough.

John: Isn’t kevlar supposed to be synthetic spider silk.

Sunbraid: That’s where the inspiration came from, actually.

                But I can look at the colors again.

BlackKing: Even if you have mostly dark colors, you can add brighter accent colors.

                 Maybe something like gold, that way it can still be somewhat stealthy.

Sunbriad: Don’t know how I feel about gold, but I’ll keep it in mind.

Chapter Text

The Dimensional Space

[Saturday 8:56]

Viridian: My entrance exam is today, hope I don’t fail.

BlackKing: You should be fine, your have decent enough skills.

                Did you have a power at least?

Viridian: Yeah, I got it recently.

John: Well I hope you had a decent mentor at least.

Viridian: Yep! One of the greatest heroes in the world is my mentor!

Sunbraid: Well I hope it works out well enough for you.

                Just don’t panic and you should be good.          

Viridian: I should be good, but there’s a practical portion to the exam and I’m not sure what it is.

BlackKing: Well whatever it is, probably won’t be too complex.

                 It will probably be a pretest for heroic characteristics.

John: And this might be a good chance for you to try out your analysis skills in a fight.

BlackKing: Overall, as long as you have backup plans, it won’t be the end of the world.

Viridian: I do, my mom told me it was good to have backup plans.

Sunbriad: Well hope it goes well for you.

John: Aren’t you going 2b a hero as well, Sunbraid?

Sunbraid: Yeah, but I can’t just go to a hero school.

               So my plan is just to go to the bad side of town and wait for villains.

BlackKing: Did you do some research on local villains at least?

Sunbraid: At least as much was available or rumored.

               There might be things other people missed abt their powers.

John: Nothing beter than practical expereince 2vstart u out.

        Think that’s how the suprheroes here started anyways.

Viridian: Here, that’s illegal.

Sunbraid: Well you have more heroes and they are more organized.

               There is probably a department under the government for heroes.

Viridian: Wow, how’d you guess that?

Sunbriad: There’s people that are pushing that now, and the PRT is already a pseudo-governmental organization.

BlackKing: Pseudo-governmental?

Sunbraid: It’s complicated, from what I heard.

BlackKing: It always is.

The Dimensional Space

[Saturday 15:34]

Viridian: Don’t think it went that well…

BlackKing: Why’s that?

Viridian: Well the only robot I destroyed was worth 0 points and I ended up breaking 3 limbs.

John: How?

Viridian: Well I used my quirk for the first time and the energy broke my arms.

John: 

         Alright, so you have a mentor, right?

         What did thay tell you abt using your pwr?

Viridian: Well…

             Just kind of use it?

John: … okay.

BlackKing: That doesn’t seem to work for you.

John: So whn you activated the pwr, wht does it feel like?

Viridian: Something of a core of energy, and then I push it into my attacks.

John: Then don’t use all of it, try only using a little bit.

         Maybe also try spreading it out throughout your entire body as well.

BlackKing: Wait, you broke 3 limbs?

Viridian: There was a healer on staff with a healing quirk.

             It fixed it easily and in exchange I’m just tired.

John: Yeah, you definitely should try to limit it.

         Having your arm broken is no fun.

Viridian: I’ll ask AM about something like that.

Sunbraid: It took me a while to figure out how to use my powers, so be patient.

BlackKing: It’s like learning any skill, you have to take time to learn how exactly to employ it.

John: There’s only so much I can learn abt a powr without seeing it.

         Hope it helps.

Viridian: Hopefully it does.

             The new perspective might help.

The Dimensional Space

[Sunday 10:07]

BlackKing: I am curious about divergences. When did powers in your world start? Aside from John’s world, I know they had powers for as long as historically recorded.

Viridian: Abt 200 years ago, there was a baby born in China that had a golden glow. Now powers are abundant.

Sunbraid: Glowing gold?

               That sounds alot like Scion.

Viridian: Is that a hero?

Sunbraid: The first one. Kind of. There’s theories on the internet that he's not even human. But he’s definitely heroic.

                And he has golden skin that from what people have said it glows a little bit.

BlackKing: How long ago was that?

Sunbraid: About 30 years ago, why.

BlackKing: Was thinking about how myths can drift over time.

Viridian: But our powers don’t work the same way.

             They happen around the age of 4 to 5 pretty much exclusively.

Sunbraid: Although from what I heard 2nd and 3rd generation capes have less… impactful trigger events.

               One of the heroes here famously triggered due to being fouled in basketball so…

Viridian: Huh, that’s pretty interesting.

             History here past 100 years ago is kind of vague, as a lot of the records from then are pretty sparse.

BlackKing: I still think you’re in different realities.

                It wouldn’t make sense if you two are the only ones connected.

John: None of this makes sense in the first place.

BlackKing: We have a baseline, at least.

                And even in things that seem like nonsense at first, there’s something that makes sense in there.

Viridian: I’ll dig up what I can find about some older history.

             Maybe I’ll find something interesting.

The Dimensional Space

[Sunday 18:20]

BlackKing: Sunbraid, you mentioned wanting to go out and be a hero?

Sunbraid: Yes. I might not reply for a while.

John: Hope it goes well for you.

         There’s no place for pride in fighting. If you’re overwhelmed, you can run away.

BlackKing: Experience?

John: Yep.

Viridian: Well if your quirk has city blocks worth of range, you don’t even need to be too close. Can you sense things through your bugs?

Sunbraid: Only as good as a bug can see or hear. Which is not well. And I can’t really afford a remote camera/microphone setup.

Viridian: Well hope it goes well for you!

[Sunday 20:28]

John: So Viridian, why do you want to be a hero?

Viridian: To save people, just like my mentor hero, All Might.

              I think I'll be able to do great things as a hero.

John: Huh.

Viridian: Why do you ask?

John: I was just wondering why someone would be a hero.

BlackKing: Selflessness does make someone heroic from what I can tell.

                 Also you did help clean a beach, that doesn’t happen everyday.

[Sunday 23:47]

John: Wonder if Sunbraid’s okay.

Viridian: You still up?

John: Yep. And you?

Viridian: Can’t sleep, it happens sometimes.

[Monday 02:22]

Viridian: iuas iofea’’’jv9

Viridian: Ah sorry I must’ve left my phone open. It’s pretty late.

[Monday 03:31]

Sunbraid: Ah, sorry for worrying you guys.

                It went… okay? I think?

Chapter Text

“Koios, did you have the new data from the Ramiel office?”

“Yes, Director. They identified the source of the caelstorm, it was a kid whose cael affinity involved weather manipulation.”

She’d never heard of something like that, but it did look like the outer islands had some new things. She grabbed the files and placed them on her desk, her copy of the documents Koios.

“See if some of the tutors we have can do some emergency tutoring. The caelstorm was growing, and who knows what the effects will be on some of our Outer Islands.”

“Yes, Ma’am!” Koios announced, the young man pulling out his cael-powered phone as he left. She’d already installed the contacts needed.

“Aella, I want you to check in with Governor Lemis. He said he found a book I was interested in.”

“Yes, Ma’am!” Aella replied, leaving soon after.

She turned around to look at the file she’d placed down. That kid showed some promise…

There was something on top of the file. A thin black box with what looked like a glass top.

She’d turned around for seconds, and she hadn’t sensed any strange cael concentrations. It was as if it had just appeared as her back was turned. Aella hadn’t said anything when her back was turned, she was facing where the phone would have appeared. Had it appeared in the second and a half when Aella’s back was turned and she had yet to turn around.

Poking around the object with cael revealed it really was a black box, she couldn’t sense inside, and that was worrying. A closer inspection revealed it had two buttons on it. She needed to run some tests to determine what it is.

Ten minutes later it was sealed in a cylindrical glass container, held in a field so she could move it around at will. Aside from the buttons and the glass side of the box, it looked completely uniform, save for a symbol on the back, six four-pointed stars, each a different color: Green, Purple, Orange, Yellow, Blue and Red. The multicolored stars weren’t painted or printed on, they seemed to be made of the same material as the black panels of the small box, and there didn’t seem to be any seam or raised bump, the material smoothly transitioning.

There was not a single seam in the entire box, aside from around the two buttons, but attempting to slice away at it had yielded no results. The only thing left was to try out one of the buttons.

Remotely pressing it with a small cael construct revealed what she’d initially thought to be a glass top was actually a screen. A phone that didn’t require cael to operate that isn’t a basic model? She’d never heard of them anywhere, and the stars only made it more confusing. The mainpage had a few buttons, but her eyes immediately drifted to VeilChat. What was this about? She’d heard about a few chatting apps popular in Coelcaitus, but this was something else. Her days were about to get significantly busier, but what was another mystery for her. None of the sensors had registered the device as dangerous , so that means she could try to open it.

Bringing it close, she dragged a gloved hand along the edge of a knife, covering it with a sharp edge of cael and trying the edge. This modified knife could cut through steel like butter, but it didn’t leave so much as a scratch on the phone.

She slammed a shard of cael into it, cracking the pedestal the phone was on, but once again not leaving a scratch. She might run it through some more tests, but in the meantime she might as well see what, or who, is in this chat. There wasn’t a lot in the chat history, but what was there was interesting. Alternate realities had been predicted by some, especially her predecessor, but there appears to be concrete proof.

B1u3M4t73R: Well hello everyone.

B1u3M4t73R has changed their name to Icarus .

Icarus: Nice to learn alternate realities are real.

John: People can be added? The Fuck?

The trees in Barrowmane were wilting.

It was no surprise, this city, according to her mentor, didn’t get nearly as much funding from the hero clan or local lords. One of the few heroes here was a woman named Chelestra. Or that was her hero name, at least. If she took her on, her training would be nearly complete. Chelestra should be walking down the middle of Main Street in Barrowmane in a few minutes, as if she doesn’t care.

Which is why she was hiding on the top of an apartment midrise. What she’d heard about Chelestra was her power. Enhanced physicality beyond what a normal gift user had was decent enough, but she had a side power that gave death visions to people, unnerving them as she overpowered and defeated them. 

Sure enough, Chelestra arrived as planned. The fight was quicker than she was expected, probably because Chelestra was used to fighting giftless thugs. She never even saw a single death vision. 

When she arrived back at the abandoned apartment she was shacking up in for the time being, there was a phone resting on the table. It wasn’t trying to be hidden or concealed, just resting on the nightstand as if it had been there the entire time. It wasn’t hers, so whose was it? Did a hero leave it for her as a trap? Did a villain leave it for recruitment. Even though her mentor had tried to keep her out of the limelight, there was evidence that she had started making waves. Still, there was no sense waiting around to see what it was.

There was a single group chat loaded onto the phone, and nothing else. So definitely someone trying to reach out.

She opened the group chat to see that it was not what she had expected. There had been another recent arrival, named Icarus, and it seemed like these people were from different realities. Did such a thing exist? It seemed like everyone else here agreed that was the case, so she might as well go along with it.

So what to call herself?

She was tempted to just type in “Hero Killer”, but a quick bit of scrolling told her that might not go down well. Maybe the heroes over in their world’s are nicer. So what now?

4eR05LaY3r has changed their username to Blood Rose 

Viridian: A sixth person? Well hello!

Blood Rose: Hello I guess?

John: Is this everyone?

BlackKing: Probably, would explain the symbol on the back of the phone.

John: The six stars? What do you think they mean?

BlackKing: The colors might correspond to one of our universes.

Sunbraid: Green might be for Viridian’s universe, then.

John: Makes sense.

Icarus: Think my universe is Blue. It’s the only color that makes sense.

Blood Rose: Think red might be mine, it’s the color of my eyes after all.

John: If that’s how it works, then orange is mine.

BlackKing: Then mine would be purple.

Sunbraid: Leaving me with yellow. My eyes aren’t yellow.

Viridian: They’re might be a deeper meaning for these. And not just eye color.

Icarus: Well eye color is pretty important here.

John: Huh.

         So what kind of powers do you have?

Icarus: It’s… complicated.

           I can control cael, and use it for a variety of effects.

John: Cael?

Icarus: Ah, right, different realities.

           It’s sort of like an internal energy in living things. And I and others can control it.

BlackKing: Huh. I’d like to ask more about that in the future. But for now, what abt you Blood Rose?

Blood Rose: …

                  I can use the powers of people I touch for a short while.

John: Interesting…

Viridian: Is this everyone here?

BlackKing: It would explain the symbol on the back of the phone.

                So I think we have everyone here.

Sunbraid: Cool. 

Chapter Text

Icarus: I never did tell you guys much about this alternate reality.

BlackKing: Is it an alternate earth? I think that’s what all of these are.

                   Although I don’t know about John’s world.

Icarus: Earth you say?

             Yep, sounds abt right.

BlackKing: so which general region do you live in?

                   Might need to describe landmasses as they might have different names.

Icarus: It’s less of a landmass and more of a large island floating in the air.

Viridian: Huh, kind of like Tarshale.

BlackKing: Tarshale?

Viridian: During the dawn of quirks, someone created a floating island. It still floats to this day although it lost most of its population because people think it might crash to the earth any day now.

BlackKing: You don’t know how it was created?

Viridian: No, not really.

Icarus: Are there crystals holding up the island?

Viridian: Just a landmass. Nothing special attached to it.

Blood Rose: Hadn’t heard of any floating islands here, but the world’s a big place so I don’t know.

Icarus: So when I said the color of eyes matters here, it’s a bit more complicated than that.

            Different colors and shades of blue eyes result in different abilities of cael control, and as a result their power.

            Although there’s other externalities, like Halos or other implants.

Blood Rose: Huh, so what does it mean if you have other colored eyes?

Icarus: Some colors show different types of affinity.

             And Black Eyes mean they have no Cael affinity at all.

Viridian: What else is there?

Blood Rose: What abt red eyes?

Icarus: Red eyes are usually associated with demons, although they can also shade to oranges and pinks.

             While shades of blue and cyan are the most concentrated power, they range from purples to greens.

             Fitting, I guess, as Red and Cyan are opposite on the color wheel.

BlackKing: And what does that mean?

Icarus: It’s just some theories of mine, passed down from my predecessor, Daedalus, who went missing a while back.

BlackKing: Huh. What a coincidence.

                    Icarus is a mythological name in my world.

Icarus: Oh?

BlackKing: They flew through the air on wings of wax, but flew too close to the sun and the wings melted.

Viridian: I’d heard that one, but if I remember, there’s more to the story.

BlackKing: Yes, the part most people forget.

                    That while Icarus couldn’t fly too close to the sun, they couldn’t fly too close over the ocean either.

Blood Rose: Could be a coincidence

Icarus: Maybe. I do remember hearing about that story.

John: Huh.

           The story sounds pretty similar but the names are different here.

Viridian: So what about you, Blood Rose? What’s your world about?

Blood Rose: Well there’s heroes here too. They’re pretty much the rulers of the planet, or at least all the important parts.

Viridian: Seems like all of our worlds have people with superhuman abilities.

               Except BlackKing’s.

Icarus: Unless he’s lying.

Sunbraid: Could also be that if they do exist, they’re incredibly rare.

John: Could be.

BlackKing: What’s the rate of people with powers in your world Blood Rose?

Blood Rose: The Hero Clan doesn’t release numbers, but around 5% of people have gifts, that’s the number people keep throwing around.

Sunbraid: So from nearly everyone to one in a hundred thousand.

                  Think their world might not have any powered people after all.

Viridian: I think it makes a decent amount of sense.

The Dimensional Space

[Tuesday 15:26]

Icarus: I wonder if there is a test we can do to see if we are really in different realities.

BlackKing: I mean, I think I've proven it fairly well.

Icarus: And Viridian’s files definitely help. I still don’t know how I managed to successfully download it.

            So you ended up evading the question. Did you lie abt abilities in your world?

BlackKing: I told the truth.

Icarus: One of the failures of texting, can’t see if you are lying over the phone.

BlackKing: I don’t know what yu want. There’s just… not powers here.

Viridian: I mean, it makes sense.

               Powers came from here because of a random event.

Sunbraid: Same here.

                 What was yours?

Viridian: There was a glowing baby born in China a while back, abt 200 or so years ago. Dates are kind of a guess really.

Sunbraid: Huh.

                 In my world it was a glowing man found over the Atlantic 29 years ago.

Icarus: Hm… similar indeed.

Viridian: Even if they are similar, the stores are quite different.

               Half a world away and pretty different.

BlackKing: Still, I’d look into it.

Icarus: One thing I learned abt alternate realities is points of divergence.

             I think for us it happened around a hundred fifty years ago.

John: Why do you think we diverged from each other’s universes?

Sunbraid: The boundaries between the realities are weak enough that something managed to get through to give us these phones.

                  So we probably diverged from each other’s universes. 

John: Well I did a quick internet search and apparently I was mistaken.

           The first records of abilities showed up around five thousand years ago, and by four thousand pretty much everyone had them.

           Haven’t found records of where abilities came from.

Viridian: So maybe the point of divergence is when everyone got powers.

BlackKing: How about sakuradite? Do any of you have that?

Sunbraid: Sakuradite? Maybe it has a different name here. What does it do?

BlackKing: A volatile radioactive dense crystalline room-temperature superconducter.

Viridian: Think something like that exists here, although I don’t think it occurs naturally.

John: Doesn’t exist here.

Icarus: Could be a foundational difference in your world, meaning the point of diversion is much sooner. Maybe around the creation of Earth.

BlackKing: Wait, didn’t you say you were on floating islands? You have an Earth as well?

Icarus: It’s complicated.

            I don’t know the full story myself. But the surface is uninhabitable.

Viridian: Huh.

               So because of Sakuradite, we think King’s universe diverged first?

BlackKing: That’s assuming there’s not other things about your earths that are different.

                   Mineral structure, continental drift, ect.

Viridian: Maybe. There’s not really a good way to send dense geographical surveys of alternate earths.

Icarus: Wait… hold on… is that really what Sakuradite is?

BlackKing: Yep. Advanced studies have actually confirmed it’s structure: A crystalline formation consisting of an element with 124 protons.

                    I think.

Viridian: So the island of stability is real? How did such a superheavy element form naturally?

BlackKing: It formed the same way as any other element heavier than iron.

                   Maybe it just formed in big enough patches to be stable, as I heard if you have a macroscopic amount, it will self-stabilize.

Icarus: Huh… I’ll have to look into that.

BlackKing: I’m not a chemist, so I don’t know more about it.

Sunbraid: Think we got a little off topic here.

Icarus: Sure.

Blood Rose: But why does any of this matter? We’re in different universes no matter what.

Viridian: Well it might answer some important questions.

Chapter Text

The Dimensional Space

[16:14]

Blood Rose: I’m curious about what heroes are like in your worlds.

John: There’s not many here.

           They just started emerging a few years ago, and there’s a group hunting them down.

Blood Rose: That’s… definitely different.

Sunbriad: We’ve had heroes for a little over twenty years or so by this point. They're pretty organized here, but esp where I live there’s more villains than heroes.

BlackKing: Interesting. Is there a particular reason for that?

Sunbraid: Well… getting powers is not a nice experience.

Icarus: Oh? How exactly? I have a few theories about enhancing cael affinity…

Sunbraid: I… don’t want to talk abt it.

Viridian: Fair enough!

               Vigilantes existed since the first few quirks, but professional heroes started from the most popular vigilantes.

Sunbraid: Kind of happened here as well, although the PRT now isn’t that picky.

Blood Rose: Huh. Sounds quite different.

BlackKing: What are heroes in your world, Rose?

Blood Rose: In a word, crap.

                      Don’t know when it started, but heroes can basically do whatever tf they want.

                     And they created an organization that effectively controls a great amount of the world.

Sunbraid: So the heroes are the dominant force in your world?

Blood Rose: Pretty much. There’s only a few groups that could oppose even a part of the heroes.

BlackKing: And you’re one of them.

Blood Rose: What makes you think that?

BlackKing: The way you described it.

                    It sounds like you have a personal grudge.

Blood Rose: I do.

Sunbraid: Huh, I’d been creating a ranking of the corruption of heroes in the universes. Yours might be on top, and John’s might be the on the bottom, because of how much in the early stages it is. And then mine and Viridian’s in the middle.

Viridian: We’re going to need more information, there’s only so much I can get from unclassified sources.

Sunbraid: Same here.

BlackKing: Aren’t you working with the heroes in your city? You won’t know classified stuff but you should be able to get a feel of it at the very least.

Sunbraid: I’m working on it… it’s complicated.

The Dimensional Space

[17:07]

Viridian: So I tried out the technique you’d mentioned John, abt the quirk.

               And it ended up working! Thx for that!

BlackKing: Nice job.

Blood Rose: Show them who's boss >:)

                      Meanwhile, I’ve got someone else to show who’s boss. Apparently there was a hostage situation and this so-called hero killed the hostages.

Sunbraid: Damn. And here there was some controversy when a hero used a slur…

Icarus: Well are they celebrity figures? Sometimes celebrities are held to higher standards than the general public are.

Sunbraid: Kind of. They have merch and action figures but from what I heard they aren’t too wealthy.

Viridian: Well it’s the same here, although there are quite a few heroes who seem to be into it more for the celebrity status then acting as a hero…

John: I mean, my friend found some vigilante merch in a mall a few days ago. 

Sunbraid: Bet the vigilante isn’t getting any of that cash.

John: Probably. But don’t think the authorities will let this slide for that long.

BlackKing: For sure. If the rulers there are against the vigilantes then they’re not going to allow any support to exist in the general public.

Icarus: Didn’t you mention something about some terrorists hunting these vigilantes down?

John: Yeah. Some group calling themselves ember.

BlackKing: Bet the rulers there haven’t done much to stop them.

John: How’d you figure?

BlackKing: It’s grey-zone operations 101. Ember could’ve been an organic group at first but it got co-oped by the ruling government, or something created from whole cloth.

Icarus: Interesting you know so much abt this type of thing.

BlackKing: Sometimes you just learn things. Benefits of private education ig.

Blood Rose: Do you think there’s a way for us to travel between realities?

Icarus: The devices made it over here from somewhere, so there has to be a physical connection.

Viridian: Could be a seventh reality that gave them to us. There’s no way we can really tell.

Sunbraid: That seems most likely really.

Blood Rose: Huh. Never thought abt it that way.

The Dimensional Space

[20:07]

Icarus: You mentioned heroes, I was curious about if there’s some infamous villains in your guys’ universe.

Viridian: A guy made of slime who could possess people and forcibly use their powers.

Blood Rose: I mean, I did hear about a guy known as the Smiling Man.

Sunbraid: Like just in my city or…

John: the fuck? How many do you have?

Sunbraid: In town? Like thirty or so regulars plus some rotating ones.

                 Overall? More villains than heroes.

Blood Rose: Huh. That’s… different.

Viridian: How does a society like that function?

John: The strong take what they can, the weak endure what they must.

Sunbriad: Huh, sounds like you have something similar going on.

John: Well it’s more controlled here.

          While not being written down…

Blood Rose: Everyone knows how it works.

Chapter Text

The Dimensional Space

[12:20]

Blood Rose: Wait, there’s games on here? Sweet.

Sunbraid: Yeah, somewhere along the line it was loaded on, think Viridian has the most access to the backend.

BlackKing: It’s been loaded up by whoever created it, it was just hidden in a menu for some reason.

Blood Rose: Some of these I haven’t heard of. Maybe they’re from your guys’ universes.

Sunbraid: Some of them might be translated for your world. I know for a fact that’s the case for the Texas hold-em game loaded.

BlackKing: Wouldn’t be worth playing until we could have a group call, at the least. Can’t really read people with just text.

John: Agreed. 

BlackKing: You play?

John: yep, although kind of surprised you do.

BlackKing: I prefer chess, but I can play almost any card game.

                Although I’m pretty sure I’d be banned from every casino if I played there.

John: So ur 1 of those ppl.

BlackKing: If you’re not playing to win, you’re not playing at all.

Viridian: Are there any games you play for fun?

BlackKing: not really.

Blood Rose: A shame, you do need something to destress yourself.

BlackKing: If I ever get the time.

The Dimensional Space

[14:52]

Icarus: Oh my, there’s been a development I haven’t expected.

Viridian: Huh, I’m curious as what you all actually do.

Icarus: I’m a scientist.

Blood Rose: And I’m a freelance vigilante. I think everyone else here is students.

John: Yep.

Icarus: Never won’t feel weird to be in a group chat with a bunch of high schoolers.

           I’m probably old enough to be your guys' mother.

Blood Rose: Yeah, surprised we were added, it seems like we don’t fit in with everyone here.

Icarus: Well we were added later, so that might be a part of it.

BlackKing: There’s all sorts of ways to divide up this group.

                 For example, John and I don’t have powers.

Viridian: so you’re a scientist, Icarus? What do you work on?

Icarus: I mainly work on Cael research. 

           It’s sort of hard to explain what I’m doing without knowing how my reality works.

Viridian: makes sense. It’s like trying to explain how Quirks work.

Icarus: I’m curious about that. What’s the energy source for your powers?

Viridian: Huh, I never thought of that.

John: Same here.

Sunbraid: I hadn't thought about it either.

Viridian: Well a lot of powers here just alter people’s biology, making their eyes stretchy or growing horns from their shoulders, so the bigger question would be those with emitter or transformation quirks, where does their power come from?

Viridian: I know how mine works, I guess, but not the source of the energy.

Sunbraid: Not sure where I get it from. I do know someone who might have an idea though.

John: Not sure either, I know people can get tired from overusing their abilities, but the kind of strength you get from them is on a different level than what muscles can provide.

John: There’s places out there studying abilities, they might have a clue.

Icarus: Huh. Any chance you could gain access?

John: Me? Not a chance. My friend, maybe, but there was a break-in recently. I don’t think they would be willing to reveal secrets at this point.

Viridian: Might ask some of my teachers about it. Who knows, maybe there's something that was discovered.

Icarus: You might be surprised. Energy comes from somewhere, after all.

John: huh, good point.

The Dimensional Space

[17:02]

Viridian: I just realized we know very little about these phones.

John: I don’t really think about it that much.

Icarus: I know i've certainly learned quite a few things from the phone.

           Its near indestructible, for one.

John: how’d you figure that out?

Icarus: Took a cael-enhanced knife to the case and it didn’t even scratch.

John: ifklt7

Viridian: huh?

John: Tossed the phone to the ground, it actually cracked the tile it landed on.

Icarus: Is it working still?

John: Yep, not a scratch.

Viridian: so at least we don't need to worry about it breaking.

Sunbraid: I asked about it because aside from my first few days in the cape scene, it’s been pretty quiet.

BlackKing: If that’s the case, there’s events happening in the background.

                 Depending on how much you are involved, you might be missing things.

There was something messing with his power.

It had been subtle at first, but in the latest splitting had left a giant mess. He’d held the Undersiders back for now, as even with their newest member, the success hadn’t resulted in enough time to do what he needed. Or maybe not, it was hard to tell, as past 6 hours the timelines started to unravel. Something in the city was messing with his power. Was it a new cape, or a second trigger event? He hadn’t found anyone who it could be yet, and his people have scoured the city twice over the past few days. If he hadn’t been able to find the source of the disruption soon, he may have to cut his losses. Sure there was years of work invested into Brockton Bay, but if he couldn’t trust his power here, then it would all be for naught. He’d timed it out, and through his own discipline he’d been able to maintain both of them for a decent amount of time.

Safe in his office, he released the timeline he’d been holding onto, and splitting it again.

In one reality, he kept studying what he knew about the thing messing with his power, and sending people to patrol the area around Captain’s Hill to see if any new Parahumans were around there.

In another reality, he modified his plans for the bank heist, and sending people to the areas of the Docks he hasn’t checked yet. It was a bit of a danger doing two things at once in each, but with the reliability of his power questioned, he needed to make it work as much as he could.

The Dimensional Space

[20:33]

Viridian: Hey John, so I know heroics is new there, so how did it start?

John: Well that’s an interesting story.

         There was a book that was published that was about a person with powers in a world without them. This person used their powers to protect others. I guess people really took the message to heart.

Viridian: Huh, that’s pretty cool. 

Blood Rose: We could use a book like that over here.

                   It seems like people have forgotten what it means to be a hero.

BlackKing: Well good luck trying to get anyone else to change their mind. 

Sunbraid: It might still be a good read even over here.

               And I might be able to help with transdimensional copyright law, as there’s some precedent here for that kind of stuff.

BlackKing: Well there’s not really a standard currency or a way to exchange physical goods between worlds, so it doesn’t really matter.

John: I mean, the book is baned heer so its not liek the author is earning mony from it.

BlackKing: Only supporting my hypothesis. Banning it keeps it out of the hands of the average person, pushing it to those already more likely to rebel against the current order, who take the message and become superheroes, and then Ember gets sent out.

John: what 

Blood Rose: Might be more to it though. The ppl who would be more likely to be heroes would be more likely to get the book anyways, and then the leadership noticed the heroes and then did something abt it.

Viridian: How are you guys so sure that Ember is controlled by the leadership?

BlackKing: It’s just too convenient. And from what John implied these superheroes are some of the strongest ppl in his world. And what would some terrorists gain by going after random superheroes instead of taking officials hostage or blowing up military equipment? That’s not normal terrorist behavior.

Viridian: … you seem to know a lot about terrorism.

BlackKing: I live in an occupied land, so hearing this stuff on the news isn’t uncommon.

Blood Rose: Perhaps they're using the superheroes as training for their elite agents, for when they eventually go after the government.

                   Has there been anything else of notice recently?

John: ther was an atk on some facility, stuf got stoln

BlackKing: Could be a false flag, or maybe a third group?

Blood Rose: Maybe. Could be gathering things for a larger goal.

BlackKing: Could be, but not sure about that.

                 One more thing, who named this group? Was the name propagated online or was it first broadcast on the official news channel?

John: nt sur. didn’t hear any1 naming it be4 it was on the news, bt mayb I missed sumthin.

BlackKing: I think that’s it then. There you go.

Chapter Text

The Dimensional Space

[08:04]

Icarus: I’m looking forward to tomorrow.

John: Why’s that?

Icarus: I’ve scouted out someone interesting.

Blood Rose: Scouted? What exactly do you do?

Icarus: Now, it’s no fun if I spill it right away.

BlackKing: Of course you’re this type of person.

Icarus: I’m not sure what you mean.

BlackKing: You’re being deliberately obtuse for no reason.

                 I get enough of that in my life already.

Icarus: Alright, I suppose there’s little risk in sharing.

           I found someone with a photographic memory.

BlackKing: and I suppose you have some documents that you don’t want anyone to find, even when stored in paper?

Icarus: Sounds like you have some experience.

BlackKing: Not really.

Blood Rose: Well that sounds pretty cool. Imagine not being able to forget where you left things…

                   Or remember people who you’d forgotten…

John: Sure, but you’d also remember everything bad that happened to you.

         Imagine that.

Blood Rose: Ah. I see what you mean.

John: Icarus, you must be pretty high-up if you can recruit ppl.

Icarus: Well the Admiral and the General can also do it if they want, but they hardly ever do. I don’t do it that often either, but this was too good to pass up.

BlackKing: Huh. Sounds like an interesting world.

Icarus: Interesting is a good way to put it.

Blood Rose: Well I’m pretty sure that we all have interesting things abt our world.

BlackKing: Indeed.

The Dimensional Space

[16:20]

Sunbraid: So I’ve explained Tinkers, right?

Viridian: Yeah, they're pretty cool.

Blood Rose: The tech people. I don’t really think that’s a thing here.

BlackKing: Why bring this up now?

Sunbraid: Well there’s someone whose specialty is bombs.

Viridian: Yikes! How’d you find out about this person?

BlackKing: I can imagine how.

Blood Rose: Nothing beats experience by combat.

John: Only if the combats at ur lvl. Nthng 2 b gaind frm a 1sided smakdown

Viridian: That’s a pretty good point.

Sunbraid: Yes, I did end up fighting her. One of her bombs was created specifically to maximize pain. 

BlackKing: That’s… impressive to escape something like that.

Sunbraid: I manage.

Viridian: That’s… I can’t imagine a bomb like that.

Icarus: What did it feel like exactly? Maximizing pain is a very general subject.

Sunbraid: When I woke up from passing out from the pain, it felt like I had papercuts on all of my muscles at the same time.

John: That’s… definitely horrifying

Viridian: So did you make it out okay?

Sunbraid: Eventually. I made it work.  

John: How’d you even end up in a situation like that in the first place?

Sunbraid: Well I’d caught a notorious villain off guard enough that a top hero was able to capture him.

               And it turns out she worked under him.

               She’d found out I was involved in the capture so she used the pain bomb on me.

Blood Rose: Yikes. If she can make bombs like that she probably left you alive deliberately.

Icarus: That’s certainly a dangerous foe. Do you have a plan to counter this bomb creator?

Sunbraid: Well we’re staying away for now, there’s no way of guessing what she’s got in reserve.

Viridian: Well bombs would be less intensive to maintain than a laser gun or power armor, right? You’d just keep the bombs until you needed them.

Sunbraid: Oh fuck

Icarus: Don’t make many bombs, but I suspect Viridian is on the money.

Sunbraid: Also the guy who was arrested is free now.

BlackKing: Such audacious actions are definitely going to make their group a big target.

Sunbraid: Probably

                I won’t be on the phone for a few days, need to heal.

Viridian: Np, nice of you for checking in but you should probably put your phone away now.

The Dimensional Space

[20:40]

BlackKing: Sometimes I don’t get… a friend of mine.

Viridian: Huh? What happened.

BlackKing: So I did explain how Japan in my timeline was taken over and occupied, right?

Viridian: Yes.

BlackKing: So my friend’s Japanese, and he got arrested for a crime he didn’t commit.

                 I found some evidence he was framed, but the trial’s going ahead anyways.

                 And… he’s just going along with it!

Viridian: How serious is it?

BlackKing: Pretty bad.

                 There’s… a reason they’d do this to him.

Icarus: What do you mean by “going along with it?”

           Is there something you can do to alter this. You’re just a high school student, right?

BlackKing: Ah forget it. If he decides something I can’t convince him otherwise.

Viridian: Is there something you can do to help him?

Blood Rose: If the justice system is as corrupt as he’s saying, then probably not really.

                  Although it depends on the crime in question. How serious is the accusation?

BlackKing: Pretty serious. Not saying what but it will probably result in the death penalty.

Blood Rose: Which in a corrupt occupying regime, could be quite a few things.

Icarus: Indeed. And I do think that I might have been a bit too forward.

           I do hope your friend manages to slip out, but I wouldn’t put my hopes on it.

Blood Rose: So Viridian, how’s your hero classes going?

Viridian: Oh! Well

              I'll be doing rescue training tomorrow. While defeating villains is what gets a lot of attention in the media, it’s rescue work that’s the mark of a true hero.

              Rescuing people from collapsed structures, cleaning up rubble, stopping fires, and more.

BlackKing: So you don’t have dedicated firefighters in your world?

Viridian: Well, we still do.

              But there are heroes who undergo special training to help them out with fire rescue and the fire itself.

              In addition, it’s good to have a hero around in case the villains come back.

Blood Rose: So there’s no common criminals in your world either?

Viridian: I don’t know the exact legal definition, but I think it’s based on repeat offenders and quirk use during the crime.

Chapter Text

The Dimensional Space

[14:17]

John: can’t belive I’m being draged to the mall.

         Let me sleeeeeep

Blood Rose: Did you just get up?

John: No….

BlackKing: Don’t you run in the mornings?

John: Well not today. I don’t have school so I’m sleeping in.

         Or well, was.

Viridian: My hero training today is going out to this facility for rescue training.

Blood Rose: Rescue?

Viridian: Of course! Rescuing civilians is the backbone of heroics.

Blood Rose: That’s… interesting

                   It doesn’t really work that way here.

Viridian: Really? Even the most volatile heroes here are careful to do as little damage as possible.

Blood Rose: If only.

                   Heroes here don’t have to worry about collateral damage or injuries at all.

John: Sunbriad.. Brk the tie….

Viridian: She might be busy right now.

BlackKing: yeah, go hang out with whoever dragged you to the mall.

                Good luck with your training thing Viridian.

Viridian: Thanks! Anything interesting happening in your wheelhouse?

BlackKing: Not much right now. Just trying to get the school president away from some of her… more daring ideas.

Blood Rose: Like what? I’m curious now.

BlackKing: There was a Swimsuit festival around a year ago…

Blood Rose: How did that go?

BlackKing: Well, considering that it resulted in the fire department being called…

                    Twice

Viridian: Twice? How’d that happen?

BlackKing: Well the second time they just kept a firetruck on the grounds.

John: Tht sounds liek wht happens at Wellston.

         How did ppl withot pwrs do tht?

BlackKing: I’m not sure exactly.

                 I was busy doing other things.

Viridian: Like what?

BlackKing: Trying to prevent more issues from happening.

Sunbraid: huh. Can’t imagine having something like that happening here.

BlackKing: Well when you have a bored student president, these things happen.

John: evn the king wudnt b abl 2 pull off sumthing like tht. how does a president do tht?

BlackKing: Her grandfather is the principal and founder of the school.

Sunbraid: Nepotism makes the world go round.

John: Ain’t that the truth.

BlackKing: Monarchy: Nepotism as government.

The Dimensional Space

[14:40]

John: Quick question, is “La Me” french?

Sunbraid: What.

BlackKing: No… it’s not. Wait you have a France?

Sunbriad: What sort of situation is this?

John: shirt

BlackKing: It’s not. That’s just a shirt with “lame” written on it.

John: I’m getting it anyway.

BlackKing: You have a France but no Japan? What?

Sunbriad: Why’d you even ask if you were getting it anyway?

John: wanted a 2nd opinion I gues.

         heard about the “lame” thing but wasnt sure.

Sunbraid: Wish we could send pics so I can see it.

BlackKing: It’s somewhere in the settings im sure of it.

John: We’ll figure it out.

Sunbraid: Or viridian will.

Icarus: I’m making an effort not to be offended.

Sunbraid: Well you have a job and stuff like that.

Icarus: Still, I have a decent knowledge of this app.

John: Race then.

BlackKing: Well Viridian’s in his class right now, so it’s not a fair race.

Sunbraid: let’s see how this goes.

Blood Rose: I think it might be in “general settings”.

Icarus: I haven’t seen it there…

BlackKing: What makes you think it’s there?

Blood Rose: I’m not sure, but I have good instincts on that front.

Icarus: We will see.

The Dimensional Space

[15:32]

Viridian: Fun things about the phone: it is waterproof.

BlackKing: How did you discover this?

Viridian: The rescue lesson was attacked by villains.

Icarus: Oh my.

Viridian: The villains had a bioengineered creature as well.

Icarus: In what way? How do you know?

Viridian: It had multiple powers. And the villain leading the attack exclaimed it aloud.

John: multipl powers? howd they pull that off?

Viridian: I’m not sure exactly.

BlackKing: Did you make it out okay, at the very least?

Viridian: I got out without too much injury, but some of my classmates weren’t so lucky.

              Overall, it could’ve been worse, there wasn’t anything life-threatening.

John: thank goodnes 

Blood Rose: How did they get in?

Viridian: The villains have a teleporter. Unknown range, can teleport large numbers of people at once and simultaneously to different locations. It is portal-based though.

BlackKing: How do you defend against something like that?

Viridian: Quirk-affecting quirks might help. 

Sunbraid: Trump powers, essentially.

Viridian: I’ve seen you reference power types, what are they?

Sunbraid: The PRT uses these classifications alongside numbers as a threat assessment.

Viridian: Oh that’s pretty cool. Do you have a list? 

Sunbraid: I think I do somewhere…

               Ah, here it is.

Sunbraid has sent 1 file.

Viridian: Cool! I’ll have to check it out.

Blood Rose: I’ll have to as well.

The Dimensional Space

[17:29]

Icarus: I don’t know how applicable that is to this world, but it is useful.

BlackKing: It’s better for places where heroes and powers are common.

Viridian: I brought the classification up to some of my teachers and they liked it.

BlackKing: Wonder what it was replacing.

Viridian: Nothing really special. Most of the time it’s on a case-by-case basis.

              Although quirks are in three types; emitter, mutation, and transformation.

              The big difference being emitters don’t change with their quirk activation, transformation ones change their user when activated, and mutation quirks are permanent alterations. There’s subgroups and hybrids but that’s the main divisions.

BlackKing: A system based on physical appearance?

Viridian: It was what was implemented first, and nobody really changed it.

Icarus: An unfortunate situation in many entrenched systems.

BlackKing: Indeed.

Icarus: However, sometimes you can use the system to your own ends.

BlackKing: What did you do?

Icarus: I haven’t done it yet, but the end goal is to remove a minor problem.

           Not saying what because there still might be spies here.

BlackKing: Fair enough.

Chapter Text

The Dimensional Space

[07:31]

Viridian: Didn’t find the image option, but found this instead.

BlackKing: There’s a colored username option?

Viridian: Yes. It’s in the “personalize” folder under “user data” under “users”

BlackKing: Alright I found it, looks like it turned out well.

but why is it there?

Viridian: Not sure, this thing is a mess.

BlackKing: Well it definitely makes it look nice.

Icarus: Are we just choosing the colors that we think are associated with on the phones?

BlackKing: Don’t see why not.

John: why have you guys added colors?

Icarus: It is fun.

John: my eyes

they burn

Icarus: I did not expect it to look exactly like that.

BlackKing: That must've taken a while to type.

Icarus: It’s easier to do in text. There’s option in there for colored text.

John: might as well change it then

John: looks ok i gues

Viridian: I think it looks pretty cool

BlackKing: so John, you never explained the France thing.

John: I mean, it’s a country in central Europe.

Viridian: Central Europe?

BlackKing: What’s the country to the west of it then?

John: Gallica? What about it?

BlackKing: Alright, so in the far east in the north there’s an archipelago of four large islands, right?

John: Ok, I think I see them. Nippon, right?

BlackKing: So there is a Japan, just under a different name.

John: So I guess it’s not too different then.

Viridian: So what’s the name of your country?

John: Americen Federal Republic

Sunbraid: Now that’s different

John: ill see if I can downlod a history txtbook

Icarus: Something we should all try.

Assuming you can get one sufficiently accurate and not filled with propaganda.

Viridian: Alright, I’ll have to see if I can pull that off.

BlackKing: It’ll mostly be a combination of the personal notes and files that I have on my laptop. The official books are pretty much just propaganda.

Icarus: Sounds familiar. I’ve got a version that I can share.

Viridian: Maybe not a full history textbook, might just include the highlights.

BlackKing: I think having the full text would be nice. It would be some nice to have some reading material.

The Dimensional Space

[12:24]

John: Another one of the superheroes died.

Viridian: Was it by ember?

John: sure was. Pretty sure he got targeted because of how popular he was.

There were even stores that were selling merch of him.

Sunbraid: Yikes. Yeah definitely a target for popularity.

You can’t have a symbol to rally around.

Viridian: Yeah All Might had told me the importance of being a symbol as a hero.

To be the type of hero that reassures people everything is fine because they’re there.

Sunbraid: Huh. Really only Scion gets that type of adoration.

Viridian: You never really explained what sort of powers he has.

Sunbraid: He flies fast, has some power that keeps his clothes pristine, and has golden light powers that seem to do pretty much anything. He goes from crisis to crisis at supersonic speeds, only disappearing for minutes at a time.

Viridian: And your world is still backsliding into chaos?

Sunbraid: Well millions of crimes happen every day. And he spends time doing things rescuing cats out of trees or stopping a mugging so the big crises can go on for a while.

Icarus: Scion is definitely an interesting figure from your description.

Blood Rose: As opposed to this world, where the hero with light powers is an egotistical douchebag who can’t resist flaunting her power.

John: I mean, you’ve explained how heroes worked in your universe.

Icarus: Oh, it’s the fundamental secret of every government. There’s always things that the people “aren’t to know”.

Sunbraid: sure. No guarantees about anything I send.

Icarus: “History” is a pretty broad topic. What would these files focus on?

Viridian: Just the big picture type of things.

The Dimensional Space

[18:07]

Viridian: Have I explained the Sports Festival yet?

John: No, it sounds like a pretty normal school event.

Viridian: Well not really. It’s a pretty big deal.

Tens of thousands of heroes watch to get a good idea of what the students do and it’s live broadcasted. Pretty sure it’s the most popular events in Japan

Well the third year one that is

Sunbraid: How did a school event become one of the most popular things to watch?

Viridian: Well the school motto is “Plus Ultra”, which essentially is all about doing everythingto the extreme.

Sunbraid: Alright, I’m curious.

Viridian: Last year they brought in a hero from America to create a 3-dimensional maze of transparent forcefields over 100m in every direction.

Sunbraid: So have you decided on a hero name yet? When does that happen?

Viridian: It happens after, just before the internships.

Sunbraid: So you compete on live television with your public identities and powers on full display? That’s pretty crazy.

secret identities are paramount in my world

Viridian: I mean, it’s not that difficult to find information about heroes, but that’s because they’re pretty public-facing. Very few heroes even wear a mask.

Sunbraid: Is… are attacks on hero’s families common?

Viridian: Not really. The villains that do things like that are usually canned into Tartarus pretty quickly. Juries tend to not like that in trial. Are family attacks a problem for you guys?

Sunbraid: It works pretty much the same here. Attacking cape families is a quick way to get yourself Birdcaged.

The Dimensional Space

[08:21]

BlackKing: Out of the two, I like the sound of Tartarus better. It’s actually honest about what it is. Birdcage just sounds more creepy than anything.

Icarus: I’d imagine it probably has an official name. Tartarus as well. But people just make the nicknames as it sounds easier.

John: Sounds like facility names here. They all have flower-based nicknames.

Icarus: And how did you learn about that?

John: I mean, a lot of the nicknames are public information.

It’s not liek that can be censored anyways

BlackKing: Huh. And here they just make the names ambiguous.

Icarus: In what way?

BlackKing: The bureaucrats keep adding adjectives to the names of the various facilities, especially in the mainland.

Britannia hasn’t occupied Japan long enough for the bureaucrats to get their teeth into them yet.

John: Sounds about what can be expected from an occupying state.

The Dimensional Space

[11:57]

Icarus: Sometimes my coworkers are just… so frustrating to deal with.

Viridian: What happened?

Icarus: Alright, before I can explain, a brief lesson in how cael works.

This is some pretty classified stuff, so you guys are lucky.

The fundamental laws of the universe have it so you can’t get something for nothing, right?

BlackKing: Alright, and yet you can use this “cael” to make lightning and crystals appear out of nowhere.

Icarus: Well that’s because whenever cael is used, it produces a byproduct. One of my former students called it “nox”. And individuals in contact with Nox become demons.

Sunbraid: Are they really demons or do you just call them that?

Icarus: Everything is called something.

Over time and greater exposure, they lose their minds and only desire to consume cael.

But what’s interesting, is there’s an individual who retains their mentality and can control their urges despite having the full powers and abilities of a demon.

BlackKing: Something you wish to replicate, in order to negate some of the side effects of cael use.

Icarus: Among other reasons, but the General had decided to get involved to save some of the Guard’s reputation after a recent fiasco.

BlackKing: Well good luck on that front.

Chapter Text

The Dimensional Space

[15:22]

BlackKing: Why is it that some people just feel the need to show up to your home unannounced?

Viridian: Usually that’s what people you know quite well do.

Icarus: Well people who know they can get away with it usually do that.

Sunbraid: Sometimes people have no personal space.

Viridian: What happened?

BlackKing: Think it could be a mix of the second and third option.

                 Had to answer a couple of awkward questions my sister asked.

Sunbraid: Oh you have a sister? Any other siblings?

BlackKing: No. How abt you guys?

Sunbraid: I’m an only child.

Viridian: Same here.

Icarus: Most likely.

BlackKing: And what does that mean?

Icarus: I don’t know for sure.

Viridian: We’ll have to wait for John and Rose to get back, but it’s crazy that at least half of us are only children.

Sunbraid: I mean, it doesn’t have to mean anything.

Blood Rose: I had an older sister.

Sunbriad: Did…

Blood Rose: She’s dead.

Viridian: Do you know how?

Blood Rose: A hero killed her, that’s all I know for now.

                  And I will find them and take my revenge.

BlackKing: I’d do nothing less.

Viridian: What sort of revenge are we talking about?

Blood Rose: Well I’m called the Hero Killer in my world….

BlackKing: Remember what Rose told us about heroes in her world.

                Heroes in all but name.

Viridian: I suppose… still it feels wrong.

Blood Rose: I’ll put it this way.

                  Remember the hero that I talked about who killed all the hostages?

Viridian: …yeah?

Blood Rose: That’s not even the worst thing I’ve heard a hero doing.

                   While it’s censored in the media, members of the hero clan do things like that every day.

                   After all, as long as they are fighting villains, they don’t bear any responsibility for deaths or injuries done in the fights.

                   A regular strategy heroes with sufficiently destructive powers is to crash a building onto the villains and bystanders.

Viridian: Oh wow!

             And here there was a pretty big scandal when a hero accidentally destroyed a couple of buildings.

BlackKing: What about you Sunbraid?

Sunbraid: I’m not sure about the exact laws, but I know that the PRT does give payouts when heroes cause property damage or bodily harm. But things definitely fall through the cracks.

John: Pretty sure that if you do anything too bad here the authorities will lock you up.

Viridian: I guess I see what you mean…

BlackKing: Sometimes it’s the only way Viridian.

Blood Rose: Oh I didn’t even mention what ticked me off.

                   A hero leveled a gun at my boss and challenged me to a fight.

                   At least I think he’s a hero, I don’t recognize him.

John: u gonna fight?

Blood Rose: Of course.

The Dimensional Space

[10:44]

John: im going to punch sum1

Blood Rose: Go ahead.

BlackKing: What happened?

John: so u know how I said ppl blew up parts of the school over a pen?

Icarus: What a thing to do.

John: 1 of them decided to do an “interview” abt weak ppl.

         Just an attempt to pry into my home life.

BlackKing: Why do you think this person did that?

John: I don’t know… He’s a rat bastard though.

Blood Rose: Lmao, will find a reason to use that.

BlackKing: What exactly was he looking for then?

John: I don’t…

         Probably just for some drama.

         Isen likes writing dramatic articles in the school newspaper.

BlackKing: Ah… the school newspaper.

                 Should have known.

Sunbraid: What?

BlackKing: Long story short, everyone there lives for drama.

Icarus: It doesn’t get any better with a national newspaper.

Blood Rose: Could you get away with punching them?

John: No.

         They’re an elite tier with a powerful physical ability.

         That also lets him find people and know if they are lying.

Sunbraid: It’s all wrapped up in one power? that seems like a grab-bag ability to me.

Blood Rose: Grab bag?

Sunbraid: While technically a single power, in practical applications it is a bunch of disconnected powers used by the same person.

John: I don’t think such a thing exists here.

        That could be the case though.

The Dimensional Space

[15:04]

Viridian: Oh wow, this made me search out for my schools newspaper.

              And oh boy is it something.

BlackKing: You’re in a hero school, right?

Viridian: Yep. You would be surprised what sort of hero drama there is.

Sunbraid: I mean, not really.

               I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s similar to hero tabloids here.

BlackKing: No matter the reality, there is always gossip.

                 Especially with a school president like the one we have.

Viridian: I think you mentioned her before.

             Certainly makes a school experience fun.

BlackKing: I don’t know if that’s what I would call it.

Sunbraid: The perks of a fancy school.

John: Well this school isn’t that fancy.

Icarus: geez, it’s been quite a while since I was in any school

           Making me feel old.

Blood Rose: and I never really got the chance of a formal education…

                   Maybe a few years?

                  Mostly I just learned from my mentor.

Sunbraid: You’ve got a mentor? That’s pretty cool.

Blood Rose: I’m sure he has his ulterior motives, but they seem to align with what I want.

                  That’s the best you can hope for in this world.

Icarus: Aligned motives is the best way to work.

The Dimensional Space

[19:34]

BlackKing: I don’t know what I expected.

Icarus: ?

BlackKing: So you know the friend I mentioned?

Viridian: Is it the same one from before? He survived?

BlackKing: Yes. The real killer came forth and admitted to the crime.

                 And someone pulled some strings? Not sure who.

Sunbraid: Pretty lucky break they let him out.

BlackKing: Sure enough. But he doesn’t want to meet up in school!

John: Have you talked to him at all?

BlackKing: Yes.

                I’d invited him over for dinner and afterwards he told me he didn’t want to do that.

                He thinks he’s protecting me but he’s not even thinking about his own needs!

Viridian: Yikes.

John:

Sunbraid: He might be worried about getting you in trouble or something.

BlackKing: It’s exactly that! But that’s not important.

Icarus: This won’t be something you solve in a day.

            I’m not a psychiatrist, but I did dabble. I wouldn’t force it.

BlackKing: Alright. I’ll see what I can do.

Chapter Text

The Dimensional Space

[20:07]

Icarus: Oh! I found a way to private message someone!

John: How’d you figure that out?

Icarus: It was under the user options. I just wanted to see what I could find.

John: That sounds like it would be useful.

BlackKing: Since when was that added? I couldn’t find it before.

Icarus: The more I learn about this app the more I think that it’s got spaghetti code in the backend.

Sunbraid: Wouldn’t be surprised if that was the case.

Private Message

[BlackKing|Sunbraid]                      

BlackKing: I’d noticed you hadn’t mentioned much about your hero work for a while.

Sunbraid: It’s been… a long and difficult journey

BlackKing: I’m guessing.

                   Did you have a side project?

Sunbraid: It’s a little more gray than it looks on the outside.

BlackKing: I’m aware. Good luck, regardless of your path.

The Dimensional Space

[20:14]

John: Well this is going to be fun.

BlackKing: What is?

John: So my friend got suspended.

           You know the book I was talking abt?

Viridian: Yes.

John: She got caught with it a while back so now she’s being suspended.

           For a month.

BlackKing: Yikes.

John: And she’s the strongest student in the school, so you know what that means…

BlackKing: You can bet everyone who was too scared to beat you up before will take the chance now.

John: Figures.

           Well I’ll just keep going I guess.

Icarus: How did that happen?

John: The book I mentioned

           She was caught with it.

           Kind of my fault for giving it to her.

BlackKing: If you can get in that much trouble for just a book…

John: Well it is a book that the authorities think creates vigilantes.

Private Message

[BlackKing|Icarus]

Icarus: I’d been meaning to ask about elements of your world.

BlackKing: Like what?

Icarus: Well the geopolitical scene.

BlackKing: Only if you give me an overview of your world.

Icarus: Sure, why not?

BlackKing: Very well, the world is largely based around three superpowers: the European Union, the Chinese Federation, and the Holy Empire of Britannia.

                  There’s a couple of other minor powers like Zilkhstan, Australia, or Iran.

                  Current events of note are the Russia crisis or the invasion of the Middle Eastern Federation.

Icarus: Interesting.

             The Celestial Reef here controls floating islands that represent a decent chunk of the islands out there. Most of the other ones are controlled by either independent states or small empires. Nothing really of note since Shin-an was defeated.

BlackKing: So if your entire population lives on floating islands, there’s not that many people are there?

Icarus: Not sure the exact numbers because of some of the Far Outer islands, but I’d say in the millions.

            Although the problems of demons and Nox remains a crisis.

BlackKing: Do you have a solution to that?

Icarus: Not yet.

The Dimensional Space

[09:43]

BlackKing: Quick question, are cats supposed to be this stubborn?

Icarus: Yes.

John: it depends

Sunbraid: What happened?

BlackKing: A cat took something important and then ran around the entire school.

Icarus: Huh. Most cats would give up after a minute or so.

             Must have a rare one.

BlackKing: Loving this.

Sunbraid: How did this even happen to you?

BlackKing: I don’t know.

Icarus: How does that work?

BlackKing: The cat in question is one I haven’t seen before.

Sunbraid: Huh, that sounds like a particularly interesting cat.

Icarus: Indeed.

Blood Rose: Sounds like a cat I would like.

Sunbraid: Hey rose, nice to see you back!

Blood Rose: I got caught by surprise, so I didn’t have the chance to reply for a while.

Sunbraid: What are you doing right now?

Blood Rose: joined up with a crew of like-minded folks.

BlackKing: And isn’t that quite vague.

Blood Rose: Well the leader didn’t provide a lot of information.

BlackKing: Definitely not suspicious.

Blood Rose: The leader’s a legacy villain from the war way back when.

                      When the hero clan took over.

Sunbraid: Well the definitions are more gray in your world.

Blood Rose: It’s not that, I do know that he does have interests that align with mine.

Icarus: Ah, convergent interests, the best way for those outside the law to get along.

John: How do you know that? Arent you in government?

Icarus: Sure, but that doesn’t mean I don’t use all available resources.

The Dimensional Space

[12:03]

Viridian: And here the most interesting thing that happened at my school is someone covered the 5th floor in glitter.

John: How?

Viridian: I don’t know either.

               Probably someone from Support.

BlackKing: What makes you say that?

Viridian: The amount of explosions I hear from the Support classrooms.

                And from what I’ve heard this is something they might try.

Blood Rose: That’s… concerning.

The effect was still here.

It hasn't increased in strength, but he hasn’t been able to increase the amount he can reliably maintain a timeline for more than six hours.

And from experimentation he was able to determine that the effect was only in Brockton Bay, with a fading effect the further away from the city he got. Managing the affairs of the city from a distance would be difficult, but that’s why he had invested in an office in New London as a contingency plan a year ago.

It would cost him in the range of two hundred thousand to smooth things over with the primary villain in the town, that being Raven King, if he were to stay here more often. And perhaps he could offer the man some services at reduced rates. Maintaining operations in the Bay would be more profitable than moving them out, even if he had to operate from a city close by. Free to operate with his power when outside the Bay, he was getting ready for the primary operation. While he had intended for Brockton Bay Central to be the pivotal point in the operation, the ABB raids would present an opportunity. Committing some of his forces to this operation would be a small price to pay for the prizes in store.

And perhaps being out of town has its strengths. Perhaps reordering the order in which his plan took place was needed.

He concentrated, and took two actions.

In one world, he was reviewing the notes. Soon enough, the building he was operating in would be owned by one of his fronts. In the meantime, he would need to focus on the situation at hand, finding a niche in the town’s gangs, and that required information.

In the second world, he was being driven back to Brockton Bay. He’d discovered something of a workaround with regards to the strange effect in the Bay, involving using his power in a place a distance away and traveling to Brockton Bay. This would buy him perhaps three days, which was enough for him to work with.

Perhaps this venture wasn’t dead yet.

Chapter Text

Hello

I’d like to apologize for the slow updates these past few months. I have been slowly running out of ideas for how to convert the weaving of half a dozen stories into the medium of a chatfic.

But worry not, this universe will continue on!

A mysterious event has occurred, and most of the people with phones have found themselves transported to another reality! (except Icarus, for an unknown reason, having Shinsa travel in her stead.) How will these people deal with the events surrounding the new world they find themselves in?

This pseudo spinoff will be in the same series as this work, for ease of location, and in the future a summary will likely be written up for it. I’ll hope to update this new story more often.

-Zynn