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“And would you say that you’ve always been so Concerned with your Status in the Eyes Of Others?
“Mm. And how long have you been experiencing these Memory Gaps?
“Not a Moment of your childhood? Not a Second of it?
“That doesn’t match my previous notes... is this a Recent Development...?
“...So you have no recollection of Those dreams, then? Of Other Worlds? Of eyes?” “I see—ahem. If you could silence your Pet Bird for a moment... it’s just that it’s A Bit Distracting, and I’m trying to—ahem, if I may—no, you’re not on YouTube Live, you’re in a Therapist’s Office, and I’d appreciate it if you’d... ha ha. Here I am, Talking To Animals... Let’s take a short Break, please.”
This is an arm where every city is a floor in an endless parking garage, the sea of cars gradually fading away as the lots further down fill up with mechanical horses, motorcycles, scooters, miniature aircraft, pairs of parked Heelies... and here, on the 79th floor, next to a sign telling you to “Remember Your Parking Spot! HYDRATION ZONE,” the elevator has been commandeered by the Petya Region Branch of the illustrious Ontonaut Program’s newest squad.
Only the best and brightest Ontonauts receive missions into the important canons – Homestuck, say, where one mistake could change the personalities of countless transgender women and the very character of countless more other narratives. The most brilliant end up in religious texts or even nonfiction, preserving the stories deemed most important to the narrative sphere by a team of experts so obscure that no record exists of their identities. But they haven’t ruined anything yet, most likely– so they keep making branches, and they keep recruiting characters, and everything seems to work out just fine.
The Compass Squad has not assembled here to change anything about Zampanio. The fact that it’s such a metanarrative tangle is... fine, in the eyes of the Ontonauts, who have far bigger fish to fry. In fact, the place is sort of infamous. The Program’s lost Ontonauts here before, so rarely does anyone end up in this inescapable labyrinth of a story. It’s worse than a death sentence – it's an eternal sentence, where even dying won’t save you from coming back to life still trapped in the same infinity. Being drawn into the web means this is what you are, this is everything you are, this is your future, and this is your past.
Roz’berry Bioluminescence Natasherd Clover Way reminds her squadmates every day that nobody there was tossed into a black hole because they were the best or the brightest. They were disposable, forgettable, up to the task, and in Roz’s case desperate. She knows full well that she’s been put on an impossible mission from a high-net-worth client that just wants to see them make a token effort and maybe lose a few Ontonauts trying their hardest. And she’s going to win anyway, because she doesn’t give a fuck what anyone thinks is impossible.
The only thing that truly may be impossible is getting through to her fucking teammates, because they keep getting distracted. Holy shit, they’re a bad squad. She clenches her pointy teeth just to keep a smile as she spots the South Ontonaut, the Rememberist of Zampanio, meandering towards their all-hands-and-flippers-and-claws meeting twenty minutes late with a guest.
The Rememberist is fidgeting with a fidget cube, a sly smirk on her face as she adjusts her shitty tie and continues boasting to whoever the fuck she’s picked up this time. “And then,” she’s in the middle of saying, “I go on the quiz, right? And I’m going through questions, and questions, and questions, and... uh oh. This is going on forever, isn’t it?” She snorts, and the girl she’s laying the charm on actually giggles. “Okay, okay, check this out. Elevator’s coming up—hey, Roz!” She waves. “Okay if I show Allie around the place?”
Roz’berry gives her a terribly sarcastic smile, eyes wide and teeth really sharp. “Yeah, no, it’s no fucking problem! You should give Allie some of our private files while you’re at it. And tell her to take some notes at the fucking meeting.”
The Rememberist gasps, and blushes when Allie cracks up at her surprise. “Shit-- uh, when’s-- how long do I got ‘til the meeting?”
“Negative twenty minutes, asshole.” Roz rolls her eyes, smile falling. “So can you tell Allie to fuck off?”
Allie tilts her head, still smiling. “Haha... what’s your beef? Can’t I sit in the corner and hang out?”
Roz shoots the Rememberist a withering glare, and she looks back, perplexed. Roz gestures to Allie, and the Rememberist shakes her head a little, still confused. Allie opens her mouth to speak, and Roz blurts it out: “Rememberist, she fucking sounds exactly like you. And have you noticed her hair’s just yours, but down?? And you’re the same height?”
The Rememberist, who had noticed exactly none of these things, glances at Allie again, and Allie waves with a little smirk. The Rememberist waves back automatically, a silly grin forming on her face. Roz can’t believe this is who she’s stuck with, and she runs a flipper through her foliage just to make her stress very apparent. “Fucking-- okay. Fine. Sure. Bring her in. Show her the base. It’s not like anything I do is secret anyway, is it?”
Allie laughs good-naturedly, and Roz immediately recognizes it as a copy-paste of the Rememberist’s unmistakable giggle. “I’m not gonna tell anyone, girl. Just curious about Remmy’s job, and we wanna grab a little lunch after this. You know we’re only two floors down from where they park all the food trucks, right?” Her eyes glimmer, and she brushes her bangs out of the way.
Roz glances down at her arm, very aware of the fact that she’s wilting. She’s been getting dizzy these past few days, and she could really use some plant food. If she watches the whole cooking process through the window... maybe it’d be okay? Maybe. So... fine. Fine. She throws her arms up, whirls around, and walks towards the elevator. “Just tell her to sign the guestbook,” she snarls, entering the base.
The Rememberist watches her go with a blank face, waits for the door to close, and then turns back to Allie with a dopey grin. “Okay, you’re gonna, like, you’re gonna love this. Check this—this out. Look. You’re prob’ly wondering why we can have our office in an elevator. But it’s bigger on the inside. Like Doctor Who.”
Allie gasps excitedly, and remains excited until she sees that the interior is roughly the size of a studio apartment – and twice as cramped, because three people are already crammed inside between a hastily-assembled hodgepodge of furniture and open filing cabinets.
“...Not that much bigger,” the Rememberist admits, and her guest – who's used to girls the size of mazes, not squeezing into some little box – manages to maintain her wide smile as she telepathically talks shit about everyone else in the room to her partner behind her, above her, in front of her, below her, and generally all around her. The entity she’s talking to wants to know if they’ve colonized these newcomers’ minds yet, and Alt just wants some gossip – but for now, that means working together to keep the Rememberist happy.
The best part, Alt notes with a gleam in her eye, is that the Rememberist isn’t even the weak point of the team.
“Zampanioooo is a really fun game, and you should play it. Zampanio Is A Really Fun Game, and You Should Play It. Why, Zampanio Is So Good You Should! Play it. Play. Zampanio is so-os. Plp. Zazz,” a black bird chirps, and Dr. Fiona Slaughter quietly wonders if anyone’s ever gotten away with A Murder Of Crows. But that’s not a becoming thought for a therapist to have about a patient’s pet, so she quickly discards it and returns her attention to the strange situation she somehow has no training for.
She’s been working with the Intern for a while, hearing about his dreams and his past and his old friend and his budding powers and so many other things that surprise and shock and delight her. He’s an exciting patient, that’s for sure – and while she’d never tell him that, it’s part of the reason she’s so eager to schedule sessions with him as frequently as possible. So he’s supposed to come twice a week, usually, except the last session he couldn't be there because he was on a business trip, and he wasn’t meant to return until next week.
But here he is, in her office, with his same old pair of red round glasses and his signature colorful sweater, bird on his shoulder as always. He’d introduced himself – and, while she’d been confused for a moment, upon reflection she was sure she was speaking to him, and maybe she’d just remembered his appearance wrong and maybe his bird was just usually quieter than this on account of the recent cold weather. Being a therapist means holding so many conflicting thoughts in her head that she was used to compartmentalizing. She could handle a little makeover.
What she couldn’t handle was the phone call from, supposedly, the very same Intern, who had just informed her in the middle of his own visit that he'd just been informed of a flight delay and would be missing another meeting. Normally, Dr. Slaughter never answers phone calls during a session, but her patient had insisted – and how could she not? How could she resist more information about her most fascinating client? How could she avoid asking questions far more invasive than a therapist ought to – and what would the limit be?
As a matter of principle, she doesn’t like turning her therapy meetings into interrogations – but this one is perplexing, in a way that grabs at all the problem-solving parts of her and forces her to press and delve in and expand her notes and get her patient. So, while she’s able to reconcile that this is in fact undeniably the Intern she’s been talking to all along, once she manages to get the bird to shut up she asks the obvious question: “How can you be in Two places at Once?”
Her patient shifts nervously, trying to smile the politest smile she can. “Ma’am, I’d like to make an exchange with you. I’ll gladly answer that question in a moment, but first... may I request a copy of the notes you have on me?” The patient nods as she asks, clearly expecting the therapist to agree—and Dr. Slaughter can’t quite articulate why she has such a horrible sinking feeling.
She feels that horrible urge again. The intrusive thought that creeps in at times like these is seeping into her mind, and she finds herself flicking her gaze away from the Intern, away from the bird, away from her office, looking away, looking away... she shakes her head a little, recentering herself, trying not to imagine the Intern listening to everything she says without question and understanding she’s just trying to help and appreciating that the notes are secret for a reason and never ignoring her advice and, and, and...
“...Ma’am? Would you like to take another break?” The Intern helpfully suggests, tugging on Dr. Slaughter’s sleeve. “I’d gladly retrieve you a cup of coffee. I work here, so I won’t take long.”
By the time Dr. Slaughter’s reasoned out that there’s no way that could be true, she’s already compartmentalized that thought, too. She won’t press the issue, she decides, because what reason would he have to lie? I’m such a Good Doctor, she thinks proudly to herself as the Intern returns with several folders tucked under his arm and two cups of coffee. It’s okay. He works here. He's authorized to have those. He never sips his own, nor does he let his bird—but as Dr. Slaughter pauses to sip hers, she can’t help but notice he’s writing a few things down in that ever-present notebook of his. She’ll have to remember that, she decides. He seems terribly forgetful.
“...AND HEADQUARTERS HAS NOT YET BEEN ABLE TO DISPENSE A RECORD OF THE TARGET’S MOVEMENTS, AS IT APPEARS THAT HER TRANSPORTATION DEVICE WAS MANUFACTURED BY A DIFFERENT BRANCH OF THE PROGRAM,” the East Ontonaut reports, sheepishly tilting an antenna as if to prove that she was listening to the bosses back in Petya. “THE TARGET’S LOCATION REMAINS UNKNOWN. BETWEEN OUR PREVIOUS GATHERING AND THE PRESENT ONE, HOWEVER, I WAS ABLE TO DISPENSE PHOTOGRAPHY UNITS 81C-08 AND 81C-09 WITHIN ARMS 0004 AND 0005. WHILE I COULD NOT ACCESS ARM 0003 WITHOUT DETECTION, WE MAY BE ABLE TO BYPASS IT ENTIRELY AND PROCEED DIRECTLY TO ARM 0002 FOR DIRECT CANON MONITORING.” Its pixelated grin widens, and it bows a little, clanging its digging claws against its metal skirt in an impression of a curtsy. It’s very proud of this.
Allie raises her hand. “Yeah, uh, question. Why haven’t you checked Arm 1? That’s, like, gotta be the place to be, right? ‘Cause you said she likes important places.” She gestures to Roz. “In your report about all the people you’ve been stalking.”
Roz bares her teeth at Allie, almost hissing. “Arm 1’s a fucking death sentence. At least with Arm 2 all the magic shit doesn’t work, but Arm 1? Are you stupid?? I do have somewhere to be after I get the hell out of Dodge.”
Allie frowns. "So what if she's anticipating that? Hiding from you in the place you’re too chicken to look?”
“That’s-- Rememberist, can you please tell your mimic to shut the fuck up? She doesn’t even fucking work here. Tell her to mimic Dr. Barton if she wants to take the empty fucking chair in the corner,” Roz snaps back -- with no effect on Allie’s feelings, but certainly hurtful to mine. Would she prefer I narrate her in person?
“I’d prefer,” she responds, “that you report something substantial. I get what you’re doing. You wanna keep a light touch. You don’t like managing a team. But you should really get your shit together, because the fucking robot is kicking your ass at your job!” Allie opens her mouth to respond, and Roz gives her a piercing glare. Everyone but her can hear me, anyway.
80N-35 raises a hand, even though it's standing at the front of the front of the room and it’s faer turn to talk. “IF I MAY DISPENSE AN INTERJECTION... I MISS YOU, DR. BARTON. I WOULD LIKE TO SEE YOU IN PERSON, IF THAT WOULD NOT BE A DISTRACTION. I HAVE NOT RECEIVED AN ANSWER TO THE HUG REQUEST I SENT YESTERDAY AT 22:00.” Oh, Nessie...
(I wish I could be there. I wish I could just report the target’s location. I wish I could do more than sit here, far away, and narrate at my squad, watching them bicker amongst themselves and invite the literal girlfriend of the maze they’re avoiding directly into their midst. But the work I’m doing is too important to involve any of them – and I know exactly what Truth wants. I know what Alt wants, too, and I know the way she’s looking at Nessie because I’m narrating it at this very moment.)
(I cannot allow Nessie to embark on a solo expedition to Arm 1. I also know that Roz’berry wants it to happen, Alt is trying to make it happen as soon as possible, the Rememberist is considering it, and Nessie herself is weighing and reweighing the idea in what’s left of faer danger-calculating algorithms. It seems like the obvious way forward. She’s not even doing it to self-sacrifice. She really wants to be there, and that’s exactly the issue.)
(Well, that and the fact that I cannot, under any circumstances, allow my team to apprehend the target. But that’s another story, and they get antsy when I turn my narration away from them for multiple paragraphs like this.)
The Rememberist is already saying something about how important it is that she gets to interview Allie when everyone who can hears me narrate again, and Roz makes a mental note to ask me later what was so important that I couldn’t tell her immediately. Allie has just offered, apparently, to explain in her interview just how marvelous Arm 1 is and how exciting it’ll be for whichever Ontonaut decides to set up watch there.
Nessie begins to raise her claw, and my mind begins to race, and, and, and I
Dr. Fiona Slaughter is spiraling, wondering how much control she has over her patients, how much control she has over her life, how much control she has over the future, how much control she has over her loved ones, how much control she has over her notes, how much control she has over--
Oh, she isn’t doing that? My apologies. She’s just still a little nervous about the interaction earlier, and her heart is racing a bit because she’s on her fifth cup of coffee this afternoon. She’s not spiraling or anything – but she is rotating the question in her mind, long after the choice was made. Should she have let the Intern walk out with his notes? Yes, he was undeniably the Intern, and yes, he obviously worked there, but... the amount of documentation he had taken and the surprise he seemed to have at its contents had been disconcerting.
Perhaps this was a memory gap thing – yes! He had mentioned something about retrograde amnesia, and so of course he would want to see his notes, because he wanted to know where he’d left off, and, and... it made sense. It made perfect sense. To deny him his records would have simply been far too controlling, and she will not succumb to the intrusive thoughts, to the dreams, to the whispers... no, she is a sane woman, and she does not concern herself with such baseless fears. And she doesn’t have time to replay the meeting in her head anymore, anyway, because she’s receiving a call from the Intern. She picks it up, asks if he’s willing to explain how there’s two of him... and when he’s confused, she hangs up the phone, because she has bigger things to worry about than details.
Her phone rings again. An unknown number. Parker, calling from another phone booth to schedule and immediately cancel an appointment, most likely. She picks up, and--
“This is The Intern,” a sheepish voice says on the other end, and she immediately recognizes him as the Intern she’d been speaking to in the meeting. “I apologize for the intrusion, ma’am, but I’m having a medical emergency and cannot presently access my account information. Would you mind reading out my list of emergency contacts?”
She obliges, only stopping to cringe at herself for thoughtlessly writing her note to pick up more aspirin directly on the Intern’s filed emergency contact list. She’s so scatterbrained today. She’s getting such a headache... she’ll need to bump her 9:00 tomorrow to 10:00, if she can manage. She could use the extra hour of sleep. After she’s finished reading out the CEBro’s personal phone number, the Intern thanks her profusely and promptly hangs up before she can even ask what emergency he’s facing. If she could tell him what to do... no. She takes a deep breath, picturing a cheering crowd, supporting her choice to read the contacts and chanting her name all the while... and then her ten-minute break is over, and she downs the rest of her coffee all at once.
Nessie is raising her – I'm not ready.
Dr. Fiona Slaughter is still drinking her coffee. She gulps the black liquid, letting it flow down her throat, awaiting the effect the caffeine will have on her brain. The second hand on her analog wall clock ticks forward once, and then again, and then again, and...
...no, this is pointless. I’ll... I’ll narrate it. I have no reason to waste your time.
Nessie is raising her claw, and even though she’s thinking about how much she wants to put it down she’s not really doing that and I feel like I’m watching a car crash happen in slow motion. It’s a bad idea, but I know she’ll do it regardless because she really, truly cares about this mission, and she’s hoping to meet the target in person, and...
(If only I could narrate what she thinks. If only I could change her mind, just for a moment – just long enough for her to realize that the target shouldn’t meet her, and that none of this is worth it and it’s all going to be for nothing. If I could tell the target to run, tell Nessie to go haywire, tell any of these young women that they don’t have to listen, don’t have to obey, don’t have to follow the rules—Oh, hold on. I should...)
“...COULD DISPENSE MYSELF AS A CANDIDATE FOR THAT EXPEDITION,” Nessie is saying, in her usual cheery text-to-voice chirp. “I WOULD BE ABLE TO DISPENSE BROADCASTS TO ALL OF YOU, AND IF THE TARGET HAPPENS TO BE THERE...”
“Y-yeah, that could work...?” The Rememberist beams, glancing at Allie for approval. “Yeah. Yeah! Just—if you make sure to report a lot, and you’re really, actually looking...” She rocks excitedly in her seat, relieved that she doesn’t have to leave her current position recording logs and interviews from a distance. Allie, meanwhile, is snorting at a private joke between her and her partner – something about the fact that the Rememberist’s mind is farther into the maze than any isekai could take her. “You’re really sure you wanna... with the Gopher Maze, and...”
Nessie’s joints squeak as its shoulders sag. “AFFIRMATIVE... I UNDERSTAND THAT I WAS UNABLE TO COMPLETE MY MISSION TO MAP THE GOPHER MAZE. I HAVE FOUND THAT ITS NON-EUCLIDEAN PROPERTIES EXTEND BEYOND EVEN MY OWN CAPABILITIES... IF I WERE RETURNED TO FULL FUNCTION, PERHAPS MY NAVIGATION SOFTWARE COULD DO IT, BUT THAT WOULD MEAN THE LOSS OF MY PARTIAL SENTIENCE.” It frowns. Nobody wants to kill it just to map somewhere the target definitely isn’t. “...BESIDES, I BELIEVE I HAVE FOUND A BETTER CALLING IN MY CURRENT SET OF TASKS. I THINK I REALLY GOT THROUGH TO HER WITH MY LAST BROADCAST.” She didn’t even hear it, but it was sincerely a good try.
“I’m in favor,” Roz says, speaking up for the first time in quite a while. She’s been picking her words very carefully around Allie – but she’s confident she’ll be able to be more efficient once Nessie’s secured in Arm 1. (I’m also privately aware that Roz barely even considers robots to be sentient. This is far more reflective of her own personal issues, and I have elected not to comment on it in further depth for the health of the team.) For her own reasons, she readily agrees. When I solemnly cast my own affirmative vote to avoid a split, by unanimous decision plus Allie, the squad decides to send Nessie into the heart of the labyrinth.
I don’t know what she’ll find in there.
But when the Changeling manages to set up the meeting she’s after with the Intern’s “emergency contact,” as she’s preparing to speak directly to her own target, the question the Changeling must contend with ultimately remains the same as it’s always been. She’s asked it as a child (although she cannot remember), a teenager (although she never got a chance to answer), an adult (although nobody heard her ask), and as a runaway (although she might never have the chance to know for sure):
Is there room for her anywhere? And, if not... what is to be done with her?
I know one thing: that's not a question I want the Ontonaut Program, its clients, its benefactors, or especially Roz’berry Bioluminescence Natasherd Clover Way to answer.