REVOLUTION - Story - Chapter 21: Memories of Alsa

TRAVEL TO ANOTHER ERA
• Original SSQ
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• Confrontation
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• Gaiden
• Crystallix
• Orionis
• Infinitus

Date: 5:42:12 PM, September 10th; 6:42:56 PM, September 17th, 2017.

Metal Man (GM): Recap
The Questers needed Mad Molly's help to access secret bunkers even Autumnus couldn't open so as to finally settle The Erastian Question.
However the problem is....
Mad Molly will only do that for the price of re-ensuring the Time Cops are formed on Alsa with her as the leader rather than the unprintable slander she spoke of Kit Redgrave and the Questers in general for not letting that happen.
She created a rune-encrusted thing to send back in time to tell her previous self to, well, do that, and upon doing that the present Mad Molly would know the deal had been accomplished and thus, give the info in return.
A neat little deal
Except....
The Questers obviously don't want that, since that was what led to the Psycho Illian / Omnus / Alsa being a trash dump
And presumably, would cause history to repeat itself anew.
Ah, for those just joining us, she thought the person doing this would actually do it because as far as Mad Molly could tell, the only person talking to her was a robot that had somehow time warping powers but wasn't any Quester she recognized.
Presumably she assumes Kit Redgrave or the other Kit or anyone else who would raise their eyebrow isn't there.
Indeed.
She would be horrified to know Marley was there afterwards to point at it and go "IT'S A TRAP!"
Continuation
Xavier has the piece of paper. He would be showing it to Kit Redgrave, after it had been shown to Marley and such.

Xavier Ridgecrest: "So as you can see, this is... what Mad Molly created to presumably undo what you did with The Book. I think she thought Louisoix was... ...not a Quester or, otherwise a foolish person."

Metal Man (GM): The piece of paper is overlaid with enough runes it looks like it's glowing, to Kit Redgrave and anyone else with magic sight (e.g. Valron's scanner)
The paper has runes that say such things as 'Kill the Questers
Evil Quester spy' and also 'Rebuild Omnus' on it
And for some reason, it says to rename the rebuilt Omnus 'Jack'

Xavier Ridgecrest: "We were going to have Marley mess with it, but to be honest, he isn't in the best of practice at this thing."

KitRedgrave: "Huh. That explains some things, at least..."

King Demon: *Is sitting in a chair asleep with a half-eaten milkshake in his hands.*

KitRedgrave: "And of course, we're not going to do this as requested... hmm."

Metal Man (GM): The main piece of paper has this written on it, as well--in normal text.
'Mad Molly: An evil fox bitch is going to usurp your rightful place in reality! Warp five years earlier and recruit your allies to become Time Cops then, before the Questers can do it!'

KitRedgrave: "You know. I see an opportunity here."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Apologies for the evil text on it but I think you made Mad Molly really mad. ...But her name was already mad..."

Nonna: "What won't she do to get power, even if it results in the destruction of everything she holds dear."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "...Does that make her Mad Mad Molly?"

Valron: "That's implying she actually holds anything dear."

KitRedgrave: "She's entrusting us, her enemies, to go back and alter time for her benefit."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Contextually, she thought it was our local Magitek robot, and not us. But yes, she probably had some idea it was us."

King Demon: "Ignorance is bliss." *Oh, hey, he's awake... and sighs at his now-melted shake* "Figures..." *Sets it down.*

KitRedgrave: "And I think we can give it to her." *She grins mischievously.* "How'd she get to be Mad Molly, anyway?"

Xavier Ridgecrest: "They say when she became a Mad Man, she became Mad Molly, and began murdering people with her powers for fun. Others claim she was already a crazy psycho murderer."

KitRedgrave: "What if she were convinced to lay down her weapons 5 years before we got there? Maybe even be convinced to join us... ah."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "She has remained nutty for most of her tenure but nobody ever spoke with her beforehand. These statements I speak of are just rumors, because she was really obscure before she became a Mad Man, and presumably before then was just a 'normal' person, even if a criminal one."

KitRedgrave: "That one might be out of our reach in time, but maybe worth a look anyway. Like, how far back are we talking here?"

Xavier Ridgecrest: "The biggest issue is that Psycho Illian guards that part of time. He only began to lose his grip on time around the time that we encountered him. Indeed, sending this message to Mad Molly of the past may be slightly dangerous. Presumably we'd be warning Mad Molly back in what is called the CONFRONTATION era to do this before, well, what we did to cause time to shift."

Nonna: "It's said that we're distantly related. Maybe there's some other family we could find in her earlier years to find our answer."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "The topography is such that Psycho Illian began to control everything around Alsa around the time the Questers first got there. Before then he only observed. In the ancient ancient past he also meddled a bunch to install the 'module' of Sinova."

Metal Man (GM): The paper also seems to have a series of runes on it that are like an 'integrity' check of sorts, to try to dissuade from tampering, or so anyone who could see magic would see.

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Granted. Psycho Illian as a distributed being... hmmm..."

Nonna: "Someone who could help us so that she doesn't grow up that way, or at least put a stop to the person who might have led her to go down that path."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "It would be possible for us to momentarily stun him and run away if we absolutely had to tinker with time involving his control."

Nonna: "On the other hand, playing god like this could have further repercussions."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "We know he was possessed by the darkness of Xalron, and hitting him with the Sword of Light really messed him up."

KitRedgrave: "Well, she doesn't seem *Entirely* hapless. There's some kind of checksum on this thing... probably nothing we can't alter. Or... duplicate entirely, even."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Yes. I was thinking you could alter it so that she still goes along with it, but doesn't do anything meaningfully different."

KitRedgrave: "Also. You *Did* check this thing for bugs before bringing it in, right?"

Xavier Ridgecrest: "...To be honest, not as thoroughly as I'd like--"

Metal Man (GM): Marley casually walks over.

King Demon: "Well, I didn't see any cockroaches on it."

Marley: "Don't worry, he was foolish to let that thing in here, but I looked at it. It's rigged to explode if somebody tries too aggressively to take it apart, but it's not got any bugs. That'd give away Mad Molly's lack of actually being imprisoned, y'know.
She just thinks we're all idiots."

KitRedgrave: "That seems to be a common thread. You'd think eventually they'd learn."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Well, she's used to nothing but idiots in the past, and most smart people leaving..."

Valron: "They probably will, Kit. ...It'll be too late by the time they do, but.
Still. Eventually, they'll get it."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "We do have to be careful to not accidentally teach Mad Molly too well of a lesson, maybe. That way she won't learn too fast. That said, messing with the past... it's dicey."

Nonna: "Do it too much, and we're no better than the Time Cops, really."

KitRedgrave: "It'd probably be easy enough to just make this note not useful at all... but kind of a wasted opportunity."

Marley: "Th' runes on there can be rearranged and modified, but I figured Kit should do it because it's gonna effect what she did before... the runes in there seem attuned to specifically tryin' to undo what Kit did. Might wanna compare it to Th' Book to make sure what it's touchin'."

KitRedgrave: "Yeah, good idea... want to understand what this thing's doing before anything else."
*She would go pull out The Book and look up something about this in the index. Because everything's in there somewhere.*

Nonna: "If we're willing to go back in time and forcefully alter history just because someone's being difficult, our conflict with them becomes more one of 'No, OUR group should be allowed to do this, not yours!'"

King Demon: "The problem with messing with time is that the one we're trying to mess with can do so as well. What's to prevent her from going back even earlier to stop US?"

KitRedgrave: "Would she even know we did it at all?"

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Well, she helped create the Time Cops in an alternate reality, and has encountered us altering time before. She might not immediately but I feel like in some way, we've been destined to keep crossing swords with her and altering history continuously."

KitRedgrave: "I see."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "So she can generally at any moment suspect us with good reason already."

Metal Man (GM): The Book flips to an interesting page.
It shows a nice image of Mad Molly all Harry-Potter esque, and a bunch of text flows off the page into the air.

Valron: "I'd be surprised if she didn't suspect us in some capacity."

Metal Man (GM): 'THE SAGA OF MAD MOLLY - THE REPEATED WOULD-BE TIME COP CREATOR'
Then it casually shows off an image of OMNUS - BOOK REPLICA MADE OUT OF METAL
Detailing all kinds of elaborate gears that encode information in 1s and 0s but mechanically.

KitRedgrave: "Well... what I had in mind is that she really always wants to found the Time Cops. What if she did, this time, but with some engineered flaws in her plan? So we end up having it."

Metal Man (GM): The note's runes would be clearly matching up to the runes that created Omnus and, according to The Book, "Match the earliest recorded Time Cop technology"

King Demon: "Woah... that's..."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Hm. It is very possible, if highly ironic. I wonder what flaws would do it, or if we somehow are already living out what we're planning to do in a way."

KitRedgrave: "It'd be pretty helpful, I think. Somebody's going to need to be looking over spacetime after we destroy the old ones."

Valron: "That could work... though, I'd have to wonder what'd potentially be stopping her from patching those would-be engineered flaws out."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "The weird part is the Time Cops, despite our meddling, continued to exist without an origin. Can we figure out even what the current origin story of them even is? ...Problem is nobody knows what's in our future anymore without going there... and if we go there, will we cause a paradox..."

KitRedgrave: "What if this ludicrous time loop thing *Is* their origin story?"

Xavier Ridgecrest: "It might be. It goes around and around so far, making it hard to prevent them from existing."

King Demon: "Is there any way to break the loop?"

Metal Man (GM): Illian would walk in as well, hand to his chin.

Illian MacGregor: "I have the earliest known encounter with Time Cops whom I killed en masse in another reality. I'm the reason we have any knowledge of those old runes."

KitRedgrave now actually looks at what The Book flipped to.

Metal Man (GM): The Book continues to show the information about how Mad Man technology gradually became Time Cop technology at an unknown point in the future.
And that in the known but no longer 'real' future, what happened was Mad Molly creating the Time Cops to prevent would-be Alsan Questers from ruling the universe, and it expanded from there.
But as noted in The Book, Kit and the New Questers averted any Alsan Questers from ever doing that and also prevented Psycho Illian from ruling, thus destroying in the process the dystopian future that required Time Cops on Alsa.
This note appears to be Mad Molly trying to re-seed that event in a past-Mad Molly's actions, thus allowing the Time Cops to be created even though Mad Molly NOW has mostly been a prisoner of Autumnus and never seen much Alsan Quester activity or Psycho Illian activity anymore.
And due to Omnus failing, Omnus failed to restart the cycle as well.

Illian MacGregor: "If nothing is changed, I believe the Time Cops are ultimately only created by Autumnus' automatic behaviors, complete with those ancient entities that follow him around in chain mail forever. Partially why Mad Molly is a prisoner. She is from an alternate timeline.
She is considered in a way a mirror of me when I was Psycho."

Nonna: "So it all goes back to Autumnus."

Illian MacGregor: "Her wish is to create her own reality, that brief one where she was head of the Time Cops and sending people like Ael to kill everyone. It's also why people like Ryll vanished. I don't think they ever joined Autumnus' Time Cops.
The New Time Cops were Mad Molly's, which Omnus usurped and lost when destroyed.
Mad Molly, in a nutshell, wishes to try again and make an Omnus named Jack...
I am guessing this new Omnus would be much less alien minded and not betray her?"

KitRedgrave: "Who actually had existed already in this timeline, 'cuz we stole all his crystal palace walls and sold 'em off. Unless I misremember..."

Nonna: "She wants to rule rather than be imprisoned. Not exactly an entirely unsympathetic desire in itself."

Illian MacGregor: "Well, there was a person named Jack, but he wasn't a machine. He was an anthropologist possessed by Dyne, an evil death spirit."

KitRedgrave: "If only she were less... like herself, that'd actually be pretty okay."

Illian MacGregor: "..." *He gets an expression on his face.* "...Yes... she probably wants to call Dyne back and combine him with Omnus. I would pity the world if that happened. The God of Death combined with an Encyclopedic knowledge of where all the living beings are."

KitRedgrave: "Just all of the evil compounded into one person."

Nonna: "Now, the question is why she was imprisoned. What did she do, or want to do, that forced Autumnus' hand like that?"

Xavier Ridgecrest: "She created Omnus and tried to overthrow him and re-create the timeline where she was in control."

Nonna: "Think further back, Xavier."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "During the early era where she ruled as Time Cop, Autumnus was a distant figure, rarely seen and mostly on the fringe of the universe. Even further back, hmmm..."

Nonna: "There was some crucial event that turned her from obscure figure to 'Mad Molly' who wanted to rule everything."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "The furthest back is more in the history of Alsa."

Marley: "Yeh, she created Borne, who was her first creation."

Nonna: "What was this catalyst that set her on this endless path with branches ending only in her imprisonment, defeat, and insanity?"

Marley: "Borne then killed her after detecting she was irreversibly evil like Eggman was. Since initially Borne helped make her rule supreme after he killed Jack and drove Eggman off of Alsa.
Also Borne was made for good, not evil, as ye see. Originally we Mad Men was the heroes.
We defeated Eggman, who otherwise was gonna kill and enslave everyone with robots and mad science experiments, one way or another.
Anthon himself had created the Mad Men after he found normal guns unable to defeat Eggman's Metal Sonic."

King Demon: "It's really a shame we can't send Molly and the others to some alternate pocket dimension that they can't ever get out of."

Marley: "Th' problem is they're as much a part of yer backstory as you are of theirs. We can only cut off their futures, alterin' the past too much is a dead end."

Nonna: "So all of our information still misses something, I've noticed."

Marley: "Now, the catalyst is a bit murky. To be honest, I didn't know much about Mad Molly before she was Mad."

Illian MacGregor: "Borne himself barely remembers anything of her not being insane."

Nonna: "It's always people reacting to her after she's already made an appearance."

King Demon: "Sounds like nobody did."

Valron: "Hrm. How odd."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "So. Maybe we could use this piece of paper to learn about her prior to it all? She wasn't too specific about WHEN she should get it other than it being in the past."

King Demon: "Kinda immaterial; we can spend as much time as we want on this, then go back to that point to give it to her other self."

KitRedgrave: "Yep... well, up until other events happen that'd be hard to explain away."

Nonna: "We could find some way to talk to her pre-Mad self to find out what happened."

Marley: "Wait a minute. Yer Nonna Tark. Anthon Tark recruited her."

King Demon: "First we'd need to FIND her pre-mad self."

Marley: "Wouldn't he know?"

Nonna: "That's true."

Marley: "He was there... he was there before it all. He was there way before most of it. We could like, jus' ask him for his input on this before we go meltin' history with magic."

King Demon: "Oh, we're going to see Ani again? This should be good."

Marley: "Well, it'd be more convenient to jus' ask him via radio, methinks."

Nonna calls her Grandfather.

King Demon: "And safer..."

Anthon Tark: *R* "Hello. Is everything all right, Nonna?"

KitRedgrave: "...That is very interesting that we have knowledge over how Omnus was built, now. I have some uses for that..."

Nonna: *R* "We've hit a bit of a problem in dealing with a matter regarding the safety of existence, as usual."

King Demon: "This time travel shit gives me a headache..."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "With that and your captured copy of him, Kit, we can potentially do a lot with it."

Nonna: *R* "Specifically, I'd like to know everything you know about... Molly."
*R* "We're more than familiar with what she did after becoming Mad. What's important is before that."

Anthon Tark: *R* "Did I hear somebody say time travel? Please don't go back in time and steal that cheeseburger I ate 50 years ago."
*R* "The scientists tell me in a realm where that happened, I had to fight a bunch of crazy people."
*R* "I told them to stop using their science on time like that... ...Mad Molly."
*R* "Of course it's all about her, she was the other scientist going on about Time Travel..."
*R* "I told her it was dangerous!"
*R* "She told me if we went through time, using the Time Stones, we could prevent Eggman."
*R* "It all sounded great, except the historians noted that there were also monsters in the past who destroyed the Vring, and also that the 'Little Planet' that supposedly existed in our myths had gone missing ever since Sonic went to it that one time..."

Nonna: "What prompted her noble-intentioned quest to get rid of Eggman?"

Anthon Tark: *R* "I told her not to do it and she did. She was never the same. And she didn't prevent anything. She just came back and told me that she didn't actually accomplish anything. That was when I went with the Mad Men project. And then... oh."
*R* "Well you see, I had decided to defeat Eggman with military force, because Sonic kept only saving human cities after they were destroyed."
*R* "I told Sonic, 'it's awful nice that you saved us, but could you hurry it up?' and all he could say is 'You're just too slow! Why can't you evacuate as fast as we can?'"

King Demon: "I don't want to... cheeseburger?"

Nonna: *R* "So it's likely that she was a victim or knew a victim of those attacks."

Anthon Tark: *R* "I would have explained but you know. It had been a years long problem that ended with a city named Crisis being destroyed. I fired the man who named that city. What kind of jackass names a city 'Crisis'?"
*R* "After Crisis was destroyed by Eggman testing some giant ice beam from outer space, I figured it was time we just kill him. So the army attacked, but he had more machines than we ever knew. Once again, because Sonic never really told us what was out there. We just were used to him doing all the lifting. Suddenly, robots everywhere."

Nonna: *R* "So she probably joined you under false pretenses. Might have even been a false name. But still, if you have any of the paperwork containing her information, that'd be helpful."

Anthon Tark: *R* "Mad Molly stepped up out of nowhere. She had previously just been a normal scientist, really! The Time stuff showed up once we began analyzing some artifacts we found from abandoned Eggman bases."

Nonna: *R* "We'd like to track down where she might have come from."

Anthon Tark: *R* "I... you know... it's... interesting... why are we so used to calling her 'Mad Molly'... it doesn't make sense."

Metal Man (GM): You hear Anthon ordering something and some paperwork being shuffled around.

KitRedgrave: "Almost as if somebody messed with time..."

Anthon Tark: *R* "I mean. Sure. There's a man named Eggman who attacked us. But that was his nom de guerre."
*R* "In peacetime we knew of him as Ivo Robotnik. But there's... what is this form..."

King Demon: *M* "Still wanna scramble his ass..."

Xavier Ridgecrest: *M* "He exploded when he used that solar array weapon... the Alsan Questers already killed him."
*M* "The Nintendus one is still out there somewhere... ...I don't think we ever want to find him."

Anthon Tark: *R* "Here. You tell me what this is."

Metal Man (GM): Anthon slaps the form on the camera.

King Demon: "Yeah, I know, I joined the Alsan's the day that happened."

Metal Man (GM): It's a GUN personnel form for 'Molly'
Strange runes are all over it.

Anthon Tark: *R* "Somebody messed with this form!"

KitRedgrave would compare it to the note we have.

Valron: "...Huh. That's... bizarre." *Analysis is go*

Metal Man (GM): The form has a similar-ish pattern, though different and older that says... 'glhf qusters ilu' followed by 'the woman I used to be is dead'

Nonna: "One step ahead of us, I see."

Metal Man (GM): Then a trippy pattern of laughing skulls where several important pieces of text used to be.

Valron: "Can't say I'm exactly surprised..."

Anthon Tark: *R* "Is this more of that time stuff? We've been looking and all I can see are these images of a much later Mad Molly sticking her tongue out at me. And when we tried to burn it, we discovered it pre-emptively had been treated with fire retardant!"

Nonna: "...But, we're definitely on to something here."

KitRedgrave: "I wonder how many times she's looped through, by now."

Valron: "Yeah, this is definitely looking to be a case of wacky temporal rubbish."

King Demon: "Too many."

Valron: "I'm gonna guess at least eleven."

Nonna: "If this wasn't important to hide from us, she wouldn't have done it."

King Demon: "Think we can undo it?"

KitRedgrave: "Maybe this isn't as ill-considered of a plan of hers as we had bargained. Need to consider this a few meta levels higher."

Anthon Tark: *R* "I'm looking through a handful of other things. There's the fact that Jack was called Jacob and created a revival system and killed Mad Molly at some point... hmmm..."

KitRedgrave: "She could be counting on us to tamper with this thing or send back a false one, and have something prepared back then for it."

Anthon Tark: *R* "It happened back when she questioned the motives of Jacob. Borne killing her again happened after, seemingly..."
*R* "The death certificates are also all covered in that same annoying magic nonsense."

Nonna: "It's a long shot, but, Grandpa. Could you look into anyone named Jack who might have been alive around a short time before she signed up with you? I have a theory, here."

Anthon Tark: *R* "So... you mean somebody other than Jacob who became Jack the Widowmaker who Illian killed, right?"

Nonna: "If I'm right, we'll encounter another taunting message."

Anthon Tark: *R* "Since Jack was always just a nickname for Jacob."

Nonna: "That's right. Particularly death records from Eggman attacks."

KitRedgrave: "So we figure she figures that we'd mess with the plan... but does she think we think she thinks that'd happen?"

Anthon Tark: *R* "Alrighty..."

Valron: "I don't know, but there's a part of me that's slowly getting more irritable. Meta-screwery is just... Oof."

King Demon: "..." *Yep, he's checking out of this conversation, his map needs updating.*

Anthon Tark: *R* "I'm looking back in time..."
*R* "Hmmm..."

KitRedgrave: "...what if she just has no past anymore?"

Anthon Tark: *R* "These records... what happened with time? They're all so confusing."

King Demon: "She erased herself?"

KitRedgrave: "Looks like it, in some sense."

Anthon Tark: *R* "She was Jacob's wife, then killed by him, but other paperwork says Borne killed her, but other paperwork says she gained her powers from a pyramid Garrick later went to, but my own memories are of Marley revealing the Mad Men shrine and then she went mad after, but I also remember her going mad after messing with time itself..."

Metal Man (GM): Anthon eventually takes out some really old piece of paper.

Anthon Tark: *R* "Right, I looked through the ancient census for people named Jack, and just that, not Jacob, and not any of these other aneurysm inducing things that suggest Mad Molly has lived and died possibly hundreds of times and could have even cloned herself..."

King Demon: "And?"

Kumiko: "Cloned herself...?"

Valron: "So her origin story is pretty much just 673 Choose Your Own Adventure books glued together, hurled into a blender, set on fire, then somehow processed through an accordion. At least, that's what I'm getting from this."

Nonna: "Stuff relating to Molly herself isn't going to be reliable."

Metal Man (GM): He takes out some ancient paperwork, including newspaper clippings.

Nonna: "She went out of her way to obscure that information from us. But if my theory is right, we may find a weakness in that."

Anthon Tark: *R* "Things calm down once we reach the point before Mad Molly's official existence."

KitRedgrave: "That's pretty clever. You can't mess with her past if you don't know what it is..."

Nonna: "After all, there was one event that she was unable to alter."

Anthon Tark: *R* "In that the newspaper still shows the same thing. Eggman attacks Crisis. Crisis is destroyed. Sonic belatedly saves the day."
*R* "Many people are killed fighting him shortly afterwards, in battles near Marble Zone."

King Demon: "Her birth. If she alters that, she ceases to exist at all."

KitRedgrave: "And then we can trace what happens from there... but good luck finding it."

Nonna: "Actually, I was thinking of another event. Something that even with time travel, she was unable to fix."

Valron: "And that would be...?"

Nonna: "She wanted to go back in time to deal with Eggman, right? And failed. This is something she failed to do anything about, despite her being able to overwrite everything else.
Which means that this one failure of hers won't be altered."

King Demon: *Nods* "She can't alter it because if she does she creates a paradox that prevents her from being able to go back TO alter it. It's like in that movie about the time machine."

Anthon Tark: *R* "Hm."

Kumiko: "Mmmm..."

Nonna: "And the keyword to this is 'Jack'. She called Jacob by that name, and now wants to call a creation of hers by the same name."

King Demon: "And this is not the Widowmaker? So, how do we find him?"

Nonna: "That's what I'm asking my grandfather to do."

Anthon Tark: *R* "Death records hold that James Krieger, Jake Dunlop, and Fredrick Omnich died in Crisis City's destruction. Meanwhile, in the Marble Zone battle, there is a single person named Jack who died early on in the battle due to a mishap. Jack Kingsley."
*R* "The heavily messed with paperwork on Molly indicates the unknown Molly was present as... a medic?"
*R* "And yet she told me she was a scientist."
*R* "Jack Kingsley was crushed by a falling block pretty much immediately when the battle began."
*R* "The first casualty. Mostly forgotten by history."

King Demon: "Well, technically, a medic is a doctor, same as a scientist..."

Nonna: "What did Jack Kingsley do? Was he just a civilian, a conscript, an officer?"

KitRedgrave: "If only there were some way to just directly look in the past and see what's true now."

Anthon Tark: *R* "Private First Class, relatively boring. He was just a foot soldier."

King Demon: "What was he BEFORE Marble Zone?"

Anthon Tark: *R* "That's a bit harder to say, but... hm." *Few moments go by* "He worked in day labor, building houses. There isn't a lot, because he seemingly didn't do much. Normal person, as far as I can tell."

Nonna: "Significant others, family?"

Anthon Tark: *R* "Leya Kingsley, his wife. Joan Kingsley, his paternal grandmother. Half-brother Ed Kingsley by the same father."
*R* "Old census records indicate his family originated from Ryndell and moved to Westopolis before the war, to build in the then-current building boom."

Nonna: "Any information on his mother?"

Anthon Tark: *R* "His mother, hmmm... birth certificate lists a Marie Kingsley as his mother."

Nonna: "Almost too clean, if you ask me."

Anthon Tark: "It was after that failed battle that everything went insane, and Mad Molly was obviously there, at that time. The various competing histories all have one thing in common--she went insane from exposure to either Mad Man energy or Time Travel. Or maybe both."

King Demon: "Any info on Marie?"

Valron: "Just need to find the right thread to pull at..."

Anthon Tark: "She was a seamstress who worked in the factories in Ryndell back when they had more significant business going on there and before mining undermined most of the area's warehouses."

Kumiko: "Very interesting."

Nonna: "What do you guys think?"

Xavier Ridgecrest: "We have the benefit of being able to potentially encounter her before she became herself and changing the script. The coordinates on the note list a specific place and time 5 years ago, and thus her wish would be, normally, for us to just help re-trigger a new cycle of this madness. But, based on all of this, we have ammunition to go back in time and attempt to stop it altogether."

King Demon: "I think we have a bit of info."

Valron: "I can't say I'm especially feeling it, myself, but... Mm."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "What do you think, Kit?"

KitRedgrave: "I'm all for it, really. You know this is the kind of play I always try to do."

Kumiko: "So we're about to go over time and space...?"

King Demon: "Can I as a question? What's so special about that specific point in time five years ago?"

Kumiko: "...I thought Princess Charlotta told me time travel sucks. Oh well. Whatever we need to do."

Anthon Tark: "I think we're going to go to one specific place, not everywhere."
*R* "If what you say is correct."
*R* "A time five years ago? Not certain."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "That specific time? Well, Mad Molly specified it on the note. That's all we really know, it was, seemingly, before Kit changed reality.
And the location... seems to be Alsa."

KitRedgrave: "...Hey, maybe The Book just knows about it."

Valron: "Wouldn't hurt to check with it."

KitRedgrave: "It knows everything else about that place..." *She goes and bookmarks this current stuff, and looks for that event.*

King Demon: *Nods* "I'm just wondering why she was so specific about when and where."

Metal Man (GM): The Book notes that the location it picked is a specific location in the middle of nowhere, on that continent where the Corallian people are. In the middle of a very distant desert, it shows images of a construction site.
At the time noted in Mad Molly's place, the site is active.
After the events that occurred in CONFRONTATION, though, it goes inactive.

Nonna: "That's where our home-building Jack probably can be found."

King Demon: "What were they building at that time?"

Metal Man (GM): The Book doesn't have an answer, since it can't look that deeply into something back in time--especially at a time when its power was waning.

Anthon Tark: *R* "That's outside of GUN Jurisdiction so there's no records I know of on my side."

King Demon: "Guess we'll at least have to go there and find out what's going on."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Well, Mad Molly expects us to give her the note then... The one that warns her of what's to come and presumably sets her to building this would-be Omnus."

King Demon: "Well, she expects LOUIS to give her the note..."

Nonna: "How about we find out what Jack's up to."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "We have a Time Engine, so we can potentially warp back then. Mind you, there will be some chronomentia afterwards..."

King Demon: "As usual."

Nonna: *R* "Thank you, Grandpa."

Valron: "Okay, so... I feel like I missed something, but why do you feel like this particular route will turn up something substantial? Is it because of the lack of any mucking about on those particular files, or...?"

Anthon Tark: *R* "You're welcome. I'll go get some rest now. Anthon out." *Click.*

King Demon: "Short version: We're trying to find out about the origins of one of the Time Cops founders to possibly prevent them from creating the Time Cops to begin with."

Nonna: "We're going to uncover what Molly failed to prevent."

Kumiko: "Ah..."

Nonna: "As it's the one thing she's apparently unable to alter, it's the closest thing we have to the truth. Armed with this truth, we can subvert this whole loop thing she's got going on... probably."

King Demon: "It would be logical to believe that whatever this event is, it's the catalyst for everything that's happened both to her and by her ever since."

Kumiko: "While I don't understand how I can be of any help here, I'll see what can be done..."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "I can use the Time Engine to warp us all there with the Wing Fortress. It'll cause some... mild Chronomentia, but otherwise... I presume we wish to observe that battle at Marble Zone Anthon was going on about?"

KitRedgrave: "Yeah!"

Valron: "Sounds like that's the course of action we're going with, presumably."

King Demon: "Sure, why not? Uh... perhaps we should JUST observe it, not get ourselves involved in it... we can always go back slightly earlier to do what we need to do after."

Nonna: "Let's learn about this Jack or other persons of interest while we're there."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "So, do we want to try to figure out where he was before he was untimely crushed? Small 'scratches' through time like that aren't as wearing.
It's just the initial era-jump that rattles the most."

Metal Man (GM): Xavier takes out a dusty control panel that's covered in ancient rust and even some seaweed.

Xavier Ridgecrest: "The Time Travel panel stolen from that old Judge Dredd ship..."

Nonna: "Jumping straight to a warzone isn't going to help anyone. Perhaps a bit before it."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Been a while. Last time it was hooked up to the Fy'aar, but now... it's here. Setting the coordinates..."

Metal Man (GM): Xavier adjusts it so that it's back in time, to a bit before the battle, located at the last known coordinates of the troops and thus where Jack would be... he also pauses for a moment.

Nonna: "The less chance there is of us intervening in the war and messing things up even further, the better the chances we'll have at pulling this off."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Speaking of observing, we can use The Book to do that."

King Demon grabs a... wait, is that a koopa troopa shell?!?!? and puts it on his head.

Valron: "...Huh. I don't remember it being hooked up to that, but..." *Shrugs.*

Xavier Ridgecrest: "At that time Sinova was functional. Well, it's a long story. It was... before you were even on our side, Valron."

Valron: "Aahh. I see, I see. So probably around the time I was still absent, then."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Back in CONFRONTATION I hooked it up to a ship that resembled the Fy'aar and flew back in time with it."

Valron: "Oh. Fun, fun."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "So, using The Book, we can contact Sinova and observe the battlefield from space, I think. That way even Red Text can't notice us hiding out there."

Metal Man (GM): Xavier sets up the warp, and then pulls a couple switches.

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Contrary to expectations, this shouldn't be too--"

Metal Man (GM): W-W-WARP

Xavier Ridgecrest: "--bumpy..."

KitRedgrave: "...hey I remember this feeling. It makes me pine for... Coffee." :D :D

Valron: "A tad disorienting, I'm sure, but... Oof."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "There is plenty of that, we have a nice fireproof coffee maker. On that note, could you use The Book to observe the Marble Zone area, Kit?"

KitRedgrave digs out the Coffee Engine she made the last time she ended up in a Sparkish mania.

King Demon: "Woah... dizziness." *Sits back down.*

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Sinova is down there... it should be possible to tap in to that..."

Nonna: "Ahh, sleepiness, my old friend from the academy."

Metal Man (GM): Outside, is Alsa.

KitRedgrave: "...right. Focus."

Metal Man (GM): Red Text's satellite is down there.
Outer space is still fairly empty.

Xavier Ridgecrest: "I would have more of a reaction but I almost went completely insane from Time Travel so this just tickles a bit."

King Demon: *Looks outside* *M* "Suddenly have an urge to go station blasting..."

Xavier Ridgecrest: *Casually eats a piece of limestone.*

KitRedgrave would make a pot of hyper-optimized motor oil coffee, and sip some while flipping through The Book.

Metal Man (GM): The Book has an interesting CHRONOLOGICAL DIFFERENCE ALERT at the top, and then, you can see the Marble Zone area. "The Oracle Statues" are detected still residing inside it.

KitRedgrave: "...tastes a little flat. Missing something. ...focus. later."

King Demon hands Kit a bottle of whiskey.

KitRedgrave: "Later." :P
"Last time I got smashed on the job, I don't even know where I ended up."

Metal Man (GM): Encrusted with their evil chaos emerald-like stones, they also have their old ability to portray what's going on currently.

KitRedgrave: "Some sort of simulation thingy for a new system? System of what? I never found out."

Metal Man (GM): The Book simply notes, 'Pick the target and scrying can begin.'

Kumiko: *Just... folds her arms and stands there, confused.*

KitRedgrave: "So don't drink on the job or you end up strange places."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "The last time I drank, I became ruler of a country of technological know-nothings, then I fought a man who claimed he was God. With an exploding toaster. I then died falling drunkenly down an antimatter mine, then Yurie killed the man who called himself God. It turned out he was just a lunatic."

King Demon: "So that's what happened to Bison?"

Xavier Ridgecrest: "I woke up a bit later. The Questers were busy angrily punching and kicking the crater where the God-man was. Master Hand bribed me ten thousand coins to never tell anyone that ever happened."

KitRedgrave: "...how far back did we go from the event? There's weird stuff we should look at."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "We went about a day or two."

KitRedgrave: "Oh nice. Plenty of time."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "There should be a military formation somewhere outside Marble Zone, based on Anthon's old records. I believe we're looking for a man named Jack who ISN'T Jack the Widowmaker."

Nonna: "Jack... Kingsley."

KitRedgrave would go and scry around the area, looking at the weird Chaos Emerald-like stones first.

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Ostensibly, what he did is why Mad Molly did whatever she was doing later."

Metal Man (GM): Looking at them is funny, because they in turn are scrying stones.
Stones cursed with evil, but still.
The evil suggests somebody cursed by great evil used to control them, or made them out of pure evil.

KitRedgrave tries to be careful not to end up having them scry us scrying them... as far as she can. :P.

Metal Man (GM): Within them are many futures cursed by zombies.
Including an image of a future in which an angel and a weird looking echidna mobian play with the stones, causing a zombie apocalypse.

KitRedgrave: "Whoa. Seeing potential futures that weren't. Neat."

Valron: *Cue Valron biting back an 'uggghhhh' when he sees that particular image.*

Metal Man (GM): And another one showing Jack the Widowmaker eventually possessing the statues... and another one with Eggman having them... and another one when Ael stole the statues away and they seemingly didn't show up again.

Kumiko: "...is this the part where a giant disembodied head pops out?"

Metal Man (GM): Also a brief image of a dude in a red top Hat staring through them, looking confused.

King Demon: "Text was there?"

Valron: "...Anyways, might wanna cloak ourselves so RT doesn't pry at what we're doing."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Some of these probably did happen... others might be common events between different timelines... ...We are surrounded by our force field so presumably no radio waves can see us, but, we shouldn't expect to be permanently invis--"

Metal Man (GM): The Book chirpily announces that it casually blocked Red Text from seeing anyone.

Illian MacGregor: "Oh yeah. The Book was technically my tool, as was Red Text."

KitRedgrave: "Awesome."

Illian MacGregor: "He can't see us because, well, he couldn't see me either. I mean he would have freaked out if he knew he was nothing more than a construct made for me to conquer the world with."

KitRedgrave: "Wouldn't we all."

Illian MacGregor: "He probably looked at us looking at that and saw nothing, thus the confusion."

KitRedgrave: "Okay, looking away from the big obvious interesting thing..."

Illian MacGregor: "As long as we don't do anything Psycho Illian wouldn't do, it's unlikely we'll trigger any alarms. I know for a fact he would scry all the time. It's what all of these redundant objects that scry things would do."

Valron: "Makes sense."

Metal Man (GM): The Book lets you casually zoom out and look around outside of Marble Zone.
A weird cell phone like 'strength indicator' notes the signal is very good.

KitRedgrave would go look for this military formation.

Metal Man (GM): You casually zoom in on a GUN formation assembled outside the island.
They're on a bunch of ships.
You can even see some names of various people there.
And... I think I will pause here, just glad to get that extra bit in Maybe try to continue a short bit mid-week, so we can keep doing small sessions... XP
~Pause~

Metal Man (GM): Recap
The New Questers went back in time, to Alsa, to a very specific time--before Mad Molly became "Mad." After seeing a ton of conflicting information about her, they wished to figure out for certain what exactly made her... her. What was it that made an otherwise fairly forgettable medical student go all-in on time travel and potentially found the Time Cops? Nonna figured it had to do with someone named 'Jack' being lost to her and her trying to bring him back, due to the recurring references to him. But it's anybody's guess, at least until all is seen... with the Wing Fortress hanging out just outside of Alsa to try and observe what's going on from space using some latent Sinova-based sensors on the planet.
Continuation
The Wing Fortress is busy showing the area outside some sort of cave, the 'Marble Zone' area where Mad Molly was before whatever incident occurred that led to her becoming so eager to tell Anthon all about it and thus, start the events that led to the Mad Men.

King Demon: *Is lounging, eating some chicken wings.*

Kumiko: *Staring blankly into space.*

King Demon offers Kumiko some wings.

Kumiko: "Hm?"

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Let's see if we can see what happened... Nova, what do you think?"

Nova: "It's a bit before the battle, as per yet. I have begun to figure out where 'Molly' is, however. She cannot hide from the systems on Alsa. Sinova is technically running the place. But I happen to be Nova.
So it can't tell the difference between me and itself.
We shouldn't abuse this too much, but given the universe's fate is at stake, we can do this somewhat...
But I have the strangest thought, of how I would like to just destroy Sinova for being an abomination... ...unfortunately my enlightened co-processors indicate that, indeed, that would be fatal to the timeline, so I cannot."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Yeah, we could all run around whacking bad people with golf clubs before they actually get defeated, then we'd cease to exist. I mean you ever just think, 'Garrick used me, let's go back in time and warp him back to where he came from before he ever met anyone?'"

Nova: "Believe me, my near-omniscience on Nintendus always made that possible. Kuja connected me to the Dimensional Cannon. I saw what he did.
I could have just as quickly averted it. But I also saw what you and your friends would do. That would have also been averted.
You are the good and the bad that happened to you, for better or worse."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "...Ever think we should build our own Dimensional Cannon and--"

Nova: "No. If that were a successful weapon, Kuja would rule the multiverse already.
As you now know, Psycho Illian had control over time then. He would have simply destroyed it with his bare hands if it ever worked.
...Gerald had sabotaged it anyway."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "All these obscure facts... but where is the info about Molly?"

Nova: "I must admit. These systems are hard to look through."

Louisoix: "Hm. So this is the past, eh? Well... to business, I guess. Yeah, we'd like to figure things out about her, after all. I would hope that the confusion between your system and this past system doesn't become... anything permanent, anyway."

Nova: "Sinova technically was created after me. So if you want to be properly confused, it's my systems of the past confusing systems of the future's past."

Kumiko: "Time travel sucks, but I guess we'll have to do what we'll have to do..."

Nova: "You have to keep into account that Illian basically wrested me from a past timeline and brought me into the future. Originally I never persisted beyond Garrick's hostage-taking of a copy of me. Garrick was a very troubled man. He spent so many hours rambling about you.
About how he needed to kill the Questers but he couldn't. So he was going to put them in stasis forever, trap them around the sun in a satellite, and then... he never figured out what he'd do next, although for some bizarre reason he wished to create his own adventuring group.
He ran away when he discovered Razor didn't like his ideas."

King Demon: "Troubled, huh? Is that what we're calling it now?"

Nonna: "Well, I've shaken off the side effects."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "I presume Nova still doesn't want to feel stupid for having decided to work with Garrick."

Nova: "He was originally someone with some decent ideas. He just had... mental problems... ...Possibly undiagnosed ones caused by being a clone of a clone, or as I call it, the Xerox Copier Problem."

King Demon: "Ah, we've all made mistakes. Hell, once I worked with Red Text." *Shakes his head* "Shoulda blown him up when I had the chance... oh well."

Nova: "Red Text is right outside the window, although unable to see us due to Kit's Book.'"

Louisoix: "Don't you... ah nevermind."

King Demon: "Yeah, but how much would I fuck up our history if I decided to blow him away now?"

Nova: "None of us would exist. Alsa's interactions that resulted in the things later on that led to Nintendus."

Valron: "Pretty much. It's all a big mess, really."

King Demon: "Exactly. Better off letting history take its course, at least for now."

Nova: "Though, between the Book Kit left open here and what's here, I can see it now... I see this Molly. And this Jack."

Metal Man (GM): Nova gestures and shows two ships. Molly is on a medical ship, and Jack is on a different ship with marines on it.

Nonna: "Our builder conscript, eh."

Louisoix: "We're monitoring them without interference, correct? And what of those runes? Hopefully something doesn't trigger just because we're somewhat close to Mad Molly..."

Nova: "We're using what Illian himself would use. Illian once ruled over this planet. He viewed everything, unseen, with The Book.
It was all a chessboard to him."

King Demon: "Let's just hope that we don't end up in checkmate."

Kumiko: "Chess... my least favorite strategy game."

Metal Man (GM): The view of Jack so far shows him near the back of the ship, in the barracks by some other soldiers and various engineering-types, who seem to have a bunch of explosive components and mining equipment.
Meanwhile Molly is casually walking down the corridors in a Nurse's outfit on the medical ship, tending to some people with seasickness, and some other people who probably have the flu.

Louisoix: "Checkers is nice, until you realize that its like tic-tac-toe." *He'd notice the explosives.* "Betting on the cause of death already..."

King Demon: "Likely; then again, given it's war..."

Kumiko: "War... a thing I knew so well... There must be a lot to learn here..."

Metal Man (GM): Main appearance difference for non-Mad Molly: rather younger looking, say, mid-20's; additionally her hair appears to be... a different shade of black than it is subsequently.

Louisoix: "Eh, never messed with the stuff. Well, never came up anyway."

Nonna: "Snap some photos. Just in case."

Nova: "Currently taking full video recordings of them, but, noted."

Nonna: "It'll be useful to have them both on file so we can check for others who might recognize them as they were back then... er, now."

Valron: "Makes sense."

Nonna: "Now, we're still before whatever happened to change Molly's life forever."

Metal Man (GM): Jack Kingsley on the other hand, is a square-jawed man with green eyes and red hair. Seemingly unrelated to anyone seen before, or at least, there's no matches for entities seen before in Quester interactions.

Nova: "Correct. It is as of yet a few hours until something happens. The Time Engine can warp us forward into the future if we wish to get closer to when things... happened."

Nonna: "Let's scan the area around here for any intruders or anomalies first."

Metal Man (GM): Several icons pop up.
Firstly, you can see one labeled 'Eggman'
He is inside the cave.
Then there is a second one labeled 'Eggman?'
It is inside the cave. It cannot actually be seen, the screen is static.
Also showing up on the map is out in outer space. Red Text is seen observing the area.
Also seen observing the area is the Illian of that time... literally floating in outer space, although his status is 'dormant'

Nova: "I checked and there's no Time Cop base in the moon. They don't appear to have been able to reach this time due to, well, Illian over there. He most likely only tolerates our presence by virtue that he isn't awake and there might be a paradox if he attacks himself."

Nonna: "That second Eggman... do we have any idea who or what it is?"

Xavier Ridgecrest: "No."

King Demon: "Huh, two Eggmans?"

Nova: "The second Eggman is so well defended that no magic appears to be able to interact with it. It cannot be scryed."

Valron: "...I have a bad feeling about that one. Best not to touch it, in any case."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "I wouldn't be surprised if it had something to do with what 'went wrong' here."

Nonna: "Even if we can't look at him, we can know when he makes a move."

Nova: "Red Text's defenses are too good for me to spy on him, but Red Text appears to be also trying to scan that Eggman and failing. His sensors are pointed at it and having the same trouble we are."

King Demon: "Keep an eye on it. It might be important."

Nonna: "Is Eggman or anyone else aware of this?"

Nova: "Red Text can't see us. Illian out there might be able to. No one on the surface can really see us. I don't know what that Eggman's capabilities are. But judging from what I'm seeing I don't know."

King Demon: "... Nova, can you cross check for Metal Sonic?"

Nova: "Searching... Can't seem to find anything named Metal Sonic, currently."

Nonna: "Hmm."

Nova: "Records indicate that Metal Sonic was one of this Robotnik's strongest robots. He presumably went rogue and required a massive army to be stopped. However, we're far enough into the past we probably won't see the full version of him, if at all. It was the Mad Men who ultimately stopped Metal Sonic, and they were, in some way, based on him, due to his shifting via nanites. This far back, it is unlikely he was in his penultimate form."

Nonna: "So the only odd things so far are that Jack and Molly are kept separate, and this mysterious so-called secondary Eggman. Do any records exist of anyone around this era being mistaken for Eggman?"

Nova: "Nothing quite so convenient, no."

Metal Man (GM): Borne casually looks on the view, himself.

Commander Borne: "Metal Sonic was one of the first entities destroyed by the Mad Men. It was by a freak accident and many people died."

Nonna: "What do you make of all this, Borne, Illian?"

Commander Borne: "Metal Sonic was Eggman's desperation play to try to defeat Mad Molly and Jack and Marley once they began tearing into his forces. At this point if Metal Sonic is here it's that non-sentient robot... still dangerous but not the one that destroyed half the world.
As for that other Eggman...
This is the Battle of Marble Zone.
The GUN forces go inside and encounter enemies they cannot defeat. Eggman escapes and most of the people are killed. We never got a full accounting of what happened.
It was the disastrous push Anthon made that led to him being practically chased out of his position by an angry mob."

Nonna: "And yet, 'Eggman' is elsewhere."

Commander Borne: "When he figured he had Eggman cornered and would just casually destroy him. Fog of war and the protests meant that he was unable to mount a proper accounting of what actually happened. Molly herself remained coy about it whenever I asked.
And Jack just laughed about it."

Nonna: "I think we found our anomaly."

Commander Borne: "As we already know, Anthon doesn't know what went on, and if Molly told Jack, he certainly wouldn't tell us. Jacob, the entity that was actually alive during this time, was leading different soldiers. It is known that Eggman of Alsa interacted with forces beyond our knowledge.
The statues, for one, which later on Alsan Questers accidentally used to summon a zombie apocalypse.
Which was later only dealt with by Time Cops and... *Sighs* Jack.
And Eggman himself. Because of course. He apparently knew how to utilize the statues in some way.
Indeed, one of the last things Eggman did before the Alsan Questers killed him was build a giant radio antenna out of the statues. I believe he was trying to use it to detect and destroy Time Cops. Something so fantastic is way beyond what I've heard a normal member of the Robotnik family would have done.
They were smart, but it never made sense for him to casually know ahead of time he could do such a thing, and worse yet, it worked, bringing Time Cops into our realm to attack us.
...Of course Xavier didn't help matters."

Nonna: "So, here's what I think. Correct me if I'm wrong here."

King Demon: "Well, we need to watch the second Eggman. That much is for certain. Probably BOTH of them."

Nonna: "These people prepared for war against 'Eggman'. And ran into... something different. Something worse."

Valron: "So... perhaps whatever the hell is in the cave that Eggman? thing is in? Yeah, I can definitely see that being possible..."

Kumiko: "Something worse than Eggman...?"

Nonna: "And whatever this was, it was a threat large enough to end the war and create horrific consequences.
Driving Molly into despair and insanity."

Louisoix: "Hrm. Well, its a nice history lesson. Though it has holes. Hopefully seeing this will answer some questions, along with what's up with Molly."

King Demon: "Definitely need to watch what happens with this thing, then."

Nonna: "Pushing my grandfather to the brink."

Kumiko: "I agree. Too many holes for me to process..."

Nonna: "And, here's the biggest problem."

King Demon: *Looks to Kumiko* "That's why we're here, to plug the holes."

Nonna: "Despite all her power, this is an event that Mad Molly herself has been forever unable to alter."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "...It reminds me of the problem I've had with Erastia."

Nonna: "Keep that in mind when you think about what's in that cave."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "I've been trying to prevent the destruction of Erastia. Repeatedly, I went back in time to fight whatever happened there. Until I eventually had to learn I had to defeat it in the future, and not the past.
...There's still several paradoxical copies of me that went back in time to try and prevent it, but apparently all they did was contribute to what happened.
It still hurts my head to think about it."

Nova: "I am beginning to pick up some anomalies... it seems to be tied to the moon rising."

Metal Man (GM): As the moon moves closer to being visible, the amount of anomalies in the cave continues to increase.

Valron: "Can we bring up the moon and the caves simultaneously and see what's up with them? Maybe it'll help give us a better idea as well, but... Hrm."

Nonna: "I'll keep watch on the real Eggman and how the soldiers and Molly and Jack Kingsley are doing while this is all going on."

Metal Man (GM): Nova brings them up. A weird teal light appears in the room.

King Demon: *Looks to Xavier* "There are some things that are always meant to happen; if they don't you have no reason to do what you do, creating a paradox." *Looks at the moon and anomalies* "Looks like things are happening."

Metal Man (GM): There's a line between the moon, going through Illian, and reaching the cave, going into the core of Alsa. It's a giant teal line of energy.

King Demon: "Can you analyze that energy, Nova?"

Valron: "Yeah, if we can get some analysis on what the hell is going on there, that'd certainly help."

Nova: "It is the energy of the Realm of the Dead from Alsa. Somehow it's being extracted using the moon... I can't understand. It's beyond any normal technology or magic.
I can see why the Time Cops stayed away from this time.
The rules of physics were Illian's to alter as he pleased and this Eggman may have further altered them more than that."

King Demon: "Realm of the dead? Like... zombies?"

Valron: "Hrm. How odd. I'd try and see if I could analyze it form here, but... Considering that I don't see any way it could be channeled, I'm not sure I could be of much use there. Bah."

Nova: "Yes, the power over death itself."

King Demon: "That sounds familiar..."

Nonna: "I... think where we are right now is a bad place to be."

Valron: "I figured that kinda went without saying."

Commander Borne: "It was said that the night turned blacker than dark before whatever it was happened. But everyone was certain it was Eggman just deploying some sort of technology. Of course, what would the average person who lived their entire life without encountering magic think?
It had long been dormant on Alsa ever since the mobians had been mostly chased away and Dyne's people died.
Anthon was profoundly skeptical, leading to there being no thought to even remotely research magic. Only crazy people did back then."

King Demon: "Can you tell what's happening in that cave?"

Nova: "Yes, but there is a danger the energy might also extend to here if I look at it."

Valron: "Yeah, can't say I blame you for not wanting to chance that."

Metal Man (GM): The image of Illian can be seen holding up both its fists. The energy is channeling through him to the surface. The moon continues moving... and then, seemingly, the beam dissipates, whatever 'that' was being complete.

Nonna: "It's already this bad, and we're still hours away from the event..."

Commander Borne: "You get an idea now why I am how I am. Alsa was a planet cursed by darkness and horror beyond that which exists in the current world."

Valron: "Hrm. We know something happened, so I'm wondering if it's safe to try and check it out now that it's stopped being active, but..."

Nonna: "I think we should. At the very least for information gathering purposes. I'd rather us not encounter something similar in our own time and not know what it is. Just in case, we should use the usual method."

Valron: "Right, then."

Nonna: "Create some setting-appropriate clothing for those of us who won't be recognized. And make sure everyone else is sufficiently disguised."

Metal Man (GM): Xavier casually takes out his mask.

Xavier Ridgecrest: "I can just transform into whatever it is we need. I mean, I rarely use it, but hey. It should be useful now."

Nonna: "Certain observers are always going to be a problem. But I figure that whatever that... thing was, and what's soon to come will keep them effectively distracted for the time being."

Commander Borne: "You have a mask that lets you turn into anything and you rarely use it... ...then again, he also has a sword that can destroy evil and rarely uses that too... Obviously I'm going to stay up here. No need to create a Time Paradox."

Louisoix: "But he uses a flaming golf club a lot. He knows what's useful."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "It is the best weapon. I mean, besides being unwieldy, balanced more to hit golf balls than faces, and constantly malfunctioning."

Nonna: "Yeah. You and Illian should provide support from here, if you can. I probably won't be recognized, considering I probably wasn't even born yet."

Illian MacGregor: "If the worst happens and the old me does something, I can probably do something to distract him. When he encountered me in that battle back when, he spent about 15 minutes freaking out and being unable to do anything, anyway.
Even an omniscient god-being like him in this timeline is prone to be unable to figure out what to do when his clone appears and starts playing Mirror Mirror."

Nonna: "Who else would like to come with?"

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Well that's me and you, and presumably Valron... dunno what we should disguise Louisoix as..."

Kumiko: "I don't... know if I would be of any use here."

Commander Borne: "GUN possessed some robots at the time." *Takes out a picture of, well, a classic humanoid robot from Sonic Adventure 2*
"They didn't talk a lot, mind you."

Louisoix: "Well, I'd like to be disguised to look like a human to everyone else, permanently. But I suppose we can't have everything."

Valron: "...Wait. Are we heading to Alsa proper, or to the moon?"

Commander Borne: "I doubt you'd need disguises on the moon."

Louisoix: "If its the moon. I've heard some terrible stories about people traveling to the moon for a plot point. But I don't think this is similar enough."

Valron: "The matter of disguises being brought up kinda confused me for a moment."

Louisoix: "Well, who knows. Maybe we need to make everyone think we're random moon dust."

King Demon: "Are the Questers on Alsa at this time?"

Nonna: "The disguises would be for the cave. The moon on the other hand would have less risk, but may not contain as much information."

Valron: "Because I was thinking of examining the moon more closely and seeing if there's something odd going on inside it, but... Hrm. And no, Demon. This is before the Questers were thrown into Alsa."

King Demon: "Oh, good, might be safe... ish... for me to go then."

Nonna: "Then again, you never know who we might run into up there. We're dealing with something that by all means shouldn't even be there already, after all."

King Demon: *Looks to Nova* "Do you know if Text caught or analyzed that beam?"

Kumiko: "In that case... I don't exist in this time frame, so I shouldn't have issues..."

Nova: "I can't tell what Red Text did, but his cameras were pointed at it."

Nonna: "So a bunch of soldiers from the surface wouldn't look too out of place following that event."

King Demon: "Then he at least knows about it." *Looks to Illian* "What WAS that, anyway?"

Illian MacGregor: "I don't actually know. The Illian out there in space is not me. I am what Kit Redgrave managed to recover and revive using The Book. But this part of my existence was most likely not recorded by The Book."

Nonna: "Are you feeling any kind of connection or resonance from it? If that Illian was trying to channel something, it's possible it had a chance to go to you instead. But it didn't, at least not from what we saw."

King Demon: *Sighs* "If it was a portal to the realm of the dead... don't suppose anyone here knows holy magic, do they?"

Nonna: "Did you feel... anything?"

Kumiko: "Holy... magic...? I... I used to, Demon. I can't recall it right now."

Illian MacGregor: "The energy was definitely creating a resonance, though it probably did on all of you too. It certainly seemed to bother you, anyway. My best guess is I wanted to use this energy to revive the people of Solaria. Not to sound repetitive but like Xavier here, I wanted to bring back my people from being destroyed as well.
This world was supposed to be used to eventually have the Questers go to it, where I would have them create the ultimate fighting team."

King Demon: "What are the odds it was similar to our old power source?"

Nonna: "Is the cave still showing 'Eggman?'"

Illian MacGregor: "Then they would kill the Time Cops."

Nova: "Yes. Both of the Eggmen."

Nonna: "Have any of them moved?"

Illian MacGregor: "The visible Eggman walked into the center of the confluence of statues and momentarily disappeared during the peak of the event, due to having to turn off the scrying to avoid being hit by the beam."

Valron: "I'm surprised I didn't feel anything particularly screwy outside of what just happened, but... I figured with my particular connection to the planet, I'd have felt something more." *Shrugs.*

Nonna: "So, even he was afraid of it."

Valron: "Huh. Can't say I blame him."

Illian MacGregor: "When it was turned back on, he had moved outside of the circle. The unknown un-detectable mystery glitched Eggman had begun moving more as well, for whatever reason, closer to where the statues were."

Nonna: "Then it's possible that's our target."

King Demon: "Can we get a visual on him yet or is he still inside the cave?"

Valron: "I take it the screwy mystery-Egg is still unviewable by remote means?"

Nonna: "That's the part that bothers me most, out of everything. We know enough to tell it's there just by the anti-surveillance field around it. But not what it actually is.
And it was part of that event just now, on top of it."

Valron: "Yeah, that's bugging me as well. I'm not sure what the hell is even up with it, but just... it's giving me bad vibes just by being there."

Nonna: "That's why I'd like to check it out."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "I have the warp field open, so it's possible to go into the cave. Just... best we be careful about it."

Nonna: "Thus the disguises."

Valron: "Makes sense."

Nonna: "Right. Once the away team is ready, let's get going."

King Demon: "Why do I get the feeling we're making a mistake by going down there?"

Nonna: "The alternative is to let things happen and for us to learn nothing by coming here."

Kumiko: "Then that solves nothing."

Louisoix: "Worst case scenario: we come back right before we leave, then tell ourselves what happened. Unless there's some sort of time paradox thing that I don't know about."

King Demon: "Perhaps I'm just paranoid about our own history, but what if us going down there is what CAUSES the problem we're trying to prevent?"

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Hard to say."

Nonna: "Then at the very least, we know more than the nothing we do now."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Going back in time to Erastia failed to change much. I even went back in time and just attacked Ael, at least once."

Nonna: "I'm not expecting a miracle solution here, anyway."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "I hit him. But whatever happened next made that moot."

Nonna: "We're here primarily to learn."

Illian MacGregor: "It stands to reason we've already changed time by being here via the observer effect. Particles observed by others are changed by being observed.
The question is whether we risk more to learn more or don't and remain confused."

Nonna: "If the worst that can happen is that things go as they normally did, then we're doing pretty okay."

Valron: "I'm just hoping we can get some good information out of this, regardless."

Nonna finishes changing into the uniform of an officer from the era.

King Demon: *Sighs* "Yeah... I just hate the idea that we're responsible for creating ANOTHER of our own enemies."

Nonna: "Let's do our best not to start any fires while we're here, at least."

Kumiko: "I'm just worried my presence could make things change unexpectedly."

King Demon: "So... you want me to sit this one out?"

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Pretty certain someone can just cast an illusion on you so you aren't obvious."

Nonna: "It's a figure of speech. Don't worry."

King Demon: "I was referring to not starting fires, since... ya know, it's kinda what I do."

Nonna: "We don't have much time before that incident happens."

Metal Man (GM): Illian casually casts 'alter' on Demon to make him look like a human version of himself in a GUN uniform.

Illian MacGregor: "Wish Kit hadn't dozed off after starting that scrying spell... but, at least I still recall my own magic. Bonus points, if anyone related to Illian sees that, they'll think the magic is related to him, not me."

Valron: "That's convenient, at least."

Metal Man (GM): Illian uses the spell similarly on whoever else doesn't already have a disguise, to get things ready.

King Demon: "... No comment."

Nonna: "Don't worry, Kumiko. If anything happens, it won't be your fault."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Technically we're the result of me going back in time and manipulating time as it is."

Kumiko: "Very well. I'll try to accept that..."

King Demon: "Yeah, it won't be our fault if something happens; only if something doesn't!"

Xavier Ridgecrest: "So it's already too late to worry about that, as long as we don't do anything obviously wrong..."

King Demon: "Like stealing those explosives from the GUN guys?"

Nonna: "Yup. Now, we all ready?"

Kumiko: "Sure..."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "I'm ready." *Puts on the mask and turns into... ...what just looks like himself without the armor, and, for some reason, sunglasses, wearing a similar GUN uniform.*

Commander Borne: "Sunglasses? At night?"

Louisoix dons some appropriate uniform.

Nonna: "Don't knock it. Some cops like to do that."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "When I wear this mask I can hear people's thoughts. I can tell if they've seen me."

Commander Borne: "...And you RARELY use that mask."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "I want to give the enemy a sporting chance."

Commander Borne: *Sighs* "At least you're not violent like the Questers that used to attack..."

Nonna: "Please... don't make a habit of that."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "It's all right. I'm not very intelligent so I end up accidentally tuning into radio stations unless I focus."

Kumiko: "I suppose I'm just worried. I do have a time traveler as an enemy that I loosely remember..."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "...Yes that sounded worse than it probably-K-ALSA 101! POP RADIO! ...Yeah."

Kumiko: "Buuuut this is a different place. So..."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "I'm ready to go, anyway."

Metal Man (GM): Xavier takes out his golf club, which is disguised as a shotgun.

Nonna heads out.

Xavier Ridgecrest: "...It might look a little weird but, hey. How many people fight by smacking people with the shotgun instead of firing it?"

Metal Man (GM): Xavier walks into the portal.

Valron follows suit, heading into the portal.

Metal Man (GM): As each person walks in, they begin to see the cave. The cave is, in fact, rather familiar to those on Alsa--there's a bunch of traps and doors and such, locking off the cave from easy exploration. Conveniently, though, the group has been warped into a sort of tunnel that would normally be used by Eggman to observe said traps, rather than in the 'outside' area.
It's rather dark in here, the lights are dim and only light comes from lava being pumped through giant pistons.
Marble Zone, Alsa, Prior to Unknown Incident
One direction leads outside of the cave to an 'observation area', while the other leads in to the cave, further.

King Demon: *Walks in, m* "Typical; even in a cave, Eggman has to have his machines."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "I recall this is where the logs indicated the Alsan Questers revisited and saw a bunch of dead people and traps... But this area we're in is new."

Kumiko: *Follows* "Odd..."

Metal Man (GM): A strange noise can be heard further in the cave.

King Demon: *Looks to Xavier* "That doesn't make me feel much better, you know."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "It's alright. My claim to fame was drowning whenever water appeared even though that made no sense, back when."

Nonna: "Well, I wasn't expecting to see or hear anything pleasant anyway."

Kumiko: "Great. The sound of probable hell."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "So, shall we approach the li--I mean sound?"

Valron: "So long as we don't attract the attention of whatever's making it..."

Nonna: "Let's do it. That's what we're here for."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "I guess we should be extra careful."

Metal Man (GM): Xavier would start inching further in, holding his would-be 'shotgun' at the ready.
The noise gets louder deeper inside; there's a lot of machinery there as well.
Up ahead is something rather interesting... according to the map, this is where the 'Eggman?' would be. But all there appears to be is a perfectly silent, dark room full of machines with blinking lights.

Nonna: "Did... it move?"

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Slightly compared to last time but not a huge amount..."

Valron: "How suspicious..." *Mutters to himself, flipping through the various available forms of vision his visor has, checking to see if the 'Eggman?' may be phased out or something odd like that.*

Metal Man (GM): You can continue further down the hallway, towards the noise, but...
Valron would see what looks like Eggman, just sitting there off to the left, in an Egg-o-matic. It's perfectly silent and un-moving, like a dummy.

King Demon: *Would look at the machinery in the room, attempting to find anything that looks out of place.*

Metal Man (GM): The glowing eyes of the "Eggman" dummy would also be visible to Demon.
The eyes dimly light up the face, somewhat.

Xavier Ridgecrest: "Hmmm..."

Nonna: "A trap?"

Valron: "...Well. At least we know where that is. Doesn't make it any less suspicious..."

Metal Man (GM): It continues sitting there, unmoving. It also continues to be on the map. It's possible to just walk past it.

Xavier Ridgecrest: "It continues to register as Eggman, but for some reason, no magic appears to exist near it."

Kumiko: "What the..."

Valron: "As in any magical energy near it just ceases to exist, or...?"

Louisoix: "Might be a decoy, or to be used later."

Xavier Ridgecrest: "It blocks all magical energy, seemingly. No one can really detect it other than this marker that says 'Eggman'."

Metal Man (GM): The Egg-o-matic starts up of its own accord. Then it casually moves 3 feet to the left. Then it turns off.

Nonna: "It could be a red herring... guarding the true problem we're looking for. Check and see if it's carrying anything."

King Demon checks his Dex to see if there's any energy coming FROM the eggman-dummy.

Smash Dex: "Eggman Skele--TEMPORAL ERROR. Updated entry: Eggman skeleton found years later, pre-skeletonization. Last observed when the Alsan Questers visited the base, finding many corpses and a mysterious skeleton Jack thought was Eggman's, because it had his clothes.
This is seemingly its pre-skeletonized form..."

Louisoix: "Strange."

Metal Man (GM): No one's checked if it's holding anything, yet. The Egg-o-matic randomly moves the skeleton another 4 feet to the right.

Louisoix: "Its also moving like its trying to keep something up-to-date, like a screensaver."

Metal Man (GM): The noises continue, down the hallway.
The Eggman Dummy continues every so often moving ever so slightly.
The sound of Jacob's ladders electrifying something can be heard down the hallway.

Louisoix: "Well, I'll go check. I'm a robot, so it seems fitting." *He'd move in closer to take a look at the dummy.*

King Demon: "Uh... right..." *He moves to check down the hallway.*

Metal Man (GM): The dummy is holding a radio. It's got its finger depressed on the 'talk' button.
In the other hand is some sort of dead man's switch... it's also got its hand on that button.
The Egg-o-matic appears to be in 'idle' mode, which, as a counter on its screen indicates, is causing it to move around a bit each time.

Louisoix: *Leaves it and returns* "...well, he's holding a radio and he's pressed some switch that looks like some way to wipe... something or other, some dead man's switch. The radio's talk button is being held. Might be dangerous to talk too much."

Nonna: *Writes on a notepad* "Okay."
*Any traces of that event around it, or around here at all??*

Xavier Ridgecrest: *Takes out his Smash dex and sends it in text mode* *'As far as I can tell, there doesn't appear to be any energy residue on the dummy or in this room. But in the next room it seems to be off the charts, that is, that weird teal energy.'*

Metal Man (GM): Demon would see in the hallway a large, open room.
To the right is several statues with a bright teal energy force in the center of them.

King Demon approaches the room cautiously.

Metal Man (GM): To the left is Eggman, with his jacob's ladders, powering up something.

Nonna: *T* 'I wonder if I could just freeze the dummy so it can't do anything.'

Metal Man (GM): There are a bunch of Eggrobos in the room, making sure nobody disturbs Eggman or the statues.

King Demon does his best to stay out of sight as he watches.

Metal Man (GM): Eggman can be seen, in the distance... with the chaos emeralds.

King Demon: *Would also try to record the scene with his Dex, sending it back to both the others in the cave AND to those on the Wing Fortress.*

Xavier Ridgecrest: *T* 'I'm not 100% certain. It has an anti-magic field of sorts, so we'd have to use technology...'

Metal Man (GM): On the video Demon is taking, Eggman can be seen with the emeralds, laughing as energy builds up.

King Demon: *T* 'This is not good...'

Nonna: *T* "What the hell...? Eggman's supposed to be somewhere else!"

Dr. Robotnik: "Oh those fools... they think they have me surrounded... they have no clue what's been sealed inside this planet... or what's out there in outer space... I will make them rue the day they confronted me. Chaos Emeralds! The servers are the seven Chaos. Chaos is power, power is enriched by the evil in the heart. The controller is the one that unites the Chaos!"

Metal Man (GM): The same sort of dark energy that empowered Psycho Illian hits Robotnik, coating him in dark energy and briefly causing all the lights to flicker.

Dr. Robotnik: "Now... to prevent the emeralds from controlling me..."

Metal Man (GM): He takes out a radio.

Nonna looks at the dummy.

Dr. Robotnik: "I am the only one who controls you, emeralds! Your energy shall control me... except it will not! No one shall know where I truly am!"

Metal Man (GM): The dark, mind controlling part of the energy goes into Eggman's radio, and then appears on the dummy.
The dummy is cursed with all of the mind destroying properties of the emeralds--but, since it is a dummy, it just glows weirdly.
It doesn't do anything unusual.
Meanwhile, Eggman, freed of the purple-looking energy, now has merely just the Chaos Emeralds' energy--pure, and untainted.

Nonna: *T* "'Anyone have a Chaos Siphon?'

Dr. Robotnik: "Yes... I assume this is something that foolish Dyne never expected! His energy... could not be contained or controlled, but it could be transferred. And as such, he will NOT have control over me. Mwahahahahaha!"

Metal Man (GM): Robotnik then walks over to the statues with the energy, as the Eggrobos salute him.

Xavier Ridgecrest: *T* 'Uh... I don't think I do, unfortunately.'

Louisoix: *T* 'Is that smart? This is the past, after all.'

Dr. Robotnik: "Now... I cannot do anything to stop anyone if I do not know what is going on. All of these strange things... you, oh oracle statues! You promised me glory and power if I could free the emeralds of their curse!"

Metal Man (GM): One of the Oracle statues actually... comes to life, the angelic statue glancing to Robotnik.

Oracle Statue: "You seek to wield the power of the ancients despite not being a mage? You are not worthy."

Valron: *T* 'Nnnot me, no. I'd think of doing Disruption on the dummy, but given its' general antimagic nature... that's not looking feasible.'

Dr. Robotnik: "Silence, foolish statue! I have the power, and I COMMAND you!"

Oracle Statue: "You do not have the ability to interpret what you will learn. It will lead to your downfall."

Dr. Robotnik: "You cannot defy me. The ancient tablets I stole are absolute on this!"

Oracle Statue: "This is merely your own protection. The knowledge is not meant for mortals."

King Demon presumably, he's still transmitting all of this to the rest of the crew.

Metal Man (GM): Yes, Demon still is transmitting. As a part of Eggman holding the radio, you can also hear echoes of what he's saying from the radio on the robot.

Dr. Robotnik: "I will not be foiled by 'protective measures'! Chaos Emeralds, FORCE the statues to do as I wish!"

Metal Man (GM): Eggman holds out his hands and the Chaos Emeralds strike the teal-glowing statues several times with beams of energy until finally they all turn to face Eggman, now with glowing green eyes.

Dr. Robotnik: "That's right. You cannot disobey your true master! Dyne is dead, long dead! His oracles need a new ruler. And who should it be but ME?"

Oracle Statues: "Holder of the Chaos, history is yours to shape. Let the knowledge of the ages shape your mind."

Metal Man (GM): A really bright green flash occurs, and then... the statues go back to normal, and Eggman looks normal again, but is also silent for a moment.

Valron: *While this is all going down, he decides to analyze the dummy while this all goes down, seeing if he can glean something more as to what's up with it, aside from its intended purpose.* (Attempting to use Mad Man Powers to see if I can't figure out how its antimagic thing is even working, amongst other things. Mainly what the dead man's switch is for)

Metal Man (GM): The dead man's switch appears to be wired up to explosives somewhere. The dummy appears to be meant to defeat magical curses as well as confuse sensors as to where Eggman is.
Also interestingly enough, this Eggman's own powers are Mad Man class. Clearly, this wasn't just some random Eggman from the cartoons--he had more powers than he rightfully should have.
Somehow the robot dummy thing is completely disjunctioned from any magic whatsoever.
It'd be possible to literally hold it up and block magic blasts.
Though right now it's radioactive with all the evil curses that were protecting the emeralds from being used.
Eggman holds his head, still recovering from what happened. He casually places the emeralds, which dropped on the ground, in a carrying case, after doing a jolly juggling of them for his own amusement.

Valron: *T* "Somehow, the dummy is just... completely disjunctioned from any sort of magic whatsoever. You could just literally use it as an antimagic shield if you felt like it. ...And, well. Felt like dealing with it being radioactive from all the evil on it."

Dr. Robotnik: "Yes, that's it. I can see it now. There's mysterious beings in outer space. They're inside the planet too. GUN thinks they can negotiate peace terms with me? Hahahaha... hahahahahahahahahahaha! The only beings worthy of working with me are the strange beings in outer space and in the planet! They are the only ones who are peers to my technology... not these FOOLS playing with circuit boards and guns...
...Hmmm... and there lurk even more beings outside... clearly... if I can kill them... then I can rule all of Time... I knew SOMEONE had to be behind the destruction of the Time Stones..."

Metal Man (GM): Robotnik casually records this into a tape deck for later perusal.

Dr. Robotnik: "Now... what do I do... their ships are out there... all this power hasn't... ...that's right. The evil curses."

Valron: *T* 'And while this may be obvious, he's vastly more powerful than he has any right to. Like, they're on par with Mad Men, even. As for the dead man's switch... That's rigged to explosives somewhere around here. Not entirely sure where, though.'

Dr. Robotnik: "I'll just let them kill me. Yes... kill... me... 'me'... ha ha ha ha. ... ...I'm hungry now. Time for a sandwich."

Metal Man (GM): He walks out of the room into another living space area, turning the lights out on the way out.
It's now all rather quiet and spooky, especially with the robot glowing purple, but Eggman has left for whatever living quarters are further inside.

Nonna: *T* 'Explosives... like the ones we saw outside?'

Metal Man (GM): The big room with the statues is empty, with the altar where he did the stuff now missing the emeralds, since he casually took them and walked out.
The Eggrobos appear to have followed him, yes.

King Demon looks around the room to make certain the coast is clear; specifically that there's no security systems.

Valron: *T* 'Perhaps. Wouldn't rule it out, in any case.'

Nonna: *T* 'So, he's likely responsible for the death of Jack.'

Metal Man (GM): No security system that you could tell, except an interesting one in which there's a door to the 'outside'--that is highly secured.
Of course you're inside so you're unlikely to trigger anything to do with that.

Valron: *T* 'In any case... Where should we go from here? What's our next move, exactly?'

Louisoix: *T* 'And, considering Eggman now has that much power and knows so much, Molly went mad in an attempt to match him.'

Nonna: *T* 'If it were so easy to stop, Molly would have succeeded already.'

Louisoix: *T* 'Though to be fair, we don't have full evidence that said theory is correct. But checking would be... difficult.'

Xavier Ridgecrest: *T* 'We never truly stopped Nintendus Eggman. The Eggman from here was even more absurd. The logs indicate he discovered how to create Smash Energy out of sunlight. It was so powerful it killed him and exploded his spaceship because the reaction went out of control.'

Nonna: *T* 'Not before ruining Molly's life, however.'

Xavier Ridgecrest: *T* 'Yes. The incident with the Smash Energy was... late in the time of the Alsan Questers.'
*T* 'He'd figured out how to finally kill them. By basically becoming like Psycho Illian. But unlike Illian, he wasn't a Solarian. He wasn't a Quester either. So it just exploded him like... ...like those guys, the Sloansters.'
*T* '...Anything else we want to find here?'

Metal Man (GM): Demon would be able to roam the open room, if he wished.

Nonna: *T* 'The question now is whether or not we want to interfere.'

Metal Man (GM): Everything seems rather quiet. Like the energy was literally sucked out of the air.

Xavier Ridgecrest: *T* 'Well... would it really benefit us to do so?'

Louisoix: *T* 'I don't think so. Maybe we stop Molly from going mad. That changes... a lot of things, really. Do we even know what would change?'

Valron: *T* 'Add to it, presumably, the dummy is supposed to explode in a massive storm of cursed energy, but... Hrm.'

Nonna: *T* 'We've learned the probable cause of Molly's suffering.'

Louisoix: *T* 'Indeed.'

Xavier Ridgecrest: *T* 'It would presumably prevent large elements of the past and that would change everything, presumably... so I can't really guess what all the effects would be.'

King Demon does inspect the room now that Eggman is gone.

Nonna: *T* 'And yet... no actual closure.'

Louisoix: *T* 'Also true, but we shouldn't really expect a solution to come here, from us.'

Metal Man (GM): The room has in it not a lot, except a piece of paper that is an official memorandum-- 'ANTHON TARK DEMANDS YOU SURRENDER IMMEDIATELY' is on it.

Nonna: *T* 'I say we should get into contact with Jack Kingsley. Maybe something he can say or otherwise provide some solace to Molly in our present.'

Metal Man (GM): The other things in the room include those gems Keikyoku and Flaeyn summoned the zombies with.

Louisoix: *T* '...hmmm... well, perhaps in some way we could, if time alteration was minimal. He's to die here, so if there's no trace then it might work.'

Metal Man (GM): But unless Demon has decided he must re-enact SSQ circa 2008 it's unlikely he'd touch those.
Certainly able to look at and take notes of them though.

King Demon: *Yeah, if he DID take them, it'd be likely to PREVENT the events of 2008, so he's just noting them and anything else useful in the room.*

Metal Man (GM): The other bits are some plans on the wall.
'Metal Sonic MX.'
However it's full of rather angry looking cross-through marks with comments like 'NO NO NO I CAN'T GET THE POWER SOURCE WORKING'

King Demon: *He'd DEFINITELY look at them* "..." *Yep, DEFINITELY going through those.*

Metal Man (GM): It appears at this point, he couldn't figure out how to make Metal Sonic... the plans look like the very one you toasted later on, Demon, but, missing some pieces.
And also having huge shoulder pads that the final version never had.
And a jetpack instead of a jet engine? Geez.
So prototypical and horky.
There's even an image of a rejected design with a helicopter.
So then, outside of that... there isn't too much in here. It's a pretty bare bones cave.
In the distance, you hear Eggman loudly chewing on a sandwich.
He can be heard complaining about running out of mustard.
And how hard it is to get mustard when you live in a secret island fortress.

Nonna: *T* 'In any case... this turned out to not be much, after all.'

Xavier Ridgecrest: *T* 'Sometimes the answer is pretty simple. ...We can observe the fight or go try to interact with Jack Kingsley, I guess.'

Valron: *T* 'At least we have a better idea on what the hell happened with Eggman, at least...'

King Demon inspects the statues, wondering if they're active still.

Metal Man (GM): One of the statues idly smiles at Demon like the Mona Lisa.
They don't say anything though.
Or do anything else.

Louisoix: *T* 'I'd be curious about what is here in the present.'

Nonna: *T* 'Let's go with Jack. Unless anyone else has any other ideas.'

Xavier Ridgecrest: *T* 'Last we checked, it's mostly a ruin. The corpses are buried and... I guess there is some degree of remnants of what happened here.'

King Demon: "Uh... huh... Right then." *He'd turn and head back to the others.*

Metal Man (GM): Only other thing that can be seen on the way out, Demon: Apparently he's... 'selling' the statues, and has a list of potential people to sell it to.

King Demon: *And THAT definitely catches his attention, he makes sure to look at the list, recording it as well.*

Metal Man (GM): The list has the following people on it: Jacob of GUN, Echidna Cultists' King, and Rouge the Bat.

Xavier Ridgecrest: *T* 'The warp is open to where Jack is now, according to Nova it's rather deserted around him right now.'

Metal Man (GM): The warp opens up and Xavier steps inside.

Nonna: *Follows.*

King Demon: "..." *Resists the urge to edit that list and follows the rest to wherever they're going.*

Valron: *And into the warp he goes.*

Louisoix follows in.

Kumiko: *Follows.*

Metal Man (GM): The next location is on the back of a battleship of sorts. Jack Kingsley is around the corner, gathering equipment for the mission ahead. He seems about as normal as they come.

King Demon takes a moment to enjoy the peaceful ocean air... well, as peaceful as it can be on a frickin battleship.

Metal Man (GM): Jack Kingsley seems to just be casually assembling a series of detonators and explosives, and placing them in a landing vehicle.
He rubs his head, having been sweating from all the work.

Nonna: *T* 'Here's our chance. Who uh... wants to initiate contact?'

Metal Man (GM): He picks up his radio, where it can be heard loudly, 'ALL SOLDIERS TO REPORT IN 0300 HOURS FOR LANDING IF PEACE NEGOTIATIONS FAIL', he nods and puts the radio down.

King Demon checks the Dex to see what time it currently is.

Metal Man (GM): Current era, current time: 2:00 AM. Nearing the time of the incident.

Xavier Ridgecrest: *T* *'I'm probably a bit odd of a choice so maybe someone more normal could do it.'*

Louisoix: *T* 'Uh, yes, someone normal... unfortunately I don't think I'd work out...'

King Demon: *T* 'You're probably the most normal here, Nonna, go ahead. Just remember, we have less than an hour left, unless we want to be a PART of the history that's about to unfold.'

Louisoix: *T* 'Demon, why don't you do it?'

Kumiko: *T* '...yeah I'm not the best choice.'

Nonna: *T* 'Very well.'
*She coughs and walks around the corner casually toward Jack.*

Jack Kingsley: "Uh. Hello."
*He continues working, in no rush to say much.*

Nonna: *She sighs and looks down* "I'm about to lose hope about all of this... What keeps you going when things get tough?"

Jack Kingsley: "Well... these inane operations they keep putting us on do get on my nerves too." *He coughs, casually threading a fuse.* "But when I think about it, I just think about all the people back home. We're doing this for them. Those mobians ignored us and let our family and friends be taken by crazed madmen, but not anymore. We'll make a difference by stopping the wars before anyone else can be hurt. Ultimately, I think of my family. This is all for them."

Nonna: "Family and friends, huh... I guess everyone has at least someone like that."

Jack Kingsley: "It can all seem like it's for nothing. But we all have somebody we care for, hopefully."

Nonna: "Who do you care about? I mean... I have folks back home, but there's also people around here I want to protect. It's hard, you know?"

Jack Kingsley: "Well, my mother, and my wife... bit personal of you to ask, huh." *He puts a hand to his chin.* "You feelin' lonely out here? Wish we were back in my hometown... there's plenty of great places to go there, although I hate what the mines have done to the place. Ryndell didn't deserve what happened to it. Yeah... I try not to get to know anyone around here too well. Too many good people vanish in these battles. Although if what I'm hearing is correct, this battle may be over before it's started. Diplomacy, supposedly."

Nonna: "Oh, you're married? Haha. I suppose it must feel strange to hear a kid like me talk about that stuff when you have a lot more to worry about."

Jack Kingsley: "Yeah... I don't want to leave my wife a widow. These explosives can be awful dangerous, in the heat of battle. But, it's what I do best, so."

Nonna: "What's her name, if you don't mind my asking? I might know her."

Jack Kingsley: "Oh, it's Leya. An unusual name, sure, but her family is one of the older Ryndell families."

Nonna: "Hmm. Leya... she was in that... oh, what was it again?"

Jack Kingsley: "Not certain what you mean, heh. The old Ryndell families were, well, the first families to colonize the region, long ago."

Nonna: "Maybe I'm thinking of the wrong Leya. Could have sworn I heard the name somewhere before while on the job... does your Leya just handle properties and politics?"

Jack Kingsley: "Well, this certainly is very specific..." *He chuckles idly.* "If it'll satisfy your twenty questions and help you be less uncertain, she runs a school back home. You could say it was political, but I don't know how many high schoolers you'd be having run countries."

Nonna: "Well, at least you can take solace in the fact that your closest ones aren't here with you in this warzone."

Jack Kingsley: "Indeed... sad pity as it is to be alone out here, I prefer not to know others here too much. Had friends before. Most of 'em died during the last major Eggman battle... oh the politicians told us back then how Sonic had it under control, but then Station Square was destroyed by a giant water monster and barely anybody survived."

Metal Man (GM): Pause