This was probably the last thing Mami wanted to be doing right now.

Things had been... okay, for a while. Her breakdown had been a surprisingly effective way of removing the almost crushing weight on her shoulders, and ever since then, she spend less and less time cooped up away from the rest of the ship.

Some of that weight had returned, though, when she realized that she and the other puella magi were still the only ones who knew the horrible truth. Mami was so caught up in her own grief and despair that she never told anyone else on the ship the truth - and as much as she hated to spread such information around, someone deserved to be informed. She's still not sure what happened when she herself had nearly turned, but she couldn't assume it might happen again. She wouldn't blame anyone if they decided to monitor her and her friends.

After sending out a simple "meet me here, I have something I need to discuss" message to Nanoha - the one she had originally talked to when that first witch showed up - she made her way over to one of the empty sensoriums immediately. She changed it to something simple, similar to her old apartment's living room, sat down, poured herself a cup of tea, and waited.

After Lirath, Miku had tried her best to keep from being too far underfoot. So, she'd retreated to the Meiji Shrine. Sitting on the steps, and turning her hairpin in her hands, an abandoned broom at her side, Miku tried to think of ways to be more useful. She even had prayed a bit, but it seemed as if the Emperor and Empress were concerned with more pressing things than how to make a single, pious young woman more worthy to return the help she was given.

She wasn't much of a fighter - as her poor attempts at practicing had quickly shown. She had always been someone's support. But even Steve was more helpful than she was, and he only spent time in Engineering when he wanted. Which is where Miku was fairly sure he was at now, though she hadn't actually bothered to check.

Miku sighed and flipped her long, dark hair from her shoulders with a hand. It was already getting too long and heavy for her tastes, and Stacy was warm and humid. Miku stood with a sigh and picked up her abandoned broom, tucking her hairpin away in her skirt pocket.

There was plenty to clean at the Shrine, after all.


((As a special note, if you get Miku, you will likely also get a Steve! That's two, two, two CRs for the price of one! (Shipping and Handling not included)))

The City didn't have weather as most people knew it, but it was nonetheless a beautiful day - warm weather with a nice breeze, Stacy's sun-equivalent shining in the sky... almost as if it was reflecting the emotions of at least one of the ship's crew. In the middle of the Park, someone had set up a little white lattice archway amongst the hedgerows, decorated with ivy and roses and lilies that looked remarkably real (if they were, in fact, synthetic). In front of the arch were several rows of white chairs, more than enough for anyone who cared to show up.

It was a beautiful day for a wedding.

And frankly, Nanoha needed it. After the chaos and confusion; the rage and terror on Galilee... she didn't think she could ever forget that horrible sense of loss and emptiness when she'd thought that Fate was gone, if only for a day or so. But this would go a long way toward exorcising those demons - a day that she'd dreamed of for years.

Of course, she couldn't go greet anyone yet. She was in her wedding dress, after all! These things needed to be proper.

(ooc: Tag the respective subthreads, please! Mingling is highly encouraged.)

At some time during the night, while some were still sleeping, and some were awake and wandering around the hotel common rooms--a massive explosion rocked the hotel the group was staying in.

Simultaneously, perhaps by lucky chance, or perhaps on purpose, a number of the group was mysteriously teleported away. Specifically, the ones missing were: Fate, Jr., Kang, Superboy, Zouichi, Howard, The Doctor, Lash, Nightwing, Zetta, Dr. Henderson, Rory, Ruffnut, and Sakura.

The problem was that the group likely wouldn't be able to tell from the vaporized common rooms and bedrooms that those particular individuals hadn't been in them when the explosion hit.

[ooc: All subthreads are open.]

A large group of crew members was gathered. In fact, given the mission briefing provided, it was curious that there'd be such a large number for a diplomatic mission.

Planet Designation: Galilee
Status: Terrestrial, H-class.
Non-sentient life: Extensive flora and fauna.
Semi-Sentient Life: Yes.
Sentient Life: Homo Sapiens. [Various translations of "human" appear here so everyone understands it]
Water: 69.5% of the planet's surface.
Climate: Earth-like [Click here for cultural equivalents for non-Earth cultures.]
Landscape: Varied.
Air: Normoxic concentration. Slightly elevated levels of carbon dioxide.
Air Pressure: 101.3 kPa (kilopascals) = 14.7 psi (pounds per square inch)
Sky: Blue. Often overcast.
Sun: A class G2V, yellow star.
Warnings: Wildlife and plant-life can be hazardous. Humans can be hazardous. A human cultural and legal database is available. [click here]
Mission: Successfully negotiate with the Galileeans in exchange for their advanced medical technology.

It was very little to work with, so the crew gathered there possibly had a lot of questions.

A good number of those affected by the clock had reached childhood, and required supervision. Several of the adults had offered to help, and no one was quite sure anymore who had first suggested it, but it was decided that one night, there should be a sleepover, something fun for the children. The idea had grown; Eva had offered Cassie's house, after getting permission from the other non-deaged resident, Aximili.

In the end, it turned out to be a packed house. There were about twenty children running around, and thankfully, there were five adults and two teenagers supervising. Luckily for Eva, she had made sure to childproof the house the best she could beforehand.

It was going to be needed.

[Planning post is here. HAVE AT. A description of Cassie's house is here, and if you have any questions about it, you can ask Lisa (Eva), Blue (Marco), Cait (Rachel) and Kaylin (Ax). Start up subthreads for stuff, and try not to wreck the place. :D; ]

She'd heard it from Einhart, and she'd heard it from Kang - and that Signum was going around the ship and attacking those with magic left no doubt in Nanoha's mind. She, like Reinforce - like Fate - had reverted to an earlier point in time. Signum was reliving the Book of Darkness incident all over again, and stealing peoples' Linker Cores... but without Hayate to tell her no, how could she be convinced otherwise?

No, the only thing to do was to stop her herself. And that was Nanoha's job - she and Fate had fought the Wolkenritter before, and she would fight the General of the Raging Fire again.

The only problem was that she had no idea how to find her.

Nanoha kept her power ratcheted down as she flew through Stacy's endless hallways, trying to sense a spark of magic that she recognized. She had no doubt that Signum had been trying to avoid her intentionally - if she'd been collecting the energy from Linker Cores, why wouldn't she have been one of the first targets? No, the knight was too smart for that; she'd likely been trying to avert a showdown of the sort that Nanoha was now trying to force.

Signum might be trying to avoid her magical signature... but it'd be significantly more difficult to avoid something barely more than a blip on the radar.

"Wide Area Search, Engage."

Six tiny orbs of pink light burst from the head of Nanoha's Device, each zooming down Stacy's corridors in a different direction, instructed to lock on to the nearest powerful magical sign. And Nanoha herself still flew, waiting for a result.

(ooc: Locked to Nanoha and Signum. If you want to get in / be an onlooker, just hit us up on AIM first.)

The hallway just outside the med-bay was a pretty convenient place to be dropped. Doc would have wanted to go there anyway given the state he was in when GLaDOS finally spit him out, still smoking, in an unceremonious heap on the floor. He sat up slowly, looking himself over, patting a few places to be sure they were out before finally slumping against the wall opposite the one he'd fallen through, a slightly hysteric grin on his face beneath the mask. After a moment's stunned silence he began to laugh. "Hah...haha.... ROBOTS CAN'T CATCH YOU IF YOU'RE ON FIRE EITHER!!!" he finally shouted, throwing his arms up over his head in victory and then promptly flipping the bird at the wall. "SUCK ON THAT ANGRY TESTING LADY!"

Ildraniath might be arrogant, but she wasn't vain. She didn't enjoy showing off merely for the sake of showing off. A display to intimidate or awe an opponent, yes, but simply for the sake of satisfying her own vanity? Never. Still, she looked forward to being able to flex her muscles, as it were. She needed to use her skills from time-to-time, after all. Especially because her attempts at discerning anything outside of a few minutes in the future were ending in failure.

Now that was disconcerting.

She hadn't summoned up anything just yet - no battlefields or target ranges here. Not yet. For now it was just the blank, emptiness of an unused sensorium. Ildraniath stood near the doorway, one armored finger slowly brushing over the helmet she had tucked under one arm. This ought to be interesting. One way or another.

_{[[Semi-open! Mostly for Nanoha, but feel free to drop by and bug Ildy.]]}

Nanoha loved sleeping next to Fate. She loved the way she could snuggle up against the taller girl with her fiancee's arms around her and feel warm and comfortable and like she belonged there. Cuddling with the blonde Enforcer was one of her favorite pastimes, and it was something they did every night.

Which is why Nanoha stirred uncomfortably, noticing in her sleep that the figure in her arms was most definitely not her Fate. And one dark eye cracked open...

...and Nanoha sat upright in her bed with a loud yelp. This couldn't be happening.

(ooc: Beginning of Fate's time-rewind. Feel free to tag either Nanoha or Fate after they split. Castmates can just come in at any time, otherwise ping us on AIM).

Deep in the ship, a winged shape moved. 'Reinforce' she was called by the rest of the ship, but she no longer knew that name as anything but an anomalous detail of her incomplete recollections of her time on the ship, too inconsequential - or too confusing - to dwell on. She was of the time, not very long ago at all, before she had been given that name. By design she was the administrative layer and user interface of the Tome of the Night Sky, but she was more than that: she was its will, its identity, so its name was hers as well.

And if she was its will, it was her body, no less than her human form. She had been content to leave it dormant in the ship's care until now, in the hopes that it might delay this day a little longer - or at least, this was the mold she now made the fragmentary memories fit - but now that the end was upon her there was no point in leaving it be. It was right that it be at her side... and she wanted the powers that lay with the tome proper, to grant Hayate's wish as best she could.

It did not take her long to find once she had set herself to it. Confusing as the ship was, the Tome was a part of her, and when she drew near it stirred, shrugged off its bindings, and flitted through the fabric of space to her side. And then she was back in transfer, heading back towards the City. To the traitor...

There was a flash of dissonance at that: she knew where to look for Nanoha because she had lived alongside her, hadn't she? She had betrayed Hayate, Hayate had wished...

It should have been a simple thought, 'the wish came first', before this chaos of other memories, but she could not form it. The wish was all she had, all she could do for Hayate before the end. It couldn't be dismissed so easily.

She shook her head as though to clear it, and there was a soft pulse of violet light that stole the color from the world as she neatly peeled a thin layer of reality away for her own. She had to work quickly, while she still had her mind...

[[So Rein's putting up a barrier space per her usual MO so she can have Nanoha (mostly) to herself. This takes place just after her ranting on the comms and is open to the Nanoha cast. Since the barrier is pretty big it'll just hit people wherever they are; she'll go find Nanoha and other people can look for them, if that sounds good to everyone.]]

Their room here - an apartment they'd taken in the City - wasn't much. It certainly wasn't the home they'd made together on Mid-Childa, with its big luxurious bed and wide-open view of the skyline. But it was theirs, and theirs together, and that was enough for Nanoha. Their bed was small, but it was big enough for two people, and the sheets were warm, and there was plenty of room to hastily discard clothing when they were in the mood for that sort of thing, and sometimes Nanoha just liked to lie awake at night on her back, listening to Fate breathe next to her, and think.

And ever since they'd returned to the ship from their last mission to that planet... well, something had been lurking in the back of the mage's mind. This was the life she shared with Fate, and it seemed so natural to be like this with her, even on a giant living ship that traveled between realities. The more she thought about it, the more it only made sense...

"Mm, Fate-chan?" She said softly. "Are you asleep?"

After the crew finished up with the Rituals of Judgement and Joining, they were permitted to enter the city proper.

Orongo was even more impressive than it appeared from outside the wall. Despite the primitive seeming architecture, the city was alive with lights and sounds and colors. The numerous stone buildings were covered in bright paints in beautiful swirling designs, each one a unique piece of art. People milled about the city in droves, many of them various examples of random alien species, though there were quite a few Moai and knee-high Rapa Nui moving about.

The priests that directed them into the city indicated to them to the Consummation Huts, where they would be spending the night, regardless of whether they chose to use them to their...eh hem...full potential, or not.

As they entered the city, each of them got the same message from Stacy.

||You will be spending the night in the city as per the Moai's instructions. Arrangements have been made to meet with the Moai Elders in the morning. For now, you are given leave to explore the city as you wish. I have transferred each of you an allowance of credits to purchase supplies or entertainment tonight.||

||Do try to have fun.||

[ooc: And they're off! Feel free to have them explore. You can also start doing open posts on-planet now, if you want. Have fun!]

It was inevitable for all of them. Something would push them, there would be cracks, and then the truth would find its way in.

How it changed for each of them would be different, but the end result would be the same.

The world would change.

Because they would change.

[ooc: I figured out a really good way to organize this with help from chat rather than a big messy communal post or spamming the comm with individual posts. Post each character with a blank tag with just the character's name in the subject. Underneath it, run as many subthreads for events as you need to set up for your specific character's change back. Hiccup's will be up as an example.]

Ah, the Fairplay Christmas Pageant. It took place in the Fairplay VFW Hall every year, which, due to the regular needs of the town had received enough money to expand the hall to use it for most community events. People filtered in and out all night so that most families in the town made an appearance at some point. There was punch, egg nog, Christmas snacks, a guy who dressed up as Santa, little kids doing the Nativity play, the mayor's speech, Christmas raffles...

Everyone was expected to attend. Everyone. Parents dragged their kids and teenagers sulked in the corners, presents were exchanged among members of the town, people who did business together used it as a time to talk shop and be a little social, and parents talked about how great their kid's grades were or how little Johnny was doing on the football field.

What a wonderful celebration of townish togetherness, right? People talking about gifts they'd gotten their family members as the status symbols they were, people trying to compete with others in a competition of "Who has the most impressive child?," people sniping each other because of what happened at the last PTA meeting or because they were jealous of another person's success with their business. Funtimes, funtimes.

And as sad before, everyone was expected to attend. Everyone.

[ooc: Follow the rules for each subthread that are in the ooc notes.]

It had been the usual mission briefing, not that any of them remembered it. The crew knew they were gone and had no idea when they'd be back, and likely wouldn't attempt rescue for quite some time, especially with Stacy considering the mission "ongoing."

They had no idea when they'd be back, either, namely because they never remembered being on the ship in the first place.

It was home. It had always been home.

Welcome to Fairplay, Iowa, folks, happiest little town in the Midwest.

[ooc: Read this before tagging.]

aaaaaaaaaAAARGH!

The noise seemed to come from out of nowhere, a wail of frustration raising in pitch until a part of the wall in a less-than-crowded section opened, spitting out a peeved-looking girl in red.

And was she peeved.

"Damn you, you stupid cowardous computer! We're not done yet!" She yelled at the wall which, for all intents and purposes, was as good as new. "Get out here, Glados!"

With a frustrated expression, she pointed her hammer (which was pretty large, come to think of it, larger than usual) at the wall. "Don't make me SMASH my way in!"


[OOC: Yeah. I fail. Anyway, Vita evidently got swallowed by Glados and was busy testing stuff. She's back and angry.]

The few times that Kang had gone to the Sensoriums and imagined up bits of home, he'd been careful to limit the appearances of anyone he was particularly close to. So far, only Granak and Riel had shown up; the only people he'd expressly banned were his mate and hatchlings. He'd felt that it would be too uncomfortable, too... depressing, seeing them. Nothing could compare to the real thing, after all.

( He was in a strange mood that day, though, feeling more homesick than usual. )

Welcome meatship crewmembers to the instrument of pure silly.

It had been a long period of waiting, but a prank was about to be issued after these dire dark times. As such, tables were set up around the WITCH Bus and other locations, unmanned stands where Lemonade and Brownies were available with the compliments of your friendly companions.

Do you dare risk chocolately goodness or sour-sweetness to discover it's dark delicious secrets?

(ooc: tag around, bug others and feel free to continue to madness. IC duration is about a day. Unless you deliberately take more with you. As a reminder, Lemonade brings you up ages to a good looking adultish level. Brownies turn you into kids. GO NUTS. Refer to the ooc post for details and ask questions there.)

Truth be told, Nanoha hadn't expected to wake up. She'd still been in the beast's clutches as the lights had gone out around her, and that she hadn't been crushed or devoured in her unconsciousness was practically a miracle.

But, as her eyes slid open after several days of unconsciousness, and she recognized the medical bay around her... Nanoha realized that, despite all odds, she was alive.

She was in quite a bit of pain, she was bruised all over, and one of her arms was wrapped tightly in a cast, but she was alive.

(ooc: Open to anyone who wants to visit a battered magical girl.)