Odds and Ends before Answers....

Rei

"Let’s get back to the part where your sister Yukido and my son John accidently ‘becoming one’ , or Soulbonded as you called it. Starting from there and…," Sarah Conner begins with a small smile on her lips that completely and utterly fails to reach her eyes.

"It’s permanent," I sigh, deciding to be blunt about it. While I probably would have tried a more delicate approach in other situations right now (and BOY do I wish to God that Aslan had the floor right now instead of ME for this mess), something tells me Sarah wants answers and wants them NOW and prompt!! "But your son’s present rather . . . inebriated behavior, like my sister’s behavior, will wear off soon enough here. . . "

"And you know this how?" Sarah asked, all but getting ready to get into a fistfight with me if I answer wrongly. "You know that Yukido-Yukiko . . .whatever the f…blazes your sister’s name and John will snap out of it for sure?"

Being WELL aware of being a guest (albeit somewhat unwittingly) in a place which would probably not appreciate casual swearing (nor would it be . . .politic to do it casually in the hearing of the Great Lion . . .something just didn’t seem too wise to do that casually), Sarah had been trying to monitor her language.

Still, Sarah was rather . . .annoyed here right now.

Understandable if a bit more than a touch annoying really, this IS her son we are talking about here. That and her son being the KEY to the survival of the human race so of COURSE wants her son to be "fit for duty" when his destiny roles around and such with the War against the Terminators and such rolls along.

That and Sarah had been a bit high strung—really on the edge truth be told!-- in the movie even before breaking out of the insane asylum….

Still, if the Master did his job right that shouldn’t be an issue any longer (nor the Singularity issue over in Russia) from what little Aslan said on the matter, but the Great Lion HAD mentioned that it had been a somewhat MESSY solution that he’d personally stepped into at least fix. I wonder…

"All this is fine and well but I do believe that the questions we at UNIT have are a bit more important right now and . . .," one of the more junior officers from the Brigadier’s group pips in, getting impatient himself, only to get slapped down by none other than the man himself for it.

That side of the room had been rather quiet up until now, I now must say.

"Conner’s question IS part of our lot of questions so be so kind as not interrupt her," Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart snaps, gesturing none too gently for the man in this brigade to stand down and shut up. Then, with a much more polite (albeit a bit forced) smile and wave, gestures for me to continue; and that leaves me with some hope of mending fences here, but still it is going to be a bit difficult (but worth the effort).

Yep, can see it in his eyes he’s still not quiet forgiven me and my group for having roughed UNIT up while protecting the Master earlier there. Maybe after he hears just WHY we had to be so violent he’ll be less hostile. Still, I had HOPED that that "mental briefing" there I’d left him before leaving would have been enough.

Must have been too skimpy. That or I kind of botched some of the mental insertion. Too rushed. Much too rushed…

. . .

!

Or if I don’t miss my guess by the way the Brigadier and the others of Unit over there wince every once in a while when they move . . .our rather painful (for THEM) encounter we’d had earlier was only a short while ago for THEM, so of course emotions are still sore and raw!

Sigh, you would think that after going around and having an uncle who’s a Timelord I would have gotten the clue earlier

"Thanks Alistair," I nod sardonically towards the man before turning back to Ms. Conner. That (the use of his personal name) gets me a look from the man (he’s ever the proper soldier that one and we’d hardly parted ways in good standing), but that’s not really important right now.

Besides, we had all agreed to forgo "proper title" decorum for this meet and greet anyway, so despite not being "drinking buddies" or anything close to friends (though I’d rather we could have parted as friends last we’d met) he’d bloody well go with it, else we’re going to have to deal with a . . .perturbed Great Lion and I’d REALLY not like to deal with that right now, thank you! But still . . .there’s got to be some kind of words (or something) soon enough here between me and "Alistair", since he seems to still have hard feelings about being knocked about by a "vicious girl gang in short skirts" (a somewhat milder epitaph we’d been given and I had overhead some of his gang whispered to each other before we’d properly started).

If nothing else, I think it would . . .clear the air a bit between us over some "misunderstandings" the man still appears to be suffering under over me and my sisters and husband. Ill feelings can fester and make things a bit of an awkward, and even toxic, relationship if left too long.

I should know, I saw it too many times whilst working as an EVA Pilot back at NERV so I should say I rather loath it happening between the Brigadier and my group. Even an analog of the man I know and respect I don’t want that happening here! Even IF by the looks of things the man and UNIT itself will NOT have any bearing whatsoever for my current upcoming quest with my sisters and love here, I don’t want that!

But that said But to Sarah first! The woman. The situation she represents is something of a more immediate concern here. I do NOT want her going off like a bomb here in my face in hysteria and anger over her son, you know.

And given what I . . .at least think I know about the woman from the movie tells me that Sarah Conner isn’t the most "stable" person right now as it stands. She might not have been in that asylum for the right reasons, but it does not mean that the woman hasn’t developed "issues" due to the weight of what is supposed to befall mankind with "Judgement Day" and "The War with the Machine" business.

She’s showing signs of stress and even buckling (somewhat) under the pressure!

"And I know this because I happened to have gone through the same process myself with my husband Fred and let me assure you that I and he recovered soon enough," I smile serenely, not letting her rile me. It wouldn’t help matters. If would not help her. "But I DO want to know just how what amounted to what was a very chaste version of a kiss in the realm of psychics should NOT have cascaded into what happened there! It usually takes years of dating for the relationship those with . . . gifts like myself and my sisters and others for a bond like that to be possible!! I’m as surprised and gob smacked about it as you are Sarah."

"Oh . . .okay," Sarah Conner blinked around the cigarette she’d been smoking up until now, taken aback not only not only by the earnest (and shockingly crimson) eyes before her, but the rather strong grip this alabaster skinned . . .woman with angelic wings had upon her arms. A grip, coupled with an earnest look in those unusual eyes (which were NOT tinted with colored contacts now that she was close enough to look) that somehow conveyed a DEEP desire for Conner to trust her.

Later Sarah would discover Rei and her sisters happened to BE rather stronger than their size and stature would suggest due to their formerly alien (a race called "the Angels" for some God forsaken reason that would make Sarah wince when she finally heard Rei’s tale) genetic material with the relatively more mundane human stock found within the Amazonian women of Terra Prime. It leant for a much stronger woman to say the least, amongst other things (like removing any possibility of accidentally causing Instrumentality and such), but that was for later.

Though said, one should add that that Digory Kirke and the others of the house who’d been shipped out here and away from the danger of The Blitz back in London were rather relieved to hear Rei had been fighting aliens who happened to be named after certain denizens of Heaven and such. Couldn’t say they’d like putting up with people trying to actually picking a fight with God and such heretical nonsense, thank you so very MUCH!

Kirke and the others here DID hale from a world setting that did have Christian overtones and such so it’s to be expected, that discomfort. Frankly, Digory had been wondering what the blazes Aslan had been getting him into here when the Angel Wars Rei and her sisters had mentioned that business, you see and had been waiting (quietly) for an answer to unanswered questions.

Still, this was a rather odd lot that Aslan had brought to the house though (and the Yanks weren’t the only strange ones of the group). The whole bleeding lot as just . . .weird.

Then again, that was par for the course when you start to do business with talking lions and magical wardrobes, don’t you agree?

Still, the half year since last when Aslan had left had been rather . . .soothing to the nerves in retrospect. To be savored in the months and years to come because soon enough "normalty" was going to be a fond memory for quiet some time. Point in fact, nothing was ever to be the same again. . .but that’s for later!!

"Good to hear," Rei sighed, letting go of Sarah before continuing, her feathered wings ruffling a little as she glances back the way both Yuki and John had gone earlier (and gotten SO involved in each other). "But as an aside and until Aslan finally deems it fine to finally grace us with his input, I’m willing to bet it has something to do with a rather desperate gambit I and a few other friends tried in saving your world from certain destruction due to adverse temporal harmonics set up with the time travelling stupidity that Skynet and a disastrous Russian Cold War project…"

"Wha . . .you know about and Skynet even before Snow White over there had the Terminator cut himself open?" Sarah interrupts, gesturing towards the White Witch (who bristles a bit from being compared to a Disney fairy tale character). That Rei and the others had known something more than normal was to be expect (being so abnormal themselves), but this was a bit much. "And what is this about Russians and time travelling, exactly?"

"As for the first," Rei coughed in slight bemusement. "Well, I knew about that business with you because of . . .something we could say is a cosmic sense of balance. Like, you might . . .er. . .recognize this setting we are in, shall we say?"

"Digory. . .I do have to apologize ahead of time but by now you’ve perhaps at least guessed? . . ." Rei frowned, glancing over at the older man in question.

"Yeah, it was a favorite of mine that my grandmother read me when I was a young girl," Sarah said slowly, giving the Terminator a withering glare before turning back to Rei. Rei could very well guess just why that glare: another Terminator (twin of the one present) had terminated the poor woman in order to garner data to track Sarah down and kill her before she could give birth to John Conner. Wasn’t exactly a good way to get on Sarah’s good side, and leave at that. "Lewis Carrol’s The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe. It sounds insane but . . . this IS that place"?

"And you’re trying to imply that since that since where their reality is fiction in our world that in there world we are works of fiction in this world’s works of fiction Rei?" The Brigadier asked drolly. "While I admit that this version of my world during World War II is rather different in some details than mine . . ."

Alistor gives a rather pointed glance towards the Great Lion as way of example at HOW different.

. . .I rather do doubt that

"I thought as much," muttered Professor Kirke, having sensed something like this was in the mix. After all, the fact that at least some of Rei Takahashi’s family haled from realities which were reflected in works of fiction; what was to say that the knife cut the other way as well? He had figured that one almost right off the bat, even if apparently the children had not (at the time) figured that out.

Thank God that Edmund had voiced that very thought during (a private) dinner a week after returning from Narnia. Speculation in private places had been going off and on, on what that “futuristic/magical” world of Terra Prime must be like and Edmund had to voice THAT possibility.

It could have cheapened the favors done him and his siblings, in a way. A cheat to get into their good graces, some might argue. Foolishness, but at least the Professor had been able to point out that even IF such a thing had taken place, what Alicia had done in order to bring an understanding between Edmund and the other siblings had been aided by something else: the substantial fact that the bear shaped woman happened to have empathic psionic abilities. She could have read easily the turmoil within the children and guessed the cause soon enough; reading ahead from some supposed fictional work would have only made a short work of effort only shorter by moments.

. . .

Strange what ideas and such the Professor had come across whilst reading various works of science fiction and fantasy. While such fair usually was not the kind one of his position would read--or should read if one wished to avoid ridicule since such genres were looked down upon as nothing but for children and would “ruin your mind” (at least in this era)—such thing gained a certain relevancy for the older man.

Yes! He had been there at the VERY beginning of Narnia when Aslan sung it into existence and his tale had more than a bit of the fantastic to it, but that had been as a young man. This was much later in his life and had a deeper impact upon him, for some odd reason. Probably perhaps due to the fact that some of those “future folks” that had visited him last time around let slip that their world was NOT the bright and shining beacon of progress and prosperity that most “futurists” seemed to be convinced was coming in the wings. Things like child soldiers (like what happened in Inquirer’s Military homeland) . . .and now this Rei and her sisters with the rest here and now.

What did that say about his world’s possible future?

Hell, what did recent events in reflection say about Aslan? Did he or did he not have plans about using his nieces and nephews as some sort of child soldiers himself, in some sort of bid in freeing Narnia if it had not been for these “Champions” coming into the picture and upsetting the applecart as it were?

Questions. So many questions he had for the future and the present….

Frankly, he’s like to have at least some kind of clue (vain hope that it is) about what might be coming down the pike for him and his, thank YOU! And who knows? Perhaps today of all days he finally might get some answers…

After all, look at what had gone and visited his own house just a few months before! Besides, while a lot of the science fiction and fantasy stories he had read had been nothing but childish tripe, SOME of it had been actually good. Actually pitched for a more serious mined audience, especially some of the more active contributors to that one magazine: Analog.

"Rei and her friends said that due to adverse interactions between you and your son’s Judgement Day and and some secretive Russian project called the Singularity," the Brigadier from the later day version of Kirke’s England says, butting in from the side and interrupting the older man’s train of thought. "Way she tells it because both of them involve time loops or some nonsense such as that the Earth . . .our Earth has been stuck in a stasis of sorts and wearing a rut into space/time whilst the rest of the universe marches on and on.”

"And that rut will soon wear through space/time into the void between realities and dooming everyone unless stopped," Rei added, frowning as if something left a bad taste in her mouth. "We had to use the Master to fix this fiasco, and before you ask consider him to be a supped up version, time travelling capable baddie akin to Professor James Moriarty from Sherlock Holmes to give you a feel for the situation I was facing."

Granted, while Sarah Conner was at least familiar with some of the story of Sherlock Holmes it takes a few more explanations (and examples) to give a full view of just why Rei having employed the Master to save her world was such an insane choice. Even IF this "Master" chap happened to be not quiet as insane as first thought, but still just as dangerous because of being "genre savy" as Rei had later discovered. But in the end she seemed to understand the method to the madness…

And for her own reasons, for some odd reason Sarah could SORT of see eye to eye with Rei on this matter. After all, she had tried to actually blow UP the Cyberdyne building in the end to help try to avoid Judgement Day.

"In a world of insane choices he was the sanest choice?" Sarah ventured a guess.

”Exactly!” Lilith put in from the side, where the children are now coming back into the room. She like the others were not too happy about having to expose everyone here to the facts of life about at least some here had life reflected in works of fiction (very privacy invasive), but to not have revealed it made it look like they’d be hiding something sinister. And while that wasn’t the case and frankly the people here and now (UNIT and the Conners and such) wouldn’t have sod all to do with their upcoming Quest . . .best not to burn bridges before they cross them.

Reika

So here we have both my newest sister and her soon to be hubby coming back into the room, a little rumple in clothing after some rather heavy . . .petting as it were. No clothing off or any such things but VERY passionate; enough to make the young Pevensie to have VERY wide eyes over the antics here.

And of course it seems I should have to expect the next part here. After all, I hear from my family that when Fred and sister Rei finally got around to letting their hearts and souls “become one” with each other they’d gone and done something similar…

"Clone! Clone! Clone your lover!!" the young lovers start to sing, still totally lost within the other’s eyes.

1. Oh, it had to be that one particular song from Zeromancer if I recall correctly.

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