Chapter Text
“I’m sorry, you want us to what?” I ask the flying cat in front of us.
“We thought it was rather clear, a neighboring universe appears to be having issues with dimensional instability not too dissimilar from Dark World Convergences, we wish for you three to investigate.” Uma’tama repeats herself.
“Okay, intellectually we knew that alternate universes were real, considering both the Antipathy and Preservers are from different ones than our own, but still this is- so much! I didn’t know this was something Earth Guardians ever did!” Thea runs her hands through her hair.
“Yes, it’s been a while, but I’ve gone to one before.” Castalia mentions, already gathering up some of the equipment Uma’tama set out for us.
“You have!?” I exclaim.
“Yes, it was very strange, there were a lot of floating islands. But I couldn’t stay long because a big tentacle monster tried to smack me when I was flying into space.” Castalia elaborated as if it was the most normal thing in the world.
For once, I am at a loss for words. Uma’tama, on the other hand, is not.
“Rest assured, as far as we are aware, there are no tentacle monsters in this universe! It is quite similar to your own!”
“…How similar? Are we talking like, similar biosphere and gravity or are we going to visit the universe where everything is the same except Castalia has a mustache?” I jape, and Castalia wrinkles her nose at the idea of possessing facial hair.
“It is still Earth, there are still humans, and the fundamental laws of physics remain the same, however, the timeline appears to diverge around the year two thousand four. Since the Dark World never began to converge there, no intervention was necessary.” Uma’tama explains, leading us further down a hallway.
“However, it appears that in the following fifty years, numerous dimensional disturbances have been impacting this universe. We would like you, a group of humans-er… people familiar with human culture, to investigate and catalogue the most glaring differences, and determine if this universe requires aid.” Uma’tama continues.
“So this world is also thirty years in the future?”
“Yes, exactly! We are unaware of much about the world, however, some catastrophes have clearly occurred, as the population has been in decline. The curve is mostly steady, however there are occasionally sharp drops. As of the most recent estimation, there are only one and a half billion humans remaining.” Uma’tama’s tone turns more somber.
“Oh, so an apocalyptic future alternate universe, cool.”
“The temperature is mostly stable, although a few degrees higher on average. What is curious, however, is that the emotional background energy levels are significantly higher than a non-magically developed civilization of one point five billion humans should be.” Uma’tama reaches a door and hovers there for a moment, turning to face us all.
“Oh! Do you think they’ve discovered the basics of magic on their own? Could they be actively cultivating it?” Thea perks up immediately, excited at the prospect of magitech infrastructure, which, like, fair, me too.
“That is unlikely.” Uma’tama immediately crushes her dreams. “This world could merely be highly emotionally charged, or there are disruptions with our sensors.”
“Or all the humans there evolved to be total drama queens.” I half-jokingly suggest.
Uma’tama doesn’t get a chance to reply, as the door finally opens, revealing a large, circular room with a large crystal archway in the center. It was shaped like a ring, large enough to drive a minivan through, with stairs leading up to both the front and back sides. Wires run along and through the gemstones like veins, an airlock separating and the rest of the room and the arch, likely to prevent any cross-contamination between universes. We don’t want The Black Plague 2: Electric Boogaloo to make an appearance. I’m guessing that there are some spell glyphs in the airlock itself for decontamination. Earth Guardians don’t need to worry about diseases, it seems the general boost their bodies get from repeated transformations affects their immune system too. Let’s hope it’s enough for multiversal travel.
“This is the gateway you will be using, Luna, are you able to replicate the spell glyphs inside? You will need to cast the spell yourself in order to create the return portal.”
“We’ll see!” I take as thorough of a scan as I can and- huh, that uses way less power than I thought it would. Apparently traveling between universes uses comparable magic to only an Abreaction. That’s still a lot of power for me, but I could reasonably cast it on short notice. I could probably even create a smaller scale version to open a microscopic portal to send and receive data through.
“Got it, when should we go through?” I ask.
“Right now, if that is possible.” Uma’tama answers.
“Uh, no, not yet, we have a bunch of things we need to get ready first.” Uma’tama opens their mouth to ask what, but I’m already rolling. “If we’re spending even a full day in this parallel universe, we’re going to need Castalia’s respirator so she can actually sleep without dying. I’m also going to need to be able to connect to the internet in this room so I can send and receive the data I find, and also to stay in touch with the humans that are important to us and not vanish on them for months again.”
Uma’tama blinks, but then nods. “That can be arranged.”
[LunaLightOTK]: Gonna be out of town for an indeterminate period of time with Castalia and Thea, the Preservers want us to investigate a parallel universe. I should be able to keep in touch though.
[MeanBeanMachine]: Are you fucking serious.
[LunaLightOTK]: [Image7612.HEIC] Yes. This is hopefully more of a Doctor Who scenario than a Crisis On Infinite Earths one.
[MeanBeanMachine]: Fucking hell. Send pics?
[LunaLightOTK]: Oh you know my ass will be playing tourist.
Respirator? Check. Oxygen Tank? Check. Snacks? Check. Drinkable water? Check. Multiple changes of clothes? Check. All of Thea’s magical tools? Check. Emergency LCI? Check.
“All right, I’ve got everything we need I think, unless anyone has any last minute requests?”
“No, I am ready.” Castalia says, and Thea just shakes her head.
I give a thumbs up to the cat in the control room, and after they consult the other cat in the room with them, the portal spools to life. Unlike the Dark World portals, which are always more nebulous and more of an outline of a portal, this one is a veritable kaleidoscope of colors. My sensors immediately start going berserk, and I have to manually dull most of them in order to focus on what’s relevant.
“Remember the plan, Thea stays in incarnate form as long as possible, and Castalia walks.” I dutifully remind them, conjuring my skinsuit around me in the same moment. I’m wearing mostly nondescript clothes and an N95 mask not having a mouth but still needing to speak reasons. Thea nods and clutches her stone.
“Gʀᴀɴᴛ Mᴇ Cᴏᴜʀᴀɢᴇ.”
The light of her transformation is drowned out by the brightness of the gateway, but the whole room does become a bit greener.
“Fᴇᴀʀꜰᴜʟ Sᴀɢᴇ Dᴏᴏᴍᴇᴅ Aᴍᴀʟᴛʜᴇᴀ.” She proclaims, touching down on the ground, and immediately ducking into another room to get changed. A few moments later, she’s back in the room, wearing the cute shorts and shirt I bought for her. Gahhhh she looks so good!
“Ready!” She sounds off.
“I am also ready.” Castalia echoes, standing on the ground which just feels wrong. She’s not supposed to do that, her natural habitat is at least half a foot off the ground.
I give a gay little salute to the Preservers watching us, and step through. Time, space, and the quantum foam within the backdrop of the universe pass us by, all that is real, that could be, that can’t be, that was, that wasn’t, and-
Disabling thread. Minimizing active sensors to prevent system overload.
-Oh wait, that can happen?
I set foot on the pavement in an alleyway, and right behind me are Thea and Castalia, the both of them immediately taking in our surroundings. Oh shit, I should also do that! It’s… a normal alleyway. Huh, there’s still radio traffic, electricity, the atmosphere is the same, I can hear cars honking and people talking in the distance.
“Well this is disappointing!” I cross my arms and mimic a huff for dramatic effect.
“We just got here Luna, so it’s still similar to our world, maybe you can find what’s different on the internet? Are you getting any signal?” Thea asks.
She’s right, of course, so alright! Let’s see if this universe has different network access protocols… Nope! Heck yeah, let’s see what’s up with-
-Oh.
Huh.
The first thing I can clearly find that’s a divergence point between our timelines is in twenty twenty-five, which yes, hasn’t happened yet back home, but this is probably where our worlds differ the most. I watch hundreds of recordings of the same incident from across the globe, because it was a global event to be sure. Most of the footage is after the initial arrival, from pedestrians, bystanders, reporters, and anyone and their dog who had a camera that day.
On June 7th, 2025, giant tentacles erupted from the moon and thrashed about for almost thirty minutes, before going limp.
Also, some people have super powers now, but so do the extradimensional invaders slowly wiping humanity out. Holy shit, there are fucking superheroes here! I dive into public record, devouring as much info as I can on what the fuck is up with that. The first thing I find is some kind of propaganda video, featuring a bunch of recent recruits to the… military. There’s a girl who can make energy fairies, a guy who seems to be completely invincible, one guy who can be in three places at once, some weird glue-gun goo man, and disturbingly, both a fucking nine year old and a seventy year old man in what is clearly a modified wheelchair. Are they that desperate? The stars of the show though, are a girl who can apparently just disassemble matter with a wave of her hand, and a straight up shapeshifter making herself look like a slutty angelgirl.
I see decades of war with the alien threat. I learn about Angels, the powered aliens who are regarded as being so dangerous that entire teams of superheroes are trained to take them down. I learn about Queens, the gargantuan centerpieces of every major incursion, and how once a Queen arrives, everyone around her for miles dies. I learn about the many theories surrounding how people get powers. Some suspect it’s totally random, some people claim they’re gifts from god, while others say they’re from the devil. There’s some research into the demographics of people who get powers and-
“Luna?” My master’s voice interrupts my thought process.
“Huh?” I turn to both her and Castalia.
“What did you find?” Castalia asks. “You were standing still for a while there.”
Was I? “Sorry, lots of info to sort through, but I uh, think I found the problem.” I point up to the night sky, where the clouds part just in time to reveal what’s left of the celestial body I am named after.
“Moon’s fucked.”
“That’s not good.” Castalia states as bluntly as always.
“H-how are we supposed to help out with that?!” Thea exclaims, gesturing wildly towards the sky.
“I don’t think we are. It’s been like that for over thirty years, it has a stable orbit still, at least. The tides are a little wonky but most humans don’t live on coastlines anymore, on account of the aliens.”
“The what?!”
“Yeah aliens are invading, it’s bad, billions dead bad, some of them have straight-up reality warping superpowers, not magic, superpowers. Lots of humans have them too, people just seem to get them when incursions happen or when shards of the moon fall from the sky or just without any apparent reason.” I explain while chomping through more and more data.
“Oh, can I just pretend to have superpowers then?” Castalia asks, hesitantly floating an inch off the ground.
“Nnnnope! That’s a bad idea, literally everyone with superpowers gets drafted into the military, they also have child soldiers fighting The Horrors here but the difference is these ones don’t even have the illusion of a choice. It’s bad.”
“WHAT?!” Thea squawks, and I start giving as many explanations as I can about this world and all its goings on.
I re-calibrate my systems and break down the spell used to send us across universes. I could theoretically cast the full-scale version right now, but it’d take 80% of my power reserves to do so, and I’m only at 65%, so that’s out of the question. What I can do instead, is re-size the portal created to being only a few nanometers wide, just big enough to send and receive signals through.
“[H ᴏ ᴜ s ᴛ ᴏ ɴ W ᴇ H ᴀ ᴠ ᴇ A P ʀ ᴏ ʙ ʟ ᴇ ᴍ]” I cast, creating the tiny portal inside my isolated frame, so no signals other than the ones I want can escape or make it through. I almost immediately receive a message.
[MeanBeanMachine]: How’s the weather over there?
[LunaLightOTK]: MOON’S FUCKED.
[MeanBeanMachine]: What?
[LunaLightOTK]: (Image7613.HEIC) MOON’S FUCKED.
[MeanBeanMachine]: WHAT!?
[LunaLightOTK]: Aliens are invading too, it’s bad.
[MeanBeanMachine]: Shiiiiit. Like Independence Day style or like, Xenomorphs?
[LunaLightOTK]: Closer to the latter, I think the zerg would actually be the closest comparison, if the zerg sometimes had queens the size of skyscrapers with the superpower to turn every human in the city of Chicago into meat cubes. I’ll spare you the details but uh. Yeah this place definitely needs our help holy shit.
[MeanBeanMachine]: Jesus. What are you even planning on doing?
[LunaLightOTK]: Not sure yet, the military has had the remaining like, twenty states of America under martial law for the past twenty years, but we might have to talk to them and introduce them to the concept of the Preservers.
[MeanBeanMachine]: Please send me a video of the grizzled military brass having to meet a flying talking cat for the first time.
[LunaLightOTK]: o7
We’ve landed in an alleyway in this world’s version of Atlanta, which is thankfully not one of the cities that was obliterated by alien invaders, I don’t know what we would’ve done if we ended up in one of those. Like, everything I’m reading seems to point to anyone who doesn’t have powers just instantly fucking dying in an ‘incursion zone’. Would the fact that we’re magical girls prevent that? I certainly do not want to find out. I’m picking up all kinds of strange readings too, especially concentrated around the Moon. It’s almost… hypnotic, in a way, I catch myself just staring at it sometimes. It’s horrifying, but beautiful at the same time. Also Uma’tama was wrong. There is at least one tentacle monster here but it’s thankfully dead. Probably.
Thea’s contact lenses appear to be holding up to scrutiny at least, anyone who stares at us is usually staring at Castalia, who is dutifully walking on the ground like a normal human. It’s actually pretty cute feeling her slight grumpiness at the idea of walking.
“Uhm… Do you think we could stop somewhere to eat? I haven’t gotten any food in me since uh… This morning.” Thea meekly admits.
I slowly turn and face her, using my speaker to play the sound of a stone door slowly opening. I place a hand on her shoulder, and with as much intensity as I can jokingly muster, search for the nearest Waffle House.
There are still Waffle Houses in 2057, and the three of us enter without any fuss. It’s annoyingly normal, indistinguishable from a Waffle House back in our home universe. I was expecting reversed color palettes! Maybe it’s called Pancake House instead! I don’t know, I guess I’m still just thrown by how similar this place is despite the glaring differences.
There only seems to be one other patron here at the moment, and no employees manning the register. The one customer turns to look at us as we enter, and smiles. They’re rather androgynous, with a short pixie cut, light brown skin, and oddly colored eyes, one green and one blue. My sensors start picking up all kinds of gobbledigook once they turn their attention our way. I can’t pinpoint what exactly it is, but this person has some kind of power or effect on their surroundings I’ve never detected before. Their emotional state is also quite interesting, they were as bored as can be before we arrived, to the point where I thought they might have had some kind of depression, maybe they still do, but now? Now they’re absolutely elated. They’re hopeful, they’re terrified, they’re dreading what’s coming, and they’re seeing someone they’ve dearly missed.
“Ah! Glad you finally made it! Now, should I call you Luna, or Muramasa?” They say, and I get a premonition that everything is about to change.