her_imperial_radiance | friendly door

Elspeth gets a door.

It's been so long she reels for a moment, and then she throws herself forward and almost lands in a peal of Bells. Yes, there's Shell Bell, there's Juliet and Aurora, there's Glass, there's some Matilda she hasn't seen before.

"Elspeth!" exclaims Glass.

"How long has it been?" Aurora asks.

"Seventeen years. Shell Bell - I need you to help me find Harley," says Elspeth.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

giftedandtalented

Here is Tab, indeed. The auras didn't come through on the security feed; she blinks a lot, when she gets a look at them. "Wow."

From:

incanted

"All this and more can be yours for nine ninety-nine," Aurora mutters under her breath. "Should any subset of us duck into Milliways?" she adds at normal volume.

From:

salus_populi

Aelise is now looking analytically at Harley.

From:

prima_sequentem

"Good question," says Lizzie. She is looking analytically at Aelise.

From:

salus_populi

Aelise says, very definitely to Harley: "Chelsa is retired."

From:

pythbox

He bursts into tears and clings to Elspeth.

From:

her_imperial_radiance

"Just retired?" mutters Elspeth.

From:

luminous_regnant

"World's Downsideable," reports Golden in an undertone.

From:

giftedandtalented

"I don't know what that means, but it sounds murdery; don't just up and kill her, please," says Tab, "she still has enough contact with the population for it to be a sharp shock."

From:

luminous_regnant

Golden's aura is still out, like all of them except Juliet's; her hiss is very nonhuman, but she doesn't disagree aloud.

From:

salus_populi

"And Corona is dead."

From:

pythbox

Harley pulls his face away from Elspeth to give Aelise a look of astonishment.

Hoarsely: "What?"

From:

salus_populi

"He denied Kers's protection and died about a minute later, a little while after you dropped yourself into the sun," she says. "We never found his body."

From:

pythbox

He stares some more - frowns - licks his lips - shakes his head and hugs Elspeth some more.

From:

salus_populi

"Corona was Harley's local alt," says Aelise, in case anyone might find this clarification useful.

From:

thaumobabble

"World's Downsideable," says Glass. "We can pick him up on our way out. We were going to Origin next anyway." She nibbles her lip, then says, "World's related to Eos and Aurum, in that way they have."

From:

salus_populi

"...Pick him up," Aelise echoes.

From:

prima_sequentem

"From the afterlife," says Lizzie.

From:

salus_populi

"Well that's a game-changer," Aelise says thoughtfully.

From:

luminous_regnant

"And is also some, although admittedly not most, of why I sounded murdery," Golden adds to Tab. "If we eventually come up with some way to safely store Chelseas - perhaps we accumulate a few hundred of them and can store them far away from anyone who doesn't produce informed consent in triplicate after Elspeth's gone over them - then they won't be irretrievable."

From:

giftedandtalented

"What is Elspeth doing?"

From:

her_imperial_radiance

"I am deprogramming Harley," says Elspeth quietly. "My power is oriented around truth. I can make people stop lying to themselves in the ways that support what Chelsa's power does. It's harder for this one than it was for the Aurum version, but I can do it."

From:

salus_populi

Aelise shudders slightly.

"That's a disaster waiting to happen," she says. "Not for Harley - you can have Harley with my best wishes - but please do not do that to, for example, me. I still have to deal with her occasionally and if I fade any faster than standard, she'll want to know why."

From:

her_imperial_radiance

"I hadn't even gotten to the point of thinking to offer. I'm only working on Harley. For Chelsea I could do a lot of people all at once. I can barely do one at a time with this one. It took almost half an hour last time."