Not with a Bang: Conclusion

[voidtreckermods]

The base camp is a mess by the time the fight is over. The heavy rain alone would have been enough, but the battle has churned up the earth itself. The previously peaceful clearing is pockmarked with craters and dark puddles where ash has mixed into rainwater, along with oil and blood that swirl unpleasantly through the shallow pools. The trees are bowed outwards with the force of the powers that waged through the area, trunks shattered and torn, boughs hanging haphazardly or draped with the remnants of tents and equipment.

Perhaps all that can be said is that it gives the Voidtrecker Express a decidedly clear landing spot. The train snakes its way through the jungle, coming to a stop in a familiar, though now lopsided, coil around the clearing, and opening its doors to allow injured to be carried on, or anyone from the train to disembark.

It’s clear that there are indeed people aboard - as the doors hiss open, activity is already visible inside, as well as voices audibly going back and forth over the tinny speakers of the ICP.

Now that the saboteurs are dealt with, the final repairs can be made to the damaged stations and the shields locked into place. By the time they are done, nothing and no one will be able to enter the planet - from space, anyway.

The train will remain in the clearing through the night of Imagination 12 and the morning of Imagination 13, until all the stations are prepared, the pandas returned to their rightful place and everyone has rejoined the train.

By midday of Imagination 13, the train is ready to leave. Everyone gets a message on their SCA to return to the train, if they haven’t already. Once all are onboard the doors shut and the train begins to snake through the jungle.

“Re-entering Voidspace in ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one.”

The train rattles and shakes as the greenery around them (and the purple of a few farewell pandas) fade into the colours of the void.

Comments

[ourtomorrow]

"Are we missing someone?"

Ken blinks. They couldn't possibly leave anyone behind, given the way the train operates, could they? Perhaps people are just...making themselves difficult to find....

He can't say he hasn't done that, at times.

[unfavorableinstigation]

"It's something that happened in the last place I was, too," she continues, trying to master dribbling this time - without much success, given she's just using her feet for it...

"People I knew wouldn't go right to Sleep - that is, back home - they just... wouldn't be around, despite being around, doing chores and such."

[so_dark_a_road]

Curufin was thinking about what Halo had said.

"I was on that mission in which those beings shaped like dark clouds closed in and destroyed the mission world. It was every bit as horrifying as was my pre-mission vision. And after the Voidtrecker Express hauled our asses out of there before those things could kill us too, we never got any kind of update from the train as to what really happened. Do we ever? -- no. The train never answers questions."

He had his notebook out and was scribbling rapidly even as he spoke.

"We need more information, though I'm grateful to Halo for sharing what she had. What if those dark beings arrive to erase not only planets but the memory of those places? What if that's the mechanism of that alteration of reality? If that is the case, they didn't succeed in erasing Halo's memories, so it's an imperfect process."

"But maybe she's right, there are alternate realities, even in the Void? I already know from my travels that the multiverse is vast, and I have met people who are supposedly from the same world, but their memories of its history are not exactly the same. What I didn't expect is that even the spaces between universes might have variations, alternate realities."

He shook his head in puzzlement, and kept writing.

"If, as Reno suspects, the Voidtrecker Express is on a mission to prevent this sort of thing from happening, then I'm 100% on board with that. And if the Ministry knows about this and is using its powers to cover it up, I'm all for outing them. The problem is, as you say, Reno, how do we communicate with the train about this, and what can we as Void Warriors do about it?"

[rieper]

47 shifted slightly as the healing spell washed over him. It's something he knew he couldn't rely on all the time--something he refused to get used to. (And yet, a part of him was becoming used to it. It was helpful in the bigger battles of these missions. He was almost always around Lightning to receive them... a handicap...)

He looked at her. "They hardly ever see the whole picture," he commented. "Just one part. We took care of that; we should have been prepared for more just in case."

But it was hard to prepare an army that didn't move like an army at all. Hell, he knew it was hard to prepare an army that had the means and know-how to do so ahead of time. Sometimes shit just happened. And it a war there were always causalities.

The strangest thing to him, then, was that they came back instead of staying dead.

[namethattune]

That gets him to look up. It would be Leafmon with the simple truths, wouldn't it. "Life is not fair," he says, the beginnings of a sad smile forming on his face. "Life is a vast, unknowable equation, and the only variable you can truly affect is yourself." It is not truly random - he refuses to believe that anything could be truly random - but an equation beyond comprehension makes as much sense as he can manage. "Beyond that, everything is...cause and effect beyond our understanding - calculations we cannot comprehend."

It is a bit of filling the silence, if he is to be honest with himself - better to talk philosophy, or as much as this approach can be considered philosophy, than to consider whether what has happened to him is fair.

(It is not, but nothing ever is. Dwelling on it is counterproductive at best.)

Ken's question blindsides him completely, and he is silent for a few moments, blinking and attempting to connect it to the conversation at hand without success, before he looks at Ken.

"What does that have to do with anything?"

He is honestly at a loss.

[namethattune]

"The sudden application of cold constricts your blood vessels," he explains in that same flat tone. "Heat will reopen them." Amazing what an understanding of basic human biology will do for you.

[radishlobbyist]

"A giant mess," she agrees and wriggles a little, moving her head in the process until she has nestled herself even more comfortably against Lightning's side. Oh, but she is tired. Maybe not even so much physically exhausted, it's not like she was out there in the heat of battle, but drained after the emotional upheavals of the day.

She reaches down, offering her fingers for the armadillo to sniff at, though it doesn't seem to like the lingering sharp smell of hand sanitizer that is still clinging to them.

"I didn't mean the blade, though," she says, a little amused. "I meant your little friend."

[light_of_willpower]

Trunks looked him up and down, assessing. "If you were injured during the fights, you need more sleep, to rest and let the body healed. Take a nap." Trying to be reasonable, and use logic.

[its_dad_sanzo]

And Koumyou covers his face in both hands again, but now it's to groan sadly, "How could you do this to me, ice cream!"

[namethattune]

He closes his hand around the SCA before Senku can take it. "And how, exactly, did you lose it?"

He knows - Seto had told him - but he wants to hear it from Senku directly, to make sure there was no misunderstanding.

[namethattune]

"Make no mistake - you did this to yourself."

It seems the commentary is colder than the ice cream.

[ourtomorrow]

"That's scary."

Leafmon sticks close to Ken-chan, both to be out of the way of Nita's soccer practice and because he doesn't want Ken-chan to suddenly be here-but-not-here. There are all kinds of ways to lose a person without them leaving, it turns out! Darkness could take them, and whatever it is Siebren does, and then there are these other ways.

"Present only physically." Ken absorbs this knowledge but can't do much with it, without a bigger picture to slot it into. "Would they return?"

Oh, good. Ken-chan is asking the important question. Leafmon grips his pacifier in his mouth and Waits.

[flatteries]

The one upside to this situation is that Inigo has seen horrible things before, back in his own world. So in comparison Koumyou's bruises don't seem.. too bad. Sure, they're still pretty gnarly, but when you get used to seeing worse, it's easy to see this sort of thing and not even blink at it.

Though Inigo's thoughts are whirling around in his head about it all the same. Should he tell the other to see a healer, even though Koumyou is so much older than him? Even though it'd be hypocritical on Inigo's part to do so?

"Yes. Though I don't think it was much of a matter of 'getting to' as much as it was 'having to'.." At the end there, anyway. It felt like those robots were simply all over the place when they got ambushed at the base camp.

Inigo frowns slightly.

"It seems they really did a number on you though, milord. Shouldn't you have someone look at that?"

[flatteries]

"Blew up a little bit."

There's a dry edge to the way Inigo repeats the words, because really, Senku? Who says they blew up a little bit and then proceeds to play it off like it's some common accident!

.. okay, maybe Inigo would. But he's a special case! An exception to the rule!

"Sheesh, I'm really glad that you weren't hurt worse.." Or well, worse enough that he wouldn't have been able to get healed up to this extent. Aka just straight up being dead. "Sorry that I wasn't able to help you out. Things really got hectic back there all of a sudden.."

[happyends]

"I'm glad.."

She means it, even though she still isn't exactly looking like she's doing fine. But any friend who managed to get through that relatively alright is already a bit more of a relief. Though it's no surprise that Piccolo of all people is mostly alright - he's so amazing. Of course he would be able to handle even something as wild as what they have all gone through.

"I'm.. um.." She doesn't want to lie to him.

But would telling the truth burden him? Maybe he already has enough on his mind.. Madoka momentarily bites her lower lip in thought before continuing.

"I'm fine.. I'm not hurt." She stayed out of the way like a smart girl! "But it seems that there are a lot of other people who are pretty hurt.."

[happyends]

"You should quickly look for someone who can help." Madoka doesn't mean to sound like she's rushing or scolding the other girl, but there's some definite concern in her tone that she just can't hide. Mami's ring turning that colour is a really pressing worry, after all. Even aside from concerns for Mami's wellbeing - which do come first in Madoka's mind - there's the problem of what would happen if a witch would appear here of all places. With this many people already wounded around them.

"Though, I.. I know it must have happened since you must've worked really hard to help and protect people.."

[happyends]

Thank god for Ken's clarifications, or this could get really confusing really fast. But with all the odd things Madoka has seen on her journey on the train, the explanation makes total sense - and it takes virtually no time for her to embrace it.

And to embrace Leafmon. Maybe not entirely literally, since she's not hugging him, but Madoka does reach out to pat the cute creature's head. Which.. so happens to be pretty much his everything now, huh.

"You're tired..? You must have worked so hard. Good job, Leafmon. I'm really proud of you!"

But it's definitely not the only being here she's concerned with. Madoka raises her gaze to look at the human present too.

".. how about you, Ken-san..? Are you okay..?"

[happyends]

".. you're such a kind friend, Yoite-san."

Even though he looks like he must be in pain, he was still thinking about her instead. Then again, that sure seems to be some sort of blue team feature, huh. Being too caught up in thoughts about others to ever think about yourself.

So Madoka moves to start walking with him, making sure to go really slow so he won't have to speed up to match her pace.

Though just watching him walk and doing nothing to help feels so bad.

So after a few moments of watching it, Madoka gently reaches out to hold his hand in her own.

"Um, this is.. okay, right..?" She doesn't want to make him uncomfortable, after all. Not when he's already doing so badly.

[namethattune]

Siebren watches, alarmed, as Seto coughs. That is not normal. "Once we are done here, you should see a medic." He is not taking no for an answer on that one.

He sighs at the question. "They themselves were not powerful, but they were well prepared. Had it just been them, there would have been little issue, but they had shielding for themselves and for the terraforming robots they had co-opted. It...prolonged things, more than I think any of us would have liked."

[unfavorableinstigation]

"Technically, they haven't left. But the impressions you get off them... they aren't all that lasting."

You knew you'd talked to them sometimes, even, but knowing them - that was what was different.

"They're more likely to leave on platform days, though, I'll say that. And if they don't leave then, I think there's a better chance they'll recover."

Whether that had anything to do with their plight overall, however, Nita can't say.

She does, however, finally make a satisfying goal.

[its_dad_sanzo]

Koumyou had also seen, and felt, a whole lot worse things than his bruises, or even the odd bullet graze hidden under his clothes.

But he was still human, and fighting against a whole bunch of big metal things that wanted to squish your meat and bones into a paste, was going to lead to some bruising. If not a lot worse!

"Hm?" Koumyou glanced down at himself, as though looking for a serious injury. "I'm fine, though?"

[10billionpercent]

So close, and yet so far. He'd even said thank you, that was quite an accomplishment for him sometimes.

Senku looked like he was thinking a little bit.

"It was..something exploding in the room next to us." Senku answered. "We fixed it though."

[hotheadwarmheart]

"Vision transcripts, huh?", Lea said. "Guess I should be glad I don't have the kind of powers that let me see visions; I've always sucked at taking notes." Seriously, Nita you should have seen his attempts at notes back at Diatu. Especially before Isa showed up and started making him knuckle down a bit.

He smiled a bit when she looked up at him. "Mostly helping out the healers. I'm not much at healing myself, but I can help bring people in and play errand boy, so I've been making myself useful that way." Nita might have seen him while she was helping with healing, in fact. "Now, I'm checking on people and bringing maybe bringing them something to eat. Especially the healers, cause they deserve a break after this one if anyone does."

[its_dad_sanzo]

"I didn't mean to!" Koumyou whined into his hands, like someone who was a quarter his actual age. Or maybe less.

[10billionpercent]

"Ah, yeah, the room next to us exploded, it was crazy. You weren't around at the time, I was with Kaiba at the control station. Good thing too since it wouldn't have been that fun. I remember it not being fun."

Senku hummed. Some things seemed foggy about the whole thing, but that was fine. It's only because he hit his head.

"Healing hurt a lot, I remember that. But I'm fine now." Mostly, he figured, maybe. He'd even had a nap, granted it probably wasn't that long.