middleofsomewhere | The Endless River

On the morning of day twenty one of the month of Kazoo there is a message on the ICP screens around the train. Their SCA's will light up the colour of the Void and show the following information.

World #398050 is a void nexus known locally as Tshering. As a void nexus this world has strong links with the void and the connection through worlds. World #398050 is home to the Endless River. Legends speak of this river being powerful enough to send thoughts from one heart to another across any distance. All that is needed is for you to know who it is you wish to reach.

On-board

The dressing carriage is open, filled with clothing best suited to a pleasant spring day. Light, airy and in a rainbow of joyful colours and florals. One closet is entirely filled with wide-brimmed hats bedecked with ribbons, feathers and ornaments. A stack of picnic baskets and containers filled with an alarming variety of passenger-suitable foodstuffs and flasked drinks sits in one corner, next to rolls of thick, weatherproof blankets in the four team colours.

The large box marked Do Not Use Yet, filled with small, empty jute bags, is hopefully still sat in the Luggage carriage, ready for passengers to grab handfuls of its contents as directed by the announcement.

Upon landing (after an appropriate countdown), the train remains on the surface, its carriages partially curved to form a gathering site for the day. Welcome to Tshering, the eighth void nexus!

A Day for Picnics

Tshering, system #398050, is a strange place, only habitable by grace of the passengers' SCAs. The sky is shot through with colours, a cascade of sunsets, and through it, the void shimmering through it in seams like a child's painting of the milky way. Still, there's a beauty to the chaotic mash of colours that soaks through its landscape, and in the shelter of the forests of towering funghi that dot its surface, the Void can go unseen by its visitors.

The temperature seems mild, suitable for the provided clothing, and if there are weather patterns around the world they've taken the day off. The funghi are sturdy enough that what air flow there is doesn't disturb their stalks, and carved grooves and holds in some of the larger examples indicate that climbing them to sit atop their glowing crowns is eminently possible, and, in fact, encouraged.

the Endless River

The Endless River is a font of pure chaos, flowing from a multitude of small rivulets across the area to a central reservoir, from which it pours directly upwards, away from Tshering's surface and out of sight, beyond the world's atmosphere.

Anything bagged and placed within the Endless River will also flow upwards and soon be out of sight, passing, presumably, into the Void. Scattered across the surface of Tshering are small, glittering pebbles, as described in the announcement.

The stones are pleasantly cool to the touch, and all passengers need to do is feel. Messages can be in any form that the Voidtreckers wish. Perhaps words, perhaps feelings, perhaps an image from their mind into the stone. Perhaps a mixture. Once they begin their message the stone will glow slightly and continue to glow as they secure it in the bag and cast it into the river. They will feel, almost instinctively, that they need to focus as they do so, thinking of the person they wish to reach all the while.

There are plenty of bags and many more stones; passengers will not be limited in their sendings.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"If we didn't get unexpected help we'd get no help at all." Colourful is probably the best description of their allies. Or at least the most polite.

"The war has been heating up and it's only going to get worse. Better to stick to the kids we picked up along the way." If she starts to think about the options... that would be counting on too many things working out. Thinking about a future for the galaxy is one thing, herself? Who knows if either of them will live long enough.

"It's really that tough, there?" Perhaps Bulma is too used to having friends in high places. Or, just being lucky enough to have very strong friends who make friends with Destroyers. The problem with knowing Goku pretty much all of her life, she thinks.

"Sounds rough..." Bulma frowns a little at the thought that it was going to get worse. "It almost sounds like the world my son comes from. His future is.." She pauses, and then sighs. "A lot to say the least."

"The odds are against us. The Empire controls the galaxy with fear. But that's why we have to fight them." She doesn't need to recruit anyone here. But she can't help talking like she is when people bring it up.

"It won't get better on its own, but I've learned here it will with the fight." Which sounds almost like what she's talking about. "Your son is from a different world? Is that a train thing or..."

"Sounds... kinda like Frieza." In a way, anyway. She hadn't known a damn thing about Frieza until the first saiyans other than Goku touched down on Earth, and now... it's a whole beginning to an odd story, basically. In the end they've won so many battles that became more important than Namek and Frieza.

"Ah, so there are people here from your world too?" Bulma makes a bit of a wobbly motion with her hand, as if saying that's almost what it is.

"He's from a different future. One death changed the course of... everything, and so there is a Future version of my son, and the one from my world."

"I'm sorry it sounds like something you know." Though she shouldn't be surprised with the amount of chaos it seems her world is subject to. Still, she doesn't wish it on anyone. "There's one person from my world. We don't know each other, but that might be safer."

And the talk of her son... that's it. THat's why. "Because things are that easy to change."

"It is, but that's okay. My husband and my best friend are the two strongest fighters in our universe, so I feel safe no matter what tries to come up against them." It's a curse in its own way, but also incredible in another. She's never bored, that's for sure, with Destroyers and the lot around to keep her on her toes and busy enough besides their children and Trunks' schooling.

"Yes. Piccolo's death in Trunks' timeline changed everything because we didn't have the dragon balls. Many people died, but without those we couldn't even endure to wish them back and have a second chance at the Androids that destroyed his version of Earth. So he came back in time to make sure it didn't happen to our timeline. That Goku and Vegeta were prepared."

"Strong friends mean strong enemies. But there's no avoiding that." No strong friends also means no one to stop the strong enemies.

"I think I'm missing something." She could follow the time travel. To a degree. "About the dragon balls."

"Yes. Just kind of bizarre when the one they want to fight all the time is either your best friend or your husband." There's more at stake since she's so close with them both, regardless of the fact that she tended to .. well. Smack them around from time to time anyway. In Bulma's defense - they often deserved it.

"The dragon balls?" Oh. Right. Other places don't have those... "Ah.. go ahead and ask but I can probably guess."

"I know that feeling. Kanan and his Padawan can do amazing things, but they attract a lot of attention." They'd attract it anyway, so she can't object. At least if they actually use their abilities they stand a chance.

"Those are some sort of powerful..." She actually can't quite guess enough to ask the question.

"Yes.. the talented tend to do that, don't they?" Bulma had in her life, though not in the same ways as Goku and Vegeta. Most of them had been good changes, though Vegeta was debatably not in the beginning.

"They're basically seven .. gems in the shape of balls. They scatter around Earth, but once you gather them all you can make any three wishes you want. Provided you aren't trying to wish back someone who died a natural death, that is."

"I'm just glad Ezra seems to be learning things fast enough to keep up with the attention." Barely, but they're scraping by. It's all that she can ask for.

"Those... sound like they must create a lot of conflict." Something like that, of course everyone would want it.

"That's always the trick, isn't it? Keeping up to the expectation." Bigger, badder, faster, smarter.. that was always the problem. One enemy down and a few more crop up that are worse in some manner or fashion, or perhaps just smart enough to stay low until they felt they could challenge them. It never worked, of course, but there's always the next challenger.

"Most of Earth's population don't know they exist, so. We occasionally get an alien or two that wants them, but unless they have a dragon radar like we do it's like a goose chase." Bulma is a little too proud of herself on that one, smiling in that cocky manner she tends to when she's flouting an invention of hers. "At any rate, I eventually met my husband chasing dragon balls, so it's okay in the end."

"Sometimes I have to remind myself that he'd still attract the attention untrained. Just not stand a chance." A kid like Ezra is never going to be safe in a galaxy where Palpatine holds power. ANother reason to avoid taking chances.

"Sometimes it takes the strangest circumstances to bring people together. Or a dragon radar." She assumes that's... more or less what it sounds like.

The Endless River

Ooor... approximately five minutes after her CAREFULLY CHOSEN CANONPOINT

WOOPS

And then BAD THINGS a few episodes later...

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