Some Important Follow-Up

[photonicfighter]

Excuse me. If everyone who went to Santa Carlita has a moment?

[Dakki pauses briefly to give people a chance to pay attention. That's how this is done, right?]

I've followed up with Tachibana, and it turns out that he put a tracking device on something that belonged to me. It's gone now, but apparently, the agents are now on the lookout for interdimensional aliens, not just ones from other planets.

I should have been more cautious. I'm sorry. Could the other agents confirm if they've planted anything, too, before I go and get everyone shaking themselves down for bugs?

...and that said, now that we're all back to ourselves, I'm very curious... did the 'aliens' pose any actual threat? What was that all even about? I'm not impressed with a government whose first reaction to extraterrestrial life is to panic and try to lock it up. That can't be the entire story, can it?

Comments

[theflyingone]

Everyone, place your things in Hammerspace or ask someone to do it for you. Time does not pass there, so their devices should not work.

[photonicfighter]

Ah, it doesn't? That's good advice, then. At least until we can confirm that nothing else was planted.

[theflyingone]

[ In this moment, Dakki is one of the few people who can get Altair to strip naked in .5 seconds ]

Access to the records and the record player will also be delayed until we are sure.

[ And everything else he picked up from 80s California. This is just the cherry on top of the cake of bitter disappointment. ]

If worlds keep seeing us for what we are, I must begin to hold required lessons on blending in at the start of every Jaunt.

[ Knowing how much the younger Travelers hate required education, he thinks that threat has more clout than it usually might. ]

[acapriciousthing]

My overlay didn't track anyone, there wasn't time.

They were still trying to figure out if the alien was a threat. They just knew at least one alien was there and hadn't disclosed their arrival. There was never enough information to be sure... or to be sure he was harmless. They're not just looking for extradimensional threats in addition, it's now the main focus. Because as far as Area 54 was concerned, the extradimensional ones did prove themselves a threat.

If we ever end up back in that one, it's going to be a Situation.

[photonicfighter]

Alright. Good to know.

Have aliens ever been a threat? Was there a history of of previous bad interactions? Or would that information be classified beyond your overlay's level?

That was my worry. We'll need to be on the alert for that.

[acapriciousthing]

It was above her pay grade. It may have been something she was about to find out about with the promotion, but at that point as far as she was concerned Travellers were a lot more dangerous than the one alien she dealt with. Her assignment was to determine how dangerous that one could potentially be.

He, at least, never killed anyone.

[claudiometer]

....oh. Gr-twelve. [Yes, she did just say 'gr12.'] Another world that hates us.

[photonicfighter]

Ger-twelve?

[Now there's some slang she's not familiar with. Right...?]

...how many does that make, now?

[claudiometer]

Internet slang. I'm not sure if it's a direct offshoot of the inflationary-language comedy gag or just a rhyme pun, but the original was 'gr9.' In this case, the exaggeration is because this is not in fact great by any stretch of the imagination.

As for places that hate us... Nova Venezia, the Illuminants, maybe not all of Bando but certainly the empire that lost the peninsula, Newport assuming the Manticore didn't stay down, possibly some corners of Pogworld, the new Olympian regime doesn't hate us as such but will definitely have planned for our interference if there's a next time, and who knows what other swaths of destruction got left in people's wakes before Moebius.

And that's just the stuff I've been around for. The only one I can say we got positive attention for any amount of standing out on was the Grid, because Programs are very forgiving of their Users by design.

[chalicejoker]

I should be alright. He was trying to recruit my overlay to battle interdimensional ninjas with him before we left.

[photonicfighter]

....you know, I'd say that sounds completely ridiculous if I didn't know for a fact that we've got at least two interdimensional ninjas.

[chalicejoker]

Yeah, Yakumo made him really suspicious. My overlay thought it sounded dumb, but he was up for the fight anyway.

[breakaleginhalf]

...wait what the fuck.

[chalicejoker]

Yakumo and Kinji.

[Clearly this is all the answer Gil needs.]

[cloudpotter]

[said interdimensional ninja has Thoughts on that.]

I should have expected as much.

[chalicejoker]

That trick you pulled with the watch really freaked him out, I think.

[rustyhonesty]

I probably woke their interest as well. Running around in my vampire form in shadows. At least one walked into said shadows. Ugh...

[Maybe he didn't do so well investigating this one after all? Whoops. That's a punch back.]

[theflyingone]

Did you kill him?

[photonicfighter]

I've said it elsewhere, but I was hoping that anything strange that we did during the breakout would just be understood to be us doing... alien things.

It's entirely possible they just think we're all interdimensional ninjas now. That's better than... vampires?

[unconventionalelf]

They had devices for tracking? Isn't that cheating in a hunt?

[ More reasons to not like those men in weak dark armor.]

I, might not have helped too much with the failed spell I cast when I freaked out.

[photonicfighter]

Cheating isn't a concern when they think it's a matter of security. This isn't a game of some sort.

...and it is what it is. I was hoping that anything strange that happened during the breakout would just be waved off as 'oh, they're aliens'. Apparently, they're smarter than that.

[loyalrebel]

You all did passably better than I've come to expect at being subtle, for whatever that is worth.

The aliens are utterly real in that world, my overlay was knowingly intimately involved with one before getting kidnapped and recruited.

[There's a mental sigh.]

I know that the people they first encountered were only minimally threatening, but there are also far stranger and more dangerous non-earth life forms in existence. I would not be entierly surprised if something terrible had happened previously and they were simply being hypervigilant following it.

[photonicfighter]

...thank you?

I have no doubt that they're real. I just wish that I'd been able to get more information on them while I was there. I'm grateful to be hearing more now, at any rate.

It seems like the reactions of a government that had a bad first contact experience. Still... were any of the aliens that your overlay knew any sort of a threat?

[tookashirototheknee]

Oh, Earth is absolutely the 'panic and lock it up' type, if they're not shooting first and asking questions not at all. Honestly, I'm not looking forward to going back if I ever do. I'll probably get locked up.

... and that is so not fair that I missed aliens on Earth. For eff's sake.

Sorry for the irrelevant comments.

[photonicfighter]

Oh. Oh dear. [She sounds so worried about you, person she does not know.]

Oh, no no, it's alright! It's very relevant! And really, most of us missed the actual aliens on Earth. It's the concert you should be disappointed about missing. It was very nice!