The Primordial Bridge

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Once everything was in order, the ex-slaves and prisoners turned over to Matthew's crew, the freedom fighter gave a hearty goodbye to them as they departed from Vestia, who was left alone now, other than to watch the remainder of the crew, waiting to go back home through Inari.

Inari stood in front of something massive in the Observatory, really the only thing big enough to hold it. It was an incredibly large portal opening that glowed with infinite and brilliant colors that swirled in a tumultuous vortex. In front of this opening was a circular stone slab, the surface of it completely covered in patterned runes as an elegant railing held up only by five different pillars circled its perimeter. Inari smiled at those who came in.

"Unlike your... Creator... friend... We wont't be forcefully tearing apart the fabric of space time to send you immediately back. It's much too risky and puts a heavy strain on the universe that could easily put it back into a Heat-Death reset. No doubt your Creator friend will be hearing from his Counsel soon about it." Inari explained, bowing slightly to them. "Instead, we will be travelling the much longer but much safer route. We're going through Space and Time; behold, the Primordial Bridge."

She looked back at the incredible vortex, smiling. "It will take a few hours, but we won't be harming any of the Fabric. My mirror and your friends will be waiting on the other side."

"The past is a dangerous place. Not even Keepers would touch it." Inari shook her head, "Though it was never tested, we as a species firmly believe in the butterfly effect. What may have been stopped to prevent one death could instill the massacre of millions more in some other way. It may pass on a burden from you only to place it on someone else, or perhaps even place a bigger burden on yourself. It is too much of a gamble that not even the Family would mess with, and if they did, I'd believe them truly gone."

Esk snorted. "You can't ever predict what one or two crazy idiots might do. That's the problem with huge power, the temptation to use it is way too high. I dunno, if the family are willing to destroy whole planets, why not fuck about with the past? What do they care about anyone but themselves? " He waved a hand.

"Perhaps we should return to the vortex now..." Armin spoke quietly.

Asher smiled weakly back at Kay. He knew that the memory of what he'd done would always cause them both a lot of heartache, but at least the pain had become less crushing with time. It still hurt a lot when it was dug up again and again though.

"Yes, let's get back to the vortex before Mourn takes a wrong step," Ethan muttered. "Please," he added, desperation making him uncharacteristically polite.

Skye watched Mourn then looked down at the gathering, watching them dance like humans from medieval times. They were playing a waltz at that moment.

Starr nodded and watched the dragons. "I will remember this, this is what we will fight for."

Merith nodded, taking the reins of the ship again and carefully beginning to float out of the ballroom. When they reached outside, they began to speed up again. The golden glow of the vortex surrounded them...

When they returned, they saw an odd shirt in color far ahead of them. Inari pointed to it, smiling. "Your destination."

Asher nodded. "We'll bring this kingdom back. The star dragons need it."

As they left the kingdom behind, Ellie looked excitedly ahead. "Home?" She asked, hardly daring to believe it.

Ethan relaxed as it became clear that nobody had effected the timestream. Whew.

Kay tensed visibly, clutching Asher's tablet closely to his chest as their destination approached.

Mourn grinned and continued to lean out as they raced through the vortex, cackling at the speed.
This was fun.

Armin held on, bowing his head and murmuring a prayer that their return would be safe and no nasty surprises awaited them. Like Todd.

Matt snorted awake and looked around as they sped up. "huh?"

"You fell asleep." Esk told him flatly.

"oh.. " Matt got to his feet. "are we there yet?"

"Someone smack him in the head for me." Esk sighed.

Luka looked excited, nearly home! nearly there! She'd quite forgotten about the potential problem of Todd still being there or what they might find. Home! well.. their home universe.

Esk watched the colour change as it got closer. "let's hope you lot have a better time removing the stowaway."

Starr looked to Asher and smiled at him gently. "Yes, they do. Someday we will be able to have parties like that again."

James looked nervous at the reminder that Todd would still be on board when they returned. "I should probably talk to him asap, assuming he hasn't left on his own yet," he said, assuming that everyone would know he meant Todd.

Asher frowned. "James, we can't afford to offend him again. He's far too powerful for that." He knew there were probably a few people here who wanted to yell at Todd for what he'd done, but it just wasn't a good idea when he was so many orders of magnitude more powerful than almost anyone here. "I'm certain that what he did to us last time was just a warning, by his standards at least. Next time he'll do something far worse."

James looked at the ground. "I know, Asher. I was the one who made him mad enough to do this. And since I was the one who got him so angry, maybe an apology from me would be the best way to satisfy him. We might be able to evict him by brute force, but do we really want to have a pissed off godlike being on our tail for the rest of our lives? No, we don't. I know I'm usually one for defiance at all costs, but he's obviously happy to take out his wrath on more than just me, and I don't want him to do it again." He added tiredly, "Look, I know it's dangerous. He might just smite me or whatever as soon as he sees me, since he really doesn't like me. But maybe if I take responsibility for what I did and try to apologize, he might listen. I know that's a huge maybe, but don't you think it's worth a try?"

Kay chewed his lip. [I'm not convinced that psychotic brat will accept an apology James, or that it's safe to go anywhere near him.]

"Why don't we let the almost god-like beings deal with it?" Esk suggested. "Maybe they'll be more effective than that clearly useless other creator."

"She's not useless, she just... " Matt shook his head. "I dunno.. couldn't do a lot to stop him. LIke.. trying to stop someone who's as powerful as you... you can't overpower them and having a fight you just make things even worse... "

"She didn't even bloody try." Esk spat.

Shut up Stellan! Kay closed his eyes, angry and hurt as he was, he was trying to be rational about this. He rubbed the bridge of his nose in agitation. [There are too many unknowns. We don't know if he's still there, if everyone else is alright, we don't know even IF we can get rid of him now. In future, I suggest we don't pick up strays and try to help them, they seldom seem grateful for it. ] His eyes flared with rage, he took a deep breath. [But right now, we need a better plan than let's hope he's gone or that he's feeling less pathetically vindictive and will accept apologies he doesn't even deserve. ] He looked up at James tiredly. [It's too much of a risk]

Matt frowned. "What can we do though?"

Kay shook his head. [I have no idea.]

Armin bowed his head. "we pray."

"So anyone got any PRACTICAL suggestions?" Esk looked unimpressed.

Armin frowned, but said nothing more.

Luka frowned. "what... what if there was something more interesting for him? you know... coax him away with something more worth his time. I mean.. we're like insects to these extremely powerful entities, and this one really likes pulling off the wings. But what if.. what if there's something better for him to do, something more satisfying?"

[Wouldn't it be nice to set him against the family and just let them all kill one another.] Kay exhaled deeply.

Luka smiled softly. "There's got to be something a being of that power level and that maturity level might like more than harassing a bunch of insignificant bugs."

"Shit... the lieutenant actually does have a brain after all... " Esk muttered.

Luka scowled at him, and turned to look at Inari and Merith. "You know more about these creators, how do we get him off the ship without violence and without... grovelling?" She looked disgusted by that second option.

James sighed. "Look, I hate groveling just as much as the next guy, but if it's the best way to get Todd off the ship, then I'm willing to try. That said, I'd rather not kowtow to some sniveling brat if I can help it. If there's another way, a way that WON'T result in us all being slaughtered or turned into eternally tortured souls or some shit, I'm all for it."

Asher couldn't quite hide how proud he was. His angry little brother, trying to be responsible and protect everyone! Even if Asher didn't much like the idea of James trying to apologize to that Creator, he still was still delighted by how grown up James was becoming. "I'm sure there's another solution," he said softly, "One that doesn't involve anyone having to apologize to that boy. Luka's right, perhaps we can convince him to leave by giving him more amusing options."
He looked at mirror Inari, recalling her scorn for how her prime duplicate had failed to evict Todd earlier. "I seem to recall you mentioning that you had some idea how to remove him from our ship. Perhaps you can help?"

"Well, you'll have to improve. We've arrived..." Mirror Inari said. The light suddenly came swiftly closer and overtook them...

They'd find themselves in a Vestia observatory. Prime Inari stared at them from behind her mask. She seemed to be staring right at Mirror Inari, who only glowered darkly back.

Both of them remained silent, however, and turned up their noses. Prime Inari bowed. "Welcome home, Vestia's Crew."