12108/What Home Truly Means

What Home Truly Means
Date of Scene:	21 July 2022
Location:	America's Apartment, New York
Synopsis:	America takes Jon to a world where an alternate version of themself had a hand in ruining reality. They talk about the nature of what it means to be a hero and how America manages to stay sane while leaving so many universes to their own devices.
Cast of Characters:	America Chavez, Jonathan Sims

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America Chavez has posed:
    Even interdimensional heroes need a place to call home from time to time and since most of America's 'work' was keeping her in New York, and while distance wasn't much of an issue, it was just more practical to keep her HQ in the city.

    Her apartment is a modest one, well furnished with basic needs: seating, entertainment, servicable appliances, but nothing is too fancy and everything seemed more or less where it sits because that's where she decided it was going to be in the room. There is a certain aire of lazy acceptance in the layout of the room; fung shuei did not equal into America's life much.

    The call from Jonathan Sims had caught her off guard. It wasn't that he was a complete stranger it's just... since the business in Wonderland, she hadn't entirely thought much of the guy. Even so, she had told him where to meet her and was in process of readying her apartment for guests for the first time in... forever. A kettle on the stove, soft, easy music for background environment, and the various articles of clothing picked up and tossed into the bedroom (with the door shut behind it of course) to give the idea of presentability.

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    Jonathan Sims remembers absolutely everything, and he therefore hasn't forgotten America Chavez. Not that he's thought about her a great deal, but every so often he thinks about the time she just punched her way into his old apartment, and she was around for Wonderland, and they ran into each other at Pride. It's one of the hazards of his new life--his social circle is pretty much entirely superheroes or those adjacent, these days. So it was that when he was thinking of who outside the Justice League Dark to contact about multi-dimensional problems, the number in his phone under 'Columbia' was the first that came to mind.

    There's a knock on the door (shave and a haircut), and when opened the Archivist stands there with a smile and a 6-pack of craft beer. He looks... different, somehow, since the last time America saw him. Looser and lighter, for one, more comfortable in and sure of himself. Shoulders straighter, less tension in his posture. It's all subtle, but it might just underlie the fact that he's wearing a bronze ankle-length skirt, Converse sneakers, and a green t-shirt, and his nails are painted bright bubblegum pink. It's a /very/ different look than he's sported in the past.

    Oh, and there's the eyes.

    He's wearing sunglasses and a wide-brimmed hat, which might be accounted for by the temperature being in the 90's, but even with the sunglasses there's a vague hint of a /glow/ coming from his eyes. And America's cosmic awareness can tell there's something... /off/. Something wrong, something that Should Not Be, attached to the Archivist and looking at her out of his eyes. Not Ma'at--the goddess of Truth and Order doesn't just belong in the universe, she is a personification of some of its most fundamental aspects. Ma'at is still there, but something else has attached itself to Jon. Or he's attached himself to something else. It can be hard to tell.

    Nonetheless, just as if he's not sporting glowing eyes and a new, creepy passenger, Jon grins at America brightly when she opens the door, lifting the 6-pack. "I suppose I'm technically contributing to the delinquency of a minor, but I won't tell anyone if you won't. The only person I could even think to tell would be Donna, and I very much doubt she'd care."

America Chavez has posed:
    America does give pause to the strange Other Thing looking through Jon's eyes. She can feel it. Feel its wrongness. Feel its out of place nature. Feel where it comes from and where it should stay. She steps aside and gestures for Jon to come in. "Given that I've shared a beer and more with Donna I don't think she'll be too upset by it. Not to mention I am -technically- an Amazon, and legal drinking age on Themescyria tends to be 'when you can reach the bar.'"

    She closes the door behind her and gestures to the couches and chairs. "Grab a seat" she says before going to the kitchenette and turning off the stove. No need for tea if Jon brought beer. "While you're at it," she adds leaning against the frame between small kitchen and living room, "why don't you tell me why you have a dead god riding shotgun on you?"

    One thing about America Chavez, she doesn't mince words. She can banter with the pros, but when serious business is about... she cuts right to the point. An Old One hanging on to someone she considers an ally definitely qualifies under "serious business."

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    Jon tenses for a moment, clearly taken by surprise that America can just... sense that. Well, damn. But she let him in, and she's not being accusatory, really, so he deliberately relaxes his shoulders and goes to sit down, setting the beer on the coffee table and pulling out one of the bottles.

    "There are Old Ones attacking the Justice League Dark," he says, evidently deciding not to mince words. "They've been using Rien as a gateway to get into this reality somehow, and I've discovered a... connection to them, that originates in another timeline." He sighs. "One of them, who calls itself the Mother of Puppets--although I have reason to believe that's not its real name--has been trying to get control of me for most of my life. It's influenced me before, and it... mmm."

    They manifest a bottle opener and pop the top right off the bottle, then take a long drink before they go on, "It tried to make me kill my girlfriend. But this other one, the Ceaseless Watcher... I've had connection to it in a past life. Or maybe an alternate version of me? I'm not clear on the matter, and that's actually part of why I came to talk to you. But I... sort of... made a deal with the Watcher."

    They reach up to pull off their sunglasses, revealing the bright green glow of their eyes. "It gets to look out of my eyes and feed on whatever fear it can sense through that, and I use its power to fight the other Old Ones. Until we defeat them." They suddenly flash a grin. "The Watcher's stupid, though. I'm going to use it to speed up their defeat. It would've done better to refuse the deal until I was more desperate, I think."

America Chavez has posed:
    America stays in the doorway until Jon removes the glasses. There is a subtle tension in the muscles of her shoulders but it relxes when the eyes are revealed. "Well, that's not noticable at all, is it?" she asks, moving to a chair opposite Jon's position. "You'd think dead things would be more subtle, but..." she shakes her head and referencing something very rude about someone's mother in Spanish.

    She grabs a beer, flicks off the top with a thumb (super strength has practical uses) and leans back to take a draw on the bottle. "And you're sure you've got it under control? I'd hate to have a fundamental pillar of Truth get eaten by The Thing on the Doorstep because you took decided to take a gamble."

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    "I'm certain I have it under control," Jon says, and while his words might not be reassuring, his tone is not full of the kind of hubris one might expect from such a statement. He's not dismissive or condescending; he's speaking as if he takes the matter very seriously. "I'm very much aware of the danger. It surely expects that I'll draw greedily on it for more power over time until I'm under its sway, but for now it's getting what it wants."

    They sigh. "There's a saying in mystical circles--'Magic always comes with a price.' I hate when people say that, sometimes, because all too often they think of it quite literally. Pay a pint of blood, get a certain result. Owe a demon a favor, get this other result. 'I can do anything, if only I'm willing to pay the price.' That, or they take it too far the other way--magic will inevitably corrupt you. Magic will inevitably drain you, leave you alone and friendless and miserable, and that's just the price you pay for the power." They smirk. "Unsurprisingly, the people who take the latter tack tend to be damn selfish magi--even when they think they're helping others, they're still terribly focused on themselves."

    He shakes his head. "Really, I've found, it's somewhere in the middle. It's a warning, and a promise. You /can/ do just about anything you need to do with magic--but you had better be prepared to pay the price. But the 'price' is almost always something... kharmic. Natural consequences of one's actions. Grab at power greedily and without thinking and you'll get tripped up in the fine print you missed in the contract. Use magic when you don't need to, and you'll drain yourself dry. Refuse help from your friends, be unreliable, try to skip out on the consequences of your actions--and you'll find yourself alone and friendless, grasping for connections, miserable even while you're telling yourself that you're not." Clearly he knows some such people. But he shrugs, and moves on.

    "Point being... there will be a price for this. I know there will. I don't know what it is, yet, but presumably something predictably horrific. The Watcher is /not/ subtle, as you've noticed." He gestures at his eyes with a smirk. "Already my girlfriend is afraid to meet my eyes. Already everyone around me mistrusts me and is worried about me. And that emotional distress /alone/ is a price. But I made a choice, and I live with the consequences of that choice. If it turns out to be a mistake, then I know not to do it again. Presuming I survive."

America Chavez has posed:
    America listens intently and rotates the bottle in her fingers by its neck for a moment. A couple more moments pass in silence and then she shrugs a shoulder. "Alright. I mean, your crew tends to handle this sort of stuff on the reg in whatever fashion they form so... I'll leave it to you then."

    She arches a finely groomed brow and asks, "What are you here at -mi casa-, then? Obviously, you don't need me to tell you that it's hanging on. You have that knowledge. And you're not asking for my help in containing it..." she makes a wry face, "Not sure if I could if you were. Mystical stuff isn't my forte. What I do isn't magic it's... more complicated than that. Wiccan can't understand it any more than Kate most of the time so..."

    She hits the bottle again. "What do you need me for?" she restates.

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    "Well, like I said, there's..." Jon hesitates, putting the base of the bottle on his knee and waggling it back and forth for a moment.

    "There is a crack in reality in Oxford," he says finally, frowning past America. His eyes glow a bit brighter. "It's beneath a house I used to live in, the house where my daughter was born. I went back there about a week and a half ago, and we found... echoes of another timeline. Rien d'Arqueness saw through the crack, into something... horrific. I got her statement, and I touched on the other reality, and it was..."

    They shudder. "There were no powers save the Old Ones. No magic, no superheroes, no advanced technology. And very few people knew about the Old Ones, either, so it was just... a lurking threat. A darkness in the world." A soft hum begins to reverberate under his words, slowly rising in volume and tone. "One day you're living your life, going about your business, and then you walk through the wrong door, turn the wrong corner, and you're in one of /their/ realms. Even those who get out rarely get out for good. It's a rare person with an indomitable will that can truly be unafraid of anything, and how many are there of those in a world with no heroes?"

    They barely seem to notice the voice, the hum, the growing glow in their eyes. "The Old Ones were summoned into that world and they fed on the fear of all living within, an unending smorgasbord of terror. Until the Archivist--the other Archivist--stopped it. He had been the one to summon them, but he hadn't meant to. So he took responsibility for his mistake, and ended their reign of terror, but in so doing he released them to other worlds. And they found this one, and attached themselves to one who is Nothing and has no Name, and through her found new victims. New fears to feed on, a world rich with fear. For what need of heroes if your life is not dark and full of terror?"

    They blink, and shudder, and curl in on themself, reaching up a hand to press it to their throat. Then they pick up the bottle of beer and chug it down, draining the rest of the liquid in one go.

America Chavez has posed:
    America blinks at Jon and listens as Jon's voice shifts into the voice of Something Else. "Yeah... I can see you have a perfectly good handle on it..." she says wryly. It was unsettling, that's for certain and she covers up a moment of wary hesitation--not precisely fear but an appetizer for it, for sure--before she nods.

    "I think I'm vaguely familiar with the sort of place you're talking about. There are a number of them out there. I don't go because..." she gestures to herself, "obviously without superheroes I'd stick out more than just a little. But there are a number of them out there for sure."

    She peers at Jon for a moment. "And I think I feel a resonance of who you are or were in another world out there. Not the same you... a different you with a different end. But..." she pauses. "Do you want to go see it?" she asks, draining her own beer and pushing herself to her feet. "I mean, you came all this way, I suppose that's what you're wanting, right?"

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    "That happened before," Jon says, after clearing his throat a couple of times. "It... seems that the Watcher's overlaid my usual statement-giving voice. Sorry about that. It's less that I don't have control over the Watcher as that being the Archivist springs up on me unawares."

    He presses his lips together. "I... would rather ask to see the diamond replica of Manhattan Cael showed me pictures of," he admits. "But I feel I should at least look at it, and find out what I can about what, exactly, is going on. Why did I get memories from that other timeline? Why are /so many/ things the same, but slightly different? Did these Old Ones come from there, or just the idea of them, or...?"

    He reaches up a hand to run it through his hair--he took off his hat a while ago--and sighs. "Maybe none of this even matters, but I get the feeling it might. I feel... responsible for it all, somehow, you know? Because of that other me."

America Chavez has posed:
    "That's right, you and Becker are a thing... I keep forgetting that" America replies, as she sets the empty bottle on the coffee table. "Well... we can take a look at this other world where your energy resonates and then it's just a hop, jump, and a skip to the that mausoleum or shrine or whatever it is--the diamond model--if you want. It's not like it's that far of a trek for me."

    She turns and punches the air behind her where a large star shaped portal of blue-white light replaces the fabric of reality before looking over her shoulder and smiling at Jon. "You don't mind flying do you?" she asks. "The Starling Highway is a road sure... but it's just easier to do long travel in bursts of flight. And from what I can tell this is a bit of a jump and if you want to see some of what it is now versus what it was... time travel is... trickier for me and I don't have to think about it as much if I'm flying it more or less follows me around."

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    Jon responds by smiling widely. "Are you kidding? I /love/ to fly." He stands, shaking out his skirt and snagging up his hat to put it back on. Then he summons up a bit of Ma'at's power, and bright multicolored wings sprout from his back, in blue and teal and gold. "I do try to find /every/ opportunity to do so."

    They take a moment to peer at the portal, then carefully furl their wings in close to their back and go ahead and step on through. It'll be fine, right? He's been through dimensional portals plenty of times before. And America knows what she's doing. Presumably.

America Chavez has posed:
    Beyond the portal is unlike anything Jon has seen. The sky is filled with stars and whisps of blue clouds. But what is more dominant is the shining white-blue walkway running down the middle of it off into the infinite distance. "Welcome to the Starling Highway" America says, stepping in behind him and closing it behind them. The Highway goes on for seemingly infinity in that direction as well.

    "It exists outside of time so any travel on it takes literally no time at all for me. Hence how I get around so quickly by it." She pushes off from the ground and finds herself simply hovering in the air. "I also know where I am at any given time. There's more to explain but I can do so as we go. Come on, let's find your wayward universe."

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    Jon unfurls his wings and launches himself into the air, gliding along with America. Though he does flap those huge wings in long, lazy strokes as he moves, there's a definite sense that it's not the wings doing the flying, really. He's flying more the way America does, but with the wings as a sort of mental focusing tool. Plus, they're pretty.

    "The... Starling Highway? You're the last of the Starlings, yes?" He remembers the conversation they had a few months back. "What makes a 'universe,' anyway? I knew people who seemed to think that escaping to Faerie during the angel business would have saved them--is that true? Or is there a Faerie attached to each of the universes you can reach?"

America Chavez has posed:
    America shakes her head. "No. That's a dimension--like Wonderland. Faeries are separated in your universe. Closed off. I've been to universes where the fae lived aside humans and reality is a mix of technology and magic blended together. Others where the fae were erradicated in a technological war that turned everything into machine run automatomns, others more where the fae won and what is left is a land of confusing magics and goods are exchanged through bargains and compacts."

    She flies along keeping her eyes ahead but looking to the sides of the highway as they go. "A universe is... a collected and contained multi-dimensional construct where a number of entities are given a chance to build, shape, and exist within realtively ordered biomes."

    She spins around and looks behind her at Jon. "My people set designations for them. Numbers. Your world is MU2152020 and your planet Earth-MU2152020. There are others. I've spent a lot of time on Earth-616. I've also traveled to other planets within different universes. Each one has it's own gods. It's own intergalactic policies and its own extra dimensional threats."

    The Starling Highway curves around a bright point to the left, what looks like a quarsar spinning and pulsing with its own vibrant light. "There are also worlds outside of it. My home for instance. Utopia Parallel, was created for the Demiurge to have a close set of family members. People that it could interact with and learn from while still giving the inhabitants free will. It was sort of a testing ground for other races."

    She frowns a bit. "It's... lost to me now. I find specks of it and remains of it here and there. I think it's alright. This wouldn't be here if it wasn't... but the world itself... is closed off." A shrug and she continues along the road.

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    "I know how that feels," Jon murmurs. "Not being able to go home. I was able to revisit the town where I grew up for the first time in over a decade, recently. It was... really nice." A pause. "Came with a side of remembering a bunch of things that had been taken from me, but--reminiscence seems about right for visiting the childhood home, hmm?"

    As they fly, he stops to peer at the spinning quasar and gasps. "Is this... a new universe being born? I can almost feel the life coming into existence. The souls that will populate the place." There's a deep wonder in his voice, as he hovers there, staring at the pulsing light. Swallows, and finally says, "It's all so much... bigger and grander than we can ever imagine. Every time I think--I've seen the birth of my world, the whole of its history, through the eyes of its creator. I'm /still/ processing what I saw. But this... this is /all/ of that, just in this little bit of light."

    They reach out a hand toward the light, though they can't touch it, naturally. "And this world will have its own Faerie--or perhaps not, hmm? But regardless-it never would have worked, what they were trying to do. They'd need to talk to someone like you. Or jump to another timeline, or through a crack in reality."

    With a sigh, they tear themself away--though it's clear they could just happily sit and watch the birth of this new universe, the whole of its life. After all, if this place is outside of time, what does it matter? But there /are/ things to be done. So they turn to fly on after America. "So... presumably there /are/ other ways to travel between universes. Like I said, there's a crack in reality at Hill Top Road in Oxford. It seems to touch more than one universe--maybe all of them? I don't know. Maybe not. Would looking at it be of any help?"

America Chavez has posed:
    "It depends on what it uses as a means to travel. Some things exist outside. The Utopia Parallel, Nullspace, a few other big things... they have their own demenses. I can't interact with them. I can only use what I am able to use," she points to the Highway.

    "So... sure I could look at it and tell you what's using it, but aside from that... I couldn't close it or even go into it without permission likely." She shudders. "Not sure I'd want to go where something else's rules are paramoiunt. Might just have the right mind to unmake me for being an intruder. That'd be unpleasant." Even as she says it there's a grin on her face. A joke. "We're almost there. Just a bit further along. I can feel the resonance growing."

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    "Resonance? Okay, so--could you use /anyone/ to navigate this way? I mean like... could you find any other universe that I'm in, or is this resonance /specific/ somehow?"

    Jon furrows his brow. "Like I said, there's a... connection I feel, but maybe I'd feel it to any world that has a Jonathan Sims. Maybe I'd feel it for some world that has no magic and no Old Ones and I just own a bookstore or something. You know, a romance novel universe, where my husband owns a tea shop across the way and we're rivals." A smirk. "Or one of those universe where faeries took over and I'm trapped by my horrible old mentor in a magic castle turning into a monster. Things like that." Is he joking? Maybe a little.

    "The other me, he... got dragged into the crack. That's what makes me think maybe it's a past life. Maybe not, maybe he just got... I don't know, splintered out across the universe. Trapped in Nullspace. Merged into the Ceaseless Watcher." They shudder, not liking /any/ of those thoughts, and mutter, "Poor bastard."

America Chavez has posed:
    America frowns. "I'm sort of following both your energy and the energy of the thing attached to you. So... yeah... I could use anyone... to find a world that has them in it. This is different though... maybe because of what you said... maybe not. What I am honing in on is the last signature that energy... you and the thing you're attached to... shared. It was... only a few years back for them... 2019, if I'm not wrong."

    She slows and stops to look at something to the side. "There... you can't see it, but it's... red... bad. Danger." She looks at Jon. "You're sure you want to see it? There's a reason I don't go into red exits. Sometimes I'm not sure if even -I- could get out. This one... probably, the danger is passive. More the nature of the world rather than any directly aggressive actors."

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    Jon does hesitate for a moment, hovering there on the Highway. He doesn't have to see it with his own eyes. He got the statement from Rien, and that's almost as good as. But still--maybe he'll see something Rien didn't, or /couldn't/. Maybe America will.

    "They're coming after my friends," he says, firmly, fiercely. "They're coming after /Cael/. And if they defeat us, all of reality's next. Not just this universe--/every/ universe. We have to stop them, every time, or they win."

    They straighten, and square their shoulders. "Show me," they say, in a tone America probably knows all too well. A tone of command.

America Chavez has posed:
    Jon doesn't fall into the realm of people America will follow, but she can respect the leader of one operation as a peer. She nods and punches the wall. There is a red rippling out from an invisible barrier and then it falls away in the same blue-white star shape to reveal a hellish landscape beyond.

    They step out next to a rustic cabin. The building is rather quaint and might even be considered cozy if not for everything beyond it. The land beyond is segmented into chessboard like divisions and each division is ruled by something horrific.

    Jon can -feel- the fear pouring up from the land. It's a veritable feast for the Ceaseless Watcher and there is a pull to the south. To a giant tower that dominates the skyline. A seat of power. A panopticon for the entire world, ruled by terror.

    America's jaw is set as she looks out over it all. "This is... disgusting" she says, spitting something foul tasting out of her mouth, bile perhaps. "This poor world."

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    For a moment, Jon is very nearly overwhelmed by the flood of fear, the images that rush through him to the Watcher. He can't /quite/ grasp at most of it--he's not properly prepared for it, or meant for it. But he remembers what it felt like for that other Archivist, and he clenches his teeth.

    He deliberately turns his back on the tower and walks toward the cabin. "It feels..." He reaches out a hand, presses a hand to the wood. Images flood his mind, of time spent in this cabin, another Jonathan Sims and another Martin Blackwood. A happy time, and then a horrible time, where the joy of feeling safe and being together cracked and split into this horrific hellscape, when that Archivist doomed this world.

    "They were happy here. Sort of. Even in the midst of horror." They swallow. "He's out there, somewhere, I think. Trying to save the world. Probably afraid he'll have to die to save everyone else." They laugh, half-bitterly. "I know the feeling." A pause. "I don't think he can see us, though. The Watcher, it--protects us, I think."

    Then he frowns, and his voice deepens. "No. It wouldn't do for the Eye to lose all the terror the Archivist can provide, now would it? To give them /hope/. Oh, no. Can't have /that/."

America Chavez has posed:
    America frowns as Jon's words slide into the tone of the Old One he's controlling. "That is really disconcerting you, know? Sort of the point though isn't it... -mierda-" she says shaking her head. "This isn't a past life..." she says. "This happened not long ago for your world too. Like I said, 3 years, give or take a few months. So unless you're only three years old... this is just an alternate world for you."

    She strides over and stands next to Jon. "I've been to worlds that have different Avengers. Different Titans. I'm friends with Lady Katherine of Bishop, who looks exactly like Kate of the Titans except she likes to wear lavender gowns and speaks with an Old English dialect."

    She smirks. "When I was young, I was friends with a Doctor Strange who was Defender of the Multiverse in his world. A keeper of Gateways and passages beyond. Sort of his... sidekick, I guess. Nothing like the Strange in your world."

    "What I'm trying to say is that... you belong where you call home. This -isn't- where you're from" she says gesturing behind them, "you're from there. It's just... these things that linger here. That fed here, they are also in our world. Not really surprising. There are a lot of similarities in a lot of the varied universes. Like Lady Katherine or Defender Strange."

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    "I thought maybe there was... I don't know." Jon gestures behind them. "That place is outside of time. The Old Ones are outside of time. If they left this universe, they could have re-inserted themselves before I was born. Even toward the beginning. The Spider's been after me since I was young. I just thought... maybe... I don't know."

    A pause. "I suppose it felt... right to be fixing his mistakes. I feel responsible, even if he's not... me, exactly. He /could/ be me, you know? What I can feel of him, I can recognize the kinship. The could-have-been."

    He turns to look south, toward London and the giant tower that dominates the landscape. "What happens to him? Happened to him, I suppose. Do you know? Can--can you find out?"

America Chavez has posed:
    America shakes her head. "Not long after this point his line just... disappears. He was here and then he wasn't. Maybe theone of the Old Ones ate him? Or maybe he's in another world entirely, where he owns a bookshop and this Martin owns a tea shop next door?" She gives Jon a sympathetic look.

    "The world survives. I know that much," she says. "Gets better. Becomes" she shrugs, "normal or well... normal for it. Pretty mundane by our standards. No heroes, no monsters--except the criminal kind."

    "I can take you there too if you want. After this is all done with." She looks like she wants to place a hand on their shoulder but stops herself. She doens't know them -that- well, and friendliness has boundaries.

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    For a long moment, Jon stares toward the south, brow faintly furrowed, glowing eyes distant, expression unreadable. For a long moment, he fights the urge to fly down there and intervene. Stop what he knows is going to happen. Find a way to fix the world /without/ sacrificing anyone. Wouldn't he have welcomed that, if someone had shown up in the middle of the siege of Manhattan?

    Then he shakes his head, and turns away. "If they aren't used to beings like us--I wouldn't want to accidentally cause an incident. I'm pretty hard to hide." He uses his glowing green arm to gesture at the glowing eyes, with a smirk. "I think the Archivist's done quite enough damage to this world already, don't you?" The tone is... bitter. Frustrated.

    After a moment, "How do you not... you can go anywhere. You could fix anything. Don't you... want to? Help all these failed universes? How do you justify..." He stares toward the tower again and then turns away, shaking his head.

    "Let's go back."

America Chavez has posed:
    America nods and punches the air once more. It takes a bit longer for the star to materialize and the Starling Highway to appear this time. A testament to how much control the Old Ones have over reality here. She leaps to safety and offers a hand to Jon to help them cross over before erasing the gateway.

    "I could do that..." she says as they fly back up the highway. "But that world isn't doomed. It goes through a terrible ordeal, and then comes out of it okay because of the people who are there. We have..." She takes a breath. "I help worlds that can handle what I can do. Who -want- my help. It's all I can do."

    She gestures behind them. "I could go there to that world and put a stop to all it went through. But what if the only solution to save them all is to kill someone? TO kill the other Archivist? You'd pick me--a twenty year old woman--to be judge, jury, and executioner for the entire multiverse?"

    She shakes her head. "I can't... I won't do that. Someone with my power, starting down that path only leads to the worst of realities for everyone."

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    Jon sighs as he comes through the portal and looks around the Starling Highway. He firmly keeps his back to the portal, ignoring the pull of the Watcher, desperately wanting to go back to all that fear.

    "Cut that out," he mutters. "We made a deal, remember? If we can't fight the others, then you don't get to use me anymore."

    Rolling his shoulders, he looks to America. "Trust me, I understand the dangers. I /am/ judge, jury, and executioner for certain entities in my universe, and that's a /tremendous/ burden. So I'm not saying--I mean, I left." Which is as much as an admission that he'd /considered/ intervening. "I just mean..."

    He presses a hand to his chest. The left one. The real one. "How do you stop it /hurting/ so much? Gods. It's--it's not /fair/."

America Chavez has posed:
    America is quiet for a moment as they travel through the lit passage. "After a while... you have to trust that the Demiurge provided superheroes to worlds that need them and did not provide superheroes to other worlds because they weren't needed." She looks contemplative as she keeps her eyes down the road. "We--all of us--are a counterbalance to those who would do irrevocable harm to the universe if allowed to succeed. I... aid in tipping the scales a bit for some universes that -need- it."

    She shakes her head, long dark curls falling around her shoulders, and then sliding back from wind resistance. "I'm not God. I met them when I was younger and I am -not- them. But they gave me a piece of advice and I think I can give it to you to help here."

    She looks over to Jon. "Only help where I feel that it is -necessary.- To save another's life. To put an end to irrevocable pain. To stop the destruction of all things. Your thing... I think I understand what you're supposed to do, and it doesn't really deal with mortals, does it? You judge things higher. So... let us super heroes handle the mortals... you handle everything up above that pay grade. -Comprende?-"

    She focuses again on the road ahead. "I expect if some Dark Starling--*no, Dios mio*--ever showed up and decided to do the opposite of what I do... I'd expect you to step in if it was needed. But then again, there are a lot of heroes out there who could take me down and do it without killing too so... maybe not."

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    "I suppose I need to remember that Jonathan Sims, the doctor, the one who took the Hippocratic Oath... died. He died saving Caitlin Fairchild from Saint Michael. He died willingly, and I /know/ he doesn't regret what he did."

    Jon sighs. "But, then--I was taught not to perform unecessary surgery, to prescribe unecessary drugs. 'That I will exercise my art solely for the cure of my patients.' I forget that sometimes, I'm so determined to try to /fix/ things, to help people." A smirk, and then a chuckle. "To control the world, I suppose. But the world cannot be controlled."

    A glance at America. Then, "I met God once. The Presence, or what-have-you. After I died. I'm not certain They gave me much advice, unless it was... well... the same thing They gave you. They do not intervene, because intervention by Their hand could result in unintentional consequences. Sort of Their version of 'magic always comes with a price,' and all."

    They frown a moment. They haven't really thought about that... at all, since it happened. They have, in fact, tried very hard to /forget/ that whole business. They were in so much pain, and had so much anger, and then they went to Duat and there was so much else going on...

    "'You are the one My Daughter chose for Her part in this contest. It is clear She did not choose in error.'"

    God Themself had said Jon had been the right choice to be Champion. So why does /he/ still not quite believe it? That he's not a horrible fuckup?

    "Are you sure there isn't some kind of... kharmic resonance across universes?" Jon glances back, behind him, toward the universe they'd visited. "Or is all my self-doubt just the product of a bad childhood?"

America Chavez has posed:
    "Jon," America says, a smirk on her face. "I'm twenty years old. I've been at this since I was fourteen. That's six years. I'm going to tell you something that only maybe three people know..." she fixes him with a dark gaze. "It's a big secret so you can't go sharing it with everyone okay?"

    She flies in closer and leans over to whisper in his ear. "I don't have all the answers to the universe" she pulls back and nods sagely. "I know it's a big surprise that a twenty year old whose only been an interdimensional hero for six years doesn't have all the experience in the world... but it's the honest truth."

    She sobers. "Maybe so... but my opinion on it? You mess up a child bad enough and that splash can cause ripples all down the river."

    She slows and stops, dropping to the highway with a small dislacement of blue stardust. "This is us. Any more great revelations you want from someone fifteen years your junior?"

Jonathan Sims has posed:
    Jon smirks at America. "My daughter is thirteen and knows more about magic than most people in the world. She understands it intuitively in a way I still struggle with--because she grew up with it. So... who knows what the schools are like in the Utopia Parallel? I figure you're like a Time Lord, you know? A young Time Lord, maybe, but a Time Lord."

    After a moment, he adds, "Also, you've been a hero for more than six times as long as I have, so..." He shrugs.

    He considers America for a moment, still hovering in the air. "I work with young people a lot. I find that people of all ages can have wisdom, and knowledge, and insight worth listening to. A young child may not know much about the world, but they look at it with a clear gaze and curiosity, and see things we old people overlook." He smirks at calling himself 'old.' Yes, mid-30's is 'old.'

    He finally touches his feet back down to the ground, furling his wings. "I just mean... maybe you're 20, maybe you've only been doing this for six years, but you seem quite competent. Your heart is in the right place. That's more than a lot of people twice /my/ age can say." He reaches out to clap her on the shoulder.

    After a moment, "Thank you. Really. Even if we couldn't do anything--it's good to know. And I think I understand things a bit more, now. Cael was right, for the most part." A smirk. "She usually is."

America Chavez has posed:
    America smiles at Jon almost meeting his gaze at her own impressive height of six feet. She smiles. "-De nada-" she says to the appreciation. "And -gracias- as well. For the compliments."

    She turns and kicks the star portal this time into existence. Once the fragments of blue-lit reality fade, it reveals the door to Jon's apartment. "Figured I'd save you cab fare, or wing fare as it were, by dropping you off."

    It begs the question how she knows where Jon lives now that he's moved, but maybe that's just part of what she is. "I'm keeping the beer though. Not like I can buy it myself yet," she says, with a wink.