1791/Two Worlds, Two Mothers

Two Worlds, Two Mothers
Date of Scene:	25 July 2024
Location:	Plot Room 4
Synopsis:	Takashi picks Glimmer up from Paris, and the two of them also end up talking about their respective family situations.
Cast of Characters:	Takashi Agera, Glimmer Brightmoon

---

Takashi Agera has posed:
    A while back, Glimmer had... requested help getting back from Paris. She'd texted Takashi a meme-image indicating Beryl was dead, before that, but now she was done spending that time with Bow and Sayaka and needed to return home.

    For the moment, it wasn't Riventon that she'd be met by, but Takashi Agera - holding up a hand and waving as she stepped from the hotel she was waiting by.

    "It's just you around, right?" Takashi asked, speaking some of the only Japanese on the paris streets. Hopefully, Glimmer knew not to tie Riventon and Takashi together too directly in the normal world.

Glimmer Brightmoon has posed:
Glimmer Brightmoon had sent a very specific text. *Witch emoji.* *Gravestone emoji.* *Dancing emoji.*

Then another. 'Hey, my phone is dying, I'm over at XXX and XXXX. Send someone, okay?'

Hadn't been much after that. She'd met with his contact... and, eventually, she met with Takashi to head home.

She was in her henshin, however. Gloria Sunhawk. The greatest thug of all time. "Of course," Glimmer said with a smirk. "The others actually left already. I'm... kiiiiind of out of juice at the moment, though." She snapped her fingers. Not that she could use magic like this anyway. But, you know, if she could. "Turns out? That woman? She's just awful. Worst queen ever. But she's gone now. Saw Bow and Sayaka and... yeah. That uhhh... that was... nice... kind of. I ummmm..."

"... So, um. Hooooow are we getting home? I don't really know how international travel stuff works here."

Takashi Agera has posed:
    "We're taking a plane. I don't know if they'll let me pull youma soon without a boss to technically work under so I need to ration energy. And as it stands I've got a lot more cash than I do energy saved up - I spent a fair bit of it sending you here in a hurry, do remember - so flying's the way." he explains.

    Now that she was gone, Takashi didn't exactly feel like he needed to avoid badmouthing her to his subordinates, or to anyone else for that matter. "Yeah, she was a terrible person/monster/thing." he agrees. "I'm not sure what it means for us - for you and me and our little group - but... it's better for the world that the problem is dealt with." he agrees.

    "Obsidian's already cleaned up what was left of her 'queendom' so soon it'll be like she never existed at all." he notes, before they get into a cab and head to the airport. No private jet for them, but Takashi at least sprung for first class. He needed the leg room. "So you finally got to have a chat with your favorite sparkleboy? Not on the battlefield?" Any other chats she might have had, Takashi either didn't know about or didn't file as important. "How did that go? How's he doing without that chip in his neck?"

Glimmer Brightmoon has posed:
Glimmer Brightmoon followed along behind him. She nodded, but didn't speak much. If anything, she seemed kind of... reserved. "Yeah... so... yeah," Glimmer mummbled. "It was... nice, I think. At the time I thought he was dead. So... he wasn't. That was nice. Him... not being dead, I mean. Other than that? It's kind of..." She trailed off, trying to come up with a proper response.

".... He really likes this Sayaka girl. I... get it. She's sweet. Apparently the two play music together. She'd... make a good knight." There was more to it than that, though. But she didn't want to speak about it. She was... really quiet. Not nearly as jumpy. "Sorry. Just... tired. Don't feel very good, too. Been glitching a lot."

"... Thanks for helping me get out here. And don't worry, I haven't forgotten my side of the deal."

Takashi Agera has posed:
    Takashi nodded. "Well, generally friends being not-dead is better than friends being dead." he agrees, a bit solemn. He can tell something's got her down. "Oh, I know of a Sayaka. Generally. She gave me a hand once, in fact. She's alright for a sparkle. She put up with Hinoiri for a long time so she's probably going to be fine for your friend."

    "Glitching... how?" he asks, leaning closer. That's more relevant to him. "And look, on the subject of people not being dead, I'm glad you're not. Even if it meant you nearly burned my eyes out doing whatever you did that made your crystal glow like a floodlamp." he notes. "We can get to that when we're back at the offices - no reason to have you spend the whole plane ride on that. You look... tired, yeah. You should nap on the plane - it's a long flight."

Glimmer Brightmoon has posed:
Glimmer Brightmoon blinked a few times. "Hinoiri... she's the... angry girl, right? People talked about? I didn't really meet her. But huh. Good that she's, well, good. Bow... deserves someone like that."

"As for glitching, well... it's like.... my teleports don't worry, I guess. I keep getting little shocks when I'm using magic. I'm currently out of magic, anyway, so it's not really... a big deal? It'll go away on its own. Probably. Last time, She-ra had to fix me but well... I doooon't think that can really work right now."

"... It'll probably go away on its own, anyway. I just had to do this thing where like, I got... put into a mirror by Phantom and like... made a... thing? I don't know."

"... But I'm really just tired. How long is the plane trip? I'd love a few hours of sleep..."

Takashi Agera has posed:
    Takashi chuckled. "She's the angry sun girl, yeah." he nods. "Now she doesn't have any powers though, so you're unlikely to run into her." he says. "I helped Sayaka out once and she didn't stab me, so that's a pretty good mark in my book."

    Takashi turns to look at Glimmer. "If She-Ra could fix you I'm sure I can fix you." he says, as confidently as anything. "You can wait it out if you want. Dark Energy did weird stuff to She-Ra so it may do weird stuff to you - it seems to affect people pretty differently, so I assume that's even more true for offworlders." He kind of wants to test Glimmer as a sort of experiment, but he's sure she wouldn't appreciate that. "...Phantom and his crew usually throw people into mirrors to turn them into youma - did he turn you into a youma?" he asks. "...I guess he also uses them to keep Pretty Cures off the battlefield more permanently, but... I dunno, you'll have to talk me through it later." he says, stretching in his chair.

    "The good news is, it's a nonstop flight. The bad news is, it means we'll be in the air for about... thirteen hours." he admits. "But honestly, all of this nonsense with Beryl - I could use the time to sleep. It's like thirteen hours where I simply can't work, so maybe I'll actually relax..."

Glimmer Brightmoon has posed:
Glimmer Brightmoon gave a small nod. "Yeah... I'm just gonna try and rest it off. If I'm still like this in a week without getting any better and once I recharge? Sure, you can experiment on me." Pause. "No trying to open me up or anything, though. I'm not a robot to be re-wired," she said firmly.

"Hu, so the mirrors are like.... a weird prison? Didn't.... seem very good at it. I wasn't... well, stronger. But I was kind of re-charged? But I don't really remember everything I did like that so.... who knows? Maybe it was pretty bad."

Glimmer paused, her mouth opening a little when he mentioned just how LONG they'd be there. "Thir. Teen. Hours? Oh my gosh... I can do so much napping..." she whispered. "We can relax.... so hard core..." .... Hard core relaxing. How... how did that even work?

Takashi Agera has posed:
    Takashi scowled. "I'm a scientist, not a mad scientist." he notes. Though many might well disagree. "I don't intend to open you up. It's all magic and energy based stuff. Hell, for all I know, your chakras are just out of alignment." he notes.

    Takashi muses. "Well, I haven't experienced it myself, nor do I intend to. Just like how magical girls can manipulate their energy in a lot of ways, so too can we." he admits.

    "You know, I have no idea how one relaxes hardcore, but it does have its appeal, yeah." he admits, as he kind of leans back and decides, for the first time in a while, it's safe to rest. There's no work he should be doing, no plans he can make without so many unknowns, and no boss to worry about displeasing. It's a recipe that might allow for a more restful sleep than the boy has had in at least a year.

Glimmer Brightmoon has posed:
Glimmer Brightmoon gave a small nod. "Hmmmm. Chakras. Yessss. I think... Perfuma mentioned those. I don't think I have them, though. We'll figure it out."

It wasn't long before... The pair of them were on the plane. And he may not know what 'hardcore' napping was. But, he would at least understand that it involved someone sleeping for almost thirteen hours straight, resting their head on his shoulders and not even snoring. Probably the longest stretch of peace and quiet he'd ever had from her.

Of course, it wouldn't last. Because it wasn't much longer after they arrived back at Obsidian, that he'd see her going by while he was getting coffee in the breakroom...

And then eventually turn back around, going the other way towards his office again, now holding a hammer. Huh. Wonder what that was about.

Takashi Agera has posed:
    On the one hand, his arm fell asleep from her laying on it. On the other hand, he stilll moved it only slightly to avoid waking her up. She was exhausted, and she was quiet, and it let Takashi think. And rest. And for a lot of that stretch Takashi slept too.

    Eventually, coffee in hand, he watched Glimmer walk by as he was taking a break from a project - and then, coffee falling from hand and having to be shot into a trash can by a Dark Barret orb because he realizes what he had stopped in the middle of doing and where Glimmer was going - transforming as he ran.

    Riventon burst into his office, intent on saving his project, and was prepared to blast Glimmer to do so. It was actually Axion that tone the incoming shot down from a more dangerous one. <<SCHLEIMSCHUSS.>> it called and instead of the usual blast of high pressure black ink, a small blast of more visculous gooey ink rocketed through the air. One might normally expect Glimmer to reactively dodge it but she was still under the glitching state - which meant it hit her arm and pinned her to the wall with sticky tar.

    Riventon looked at Axion, then Glimmer, then the desk. "What the hell were you doing with that hammer? This tech is valuable!" he said, snatching up the precious little sliver of metal, a rare offworld trinket of magitech.

Glimmer Brightmoon has posed:
Glimmer Brightmoon yelped when he burst into the room, turning to him... Hammer raised and--

He blasted her! She yelped, and her other arm was snagged, pinning it against the wall. She blinked a few times, before ineffectially flailing her hammer AT the chip. "Grrrrr! What are you doing? Have you lost your mind? She's dangerous! You need to break that chip before she pulls something REALLY stupid and tries to blow up this planet too!"

"Do you have any idea what that chip IS?! How DANGEROUS it is? I DO! I've seen the damage it can do! He tried to use one ON MY FATHER! It nearly destroyed half of my friend's minds! That's before even CONSIDERING Light Hope!" she yelled at him.

Takashi Agera has posed:
    Takashi blinked. "What? It's a damn machine." he says. "The intelligence inside it is contained." he clarifies. "Light Smoke or whatever can't affect anything, she's just a research subject - and the fact that it's dangerous is the whole reason I need to study it." he clarifies.

    "Look, the sparklesquad had one of these, for a while. They could have made more. They threatened to use this one on Catra!" he exclaims. "So I need to be able to figure out how it works so I can stop it." he says. And so he can emulate it. From electrical impulses to magical energy to mental signals, it was just such a wealth of information on how to manipulate the chain of energy.

    "I'm not going to let the AI inside talk to anybody unless I can get it under control, but look. It's complicated and way above our world's ability but in the end it's just a machine, and I can control any machine intelligence. Do you know what it would be capable of if we could control it? It could advance my plans so rapidly. Right now it's got its own agenda - but an AI's agenda is like anything else. It's code. Numbers. It can be changed. It can be made to work for us - for me." he says.

    "Also you can't just walk in here and smash things, Glimmer! I haven't smashed your cat so I could get a proper look at your crystal, you could at least give me the same damn courtesy I give you! I'm dangerous, you're dangerous, Melog is dangerous, your crystal is dangerous - that's no reason to go around smashing things." he yelled back. "Do you know how much time and effort you could have cost me?!"

Glimmer Brightmoon has posed:
Glimmer Brightmoon growled, flailing her hammer a few more times... before finally letting it go. She then gave a soft sigh and let it fall. "First of all. No. They wouldn't. Bow, least of all. He might threaten but he would *never* do that. You have *no* idea what those things are like. They FUSE with a person. Eventually, they're permanent. I can guarantee they didn't copy them and if I ever find out they did? I'll destroy them myself."

She then glanced at the chip. "She may be an AI but she is incredibly dangerous AI. She has one goal. One simple goal. The destruction of *everything*. She is only very slightly better than Horde Prime. The moment she finds an out, she'll use it. She almost destroyed our world. She cause so, so much trouble."

"But... fine. FINE. Just... keep it away from me. And don't you dare *ever* try to put it on anybody, Takashi. That thing... that thing is more dangerous than even you know and you know a lot. But you're also a lot like Entrapta and this is exactly the kind of thing Entrapta would make us regret her having."

Takashi Agera has posed:
    Takashi listens to Glimmer and sighs. He sighs and he sits down on the edge of his desk facing her. "Alright, you've made your point. I won't destroy it - but I will treat it with exceptional care." he says, his hands in his lap. "And I don't just mean like, care relative to me. I mean I'll be very careful with it and never let it have direct access to anything or to anyone." he offers.

    "I'm only interested in it for the scientific value, for the knowledge. I won't ever attach this thing to any living thing; not a person, not a cat, not a bug." he says.

    "And I won't ever let the AI inside out directly. If I want to converse with it I'll do it only in small chunks at a time - in copies that don't retain the main code's full capabilities in any way." he continues. "I'll treat it the way other people should treat Dark Energy."

    "I can tell how serious you are about this, I can tell how much it bothers you. But not everything that's dangerous needs to be destroyed unquestioningly without trying to get some positive value out of it... if it's capable of all that, it should be at least partly capable of some good, some information turned to something valuable. I won't use it foolishly or connect it to anything where it might escape, though." he offers. "I mean it, I promise, I'll be extremely careful with it." Last thing he wants is the universe destroyed or himself taken over.

    "... why do you keep comparing me to whatever an Entrapta is?" he asks, after a moment. "What even is an - actually, come to think of it, you still owe me an explanation since I shunted you all the way over to Paris." he adds, crossing his arms.

Glimmer Brightmoon has posed:
Glimmer Brightmoon sighed and then tugged on her arm. "Yeah... fine. So long as you keep to all of that? Then fine. Just... remember. Dangerous. She is. Soooo much. Don't. Underestimate her."

She then glanced to the Moonstone. "And... fine. I'll... tell you everything. But first..." She pointed to her bound arm. "I kind of need you to..."

Once he let her go, she walked over to sit on the desk, legs crossed... And didn't try to smash it.

"So, Entrapta was a genius back home. Incredibly smart, helped save the world. Understood tech better than anyone I know, created space suits ,fixed an old spaceship that was from a bygone era thousands of years ago..."

"And the dumbest person I ever knew. She got so attached to science, robots, getting as much knowledge of things as she could, she forgot about the people she ran over, the people who got hurt, the destruction her inventions could cause. She got so excited creating a new robot that could, maybe, defeat She-ra... that she forgot WHY She-ra was fighting the Horde to begin with. Good girl, one of my friends, but she needed... direction."

"As for well... what I've been hiding from you?" She stood up then, leaning back, against the desk, rocking back and forth on it a bit. "How to start... Right. Soooo... you know how I said Catra killed my mom? You know, pulling that lever, my mom had to sacrifice herself to save it, trapping herself, eternally, in a no-where dimension. Leaving me to run the kingdom, without her?"

Takashi Agera has posed:
    Riventon shakes his head. "It's an entirely different discipline of technology than the alien technology I'm used to working with." He explains, patting his gauntlet. "I'll be studying it for a while before it's even close to field-test-in-theory-ready." he tells her.

    He still takes the chip and disappears it into his lab coat after he 'pops' out of his henshin.

    Takashi blinks as Glimmer talks about Entrapta, nods, and decides to think better of expressing how different he is than this person. Probably a more effective strategy.

    Takashi nods at Glimmer. "Yeah, part of why being stuck on our backwards magic-free planet has actually been such a vacation for you despite you know. Obsidian Versus The SparkleSquad." he says. "And why you're having a hard time making anything happen with Catra, yeah I remember." In fact he's tried to keep the two of them physically separate to reduce the chances of a fight breaking out between two of his employees.

Glimmer Brightmoon has posed:
Glimmer Brightmoon gave a small nod. "Yeah. It wasn't... easy. I wanted to kill her for so long, strangle her. But... we all mess up, you know? I thought I never.... I thought I'd never be able to forgive her. I *hated* her. She took... so much from me. But... Catra... put her life on the line to save me. When it all came to the end, when it mattered the most? She was... there for Adora. For me."

"... I forgave her then. I let it go. Seeing her like this? Now? It kind of hurts. And I want to hurt her. I want, so bad, to hurt her again for everything she did. The Catra she is right now? I HATE! She killed my mother... Or... she had..."

"... But it's my fault," she finally muttered. "You see, I found... a way. To save my mother. When we had won the war. When we stopped... when we stopped Horde Prime. I found... something he'd made. When he... when he ruled. It was... it was some kind of... weird... dimensional... thing. But I was able to use it. I was able to get to where my mom was."

And now? She smiled. Little tears in her eyes. "I remember seeing her. I *saw* her. I was able to tell her that... that dad was alive. That he'd survived. That I was queen. I-I got to see her." And she just kept rocking, a few more tears trickling down her face. "She... she was so proud of me. I told her... e-everything. The war. Catra. Hordak. That there was peace. And then? Then I hugged her. You... you know what it's like... to never... to hug someone you never thought you'd see again? I was so *terrible* to her before I lost her. I was such a little *monster*. And I got another chance. I hugged her and I never wanted to let go. But..."

"I was trapped. Between dimensions. For a while. I don't know how long. An hour. A day. A month. A year. But... but I was trying to find a way out. And I did. I found the Moonstone." She glanced to it.

"And I grabbed my mom and I... left." She pushed off the desk and walked to it, placing a hand against the stone. "And I took her with me. And she's trapped inside it now. I can feel it. It's why I have to recharge again. I'm still... connected, as I once was. But there's my mother. Drawing her power from inside it. But I don't know how to get her out. I don't even know if I *can* get her out. But... but I have her now. She's closer to me than... than she has been in years..."

She turned and placed her back against the stone before sinking to the ground, sitting.

"And all it cost me was everyone's happy ending. Catra's memories are a mess. Bow doesn't remember my confession and now he has a new girlfriend. Scorpia's... I don't even know. Our world is now connected with yours in the weirdest way. And it's all... It's all wrong."

"... And I did it. I did all of it... Everything... is my fault."

Takashi Agera has posed:
    Takashi Agera sits, uncharacteristically quiet, not interrupting, not even making comments; he just listens to Glimmer as she tells him the whole story - a story of loss and gain and victory only to be turned around and for her to lose it all at the end chasing just a little more of a victory.

    "Damn." he says, when he finally speaks. That's all. He folds his hands into his lap and looks down, before he finally continues. "...I get it, though." he says. "I... know that sounds like a bunch of crap since I've never gone through all of that, but risking all of it for your mother, I can kinda get it."

    "...I've never known my mother? Like. I grew up without one. My mother died when I was born, and my father - well, they weren't married so he didn't claim me and I just kind of ended up in an orphanage." he explains. "I'd give a lot to know my mother. To have a mother. It's hard not to be jealous of everyone who does. But at least I never had her like... ripped from my hands as part of a war."

    He sighs. "My mother kept documents, she was a scientist too - it's her science, her work that made me who I am. Her stuff is all encoded, in ciphers, and I can only break it down a bit at a time, and the amount of work I expend just to be able to read her writing... just to have a tiny, tiny bit of her that I can share in, just to know her a little bit from her work? I put a ton of work into it. If there was a chance to speak with her again, I'd probably do all sorts of crazy, dangerous stuff for it."

    "Like... I've risked a lot, getting ahold of the documents and artifacts of her I have. My life and more. Just to try to one day read her writing. So... I do get it."

    He looks over at the crystal. "To know your mother's right there, but you can't talk to her, and to know you're stuck on a foreign planet, in a dangerous place... just... damn." he says, shaking his head.

    "...I don't think you should tell anyone else, no. If Obsidian finds out they'll know they have the leverage to make you do anything." he notes. "If your friends find out they might try to attack us to get the crystal, and since even you and I together can't move the damn thing - they won't be able to, and what, are they gonna fight everyone in Obsidian? That's a losing battle, especially on our turf. The battle against Beryl alone was a nail biter, I've heard."

    "So... yeah I think you're doing the right thing by keeping all this secret. Even the stuff you've already told me is a real head turner. I think it's best if nobody else knows the rest." he admits. And then he gets up and walks over. "I'll help you where I can, though. I really will. I hope we can get your mother out of there one day and get you back home." Because, well... one, it felt like the right thing to do. And two? Takashi knows he'd be indebtted to anyone who helped him meet his mother, he figures if he can save Glimmer's - he'll always have an ally to some degree.

Glimmer Brightmoon has posed:
Glimmer Brightmoon gave a small nod. "Yeah. My... my dad... I thought he was dead. When I was just... when I was a baby. He died, or so we thought, in the war. Turned out he was trapped on this place called beast island. I didn't... I didn't find out until later. That he was alive."

"I finally got to meet him. You know how I met him? One of those chips. On his neck. I had to fight him. The greatest sorcerer to have ever lived. And I had to fight him, because Horde Prime had tried to take him from me."

And now, at least, he could possibly better understand WHY she hated them so much.

"... My mother... never knew. She thought he was dead. She told me... she was always so afraid to lose me, too. Afraid I'd get hurt. That I'd... That I'd leave... I'd be gone. And she'd... be alone..." More tears drifted down her face.

"I-I was so terrible to her. S-she was the immortal queen, you know? Because of her, I-I was the weak princess. T-the one who had to recharge. To... to need others. I-I couldn't p-protect my kingdom alone. I-I'd never rule. And then... then she was gone..."

She hugged her knees to her chest. "Once it happened... I'd do anything.... everything... j-just to have her again. J-just... to hear her again. I'd listen to the recruitment videos we made. Mom made me so embarrassed in them. Heh... heh heh..."

"... Why don't you tell me about your mother's research? It might... help. I doubt I'll understand it... but... you know. You never know. And... don't worry. I don't intend to tell anyone. Well... except... maybe Bow. If anyone could understand..." If anyone could, it'd be him...

For now, though, she just... needed to cry a little bit. And let the tears flow.

Takashi Agera has posed:
    Takashi nods. "You can talk to me, yeah. It's good to have someone you can talk about it too, helps you keep it down from everyone else. I dunno about Bow but you know him better than I do so I'll let you be the judge." he says, though he still had that tone that made it sound like it was clear he thought it was a bad idea.

    "I hate to say it and sound like as big a jerk as people usually make me out to be, but... look, you've got a lot in front of you still. One day you'll get to have your dad and your mom back both and... they want you, they love you. Even the time you've already had with them isn't nothing; it's valuable. Even if you ended up stuck like this you had more than some people got. Hematite and I both didn't get that. Mami's parents are both gone. Hinoiri's an orphan too. A lot of us were just kind of the unwanted kid, maybe that has something to do with our powers, I don't know." he admits. "But... you've still got a path. It's not an easy path but it beats raising the dead." he says with a smile. "That's why I know I can help you." he adds.

    Then he nods. "Well. My mother was researching what we now call Dark Energy. I don't know how she got into it when she didn't seem to be magic herself, I keep hoping the documents will shine some light on it..." he begins, moving closer to Glimmer and lowering his voice as he talks about her, getting a little more serious and the two of them kind of sharing things a little bit quieter now as the emotions give way.