*label build_start

[b]THE PIECES ADVANCE[/b]

"Okay!" Holt says, looking over his workbench. "Okay. I think we have everything we need to really create a time machine."

Frankie looks intrigued.
*if (ally_elizabeth > 0)
	Elizabeth looks excited.
*if (ally_akkaron > 0)
	Akkaron, well, you can't really tell, but he seems interested at least.

"Unfortunately," Holt murmurs. "It's not just a matter of getting the parts together and hooking them up. We have to do that, but then..."

"Then what?" you ask.

Holt sighs. "It needs to be tuned and reconfigured. A process that, honestly, can often take years."

*if (ally_elizabeth > 0)
	"Well, why don't we use time travel?" Elizabeth asks. "Tell the machine to travel back here once it's done!"
	*goto after_mschen
*else
	"Well, why don't we use time travel?" you ask. "Tell the machine to travel back here once it's done!"
	*goto after_mschen

*label after_mschen

"We [i]could[/i]," Holt says. "But that would increase the paradox acting on the machine. It's, well it's not guaranteed to work."

"Hm," you murmurs. "It would be kind of boring doing that for years. If only there were a way..."

"I know how," Frankie suddenly says. She moves over to her desk and presses a button.

A heap of metal in a corner of the room unfolds and stands up. "Gotta fix it!"

*page_break Of course!...wait, what?

"That's the maintenance robot!" you say. "It can interface with any technology! Except, it sounds like it has its old personality."

"It does." Frankie grins. "I've been working on that personality chip. I stripped out the contradictory orders and overriding drives. The robot is single-minded, but it will only work on things with permission."

"I see," you say, then your eyes widen. "We can leave it here, then use the time door to go 100 years in the future! That should be enough for the robot to have completed the work, right?"

"If it's smart enough," Holt says, eyeing the thing.

"Right!" You clap your hands. "Holt, draw up some blueprints. No, wait, the robot may need to change things around. Draw up, er, wiring diagrams?"

Holt nods. "A list of components and how they should fit together."

*if (ally_akkaron > 0)
	"I'll get some documentation for the dimensional envelop," Akkaron says.

*if (ally_elizabeth > 0)
	"I'll help with the wiring and temporal theory!" Elizabeth says.

Frankie nods. "And I'll make up a list of what we have in the Octagon and what it's good for."

You smile. "Sounds like a plan."

*page_break "Gotta fix it!"

You stand in the swamp. A light rain falls. High above, the Octagon door opens; Frankie appears and starts down the stairs. "Sorry," she calls. "I couldn't resist taking care of a few last-minute things."

"It's fine," you call back. When she joins you, your party is complete. Smiling to cover your nervousness, you look around, then through the door of the escape pod. It shows the interior of the pod, but you know you're actually looking at the year 2222, the Professor's time door having created a link between the times. "Well...here we go."

You all file in to the pod, then you close the door. Now the time door is deactivated. Opening the door, you step out into a scene that is similar, but not identical. The ground and water come up higher along the pillars, and the stairway is rusted and swaying; the sky is cloudy, but not raining, barely hiding the sun.

The Octagon looks the same as always, though.

*page_break Except, suddenly, it doesn't.

Your view distorts. The concrete structure twists in front of your eyes, shrinking until it looks far away, then swirling and stretching. You have to blink and your eyes water as you try to follow what's going on. The scene twists again--

Sharp reports echo through the swamp, grinding cracks. There is a sound like a thunderclap, then a protracted screeching and clattering.

You blink again. The concrete pillars have all broken midway, fractured stone and twisted rebar sticking up from the stumps; dust fills the air. The metal stairway collapses completely, metal wailing as it is twisted and compressed.

The Octagon is nowhere to be seen.

And then...

*page_break There is another sound.

A humming, coming from nowhere, then a rising, pulsing sound. You feel a smile breaking on your face--you first heard that sound when you stepped into Dan's time machine, and he started it up to take you on your first mission. Something fades into existence, an upright rectangle of dull gray metal. It hovers over the grass, then it gently settles to the ground.

The door swings open.

*page_break Glancing at your companions, you walk in.

It's the Octagon. It looks both very similar and very different from the last time you saw it; you're not sure which is more startling. There are still tables lining the room, still the dusty warehouse feeling with skylights above. But the center of the room is dominated by a circular console. You and your friends fan out to explore.

"What the f--!" Frankie stares wildly around the room. "Everything is...everything's [i]put away[/i]!" Indeed, where the tables were once piled with junk, there are a lot more neatly stacked boxes.

*if (ally_akkaron > 0)
	Akkaron rushes to the central console. "Yes, the controls for the dimensional envelope. Operating as planned! We are currently in an extradimensional space, access point linked to the outside 'booth'!"

Holt looks over the controls as well. "As time machines go, it's pretty simple," he says. "I like the computer system, though." He taps at a screen. "Looks like it's easy to input and analyze time coordinates. Hm...no relativistic ephemeris. Oh, but we can change space coordinates. That's useful!"

"Space coordinates?" you ask.

"Like changing Oklahoma 2012 to New York City 2012," he replies. "The math for that is pretty easy, compared to most temporal math."

"Right..." You look around. "Well. Do you think it works? Because you know what we have to do."

Your allies nod. "Just a few tests," Holt says. "And then we'll be ready for...jailbreak."

*page_break "I can hardly wait?"

*goto_scene jailbreak_0 jailbreak_start

*finish