Let's Do The Space Warp Again

[iamnotpolaris]

'Guided random' selected, parameters recalibrated, universe selection initiated.
What's on the other side now?

Comments

[whatamithinking]

"Yyyyep. Apparently one dragon named Ancaladar is now the sole living male ancestor of almost all the other dragons. And the only female dragon who's not one of his descendants almost died recently."

[endragoned]

"A problem my beloved will be happy to help solve."

[whatamithinking]

"I had, um, guessed. I was actually wondering, though--you changed the entire ecosystem of this island to support your dragon. Would it be possible to introduce more diversity to the current dragon genome like that?"

[endragoned]

"I am... much better with plants than animals. And I have never tried to use my magic on a dragon in this way. I do not know."

[whatamithinking]

"Well, something has to change. Dragons don't die very often, apparently, but as small a gene pool as they seem to have isn't indefinitely viable."

[endragoned]

Shrug.

[whatamithinking]

"Maybe we can find something in another world that will help. We haven't exactly been keeping an eye out so far.."

[endragoned]

"What might you find?"

[whatamithinking]

"I don't know--cloning technology, maybe, that would be helpful if there were sufficiently well preserved remains of unrelated dragons."

[endragoned]

"What an interesting word."

[whatamithinking]

"Oh--cloning? Yeah, looks like I had to loanword it in. It means making a new organism that's a genetic copy of a previous one."

[endragoned]

"Even more interesting."

[whatamithinking]

"It would probably be worth checking the universe where we got our method of transportation, actually, they have significantly better technology than most of the ones we've been to and that kind of thing wasn't really the priority last time we were there."

[endragoned]

"How many worlds have you seen in your travels?"

[whatamithinking]

"Um. Hang on."
She pulls up her sleeve and begins fiddling with some kind of device attached to her arm.
"Not counting our home universe, we've been to forty-four different worlds."

[endragoned]

"Why so many?"

[whatamithinking]

"The world where we got our method of travel isn't the same as the world we're from. We went there via a different method in order to help the person who brought us, but he was killed before he could take us home. So we're trying to find our way back the long way, and that involves going to a lot of different universes along the way."

[endragoned]

"How unfortunate for you. Well, if you like your home."

[whatamithinking]

"We're very fond of it. And there aren't any other telepaths in most other universes. And the two universes we found that did also had alternate versions of our parents, but not alternate versions of us, which would have been awkward in the long term.
And the relevant version of my dad--who is not terrible and I love dearly--was an infamous criminal in one of them, which would have made things even more awkward when I got fed up and snapped at someone for saying unkind things about him."

[endragoned]

"Ah."

[whatamithinking]

"It was awkward enough just being there temporarily. I got stuck talking to him for a while and had to lie about my name because I was named after his mother."

[endragoned]

"Why not tell him so?"

[whatamithinking]

"Because his archnemesis was the relevant alt of my other parent, and I would have had to explain that instead of the unhappiness he was going through, in another universe he had gotten to keep the love of his life and raise a family with them."

[endragoned]

"Would he not have wanted to know?"

[whatamithinking]

"I think...knowing my father the way I do, at that point in his life it would only have hurt him more. He knew that the things he was doing were wrong, but saw them as necessary evils. He saw himself as a necessary monster. I think if he saw what could have been, it would have only convinced him that if he didn't have them then that meant he didn't deserve them."