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Harvey double-checked the memo one last time.
This was the way.
Zhe hadn't been in the game for too long when the memo had popped up. Zhe didn't even really know the one posting it, verseFantasic. There was a sneaking suspicion that it was this Bob-person, though. They one zhe had been told was the leader of their session.
In fact, Harvey's chumroll had expanded at some point within the last half hour. Zhe certainly hadn't added all these people. One of the others had been messaging everyone in order to introduce themselves. She said her name was Kierra Brown, and she would be functioning as the combat-medic for the session. She believed some guy called Pygmalion was responsible for the expanded chumrolls. But other than those quick little blurbs, she hadn't said much. Apparently it was just a thing she was doing so everyone in need of healing knew where to go.
verseFantastic had put up the memo about ten minutes ago, saying they desperately needed help and they needed it fast. A location was given, with directions on how to get there, and the memo ended.
Since zhe still wasn't certain on what zhe was supposed to be doing, Harvey had decided to answer.
Skating forward across the stone floor of the mausoleum, Harvey turned the flashlight of zhir phone on. At least zhe assumed this was a mausoleum. It was creepy and cryptic enough. This whole realm was creepy, filled with skulls and temples...
There, that had to be the little platform verseFantastic had been referring to. It had the spirograph glyph on it, anyway.
Taking a moment to exchange zhir skates for sneakers, Harvey took a deep breath and stepped onto the platform.
For a moment, nothing happened.
Just as Harvey was preparing to step back off, there was a flash of green light, and zhe was no longer in a dark tomb.
Instead, zhe was in a brightly and artificially lit lab of some sort.
And instead of creepy crypt noises, there was a soft humming, an occasional beep, and the unending wailing of infants.
“Oh, thank god!”
Harvey couldn't help but stumble as someone tackled zhim, practically blubbering in agony.
“Um... hello?” Harvey offered as they righted themselves. “Are you... verseFantastic?”
“Yeah, that was my memo— Bob Thompson. Nice to meet you and thank you for coming.” the blonde said, eyes shining as he clasped zhir hand.
“Harvey Shea... and the daycare here...?”
Bob seemed to crumple a fair bit. “I don't know! When I got here, I was following my grandpa, but I think he already left... All I did was push a button! And suddenly there are babies!”
Confused, Harvey picked one of the infants up. “... This one looks like you.”
“He is me! I think I'm making us!”
As two more of the babies started tugging at zhir legs, Harvey looked blankly at Bob.
He waved frantically, picking his way across the floor towards a machine with a large screen over it. Displayed on the screen was an elderly woman sitting outside in a rocking-chair by a sliding glass door. There was a sight zeroed in on her head.
Without warning, Bob pushed down on a large button in the center of the console.
There was a flash of green light, drawing Harvey's attention to another platform. This one was set into the wall, flanked by two glass tanks on each side. Standing on the platform was a green goo sculpture of the old woman. It wobbled for a moment, then melted in on itself with a small slurp and a splat. A vacuum of some kind cleaned up the goo, pulling it into one of the tanks.
With another flash of light, a brand new baby appeared, sucking on her thumb.
“And then I get new coordinates!” Bob said hysterically. “And it fills up the next tank, and then the two drain out into the trough below and make two more! The first one I appearified was my grandfather, followed by some woman I don't know! And then there's baby me and my slime-sis!”
Harvey couldn't help but shake zhir head. “Today just keeps getting weirder...”
“Yeah. And I have a lot more to go, it looks like...”
“So you need me to babysit?”
“... Please...?”
After a minute, Harvey nodded, sighing.
While Bob continued making more and more babies, Harvey did what zhe could to round up and control them. Zhe added zhir own plea for help to the memo, elaborating a little on the situation. Pulling out zhir laptop and putting on some of the videos zhe'd made over the years helped control some of them. Just not enough.
Finally someone else appeared.
Even better. Two someone elses, and Harvey recognized both of them.
“Jackie, Andie.” zhe greeted with a smile, hefting up another impish infant.
“Muito tempo sem ver, amigo!” Jackie grinned, holding out her fist. Harvey obligingly bumped it with a grin of zhir own. “How you been?”
“Could be better, could be worse.” zhe smiled.
“Do you know if I've been made yet?” Andie asked eagerly, her long, synthetic hair rippling as she bounced on the balls of her feet.
“Not a clue—”
Before Harvey could finish, there was the sound of glass shattering. All three of them looked up in alarm. Jackie was the first to react, sprinting into the corner and coming back with the adventurous baby.
“Nothing big, nothing big. Not even hurt!” she said, giving a little twirl. The infant shrieked in delight.
“I found me!” Andie declared, her voice squealing awfully and making everyone flinch. For being artificial, her voice was very beautiful, but she did tend to dip into the range of echolocation and dog-whistles when she got too excited.
“You three know each other?” Bob called from the console.
“Yeah. I make short films, and Andie is a musician. We met online and I wound up becoming the one who made her music-videos. Jackie's a street-performer, and she stars in a number of Andie's music-videos.”
“Nice! Oh, uh, nice to meet you, ladies! Bob Thompson!”
“Hello!”
“Olá!”
Noticing one of the infants crawling dedicatedly away, Harvey set the one in zhir arms down and bounded across the floor to redirect her. She squawked indignantly and pounded angrily on the floor with her tiny fist.
A yelp from Andie made zhim look up in alarm.
“S-sorry! She ejected my Sylladex somehow!” the pseudo-android stammered in apology as her belongings scattered across the room. The baby-her laughed in delight, waving about a sheet of music.
“Well, if there's nothing dangerous in there, we have some toys for the otários!” Jackie laughed as she gently tossed one baby up and down.
“Here, tell me what's important and I'll gather it up.” Harvey instructed.
“None of it, really. She didn't get at my Strife Deck, so I suppose they can play with my things.” Andie replied, leaning down to pick up another baby girl. This one had grabbed onto a stuffed dog toy and was hugging it tightly. Baby-Andie was chewing away at the music.
“Maybe try getting them to nap?” Bob suggested frantically as someone else arrived.
“... It's just fucking chaos.” the newcomer grumbled, rubbing at his eyes. He didn't say anything else, just plodded into the center of the room and produced pillows and blankets.
Before everyone's eyes, a nest-like fort had been constructed, and drowsy babies were being tucked in and swaddled up inside. “... Well?”
As the newcomer curled up inside and began playing something handheld, the rest of them worked with the non-drowsy half of the babies.
Harvey was trying to wrestle one off Jackie's leg when the screen's display caught zhir attention.
That was zhir mother.
Quietly, Harvey moved over to the slime-station. The baby version of zhir mother and a strange man were already crawling about. Zhe watched as the slime emptied out of the tanks, mixing together below. There was a flash, and another baby girl and a baby boy appeared.
Still silent, Harvey picked up the two new ones.
Zhim and zhir sister.
Zhe had a sister.
Examining her face yielded nothing familiar. Zhe didn't know her. Zhe couldn't recognize her.
Harvey sighed in frustration before looking to baby-zhim.
Boy-zhim.
“... You, friend, are going to change a lot.” zhe said as the next batch was created.
“Ah-hah!” Bob cried triumphantly. “I only have a few more to go!”
“Good, cuz we've got over two-hundred already, closing in on three!” Jackie said, sounding surprisingly irritable.
“You didn't have to count...” Harvey heard Andie say.
Noticing another one crawling away, zhe sighed. Putting the baby version of zhimself and zhir sister down, Harvey gave chase.
This one was fast, and already had a fairly large head start. Harvey found zhimself racing out of the room in effort to catch the kid.
“Hey, c'mon now!”
Without warning, the ground began to shake.
“Shit...!”
Glass shattered somewhere, and the baby wailed. Switching to zhir skates, Harvey clattered towards the cries, scooping them up as zhe swerved. It was a baby girl. The glass had cut her forehead, coating her face in blood, and a spiderweb had fallen over her head somewhere along the line.
Gritting zhir teeth, Harvey clutched the kid in one arm, using the other to maintain balance. The ground hadn't stopped shaking. By now the others were yelling zhir name frantically. Dust was falling from the ceiling, and things were starting to crack.
Coming into the first room, Harvey saw the babies starting to vanish.
“Harvey! Aqui! Vamos!” Jackie yelled. She was the only one left, standing by the transportalizer and waving her arms.
Gritting zhir teeth, Harvey leaned forward, speeding up.
“Aah!”
Just as zhe reached Jackie, the crying, bloodied infant vanished. Zhe turned to look for the others, but Jackie pulled zhim back onto the transportalizer.
With a flash of green light, zhe was falling back in the darkness to the cold stone floor. The only light in the place at the moment was Andie's LEDs, shifting mellowly through the spectrum. All five of them were crowded around the transportalizer, which was sparking and hissing.
“What... what was that?! Where did the babies go?!” Andie fretted.
“I fell asleep. You had to wake me up, so I thought you all knew.” the strange guy yawned, still managing to look concerned even with that lazy expression.
“I don't know... Almost directly after I finished the last batch, everything started shaking.” Bob said weakly, collapsed on the floor.
“One had crawled away... I chased her, and when everything went FUBAR, some glass cut her face. She was still all bloody when she vanished. I hope that whichever one of us she is, she's alright...” Harvey murmured.
“In theory, all of them are alright...” Bob mumbled.
But all of them were still concerned.