Jumping off point

Cramped meeting space. The kitchen wasn’t meant for that many adults but it was the only suitable place in the house given that it had started to rain. The clones, Lore, Char, Brian, Alodrass, Durien and Sukal made the walls of the three person space bulge as they crowded around the dining table. Lore’s crude drawing was the centre of their attention.
“Where did you get that?” Durien looked almost scared by the sketch.
“Reality showed me the multiverse. I’m guessing it happened sometime between the rift opening and the crystal shattering.”
Alodrass squeezed her way to Lore’s shoulder. “May I?”
“Oh, this is going to be amazing.” Brian chuckled from the back.
“What?” Lore backed away slightly.
“I can project people’s memories.” Everyone but Brian and Pwy’he looked at her confused. “Aetar are touch telepaths and using my powers as life, I can recreate what I see.”
“Yeah she can. Makes movie night more enjoyable.” Brian held up his hand for someone to high five but due to the constraints of the kitchen, he was left hanging. “Sorry.” He awkwardly lowered his arm.
Lore nodded. Alodrass placed her hand on the back of their head. Energy poured from her hand forming a small, humanoid figure, floating above the table. Alodrass gave her best to emulate Reality’s booming voice. She settled for her usual tone for Lore. Recreating their conversation, the universes came into view. As the decaying universes appeared Lore asked her to pause.
“These universes here are, as Alodrass will soon tell you, decaying universes. They are also the only place where Lores, Chars and Clones live.” Lore cocked their head. “Hang on. Which frequency did you use when you tried to call for us?”
“The usual one.” Ace’s voice carried from the back door.
“So if there was a Lore in that universe, they would have received it.” Lore looked to the orbs before them. “He never said how many survived. If you lot still remember me then maybe…”
“Shall we continue?” Alodrass pointed to the multiverse. Lore nodded and so playback resumed. Lore gestured for her to skip to the end so their conversation sped by until the moment time froze.
“This is it.” Lore pointed to Reality’s frozen expression. Alodrass pressed on as Lore’s figure flew towards the centre of the multiverse. The multiverse behind them melted away once again and the central universe came into focus. It too eventually disappeared only to be replaced with a second multiverse. “And then, I came back.” Alodrass ended the playback and removed the projections. “I know what we need to do now.” They sounded extremely sure of themselves. “I thought Reality showed me this so I would stabilise those universes but it’s bigger than that.”
“What happens if we don’t?” Char was wearing a concerned look.
“Everyone on the decaying universes dies and the universe it collides with gets devastated.” Lore looked to their drawing. “I owe it to the others to search for them.”
“So what’s the plan?” Ace shouted.
“Char and I will be going for the council survivors and hopefully, we’ll be able to stabilise their universes as well. Everyone else, it sounds paranoid I know but, I think we should be preparing for whatever that second universe means. Gather whatever aid you can.” They paused. “And check those universes for other clones. Reality said there were only three Lores and Chars left but never mentioned the clones.” Magpie looked almost offended as he scoffed to Midpoint.
“What sort of aid are we looking for?” Alodrass’ question got nods from all in attendance.
“Reality said I was the second Lore to break the multiversal barrier. That doesn’t mean I’m the second person. There may be someone out there who knows more about the second universe.”
“So we’re on recruitment and reconnaissance then?”
“Exactly.” Lore reached into their pocket and retrieved the crystal shards. They gave them a scan with their Breacher. A smile quickly appeared across their face. “When we first met Varkral, he was after a crystal for his staff thing. I theorised that he was using it for multiversal travel. For the last ten years, I’ve been looking for something that we can use like that and then you bring it right to us.”
“So how does it help?” Curves looked to Destiny’s hand.
“Breachers work like bit like a slingshot.” They drew an arch on one of the universes. “You start at point A as a ball of energy. Get flung into the void and then end up at point B. During this journey, you pass through the universal barrier. You’d think it would be simple to reach other universes if that were the case but it’s all about polarisation.” Lore poked a hole in the paper. “To enter a universe, your energy has to be polarised correctly.” They held the pencil sideways and tapped it against the hole. “Like this, the pencil cant enter but if we polarise it.” They reoriented the pencil to push it through point first. “It slides in easily. The Tempora crystal does that for time travel and until now, we didn’t have anything that could do it for multiversal travel.” Lore held up a shard. “Take my Breacher and The Destiny and start exploring the multiverse. Get whoever’ll help us.” Lore started to remove their Breacher but felt Char hand them hers.
“I’m with you all the time anyway. We always use yours.” Lore smiled before they pulled the back off of her Breacher. Into the secondary slot, they inserted the crystal. Upgrades completed, they handed the Breacher to Alodrass as she was closest.
“Good luck. The Destiny should have all of my data on it but in case it doesn’t, this indicates the universe.” They pointed to the Breacher’s new interface “One point one means you’re here. The number after the point determines the multiverse and shouldn’t go higher than one point five two.” Alodrass nodded and put her hands on her nearest crewman. One by one, they all nodded and in a flash of white, they were gone leaving Lore and Char alone. Their disappearance gave them room to breathe but also uncovered Pwy’he.
“There you are. Almost forgot you were here!” Lore invited him over. They shot a glance to Char. “Want to come with us?” The First Step.