Daichi: When I say this is loosely based on the game, I mean really loosely. The important plot points are sort of there, just less touched upon because we already know how the game goes. I will not copy and paste every line, because that's just boring for everyone involved.

Verity: We don't own the mentioned franchises.

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Detective Jowd had seen his cat leave just a few hours ago with no explanation, and hadn't really been worried. Sissel did this all the time, and he'd be back soon enough.

He started worrying when he answered a call from a confused Yomiel, who apparently had the cat's body... and a distraught Pomeranian.

He wasn't quite sure what he had expected, but that definitely was not it.

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So... do you think you could stay here for a bit? Seriously, do not move, I'm leaving for a bit and would like to be able to find you again, just in case. Lynne's mental image of the cat twitched his ears.

"What's the worst that could happen?"

Why did you say that? Now I'm really worried. Just... make sure you aren't dead when I come back, all right?

"I make no promises."

That is probably for the best.

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He wanted to find the one that had helped them. He needed to know who he was, and why he had been so unsettling.

His conversation with him had been not unpleasant, but there had been something else that gave him a headache just trying to think about it.

It was the color of the man's core that had thrown him off. Before that day, cores had come in either blue or gold. This was a new development, and given how painful it had been to make contact, it wasn't one he wanted to be in the dark about.

Suddenly it felt as if the world had been pulled out from underneath his paws. Figuratively, anyway. Something was nearby. And whoever it was knew that he was there.

He jumped to a more hidden location, but the feeling remained. Who's there?

"This is the place, right?"

"I was around here. Still, I have to go. It's risky for me to be here, so close to them. You'll tell me if you find anything, right?"

"Of course. I still think you were just hallucinating again."

"I had no clue she was there until he mentioned it."

"If you say so." Sissel decided that it wasn't worth it, and decided to get out of there before anything happened. Still, he checked for nearby cores.

Purple.

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He knew it. This just had to happen at least once. He had no clue how Lynne had ever managed to stay alive before he came along, because this was just excessive.

He was used to dealing with ridiculous deaths. If he didn't know someone, he'd generally turn back the clock for them if it was exceptionally undignified, and there were a lot of those. And then there were the truly absurd deaths, that only one person in the world could ever manage. Like this one.

He wasn't quite sure how Lynne had managed to collapse the wall on herself, but figured that he'd find that out for himself.

You know, I did tell you not to die.

I don't recall making any promises. She'd adjusted to death rather quickly. Of course, this was the one who figured out how to telepathically communicate without any actual ghosts being involved. Perhaps things like being used to dying never did fade. A bit too used to dying, but given her luck, that was probably for the best.

Fair enough. He tried not to let his irritation show. Of course, this was the ghost world, so thinking about how annoyed he was was just as if he had been actually saying it. You're lucky I can turn back time for you.

You can? Really?

Oh, right, I never told you that. Just stick with me, and everything will be perfectly fine. Time rewound itself around the two of them, until, finally, it was half an hour earlier.

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Lynne's death had involved explosives. Given the collapsed wall, that hadn't been too much of a surprise. Where the explosives had come from was anybody's guess.

All they knew was that a group kids had gotten their hands on explosives, and decided to set them off by the wall. Why they had chosen to do that was beyond the kitten, who just twitched his whiskers and got to work.

The first thing that came to mind was simply getting Lynne away from the wall, but there wasn't much around there that he could use as a distraction. The second option was stopping the explosion. Viable, if, possibly, a bit frustrating.

The kids that set off the explosives were not easily distracted, and doing something wrong could cause the explosion to be set off much sooner. Still, the nearby siren was worth a try.

"Taiyo! Did you set that off?"

"It wasn't me, Suki!" He dropped his explosives and walked over to the siren, most likely to check why it had gone off. "That's strange. It doesn't have any power source."

With Taiyo and Suki arguing, Sissel had time to move. He flipped a nearby box's lid, causing it to fall into a nearby puddle, which splashed the matches that the kids were planning to light.

"Wait, why are the matches wet?"

"I'm not sure, but we can't use them now. We'll have to try again another day. Maybe not after the rain."

Good, that should have done it. Now, ideally, this situation won't happen again. Sissel was just the slightest bit annoyed.

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In the world where they came from...

"So, she isn't picking up?"

"Not at all. She doesn't seem to have powers, but... well, it's not like we're the best choice. We should leave a message." She picked up the phone and dialed again. "So, Lynne, this is your mother. You remember your older sister Metis, right? Well, she's dead, and we certainly can't look after Athena. We'll be coming around in a month or so. If you can't take her, call us back by then, all right?"

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Daichi: So, there is a time limit for sanity involved, now. And the signs of a few more crossover elements are showing, although given that it's mostly about Sissel and Lynne, they won't be that big a deal. Also, there is a fourth crossover that really won't do much. A hint for that: Powers run in the family, and will give Lynne an edge against the Dark Signers.