(Void Space Navigation Room)
In the new and admittedly rather optimistically-named Void Space Navigation Room, Chaldea's resident magical girl sighed in frustration, waving her wand about as if that action could resolve the issue at hand. Which it couldn't, of course.
"That limitation sure is rearing its head," Gudako commented, looking over Emet's readout before switching to da Vinci's more accessible analysis. The pair of consoles were backlit by the pale pink glow of the magic circle ritual being used for broadcasting.
"Well yeah; if I could access this set of Skills and my standard set, I'd have already run the mapping algorithm directly," Sasaku agreed. "But even trying to report reply pings with enough accuracy isn't going to happen like this."
"Hmm." Shirou thought for a moment. "But the moment you starting trying to 'ping' you began receiving pings from other Chaldeas, so we must be on the right track. Although as expected no one can actually tell us how to operate a successful navigational system."
"If you were able to connect and write System messages that would neatly solve it as well," Emet started before catching herself. "I know that's not happening, but hmm, is there some way to get data output from the wand? Probably no compatibility with standard systems, magecraft or not."
"I'd appreciate you not trying to jam a USB into me," Ruby quipped.
"Speaking of system messages," Gudako shared a look with Emet as the alarm system began blaring an alert. "Let's get moving."
"This is worse than before," the Master explained as the trio stepped out into a corridor filled with activity from everyone else exiting nearby rooms. "Sensors reported a massive energy signature, unreasonably dense. The Free Quest Gudao's group were gathering in collapsed right after and Rayshift had to pull them back. These are definitely connected so we're heading to Rayshift to get the info from him quickly."
"What do you mean by density?" Shirou asked, not totally familiar with Chaldea's new instrumentation, created as it was by da Vinci, Scathach and others after his mortal career ended.
"What it sounds like: far too much energy in a very small spot. Just appeared too, according to the reports and it's gone somehow."
"What that sounds like is a sensor glitch. Ah, if only," Sasaku frowned, flying a little behind the Master. Ever since confirming that flight was effectively free when transformed, the Ruler basically did it all the time as though that was perfectly natural. Then again, it might have been in part due to Scathach pointing out that it added a great deal of movement options, while she wasn't giving up any speed or agility advantages due to not having any in the first place.
"The unexpected collapse of the Quest strongly suggests that something of note happened," Gudako replied simply.
"Forewarned is forearmed, if you arm yourself," Shirou remarked calmly. Indeed, the activity around them was not panicked, but purposeful. Perhaps in part due to a similar incident when X arrived just a few days ago.
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(Scathach's Workshop)
"That's interesting..." Looking over her growing collection of hand-manufactured Gae Bolg alternatives, Scathach picked up a clutch of them, as though they were the simple javelins used by warriors of old.
"What are the chances X had rescue coming?" Agesipolis put on his helmet as though to say it could never be that benign.
Georgios carefully stowed his camera before looking to his own arms and armor. He switched from documenting Scathach's workflow to combat readiness in hardly any more time than the other two. "At least the four of us are already suitably battle-ready."
Pulling on her holy gauntlets (perhaps more like protective knuckle dusters, but who would say so openly?) Martha took up her staff as though it might be necessary to bludgeon a hostile to death with it. "Ah, of course I will be running our backline support, right?"
"Well we already have a Cas-" Agesipolis paused to reconsider. "I mean it depends on the enemy match-up."
"Both of them are pretty good against Divine and Undead types," Georgios pointed out. "Though I hope it won't come to heavy fighting in Chaldea."
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(Ultra Heroine Z's Spaceship)
"...? Nnn !"
X was returned to consciousness by the tickling, uncomfortable and definitely unexpected sensation of someone's tongue invading her mouth.
"Ah... tsk." The personal-space-invadingly present and indecently powerful individual, surprised by X's stirring, pulled away before catching herself. "Hmm... that should have been enough. I hope. Well, it would be too risky to try another energy transfusion..." the Heroic Spirit on an unlikely mission, Chloe, muttered to herself while wiping her mouth.
"Alright listen up," the Archer addressed X directly, while taking her hand and laying it onto the yoke that controlled the ship's warp drive. "I've put in a flight path which will get you back, but this craft can only make the jump if you initiate the warp sequence."
"..."
"I hope you're at least slightly conscious," Chloe continued after a moment of silence in response, seeing no other options in hand. "I assume that Merlin planned ahead for when you get back, but I'll just fall through the texture of this ship when it goes, so it ain't up to me either way. Ok. On the count of three we'll be starting the warp. So good luck with everything !"
"One.. two.. three !"
*creak~~*
*Warp sequence initiated*
*ERROR: Corrupted warp path detected*
*WARNING: Automatic warp abort failure*
*ALERT: Warp drive in runaway condition, uncontrolled warp imminent*
"Oh, by the way, I think you'll have a breakthrough soon with the 'Saber Badge' affair, so keep at it ok?"
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(Spaceship Maanna, Shining Blue Galaxy)
After reaching the coordinates specified in the contract, the space bounty hunter looked around eagerly for her payday. Or, to be more exact, she checked and cursed at her sensors for acting up again.
"Are you really sure this isn't a trick or trap?" her companion asked while trying to troubleshoot the surprisingly empty readout. Well, they were in a major void, but that really meant no inconvenient bystanders or witnesses around if it was going to turn into an ambush.
"Manager M's good," the first replied confidently. "She went way back with my father, after all. Anyway, isn't that what we're looking for?"
Indeed, not long after the pair had started going through the Navigational System Reset and Restart Checklist, a new sensor return popped up. Judging by the readings, it wasn't all that far away from the Maanna that a new spaceship abruptly dropped out of warp. However, it was clearly in a terrible state judging by the follow-up scans.
"You know," the bounty hunter noted slyly, "The contract only specifies we need to deliver any persons. Do you think we can take the ship on the side?"
"You can't be serious," the gun-wielding Archer retorted. "If it exited warp with such a weak signature, it ain't going anywhere under its own power and we can't tow something as massive as ourselves any real distance."
"Tsk. And it's a whole ship, too."
"It's a whole ship's worth of scrap, likely. Well we can at least see if there's any systems worth stripping. But to think that they warranted a contract, I wonder who it is?"
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(Tower of Avalon)
"Oh that Chloe is quite a character, isn't she?" Merlin was chatting to her Chaldea-aligned counterpart. "I must say though, it's rather earnest of her to take care of that in person."
"I wouldn't say that," the other Merlin replied. "Normally a Servant-level Chloe would do it, but there was no way to get anyone summoned in there with such short notice."
"By the way, I did check and we don't seem to have one over here," Merlin toyed with her staff while thinking it over. "Someone else is the prototypical magical girl on this side. A Devil or something like that."
"Ah, that's probably because... you'd have to look for some version of Emiya Shirou. I'll look up the file on him, but it's likely that even if there's a counterpart he didn't go the same way that the (currently) Mooncell's Nameless did. But most importantly: no Kaleid Liner project. Sure, standard humans can't take your ambient mana, but that's fine since humanity basically just evolved into Servant-level beings that are all at equilibrium with the environment. Problem solved, basically."
"Hmm, I see," Bored by the tangent, Merlin returned to the main subject at hand. "I threw out some spare change and yep: there's someone reporting they picked up our 'X' so we're go on that plan."
"Good, great. What was your equivalent of the Security Organization again, Time Space Administration?"
"No, that's the magical girl group, the Holy Lance is associated with the Galactic Police. Boring, but they keep things from exploding. Mostly."
"Unfortunately Big Bad exploded all of human history here before we got things off the ground," Merlin said ruefully. "Although his Revelation Skill was unreliable (read: useless) as always, we should've noticed something was up when Solomon's Clairvoyance couldn't see how the current situation would end."
"I thought Gilgamesh would also have a sufficient rank in that to see into the future?" she asked.
"Unfortunately his own origin time is being assaulted. I don't think it is a coincidence that we lack any ability to foresee the conclusion. But that also means we haven't confirmed something as unfortunate as, say, our total loss and subsequent dissolution."
"Humans wouldn't believe you even if you did see that," Merlin pointed out airily to her male counterpart. "It is a sign of strength, to cry out against fate, rather than to bow one's head and succumb. Or so I've heard anyway. Space literature is weird sometimes."
"On the contrary," he retorted. "It's humans who do things like despair and commit suicide. You can hardly find an animal who would do such a thing, mundane or Phantasmal."
"They don't generally understand fate, ignorance is not the same as strength of will."
The two of them stared at the other's image for a moment before both laughing in synchronized manner. "I can see why the World likes them so much," the Blue Galaxy Merlin said first. "Indeed though one might say we do not have 'humans' here, in a sense they must tick the right boxes."
"That's certainly a possibility," Merlin thought about his time with Artoria. She might seemingly feel upset with him for keeping quiet on his knowledge of Camelot's then-future, but he had a hunch that even had she been told, it would not have drastically changed the outcome or indeed her path. And perhaps it made her journey that much more valuable - the fact that it could change based on her actions. "Oh right, can you call on that Beast-hunting Arthur? I think we will have need of his Holy Sword."
"Unfortunately his journey conceptually passes outside my sight," she muttered. "But if he is truly needed, that same concept should ensure he is drawn in at the right time. You also have a random-warper, right?"
"What? I don't think one originated here at least," he thought for a bit before forming a guess about who she meant. "Oh, the Heroic Spirit Chloe isn't from here, I actually think her original Branch doesn't exist anymore."
"Huh, but I saw Chaldea had a Sasaki Kojirou present?"
"Well the human part of that one is from here, but the legend was from the Grail; the legendary swordsman is just fictional here."
"I see. Well if you happen to find a Miyamoto Musashi, a woman by the way, who warps around please let her know about the Shining Blue Galaxy."
Merlin took a while to process the request. "But you were asking about a random warper."
"Yes, but in some cases it helps shift probabilities when they have some prior knowledge or even a link somehow."
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Notes:
Doesn't Ruby actually have a USB-like connection? Yes, but either it doesn't have or specifically don't use any standard protocol. You can probably guess why.
Who is in that group behind Chaldea? So far the players are: Kelretch, (Heroic Spirit) Chloe, Merlin, (Wise King) Gilgamesh, Irisviel and Kiritsugu, Solomon.