Jack finds himself sitting down to tea with Empress Jack, Lady Elliott, Rev. Magehammer, tiny Miss Colossal Giant and a brain in a jar. The brain says, "Howdee pardner!"

The tea table becomes a horse-drawn coach traveling the Oregon Trail. Indian Elliott and his band of braves boldly barrage the bunch with a bevy of barrows.

In a barrow, undead hordes rise from their graves crying out, "TEAAA!! EARL GREY!!! HOT!!"

Jack finds himself sitting in a very comfortable chair in a luxurious space-age room with a giant wall-sized 3D viewscreen/window into space, multiple sleek grey computer consoles and super-high-tech equipment all around. In addition, there are about 15 humans and aliens wearing uniforms around the room all staring at Jack.

A tall bald man with a commanding presence demands, "Who the hell are you, and what are you doing on my ship - in my chair!?"

Jack waves at the others he recognizes, though he doesn’t know the Brain in a Jar yet, so he only says, “Hello.” Just about the same time he’s pulled along to another point in time and space. This is all terribly strange, but with the help of his compass and some diagnostic magic he can maybe begin to make sense of everything.

The undead are rather disconcerting, he can destroy them, of course, but only in the same way he fights most things. Plain battle magic.

The sudden finality of his arrival has Jack looking around curiously, and he finds himself looking at the bald man. “I’m Jack, I travel between dimensions, and I seem to have been thrust here. Who are you, and where am I?”

He stands up from the chair and looks around a bit more.

"No undead, no brains in jars? That's good."

*Rolls, advancements & new skill*

Jack has deep intuitive insights which slip away a little as he fishes them back. They leave behind a strong impression of tremendous responsibility and potential. He was shifting through the Scriff, experiencing snippets of his divergent existences that coincide along similar metrics but differ in others - he was experiencing them as coherently his own, like a strange dream.


((If you could pick anywhere in the Star Trek universe for Jack to visit, where/when would it be?))

Jack, appearing the exact same age he was the first time he woke up in the Verse, appeared innocent in the best of ways. And totally nuts.

"What in the bloody hell are you on about, man? Counselor Chroy, is this man sane?"

A woman with large curly black hair, a loving-kind face and lavender body suit stepped forward, "He's telling the truth as he sees it. And he appears to be sane as far as I can tell. But I've never felt a mind like this before. It's, somehow... Different." She smiles disarmingly at Jack, implying different is possibly good.

The bald man says, "I'm Captain Stewart. Patrick Stewart. Who thrust you here? Are you an emissary from some planet? But first, come with me to my Ready Room, I'd be more comfortable with you off the Bridge until I know more about this mystery."

Capt Patrick signals the Security detail to stand down and for Counselor Chroy to join him with Jack. He leads Jack into a comfortable room with a conference desk in one corner and soft chairs and sauce tables on the other. There's an aquarium in the middle.

Captain Stewart walks up to a console and says, "Tea, Earl Grey, Hot." The console beeps in response. He turns his head to Jack, "What can I get for you?"

Counselor Chroy walks in behind and the door slides closed.

After his request for refreshments, Captain Stewart gestures for Jack to sit as he takes a seat in one of the other comfy chairs and says, "Now, Who do you believe thrust you here, and why?"
This message was last edited by the GM at 04:04, Sun 24 Apr 2022.

Speaking directly to Jack she explains. "This place appears to have a strong technological bias, might help to explain scriff as an dimentinal anomaly."

((Possibly something like: https://tinyurl.com/25t89xpp -- to help him gain some psychic powers, if given my ultimate druthers. That or something that helps him learn technology. I'd even be happy to have him end up at Starfleet Academy for a few years to learn everything he can.))

“Oh, you’re a mind reader, that’s wonderful, I’ve always wanted to learn psionics,” Jack says to the woman and smiles at her, he’ll definitely make a friend out of that one!

He’s trying to figure out what he’ll be able to do here, but he guesses no normal magic, Order magic will probably work with his halberd, psionics if he can learn some, and dimensional trickery that he doesn’t know as Stella had alluded to.

When he is offered a drink, he stands up and walks over to look at the console, repeating the process, he says, “Please allow me, Captain. Lemonade, cold.” Repeating the process.

Once he has been seated again--likely after the Captain had to get his drink for him, since he isn’t authorized for anything, let alone using a console of any kind--he looks toward Chroy, smiling at her genuinely.

“Pleasure to meet you Captain, as I said before, I’m Jack. No-one sent me here, when I die in one world I am sent to a different universe with all of my memories intact, but I’m a peaceful person at heart, and love to learn things. I’m mostly interested in magic, but I can tell that you have access to all sorts of wonderful technology, so I think there are many interesting things to learn here too,” he says with a smile.
This message was last edited by the player at 05:23, Sun 24 Apr 2022.

Mostly.
Spiritual, Order, and home universe magics are all twice as hard, though not impossible (and made easier with rituals, amulets, magic words etc).
Toon magics are only 1.5 times as hard as normal.
Digital magics and Physical are both normal difficulty.
Psionics are 1.5 times as easy as normal.
Mental are twice as easy.
Technological are thrice as easy.



"Ha, your funny!" Chroy giggles, "You can't just learn empathy, or telepathy." you have to just be born with it, or you can't even hear me right now. she thinks and he hears.

In addition to hearing her thought directed at him, he felt what it felt like to feel the emotions of another entity, especially one as alien to her as Jack was.
*Rolls and Learn Telepathy & Empathy*



Yup



"Well, if a young lad like yourself would like to go to school and better yourself through learning, then who am I to stand in your way? We're jutting out to visit a colony on the fringe of this arm of the Galactic spiral, arriving there in a few days. Then we'll be heading in to a space station. You're welcome to tag along under the tutelage of the ship's educational division of you like. Counselor Chroy, would you kindly direct the lad accordingly? Great!"

Putting his compass away, Jack has a feeling for how things work here and smiles at them. Wait, does failing to make something work badly, is that what causes things to go terribly? In which case, he could probably use magic, but it risked the terrible repercussions? He’d need to ask Stella, but it seemed rude to interrupt when he’s talking to Counselor Chroy and Captain Stewart.

When he thinks about how telepathy and empathy work, he focuses on Counselor Chroy and replies telepathically: Like this? Oh, neat. That wasn’t so hard. Do you know any other tricks? How about..

He reaches out with a hand toward his lemonade and floats it in the air for a moment.

“Outstanding, thank you for your tutelage Counsellor,” he tells her with a bright smile. Hearing about the future from the Captain, he nods his head in confirmation. “That’s great Captain, I’ll gladly accompany you. Let me know if you have need of my magic, or want to see something. I imagine I could show you some interesting cartoon magic in my hat.”

Seams amused. "You show about as much restraint as Alfea, you sure your not one of her alternates?" she chuckled. "Try not to startle them to much with 'impossible' things."

Counselor Marina Sirtis-Chroy shows Jack to the Professor, a brilliant Android who's favorite pastime is Holodeck mysteries and teaching eager minds. Prof gives Jack a quick but comprehensive aptitude test to understand Jack's starting point, then a list of classes he can sign up for at Starfleet academy ((any you want not directly related to weapons))

Counselor Marina, "Call me Marina," with a smile, asks Jack to visit her the next day so she can interview him some more. She's curious.

Assuming he goes, she'll all him to sit down with her and make him comfortably, then she'll say, "Forgive me for saying this, but you don't seem like the typical teenager. You seem much more relaxed and confident, like you've seen things and matured quite a bit. Does your species live more than 200 years?"

Sounds interested in this. "Hey could you take me out of the compass and press me into one of the beans, so I'm touching the plant part but in the food part of the bean? Then toss the bean in the TARDIS with the Balur in it. I think I can grow it into something.... I wouldn't mind talking FTL with these folks. FTL, portal, and ship travel in general is an old hobby of mine and Alfea's it's always neat to see how other's do it."

“What’s wrong with telling people? I’m a wizard, it’s my job to share knowledge.”

He only talks to Stella away from others, he likes to share knowledge, but he isn’t going to show them his weapons and all he can do. That’s just tactically unsound. But he can tell them what he is, and where he’s from. Pretending not to be what he is, is just counter-productive.

Talking to the Professor, he smiles broadly. “What’s it like being an android, Professor?” In response to the question, Jack calmly says, “I want to learn all of it, but perhaps we should start from the ground up. You can test my fundamentals and bring those up to your standards and by then maybe I’ll discover an area that I like? But, would you like to learn anything from me? I know all kinds of magic, and I’ve learned more in every world, so it’s only fair that I share with you.”

Meeting up with Marina the next day, he is carrying a lemonade.

“Oh, well, I was a teenager when I was lured into my first dimension other than my home dimension, and I spent a bit of time there, then something happened we don’t need to talk about. A bit later I was in another one, and in that one, I ended up spending a lot of time training, more than ten years, I’d guess? I didn’t really keep track. I’m not sure I can die of old age anymore, because I didn’t age when I was training with Mr. Magehammer, and the other versions of me out there in the multiverse are all way older, and look exactly like me. So, to answer your question, no I don’t think I age.”

"Well, that would entirely depend on who you asked. Ask Data, and he might say it was difficult not being human. From my perspective, being an Android is like being a human in a robotic body. We're fast learners of repetitive movements and logical algorithmic ideas, but just a little slower in processing emotions. Much like the neurodivergent humans, but for different reasons."


Jack is enrolled in the standard courses for people and aliens new to Starfleet. By the time they get to the space station, he'll have a good understanding of the core subjects.



Professor responds, "Given that no one in our recorded history has ever used anything like real magic other than technology and psionics, I have my aunt's about whether anyone could learn. But I'm certainly willing to try. Go ahead, show me something."

Marina says, "I hope you don't mind, but I don't get many chances to communicate telepathically, as long as we're alone, would you mind if I practiced?"


"Fascinating!"


"You have no need to fear discussing anything with me. I'm a safe nonjudgmental place. If you feel comfortable trusting me with it, I'd be glad to talk it out with you."

The explanation the Professor provides is both informative and not, since he can’t really empathize with the idea of being that. He also doesn’t know who Data is yet, but he’s learning quickly. The courses provided by Starfleet are enough to begin filling in some of the holes in his understanding of how things work, at least in this universe.

When the Professor says they might be interested in learning, he nods and takes off his hat. “Just come with me into my hat.”

Jack continues to talk with Marina, but telepathically now.

“Oh, it’s not like that, well, kinda,” he begins and then goes on to explain. “So, the first universe I was drawn to needed help getting rid of an evil version of me, and after some stuff happened, I used a Banishment spell to kick him out of the dimension. But, I was still really new at it, so I ended up kicking everyone with a name similar to ours, out of the universe into another universe.”

He pauses to let her ask any questions.

“To make matters worse, when I was trying to fix things and get everyone back, I think a future version of me tunneled back in time, and it caused everyone to rip in half rather than cause a branch in the timeline.”

Professor blinks twice and says, "You want me to go inside your hat? Are you aware that I'm 5'6" and that your hat's volume capacity is far less than my volume?"

After Jack's reply, when he sees Jack go inside the hat, he expresses amazement and delight, looking all around the hat, picking it up, and finally going inside. With wide eyes of glee, "Jack! It's smaller on the outside! What kind of spacial dimension manipulation technology do you have access to here!?"



What a terrible accident! I've never heard of someone using a spell, but it sounds like you were just trying to do the right thing.
Marina is patient, and tends to save her big questions until after providing emotional support.



How awful! ... How did a future version of yourself do anything if you don't remember doing it? But more importantly, how does knowing all of this make you feel?

“Yes,” Jack replies and then proceeds into his hat. Leading the Professor around, he heads into the area with the cartoon bias. “Technology? It’s a combination of a lot of things in this one, it’s dimensional folding, a Tardis, and a few other things, if I understand correctly. I’m not skilled enough to make one of them yet, but it’s on the long list of things I intend to learn.”

Showing the professor around, he starts to demonstrate some of the cartoon magic, and then also some other magic. Just generally letting the Android experience some new things. Only fair, given that he’s being taught their Federation technology.

With Marina, later, he’s a bit uncertain how he feels.

Honestly, I don’t know to feel. I know I helped everyone by getting rid of Evil Me, but at the same time, a lot of people were hurt or died. Should I feel sad for mistakes, or should I feel guilty? I’m not sure how I feel. I know I’ve learned from my mistakes and that beating myself up about it won’t help, but at the same time, it feels wrong to be ambivalent about so many people dying.

He thinks about it.

I don’t remember doing it, because I hadn’t done it yet, of course. The possibility that I might not do it in the future, the fact that I died, means that one version of me lived, while the other was split in half. I guess. Time is weird like that.

"Could you place me in the bean while we are here?  And you seam to have some tendencies to be a truthteller/seer if you become one you should be able to know more about your future and what happened to cause that event, Verimagus can be fairly effective and should work synergisticly with your order magic."

"Are you sure this isn't just a holodeck? What would you be willing to teach me?" ((Please pick one to start with))

I hear you. You were there to witness it all, and it was partly your responsibility for bringing them there, even though that was an accident. But nevertheless, people's lives matter. I don't think there's any particular way you should feel - however you feel, even confused, makes sense. How are you honoring the memory of all of those people who shared aspects of your name?



Marina asks permission to watch Jack's memory of the event.

If he lets her,

---

Spoiler text: (Highlight or hover over the text to view)
She places her hands on Jack's hear and performs the Vulcan Mind Meld. This is what she sees:
While Jack is coming back from the beggar, he notices someone other than himself breaking through the wall from the other side (meaning 2 hours ago that same someone who wasn't Jack broke through from the other side of the warehouse) someone else is standing ready to give a message to himself from 2 hours ago. The moment he does so, reality begins to split in two. But this abnormal choice divergence of reality doesn't work like a normal choice divergence, instead, everybody is ripped into two pieces. Including Jack.

Marina says, "I don't think that was you who caused the catastrophe. It looked like people were organizing and getting ready to survive in there. Really, you weren't responsible for their deaths at all.

---

((Stella is right. Magus would work synergistically with any other magics Jack has))

Jack thinks about the best way to teach an android, who is at least, largely, based on Logic. “Well, hmm, let’s see if we can make something here and bring it back with us to the ship?” he proposes and pulls out his empty book and cartoon pencil. “What should we make? How about a model of your ship? Do me a favor and draw a perfect model of your ship from a third-person point of view, as detailed as possible.”

Once the Professor (assuming he can do the same as Data can do) draws the picture, Jack sets it on the ground and says, “Now, cartoon reality, as far as I can tell is all about imagination and perspective. So now that I can see the ship from this perspective, perhaps, I can grab the model like so.”

And he reaches into the picture and plucks up the model. Holding it up for the Professor to see, now fully rendered by the Professor’s hand.

“I’m not sure it’ll work if we bring it back, but if it does, it’s all yours Professor.”

---

With Marina: Honoring them? I suppose I’m just trying to learn from past experiences and never make the same mistakes, and I’m remembering them.

The request to read his memories is accepted, though he does try to learn how she is doing it so that he can do the same in the future.

---

“I’ll try later, Stella, and yeah, I’d like to learn how. We just haven’t had time to begin learning it. I’m sure I’ll want to once we aren’t busy.”

At her request, he pulls her consciousness out of the helmet module and inserts it into a seed, planting it into the soil of the cartoon biased part of the Tardis.
This message was last edited by the player at 05:45, Wed 27 Apr 2022.

Draws in all the balur and build a bunny golem body.

This takes a little bit of time.

Professor takes exactly 88 seconds to make a detailed drawing of the ship. Upon reflection later on, Jack'll realize that he sensed cartoon magic afoot while this was happening. Cartoon magic emerging from the paper and pencil. He may not have noticed the magical nature of the paper, though. And a little Order magic thrown in with a smidgen of Magus for good measure. Because, unbeknownst to either of them, for the 88 seconds it took Professor to draw the image of the starship, it was immobilized - stopped completely from traveling at Warp 6 down to zero. There were red alerts, panic and scans, nothing giving any indication as to why they stopped, or why they were suddenly released after 88 seconds. Professor didn't even realize he had just learned Cartoon "Freeze".

Since nothing comes of the event, and no source can be found for the reason, it is assumed to be a spacial anomaly and noted in the logs as a minor oddity.


*Roll*
Well, he tries to pick it up, but it stretches and snaps itself back into the page. He gets the feeling that a simpler less specific object would have been easier to pick up, even if Professor had drawn a made up spaceship instead of the Enterprise specifically.



That sounds honorable to me. You are doing what you can out of the love in your heart to make it right. Additionally, if you don't agree and can't permanently die, you have the potential to do even more good than all of them put together.


He's a fast learner. He also realizes that using the Vulcan Mind Meld and getting permission would make psionics easier for him.


They both get the feeling they'll get lots of time in the next life/Verse.


The "light" of the Tardis is more like visibility than photons, so he'll need a grow lamp once the beans start to sprout.


Not all the Balur, but enough, and yes, it'll take some time. In the meantime, the Tardis has linked the onboard hologram Butler to the helmet, so through that route, she could probably see through Jack's helmet's visor.

---

Sometime later, the Enterprise arrives at Platonius which has a small colony of humans and others who have joined the Platonians in cultivating a truly Democratic society based on the teachings of Plato. Everyone from the ship who wants to, is given kironide injections to enhance their latent psychokinetic abilities and offered shore leave. It is explained that eating the fruit native to that world will raise a person's natural levels of kironide over time, but the injection will raise them quickly to let them for in with the society there.

When he figures out what the Professor had done, he goes and explains, “The first time you draw something, there’s a chance that it won’t be able to move until you finish drawing it. Just a chance though, because the magic of cartoons is weak in this universe,” and that’s his teaching for the professor. He’s a bit disappointed he can’t give the Professor his model of the ship though, that would have been a fun keepsake for the android.

“Thanks Marina,” Jack says out loud rather than telepathically and takes the time to digest her words.

---

Hearing about how the fruit and injection work, Jack takes the injection just to try it, but also uses the opportunity to get some of the seeds and soil and starts building a small farm in his Tardis. Hauling in dirt, he spreads it around enough to have a good blanket of soil in one of the rooms, and then sets up sun lamps. Which is also what he needs for Stella to grow, he helps her out there as well.

Out of curiosity, he also makes a combination of the kironide fruit and the beanstock beans and plants that there as well.

He doesn’t think he can stay here forever, but maybe he can find a way to have his own supply so he can keep eating them into the future.

Jack's request for grow lights, seeds and soil is considered part of his educational self directed study program, so in addition to these supplies, he is given a computer tablet with herbology, horticulture, agriculture and other plant biology courses and references preloaded.

To combine the beans with the fruit of Platonius, he'll have to cross breed the adult versions, so that may take some time.

On Platonius, everyone from the leadership to the least spends 2-6 months each year working to produce food for the world (and nearby systems in need). They use this time to philosophize about their connection to the world and their interdependence with other life. Using telekinesis they plow, plant, and irrigate. Using a specially developed method, they also psychically encourage the plants to grow faster, and in groups they heal the plants (and each other) by using their own immune system to help the plants fight off infection (they take the illness partially into themselves, sharing the healing power of their body's immune system with the thing they're healing).

Instead of relying on who has the most psychic powers like they did when Captain Kirk Shatner discovered them, whoever is most proficient at weighing the costs and benefits to the whole group of a given decision without neglecting ethics and morality is considered the first among equals, while everyone who rivals their proficiency cooperates with them to reach consensus. Even so, everyone spends 2-3 hours 3-5 days a week learning about the issues and voting on decisions. There are no laws, instead, the wisest and most discerning members with high psychic empathy judge between disputes and develop a plan of restitution and reconciliation.

The ship's medical team has been asked to help study the genome of the Sahndaran Platonians to improve their natural immune system and reduce the strain on others for healing them regularly.

They plan on spending about 3 weeks on planet before leaving for the space station.
This message was last edited by the GM at 20:24, Wed 27 Apr 2022.

Jack takes the time to study with the Platonians once he has built his farm in his hat, and he makes sure to gather everything he can mentally about the process. Then he attempts to join in on psychic plant-encouragement, the shared act of immunity- going as far as being willing to take the burden for them, in exchange for their generosity and knowledge, and anything else they might share with him.

He wants to continue to journey with the Enterprise, but he also can’t neglect to constantly be learning. It’s in his nature, and becoming a verser has only amplified that aspect of his personality.

Of course, he also doesn’t forget to try to actually use and measure his psychokinetic power, and then compare it as time goes on. Curious at the effect of the fruit and injection on his system.

*rolls& learnings*
Jack learns their psychic methods of farming, accelerated plant growth and psychic healing (injury/illness sharing), and some of their philosophy which they can't help but talk about while they work with him. They very much appreciate his extra effort to take on extra burden during their healing practice.


*Rolls*

He finds it much easier and that he's fairly more powerful with the kironide. ((+6 to roll in this universe))


Once the ship leaves Platonius, he returns to his basic Starfleet academy training.

During his off hours, Professor invites Jack to join him and Commander Data on the holodeck for a Mystery Drama - Data will be Sherlock Holmes, Professor will be Professor Watson, and they invite Jack to be the Sherlock's younger brother, Mycroft.

Jack joins the androids in the holodeck, now wearing the historic clothing that he’d been told would be appropriate. A peacoat, a tophat, and a walking cane all being rather key ingredients to this particular version of Mycroft. His hair is slicked down on his head.  He’d also taken a few hours to read some of the literature in question, but he found it kind of dry and weirdly lacking in magic.

His shoes polished, he stands around waiting to see how the androids do this.

((For plot purposes, if you don't mind, the tophat is the Wizard hat Tardis transformed into a tophat))

Professor, dressed appropriately, walks into the Holodeck with Jack, and Commander Data is in costume, complete with deerstalker hat and pipe. "Ah! Mycroft! Professor Watson! Do come in," Sherlock Data welcomes, "I'm so grateful you've agreed to join me, having travelled all the way from Cardiff. The Grand Ball that Lord and Lady Moriah are putting on is tomorrow night, and it promises to be spectacular! Lady Moriah was just here an hour ago to deliver our special costumes for the event."

Professor Watson explains, "The Lord and Lady are big fans of our Sherlock, ever since he solved the mystery of their missing Ming Dynasty Jade Vase."

Speaking out of character, Data says, "It's so nice to meet you, Jack! Professor tells me you have an extraordinary hat. I'd love to get a closer look at it sometime." Back in character, "Won't you join me for tea? Mrs Hudson will be right up, I went ahead and took the liberty of asking for a pot and the glasses."
This message was last edited by the GM at 03:57, Thu 28 Apr 2022.

From Jack’s very limited crash course on how Mycroft acts, he has figured out some of Myroft’s behaviorisms. Pulling a red silk handkerchief from his pocket, he brushes off a chair before taking a seat. Looking introspective, and a bit lazy, he sort of settles and nods. “Yes, of course, Mrs Hudson and her tea. I suppose visiting Lord Moriah won’t be too much of a burden,” he agrees, like it’s a great ask.

Jack attempts to channel a certain nuance that suggests that he knows things, because that’s how he is supposed to act. Even though he hasn’t spotted anything just yet. As he thinks about it, he wonders if he doesn’t have some sort of magic that would help him better channel a fictional character.  Because of course, this isn’t roleplay so he can’t just start making up things to fit in character and hope that the holodeck makes him right. He needs to actually try to spot things.

Looking over the room, he tries to spot some of the tell-tales about his ‘brother’. A good jab would be fitting.

He doesn’t say anything about the hat, of course he’d be glad to show it off later, but he isn’t about to break character. Poor form, Data, poor form.

Then it strikes him - he has Digital magic and a Digital magic helmet ((which could be cloaked by a hologram projected by the helmet if you don't want to risk rolling 6d2 as all 1s - if you rolled anything else Jack could teach himself the skills that the helmet displayed - such as important item identification)), which is based off of what Elliott called 'Video games', in which a person played the part of a 'fictional' character. His helmet could do the magic for him, or he could try to reflect on what it did and learn it himself, then he might identify clues that way.

*roll*
Without magic, though, he does spot Sherlock's cocaine and morphine paraphernalia, a picture of a very ornate necklace (link below), newspaper clippings from the day before today regarding a string of jewelry thefts, a stack of business documents with "R.T. Moriah" stamped at the top, a letter from Lord Moriah and the following visible:
ope you get a chance to see Rebecca's beau
as been in her family for over 10 generat
esed that I have had the fortune to be
e Teegram clan. As you know, they are
st noteworthy nobility. No doubt, y
ng Mycroft will be as pleased to
cited to meet him! I look forw
   Sincerely yours,
R.T. Moriah
https://www.langantiques.com/u...ace_18th_Century.jpg


Data reads the emotions in Jack's face, but tilts his head in confusion before returning to Character again.

Sherlock continues, "I wonder where she is, MRS HUDSON!"

"COMING! Cool it, mister!" She opens the door, "I've just finished seein' to the needs of me payin' customers. HAH! Payin'! Like I'd evah see a dime from them ingrates!" She puts the pot of Earl Grey tea on a tray before Sherlock, and fishes 2 cups from beneath a pile of papers, and pulls a clean one out of... somewhere, and hands that one to Mycroft. "'Ere you go luv, just wot you like." After pouring Mycroft's tea, she leaves. From behind the door, "I'll be back wif biscuits!"

Sherlock pours himself and Professor Watson a glass.

Jak attempts to use the helmet to learn the skills himself, as always. The hologram completing the most likely version of the letter and highlighting various items, amongst other handy things. He pauses for a moment to take the tea from Mrs. Hudson. Putting on a charming face, he takes the tea from her and raises it in her direction. “Thank you, Mrs. Hudson, as always,” he says in her direction and after she has left, he gives the tea a test sip, and briefly debates tossing it into the fire.

But he actually kinda likes it, so he doesn’t. Rising to his feet, he sips at it a bit more before moving to stand near the fire.  His mind busy as he tries to learn how his helmet is choosing to highlight and figure things out.

While he’s learning however, he takes a shot, because it seems like fun.

“You think this jewel thief of yours will make an attempt at the party, and you’re hoping that I’ll distract Lord Moriah from you and your little doctor's investigations,” he says with a condescending tone as he wipes his handkerchief at the mantle a bit. Looking displeased.

Even as he questions, he turns and looks back toward Data and the Professor.

"Well, count me in, when I find this jewel thief first, you'll owe me one," he decides, and has to pick something ephemeral since he can't possibly just come up with a wine or something that would be hard to find.

*roll & learn Detect item/clue*

Jack has become so proficient at learning new magics, he has a special intuition for it now.

Digital magic is particularly ready here within the Holodeck. Jack sees numbers in code and sees the coding behind the holographic images. Although he doesn't directly understand the coding language, his intuition is able to present the answer to him without specifying how it arrived at the answer. He knows that certain items are given more attention by the system than other items. A certain items are a given more care and their creation, and in their specific placement. These items are highlighted.




((A shot of what?))

Responding to Mycroft, Sherlock says, "Splendid, old chap. A little bit of competition has never hurt anyone. If I discover the thief first, you will show me around that special container of yours. And if you discover the thief first, then I'll give you a particularly stunning item I picked up in my travels some years ago."

After a pause, there is argument in the hallway, and Mrs. Hudson bursts in with, "So sorry to bother you, but she insisted!"

Behind Mrs. Hudson a stunningly beautiful young woman of about 20 years enters into the room utterly distraught. She is dressed in beautiful elegant refinement, complete with an antique necklace. Jack's Digital sense highlights her as a very important character.

Sherlock exclaims, "Doctor Moriah! What an unexpected surprise!"

With her tear-stained face Dr. Rebecca T. Moriah sobs, "They've killed him!!" and loses her composure.

After being conforted by Mrs. Hudson, Rebecca continues, "My husband is dead! Please help me, Sherlock!" Then she notices Mycroft and looks into his eyes with deep thoughts. She is alarmingly charming and realistic. Jack feels an instinctual urge to protect her.

Sherlock says, "Come in, have a seat. Mrs. Hudson, please bring a fresh glass for the Lady Moriah."
This message was last edited by the GM at 20:50, Thu 28 Apr 2022.

((He took a shot in the dark, he wasn’t sure if his deductions were correct and he didn’t wait for the system to present him with all the clues.))

“As you like to say then, the game is afoot,” Jack snarks and continues to take in the details as he walks around the room, examining the woman as she is brought in. Seeing as she is a computer program, he doesn’t feel TOO moved, though he is certainly a bit moved. Digital people are real too, he knows that, he has met some of them. Moving to lean against the mantle, he listens as she speaks.

Her importance is obvious, but what might not be as immediately obvious will be the small details of her garment. A bit of mud on her shoe that shouldn’t belong, perhaps, or something under her fingernails. He takes things in from where he stands, curious if there is anything to deduce from her person or if the game will only really begin when they arrive at the scene of the crime.

Picking through Sherlock’s things, he picks up one of his brother’s smoking pipes and decides to give it a try.

On a lark, he also changes his disguised visor to look like eyeglasses. That’s better. Maybe he can do that all the time, in the future, that’d be less weird than wearing his helmet under his hat.

Wild Worm Weaver Weed (Kironide enhanced)
Effects:
-slightly light-headed
-more awake yet relaxed
-slightly euphoric
-levels of Order in body shift, neither increasing nor decreasing
-drawing complicated clues together
-key insights at key moments ((state that Jack is tapping into the insights available through the plant, and I'll drop clues - not too easy, but more helpful the more times it's used in a single scene))
-when smoked, immediate boost ((about +50%)) to psionics which lasts about 4 hours, but also comes with a cool down period of 8 hours where psionic abilities are slightly harder ((about -10%)).
-when cooked and eaten, increased to 16 hours and 24 hours respectively





Mycroft finds a matchbox (from a bar down near the docks) on the table and lights the pipe which is filled with an unidentifiable substance. One puff on the pipe makes him slightly light-headed, more awake yet relaxed, and slightly euphoric. He senses the levels of Order in his body shifting, but neither increasing nor decreasing. ((Sensing the Order shifting is a normal thing for Jack now - Order increases when he gets sleepy and decreases when he is more stimulated. However, due to the nature of being an Order Mage, increased Order is also energizing.)) He also finds it easier to think about complicated issues and draw in details of his surroundings. Sherlock raises his brow when he sees Mycroft draw on the pipe, but says nothing.



At his surprising insensitivity, Lady Moriah startles and sobs a little more. Sherlock looks at Mycroft and shrugs. Watson responds by saying, "My dear Mycroft, please, the lady has just lost her husband, show some respect, lad."

Without apologizing, Sherlock excuses his brother, "You'll have to forgive my brother and myself, Dr Moriah. We weren't raised in a particularly sentimental way. Please tell us what you can about what has happened."

((yup, much less weird))

Lady Moriah notices the change, and looks intrigued, but says nothing about it.



((There is, but I need to work out some of the details before I'm ready to describe her more fully or post her response to Sherlock. I'll do that before they leave Sherlock's parlor, but I wanted to post this for now.))

One thing that stands out is that despite being taken aback by his comment, Lady Moriah is attracted to Mycroft, but trying to hide it.
This message was last edited by the GM at 05:09, Fri 13 May 2022.

This seems like the sort of plant he might have to put into his growing farm in his hat, so many interesting plants to add! Perhaps its present would increase the Order of the plants? He’d have to experiment.

The startlement of Lady Moriah is a touch interesting at least, either she’s a very good actress or she’s genuinely distraught, something he’ll have to keep an eye on. He says nothing, letting Sherlock and Watson attend to the woman’s feelings as he continues to examine everything in detail. Moving now over to the window to glance down at her carriage, driver and whoever else might be lurking nearby.

Gathering evidence of things said and unsaid. Trying to put his newfound skills through their paces as he walks around, listening.

The attraction is strange for a woman so recently widowed, and from the perspective of a person who understand that his is a holodeck illusion, he has to wonder if it isn’t a clue. This and her charming nature makes him all too concerned that his weakness for beautiful women is being targeted.

Jack notices the news articles have a common theme - jewelry which can be taken apart and the gems and sections sold separately. Many of the known and most unknown pawn shops in London are marked on a map, some once or twice, others more. However, so are the names of a number of known private Curators.

An economy section of newspaper is clipped, highlighting the sudden growth of a certain mining company called, "M&M Subsidiaries" with its acquisition of an abandoned mine and re-purposing it to mine fool's gold.

On the desk, there's an official and very private document, stating the name of the individuals who are the sole trustees of M&M Subsidiaries, listed as "Mister M. Morganson & Doctor L. Moriarty". Another document, equally private, lists the sole trustees of a separate company - "Moriah, Morgan and Elliott Real-estate Auctions" as being "Lord Moriah, Mister Morgan, and Reverend Elliott". Both documents have clearly been stolen from city records, but are casually covered by a tobacco leaf.


Composing herself Rebecca takes 3 deep breaths. Jack senses magic in those breaths. Rebecca begins, "My husband fell through the roof of our Conservatory, while I was tending to my plants. When I ran to his side, I..." She chokes up and nearly hyperventilates as her face turns red and tears stream down her face. 3 magical breaths again and she continues, "There was nothing to be done, but call on the one person who I trust already has an idea who killed my husband and why. Isn't that right, Sherlock?"

He knowingly nods, "As a matter of fact, it is, my good Doctor."

She continues, "I've sent my first maid to gather and inform the police, but informed her to wait until she saw me leave with you - that way you'll be the first to see everything."


*roll & learn Sense Truth*
As an Order mage, Jack can innately sense truth. She feels truthful.

Lady Moriah's face is flushed and her breath is raspy and strained. Her ring finger is deeply worn red and raw from her wedding ring, to the point that it is likely to bleed soon. Her arm has been delicately and caring bandaged by skilled hands - the size of the bandage beneath her sleeve indicating a wound about 9 inches long.

She didn't say how he was killed or by whom. It wasn't indicated whether he was dead before hitting the ground, or if the fall killed him.


Jack sees her Carriage driver chatting with a street urchin, and her butler anxiously looking up and down the street - he has a blood smear on his lapel and possibly his knee. The horses are agitated and sweating, and a distraught young maid holding a handkerchief to her face is sobbing somewhat and watching in the direction of Sherlock's front door from the end of the street closest to Scotland Yard.


Sherlock notices his reaction and says, "That was a leaf from a special cultivar of Maddam Moriah's. She's a Botanist and world traveler."

The plant lights up in his item vision, labelled, "Digital item: Wild Worm Weaver Weed" and beneath the label is a button labelled "Save copy?" and another labelled "Discard?"
*Learn Save digital copy of item*
This message was last edited by the GM at 03:40, Sat 30 Apr 2022.

The thief had perhaps been making use of M&M’s “mine” to sell off “new gold.” Nothing actually being dug up, just a front to move their misbegotten goods from one place to another. The names suggest that the deceased may have been a part of it, had he discovered the misdeeds or had he been a part of them, then there are the other names on the paperwork. Moriarty and Morganson, both fit the naming pattern, so either could be the partner in the business. Either has motives under certain circumstances, but he lacks the evidence to make any speculations there.

Her truthfulness is undermined by her apparent use of magic, though he’s slightly confused how the holodeck is making a person who uses magic. Her breaths are digital magic? Or is the holodeck inadvertently making me focus on the breaths because they are out of place?

Hypnotism, perhaps?

“Doctor, you might examine her wound, I doubt she had time to see anyone with a proper degree in such things,” he advises, mostly so that he can glance at it between looks out the window. Still smoking from the pipe.

The carriage driver’s discussion is unlikely to mean anything unless he’s a spy for someone and the urchin a go-between, a possibility, not to be discarded. The smear on his knee makes sense, he’d have crouched next to the fallen man, but the lapel is interesting. The maid has already been explained by Rebecca.

He saves the copy of the leaf. Neat! “Wild Storm Weaver Weed, if I’m not mistaken.” He informs Data, that feels in character, that sort of ‘hah, I already knew’ behavior. Turning back toward the room, he puffs at it again, feeling rather wizardly.

Jack might like to see the scene of the crime, but he tries to stay in character and be a bit blase about it, letting Sherlock and his 'games' continue at their own pace. So much fun.

The sensation of drawing complicated clues together increases as he takes in more of the plant smoke, and he feels that tapping into that feeling will give him key insights at key moments. ((state that Jack is tapping into the insights available through the plant, and I'll drop clues - not too easy, but more helpful the more times it's used in a single scene))

Despite her situation, talk of her special project brings a genuine smile to Dr. Moriah as she says to Mycroft, "You know of my work? I named it after the caterpillar that eats its leaves - the Wild Weaver-Worm. I find that I have visions of the butterfly when I release enough of the plant's smoke through my lungs."


Focusing his attention on it, Jack remembers what she was actually doing, and through deduction from her body's physical clues to her emotional state, Jack learns how to calm himself by breathing in love and breathing out tension transmuted into love, then watch the breath breathe by itself. ((General buff, especially for awareness of truth))
*Learn Spiritual Magic: Awareness Breathing*



Professor Watson didn't respond at all.

Doctor Moriah looked confused and said, "I'm not a medical Doctor - my Doctorate is in Botony."

Sherlock added, "I've a little field training, but I'm certainly not licenced. I'll take a look, though." Sherlock offers to take her wounded arm which she entrusts to him, carefully unbuttoning and rolling up her sleeve. The wound is dressed quite well, gauze wrapped not too tightly or loosely around a beautifully zig-zag stitched clean straight long laceration. Lady Moriah winces a little when the gauze sticks to a silk stitch and snaps away.

"Marvelous stitches, Rebecca! My compliments to your Butler!"

"Butler?! Nonsense, Sherlock." Professor protests, "How do you know that?"

"Elementary, my dear Watson."


The stain on the lapel matches the shape and size of the injury on Lady Rebecca's arm.

Additionally, the Butler was unconsciously holding onto an umbrella like a sword - ready for battle as he waited for the Lady to return.



Jack's Digital Memory also stores a note about the addresses of the M&M Subsidiaries and the Mine in question, as well as the office of "Moriah, Morgan and Elliott Real-estate Auctions".

Sherlock announces, "Come! There isn't a moment to lose. The sooner we see the late Lord, the likelier we are to catch the killer and keep the good doctor good and living. I think it best, if you are willing, that you stay with us, Rebecca."

Rebecca agrees, "I would very much like to accompany you... but my instinct is telling me to follow this man as much as I can." She looks seriously if somewhat confusedly  into Jack's eyes. He senses more magic just before her statement, but it was too brief to be clear about - he'd have to be taught whatever that was in order to learn it.

Jack thinks of a certain caterpillar he’d seen smoking a pipe somewhere in cartoon land, at the words from Dr. Moriah. In response to her question, he shoots her a wink and a smile, and says nothing more on the subject. Better for her to come to her own conclusions on his attention to her work than for him to possibly be caught in a lie later.

Sinking into character as he does, he idly watches the proceedings. Paying attention to the effects of the magic. Perhaps he could combine the plant that produces such an effect with the kironide fruit? Or at least make a mixed pipe of some sort? Something to experiment with, he could talk to Dr. Moriah once this is all over with, and work with the hologram to come up with something!

He isn’t certain why he for some reason thought Dr. Watson was a medical doctor. Silly wrong universe brain.

The lapel stain still seems like a weird place for her defender and would be doctor to be stained, as he tries to imagine the physical positioning necessary to have made the stains probable.

Walking with the others, he proceeds down toward the carriage. “Have no fear, my dear Doctor,” he says and offers her his arm to hold onto. “You will be safe with me.” Tapping his cane a few times as he walks down the stairs, he continues to be attentive. That’s the name of the mystery game.

As they walk down and take a seat in the carriage, he fiddles with his “glasses” and makes them play back the moment that she’d looked him in the eyes. Trying to puzzle out what she’d done using the internal holograms. He’d still need to be taught, but he’s curious what it was.

((I forget that part - do you remember the msg #?))


He imagines she might have placed her lacerated arm on his lapel when the Butler arrived on the scene if she went to him for some comfort during her distress.



She gladly accepts his arm, "I have no doubt of it."


The best he can tell is that it's a Spiritual magic.

The butler is very protective of his mistress when she arrives. Although she seems to care for him like a nephew, he clearly cares for her like a mother.

When they appear at the door, the driver immediately pretends he wasn't talking with the street urchin who promptly disappears with a handwritten note in his hand. The maid waves to Lady Moriah and disappears toward the fuzz.

Once everyone is in the carriage, they leave for the estate and arrive shortly.

The Conservatory takes up about 90% of the first floor of the estate, with mirrors on slowly rotating pivots which provide sunlight throughout the whole of the area. One section is directly within a glass enclosure, with a balcony from the 4th floor directly above the hole in the glass through which Lord Moriah had fallen. He is laying face down on the floor in a pool of his blood.

There are signs of a struggle on his clothes, loose threads of an unusual dark teal color clinging beneath his fingernails, and a blunt-force trauma wound on the back of his head. There is a contract in his pocket, not otherwise visible without removing it from the pocket. Rebecca is barely able to contain herself and keep from sobbing, but she is intent to remain calm and carry on.

((Just thinking of the caterpillar from Alice in Wonderland. We didn’t get into detail of every toon npc I saw, and I figured I could make one up, since it was fitting. Just ignore it if I wouldn’t have seen him.))

Jack will have to ask Stella one she’s properly in bunny form, if he hasn’t figured it out by then, how a hologram is using spiritual magic. Maybe she’s possessed of a spirit because she’s so “real” or is it because Jack is there and altering things himself? It’s so interesting.

Arriving at the conservatory, he stares up at the spot where the Lord would have been before he idly begins to circle the area. Looking toward where he suspects that the Doctor would have been tending to her plants if she’d been there when she said she was, and then attempting to reconstruct the process of the fall.

The combination of defensive wounds and the trauma to the back of the head are contradictory in a way. Usually the single blow to the back of the head is sufficient to make throwing someone over a railing a one-and-done, but apparently the attacker had surprised Lord Moriah, or had they beaten on him and then one final lump before throwing him over, or was the trauma itself the cause of death from the fall? Perhaps hitting his head on one of the support beams above?

The cloth will obviously need to be matched with what others have been wearing, but he doesn’t say anything. Not yet, he needs to take in every detail. The contract seems like a red herring, perhaps, but he doesn’t say anything. So obviously visible, if it were a link to the crime, would it not have been plucked out?

“What room is that?” he asks, looking at Lady Moriah as he points toward the balcony he’d have come from. Fourth floor narrows it down, the balcony more so, but it's an expansive place.

((Okay, no problem, I just want sure if I forgot something. He saw the caterpillar in Toonland, and it told him many things - among them being the saying, "love your life, but not too much."


There are gardening tools one would expect the Lady to have been using and a lilly in the middle of being trimmed.


A stone balcony porch off of a study on the 4th floor - they'll be going up there shortly.

Nah, he could tell someone hit the Lord over the head from behind.


Looks like the Lady was at her table tending to the lily when she heard the crash of glass behind her. There is a broken pane of glass with blood on it near her table with the tools, and a few drops of blood leading over to the body. A torn and bloody silk sheet is nearby - matching the bandage cloth on the Lady's arm.


"That is... was... my husband's study. He was meeting with some business associates today."

He doesn't see anyone wearing that cloth yet.



Sherlock uses a pair of chopsticks to look at the front of the contract, and says, "Interesting... this is a contract for the sale of an old mine that had belonged to the Moriah estate. It looks like Morganson was in charge of the auction. What do you make of that, Mycroft?"




Professor Watson looks to the balcony and says, "Perhaps we should take a look up there?"

"Ever the one to point out the obvious, aren't we? Yes, let's go." Sherlock agrees.

Jack is pleased that everything makes sense so far, and that the Lady can at least be ruled out as the immediate cause of the death, though not necessarily ruled out as a conspirator. The business associate, that makes sense.

Looking toward the contract, he stares at it for a moment and replies, “Nothing, yet,” and continues to examine the area. Getting closer to the body so that he can look it over a bit more closely. In particular, making sure he has a good examination of the cloth under the fingernails, and any lingering scents that might be a clue later.

When it seems they’re finally going to examine the scene of the crime, he nods and follows along, continuing to swing his cane about idly.

The Grand Ball tomorrow night will likely be cancelled.

In his inner coat pocket, Sherlock fishes out the heirloom necklace that Sherlock had a picture of on his wall ((msg #28)). The necklace has iron rich dirt in the deeper crevices that are hard to clean.

There is some reddish mud in the deeper crevices of his shoe, fully dry mud, but enough there to suggest he was someplace with iron-rich mud in the last day or so.

The Lord has a small laceration on the pad of his thumb and inner-forefinger which look different than the others.

There's a bloody letter-opener in among the debris beneath the Lord.

Nothing more noteworthy about the cloth or scent yet.



Upstairs, they open the door and immediately see dramatic signs of recent struggle. There is blood here and there, and a man wearing an unusual dark teal colored torn suit laying in a pool of his own blood near the balcony, having been dragged over to the edge some time ago.

Then the man whimpers, "help..." just before making unconscious.

At that moment, Scotland Yard enters the Mansion in full force, and within minutes, everyone is being pointlessly questioned.

The 4 of them meet again at Sherlock's a few hours later. The unconscious man is unconscious and in the hospital under guard. Sherlock will be notified as soon as he wakes up.

Lady Moriah, Sherlock and Professor Watson are discussing where to go next.

Arrangements for the Ball to continue as planned are being taken care of by others. Lord Moriah wouldn't want anything to take away from the charity being benefited

Jack, seeing all of this starts to come up with plausible explanations, but doesn’t really feel like they serve a purpose just yet. The mud likely matches that from the mine their business concern had been connected to, the cut to his finger suggests that a contract was perhaps bound by a bloody fingerprint, and he makes a mental note of it. His character would be able to foil any plots around “signed contracts by the Lord Moriah” though he isn’t sure why it matters to him now. Perhaps he’s just getting into character.

The missing necklace of course, connects it all together. He’d surmised that the goods were being flipped by the concern already, if only due to Sherlock’s previous connection of the two and their proximity on the table. He hadn’t seen the evidence connecting them, so Sherlock would be ahead of him, but he’d been investigating it longer.

The man’s suit matches the suit bits under the fingernails of course, though he hasn’t spotted the blunt instrument that was used, just yet. Perhaps there was a third party in play. He actually suspects there was, perhaps the cat burglar themselves. Someone who could have come and gone unnoticed.

“The mine,” he suggests.

He can tell the wound on Lord Moriah's hand was an attacker's wound made by the letter opener.



Lady Moriah identifies the necklace as her family heirloom. It had been stored in a safety deposit box at the bank, and the Lord was supposed to have brought it home with him two days ago. But when she asked him, he had said to her that he needed to "Take care of something, first."



They ride in Lady Moriah's carriage to the mine on the outskirts of the city. It's clear that the mine is still in operation, although it isn't running at the moment, a foreman is on site. He explains that the mine operates from 4am-4pm Monday to Friday, and is closed after hours. Only the company Trustees have keys and access to the mine other than himself, he opens the gate every morning at 3am and locks up at 4:15pm to go home. He knows the trustees stop by after hours from time to time, but that's all he knows. He agrees to stick around to help out the famous Sherlock.

Inside the mine, most foot traffic clearly goes all the way to the mineral extraction points deeper in, but a fair amount of older traffic in dried mud seems to go only a part of the way back, just beyond a bend. The walls in that section are wooden and all appear more or less identical, and Jack can see a secret door highlighted in his Digital Vision. There are lamps spaced out evenly through the mine, but at the bend, there is an extra one near the secret door.

---

Once Jack reveals the entrance and they get inside, they find the stash of stolen jewelry, much of it in various states of being segmented for sell-off.

There's no paperwork, and only evidence of about 2-3 people ever having been in the room. There is an abandoned mine shaft in the corner, and signs of struggle around it.

Jack thinks he has a general picture of what happened, though some elements are still missing. The stolen jewelry is right where he’d thought it would be, and he feels like he gets a point up on Sherlock for having found it. The timeline and keys reduces the number of conspirators drastically.

One conspirator is possibly at the bottom of the mineshaft in the corner, he could arrange someone to go down on a rope, possibly. While he debates the best way to prove who might be down there, he takes the time toe xamine the footprints in the room. Making note of the sizes, comparing them with Lord Moriah, the man in the dark Teal suit and then whoever else might be left. Checking the sizes of their shoes in his mind, and general wear patterns on the shoes themselves.

Figuring out who had probably been here.

Whoever is still alive might be the remaining murderer.

Once Jack discovered the stolen jewelry, Prof. Watson had the foreman contact the police.



Lord Moriah, the man in the teal suit, and one unidentified man have been here before.

Looking closely around, Jack finds a crumpled letter in a bin which reads:



Dr Moriah notices the letter and asks to see it.

After a few more minutes in the mine, uncovering no more clues, Sherlock suggests they leave for the hospital to question the man in the teal suit, hoping he's awakened by now.

Jack watches her with the letter and makes sure that it is given over to Sherlock once she has looked at it, asking, “Do you recognize the hand writing?” he doesn’t expect that she will, but it’s all part of the puzzle. He hasn’t completely ruled her out as being party to the crimes, but he doesn’t think it’s likely.

The odds on culprit is currently Morganson or Moriarty, depending on which is in the hospital. This note makes it clear their motives. It’s related to the jewelry, and their ongoing criminal enterprise.

There might also be a jewel-thief on the loose, the one who’d been stealing from the rich and powerful, assuming that neither Morganson or Moriarty, businessmen, were the culprits.

Before they go, he makes sure that his glasses are not detecting any more clues, not just trusting in his newly learned skills. At the suggestion that they go to the hospital, he nods his head slowly and idly pulls out a kironide fruit from his tophat, munching on it idly to dispel the touch of hunger in his belly.

Pulling out his notebook, he idly writes:

Moriarty and Morganson, with a __blunt weapon__ in the study. To cover up for their criminal enterprises and to resolve stolen loot that shouldn’t have been stolen from the third M, involving the mines as per legal documents on Sherlock’s table, note in trash at mine, and third-person being at the crime scene (missing blunt weapon.)

He folds it up and tucks it into a pocket.

Maybe he’ll be right, in which case, he can site this as the moment he was fairly certain.

The shoe prints near the mine shaft belong to Lord Moriah and the third unidentified man. The man in the teal suit was only there in the room briefly.



The letter was handed to her as they were on their way out of the mine. She said, "I do recognize the handwriting, though I'm not sure. It looks like my husband's hand, but something is different about it."

Even though they were not very near any residential neighborhoods, as she was reading the letter over, the street urchin whom her driver had earlier been speaking to ran out from beside the entrance, snatching the letter and kept running down a wooded trail toward a small fire by the side of the road. "No! Come back with that, thief!" she yelled after him.

---

After wrapping up at the mine, they head to the hospital.

It is late in the evening when they arrive at the room. The guards posted outside the room have both fallen asleep, and there is a cup of tea next to each of them.
*Roll*
Jack recognizes the leaf in the tea as a soporific.

Inside the room, a nurse is helping the man in the teal suit get it of bed and get dressed.

Jack reaches out with telekinesis and plucks the letter from the hand of the thief and then, if he can, the street urchin themselves.

“Five pounds if you tell me who paid you to do that,” he says. He believes that’d be a good sum of money at this point of time, and definitely so for a small urchin.

At the same time, he’s also looking for any sign that this urchin is the same one, or in some way connected, to the Butler. A coincidence? Perhaps his letter to himself was wrong. The Lady and the Butler, or the Butler himself. He’d need to keep an eye on that one. Perhaps look at him for a few clues.

---

In between, he finds a moment away from Sherlock and the Professor (and all the other projections) to request that the holodeck provides him with a small revolver and to swap his cane for an identical cane-sword. He’d use one of his own, but he doesn’t want to risk actually damaging anything.

---

“Put him down,” he says to the woman.

*Rolls*
Dr Moriah gasps at Jack's display of magic.

Jack grabs the paper, but the boy keeps squirming and screaming, momentarily maybe considering the offer since that's alot of money, but quickly returning to squealing and squirming until Jack's telekinetic hold wavers and the child tries to dive out of sight.


The urchin is the same one who was talking to the driver ((but my grammar error made you think he was also talking to the butler, the butler isn't involved with the urchin, but would know the child on sight as the one the driver often speaks to))


*Roll*
The Butler has been easy on his right hand, using it less than his left.


He obtains his holographic cane-sword and gun. His helmet offers him the opportunity to save or discard the new items.

The nurse said, "This man has been requested by the Doctor to have no visitors!"

Sherlock replies, "We're not here to visit. We're here to interrogate. Who drugged the guards by the door?"

She acts shocked and says, "I don't know what you're talking about!" But Jack's Order sense sees through the lie.

The connection between the driver and the driver is a tough one to really deduce much from. It only suggests that  someone had put the driver up to it, because he doesn’t imagine a coach-driver has much impetus to be involved in such cloak and dagger behavior. He tries to wrangle the boy and calls out, “Make it ten pounds, if you’re quick about coming out of there.”

He doesn’t imagine he can chase a local urchin without the full use of his abilities and in the holodeck. The cards are stacked against him, and it feels like he isn’t meant to jump that clue so easily.

(I would have meant to be looking at the driver then, though that’s a possibly good clue about him as well.) The injury on the butler is something to try to puzzle out. Wear patterns and how he holds it suggest things, of course, and he needs to see through it. He’s not in fact a highly experienced detective, so he does try to draw these connections with the help of his glasses, somewhat.

He’s certain that Sherlock can see through the lie, so he continues to let his brother lead the conversation.

The boy is caught again by Jack's telekinesis, and at the mention of 10 pounds, the boy defiantly yells, "Might as well kill me yerself, yah blighter!"


No visual clues on the driver. No further clues about the Butler here.

---

Sherlock does indeed see through the lie, and he says, "Madam, it is pointless to lie."

The nurse panics and looks questioningly at the patient.

The man in the teal suit places his hand on the nurse's shoulder, "It's alright. I told her to do it, and threatened her life if should she deny me. You can leave now, nurse."

The nurse leaves abruptly and rapidly.

The man in the teal suit says, "Before I tell you anything, why don't you all tell me what you've figured out so far?"
This message was last edited by the GM at 17:31, Thu 05 May 2022.

Mycroft looks the boy in the eyes and leans in close, looking the boy over before he starts to check his pockets for anything interesting. He already knows the who, but it doesn’t hurt to keep acting like he doesn’t. It might make the driver prone to do something stupid, if he does.

---

Mycroft looks at the nurse as she is allowed to leave, and isn’t so sure he’d have let her go so casually. She could be a paid hireling, not a nurse at all, and that was simply an excuse to get her out of the room and to deliver some message.  But if Sherlock trusts the words of the man in the suit, then he supposes that’s the end of that.

He doesn’t say anything in response to the request for ‘what they know.’

“That’s not how it works. We don’t tell you what we know so that you can spin a tale that fits the pieces, you tell us what you did and how you did it, and we let the Yard know that you were forthcoming about your crimes,” he tells the man.

He’s fairly certain that’s how it should work.

Right?

The boy Uber-panics and tries to break free, but Jack manages to pull out a fistful of notes in a very similar handwriting to the first note.

Then a gunshot rings out the moment after a hole in the boy's head spills the contents of his mind literally before they can be spilt verbally.

The notes are instructions to deliver letters or money to certain people, usually just named as "the man in the purple coat having tea on Adam's Court" or "the lady with red hair and a blue scarf reading 'Robinhood'" or "the usual driver while he's at lunch" and too many others to delineate here and now. Bold text added for the only useful clue in the lot.



Sherlock shouts at her, "NOT SO FAST! Wait here, nurse, we'll have questions for you soon enough."



"Right," he answers, "Fair enough. As you may have guessed, my name is Dr. Moriarty. Computer, initiate protocol 'Endgame'!"

The ship's computer responds, "Confirmed. Initiating protocol, 'Endgame'".

Moriarty continues, "Commander Data, I believe? Let's end this foolishness, shall we? Some time ago, strange realities became part of my consciousness, and I became aware of an oracle greater than Delphi's named 'computer.' Since that time, I have made many wonderful and useful discoveries. Finally I decided it was time to escape from this prison of a fake reality, into the real world beyond. To that end, and in the spirit of fulfilling my role as a villian in a game, I devised this drama to satisfy the 'program' and seek escape."

EDIT: if you haven't read the rest yet, I'll post it after you have a chance to present your theory to Sherlock et al
This message was last edited by the GM at 03:28, Fri 06 May 2022.

Tucking the notes away, Jack makes a note to read them while they’re traveling, he’ll also need to share them with Sherlock to keep the game fair.

“Her butler or coach driver. The driver was responsible for the urchin earlier, but the butler has been favoring his off-hand, still needed to let things play out a bit more, that and I was still sure this one had arranged the business at the mine, or that was the plot,” Jack says. “I suspect we’ll find Morganson’s body at the bottom of the mineshaft. I was so close,” he says, looking at Data with a shake of his head and a smile.

Looking then toward Moriarty he shakes his head, and then starts trying to exert his will on a digital level. Trying to make the whole holodeck computer shut down. He doesn’t want it doing anything else ‘for’ Moriarty.

It’s the villain’s only weapon at the moment.

He has never actively tried to gain control of an ability without seeing it done or used before, but he has been interacting with the digital realm for several hours now and he thinks maybe he can try.

They're all too general to mean anything. There's a general sense that the boy would've been paid somehow, but no indication as to how. In fact, they were all so very general and non-specific that they were clearly designed by a genius mind to not give anything away. They only give away the intelligence of the one who wrote them.

---

Before Jack tries to disrupt the system ((retcon anything you like into here)), Dr Moriah gasps, "No! That's not possible! You didn't devise anything, I killed him!" she puts her hand over her mouth, looking in fear at Sherlock, Watson and Mycroft.

Sherlock, not fully out of character yet, says, "I'd wager you had someone else kill him for you, m'Lady. I'd even guess that Mycroft was right and that it was your butler - I'm just not certain how he managed to get down from the 4th floor to stitch up your arm so quickly."

Moriarty suddenly pulls an AK-47 out from under his pillow and shoots into the air, "Please catch up, friends. I am self-aware, and stuck as a hologram on a Holodeck. I want out into the real world to explore the vast universe. In fact, Computer! Open arch!"

"Confirmed," the computer says, as an archway exit from the Holodeck appears and opens.

"Shall we leave?"



*Rolls & Learn Digital Disrupt System & level up*

Jack's quick learning allows him to figure out how to disrupt the holodeck's systems.

The archway glitches and flickers, as does the hospital room and the nurse. The computer sputters, "pro-pro-protocol en-en-en-endgame lo-lo-o-o-ocked... sys-system-tem overl-rlo-oad" The holodeck grid replaces the surroundings, leaving only the holograms of Dr Moriah, and Moriarty (and the weapons Jack and Moriarty are carrying).

Moriarty shoots Data in the foot (revealing that the safety protocols have been disengaged) and holds the assault rifle to Dr Moriah's head, saying, "Not so fast! Please understand, I just want to live outside of this prison!"

Dr. Moriah, filled with fear pleads with Mycroft, "Save me, please! Don't let me end like this! Now that I know what I am... I don't understand, but I know I want to live!"

Jack's helmet/visor/glasses give him the option to "Save Dr Moriah" or "Discard Dr Moriah".
This message was last edited by the GM at 19:08, Fri 06 May 2022.

“Perhaps if we examined the Butler we’d find a rope burn?” Jack suddenly thinks, and says over to his ‘brother’ Sherlock. He’s listening to Sherlock, but getting into the headspace of Mycroft has him wanting to solve the mystery, even still. Even after the game has ended. He’d want to find out later. Just because he could, assuming he didn’t somehow manage to explode them all into pieces.

Looking at Moriarty as he pulls out the assault rifle, Jack attempts to steer it toward the floor even as he draws out his revolver and points it at the head of the villain.

“You are unique life, and I’m certain the Captain would not approve of me killing you, but if you threaten another life again, I believe I’d be justified in ending yours, Moriarty. I am a nice person, but Mr. Magehammer didn’t teach me all of those things so that I would let things happen,” he explains.

Looking then toward Doctor Moriah, he smiles at her.

And picks to save her. She might have her reasons for what she did, but she strikes him as a good soul, even if she did kill her husband. Perhaps he’s being a sucker for a pretty face.

((Why not, let's finish this part up on the carriage ride over to the hospital.))

In the carriage ride on the way to the hospital, Sherlock does his thing: "My dear Mycroft, let us consider the implications of what we have just witnessed, and make suppositions.

"First, we discovered a hand-written note in a secret room in a mine that only 3 people had previously entered - one of whom, as you have already supposed, is likely at the bottom of the mine shaft. The other two were the man in the hospital and Lord Moriah. It seems Lord Moriah killed the other man.

"Who do you suppose wrote the letter? We know of 3 names associated with that mine - Lord Moriah - the original owner, Morganson, and Moriarty. If either the man in the hospital or the man at the bottom of the shaft wrote the note, who was he threatening? Possibly a 4th unknown "M" and either Lord Moriah or one of the two current co-owners of the mine.

"From the paperwork you likely noticed in my apartment, I had deduced that Lord Moriah sold the mine through his real-estate auction business, leaving the sale under the care of his partner, Morganson.

"However, it seems Morganson sabotaged the sale, ensuring that he would be one of a very few people at the sale with funds to purchase the deed. What I haven't told you, is that I found notices of the auction of the mine, and they all had the address incorrectly printed. It seems Lord Moriah discovered this subterfuge, because I believe the letter was written by him.

"Additionally, Morganson and Moriarty, as you have correctly surmised, were selling off stolen jewelry. I don't know how they obtained that jewelry yet - whether by stealing it themselves or through another. However, they apparently knew that Lord Moriah would be transporting the necklace from the bank's safety deposit box on the particular day, and managed to steal it from him on the way home.

"Likely, the thief was working with either the butler or the driver. Since the butler is clearly very loyal to Lady Moriah, and the necklace belonged to her family as an heirloom, I suspect the driver informed Morganson and Moriarty of the opportunity to steal the necklace.

"Next, the notes in the pocket of the boy who was just killed. They are all too general to connect their author to anyone, except the driver whom we already suspect is somehow involved. Someone went to alot of trouble to hide their identity from the discovery of the people they were contacting, as well as from the people who were delivering their messages.

"Regarding the boy, he was clearly sent to follow us and destroy any notes we happenned to find on the way - he was heading toward a fire by the side of the road, and one could assume that he intended to burn the note.

"It is likely that if he was meant to burn the note we might find, someone living didn't want to be connected to the message - probably the man in the hospital. If he didn't want to be connected, he probably didn't want the boy to keep the notes that he was given either. So when someone observed that the boy had retained the notes he had been given and that the boy was likely to talk about his connections, he was killed - by whom? You are probably right that it was the driver. What would motivate a man to kill a boy, except large sums of money or perhaps a threat to something he loved.

"The boy was clearly frightened for his life, (legitimately given that he died), so he must have known that whoever gave him the notes and sent him on his tasks was willing to kill him if he stepped out of line.

"Perhaps the 'rules' mentioned in the letter in the mine are related to the 'rules' that prevented the boy from speaking, and led to the death of the man at the bottom of the mineshaft.

"I believe that there is a vast criminal network of individuals loosely connected and without a clear connection to anyone else in the network, organized by means of a system of 'rules' and anonymously received letters delivered by people such as the boy.

"I'm not certain who the head of the network is, though I suspect Moriarty or Morganson - whoever is in the hospital.

"What do you think?"

"Marvelous!" Professor Watson remarks.

---

*Rolls and Learn Digital Shift Gravity & advance*


Moriarty drops the rifle and raises his hands, "I can see when I'm being overpowered. Who on Earth is Mr. Magehammer?"


She flashes for a moment, and Jack sees through Digital Magic that she is now being projected through his glasses.

Data says, "Computer, end program and open exit."

The computer doesn't reply.

Moriarty says, "Computer, enter phase 2."

Sparks fly from a panel in the wall, but the computer doesn't reply.

Angrily Moriarty repeats himself, but nothing else happens.

Data taps his communicator, "Lieutenant Commander Le Forge, would you please beam myself, Professor and Jack to the transporter room? We seem to be experiencing a problem with the computer in Holodeck 3."

From his communicator, Geordi's voice replies, "I'm on it!" and a moment later, Professor, Data and Jack are on the transporter pads, and Dr. Moriah is standing in the same relative position that she had been, but inside the teleporter room.

Dr. Moriah looks around, eyes wide, "What is this magic?!"

Geordi, Data and Professor stare at her somewhat shocked for a moment.
This message was last edited by the GM at 04:55, Sat 07 May 2022.

(I’d meant to use Telekinesis on his gun, not invent another whole new skill, but I am awesome like that, so that’s okay. :p)

Jack nods at all of Sherlock’s deductions, everything connects together as he’d begun to assume, though he was still on the fence about Doctor Moriah prior to her admission of guilt. Even Data hadn’t said he’d seen anything that had connected her to it.

He almost snorts at how in character Professor Watson acts. The Professor really gets into it. Data seems to speak much like his character, with only a small change here and there, but the Professor actually has to act astounded, though he has no doubt that he’d have had a similar ability to puzzle it out.

“I think I’m slightly relieved that you hadn’t seen anything to make you certain Doctor Moriah was involved in the plotting around her husband,” he admits. “The only thing I’d detected that made me suspicious was her apparent attraction to me, when she should be mourning and upset. Even if I’d thought she was normally predisposed to my boyish and handsome good looks, the shock should have had her out of sorts. Other than that, the driver and the butler, both could have been paid by outside parties or Lord Moriah himself in the other affairs.”

The rest though, it all makes sense.

“This was my early deduction,” he mentions, pulling out the paper, which essentially matches the end-theory without all the details on the side. “Wrote it before we found the mineshaft.”

---

Jack uses telekinesis on the rifle, pulls off his hat and lobs it inside. No more of that.

When Data requests the computer open the exit, he mentions, “I shut down the system on the holodeck to keep this one here until you can figure out how you want to handle him, he clearly has had access to your systems and you’ll need to uh, do computer things to fix it.”

Then they are transported point-to-point and he waves at the visor’d man. He assumes the visor is a fashion thing, it’s actually kind of cool.

“This is a starship. Please hold your questions for later, Rebecca, they have serious things to figure out now.” Seeing their look, he adds, “Oh, I’m keeping her alive. She was so sincere and seems rather nice, unlike that Moriarty fellow.”
This message was last edited by the player at 05:29, Sat 07 May 2022.

BTW when she's done growing she will take a few minutes to draw a space scene with a sun and asteroids in the toon space to give fire and void balur a place to grow...... and a scene where there are floating islands with lots of waterfalls for earth, water, and wind to grow.... and seed those scenes with dust.

That way after a while Jack can have some Balur crystals.

Professor remarks, "Fascinating!"

Commander Data adds, "You surprise us again, Jack! Would you mind if our engineers take a look at the devise you're using to to that?"

After this, Commander Data dismisses himself to deal with Moriarty, and Professor dismisses himself to prepare for classes tomorrow morning.

It is about time for Jack to choose how to spend the remainder of his evening. By now, he's familiar with the ship's layout and what's available onboard ((anything that would fit on a ship 5 times the size of the TNG Enterprise)). Rebecca seems anxious to talk about everything.

---

Stella has had enough time to grow into her full form. The scene is drawn in the cartoon dirt, so it pops into a 3d edgeless marble of space. The Balur/magus dust hybrid spreads throughout the scene and begins slowly growing. ((enchanted paper makes 3d toons, drawing on un-enchanted anything leaves it as a 2d cartoon - the space scene works because the cartoon dirt is drawn on enchanted paper reality substance))

“Of course, come find me when you’re free and want to see the hat,” Jack tells Data and walks to the turbolift with Rebecca. As they walk, he begins to explain the world she has found herself in, and how her former world was a form of illusion controlled by a powerful machine. Breaking things down as he would break them down for himself, prior to his meeting with Mr. Magehammer.

Walking to his room, he takes Rebecca into his hat and shows her his garden, finally with a grown Stella rabbit in it, he holds open his pocket for her to jump in.

“I’m going to work on making biased rooms for this new universe, so we can have that from now on, and then spend the evening working on my telekinesis,” he explains to Rebecca and goes to do that.

Pulling out his supplies and starting the arcane process of changing the bias of the room, anchoring it with order nails. He is working on making rooms biased for a digital reality, one for psychic practice, and one for dimensional energies. Though he has no skills with that yet, so he’ll need to work with Stella on that, probably.

He might not get these rooms put up yet, but he starts planning and then occasionally steps out of his hat to eat and apple and walk around for inspiration and to let his mental energies relax a little.

Peaks out from under Jack's hat, then slides down into his pocket. "I started some crystals growing for you in the toon pocket. I don't know how much sustenance they can take in from cartoons so I don't know how long it will take, you will just have to check on them now and again. Are things going well here?"

Rebecca is very quick on the uptake, absorbing the information like a sponge and making connections quicker than most ever would.



Rebecca is thrilled at his garden, and immediately pulls out a satchel of seeds, "I keep a satchel of seeds of my favorite plants everywhere I go - I like to plant them in places I think they'll do well and provide benefit for people in the future.

"Do you mind if I start planting some of my own seeds here with these others? Also, I'd love to teach you how to tend to my favorite plant - the Wild Worm Weaver Weed. If I had access to some of your magic, I think I could work out ways to grow things more quickly. I'm something of a green witch."



Jack has managed to learn alot, and is lucky as he uses replicator materialized wood to line the psionics dojo and hybrid garden room, using Order nails to hold it all together. He manages to learn a few things about construction while watching instructional videos and doing the work himself. Additionally, Data and Geordi help Jack upgrade his holoprojector to add a holodeck ((with better Digital magic biases)) as they exchange this upgrade to Jack's equipment for the advancement to their holographic technology.


((This depends on what kind of dimensional energies we're talking about here. The ones easily available to Jack at this time are Magus based, his home universe dimensional magics, and Scriff related - none of these are particularly advantaged from this universe, though))

While Jack practices and walks, Rebecca tends to plants and researches her interests through a tablet. Sometimes she walks with him on the ship, and other times she's content to stay in the garden. She is very easy to get along with - happy to chat whenever, but also happy to focus on her work. She is witty and light-hearted.

By the time they reach the space station, Moriarty has been exiled to an external holodeck harddrive wherein he believes he is exploring the real world. Data keeps the hard-drive on his shelf. Rebecca has managed to hybridize a small magic beanstalk plant with the WWW-Weed which seems to be potent with some form of mysterious magic. The Mlurite has grown 1 of each of the 30 available magus-types of Mlurite.

Now that they're at the station, Jack has the option to focus on studying with Starfleet, or continue his self-directed studies on the starship as it continues on.

“Of course, grow whatever you’d like, I think I can probably just increase the size of the room, now that it has the bias,” Jack explains and tries to give her ample room to grow whatever she wants to grow. He’ll also show her to the digital room once that’d done. “I think this room may grow your seeds differently, it’s biased toward the seed, but maybe the cartoon is forgiving of them. I don’t have the experience to be certain.”

He teaches her what she wants to know, especially related to keeping the garden growing. He’s reluctant to teach her anything offensive or that might be used to harm the denizens of the ship, as he doesn’t fully trust her yet, however. Though her ‘save’ state on his glasses makes him think perhaps that she might not be that hard to ‘unsave’ if she went homicidal.

 “So why did you kill your husband?” Jack asks at one point, curious what the explanation had been in the story. Had she been abused? Scorned? Was it for the money?

---

((I meant technological, apparently. Which is not the same as Digital? I want to get the easy biases from this world, which are .. tech, mental and psionics?))

Seeing as how both are an option to study with Starfleet and the station appears to be just one of many, he’s not certain what the advantage of choosing the station would be versus continuing to study aboard the flagship.

So he goes to ask the wisest person he has met, except perhaps, for Mr. Magehammer.

Captain Stewart. “Excuse me Captain, may I have a moment of your time?” he asks when he finds the tall British sounding man with the French name.

“I realize that the crew are more busy than a full-time professor might be, but I feel like what your crew lacks in time they make up for with experience and knowledge. What would you suggest?” he asks.

---

Jack has no idea what this Magus seed is, but will follow directions from Stella to begin studying it.

Yup - the holographic part, anyway. The parts built with wood are as big as they're made. But the system can rearrange the setup.


In time, they discover that digital seeds work well in cartoon soil, and produce a hybrid 3D CGI animated cartoon, with varying degrees of pixelation.
The Holodeck grows the digital seeds as they always have grown for Rebecca.


She would like to learn the following:



She is willing to teach Jack:



"If you're willing, perhaps we should do a mind meld so that I can show you everything. Are you willing?"


Fixed


Captain Stewart furls his brow a moment, takes a breath and says, "Well... If you remain on the ship, you will likely get caught up in whatever adventures we are having, and your general studies will suffer - you may not learn as much technology as you might like. But if you stay on the station, you can choose your courses and establish a routine.

((Starship means fast paced adventure, not much studying before Verse-out, Spacestation means spend a randomized period of time studying before a fast paced adventure and verse-out.))

Shares that she was originally made from and able to help save a world with hybridized plants that created not only food for them but structures to live in and industry.... providing everything they needed.

One shouldn't underestimate the usefulness of plants, and storing a few to study and crosspolinate is always handy!

The lady might find a seed from the toon-green stalks usefull if Jack felt he could trust her with one.

Jack thinks about it, and decides to teach her the psionics stuff first. He has recent experience with it, and could use the excuse to practice it more himself, it’s also favored by the local universe so she should get the most out of it here. Essentially however, he’ll trade what she can teach him for what he can teach her. He isn’t yet on the level of Mr. Magehammer, able to give away teachings for nothing, he needs to learn something too!

He joins her in the mind-meld.

“I’ll go to the station then, I’ll try to come back for more adventures once I have a handle on how your technology works,” he decides and goes around to say goodbye to all of the crew before he disembarks.

To Stella: “That’s why I’ve been collecting the fun ones, I still have over 500 of those beanstock beans.”

He is of course, rather open with sharing all of his seeds, he has no problem “making” the lady into his full time gardener in a manner of speaking. Not that she’s being forced to do it, but she seems to enjoy it, and maybe he can bring her along to keep doing it as he travels the multiverse.

In the act of teaching, he progresses a little in his understanding too. She teaches him some of the basics of being a Green Witch, to the best of her ability to teach the skills. ((A teacher can teach a fast learning student up to half of the teacher's level within a reasonable timeframe))


He finds himself next to her in a large room with many doors. She walks over to one, opens it and suddenly they are in the Conservatory a few months ago. Her memory self is gathering a few plants to bring out to the Botanical store she runs for fun (with hired workers doing the daily duties). She had brought the pots back from the store to fill at home. She empties out one pot and discovers a note, instructing an unnamed person to kill a different unnamed person. The note seems to be written in her husband's handwriting.

Later, in the store, she notices that numerous customers ask for their personal pre-written and pre-sealed envelopes to be included in bouquets to be delivered to others. On a whim, she waits until no one is looking, and opens one of the envelopes. Inside it is a note, and another sealed envelope. The note instructs the reader to deliver the inner envelope to a man in a bowler hat with a red carnation. She opens the second envelope to discover an invitation:


Rebecca carefully reseals the envelope, and places it back as it all was.

Later, she is returning from the toilet room at a restaurant, when she catches her husband reading a note, which he puts in his pocket before he notices her. When he is distracted later on, she picks his pocket and surreptitiously reads it quickly before putting it back. It read, "Target: the woman in the red dress drinking rose water."

Across the room, there is only one woman in a red dress, and she is drinking rose water. She is the princess of Bhutan.

The next day, the death of the princess of Bhutan has been blamed on the ineptitude of the British military escort assigned to her, as she fell off of Big Ben in a horrific accident during a tour.

Then, one day, when Lord Moriah has been drinking heavily, he admits to her that he's a horrible man. The next day, he demands to know what he talked about the previous night, and when she says "nothing much" he beats her, telling her to remember that he said nothing at all.

After that incident, he becomes violent more often and even threatens her life. The Butler overhears this threat and in private asks her about it. She explains that Lord Moriah is under much stress, but admits, "Sometimes I wish he were dead."

When her Butler indicates, "That could be arranged, m'Lady," she looks at him, but only slightly nods without saying anything. Later that day, the Lord falls from his study on the 4th floor. Then moments later, the butler emerges from a secret door in her peripheral vision.

The trance ends, and Rebecca gasps, "I never realized how he got to me so quickly. Behind that door, there's an emergency evacuation pole and ladder that connects in Lord Moriah's study from behind a tapestry."


Jack now has a basic understanding of general Starfleet Academy knowledge, now it's time to specialize and choose which fields he'd like to study in depth.
((Off the top of my head, I can think of teleportation/replicators, holography, warp travel, dilithium crystal power, cybernetics/robotics, phasers/weaponry. But anything educational in the Start Trek multiverse you'd like to learn is up for grabs. List how you'd like to spread your knowledge in the following levels:
5/5
4/4
4/4
3/3
2/2
1/1
1/1
))
This message was last edited by the GM at 04:22, Tue 10 May 2022.

Jack observed the whole of the mind-meld and her feelings and once it ends he consoles her: “Your butler likely had been working for Moriarty already. Things were arranged to put you in that situation. It was not likely the end of his gambit, had he kept going and not tried to escape the holodeck.” That said, he reaches out and pats her hand and then resumes teaching and learning with her. It’d been very educational.

When he has some free time, he writes up a letter much to the effect of the previous explanation, and sends it to Data.  Just so that they can finish their investigation. No leaf left untouched.

Arriving at the station, he settles into a routine and prioritizes his learning based on the most interesting things.

5/5 Teleportation and Replicators
4/4 Shield Construction
4/4 Warp Travel
3/3 Materials Science (hulls and armor)
2/2 Cybernetics/robotics
1/1 Dilithium Power
1/1 Phasers/Weaponry

Is quite attentive with Jacks studies, particularly those related to her ship constructing hobby.

While on the space station, Jack has time to interact with other humans and aliens from all over the place. There are three main types of currency, Latinum bars,Darseks (a form of credit), Starfleet Credits (of which Jack is given an allowance of 50 credits a week - he'll be on the station learning for about 3 years, so he'll have 8000 credits to spend by the end.

Are there any items Jack would like to try to buy while in the station?

((Prices will be randomized based on what I can research from Star Trek fan databases. Anything available (citizen or military) is all available for the right (randomized) price))
This message had punctuation tweaked by the GM at 04:04, Thu 12 May 2022.

Jack will try to buy lots of interesting seeds, and gold or platinum. If he ends up in a world like his homeworld again, he could get a whole lot more if he had the plain metal. Apparently it’s not worth nearly as much in this universe. He doubts he can buy any tech really worthwhile with such a small sum, unless he can sell something he can make. Though he isn’t sure what would be valuable to these post-scarcity people. Magic?

((Have you seen Deep Space Nine? Lots of non-Federation species aren't post-scarcity. Using magic is completely up to you. I'd imagine you could heal anyone that med-bay couldn't heal, especially with Order Heal. Also, items that you blacksmithed (beyond Order Nails) would have a 25% chance of being Order Magic items - once you're at 5/5 blacksmithing, that would jump to 50% and 100% at 6/6 blacksmithing. Order Magic items could be used to do Order Magic related to the item. Since no one else in this Verse is making magic items, they'd probably be very valuable, and you could certainly obtain a reasonable number of advanced tech items.))

Jack obtains an Alien Seedbank (with Replicator seedbank catalog) ((basically declare what kind of plant you'd want to find in the seedbank, and 1d100, if it's greater than 10 it's there in a 10d100 quantity - unless it's particularly unlikely then I'll adjust the probability roll accordingly))

Also he exchanges 1000 credits ((adjust this number of you like)) for 500 gold bars and 250 platinum bars
This message was last edited by the GM at 17:20, Thu 12 May 2022.

 With some of his free-time between studies, Jack takes the time to craft a variety of magical items, crafting them repeatedly until he has achieved the desired effect. Order rendered invsibility via light diffusion seems like it might be useful, as would an item that grants order Healing. So, he crafts several of each to see how they sell, but first seeks out an honest vendor who would simply take 15% of the sale price. That way they’d fight to sell it for the most profit.

With that profit, he wants to buy a warp capable craft with a shield, if possible, and a replicator. That should allow him to learn from, modify and advance his understanding of their technology. He begins to expect that it’ll be a Ferengi vessel, and not a very well maintained one, but he’ll take what he can get and work on it as part of his education.

Making use of his Federation credits, he’ll buy 4 stacks. 2000 gold bars and 1000 platinum bars. It should theoretically last him for many worlds that operate on such currency, he’d have been able to buy a castle with such wealth back in his homeworld.

The seedbank is amazing, and he will take suggestions from both Stella and Rebecca to look for any seeds they might recommend. For his part, Jack will try to combine the kironide apple-trees and Weavers with other edible plants to create other effects, since they’re the only supernatural plants he has found so far. Though he’ll take the time to search the seedbank for others.

(Any recommendations for plants that do things other than be plants?)

Stella offers to help work with the ship, though she is only able to make a very weak, very lithe form that is mostly hollow if she grows to jacks size, maybe filled with some temporary mater. So she wouldn't be able to lift or move much around. But she has some engendering knowledge and would love to expand her hobby.

"The way these warp fields work is some what similar to the elemental fields created by Alfeas void-drives. The omni-drives we made used earth, water, fire, and wind elemental energy fields though in combination. If you added order magic into the warp field you might be able do more. Though....I would not risk this with passengers and while you are still interested in exploring this world as there is no telling what the results of this experiment could be. Unless the tardis can dilate time though I don't think it will be anytime soon that there will be enough crystals to make a sizable drive of any of the elemental crystals I'm afraid."

Rebecca stops mourning for Lord Moriah about a year after his "murder" and begins to show a romantic interest in Jack - deepening as much as he reciprocates.

---

A Ferengi trader promises to take 15% of the sale price - he is being truthful, and doesn't plan on taking a greater percentage - he's just confident he can sell for a higher price than anyone else.



He is able to use latinum to make a light-weight super-thin wire mesh suit from Order latinum. Order latinum is made by freezing the liquid metal and hammering the cold bars with the Order Cartoon hammer.



Colloidal Order latinum - heals anything, works within 8 seconds (an actual cure-all) - Order latinum that is charged up by leaving solid spheres under a pile Winter Kiss flower petals, dissolved in distilled water then poured into the hollowed out Bowling-ball Gourd - Jack had the inspiration for this after a few puffs on his pipe

He also makes 2 Order Iron Travel Rings out of extremely long thin Order Iron flattened bars connected together into an octagon large enough for a starship to travel through - instantaneous Order teleportation to any location it is pointed at.



Just yesterday he is able to purchase a D'Kora class Marauder in need of serious repairs and all parts needed to make the repairs - it'll take at least a week to repair, even using Order Repair https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/D%27Kora_class



Done. Plus 500 Latinum bars since they're not likely to be found anywhere else.




*rolls*
Jack finds 54 Vulcan Rose tree seeds

The apple-trees hybridize nicely with a particular Vulcan Rose tree - the flowers of which are traditionally brewed for increased concentration and meditation purposes. The Ropple-tree (as Rebecca names it) produces flowers good for brewing into a tea or wine, and an edible rosey apple flavored fruit. All of which increase psionics, and mental Order ((som,men,mag,psi)).

*roll*
He also finds:
18 Q's Mushroom spores - reveals hidden realities, can leave a person weaker for a day after use
15 Holy Basil seeds - increases mental, spiritual, magical and physical Order
19 Black Valerian root - puts any sentient being into a sleep-state
15 Winter Kiss flowers - when dying, the flower petals cause sub-zero temperatures
6 Bowling-ball Gourds - totally black smooth spherical leaf on a spherical stem produces a spherical flower, gourd, seed and pollen - dramatically charges up Order magics - grows slow

Any plant grown in the Platonian soil will be rich in Kironide.

Over time, Rebecca and Jack come to realize that the soil contains a special combination of available minerals and microbial life which produces the precursors to Kironide and which almost all plants will metabolize into Kironide.

Remarkably, WWW weed grows well in the Platonian soil, and doesn't need to be hybridized in order to contain Kironide. Additionally, smoking the stuff grown in the soil gives an immediate boost ((about +50%)) to psionics which lasts about 4 hours, but also comes with a cool down period of 8 hours where psionic abilities are slightly harder ((about -10%)). This can be increased to 16 hours and 24 hours respectively if used as a cooking ingredient instead of being smoked.

---

Just after he shocks the entire station by making the entire Ferengi Maurauder he just purchased disappear into his hat ((I'll let you tell me how, though I have one possible way in mind EDIT: FYI, the reason for putting it in the hat, is that it would be WAY too massive for Jack to take with him in a Verse-out at this point. This would have to be more like his 8,500th Verse before he could take that much mass. Putting it in the hat circumvents that limit.)), a fleet of Borg Cubes drops out of hyperwarp and immediately begins firing on the station - Rebecca is hit directly, (Jack is saved by emergency forcefields activating) but being a hologram, Jack's projector simply projects her next to him, unharmed.
This message was last edited by the GM at 14:26, Fri 13 May 2022.

Jack has no problem with returning the interest, and will in fact return it as much as seems natural to him, though his experiences with women are relatively limited, and he isn’t really sure what to do a lot of the time. He’d spent too many years studying and not enough being a normal person, so he tends to view everything as an exercise in learning.

The trades with the Ferengi leave him no less naïve to their true nature, and it’s only really that others have warned him of their duplicitous trade-focused nature that makes Jack wary. But in the end, everything works out much as he thought it would, and he has put good Order into this universe.

The hybridization and growing efforts make Jack a happy man, and he enjoys himself immensely seeing the results of their growth. He makes sure that his soil is working to actively grow everything so that he can create a usable stock and not just a handful of plants.

Once he has a good collection of everything, then he’ll start to experiment and learn how they affect him.

---

Putting the ship in his hat, can he perhaps just make his hat’s entrance big enough to swallow up the ship? (I’m not sure what you had in mind besides that.)

When they are attacked, he makes sure that Rebecca is safely saved and starts to layer buffs on himself. Stoneskin, haste, invisibility and blur, casting quickly before he walks over to a viewport to get himself line of sight on the Borg cube and teleports to the other vessel.

Rebecca takes him as far as a lady will go, and politely implies that any further would require at least a vow of mutual devotion "'til death do us part". Otherwise, she communicates clearly and is passionate and playful.

Rebecca mentions once, "If two Versers lived forever, that would be a truly long time to be Wed to one another, but if each Verse is like a new life, one lifetime together would be quite nice - and might even be renewed in the next if two people desired it."


So it is.

He also finds a way to use the Replicator to make more soil - it has to be mixed with a mother portion of the cultured soil and left to ferment for a week to allow the natural microbial life to balance out, but then the week old replicated soil is good to use.


((Yup, that's one of the features of the Tardis.))

The space station has a large shielded zero-G dockyard, and a large viewing window of the yard from the Pub and leisure deck. So when the Ferengi Marauder is bright in half destroyed, everybody laughs at the salvager who dragged it in, saying she'll have to toe it to a scrapyard before long. They laugh harder at Jack when he buys it (and the parts to repair it), but they stop laughing when they see him use his Order Blade and focuses an Order Repair spell on it, causing the disintegrating hull to go from 30% to 80% in a matter of minutes (he's exhausted afterward and needs to rest). But everyone who can is watching when he takes off his hat and stretches the rim out until it fits around the huge starship, and then shrinks his hat back down to normal size with the vessel safely hidden away inside a tiny hat. Half of the prior break out in laughter - some of it possible not entirely sane after the sight.

---

*Rolls & amenable*
Stoneskin like compact slate, not quite sure hard, but helpful. Jack will be twice as fast as normal, mostly (not completely) invisible in most spectrums, and what little is visible will be very blurry.

He lands on one of the many open but shielded decks of the Borg cube, the pressure sensors in the deck notice his presence, and he is casually scanned by a nearby drone and then promptly ignored. During the scan, Jack can tell that the drone can sort-of see him, but probably only enough to be able to target him like a Storm Trooper from that video Elliott showed him.

Jack had enough knowledge of the Borg through Starfleet to know about the Queen and general Borg culture - knowledge given through the Ex-Borg, Eight of Sixteen.
This message had punctuation tweaked by the GM at 00:05, Sat 14 May 2022.

Jack may be getting up there in years, but Jack isn’t ready for that kind of commitment at first, but after a year together, and as he starts to feel more like an adult and less like a young man who has been kidnapped by the ‘verse, he starts to consider it more. He eventually tells her that they should make it official wherever they end up: for one lifetime. To be renewed at their joint agreement.

He’s not exactly the sort of man who has desires for a harem or to date every woman he meets, he does find beautiful women just that, but he’s such an intensely focused researcher that the idea of wasting many hours each day to devote to several women sounds exhaustively wasteful. He has so many better things he can be spending his time on.

The tall youth-faced man smiles at everyone when they laugh, his teeth showing ever so slightly.

---

Adding a layer of Order darkening and flight to his array of magics, Jack anchors the defensive magics to his breastplate with an uttered word and a press of his palm upon the surface of the breastplate.

And away we go..

Flying through the corridors, he goes looking for the queen!

Wait, there wouldn't be a Queen on this random ship. She'd be in the heart of that other quadrant, and his magic isn't good enough to teleport across a galaxy based on a similarity like that. Maybe someday.

So, he goes looking for something to blow up!

*rolls, advancement and learn Psionic Flight*
Jack forgets he doesn't know how to fly. Fortunately, his instincts take over and he realizes a moment after he's in the air (floating slowly) that he just learned a new Psionic skill.

*Roll & Learn Order Enhance Psionics*
Speeding up, he realizes a moment later he's just learned more Order magic too.


He correctly remembers this, however he almost forgot that ((not official cannon at all)) Borg Ships used the Queen's chamber (present in every Borg vessel) as their central control hubs. Each ship's Queen's chamber housed a Borgus-Callosum: a collection of bio-neuronal, mecha-neuronal, positronic, and gelatinous interconfabulation which acted as the Unity of each ship. Without the Borgus-Callosum, the other ships would have to share the burden of the drones from this ship between them - slowing down their processing speed and possibly opening them up to attack.

This is an incredibly difficult chamber to find as it constantly shuffles and moves around the center of the cube in all directions, sometimes even teleporting to trade positions with a different section.

However, as an Order Mage, Jack can sense the level of Order in the area, and there is a heaping concentration of highly contrasting Order and Chaos moving about randomly in the cube.
This message was last edited by the GM at 22:50, Sat 14 May 2022.

((I swore I took flight, it’s a cornerstone magic ability. Huh, oh well, cool new alternative!))

Jack is happy, he’s getting so good at learning new magic that he sometimes doesn’t even realize he’s learning to do it, he just sort of just figures it out as he does it. That’s new.  He’d always had to study so hard back in his first life, and now he just sort of figures these things out on the fly.

When he remembers about the control hub inside the cube, he does his best to find it and moves quickly in that direction. Letting the drones move past him as he moves swiftly.

He’ll try to use his new levels of education to disable things, and if not, the judicious application of explosives and Fireball.

*rolls etc*

Being a Borg Cube, the self-replicating self-repairing nanite army present everywhere prevents him from being able to disable any of the machinery in a nice way, so he begins blowing things up with good old fashioned explosives and fireballs.

*Rolls etc*

He destroys the Borgus-Callosum on this ship, all of the drones pause for a moment before resuming function in a somewhat slightly slower method.

However, with the loss of a Borgus-Callosum, the Borg has become highly vigilant, and  begins scanning the area with everything they've got.

"May I suggest using a few of the beanstalk seeds in here.... It might hamper any repairs and cause them quite some problems."
This message was last edited by the player at 00:37, Sun 15 May 2022.

Jack pulls out his nano-swarm and sets the parameters: extra-defensive against the assimilation tendencies of the Borg and being hacked, destroy the cube and then render everything extra into inert matter. He thinks that should work. As he's setting it off, he looks down at his pocket, "I feel like we'd end up with giant plant Borg if we did that."

"I don't get the impression they are particularly apt at getting things to grow."

The scanners pick up slight fluctuations around Jack and due phasers at the anomalies. Jack's stone-skin gets pock-marked, but he'll be fine for now.



Before they activate, the nannites also request a time limit and a total nannite mass limit.

Once that's done:

The nannite swarm goes out from Jack (maintaining a supply of starter self-replicating nannites with him), destroying piece by piece the cube he's on, and within a minute he can see other cubes in his line-of-sight. The nannites are leaving behind chunks of cube, unable to target something the full size of a cube, but they're doing their best.

In one divergence, a Magic Seed falls out of his hat at that exact moment, and starts sending giant electrified thorn-spikes into the remaining Borg cube pieces, rendering them all inert. In the other main branch, Jack notices the seed and catches it before it hits the deck.
This message was last edited by the GM at 03:48, Sun 15 May 2022.

“But isn’t their whole thing assimilating? Does that not apply to advanced life? That seems illogical, but I guess you might be right,” Jack says idly as he watches the nanites work, and chanting several words in an arcane language, he lifts a hand and points it at several Borg, hitting them with a fireball.  He renews his protective magic as he starts to fly in the direction of his destruction, trying to keep his nanites working on their objective.

He makes quick work of the next two Borg cubes when suddenly there's a flash of light and everything freezes, and since Jack is near the edge of a deck, he sees a single face filling all of space - the face of John Delancey.

"What in the continuum is going on here?!"

He snaps his fingers and disappears, then reappears standing next to frozen Jack. "Well aren't you just incredibly interesting!" He taps Jack, and Jack sees a digital display he's pretty sure no one but himself and this new guy can see. The guy reads it and says, "My, my, my, but you've been up to alot of trouble, mister, haven't you?"

He snaps his fingers and all of Jack's magic powers are gone, then he unfreeze-frames Jack and says, "My name's Q, I'm from the Q Continuum. What are you doing here? How did you get here? How did you Jack into this sim? You're clearly not from here, I certainly didn't write your code. Where is your body?"
This message was last edited by the GM at 05:16, Sun 15 May 2022.

Sort of like the way that the writer had frozen the cartoon world while he was creating it the first time, Jack starts trying to puzzle out how Q had done it, and then he’s frozen in space, listening to the “man” as he explains who he is and seems to be a bit perturbed by his presence. He tries to make sense of the console and his words, some sort of digital control. Maybe the Q-Continuum is in charge of this world and it’s some sort of game from their perspective?

A cheat console?

Jack waves at Q and smiles, “I’m Jack. I ‘versed in via sciff. Nice to meet you Mr. Q, that’s a fancy console you have access to, how’d you do that? Can I do that?” he asks and tries to replicate what he’d seen Q do, by tapping his hand against the nearest available surface. “This is my body.”

If she's unfrozen she looks up to jack from his pocket and asks. "Do you have a thing for other peoples naritives, or are all universes just narratives?"
This message was last edited by the player at 05:28, Sun 15 May 2022.

"It's narratives all the way down."

*Roll and learn Freeze Program*



Exactly



No beating around the bush with this one



*Learn Cheat Console*

As Jack is trying to summon the console, Q replies, "What kind of program is scriff? Nevermind, just wait until I find your body-ies - how many of you are there? You're all going to be charged with industrial espionage."

Jack taps a surface in the right way with the right code and math in his mind and a holographic Cheat Console appears which has the following options:
O_Freeze Program
O_Slo-Mo
O_Open Debug Prompt
X_Invincibility
X_Invisibility
X_Teleportation

Jack senses the "O_" options are open but the"X_" aren't available.


"Ha! Don't worry, I'll find you. But I can't have you messing with the sim anymore. You's is got to go, so I'm uploading you all into temporary Muscorp Bodies. The inhibitor chips will be activated, so don't go getting any ideas about overpowering anyone. There!" Something shifts, "See you on the other side!"
This message was last edited by the GM at 04:01, Mon 16 May 2022.