Xaviers!

Caretaker was working on repairing the connections to the network had been severed, but the crystal cave's connections were repaired and the Point connection were coming back on line and Natalie was testing them by materializing in various locations and doing a visual inspection of the corridors. She faded into view in one of the corridors leading to the hangars, looking around, looking at the information that Guardian and Caretaker were feeding her. Clarion was indicating that she still needed to talk to the Citadel, but Natalie had snoozed that, preferring to make sure the university was stable first. She sighed, her avatar reaching out to touch the wall and flip open a panel, visually inspecting the connections behind it.

((Open))

Exploring the Point again without Lippincott's restrictions, Tosh spied Holo-Nat and wandered over.

"So, um... you were in a weird crystal computer now. Neat?"

Natalie pushes one of the connectors back together, a minute adjustment, but important the information tells her. When she hears Tosh, she turns, "Still in the crystal computer actually." She pauses, "Actually am the crystal computer now, I'm pretty sure."

"What do you mean?" he asked, "Did something happen to your body?"

"Long story, but yes. Most of it is Ashlie's story to tell, but I had to assume the duties of the Mastermind system and I had to give up my body so Ashlie's nanites could have a pattern to work from to build hers. So... yeah..." She flips the panel closed.

He didn't even know how to begin addressing what a sacrifice that was, so his brain mostly saved it away for later.

"I trust there was no other way to get her back?"

"She was using the MGH core from the rock monster as a temporary power source and the fluctuations I was detecting in her nanite swarm's make-up were... concerning. Ghost had damaged the crystal computer pretty significantly and we had our hands full trying to keep the system from unraveling and reestablishing connection to the network. I couldn't take the chance that there would be a repeat of that mission and... I couldn't risk us losing her again."

"For what it's worth, I'd have made the same call. She's important to me too."

Then he paused. "Wait wait, back up... her nanite swarm?"

"Yes. Again, her story, but she was using Acala as a... hiding mechanism? She and I still need to talk. I understand she was injured in apprehending Lippincott, so I expect that talk will have to wait."

"I was wondering how her getting wounded worked."

"So she was here all along, just partitioned away in Acala. Now I feel really dumb ever blaming the swarm for her loss."

"It's natural and understandable, based on the evidence we had at the time. I'm glad the hypothesis was wrong though."

"Yeah. Me too. It's just too bad this is what it took to wake her up. I owe Lippincott a piece of my mind."

"I imagine there's a very long line for that privilege," Natalie says. "So... want to meet the others?"

He raised a brow. " The... others?"

"It's a good test of the projectors in this section," she says. As she does so, three new figures materialize behind her. Their images aren't as stable as Natalie's, but they're solid enough. "Tosh, meet Caretaker, Guardian, and Clarion."

"Duuude. You did all this to join the multi-self club, didn't you?" he joked.

"Having some extra processing is nice," she admits, "But no, I had no idea what would happen when I had the system designate me as the core node."

"I wish my brainmates came with extra processing. But no, all I get is wacky banter and the occasional confidence boost. And fish puns."

"They're new, give them time, I imagine they'll get there," Natalie says. "Caretaker handles maintenance, Guardian handles defense systems, and Clarion handles communications, especially with the Starlight Citadel."

"Trust me, you don't want constant puns."

"That I can probably do without, but if it happens, it happens," she says with a laugh. The other three disappear and she sobers, "Have you seen Shari?"

"Not lately, no. No conspicuously large lutrinae either."

"I'm going to have to figure out how to talk to her about this... Hopefully I handle it better than I did last time something like this happened. I should have projector access to the campus restored before too much longer."

He gave a sympathetic wince.

"Yeeaah. I don't envy that conversation."

"I *think* she'll understand, just be disappointed that I won't be leaving campus for the foreseeable future."

"But you'll be able to appear anywhere on campus? That's convenient I guess."

"In theory. Still have some points of the system that I don't understand."

"Such as what? Not that there's a computer thing I understand better than you do."

"The protocols with the Starlight Citadel are a bit unclear at the moment, but I've been more focused on 'here' and letting that worry about itself for the moment. Also, I haven't quite reconnected to the extent of the campus network, so I'm not exactly sure what the capabilities are there."

"Yeah, I'm sure it's complicated enough without other worlds and all the... Merlin stuff the... what'd you do with the old Caretaker anyway?"

"Locked him up in my personal brand of code containment. The Citadel said he's under interdiction for actions leading to the death of a member of the Captain Britain Corps, insurrection against the Citadel, and some other things I don't totally understand. I'm still looking for where he ended up after the system got damaged by Ghost's pet. No sign of him yet, so he was probably caught up in the damage.

"If he was, it might be best if the destruction was total. A glitched out version could be a problem."

"I have no reason to doubt the Citadel's records and I didn't have a lot of time to deliberate the decision. He was very upset that I didn't hand the authentication token over to him though."

"Well it's moot now I guess. Whatever his intentions, you're the caretaker now and you know how to handle buggy software."

"Just... well, I don't need to tell you to be careful."

She smiles, "Thanks, Tosh. For better or worse, I made my digital bed on this one and I have to take care of it now, but I'll do my best."