entranceway | [Video]

[The video opens with a pitched cackle. The man on screen wipes a tear away from his eye and shakes his head, sighing contentedly as he comes down from the fit.]

Ohhhhh-okay, okay. Okay. People of--is this, is this really what we're going with right now? Wonderland? What pretentious dickwad came up with that one? [There's another short bark of laughter then he clears his throat.] Wh-oookay. Ahhh, this is just--just beautiful! God, and here I thought things just couldn't get better.

[There's a pause in which he composes himself, runs a hand back through his hair, and fixes the video with a slightly less hysterical visage.]

So, right, I did the reading and the whole shtick. Oh no, where am I, I'm so confused and lost. Wah, wah, I don't like change. What am I gonna do with myself? Here, let me confide in the local ECHOnet, seeking solace from my equals. Yeah, that crap just ain't me, kiddos. So uh, I'm Jack. If any of you assholes knows me, pipe up, because I'm gonna need a basic rundown of the whole dealio as far as who's here. And I swear on my mother's grave--the devil condemn her soul in eternal torment--if I see or hear one CL4P-TP unit, I will set it on fire. I'm not even kidding right now. You have been warned. I don't need that crap here, too.

So yeah. Really, just uh, sayin' hi. Oh, and in case you didn't really catch it, I was making fun of the ostentatious name of the place. Yep. That about wraps up this video. Later, losers.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Can't say I have, nope. But, there's one of those library things here, right? I'm gonna guess it's not of the electronic persuasion, but an actual, physical book kind. A bit old fashioned, but I can deal with it. If this place is based off that book, then I should probably start there, huh?

[He can't say he's too terribly interested in the fiction of another culture, but if it will give him even a hint as to what's going on here, he'll take it.]

Ehhh, on the digs, though. If the people here have been scavengers or collectors, it makes sense that the artefacts you found together could've already been found before. Let's say, for argument's sake, you've got a museum. Shit happens, the museum gets buried for--oh, a century or five--and someone comes along and digs it up, they're gonna find all these weird-ass things from the wrong times and the wrong places all in one spot. Could be what's happening here. Just a thought. If this whole kidnapping thing has been going on for--wh... eh, like, centuries, or something? The only thing you'd find is shit already collected from wrong times and wrong places in the same spot. This place doesn't sit on the same timeline as everyone here, I'm gathering, right? I could, say, be here and meet my daughter's grandkids and exist with them even though we wouldn't really be from the same time.

[Let it be known that Jack isn't actually an idiot. He's just surrounded by idiots on Helios.]

[Old-fashioned. Yes, it is increasingly apparent that possessing anything in a physical, hard form is old-fashioned, because those from the future are very much preoccupied with ethereal copies of things that float about in the aether like some sort of information-laden faerie.

Miraculously enough Jack brings up a cogent and relevant point that Evelyn has discussed in theory with others in the recent past, having become accustomed enough to events not to be bothered and instead focusing on research potential.]

No, you're exactly right!

[Evelyn brightens; even if his vocabulary is less than academic, the point still stands.]

I've postulated something similar but any collection of artefacts from a centuries-old museum wouldn't be so egregiously scattered, you see- the area is too large and the distribution would have had to be deliberate. Another theory was that this particular universe is just where lost things end up - excluding residents like us, of course, I simply mean material culture - but given the subject matter of the book that this world is based upon-

[God forbid, perhaps Lewis Carroll was trapped here and based this book upon the world.]

-the consensus is that it simply doesn't have to make sense, which...irks me, on a fundamental level. [A beat.] ...you should probably come to the library, regardless, if you're unfamiliar with the work of fiction.

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