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That's cryptic. Should I be sitting down? Is this face to face news and I should come to you?

Sitting's probably good, yeah. Definitely a sitter.

[He pauses, weighing whether or not she should make the trip out. On the one hand: she'll probably want to be alone. On the other: 'your dead friend isn't dead and isn't the person you know and also you're dead' isn't something you just text someone. Even he knows that.]

... And yeah. You might wanna come out here for this one.

[Well, that has her worried, even though the potential for it being good news had had her trying to clamp down her concern.]

Okay. Where are you?

Nonah, actually. Meet you at the Porter?

Yeah, can do. See you soon.

[Ashley doesn't spend a lot of time in Nonah, but she's Ported in enough times that she could Shadow Step there if she wanted... and if she hadn't realized that the soldiers of the military bases Porters are in don't like that sort of entrance. She comes to Nonah like a normal imPort, looking around for Cayde as soon as she's through the Porter.]

[He's leaning against a wall, half in shadow, waiting impatiently for her arrival. Sundance detects her distinct biotech signature before he can pick her out of the crowd and marks her on his HUD. He pockets the cards he's been fidgeting with and trots over to greet her.]

Hey. Let's, uh. Let's find a place to sit, huh?

[She meets him halfway, giving Sundance a digital wave as her hand slips into his.]

Yeah. This sounds serious - you okay?

[Her question's accompanied by a small squeeze of his hand.]

Me? I'm great, just fine.

[He squeezes her hand back, leading them towards an unoccupied bench and thinking about how to present what he's found out. Normally when he gets weird intel that he doesn't know what to do with, he just dumps it at the most relevant, intelligent person and leaves them to sort it out. But this is both weird and personal.]

So uh ... okay. So, where I'm from sometimes it happens that you strike up a friendship with someone who ain't touched by the Light, but then they die and are brought back by a Ghost. So you're happy to see 'em again but they don't know you from Adam, so everything's all weird? It's ... it's kinda like what this is.

[Her brow furrows as she listens and tries to find an equivalent in imPort life.]

So... Jacob or Iris got Ported back in but they don't remember this place?

[She hears about it on the network sometimes, and luckily the one time it's happened to her, it was with someone she didn't know very well - the Sabriel who was in Aegis Force at the start didn't have the memories of the Sabriel she'd talked to about RISE.]

Not exactly.

[He waits until she's sitting to continue.]

So I was out, grabbing some coffee 'fore runnin' an errand and I saw this guy with one of those omnitool things do some warlocky trick with a plant that fell off the floor above or something so I thought, hey, this guy might know Ashley, right? So I pop a squat, say hi blah blah blah, aaaaand the man says his name is Shepard. Then I mention your name and he gets pissed, says I'm pullin' a joke on him. Which, hand to Light, I was not! Anyway ... he, uh, let's just say he wasn't expectin' that he'd be seein' you.

[It all comes out in a ramble that he hopes blunts the shock. It probably won't, but hell if he won't try.]

[She doesn't let his hand go as she sits down to listen. Never one to hide her emotions, especially around someone she loves as much as Cayde, her reactions to his rambling play out on her face: The light of interest in her eyes at the sound of someone with an omnitool and what he describes as warlocky so is probably biotics. Her eyebrows raising at a male Shepard - not a new concept to her, she's seen Jacob's memories and photos and there's the odd fanartist at fanPort still selling art of the Shepard who had Ported out before she came along, but she hasn't met one herself. Dismayed confusion at her name making this male Shepard angry - and then her face falling as she realizes why exactly any Shepard might not expect to see her, might be so upset at her name. Her hand goes slack on his as she processes this.]

So, I'm... I'm dead, in his universe?

[And if he was so mad, sounds like her death is a sensitive subject for him.

[There are a lot of ways to die in a war, but her mind goes immediately to a wet planet with a nuclear bomb.

[Her voice is quiet, her gaze wandering away.] Glad you told me to sit down.

[He can feel the weight of what he's said through the expression on her face, so when he speaks again it's quietly, devoid of all attempts at charm or guile.]

... Yeah. I'm sorry. He, ah, he wanted me to make sure you got his network ID.

[She nods numbly, still looking elsewhere.]

Sundance, could you please...

[She doesn't bother to finish, instead bringing Cayde's hand to her heart for a moment.]

'Least we both found out from you, instead of me running into him and giving him the shock of his life.

[It's brittle, almost a thank you or acknowledgment of his empathy rather than an actual bright side.]

[Sundance wordlessly transmits Shepard's contact details. As she does so, Cayde's fingers curl around Ashley's]

"That's what a good scout's for," he says. Not an intentional intel-seeking mission—but the run in effectively worked out that way.

Thanks.

[When she nods again, this time it's steadier, more able to look at him. Her scout - always an important role in the military as well as with Hunters.]

I might not even have recognized him. [It's a sudden realization.] There used to be a guy Shepard here - I saw one of Jacob's memories of him, and Jacob put up a photo in the memorial, but he was before my time.

[So that surely would have been weirder for this Shepard, a dead friend who doesn't know him.]

[Sundance nods her shell and settles into a lazy orbit around the two of them.]

Huh, that's the part I thought was gonna weird you out more, to be totally honest. Alternate timelines I get. Sorta. In concept. But the fact that someone can be like, an entirely different person entirely? That's super-weird. I dunno what I'd do if some blue-eyed blonde-haired lady came waltzin' in, claimin' to be Andal. That's—yeah, can't even think about it. Brain starts hurtin'.

[A rueful smile.]

I got the weirded out over with before you Ported in - Jacob's from a different timeline from me too, his Shepard's a different woman from mine. And, well, if there was a Kaidan here earlier... it makes sense for there to be a Shepard from a timeline where I'm dead.

I just didn't expect one to be here.

And now there is one. I uh ... I don't know what the play is here for you but just remember? I got your back. And about what I said earlier—about old friends coming back as Guardians, not bein' able to remember you? Doesn't mean you can't become friends again. There's just ... a little weirdness.

Thank you.

[The way she says it, it's not just a "thank you", it's an "I love you".]

I guess I'll... call him, see why he wanted me to have his ID... It's nice that there's someone else from my world here again.

[She makes no moves to her phone or even the telepathic network, however, instead lingering with him.]

... do you... want to come to the memorial with me? See the photo of the last Shepard who was here.

[He reaches an arm over her shoulders, pulling her close to him in a sideways hug. If she wanted to go off on her own at this moment to find Shepard, he wouldn't have blamed her; the fact that she's lingering here with him ... it feels special.]

Yeah, I can do that.

[He's been to plenty of memorials, but none for a living man, but stranger things have already happened today.]

[For a moment, she snuggles into his side, enjoying his closeness. The first person from her world here in months and it's a version of one of her best friends who may have left his version of her to die - yeah, she'll come to grips with that with the support of someone who chooses her every day.

[Then she stands, pulling one of her gloves off.]

Okay. Let's go.

[She leads him to the nearest shadow they can both stand in, then puts her bare hand on his face and Shadow Steps them to just outside the Ted Kord Memorial Centre in Heropa.]

[The world spins as they emerge in Heropa and Cayde feels the phantom churning of a stomach he doesn't have anymore. He reaches for Ashley's hand and places his other over his chest.]

Alright just gonna ... try not to lose my breakfast. Gimme a sec.

[There's a few moments of him staring blankly at the ground before he decides to properly get his bearings. He's never been to the memorial before—besides not being fond of these kinds of things in general, he doesn't see much point in memorializing folks who strictly speaking didn't *die* they just ... left. Still, he cranes his neck, flicking his eyes over the public-facing photos, recognizing a few lost acquaintances.]

Huh.

[Ashley tears her gaze away from some photos and flowers someone's left for Iris to look over at him with concern.]

You good? Do I need to go grab a bucket?

Nah, nah, I'm good now.

[He flashes her a cheeky robotic grin.]

Now let's find your not-dead not-friend friend.

[She can't help but smile back, partially out of amusement at that turn of phrase. With a nod, she holds her tattoo to the scanner to get them inside, then leads him through to the digital photo wall.]

It's on here somewhere...

[Her eyes unfocus, and photos start to move to the edges of the wall as she looks for the right one.]

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