Chapter 1: Journey's End

Here's the sequel. Just a treat before I start also uploading the rewrite in tandem. Man, I'm going to have to set up a schedule for myself to get all these in order.

Also while this is technically a sequel to Fixing the Past, it's a sequel to the rewritten version so some things they talk about might be different from the story that is currently uploaded.

….

Brandon bolted awake, absolutely drenched in sweat. His eyes darted around the room frantically. Had that been all a dream? Everythi-? He felt someone shift beside him. He smiled, feeling her arm reach out and wrap around his shoulder.

"Mrph, mornin' already?" Nia mumbled, still half asleep and rubbing her eyes.

"Not quite."

"Hm. Bad dream?" She asked.

"Of a sort, yes," he sighed, "I regret the choice to make this room look like a room from home."

It had already been several months since the destruction of the World Tree and the end of Torna. The pair had settled down comfortably the week before after sorting everything out. They were still figuring things out but thanks to Rex, the process of settling the new land hadn't been too difficult, the miser and natural businessman he was.

Of course Brandon was still in high demand as he lent his scientific knowledge for the betterment of the people and not just himself now that the nations had settled things. He had thought the war would have continued between Mor Ardain and Uraya but apparently being almost annihilated by Artifices will make even the most war hungry senator call for peace.

As the new Empress of the Empire, Morag had asked for his help in resolving the issue of how to sort things out in the new world. He returned several days later with a drafted Constitution that combined many aspects of the old United State's government but changed it up to suit the current kingdoms. The governments of each titan had come together to look it over and make changes as they see fit.

Once the dust had settled from the massive reformations, everyone had gone back to similar roles from before their journey across Alrest.

Rex, unsurprisingly went back to Gramp's… well… back, the little cheapskate. He had a well paying position in the new Exploration Corps but still didn't want to pay rent. Rex argued that it was more convenient because then he wouldn't have to camp everywhere. He was doing better than ever financially and physically. His emotional state, on the other hand, had changed immensely. No matter how much Brandon or Nia probed, he would maintain his cheerful mood but it was painfully obvious how much he was hurting over Pyra. He would obsessively throw himself into his work of exploring New Alrest, to the point where he would collapse often from exhaustion. And it was hard to even approach the topic.

No one else was really able to help as they all had their own duties as politicians or engineers. He had wanted Tora on his team but seeing as how… tactless Tora could be with emotions, he had asked him to work for the technical team that was helping to establish new towns in New Alrest with some of Brandon's modern conveniences such as electricity and running water.

The governments of each of the titans had agreed to create a massive alliance, effectively combining their nations with the leaders of each forming a council that would be voted in. While the current leaders were great, this was a more foolproof system to ensure that power could never be abused.

Brandon had mooched a little off of his hero status by getting the nice house along with a lab. He even had an entire team of some of the best scientists and engineers in Alrest working by his side. He was even able to pull a few more strings and get Nia the 'doctor's office' that she wanted right next door.

They still rarely saw each other at work though. Nia, true to her word, worked tirelessly until she treated every patient that stopped by her door. Then again she didn't get many patients, and the few who came in were all Gormotti. Not that he had any issue with that but some of the younger men had the tendency to hit on her, but that was a different can of worms.

Her flesh eater status really did work against her. While the Praetorium had been condemned, many still had their beliefs hard drilled into them. Many of the scientists disliked Brandon for being in love with what was essentially a demon to them but many held their tongues to be able to study under him.

The only reason why she had customers to begin with was because the Praetorium had also looked down on the Gormotti, considering them to be only half human and lesser beings, meaning that few from Gormott actually listened to the Praetorium.

Usually after he was done teaching and researching, he would stop by and wait with Nia, sticking it out until about five in the afternoon.

He sighed and curled up around Nia. The first day had been particularly painful.

The moment Nia had stepped out and locked up, she was assaulted both physically and verbally by the human residents of Torigoth. He heard the commotion from his office and decided to jump out of the window, three stories up. He landed hard on his now perfected mechanical leg and sprinted over. When he saw that people were attacking her, he had shoved his way into the center of the group and punched out the nearest person in a fit of anger, breaking his jaw and immediately knocking him out.

Nia, the kind soul that she was, had immediately healed the man. A nice gesture but one that had little effect on the crowd. It was only after Brandon had started to threaten the crowd had they reluctantly backed off. He then dragged the unconscious man off to the recently established police station to be locked up for a day or two. He then cracked down and fired the scientists responsible for leaking the information.

Nia thoroughly chewed him out afterwards but quickly forgave him.

"Tell me about it," she mumbled.

"I did say not exactly."

"Tell me about it," she insisted.

He sighed, "woke up thinking that I had dreamed everything."

"Again?"

"Yeah," he groaned.

"That vision is still gettin' to you huh?"

"Yeah."

She shuffled back and pressed herself into him, "I'm real, I'm here."

"I know," he wore a small smile, "but it isn't hard to mistake for real… after all, why would the most amazing woman in all of Alrest have fallen for me?"

"Flaterer."

"Love you," he said as he kissed the top of her head.

"Mmh. Of course you do."

"Heh, wonder what it would have been like if I was never here. Think things would have played out the same? Or at least similarly?"

"Not for me," she pressed her body closer to him, "after all, who would I be snuggled up with right now if not you?"

"Hm, I don't know… Rex?"

"Rex? Ew."

"Hey are you calling my brother gross?"

"No, but he's just a kid," she said, "plus he might as well be my brother. Also, he's got heart, but not as much of a brain."

"So you're calling him stupid now?"

She sighed, "everyone seems stupid compared to you."

He huffed into one of her ears, "nice save."

Her ear twitched.

"Y-"

"Don't say it."

"But you are cute."

"Ugh, you say that so often it's gettin' super repetitive."

Brandon reached up to rub an ear. Nia mumbled something in content.

"What was that?" He teased.

"I love you."

"I-" he tilted his head, "damn it, how am I supposed to tease you with that?"

"That's the point," she smiled.

"Ugh."

"You love me and you know it."

"That I do milady," he sighed contentedly, "but…"

"But what?" she poked his arm.

"It's hard to get Rex out of my mind right now," he said, "I'm worried about him."

"Even over me?" Nia teased.

Brandon giggled despite himself, then immediately tried to cover it by clearing his throat, "I'm being serious Nia, playful snuggles time is over."

"Aw," she pouted, "fine."

He rubbed his temples, "I've been trying to come up with something for a while and I really think that I've got something."

"Yeah? Like what?" Nia asked, her curiosity piqued.

"You know how he always carries her core crystal around, right?" he asked.

"Yeah?" She gave him a curious look, "I'm not sure I like where this train of thought is goin'."

Brandon bit his lip before continuing, "I've noticed that it's still a core crystal."

"Well duh," Nia said, "anyone could see that."

"But that's the thing, she hasn't regenerated and rebonded even though there hasn't been any external damage to the core itself, only her physical form was destroyed in the detonation of Artifice Aion and Rhadamanthus," he reasoned, "what if we could somehow… force her core crystal to regenerate and bring her back."

Nia narrowed her eyes at the idea, "I don't like it," was her response, "let the dead rest."

"Pyra didn't want to die either," Brandon argued, "she would have wanted to live out the rest of her life with Rex."

"And then what? Have her fall into depression once he dies from age if somethin' else doesn't get him first?" she hissed, "or was that not one of your concerns? Rex understood that she did what she thought was necessary, what was necessary."

"I-"

"Ugh, you can be such an idiot sometimes. We're not human, or Gormotti in my case. We live for much longer than you. Honestly, some days it hits me hard and I wish I never met you-" she glanced into his eyes, "not like that. I didn't mean it like that. But… no matter how hard I try, you'll die before me and I'll have to live for hundreds, if not thousands of years longer after you're gone from this world, and that kills me inside. It feels like my heart is bein' ripped in two."

"I'm sorry," Brandon pulled Nia in close, "I wasn't really considering everyone… I just… I had that idea fixated in my mind, I wasn't really thinking."

"I get it, and I do miss her," Nia said wistfully.

"The only reason why I bring this up," Brandon said softly, "is because I think I've figured out how to bring her back."

"Yeah, I got that, obviously…" She paused, "wait… you have an actual way and you're not proposin' to experiment on her core."

Brandon nodded, "it's because we now have access to the other Beanstalks. There was only one Trinity Processor but these other space stations have supercomputers of their own. I could theoretically recreate the Pneuma simulation to kind of shock her back into consciousness."

"What do you mean by the Pneuma simulation?"

"It's the virtual environment the Trinity Processor created the Aegis consciousness-"

"Without," Nia sighed, "all of the science jargon please."

"It's the thing that made the Aegises," Brandon simplified, "I can remake it… kind of."

"Wasn't Klaus the one that made the Aegises?" Nia asked.

"Klaus is the one that gave you physical forms by changing some properties of the Core Crystals," he said. He wasn't really sure what Klaus did. He didn't add anything to it and he made life evolve naturally, well naturally at an extremely accelerated pace.

"I'm not sure if that makes you an artificial intelligence, but the Aegises are," he continued to explain, "they were made by a supercomputer. I could theoretically revive her through it."

"And you promise that this is humane?"

"Yeah."

She sighed, "I'm not entirely on board… but let's do it."

"Yeah?" He perked up.

"Yeah," she confirmed, "I'll close down my place for a little while, it's not like I'm gettin' a ton of business anyways."

"Alright, I'll let the guys at the lab know tomorrow."

"I'll get our stuff ready then," Nia said, "let's go on another adventure."

"So where is this exactly?" Nia asked, drumming her fingers on the side of the bare bones car.

"Relax," Brandon said, "it's going to be at least a few days, if not weeks, to get there."

"I'm not an impatient child," she raised an eyebrow, "I was just askin' where it is."

"It's in California… I guess you don't know where that is," he stuck his tongue in his cheek in thought, "I uh, guess it's to the west of the general landmass. We're in the area where Florida used to be so it's going to take a little while because we're on the other side of the continent."

"I can't believe we're doin' this," she groaned, "remind me why I agreed to this?"

"This wouldn't even have taken an hour if we were still able to use old public transportation."

"Well we can't, can we?" she snarked, "we've gotta take a shite vehicle that's slower than a Titan ship."

"Well it's not like we can just commandeer a Titan ship. None of us have enough money to buy one that can fly. So we go back to the basics."

"With a gas guzzlin' car," she rolled her eyes, "that you're runnin' off of gas reserves from Morytha. A gas guzzlin' car that is designed by one of the smartest people in Alrest. Right. The basics."

"Basics for me," he made a face, "we're still getting more people up to par with electricity. If that wasn't limiting enough, our engineers just aren't good enough to make electric cars yet."

She tapped his shoulder, "you could build one."

"Eh, not really. I may have done things with energy but I barely figured out how to put this thing together with all the Ardanian engineers and that was with blueprints. We just don't have the parts to put together an electric vehicle."

"Well what about Tora? Why not use whatever's powerin' Poppi?" she waved a hand around, "whatever machine he used just took one hit of lightnin' and she's just runnin' forever."

Brandon frowned, "I'm not sure what he used exactly but she runs on ether energy that's powered by her furnace. It takes a lot of time to build one and someone who understands that stuff. I don't know how to harness that energy."

"But you understand this other thing called electricity," she snorted, "huh."

"Electricity is something that we've been studying for years and mastered. Ether is something that Klaus made. It may have been studied but by people of Alrest. I've never done any research."

"Well that's why you have a team right?"

"I guess? But I don't work super well with teams. Again, we could barely piece this thing together."

"You work well with me," she placed her hand on his.

"Yeah," he pulled a face, "when I can actually get your power under control."

"You arse, you know what I mean," she elbowed him.

Brandon chuckled, "yeah, when your powers aren't giving me a nosebleed."

"You sure that it's my powers givin' you the nosebleed?" She teased.

"Ha! Cute doesn't give nosebleeds, nice try though," Brandon laughed.

"Cute?" She said indignantly.

"What? Did you expect me to say sexy?" He elbowed her back, "you are many things, milady, but sexy isn't one of them. And before you say anything, yes I've ogled your hips, yes I think they're great, no that doesn't make you sexy."

"First off, ew, pervert," she smiled to show that she wasn't being too serious, "second, I was expectin' you to say beautiful or elegant. Not 'sexy.'"

"So you were trying to joke about me getting a nosebleed… over beautiful? Who gets nosebleeds from 'beautiful?' Hm. Maybe if I saw you in a bikini."

"Why do your hormones have to kick in now?" Nia sighed but with a slight smile on her face. He seemed much happier now than ever and it was honestly a relief to hear him make a few dirty jokes like a normal young adult.

"They're probably just making up for the years I spent in combat. Might as well, it's not like I've got any more fighting to do."

"Right," she gave him a deadpan stare, "that's why you brought a gun with you."

"Self defense," he defended himself.

"A military grade gun… from Morytha."

"It's…" he searched for words, "still self defense?" he tried when he came up empty.

"How is that self defense?" Nia said, nodding her head in the direction of the trunk where it was stored to emphasize her point.

"We might run into more blade eaters," Brandon argued, "can't kill those with a basic firearm."

"I didn't even think of that," she smacked her forehead, "wait, then why didn't you bring anythin' stronger? Those things were damn near impossible to kill."

"Well the armor I wore around Alrest blew up along with the low orbit station. The Marine armor I took from the station is too big and bulky to travel with. My gauntlets are in disrepair since I stopped using and maintaining them. Not sure what else I could have brought unless you wanted me to mount an aa gun on our roof."

"I don't know, you could have prepared for this better."

"You were the one who was like 'let's go on an adventure!' last night. That's not enough time to prep anything. Besides, I'm purposefully trying to avoid all the old cities so we don't run into any trouble."

"You sure about that?" she pointed out through the framework of the car, slightly to the right of their line of sight.

"Ohhh shit… I must have plotted our route wrong."

Nia sighed, "so much for avoidin' the old cities."

"I honestly don't know how I fucked this up. It's okay, we can take the long way around, I've made sure to pack enough food in case of emergencies."

"I don't know…" she said hesitantly, "blowin' through our backup supplies so quickly seems like a bit of an issue."

"It'll only delay us by a day at most, we'll still have plenty leftover."

"Well how many of these detours do we have to take?" she said, her voice slightly raised, "if this is wrong, how many of your other routes are wrong?"

"This is a one off thing, I swear. I've never done this before."

"You've never fucked up, right," she rolled her eyes, "like that one time with that giant gogal that nearly killed you before I could swoop in? Or that time with the deinos sauros that nearly bit you in two while we were exploring Temperantia?"

"To be fair those are wild animals and unpredictable. I've never screwed up with something that's static."

"Oh yeah! You've never fucked up because you're more machine than man, right?"

"Oh ha ha, yeah, make fun of me for being insecure and defending myself," Brandon clenched a fist over his heart melodramatically, "woe is me."

Nia giggled, "you're such a child sometimes, I swear."

"Hmm, is this what being a child is like?" Brandon tilted his head with a lopsided grin, "I think I like it."

"I'd like some maturity instead."

"Maturity? If you wanted that you should have asked out Morag," he joked, "she's much more… or actually, she's the only mature one of our entire group now that I think about it. Even Brighid can be impulsive."

"Are you sayin' I'm not mature?" Nia scowled playfully.

"You said it best yourself, you're a violent goon!"

"Oi, I said I'm not some violent goon!"

"And there it is."

She gasped exaggeratedly, "you tricked me!"

"It was but a simple task, milady."

She laughed, "ugh, of course it was. Seriously though, what are we goin' to do about the city?"

The city drew ever closer as they kept on driving. "I'm not sure… I'm thinking that we should actually try to drive through it. With the speed we have, there shouldn't be much of an issue. Plus if we do see any, you could always just pop them with your mind."

"That's… not how it works. Those… things, they're not alive. I can't manipulate their cells because they don't have any left still functionin'."

"Oh… that makes more sense," he shrugged, "well even if you can't, we have other options. We should be fine."

She put her hand on his arm, "I trust you," she said softly, "but if this goes wrong…"

"I know, I know," he breathed, "we'll be fine."

"Not one in sight. Okay, we should be fine if we're already halfway through without encountering a single one," Brandon said tentatively.

"I hope you're right," Nia said.

"I hope I'm right as well," he said, "or this is going to be a short trip," he added under his breath.

The two had been traveling for a few hours through the city. He wasn't entirely sure which one it was, but judging by how there weren't any advertisements for any theme parks, it wasn't Orlando.

"I wish we could find a spaceport, that would make this so much easier."

"If it has a functionin' ship leftover, that won't fall apart in ten seconds like the one in the World Tree did."

He sucked a breath in through his teeth, "right. That might be an issue."

"Mmh. Real smart, buckethead."

"I thought you retired that nickname."

"When you're still calling me milady?" she grinned, "not on your life."

"Fair."

"Ugh, I can't make fun of that."

"Apologies milady," he shrugged, "were you expecting a rebuke."

"That's how our relationship works, right?" She laughed.

Brandon smiled, "constant banter? That's why I love you."

"Love you too," she nuzzled her head into his neck.

"Hm, I bet most people wouldn't think so, given how much you insult me."

She just stuck her tongue out, "they can suck it." She closed her eyes and started purring. Brandon laughed and reached up to scratch one of her ears.

"I could get used to this."

Brandon suddenly swore and slammed on the brakes. Nia jerked forward but was stopped by her seat belt.

"What the fuck was that?"

Brandon grimaced, "looks like our luck just ran out."

….

To those of you who enjoyed the original, hopefully this was at least passable as a sequel so far.

Yes, Nia starting a clinic is very much inspired by "A Purpose for the Gift of Life." It's a really good piece of writing, check it out if you haven't. I believe it's on page 2 of the archive.

I also like replacing how Nia says ing with in'. Trying to represent her accent a little bit more. Adds to her character design.

In case it wasn't obvious enough already, I take a lot of inspiration from other stories I read, media I watch, and video games I play. Starcraft is a universe I take a lot from. That's why the humans before the whole Klaus incident had very Terran esque technology. Stuff like CMC marine armor, reaper armor (which is what Brandon had on for most of my story), Gauss rifles, and a few other things I might add later.

As for their location, no one really knows. I know Luxin did a whole theory video on it but I decided on Florida. Why? It's mostly to add some runtime to the story because they have to cross the entirety of the US. Plus it's not a massive stretch as Alrest is apparently located above Texas.

Of course they settled down relatively quickly, but after such a cataclysmic event, I feel like the world leaders would band together. They don't want their successors to make similar mistakes to them and start a massive war while being blind to the moves made by both the Praetorium and Torna. Of course, Morag being the new Empress of Mor Ardain knows Brandon is from Morytha and knows of his governmental structure. I think it fits her character that she doesn't want to be an empress and reforming a newly revived empire into a democracy doesn't seem to be that far of a stretch.

Also shameless stream plug, twitch . tv / sparklehandss. Check it out for some quality Starcraft 2 content, or just to say hi.