Five millennia later:

They were seven, and appeared as students a few years out of college, in age.

Their leader wore an evening gown, and had long-since shed the girlish pigtails of her youth. She had styled her ash-blonde hair into a ballet bun at the nape of her neck. She was tall and statuesque, her green eyes placid and analytical all at once.

She stood beside a shorter man in a tuxedo. His hair was white, his eyes were red, and he wouldn't have looked out of place in the days of Bach and Beethoven. Every aspect of his appearance was neat and cultivated, with nary a detail out of place.

Two girls and a guy, blondes and a boy with black hair, wore futuristic looking jumpsuits that had actually gone out of style a century or two ago. They didn't care in the slightest, and continued to wear the fashions of their favorite historical era.

There was a woman with a stunning hourglass figure, which could hardly be seen through the baggy casual clothes she wore. Her hair went clear down to the small of her back, and was perfectly straight. She was making her way through a colorful dish that was probably a dessert of some sort, a wide smile on her face.

The guy with a blue crew-cut next to her looked more like a male model than anything else, dressed in designer clothes, which were nice, but not eye-catching. He was wolfing down his food with a ravenous expression.

Naturally, the two most ordinary were the Assassins.

Team Albarn, it seemed, had aged well.

In the first few centuries of their existence, they had had a great deal of fun with cosplay, dressing up as the Magnificent Seven, the Seven Deadly Sins, and various other themed costumes. As the years went by, however, they found themselves being more and more recognizable as a team, and even becoming an archetype themselves. These days, it was just as likely to see a cosplay of the Seven Weapons (as Team Albarn had been most famously known) as it was to see the Seven Samurai, or any other group.

After that point, the team had just dressed however the heck they wanted to, dressing up only on occasion.

All seven were at a table, in the midst of a vast cafeteria, which, itself, was only a small part of the gigantic base where the Time Wasters Society now met.

In a game hall, there was a zero-g soccer tournament going on: Aperture vs Everyone Else. Aperture was leading, four to two.

In the theater, there was a play being performed. The whole thing had been put together by a mostly human cast and crew. It was a production of Shadow King, a play describing the rise and fall of the ancient Death Empire, which had, in fact, been written by an actual Shinigami: The Playwright, who in his human life had been known as 'Tamaki Suoh.' Shadow King, in the millennia since its publication, had come to be considered a classic highbrow comedy, and if Tamaki hadn't already been immortal by the time he started publishing plays, then Kyoya probably would have killed him for it.

There was a combat workshop going on in another section of the building, and that was only the only even that was actually on the schedule.

The highlight of the day, it would later be agreed, was probably the Parrises Squares match between Yuki Nagato and Demona taking place in the gym, which would eventually end in a tie at sundown.

But in the cafeteria, things were relatively quiet, except for the game of Texas Hold'em going on in the middle of the room. From the looks of things the Shinigami, Noctis (who, incidentally was actually the apprentice of the Heir of Abyss), was winning, and had a large pile of betting chips in front of her, much to the dismay of the punk Fairy and dainty-looking Cat also at her table.

There were not humans in sight, but that wasn't to say that there were no humans in the society. For an organization founded by immortals, there were a surprising number of ordinary people running about, and they outnumbered the more powerful members by nearly two to one.

So, mortals wandering around wasn't all that uncommon, but new immortals were a much rarer occurrence. And so, when five of them had suddenly burst into the cafeteria, continuing an obviously already in progress fight with a mortal assailant, it was definitely a noteworthy event.

And, truth be told, a rather ominous one as well.

The newcomers were four beings who looked like humans, and one who most certainly did not. There were two girls, a blonde and a black-haired girl, and three guys, blond, and black-haired, and one who was completely bald.

In terms of weapons, one of the girls fought using hand-to-hand, and one using an honest-to-god spoon. The guys were using more traditional weapons, like guns and knives. And the last fighter was in a class of their own.

It was a muscle-bound man with green skin and red eyes, who looked not unlike the Incredible Hulk. He, too, was fighting barehanded, because, frankly, any kind of weapon would have been superfluous in his hands.

Their opponent looked very much like an ordinary man, at least until his soul-protect cracked and he morphed into a Clown with a Kishin-Egg soul.

Well, with that revelation, everyone who had been considering intervening in the fight instead, formed a ring around the six fighters to heckle them instead.

"Hey, green man," said Patty, "want some help?"

"Fuck off, losers!" said the guy.

"Kay!" said Patty.

Another few minutes saw the monster slain, and the five newcomers victorious. The green guy ate the soul himself, which was a little unusual, but by no means unheard of.

"Hmm," said Maka, "I wonder if his diet had anything to do with his appearance."

"Someone should go talk to them," said Liz, noting how no one else was making the first move.

The five were arguing among themselves, and the guy in short-shorts was apparently trying to scale the side of mount-hulk, to prove some point or other.

"On it," said Black-Star.

"Hiya!" said Black-Star. "Are you new members, and are you doing what it looks like you're doing?"

"Jake, you moron!"

"Hi," said the guy. "I'm Jake English."

"I'm Black-Star. Nice ta meetcha."

"I'm Jane Crocker," said the girl with the spoon. "That's Roxy Lalonde, Dirk Strider, and, of course, Caliborn—"

The green behemoth interrupted her. "Calliope," he said.

Flames engulfed his figure and, when they died down, he was no longer actually a he.

She was bald, and green skinned, just like a moment ago, with the same red-green spirals on her cheeks, but the eyes were now green, and not red, and two white wings sprouted from her shoulders. While the man before had been ripped, the girl was willowy and lithe. Her head still looked very much like a skull, and she had much more the appearance of being a skeleton than she (he?) did previously.

"—Calliope," Jane corrected herself, smoothly.

"Jake," said Calliope, in a soft voice. "Is it really necessary to hang off my arm like a monkey-man?"

He grinned. "Sorry, Callie," he said. "Some people just don't know how to take a joke."

Someone cleared their throats, and the five all turned to see that the blue-haired guy from before had been joined by a guy in a spandex jumpsuit, Death the Kid, he had told them his name was.

"Forgive me for asking," he said, "But... what exactly are you?"

"Well," said Jane, "Us four used to be humans, before we went god-tier. As for Callie and Cal, well..."

"Are you a weapon?" asked a woman in a violet gown, Maka Albarn.

Calliope blinked. "Am I a what?"

In response, Maka transformed, and Soul caught her, cracking the Soul Whip a few times dramatically for effect, before Maka turned human again.

"A weapon," she said. "Most of them are human, but we come in all forms and species, really."

All five of the newcomers actually shrank back in horror.

"Oh, crap," Maka said in realization. "I'm sorry! I didn't mean to scare you! We're not like we are in the moves, really, we're not!"

The obvious fear with which the strangers were looking at them, actually wasn't unjustified.

As it so happened, not even thirty years ago, a director by the name of Cliff Vontague had made a slasher flick by the name of "Katana" about a Weapon serial killer (the protagonist of which had actually been inspired by Tsubaki). At that point in history, prejudice against meisters had been all but eliminated for centuries, as had the subjugation of weapons.

Katana had been critically acclaimed as a masterwork, a must-see, and had terrified audiences across the world, and even across the solar systems.

And, quite unintentionally, actually, weapons were starting to obtain a reputation as the most dangerous ones in a meister/weapon team. They were a common movie and cartoon stock-villain, and had very intimidating reputations, nowadays.

Whereas meisters had once been stereotyped as cold, controlling, and callous, weapons were now held to be dangerous, without loyalty, and willing to work for anyone. It wasn't any more true than the assumptions about meisters had once been, but the public will usually believe anything that is both ubiquitous and plausible.

"Sorry," said Calliope, deliberately stepping forward to stand where she had been before she'd flinched back. "We should know better than to judge by reputation, by now..." she shook her head. "Well, to answer your question, I don't think so. I mean, how could we be a weapon? We don't even have a weapon-form, for one thing..."

"Are you sure?" said Maka. "I once knew a man whose weapon-form was a lamp with a genie inside. And a girl whose weapon-form was a Robot Unicorn. In one case, I even knew a man whose weapon form was another human."

Calliope blinked. "What?"

Maka shrugged. "Well, if you think about it, what more powerful weapon is there than a soldier? Now, granted, he wasn't normal—had D.I.D.—another personality," Maka explained. "One of them was weapon, and the other was wielder. A lot of people didn't believe that they were actually a real weapon... but they made Death Scythe and showed the world their strength. You remind me a lot of them."

Calliope exchanged glances with her friends, before looking back to Maka. "Well, honestly, I'd never thought of it like that. Maybe there's something to what you're saying."

"Hey, Cal, you hear that? They think you're a weapon!"

"Shut up, Roxy," said the guy's voice from before. It would have been disembodied, except, if one looked closely, his reflection could be seen in each of Calliope's eyes.

"So," said Dirk. "What kind of party are we crashing?"

"Well," said Liz, rubbing the back of her head. "We're actually not doing much today. According to an ancient prophecy, today's the day that the all powerful 'Cherub' Lord English destroys the world, whatever the heck a Cherub even is. We can't do anything to stop it, and apparently something like this happens every million years or so, and is beneficial to the life-cycle of the universe, so we're just trying to enjoy our last day of being alive together."

"We have cake," said Patty. "Want some?"

The green-eyed monster-girl and the other four, who had been looking more and more panicked as Liz went on, now looked nothing but relieved.

"Sure!" said Roxy. "By the way, got any booze?"

There were a good deal more than the original seven of them, when they went back to their table. A large number of other humans and immortals had come over, drawn by the novelty of the newcomers. Although, to be fair, some were just as interested in the Seven Weapons.

A guy with Silver hair, for example, was speaking to the male Assassin.

"'Black-Star'?" he said, trying the name out. "Which part is the first name and which part is the last?"

Black-Star tilted his head. "All of it is the first and last name," he said.

Normal conversation continued for an hour or two, before the Hitachins decided to drop by on a pranking spree, after that, things had gotten messy, and the ice had well and truly been broken. The five newcomers were more or less accepted as eventual society members.

Then, the recruiting attempts started. While they were all one big, happy, society, of course, there were still various factions and social circles within the group. And, much like the recruiting of freshmen at a fraternity rush, the induction of new blood into the society produced an outpouring of interest.

Noctis, for example invited them on the Expedition that a local Coven was planning on taking to the moon of Io.

Chrona dropped by to announce that she and Ragnarok were going on a poetry crusade, and inviting anyone who wanted to come.

GLaDOS popped in, via portal, to announce that Aperture Science was currently hiring, before being called away by the sound of mad laughter, followed by an explosion, cut off as the portal closed.

Occasionally, Lord Death and Sid could be seen, trying to hide inconspicuously behind potted plants. Apparently, someone had spread a rumor that Kid had been doing drugs, and the Grim Reaper was 'just making sure Kid was okay.'

Eventually, the Seven Weapons decided to go LARPing in Aperture, with GLaDOS as Game Master, leaving the five new people to immerse themselves in the Society, after they'd declined to join them in role-playing.

Kid was currently offering some last-second advice.

"Well, the sun has set, so the prophecy was, apparently, a load of crap," he was saying, "but I wouldn't let your guard down until at least after midnight. And, if you see any fat babies in diapers, shoot to kill."

"Right," said Jane.

They waved goodbye to their new friends, and then portaled into Aperture.

When they were alone, the seven looked at each other. "Do you think that was them?" asked Tsubaki.

"Probably," said Black-Star, with a shrug, "But, we should know, better than anyone, that people are way more than a stupid concept like 'destiny' or 'prophecy.' If they destroy the world, fine, we've had a good run. But, if they're not here for that, then we'd be brain-dead to be the ones to turn the prophecy into a self-fulfilling one."

"We'll face this like we've faced everything else," said Maka, with a smile. "Together."

And so, back in the Society, the party continued on, warnings of a failed apocalypse laid aside in jubilation. Caliborn had even been called out for an arm-wrestling match with a famous meister called Torus.

Though none of them yet knew it, this particular historical era, and its immortals, would endure for another three and a half million years, going on to contain one of the longest golden ages in history, recorded or otherwise.

Caliborn and Calliope were lauded in their day, but not terribly important, historically. For truly, they were never really meant to be heroes. They were supposed to become the Kishin to end all Kishin, who would drown the world in blood and raze it down in flames: either as Lord English or as Muse Felt.

And, in many of the other dimensions, that's exactly who they were.

But here, at least, they were heroes.

Not the heroism of saving the world, no, but the heroism of a bully-hunter, antagonizing and tormenting overbearing and abusive weapons who mistreated their meisters in his presence... and that of a kind and supportive friend to those she cared about. The heroism of climbing the echeladder to becoming a Death Scythe with slow and steady deliberation, and much bickering along the way, and eventually going on to become the regional Death Scythe of Europe.

So, what made this dimension so different? Well, here, the two young Cherubs had been hatched on Earth, and found by a religious order, thinking them to be demons, noting their resemblance to the harbingers of doom from an ancient prophecy. They would have been killed, if not for a compassionate deacon in the upper ranks. It was decided that nurture could, perhaps, save them all, and the two were to be raised with love and compassion, in another country, to preserve the secret as well as they could.

Which had worked on Caliborn to the exact extent which could be expected, which was to say not at all.

Calliope always had been an adorable sack of sugar to Caliborn's giant sack of—well, the point was, she would have turned out fine, regardless.

When they were thirteen years old, a couple of Witches had come after them. They'd evacuated the entire orphanage, piling them onto a bus, and making a rush for the safehouse. They'd even had a few bodyguards. They'd been really worried for awhile. Huddled behind bulletproof glass, listening to the sounds of fighting on the rooftop. Their caretakers praying for a miracle. Calliope had hidden within their mind, refusing to come out. Caliborn had looked out the window, and so he saw the bodyguards running off, probably trying to save their own hides, he thought, now that the Witches could no longer reach them. What a bunch of cowards.

He'd seen them fall, and then not get up. It had made him angry.

It was just so... undignified. They were the good guys, they were supposed to prance around, being all happy and majestic and shit. Not get dive-bombed into comas for picking the wrong fight.

The next time they'd needed bodyguards, it had been an entirely different team. Calliope had asked about their rescuers. They'd learned that the three had been turned into weapons, and then kicked down a social level.

And this, of all things, had been what finally got Caliborn thinking about issues of morality. Why would three people sacrifice themselves for himself and his sister? They'd never even met, and they could have done their duty without going to so much effort and heartache.

This had no discernible effect on his personality, in the short run, of course. He was just as acerbic as ever, and just as antagonistic.

But he did start to consider, whether he wanted to be the one crippling people like that, like he would surely have to do, if he walked his intended path of a conqueror.

No. No, actually, as it turned out he didn't want to do that.

It didn't change who he was in the slightest. Some things were immutable, but it did change his actions. In fact, when he finally managed to escape his chains and wander around the building, he didn't even maim anyone. From there, Calliope had managed to get her claws into him, and it had all been downhill from there.

Not that it had made much difference in their immediate social standings, for it seemed fate had ordained a different role for them. When they were fifteen, they'd gone trickster and decided never to predominate. When they were sixteen, they'd found a crystal cavern, and there they'd gone to sleep, for four thousand odd years, living in worlds based on their own experiences in dream bubbles, refining and honing their powers, learning about their great destiny of destroying civilization.

As Lord of Time and Muse of Space, that had been easy enough to avert. Caliborn had overclocked their minds to give them more time to plan. Calliope had moved their cavern to an uninhabited planet in a distant galaxy. When the uncontrollable destructive rage had overtaken then, they'd destroyed the dead planet, as well as its neighbors and its sun, for good measure. (Turned the sun into a black hole and played eight-ball with the planets, as they found out later.)

And, of course, they'd expected that their quartet of friends would have been dead, but, much to their surprise, all four had been waiting for them, having immortalized themselves through their own efforts.

Then, they'd all gone back to Earth, to pretend that nothing had happened. Back to all the ungrateful fucks who treated them both like shit. Who didn't even know that they'd they'd saved their pathetic arses.

But, whatever. Built a bridge, got over it. This was what heroism usually looked like, it seemed.

Sometimes, perhaps, heroism might be squaring off against the forces of darkness, or throwing oneself in front of a bullet to save someone. Most of the time, though, it was less than that. Heroism was taking shit from morons without disemboweling them, it was hiding out in caves, plotting world salvation, and it was three bodyguards lying limp and unconscious in the middle of the street.

But, enough of shitty introspection. Good or bad, the past was dead and gone.

And the future was much more interesting.

Caliborn frowned. "So," he said, "What do you morons call this place, anyway?"

AN: Right, and that's the end of that.

In terms of future writing, I'll probably take the next year or two and just practice editing my old stuff, especially Snowstorm. What's posted now is still nowhere near as cool as what I envisioned in my head.

Also, once I'm fairly happy with it, I'll probably change the name from Snowstorm to "The Time Wasters Society" like I have on AO3. The only reason I didn't name the fic 'Time Wasters Society' from the start was because I thought that I might want to use the name "The Conquest Society" for an as-of-yet-unwritten original novel. I no longer care if the two have similar names, but right now I'm leaning much more strongly towards "A Mobius Road" for the title, making the point moot.

As far as content goes, the core of the Snowstorm is there, and I'm happy with it, but the details will probably change, as I correct typos, fix contradictions, and improve on the pacing, clarity, and characterization.

Anyway, there'll be more fics and/or novels from me, eventually, because I couldn't stop myself from writing if I tried, but, again, don't expect anything substantial for the next year or two, at least.

Thanks to everyone whose read this story! Hope you enjoyed it!

-Shameless McSudonim