[ChicletPrime]

WU 14 Elysium
Flashback to how Elysium came to be / pre Death&Rebirth lore

• I am not a fan when the stories reference people by initial. I can't keep track of actual names, let along "Mr. P". Mr. J was messing around in Kahli, I think the Academy researchers were dealing with a Mr. R?
  
• Okay, Mr P is rich (diamond studded watch) and obviously part of the N109 shenanigans.
  
• oh. the watch is... stolen? from the auction at the Solon Hotel, to boot.
  
• so our P-guy switches the watch for the.. frog plushie on display at the antique store? intriguing.
  
• code word time! "Connoisseur's Menu"
  
• /sifts through all the stuff on the menu
  
• okay, "four distinct powers in the N109. They don't complement each other, they're just equally expensive." hah!
  
• Ah, so Mr P is likely this "Phantom Thief Pea".
  
• 2036 was the gang war 'that engulfed the N109'. so two years after the Catastrophe - when Sylus arrived?
  
• "Ginevra... bar's bouncer... short orange-red hair."  is this some sort of hidden homage to Harry Potter?
  
• ho ho. so Aislinn takes up with Ginevra and grows up learning to fight and run a bar. she overhears a conversation between a scarred man and Ginevra about finding "missing Evolver", "test subject" "base of operations"
  
• Okay, so the scarred man is Dexter, they are trying to return children back to their parents (hello, EVER!) and 'Ginevra' has a Special Task Force ID card.
  
• 7. Protocore Trading - Strawberry Disaster Special - present day again
  
• the N109 gang war started over a 'protocore 'map'. which was lost in the ensuing chaos.
  
• random clue? Aislinn wears a silver wildflower earring. whatever that means. memorial for the dead? Dexter never comes back.
  
• so this mysterious map is a.. treasure map to a 'priceless' protocore? hidden somewhere in the N109. so, the one that we eventually get, i guess? Creatio? They can't possibly be talking about Sylus'.
  
• speak of the devil. "Someone says Sylus has starting eating people."
  
• wow. okay. i get that desire is a bottomless put, but if he keeps snacking between meals, he's gonna spoil his dinner.
  
• yeah. the original gang war in 2036 was ended when Sylus emerged on top after months of fighting. the bar was untouched throughout the whole thing until at the end Mephisto delivers a message "The deal is done. I'll be taking the map." oh! so Ginevra had the map everyone was fighting over and she made a deal with Sylus to protect the bar (and Aislinn) in exchange for it.
  
• hah! the last item on the Connoisseur's Menu can only be ordered by one specific person, a 'certain lady'. bet that's me! Sweet Evil Trap. and its side dish... Sylus himself.
  
• the Elysium bar closes at 3am. heck, i would have thought it a 24/7 operation.
  
• the frog plushie (sans bomb) is still on a table (thanks Mr P!)
  
• confusion. "someone traded me a map for what's in this gift box... maybe I'll try the dish you created just for me next time."
  
• inside the money that child Aislinn gave Ginevra to learn how to fight. so Ginevra gave up the fancy protocore map to Sylus who by infererence is this Phantom Thief Pea as well, not to protect Elysium specifically but to protect Aislinn (??). i am not sure i'm reading this right, but that's the gist I'm getting.
  

WU 15 Sketches Vol.13
Backstory about Liam (Caleb's adjacent)

• okay, so a chunk of actual land (well, an island) was so rich in magnetic ore that it 'rotated over the planet's Protofield... [which] ground the surrounding lakes into a perfect circle like an ice ring. That's also why is could float skyward when the Deepspace Tunnel's appearance altered the magnetic field and gravity vortex."
  
• /stares into the sky for a bit, absorbing that
  
• i just assumed that Skyhaven was built somehow, not *ascended*. but props to a general suspicion that Caleb is very linked to the Tunnel somehow if there's a 'gravity vortex' involved. apparently they are now stabilized in the air using protocore technology, courtesy of EVER (i already knew that somewhere)
  
• "What about those suffering from Protcore Syndrome? They're no different from past radiation victims." ... "Do you think people can trusted? Nuclear reactions weren't originally developed for power generation."
  
• "Do you truly believe our world has become a better place?"
  
• these are all fantastic insights and a tough last question.
  
• "Your research in protocore energy helped stabilize the floating islands... while preventing the risks of a stabilising protofield."  huh. okay, even.
  
• ohhh. this is Liam's wife. well, shit, as they say. Liam barely remembers them, let alone has any feelings intact.
  
• "I'm working on anew book, Colonel Caleb. You might be interested—it's called 'Heartless.'"  nice. when asked why she named her latest book with that title, 'because heartless rhymes with coreless.'
  

WU 16 Utopian Roamer
lore about protofields

• this is just after the Catastrophe.
  
• wow, okay. protofields really are manifesting different worlds, pulling some of *there* into *here*.
  
• another mention of "gravity vortex"
  
• apparently Wanderers normally escape before death through "rifts" before reappearing again, but this researcher ended up going through one along with the Wanderer, ending up in this new place. still breathable air, apparently and Evol is unaffected. this time, the Wanderer dissipated into particles when defeated instead of escaping again as normal. When it died, the rift dumped the researcher back into their original world.
  
• okay, so the more powerful the Wanderer, the bigger the protofield it can deploy around it when in an alternate world (ours), which maps to its original world and thereby can escape attack and return to safety?? Air is breathable, water is drinkable, food is edible.
  
• "Professor Shaylin reached the following conclusion in her subsequent research report: "Wanderers in reality escape to an alternate space when near defeat. Pursuers can follow through these rifts to eliminate them permanently. As the first discoverer, Professor Shaylin terms this alternate space "Protofield.""
  
• the next data entry has the year as 203*, so i guess an unknown time has passed
  
• and its messed up because Shaylin when ... back to the Catastrophe?
  
• they've found a protofield that has yet to collapse even with its Wanderer defeated - a whole day so far. its a particlarly large space and has ruins in it, suggesting civilization.
  
• those "killed" by Wanderers might instead just be trapped in protofields.
  
• oh dear, our researcher is starting to hallucinate, having been living in this protofield for a month.
  
• "All of existence dwelled within that tiny rift, like glimpsing an ocean within a single droplet of water."
  
• the Library HAS to be involved with this, like some sort of traversal point? since all worlds connect to it and through it?