There had been a whole lot going on at the base over the last couple of weeks. Rebecca didn’t know any of the details, but the department knew that at least two missions had been sent out for shorter amounts of time than normal with specific instructions. The missions were different in that they were shorter but also because they were back-to-back. Monthly missions had been a theme for as long as she’d been in Atlantis, not that she’d actually been on any of them, but as one of the diplomats, she had a little more knowledge of them than the average, non-field agent citizen of Atlantis.
It had been a long day, so she’d run out for a few minutes to the coffee shop for a little pick me up. Something frozen, a little mocha-chocolatey, and very tasty. Her classes had been over for a month or more now, so she was spending all of her time at the base working rather than half working and half in a classroom. She never thought she’d say this, but sometimes she actually missed going to school.
Not only thinking about herself, and in one of those rare generous moments that she was having more of these days, Rebecca picked up a drink for Lissa while she was out too. It wasn’t quite as loaded with things that weren’t coffee, but it was one she thought the girl would like.
The door was partly open to Lissa’s office when she arrived back at the base, so thankfully she didn’t have to do the whole awkward knocking thing while carrying around two coffee drinks. She stepped inside and offered her the drink. “Here, I thought you might like this. It doesn’t have any blood in it or anything, but it seemed something you’d like.” She shrugged and sat down in one of the chairs, taking a sip of her own. Rebecca had gotten used to being around and/or living with witches, vampires, Jedi, and freaking unicorns, but she still often found it weird as hell.
Lissa was going over some of the intel that was shared with her for the next few pieces of the puzzle and how they were working out. She hated not having more eyes on some of it but she knew sometimes too many eyes caused problems and these were targeted enough that she didn’t even access to all the information.
She heard Rebecca’s footsteps well before she pushed the door open, but Lissa didn’t show that instead, she took just a beat before looking up and giving Rebecca a small smile.
“You must have read my mind,” she said taking the offered drink. “I was just thinking I could use a tasty treat, one without blood,” she made sure to add.
“Thank you.” She took a small sip before adding. “What do you think about what’s happening right now?”
What did she think? Rebecca thought about the question while taking a big sip of her coffee drink. A big enough one that gave her a little bit of a shiver from the chill. “I don’t know. I guess it’s a little confusing why it’s happening the way it is. Old missions, time travel.” She made a face. “All of it sounds strange even for here.”
Even after all of the weird happenings in Atlantis, time travel still wigged her out a little. “It’s figuring out how it pieces together that I don’t get yet.”
Taking a small sip of her coffee as she let Rebecca think and answer she couldn’t argue with the fact that there was a bigger puzzle that they hadn’t figured out yet.
“There does seem to be some pieces missing, I do wonder how the tools are actually going to play a part in the inevitable confrontation with COS leadership.” Lissa felt like things were building to a natural progression, she didn’t like the idea of an all out war in the city but she doubted it’d just be missions as it had been.
“Perhaps we should spend some time studying why the missions that are happening and if they have any significant connections,” she offered as a thought.
If Cyprus Rhodes, Zeta Beta Zeta President Rebecca Logan could see that Atlantis, Diplomat Rebecca Logan was studying mission files and creative tools in order to save creativity, she probably would have screamed in her face that she needed to have her head examined. Even sitting here, Rebecca wasn’t sure if she wouldn’t have been right. All of this seemed so crazy any time she allowed herself to think about it too hard, but she’d seen and experienced too much first hand to believe it was all a lie or an allusion.
“Maybe. You don’t happen to have a list of ones that might be coming up, do you? Or just the ones that have happened, the short, recent ones. Do they all have anything in common? Something similar that happened or was taken with them?”
Lissa tapped her finger gently on the cup in her hand as she thought about it. Rebecca’s question was one she’d been thinking about a lot. “I do know they figured out which missions they needed to go back to, the puzzle pieces were a huge part of it,” she informed Rebecca. “But this information isn’t something they want broadcasting,” she made a decision that the information she had she needed to share to see if they came up with something.
“So far it seems most are either placing objects or in some cases stopping potential attacks. I don’t know all of them, but they are targeting the first time we got the notebook, 100 acre woods, when we got the pocket watch, the kidnappings, the anomalies and Scooby Doo. Some are just Atlantis based, while others are cartoons,” Lissa frowned pushing over a piece of paper she had listed out with the little bit of info she had.
“Hey, I can keep a secret when it’s worth keeping,” Rebecca said and held up her hand. When it was worth keeping was the opportune wording, but this fell into that category as far as she was concerned. It wasn’t sorority house gossip that could benefit her in any way by letting it slip to the right couple of people to ensure the entire Greek system was aware by the end of the day.
Rebecca leaned forward while she took a long sip of her drink and looked over the list that Lissa scooted forward. It was a lot of information but enough that gave them a start. She hadn’t been in Atlantis for several of these, but she’d read and caught up on the basics of them shortly after she’d been assigned the job here. “Do they all involved an instance where we located an item or just some of them? Or picked up another piece of crucial information?”
Smirking she nodded, she had a feeling this wasn’t the kind of thing Rebecca would share around.
“The Notebook mission they dropped a clue about a potential attack,” she said looking over it. “The woods mostly just making sure the correct paths were followed, it looks alpha 3 is set to plant a few things, and bravo one will be giving out tattoos,” she paused sitting back. “But how does all of the puzzle pieces that we have now lead to that, and where did they come from in the first place?” Lissa wasn’t expecting a real answer.
“The pieces were the ones that came from the people who, um, died in the arena, right?” Rebecca asked, trying to make sure she remembered correctly. “And no one ever really figured out where those came from?” She hadn’t studied them intensely, but from what she’d heard of those who had been in the arena, the general idea was that the puzzle pieces weren’t from COS. They were from someone or something else. But what?
“I wonder if figuring out who gave them the pieces would answer questions or raise more questions.” Rebecca was betting on the latter but hoping for the former.
Lissa nodded to confirm that Rebecca was right. "No one knows where they originated from, I know there were some theories around, but nothing solid has ever been discovered of their origin."
"Or were we," she meant the general we of the base, "the ones that will give them to them in our future, but that still begs the question of where do they come from originally."
"I feel like no matter what we find out, we are going to be finding more questions than answers."
It took Rebecca a second to wrap her mind around what Lissa was saying. “So, you mean, we went back in time and somehow managed to get to wherever the people were when they woke up before they showed up in Medical and gave them the puzzle pieces ourselves?” Shaking her head, Rebecca slumped back in her seat with a sigh and sipped her drink, staring blankly ahead. She was starting to get a headache.
“We may not know anything more until the missions are complete and any additional information is gathered. Well, re-completed. Or completed again. Since these are do-overs.” Sort of. This felt like she was in the middle of a science fiction movie with time travel and time paradoxes. Way above her paygrade.
“I don’t know,” Lissa admitted. “I’m speculating, but they have the pieces now, what if we now go back and give it to them?” She suggested running a hand through her long blond hair. “It still begs the question, where did the pieces come from in the first place.” Lissa looked down picking up a pen and biting the cap thoughtfully.
“I’m not sure they are really do-overs, or if it’s all been done already,” she admitted with a small frown. There was so much about Atlantis that didn’t make sense, the magic, the way time worked, everything about it always seemed a little off to her.
"It's sort of like the what came first argument: the chicken or the egg. Did the chicken appear because the egg was there first or did the egg appear because the chicken was there to lay it?" This almost felt like a conversation she'd be having with Cappie. Strangely philosophical or something. "But instead it's did they get the puzzle pieces because we were there to give them after already having them or were we there to give the pieces to them because they had them in the first place."
Rebecca stopped herself from thinking anymore on that and leaned her head against her hand, her eyes widening a bit. "I think I just gave myself a bigger headache." She nearly resigned herself to be confused but then had a thought.
"Does COS have the capability to go back in time too? I mean, I guess that they would since they screw with our other realities in different ways all the time. But do you think they tried screwing with old missions, and that has something to do with why we're going back to make sure everything is okay and works out the way they're supposed to?"
Lissa laughed softly. “The philosophical arguments are starting to become more of a pressing reality, and yet there seems to be no solid answer or conclusion.” She said softly as her own mind worked on the problem.
At Rebecca's next question she paused for a second. “I would imagine so,” she offered. “But truthfully the technology side, or how they are sending the teams back is a question I don’t fully know the answer to either, if it is like sending the teams to different lands, for lack of a better way of putting it, or if it something else altogether.” She supposed keeping some of those answers closer to the vest was prudent but she did wish she knew more.
“Yeah,” Rebecca said, thoughtfully. Ultimately, she had no idea how any of this worked beyond some of the basic explanations they were all given. Sometimes she pretended to understand more than she actually did, and sometimes it clicked. Today was one of those half and half moments.
“It’s probably one of those things we’re not going to really know until it happens. Or right before it happens.” Rebecca sipped on the drink again until it was nearly empty. She was going to need more caffeine if the conversation kept going this direction. “At least not until the next mission is over and we find out how it went or if anything new happened.”
Lissa sat back as she thought for a moment. “I’m not sure it really falls under what we do, but we might want to see if the memory of one of the people who was on the original mission changes after the current mission gets back.” She looked down as she thought.
“At the very least we could probably get their written statement and ask questions post the mission,” she’d have to see if Becker would find it worthwhile but she had a gut feeling he’d probably just look at her pretending to not follow and nod his head and wave her off.
“We could pull someone from medical, magical and perhaps technology to help.”
Rebecca hadn’t thought about memories changing, and it was an interesting theory and possibility. One that might actually lead to some real answers if anything came from the questioning. It was a long shot but one worth checking out to see what they could find.
“Of the missions you mentioned, I can try to gather a list of those that went on the original missions and then cross reference to those that have gone on them now. The ones we know of so far anyway.” She didn’t have access to all of that information, but Lissa might have the full list of agents or could get them from Captain Becker.
“It’s a start at least,” Rebecca said and leaned forward to sit up in her chair.
Nodding with a smile. “That would be fantastic.” She had a feeling this was the right path and she was glad that Rebecca had come to talk to her.
“I’ll send Becker a note mentioning that you’re looking into it all and that should give you access to what you need, at least what he and his team decide is necessary.” She knew the secrets that they sometimes kept were simply kept for security reasons.
“I’m curious to see where this might go,” she admitted.
“Works for me,” Rebecca said lightly and stood up from her chair. They at least had some semblance of a direction that they wanted to move towards, and she considered it to be a fairly good one. She generally was someone who would put in extra effort to make sure an event or project was as best as it possibly could be, but that energy was usually directed towards event planning and making sure pledges were kept in line. Research about time travel and missions had taken some getting used to after arriving in Atlantis.
“I’ll let you know once I have the lists together, but if anything comes up before then let me know.” She moved towards the door and gave Lissa a small wave before leaving the office. Classes were out for the summer, so she might as well have a good excuse for some research, right?
Lissa smiled and nodded. “Likewise,” she said before adding. “And Rebecca, thank you.” She held up the drink before turning back to look at her own thoughts.