Provoking Alternate Time Lines (W|W cast version)

Meanwhile (what happened between novellas)

Content Sensitivities
1) Suicidal ideation: If you are sensitive to the topic of suicidal thoughts, you should know that it is briefly mentioned in the earlier portion of the novella. If you prefer, you can skip to "the new adventure nears part 1" part or just skip the scene where the narrator goes into Rose's thoughts under the sub-section "inside Rose's head" (of which there's only one in the whole novella). It shall be indicated with *.

A city on fire formed a border between the rest of the continent and a dark blue-green ocean. The fire had intentionally been created several days prior and was maintained by dragons to prevent the continent's attackers from gaining access to the land from that side. The inhabitants of the city had been evacuated and given temporary homes before the dragons had set the region on fire. Forty kilometers inland, a dark mountain over seven thousand meters high with nine plateaus on its upper half displayed a purple-cream marble mansion on one of its highest level surfaces. Outside the mansion's main entrance were two guards: one was part horse and part human and the other was a six-foot tall bat.

Through the building's silver-plated main doorway and the smooth floor and walls of its main hallway, there was a room where two dozen people in beige robes gathered. Half of them stared at the purple floor with their hoods hanging over their heads expecting their leader to give them bad news. Their leader, who had short orange hair and high cheek bones, looked out a circular window staring at the fire, then turned to face the others. With a glimmer of hope in their eyes, they told them that it was time to execute their latest plan.

As the blue sun set darkening Rose's dark blue painted bedroom, Gwen and Rose kissed on the bed. They rolled over one another undecided on which position to keep. They had already moved so much that the bed's blanket and sheet were on the floor along with their shirts. Rose's bra was somewhere on the floor while Gwen kept hers on as usual. Eventually, the both of them stopped moving and kept their position for two minutes. Rose put one of her hands at the top of Gwen's pants and Gwen pulled her lips away from Rose's.
Rose asked, "Are you stopping just to stop or because it's still a no?"
Gwen didn't answer.
"So no?" replied Rose taking her hand off Gwen's pants.
"It's over." Gwen got off the bed.
"Okay. Do you want to do something else here or do you want to get milkshakes?"
"No, this is over. US." Gwen put her shirt back on as she left the room.
"What? Why?" Rose threw herself off the bed to follow Gwen.
Gwen shrugged as a response.
"Was it 'cause I stopped or 'cause I tried again? You told me to check with you in the moment. If you're no longer okay with that, I can't guess that. You're the mind reader, not me. I can stop. You just have to tell me."
Again, Gwen responded with a shoulder shrug.
Gwen reached the front door of the apartment when Rose added, "Just tell me what the problem is. I can probably change it."
Gwen opened the door and walked out. Rose tried to follow her but Gwen made Rose lose consciousness using her ability. Gwen closed the thin creaking door and went home.

That evening, Alex and Sam played the video game Super Smash Bros. at their apartment. They had agreed that neither of them could play as Kirby nor Yoshi that day to not become distracted by small arguments during their on-line competition. The two of them had created various powerful attack combinations using those two characters as a team but during the past few days, they had lost matches because they couldn't agree on which attacks to use against their more skilled opponents. Therefore that day, Alex played as Pikachu and Sam chose Samus. The two were in the middle of a match against four other players when Rose opened the main door and passed the three-quarter filled closet on her way to the living room. Alex was on the grey couch, whose mint green pillow had a chip dip stain, and Sam stood less than a meter from the forty-five-inch screen displaying the game.
Sam joked, "I'm surprised you didn't knock. I take it you weren't traumatized by what you saw after all." She referred to nearly two weeks ago when Rose had entered the apartment without warning and witnessed Alex and Sam having sex on the floor.
Rose replied in a low voice barely able to recall the memory. "What?... Yeah." She lay down on the rectangular light grey rug near the couch. "When is your round over?"
"In a minute or two. Why?" answered Alex.
"I'll wait."
"You can tell me now. We don't need much focus against these players."
"Ya and why do you look like someone died?" added Sam.
"She dumped me."
"What?" replied Alex and Sam at the same time.
Rose responded while sitting up, "I'm not repeating it."
"Why did she dump you?" asked Sam. "She didn't tell me anything. We spoke about you two days ago."
"Did she tell you why?" asked Alex.
"No. She shrugged, as usual, and left. Well, she knocked me out, then left."
"She hit you that hard?" asked Sam surprised.
"No, with her mind."
"Like the Gwen from the other world?" asked Alex.
Rose nodded her head to confirm Alex's presumption.
Sam replied with a small smile, "She's been wanting to do that since our return from there. Good for her."
"Did she leave and that's it or she actually broke up with you?" asked Alex knowing that Rose had a tendency of making assumptions.
"She said 'it's over' and specified it was us that was over."
Alex replied, "That sucks. Do you want to join the game, bud?"
"No. Coming here was supposed to make things better somehow but everything feels worse. It was a long walk for nothing."
"I don't even live that far from you. Why did you walk though? What's wrong with your car?"
"Nothing. Nothing new. When I got in the car, I forgot how to drive so I walked over."
Alex stated, "This can be a good thing. The getting dumped part. Now you can go after someone who you won't spend half your time arguing with and who'll be at your level for the physical stuff."
Rose responded, "No."
Alex continued, "Give it a few days. You'll feel better, then we'll go out. I'll help you meet people."
Sam added, "I'll help too. You'll have two of the best wing-women. We can get you anyone. Depending on why Gwen dumped you. I never saw the two of you that well together. I'm assuming she finally saw it too."
Rose replied, "The only place I'm going is my stupid apartment. This was a bad idea."
Sam responded as if she were offering Rose something special. "You shouldn't be alone right now. Play with us. You can be Yoshi."
In a similar tone, Alex added, "Yeah, be our Yoshi."
Rose looked at them unsure about the underlying meaning but didn't care enough to ask about it and stood up to leave. Alex and Sam tried to convince her to stay but Rose left the apartment.

After celebrating winning the video game tournament with Alex, Sam went to Milli's. She greeted Milli and her twin siblings Lilla and Lilly, who were all in the kitchen baking peanut butter brownies, then went to Gwen's room assuming that she would find her sister there. In the first bedroom from the ramp on the second floor, Gwen sat alone on her bed reading a book on a computer tablet.
At the doorway, Sam said, "Hey."
Gwen replied, "Hey."
"Can we talk?"
"About what?" Gwen set her tablet on her night table.
Sam stepped into the room and closed the door to make Gwen feel more comfortable about sharing emotions and to avoid having the conversation telepathically.
Sam joined her sister on the bed. "I heard you broke up with Rose. What happened?"
"We broke up."
"I got that part. Why? You told me everything was fine. What changed?"
"Nothing."
"You decided out of nowhere for no reason to dump her?"
Gwen answered with a shoulder shrug.
"You can tell me. What happened?"
"Why? Do you think I should take it back?"
"I just want to know what happened. Mostly, I want to know if Rose did anything bad. If not being with her is what you want, you made the right choice. Is it what you want?"
Gwen answered with another shoulder shrug and added, "She didn't do anything bad."
"I take it I won't get more out of you than Rose. Ok. Movie and ice cream?"
Gwen nodded her head to accept the offer. Sam went to the kitchen and grabbed a container of caramel chocolate chip ice cream, which she topped with some of the raw brownie mix, while Gwen chose a movie from the collection on her desk computer.

Veronica woke up relaxed in an extra large bed, which could comfortably fit four people averaging a weight of under two hundred and twenty-two pounds. She took in a deep breath as she swept some of her blond hair from her face and appreciated waking up naturally rather than due to a vision. It wasn't common for her to receive many visions within a small period of time but the past month had been an exception. She looked to her right, then to her left. It had been her night to sleep in the middle so she had a spouse asleep at each side. She lifted her body over the one on her right to get out of bed. As usual, she checked her satellite device for urgent messages first. Veronica hoped to continue enjoying her morning by getting ready slowly and taking her time to choose an outfit but found a message from Holly asking for help as soon as possible.

Holly was Veronica's apprentice in a sense. They were twelve years old and had received their first vision at the age of ten. To help Holly transfer their messages, Veronica had been asked to teach them how to understand their visions, how to find people and how to convince others that their visions were real. Veronica knew that a few small or even large lessons would only help Holly a small amount and that it was hard to fight societal pressures in order to pursue their calling so she had given herself the responsibility of becoming their mentor. She assisted Holly in a variety of ways even at times by simply being present to give Holly's vision a little more credibility.