Provoking Alternate Time Lines (M|M cast version)

Meanwhile (What happened between novellas)

Sensitive Content
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 adventures near part 1" or just skip the scene where the narrator goes into Rodolf's thoughts under the sub-section "inside Rodolf'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 Rodolf's dark blue painted bedroom, Giovanni and Rodolf 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. Rodolf was topless while Giovanni kept his undershirt on as usual. Eventually, the both of them stopped moving and kept their position for two minutes. Rodolf put one of his hands at the top of Giovanni's pants and Giovanni pulled his lips away from Rodolf's.
Rodolf asked, "Are you stopping just to stop or because it's still a no?"
Giovanni didn't answer.
"So no?" replied Rodolf taking his hand off Giovanni's pants.
"It's over." Giovanni 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." Giovanni put his shirt back on as he left the room.
"What? Why?" Rodolf threw himself off the bed to follow Giovanni.
Giovanni 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, Giovanni responded with a shoulder shrug.
Giovanni reached the front door of the apartment when Rodolf added, "Just tell me what the problem is. I can probably change it."
Giovanni opened the door and walked out. Rodolf tried to follow him but Giovanni made Rodolf lose consciousness using his ability. Giovanni closed the thin creaking door and went home.

That evening, Andy and Sasha 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 online 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, Andy played as Pikachu and Sasha chose Samus. The two were in the middle of a match against four other players when Rodolf opened the main door and passed the three-quarter filled closet on his way to the living room. Andy was on the grey couch, whose mint green pillow had a chip dip stain, and Sasha stood less than a meter from the forty-five-inch screen displaying the game.
Sasha joked, "I'm surprised you didn't knock. I take it you weren't traumatized by what you saw after all." He referred to nearly two weeks ago when Rodolf had entered the apartment without warning and witnessed Andy and Sasha having sex on the floor.
Rodolf replied in a low voice barely able to recall the memory. "What?... Yeah." He lay down on the rectangular light grey rug near the couch. "When is your round over?"
"In a minute or two. Why?" answered Andy.
"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 Sasha.
"He dumped me."
"What?" replied Andy and Sasha at the same time.
Rodolf responded while sitting up, "I'm not repeating it."
"Why did he dump you?" asked Sasha. "He didn't tell me anything. We spoke about you two days ago."
"Did he tell you why?" asked Andy.
"No. He shrugged, as usual, and left. Well, he knocked me out, then left."
"He hit you that hard?" asked Sasha surprised.
"No, with his mind."
"Like the Giovanni from the other world?" asked Andy.
Rodolf nodded his head to confirm Andy's presumption.
Sasha replied with a small smile, "He's been wanting to do that since our return from there. Good for him."
"Did he leave and that's it or he actually broke up with you?" asked Andy knowing that Rodolf had a tendency of making assumptions.
"He said 'it's over' and specified it was us that was over."
Andy 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."
Andy 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."
Rodolf responded, "No."
Andy continued, "Give it a few days. You'll feel better, then we'll go out. I'll help you meet people."
Sasha added, "I'll help too. You'll have two of the best wing-men. We can get you anyone. Depending on why Giovanni dumped you. I never saw the two of you that well together. I'm assuming he finally saw it too."
Rodolf replied, "The only place I'm going is my stupid apartment. This was a bad idea."
Sasha responded as if he were offering Rodolf something special. "You shouldn't be alone right now. Play with us. You can be Yoshi."
In a similar tone, Andy added, "Yeah, be our Yoshi."
Rodolf looked at them unsure about the underlying meaning but didn't care enough to ask about it and stood up to leave. Andy and Sasha tried to convince him to stay but Rodolf left the apartment.

After celebrating winning the video game tournament with Andy, Sasha went to Milli's. He greeted Milli and his twin siblings Lilla and Lilly, who were all in the kitchen baking peanut butter brownies, then went to Giovanni's room assuming that he would find his brother there. In the first bedroom from the ramp on the second floor, Giovanni sat alone on his bed reading a book on a computer tablet.
At the doorway, Sasha said, "Hey."
Giovanni replied, "Hey."
"Can we talk?"
"About what?" Giovanni set his tablet on his night table.
Sasha stepped into the room and closed the door to make Giovanni feel more comfortable about sharing emotions and to avoid having the conversation telepathically.
Sasha joined his brother on the bed. "I heard you broke up with Rodolf. 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 him?"
Giovanni 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 Rodolf did anything bad. If not being with him is what you want, you made the right choice. Is it what you want?"
Giovanni answered with another shoulder shrug and added, "He didn't do anything bad."
"I take it I won't get more out of you than Rodolf. Ok. Movie and ice cream?"
Giovanni nodded his head to accept the offer.
Sasha went to the kitchen and grabbed a container of caramel chocolate chip ice cream, which he topped with some of the raw brownie mix, while Giovanni chose a movie from the collection on his 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.