And so it was that Kahli stood there, frozen in the infinite void, listening the the jellyfish mind-speak to her about the reseults of the second scenario.

That was quite an amusing scenario that played out, was it not, Kahli? thought-spoke the jellyfish. I'm sure you would absolutely love to know what was going to happen next. I guess the question is, do you want to know what happens next badly enough to pick that scenario over your tried and true third scenario?

Kahli felt a bit of pause with this. After all, what the jellyfish had thought-said was generally true - however, there had been cases wherein she hadn't chosen the third scenario. Then again, that had of course resulted in losing her hand... Regardless, Kahli needed to decide what she was going to do, and engaging with the jellyfish's odd whims was not the way forward. The only way for her to really know, was for her to see that third scenario. The jellyfish started thought-speaking about time again, and about its immateriality, and how immateriality itself could have its own kind of differing infinities. Kahli was happy to ignore this completely and look down at the timelines under her big left foot. It was time to focus on the third and final scenario.

[Scenario three]

The agent glared at Kahli. "You expect me to believe that Agent 42's head just popped off because of a skin condition?"

"Well, a skin condition due to a venereal disease, if we're being honest," said Kahli. "But I didn't want to bring it up, because he explained it to us and how it was rather embarrassing. Somehow it, um, it magnetizes the skin in his neck away from the skin of his head so much that it appears to completely sever his head. However, he's completely okay. He told me that he's even used it before to his advantage in fights, people will think that he's dead but really what has happened is that, of course, his disease has flared up. This has generally kept him from seeing a healer about it, although I told him myself he really ought to look into getting the thing taken care of. I mean, it's no way to live, having your head virtually pop off all the time and looking like you've been the victim of a terrible pod crash or something because you couldn't be bothered to, erm, well, to either be chaste or to at least be unchaste in a safe manner."

"I'll say," replied the agent. "Why, I think I've even heard of that disease, though of course I've never been promiscuous enough to worry about contracting it myself. Who knew Agent 42 was sleeping around? I always thought that he was so faithful to his partner. That's... Gods, that's shameful. Twenty years of marriage, too."

Kahli couldn't help but smile and chuckle a little to herself, which ended up making her feel a little bad and kind of like a jerk. After all, she'd essentially tricked this agent into thinking that Agent 42 was an adulterer, apparently, and Agent 42 was of course too dead to do anything about it.

"Hey, I fixed your robot, lady," said the mechanic agent with a grin. He walked Unit 5a23 over. "He's better than new."

"Better than new? What does that mean?" asked Kahli.

"Well, he's not worse, first of all," said the mechanic, chuckling at his own little joke. "But really, I'll let him show you. Better to not spoil it."

Unit 5a23 lifted up both his arms to reveal his hands, which had been replaced with-

"Chainsaws?" said Kahli incredulously. "But Unit 5a23, you're a pacifist!"

"Ah, and that is the cruel joke that life has thusly played upon me, Kahli," said Unit 5a23 with a forlone tone to his otherwise cold, mechanical voice. "See, the problem is that my identitify module, as the engineer explained, is massively overheating. Apparently, some ways back, it was overclocked and it's finally started struggling to manage. So, I've got to have some part of my body to route all the excess heat energy towards. Originally the mechanic tried to hook a toaster up to me, however, it started smoking like crazy when it was hooked in to my system and soon ended up toasting itself. Since the toasted toaster was toast, the mechanic did the only thing he could think of with the materials he had and welded these chainsaws to where my mechnical hands used to be. Now, I know what you're thinking, but these chainsaws will not be used for combat in any way, shape or form, regardless of how they might look to you. No, as soon as I booted back up and saw these things, I knew exactly what I'd do with them. Gerry, do you want to bring me a log please?"

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"Absolutely," said the mechanic, walking off into a small side room.

"Gerry? You know his name?" Kahli frowned.

"Of course I know his name," replied Unit 5a23. "I make it a point to always talk to my doctors."

Gerry wheeled out a large, wooden log on a gurney. "Here you go, Unit 5a23. A fresh log for you."

"Great to have a big, long log like this." Unit 5a23 sounded like his usual, atonal self at this point. Clearly, this was cheering him up, for whatever reason. "Would you please stand the log up for me?"

Gerry smiled and tipped the log into the air, so it was standing there in the center of the waiting room for the tech bay beautifully.

"And now it begins," said Unit 5a23. On whirred the chainsaws, and in a brilliant flurry, Unit 5a23 twisted his torso around 360 degrees as his arms flailed with wild abandon. On and on this display went, sending wood shaving sflying through the air moment after moment. Finally, Unit 5a23 stopped his carving and deactivated his chainsaws, but even then there was a cloud of dust obscuring his creation from view. Slowly but surely the dust settled to the ground and all was revealed.

"You made a statue of yourself?" said Kahli with an incredulous frown as she looked at the near perfect effigy of Unit 5a23. The only different seemed to be that he seemed to have emphasized his robot musculature in the sculpture, making it look more defingted than it did in real life. That being said impressively enough the sculpture did include his chainsaw-hands, which was humorous to behold as he'd sculpted himself in a meditating position with crossed legs. "That's... Nice?"

"It's more than nice. You ought to see how much these sell for on the amateur art market," said the mechanic. "Now, I know what you're thinking here, Kahli, and the answer is yes - he does have to make these sculptures often in order to keep his identity module from overheating. However, I've worked hard to set up a tote bag of holding for you that will always include a fresh log for you, thanks to some nifty [skills] and [enchantments]. If you get him carving, say, five a day, he should be fine for the forseeable future. That being said, I'll want you to bring him back in two weeks to check in." The mechanic held up the tote bag of holding proudly. To Kahli's horror, it was not at all cute.

Kahli balked. Five log sculptures a day was just too much. Kahli wasn't planning on becoming an art dealer, either. She'd always said that she didn't have a mercantile bone in her body. She was bad with money, and didn't care to get much better with it, either. And the tote bag of holding that she'd have to lug around - because let's be real, there was no way Unit 5a23 would - was really just not cute. Kahli would've really preferred that, if she had to carry yet another thing, that it would be at least as cute as the handbag she carried Froufrou around in. Of course, Kahli figured she could always get a less cute handbag to balance things out, but she hated the idea of giving Froufrou a downgrade. It didn't seem at all fair.

Still, what choice did she have? She accepted the ugly handbag, the handbag that clashed with her general stylistic vibe, and slung it over her shoulder. Then, Kahli looked to Unit 5a23. "So, are you happy, Unit 5a23?"

"About as happy as a cold, uncaring piece of machinery could ever be," said Unit 5a23. "That is to say, I'm quite pleased."

[End scenario]

Kahli would've been frowning if she could move her face at all in the void. That timeline had been terrible!

Well, Kahli, are you going to choose the third timeline?

I don't think so, jellyfish. That tote bag of holding was terrible. Did you see the pattern and how it-

Yes, Kahli, I saw the pattern. However, I want to remind you to be prudent. One thing we don't know for certain is, well, we don't know whether something terrible will happen if you don't pick the third scenario. Remember, last time you picked a different scenario you ended up losing an appendage. Not exactly the best move there, now was it?

Kahli thought about this. Actually, I do think that was the best move. Thanks to that decision, I got that evil alien Lloyd to run away like the scared, petulant child he was with his tail between his legs instead of establishing a doomsday timeline. I stand by my timeline choice. And I think this third timeline is terrible, I think it sucks. I'm going to timeline two, because I want to know the dirt on the anomaly.

Very well. It is your [skill] to use as you see fit. Just don't say I didn't warn you.

Kahli was so over this jellyfish's holier-than-thou attitude.

[Scenario two selected]

Kahli had already learned from the agent in this second timeline that the anomaly was generated in the land of the living, and that it was intentionally placed in a manner that would call in skeletal beasts that were powerful but easy to manipulate. It was time to learn what else the agent had to tell her about the anomaly, and she was all ears.