Well, that's... kind of depressing, actually. Huh.

Anyway: yes! That story remains once-and-future canon, and doesn't need rewriting; it's not perfect, but I'm still pretty fond of it.

But, to mark the occasion, I will offer a sequel of sorts, set... well, now, but keeping to the spirit of Ten Years Hence. So:

Ten Years Now

"Bonjour, maman!"

"AWWWWW! Elibabef, I was going to say it!"

"Now, now, girls." Elanor held her hands out placatingly. "Don't welcome me home by fighting, mes petites."

Mary's face hovered on the edge of crumpling. "But I! Wanted! To say it!"

Elanor smiled and knelt down in front of her black-haired daughter. "Then do. Or have you forgotten the words?"

Mary's incipient tears transformed into a scowl. "I neber forget," she said firmly. "Bon drawer, mum-on."

Elanor worked hard to keep her amusement from her face. "Very good; we'll make a French girl of you yet." Straightening, she walked over to Mortic and looked down at the baby in his arms. "And how about you, Mark?" she asked. "Anything to say to me?"

The not-so-little-anymore boy beamed at the sight of her. "Mmmm!" he babbled. "Mmmm!"

"There, you see?" Mort made a face that was at once exhausted and triumphant. "I've been coaching him all day, just so he could say maman to you when you got back."

"That's very sweet," Elanor said, patting her husband's cheek. "But I don't think 'Mmmm' counts."

"You question me?" Mort pulled back, frowning. "Me, who has seen nations rise and fall, yea, and the very mountains shift beneath-?"

"Stop exaggerating, o Mortic of the Order; it makes you look like a goose." Elanor took the baby from Mort's arms and smiled down at him. "And maman has been working hard, oui, she has; she has no patience for Daddy Goose."

"Mmmm!" Mark said again, reaching one fist up to grab at Elanor's blonde hair. "Mmmm!"

"Sorry, El." Mort rose from his seat, gesturing for his wife to take it. "So how was the mission?"

"Pas mal," Elanor said vaguely, watching Mark's face. "It was good to see the team again; there's not many of us who work in French slash, so we used to be pretty close."

"Are you thinking of transferring back?" Mort leant on the arm of the chair, shooting a quick, quietening look at Elisabeth and Mary as their noise level rose. "I thought you liked the Nursery."

"I do, I do." Elanor smiled up at him. "Fear not, this was just a one-time thing. But it's always nice to see old friends."

"I suppose so," Mort mused. He reached down to tweak his wife's hair away from their son's fingers. "And, you know if you do decide to move back, I'll-"

"Mmmm!" Mark stretched out for the stolen hair, his brow furrowing in concentration. "Mmmm!"

"Mmmmaman," Elanor said, taking his hand in hers. "Come on, mon petit - say maman."

"Mmmm," Mark replied, squeezing her finger. "Mmmm-"

"I think he's still too young," Mortic began.

"-mmmum!" Mark looked startled, as if trying to squint at his own mouth, and hiccupped. "Mmum! Mmmum-um-um-um-um-um-um!"

"Mark said Mum!" Elisabeth ran over, dragging her sister by one hand. "Mummy, mummy, did you hear, he said mum!"

"Mum!" Mary repeated, beaming from ear to ear. "Go on, Mawk - say mummy!"

"Mum-um-um-um-um," Mark said solemnly. Then, abruptly, his cheeks puffed up, and he burst into tears.

"Oh, Mark..." Elanor looked up at her husband and held the squawling infant out. "Can you take him?"

"Of course, my heart." Mortic scooped the baby up and rocked him gently. "Come on, little one, it's all right..."

"It's not that all right," Elanor muttered, scowling down at the floor. "Three babies, and not one of them said it in French first? Honestly, I don't know why I even bother...!"

hS

I had suspected it for a little while. After all, we've got jetpacks, robots for doing household chores, and modern smartphones are actually more powerful than most older sci-fi imagined, but it's nice to get confirmation :)

My first thought on seeing that that we'd caught up with the date of a piece that was set in the future was 'It's like PPC history, but opposite'. I don't know why, but that amused me.

I do find it funny that we now catching up with the times that some older sci-fi is set. Not just the future, but the cyberpunk future: 2019 is the year the original Blade Runner was set, and 2020 has long been associated with cyberpunk. We're even approaching the earlier dates mentioned in the Ghost in the Shell backstory, I think that refers to events in the 2020s or 2030s.

-Irish

She was a random child who just showed up in HQ, and I'm not sure how anyone found out, but she was also the child of a pairing that was intrinsically breaking canon. She was adopted by a minor agent who then retired and eventually brought her adopted daughter back to HQ. Her partner was a "canon" from a cheap ripoff of a game, who had joined the PPC to escape said ripoff's destruction.

Think I've kinda ditched the idea now, in the process of rethinking all my agent ideas in preparation for a Permission request. Not only because I shouldn't start thinking about what TYH will look like if I don't even have Permission yet, but also from other factors.

-Twistey