Experimentation Required (Exposition chapter)

While I'd like to say I enjoyed a passionate night with Rangiku following our date, Mitsuru was adamant that we needed to stock up on troops before the first Invasion Outbreak. So instead of going home with my wife, I'm instead going to go chat up another woman... to save the world. I'm so bewildered by my situation I can't even stop to properly appreciate how stupidly lucky it is. So as we made our way back to the lab (in Mitsuru's self-driving car), the three of us discussed our next recruit.

Mitsuru began, "Jason, I've compiled a list of attractive female scientists of the fictional world. With their assistance, I, myself, should be able to contribute in no small part via robotics and cyberwarfare."

Rangiku interjected, "But why don't we just cut out the middleman? Just summon some bizarrely powerful goddess. There's bound to be loads of them in this Earth's fiction. No need to lift our fingers at all." It wasn't a bad idea. If I summoned someone stupid powerful like Arcueid from Tsukihime or someone capable of blowing up the universe, we could put our feet up while she handled it for no other reason than pleasing me.

The car parked, and as we got out, Mitsuru rebutted, "I had considered that, but we aren't prepared for that for three possible reasons." She walked into the ground floor of the lab and erased the contents of a chalkboard, before drawing a diagram as she spoke, "We now have two samples of objects retrieved from parallel worlds. First was the bar of Latinum. When I pulled it from Quark's bar, there was a draw on the city's power grid that I had expected but was unable to properly plan for."

I was confused, "What do you mean, Mitsuru?"

She sighed, but it seemed less like an insult to my intelligence and more like she was hitting herself for an inability to properly explain it. "You are familiar with the law of Conservation of Energy? Neither Energy nor mass can be created nor destroyed. Something must always come from something else, aggregate from something else, or disperse to something else, including its ability to be transferred into mass and vice versa via the famous equation E=mc^2" I nodded. I knew that much. "It seems that the rift isn't a portal as you've come to expect from something like Valve's 'Portal', it's not a literal hole between 'here', and 'wherever we want to connect to'. The Rift is something like a police checkpoint between the instantaneous travel between two places." I nodded again.

"Well that makes sense to me, but how does that restrict Jason's capture targets?" asked Rangiku, referring to herself and my future harem as Eroge heroines. I felt the same way. I understand the law of Conservation, but...

Mitsuru continued, her face hardening, "The issue came when I pulled you through, Lieutenant. The Energy Draw was much, much higher than the Latinum. Many of my power cells are fried, and I believe that replacing them won't solve the problem."

"Oh," I interjected, thinking I understood, "Are you saying we don't have enough energy to 'replace' the exchanged... heroine when she comes through?"

Mitsuru clapped, also seemingly at herself instead of me, "It's the strongest possibility. When I pulled the Latinum through the rift, the energy draw was fairly light. When I pulled Rangiku through, however, the energy draw nearly bankrupted the lab's power. I have a few theories for why." Mitsuru took in breath and began making bullet points on the chalkboard

• "Theory one: Mass. A bar of Latinum is small, approximately the size of a graphing calculator. It's possible that since the Lieutenant is... bigger than the Latinum," Mitsuru growled bitterly, poking Rangiku's left breast, "that the increased mass was responsible for the energy draw. Again, refer to E=mc^2, where in this case her higher 'm' would require more energy to make the conversion. In honesty, this theory is less likely, as we already have one constant."

"The Probe," I interjected, to which she nodded and Rangiku realized with an "ooh""Yes, the probe. Since the mass of the probe has been constant between both trips to other universes, there should have been some correlation between the energy output that I could've found. There was none. That leads me to two other theories, one of which is (quite difficultly) solvable, the other is not," she continued.

• "Theory two: Energy. In addition to the mass required for trips both ways, the heroine's 'energy' must be considered in the exchange."

She pointed to Rangiku, "Lieutenant. You are among the most powerful soul reapers to exist, one of the 13 lieutenants to 13 squad captains in the Soul Society." Rangiku puffed up at the praise as befit her nature.

"You think we need to consider the 'power level' of the heroine before we summon her." I said, finally understanding.

Mitsuru smirked, and began walking to the elevator, which was a tight fit for the three of us, "Correct, Jason. It's likely that when we exchange with another universe, it's exchanging the energy output that heroine is capable of with our electrical energy."

And thus it all comes together, "So if I were to summon Android 21, who is capable of at least destroying a solar system, we would need a solar system's level of energy or mass to send to... DBZ land." It made sense, but I'll be damned if it didn't complicate things. Now in order to fight off these invaders we needed to think about the logistics of this kind of power draw.

Rangiku piped in, her tits pressed against me in the compact elevator, "But that also works in our favor, lovey." Mitsuru and I raised an eyebrow, "The issue of technology came up in the manga. You eventually copied other universes designs and improved them to create mishmashed machinery." She was right. If I was able to summon Tony Stark for instance (not that I would; he's not exactly my type), Mitsuru could take his design for an ark reactor and build it here. Using another universe's information and technology to improve our own technology to summon stronger heroines.

The elevator landed on the rift floor, we began the walk to the chamber and Mitsuru chimed in, "My thoughts exactly, hence why I suggested summoning scientists before."

I had a thought as well, "Do the invaders have the same issue, Mitsuru? What would they 'take' from us in order to arrive here?"

She stumbled at that, "I... I don't know. I can't imagine that there is a way to enter this universe without sending a probe through and using it as an anchor to siphon as much 'payment' as is necessary to make the conversion. There are too many unknowns and not enough time or chances to test them all."

I was stumped for a moment, until I saw Rangiku's lingerie bag, giving me an idea. I stopped, causing Rangiku and Mitsuru to look back at me. God, I'm a fucking genius. Not enough time or chances? "Yes, but... what if you did? What if someone gave you as many chances or as much time as you needed? And what if...