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Hi!!! I really liked your prompt about Delta roleswapping with Phi!!
I was feeling like being meticulous and made up a backstory leading up to such a timeline (under the cut). It's super long and confusing but I had a lot of fun thinking about it! And I'll take any opportunity to draw these two.
Happy holidays!
I really liked the idea of Delta playing the Decision Game and Phi being the leader of FTS! I struggled a lot because I wasn't sure what to make Phi's motivation for it, and how Delta got there in the first place without making a simple swap AU. I honestly don't think Phi would react the same way to Left's death if she were in his position, and her power would lead her in different directions. In order to make Phi leader of FTS, I think she would be recreating the events of ZTD. This is somewhat ignoring real world history, assuming this takes place somewhere in Europe during the World Wars... For the sake of focusing on time travel, let's say they survive through major world events.
I wanted to start with the Phi and Delta at the canon good end of ZTD, where they survive the coin flip. Carlos doesn't shoot Delta. Delta decides to create a ripple backwards. What if he could save Left? Could he create a world where Left doesn't die young and his younger self would still have a family? In this scenario, Delta transports himself to the year Left dies and saves his life. ZTD Delta would remain in 2028, presumably helping or working against Crashkeys. Cloned ZTD Delta, having achieved his goal in ~1920, would have no reason to stay there and would kill himself.
However, this would create a timeline where Left doesn't meet his fate and both Delta and Phi grow up in 1904 unscathed. Phi would be raised by scientists, have her baby self cloned and transported to 2008, and she would eventually raise baby clone Phi up to the events of 2028, where she is cryogenically frozen and SHIFTs to the unfrozen Phi in 2074. In this timeline, there would be no Ambidex Game because there is no FTS. Therefore, Phi and Delta are never born, and they should not exist. They exist as copies sent from a different timeline to their current timeline, and she's afraid of the consequences of this anomaly. 1904 Phi begins to understand her situation after receiving visions through the Morphogenetic field. She'd find out that her twin is alive and well and contacts him. Together they'd hone their powers through experimentation to learn information about their origin.
With trial and error, Phi would inadvertently create many doomed timelines where she SHIFTs and never returns. To prevent injury or mishap, Phi would be restrained in this process. In this situation, the new Phi that gets forced into this body would have to carry out her 1904 life, or could resist and SHIFT to a different timeline entirely. In order to learn about the events of VLR and ZTD, 1904 Phi would eventually have to SHIFT and swap with a Phi from the successful ZTD timeline and keep her captive. I'm not sure what 1904 Phi would do in ZTD Phi's 2028, but she'd have the opportunity to meet Crashkeys and her own parents. And if she meets ZTD Delta, he'd read her mind and understand what had happened in their timeline. He could provide important information and research to help her with their goal. If this Phi manages to SHIFT back to her own 1904 body, she'd have new information to share with Delta, and Delta would have his own information that he obtained by reading ZTD Phi's mind. If 1904 Phi never returns to her body, there is the possibility that ZTD Phi agrees to help this kinder and foreign Delta. If this happens, the remaining Phi would have experienced everything from the canon timeline and have knowledge about future technologies that could bring them up to speed, but she'd have more bias towards the idea of creating a cult.
Eventually Left would pass, maybe from sickness or injury in his later adulthood. Together they would recreate the Myrmidons with Left's DNA, without his knowledge if he's still alive while they're studying cloning, and eventually FTS. The indoctrination, the bombs, etc. are necessary but morally dark gray to create. This Phi is colder, more calculated, and is willing to comply. This is one outcome-- Delta and Phi work together as Zero II with Delta playing the old man in the wheelchair, and Phi working from the shadows. 2008 Phi would have an Ambidex Game and a Decision Game to play, though it may differ from the original timeline due to Phi's influence. They'd reveal themselves in the end as a duo, and things would go mostly as planned.
Alternatively, if we want young Delta to play in the Decision Game, things would have to go differently. Delta was raised by Left's family and Phi was raised by scientists. If ZTD Delta had not saved Left from his early death, Delta would have created FTS. The creation of FTS is necessary to create Radical-6, the Ambidex Game, and eventually the Decision Game where they were born. Phi was put in the transporter and her clone is sent to 2028, but what if Delta was sent instead?
Phi would come to the conclusion that FTS would not be created without Left dying, especially if ZTD Phi stays in 1904 Phi's body. 1904 Phi would know about FTS through ZTD Delta when she SHIFTs to 2028 and SHIFTs back. After consulting 1904 Delta, he refuses to even contemplate killing Left, as this Delta is closely attached to his brother. A variable has to change, so this would be a last ditch replacement "coin flip" in place of Left's mortality. The two agree to transport this Phi to 1903, a year before their baby clones arrive in 1904. This adult clone of Phi would either infiltrate the lab or join as a colleague in order to transport baby Delta's clone to 2008. After this, she would raise the baby 1904 Delta (with or without the other scientists in the lab), and allow baby Phi to be adopted by Left's family. Phi and Left would bond, and her power wouldn't be immediately evident. If Left dies as expected, Phi would mourn, but she wouldn't go through what Delta did. She'd have no reason to create a cult. (Maybe she feels Delta's rage through another timeline and creates FTS herself while communicating with him through the Morphogenetic field? That's not what I had planned, but it is a possibility if we want solo 1904 Phi to facilitate the Decision Game.)
This is where Delta comes in-- he would take Phi's role in their "original" timeline (where Left lives). Through her grief, she'd access the Morphogenetic field and find out about her living twin brother. They'd be reunited again, and Delta would be a scientist working with the lab they came from. If cloned adult Phi is present, she may decide to help the twins. Delta would read her mind and be filled in about the future. If this Phi is cloned from the original 1904 Phi, she would have returned from 2028 and have worked with ZTD Delta. If this Phi is a clone of ZTD Phi that agreed to help 1904 Delta, she would naturally have that information in her memories. If cloned adult Phi is not present (dead or not involved), they would have to discover this information via a SHIFTed ZTD Phi, like in the other timeline.
In our scenario, 1904 Phi and Delta live to 2008 after co-creating FTS. 1904 Delta adopts baby Delta for 20 years after he arrives in 2008. For this to work, Delta would be unable to read his adoptive father's mind or Mind Hack him, which would be curious to young Delta but not explained to him until the end. He would be kidnapped in 2028, be forced to SHIFT to 2074 (maybe with the help of other espers while he's asleep? still unclear) to play the Ambidex Game, and SHIFT back to 2028 to play the Decision Game. In this Decision Game, Zero II will be played by 1904 Phi. She'll be the old woman in the wheelchair, but because she's in Q team, young Delta will not be able to read her mind. This Decision Game would have to play out differently because of Delta's power, which is an unintended consequence. He'd be able to SHIFT to pre-coin flip with the help of the other Espers, similarly to Eric and Mira. Delta and Phi both appear before the group, and young Delta reads Phi's mind and is overloaded by the complexity of their journey.
I have some qualms with this new route, as fun as it is to imagine young Delta playing the game alongside his parents. In this ending, Delta and Phi HAVE to be the babies who are born. I guess this is a problem with ZTD, too. What if different eggs are fertilized? There would be a slim chance, so maybe one branch of timelines works out. But what if there's too many differences in their game due to Delta playing instead of Phi or Phi and Delta sharing the Zero II role? What if a DIFFERENT set of twins are born, or not twins at all? Who would Delta meet in the end? Would there be different espers in his place that would be Delta and Phi's siblings? The series is vague about why in some timelines a person who should not exist in a timeline seems to exist, or I'm misunderstanding it. I guess it's the Schrodinger's Box analogy-- you don't know unless the box is opened. Akane seems to faint and disappear in the bad ends of 999, but she existed briefly in the timeline regardless of if she's dead or alive and affects reality directly. I'm going to say Delta and Phi are experiencing the same thing before they secure their birth under these circumstances.
In the end, my AU version of Delta would get to save Left in some timelines AND have a relationship with his sister! Yippee! Sorry if this is ridiculously convoluted or doesn't completely track, I'm not much of a writer. But I hope you enjoy the drawing and the concept!
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