Milliways Again

[her_imperial_radiance]

It lurks. Oh how it lurks.

Comments

[self_composed]

Well.

Bella decides it is time to go make carrot-cake pancakes.

[prima_sequentem]

Bella is so kind!

"What else should we talk about?" wonders Libby. "I want to get to know you."

[her_imperial_radiance]

"Dunno. What's your world like? It's got a Her Majesty in it so it can't be too wildly different, but obviously not exactly the same."

[prima_sequentem]

"Well, for starters, it's 2005," she says. "And there are no vampires or werewolves; I'd know if there were. There's mints, who make wishcoins, and ingots, who are roughly equivalent to your witches."

[her_imperial_radiance]

"Funny names," Orfeo remarks. "And 2005, wow. I wasn't born then. This might be legally complicated if I can't just bring my actual documentation and claim that they must have lost everything on their end, even without hidden laws making everything easier for supernaturals."

[prima_sequentem]

"Oh, leave that to me," she says with a dismissive wave of her hand. "Documentation is easy. When's your birthday? How old are you?"

[her_imperial_radiance]

"January 3, 2010. I'm twenty," he says easily. "I'm going to pass for 25 until and unless I quit, though."

[prima_sequentem]

"So with a little math: January 3, 1985. And I don't plan on aging much past thirty, but by the time that starts getting really obvious, people are going to be used to immortal Martians. In the meantime, we can fake you some reasonably accurate documents."

[her_imperial_radiance]

"Martians?" he laughs.

[prima_sequentem]

"My world's Bella founded her empire on Mars," Libby says serenely. "It's very pretty there. I'll show you sometime."

[her_imperial_radiance]

"O-okay," he laughs. "Wow. And Martians are immortal?"

[prima_sequentem]

"There weren't pre-existing Martians, but she plans on eliminating death eventually and she's starting with her subjects. Who are all emigrating from Earth. Including us, eventually, but I have too many responsibilities to abandon my planet just yet, no matter how enticing the alternative."

[her_imperial_radiance]

"Oh. Okay then. Wow. Her Majesty's working on death too but her plan doesn't involve Mars anytime soon." He grins a goofy grin. "Heh, I'm gonna live on Mars in the past."

[prima_sequentem]

"By the time we live on Mars, it might not be the past anymore," she says merrily.

[her_imperial_radiance]

"Oh. Okay. I'm still gonna live in the past."

[prima_sequentem]

"Barring catastrophe, yes," she says. "This alternate universes thing does have its upsides."

[her_imperial_radiance]

"Have you been to lots of them?" he asks. "I've been all around the world but I've never seen the inside of Milliways. Everything I know about it is secondhand from Jake."

[prima_sequentem]

"I haven't gone visiting like this before, but I've had some bizarre encounters there. The most bizarre was definitely the time I met Elspeth, though."

[her_imperial_radiance]

"Just because her mom is a duplicate of your Empress of Mars?"

[prima_sequentem]

"Empress of the Stars," she corrects absently. "Mars is just the first stop. No, in fact, there was some coincidental timing too. Milliways likes its coincidental timing. See, when the door caught me, I was in the middle of having coffee with my Bella for the first time, and she wasn't empress of anything yet, but I was trying to find out what she wanted and I'd joked about giving her the planet for Christmas. And then I met Elspeth, whose mother actually does rule the world, and I chatted with her for a while until I felt like I had enough of a handle on the inner workings of Bellas in general to be confident that mine really did want the planet for Christmas and would be likely to take extremely good care of it."

She grins reminiscently.

"At which point I told Elspeth that she had been unknowingly interviewing for world dictator on my Bella's behalf, and had passed. Oh, and then we found out Elspeth's dad's mom was probably an alternate of me. Which is why you may occasionally hear Elspeth call me Grandma."

[her_imperial_radiance]

"You don't look like Esme," says Orfeo quizzically.

[prima_sequentem]

"Biological," she explains. "Her name—well, her maiden name—was Elizabeth Kirsch, same as me. And she looked reasonably like me and acted reasonably like me, as far as I can tell."

[her_imperial_radiance]

"Oh. Interesting. But you don't actually have a little His Majesty running around at home, do you?"

[prima_sequentem]

"No," she confirms. "No kids. I am toying with the notion of naming a hypothetical eventual son after him, but he probably wouldn't like the idea, so maybe I won't."

[her_imperial_radiance]

Orfeo laughs. "I don't think he would, no. A few supernaturals have named kids Isabella - I think there are three, now, a puppy and an adopted human and a quarter-vampire - but no one has tried naming anyone after Edward."