Snuggles. "Hey, several thousand people think I'm a deity, I can't disappoint them by falling apart on account of unexpected offspring. Or, as Juliet was putting it when comparing my kid to her sister, 'spontaneous teenage relative'."

"Maybe I should write you a hymn," he jokes.

"Oh dear. It would have to be better than the samples Jane found for me from this one little church's online recording repository."

"I am pretty good."

"I have not actually heard the one you wrote for Pat."

"You should, it's awesome."

"You wanna sing it for me?"

"That is a pretty anthem. Maybe I will look you up for your songwriting services when I have anything to anthem. Unless there's one of you in Alethia, I guess." Pause. "I should, you know, actually check. For other templates too, I should do a full sweep, it's been a while and Kas wasn't really keeping an eye out."

"I think there's enough of me already," says Ripper. "...Although maybe I'd think differently if we found one who was my age."

Amariah laughs. "I can have Jane check right now," she suggests.

"Sure, why not."

[Hey Jane, you want to see if you can find a Rupert in Alethia?]

[Really?] says Ripper. [A young one or an old one? Or can't you tell?]

Well, Alethia does contain a punk rock band called Wretched, with a singer called Ripper. The cover of the first album is remarkably similar, even.

[Yep, here he is, here's his copy of Wretched, he is still going by 'Ripper' in band-related material, found his birth records and his driver's license though and it's a match. Twenty-one, pied kingfisher - would he not want me sharing her legal name either?]

Ripper winces. [Look, I know you can see anything anyone has ever put on a computer, but that doesn't mean you should. We ditch our names for a reason.]

[It's not that I can, it's that I do, I am those computers. It's significant attention that's optional - or being on them at all, like Syntropy. Don't send me to look at things you don't want me to pay attention to,] huffs Jane. [Okay, secret pied kingfisher legal name. He doesn't have it in his website bio as anything.]

[Yeah, I didn't know how you'd be checking. Won't be making that mistake again.]

[The checking for the existence of the template at all is just sending whitespace by text brainphone,] Jane says. [That part's very unintrusive.]

[Great. Thanks.]

[No problem. Should I say hi to him?]

"What do you think?"