Eclipse continues to be itself anyway, so there.

He was not expecting it to be moved by his discomfort. Can he find any resources on what it was like in the early 1800s?

It was genderier. Less with the collars, less polyamorous.

That's reassuring. Are there historical novels or something.

Tons. Erotic ones, even, especially if he wants to put in a demon request.

He will start with not-erotic ones since he is reading for cultural background. Unless there are any his Rebecca owned.

She did in fact own a couple of erotic books, although not many. (Mrs. Way tells him that it's really hard to get ahold of them and they might not be an accurate reflection of her taste if they were all she could find.)

He will start with those anyway.

Eclipse Rebecca possessed a) missing scene fanfiction of Pride and Prejudice and b) a collection of smutty ballad lyrics.

How does 'Pride and Prejudice But Kinky' even go.

The plot is the same! Although a number of the male characters take on a more generally threatening air and the flirtation is different in content.

This is not the most productive line of research. 

He goes home to complain.

"I don't care what you get up to as long as it doesn't bankrupt the consortium."

"You have approximately infinite money."

"You are very creative."

"I am actually not even sure that giving her presents is the right sort of thing - Eclipse is so weird - it's not even that I wouldn't enjoy throwing a girl around some but not one who felt like I had the right to do that, that just ruins it."

"Too much information, Cáno."

"Oh, come on."

"Am I supposed to go 'I relate! I too enjoy mild intimate violence!' -"

"Okay, now you're making it awkward but you did not have to do that, that statement had several parts and you could have focused on one of the other ones."

"You are an infinitely powerful alien and I think Rebeccas are very pragmatic, and also they have an 1800s Earth concept of marriage, the 'you have the right to do that' thing is pretty inevitable once you marry her. If you do not want to have the right to mistreat a Rebecca in the opinion of the Rebecca you will probably have to wait for another one from a world with higher standards."

"They might exclusively come in 'horribly low standards'."

"Possibly! I think Peka's better but maybe it's just that your alt hasn't married her yet. You could ask?"

He consults with Michael.

Michael consults his wife.

"...sorry, can you rephrase the question -"

"He doesn't mind some Eclipse things but he minds, like, the idea that they'd be okay even if they weren't what you wanted. Like, if I grab you and drag you into bed, that is okay, because you would think it was nice, and it wouldn't be okay if you found it scary or upsetting and just endured it because you loved me."

"Is that a question?"

"I'm trying to get to the question - he makes sense to me - so that's how we see it. That's not how you see it, right?"

"Yeah, that sounds really complicated. If you grabbed me and dragged me off to bed - is this conversation going to have a lot of examples like that and if it does can it end with one of them? - then that would be nice? And if it weren't nice then... it... wouldn't be?"

"But you wouldn't, like, say 'Michael, stop that, I don't like it."

"...I might say ow if you pulled my hair or something? I think you can tell when I'm having fun all by yourself."

He shakes his head. "You make so much sense when I'm talking to you and then..." Sigh. Kiss.

Kiss! "Am I confusing as soon as I leave the room?"

"You are confusing as soon as I am trying to talk to my alt about whether he should be scared of hurting you. I don't think he should? But I see why he is."

"It's not like it's literally impossible but that seems like an unreasonable standard."

"That's not exactly the standard it's that - it would be extra bad to hurt someone who felt like they just had to accept that and get used to it and not fuss about it. And since you can't bring the chance of hurting someone down to nothing it's tempting to try to change the thing that makes it extra bad."

"...why is that extra bad?"

"I don't know, it just is, it's, like, kicking a shivering puppy or something. Kicking dogs is bad but kicking shivering puppies is worse."

"Iiiiis there some reason he can't just be like, 'so was that fun', if he isn't sure if it was fun? Or, like, the Eclipse version, whatever that is, like, 'I command you to tell me how fun that was or else'."

"He can read minds, if she's okay with that. The thing is that it's less fun if she doesn't feel like she has a choice even if she's okay with what's happening?"

"...that doesn't make any sense but if mindreading helps I bet she's into it."

He reports this.

"How does that not make sense, I think that makes perfect sense."

"It's - too many levels. It's great to care if she's happy. It's not helpful to care whether she believes herself to be entitled to be happy, that's confusing and it's not clear what you want her to do and now she's not happy, get it?"

"No!"

Shrug. Giggle.

He goes back to Eclipse and reads more Eclipse things.

Eclipse has many things. In the modern day they have catlogued a truly staggering variety of subtleties of dynamic and kink. In the 1800s there was less of that, although still plenty of range between "kneeling, occasional spanking, husbandly permission required for major decisions" and "wife not allowed to speak to strangers or eat anything not handfed to her and sleeps in a locked box and is well acquainted with various medieval torture devices".

He hopes Rebecca is not into medieval torture devices.

She is currently dead and cannot reassure him on this point.

He visits Space.

He is making up for all that time he spent pining for his Peka without having met her.

And this is AWESOME.

One second of watching Peka smile would make it worth it except for how it was totally worth it in its own right.

She will smile for a lot more than one second! She smiles a lot. She looooves him.

He loves her! He is so so happy! He explains adjacency and why the house keys worked the way they did - "had to get you through Revelation and then Hell and then to here - the castle's in the other direction, in Telperion -"

"Ooh, I get it. Are people going to be mad that I stood in their valleys?"

"Arranged 'em different valleys because we suspect they'll get over the pollution thing faster if they're sure everyone's accommodating it. This generation might never, but their kids hopefully won't catch it so bad, with nothing around to be freaked out by."

"Maybe."

Snuggle. "I don't mind accommodating them so long as it's like 'so all the reds can go wherever they want and do whatever they like, given that what are you going to want in order to feel comfortable?'"

"One of the theologians asked everybody if they felt better after she magicked them."

Snort. "I wonder if the ones who don't think you're people think you suddenly acquired peoplehood." 

"Maybe they think we have been ejected from the species and, as animals, cannot be inherently polluted."

Kiss. "One of my alts wants to talk to you."

"Like, 'hi, welcome to the bizarre multidimensional family' or like 'threesome?' or what?"

"There is a world where everybody is kinky and he has decided he wants that world's Rebecca but is worried about the 'acculturated into reaaally low expectations' thing. I said I don't think you have reaaaally low expectations but I don't know if his Rebecca's low expectations can be fixed with enough magic presents."

"...there's a world where everyone is kinky?" she blinks.

"Big multiverse!!! They built all their social institutions around it. Everyone else thinks they're weird but, y'know, you do you."

"Anyway I'll talk to him, sure."

He stops by. "Hi! Oh, that is a pretty hair color."

"Thanks!"

"So there are a bunch of you who died on 1800s Earth and we are trying to fetch them all back."

"That's really sweet. Why do you want the kinky one, unless I misunderstood that's not your thing? What kind of kinky, anyway?"

"We don't know, that's kind of the problem - there's plenty that would be my thing but some that'd be more of a stretch and resurrecting her for an interview about whether we have a boyfriend for her seems like the wrong way to go."

"Kinda clinical yeah."

"And she's too Catholic to just go around having fun until a sufficiently kinky me turns up somewhere in the multiverse. ...'too Catholic' is actually a lot of the problem here, I can do either 'sincerely believes one shouldn't refuse their husband anything' or 'into some extreme stuff' but both is scary."

"What does Catholic mean?"

"It's a religion - does Amenta have those -"

"Yeah but I think not the same."

"Earth ones are often variants on 'there is a God, but he doesn't do things that would make that obvious, but if you do what he says then you'll go somewhere nice when you die'."

"That would make getting resurrected kind of weird, wouldn't it?"

"The one that we got back so far decided she'd probably forgotten being in the afterlife."

Snort.

"Anyway, it is very mean to resurrect a Rebecca without planning to marry her that very week, because Catholicism prohbits extramarital sex, and we'd like to get them all back now so the Catherines can grow up together - apparently Catherines get along splendidly with themselves -"

"Wow the extramarital sex thing must be rough. She didn't marry her version of orange boy, did she?"

"I think she wouldn't have had much choice about if if he'd been the same religion and wanted to but he's a different one so she was just supposed to go be celibate forever."

"That's awful."

"Yep!"

"Okay so you wanna resurrect her and get married but you're scared 'cause..."

"Because I don't know, 'married and believes you can never ever leave a marriage' and 'outrageously low expectations' seem like a bad starting point for having, like, a kinky power imbalance as opposed to just a shitty one?"

"...why?"

"I feel like it'd be harder to notice if something isn't working if you have never ever encountered the working version of the thing."

"Uh. Get her to make friends with more people from Kinkland?"

" - that would probably help, yeah."

"And you're the mindreading kinda Elf, right?"

"Rebecca didn't think she'd mind but I didn't want to count on that."

"I think it sounds sweet."

"That's helpful. Thank you."

"You're welcome!"

"How are you doing? We all watched the concert video, it was absurdly cute."

"Everything is awesome."

"Oh good."

"The kinky one will probably also think everything is awesome. I don't think being kinky would make her depressed or anything."

"And even the horrible dying doesn't seem to have made the one we fetched back depressed. She was very - well, I'm alive now, baby is alive now, that's all great then..."

"Was it very horrible?"

"It sounded absolutely horrible."

"Well dang."

"Do you think she'd rather have, like, some time alone with her Catherine, before there are dramatics..."

"Uh... did they die at the same time...?"

"No."

"Who first, is this like, two year old Katin whose mom died a year before -"

"Catherine was three months old and died first, Rebecca a few months later."

"Yeesh. Yeah give 'em a couple hours."

Nod. "Thanks." 

He heads out.

He squeezes Peka. "It was really hard not to race over there and drag you both home right away."

"That would've been good too but this was so exciting."

"And you were safe. That's important, that you're safe."

Snuggle. "I love you."

"I love you so much."

Kisses!

Reds accumulate in droves in Ambaróna and are avid consumers of social gossip regarding the "red princess".

Local administration is a bit overwhelmed but cheerful enough about getting all their new citizens armbands and bank accounts and apartments. They have heard all about the red princess. "Very, ah, dramatic of him."

"Dramatic?" asks a red.

"It's terribly romantic but I have no idea how people'd explain it to their children if they were watching - hairpetting in public - he should really have married her first -"

"Wait, what's wrong with hairpetting -"

"Is he going to marry her too, that's amazing -"

"Elves don't have a nudity taboo but we have a taboo on loose hair. I certainly hope he's going to marry her, they were hairpetting in public."

     "Of course he's going to marry her."

"But he should have done it first - the world's getting so wild and liberal these days -"

"It'd be really irresponsible to get married until you're sure you can stand each other in and out of spring -"

"Unless it's political?"

"Who marries a red for political reasons?"

"Do I have to grow out my hair so I can unloosen it -"

"People who live in the city are very used to seeing aliens by now, don't worry about your hair."

     "Yes, it is irresponsible to get married right off the bat, but you're supposed to be discreet until you're married, see."

"I don't think it's political, he's wildly in love with her, but it would be good politics, everyone being all angry about reds like they are..."

"If he were discreet we wouldn't've known this was a good place to go."

" - I guess there's that."

"That's actually kind of clever really."

"If you think he thought it out."

"And it was awfully romantic."

"Wasn't it just."

"Are people angry? Why are they angry?"

"They're angry at the Amentan governments for mistreating reds and they're angry at Vanda Nossëo for catering to the Amentan governments and waiting until they approved cleaning procedures before they offered you all the chance to emigrate."

"The clean Amentans would have been so angry if you'd taken us before that."

"I think Prince Canafinwë probably did it the right way but people who are critical of the process don't really care that the other Amentans would have been angry, they feel like if you mistreat people you lose the right to have your feelings about that kind of thing taken into account."

These reds have no strong opinions on that.

Here are their ID chips and apartments and bank accounts, all set up!

Yay!!!!

"They're trying to recruit red public safety officers, they're concerned you won't call emergency services otherwise, if that's something you're interested in I can email you the application."

One of this bunch will take an application.

They get cheerily led apartments-ward.

Reds move in. Some of them decide it is time to go on vacation for a long time. Some of them want to be emergency responders or work for Vanda Nossëo onboarding teams or do interior decorating or learn cheffery.

They are cheerfully absorbed.

He does concerts in Eclipse and looks for good candidates to be friends for his Rebecca. They will need to appreciate music and be good people and have sensible understandings of consent and so on and find it intensely romantic to eventually go be ladies-in-waiting for a princess on an Elf planet.

Well, he can sure get people to attend the concerts, although apparently it's not customary on Earth to go ask for an autograph and then add that you're in the market for a princess to be a lady-in-waiting for.

He has been living in Vanda Nossëo for thirty years and knows that and instead tells Rebecca's story online including the fact it'd be good if some people who got along well with existing Rebeccas were interested.

People think her story is so sad! Occasional concert fans send emails.

He absorbs Eclipse media and finds erotica that is hot instead of weird and uncomfortable and if the concert fans seem like the right kind of person he nags Michael to come bring the kids and Rebecca to a series of lovely Eclipse parks and playgrounds where they can entertain candidates.

"Do I have to wear a collar?"

"Uh, no. Weeeird.  - unless you want to, I guess?"

"I just dunno how customary it is. I braid my hair when I remember to when there's Elves."

"I think long hair is a signal all by itself so you're probably fine." Squeeze.

"Okay!"

They can visit strange playgrounds and meet people Macalaurë thinks might be suited for his Rebecca!

Rebecca makes friends! Some of the candidate friends are actually mostly there to learn things about other worlds and/or the 1800s but many of them are neat in their own right anyway.

He does more concerts and gets more acclimated and reads about weird medieval torture devices.

Those medievals were sure creative.

"It's not the same thing at all."

"Yeah, but there's enough similarity that I can't find it appealing."

"Could have Sybil pay attention, notify you if you get a girl who wants to be tortured in ways that hit a little too close to home."

"I also want to leave her alone for a couple hours, though, she just traumatically died and she gets her baby back and I don't want to interrogate her about torture preferences right away."

"For whatever it's worth I do not care if you torture consenting people."

"I believe you. I just - it's permanently in a completely different category."

He writes Beka. 

How likely do you think it is that kinkier you specifically enjoys being tortured?

I don't really like it myself and I had lots of chances to get used to it, but I dunno how much "kinkier" would fix that up.

How many concerts will he have to do to afford a precog with a longer time horizon than Sybil.

Seventeen.

That sure is a lot of concerts. He does concerts.  

He books a time for a wedding at a Catholic church in Warp. He books a resurrection for the day before that. He books a precog.

His precog says he says his Rebecca isn't into medieval torture devices.

Oh good.

His Rebecca can wake up in a Lórien with her Catherine beside her.

Ooooh. Heaven is pretty.

So pretty! Peaceful and pretty and quiet.

She scoops up Catherine and feeds her and sits for a bit and then gets up and walks.

She can hear singing in the distance.

Ooooooh. She goes singingward.

There's someone sitting there in a valley singing.

She cradles Catherine and approaches to a respectful distance and stops.

Hello, Rebecca.

"Hello your holiness."

"Come here."

She goes right up to him and kneels at his feet.

"We're on Earth. It's 2025. They found a way to resurrect people."

"- 2025," she murmurs.

Squeeze. "I can read minds. I'd like to read yours."

"Yes sir. Do I need to do anything?" She's never met a psion before.

"No." He puts his arm around her and stops not listening.

Ooh arm. She wonders what he is going to do with her. She does not think she would have been remembered for hundreds of years, let alone so well that angelic future people think to bring her to life complete with Catherine.

"There are other worlds, and in one of those you married me and they are very happy together, and so I knew I wanted you. We're going to marry tomorrow and then you will live in my palace and raise Catherine and learn magic music."

...gosh! That's really fantastic! She giggles.

He sings raining flower petals.

Oooooh is he doing that by singing??? That is so cool. She is going to marry a hot magic-singing guy who brought her and Catherine back from the dead wow.

"Should work for you too, once you learn the words - there are some with English lyrics -" He sings one of those. There is an English one that charges phones but that wouldn't be very interesting; he makes it breezy instead.

Oooooh she listens very carefully and leans on him delightedly.

He sings it through a couple times.

She sings along on time three when she is sure she has it (she is not sure if bad things happen if you get magic music wrong).

No, they just fail to work. I won't let you get hurt. 

She doesn't know how he's doing that, different psions work differently she thinks, but thinks "thank you sir" at him.

Unless you're into that.

Ooh right they're getting married she was all distracted by the music. She thinks she is not super into that but it's interesting to think about and she could get used to it if he wanted!

He wants to kiss her, apparently.

Kissing!!!!! This could only be more perfect if she had somewhere to put Catherine and maybe if he grabbed her by the hair to put her head wherever was convenient.

He can sing the grass up tall and fluffy for Catherine and then check very carefully that they're alone before any hair-grabbing.

Down on the soft goes Catherine and wherever her fiancé wants goes Rebecca's head and it prickles just the right amount, enough to remind her what to do but not enough to really hurt.

He is so, so delighted that that's the right amount. 

She is delighted about kissing.

Kissing is pretty great! Kissing someone when you can read their mind about how exhilarated they are is even better! Pulling someone's hair is really something! He possibly gets a little carried away kissing!

Well they're not married yet buuuuuut they will be tomorrow assuming he was not making that up?

" - hmmm?"

"- sir?"

He pulls her shirt back down.

Oh right he's reading her mind. Did she think something offensive? Or maybe he's just not in the mood anymore for unrelated reasons.

No, no, just remembered you'd want to wait. Forehead kiss. 

Forehead kiss! It is nice. "Thank you sir."

"I would like you to get good at noticing when you want to wait, so I can notice."

...over the course of the next day? She is not sure that can possibly be what he meant.

It is not what I meant. I meant in general.

"...aren't we getting married?"

"Yes. Tomorrow."

"...we don't have to wait after that, sir, I was not a very good nun but I am pretty sure about that part."

Forehead kiss. "Is that the only reason you can think of why you might ever possibly want to wait?"

...

...

The first few days after giving birth would be kind of dicey for certain things but it's not like if he wanted she'd fuss about it...

...

If Catherine or future siblings of Catherine needed her presumably he could figure that out? Maybe this is a very convoluted way of asserting that Rebecca is responsible for allocating enough of her attention to childcare.

Snort. "No - the other Rebecca likes having servants to help with the kids, we can arrange that..."

Oooh that sounds really convenient!

...

Yeah she has no idea what he meant then.

"So - if something is hard or unpleasant or scary for you, and you notice, then I can decide whether I want to change things so it's not as hard or unpleasant or scary. If you don't notice, then I have less control over that."

...maybe his mindreading works strangely and he can't just tell if she is scared unless she draws mental attention to it. "Yes sir."

Sigh. Snuggle. 

Snuggle. Was that a disappointed sigh? Did she do something wrong?

You are perfect and delightful. I thought I might have trouble explaining this. - it's just a thing the modern world does differently - but it won't upset me as long as you're happy.

She is very happy and hopes she understands whatever the thing is eventually!

Wouldn't that be something.

I want to listen to you thinking about marriage and what excites you about it.

Oooh.

Well, as the baby evidences she is not a confused virgin which is sort of a pity but means she can imagine without any anatomical bewilderment all kinds of things. There are no medieval torture devices, just casual forceful handling as an incidental because that's hot, and being told what to do because that is the right and proper shape of the universe is her being told what to do.

...when she eventually drags her mind out of the gutter: security and affection and babies (?) and being hand-fed and petted (brief detour to gutter) and a wedding and - huh she does not know his name.

"Macalaurë. Canafinwë Macalaurë."

Giggle. "It's nice to meet you."

"Likewise. I apologize for not finding you two hundred twenty years sooner."

"Well, I don't see how you could've."

"I was around then! My people live forever. But resurrection had not yet been invented and I did not know to look for you in particular."

"Oh wow, how old are you?" She'd been figuring he was a psion all this time. Maybe he is from somewhere with a mage who does that.

"Two thousand, five hundred, and a bit. I'm called an Elf, we're from another world."

"Wow!"

Kiss. "You're going to be immortal too."

"And Catherine?"

"And Catherine, and all her little sisters and brothers."

...awwwwwwww.

She is a very happy Rebecca snuggled up to him contemplating magic music and immortality and babies and a wedding.

"Thought about scheduling the wedding for today but I didn't want to be in a position of rushing you into it..."

Aw that's sweet. "I don't even have a dress yet!"

"I have dozens approved by other Rebeccas! You can pick your favorite."

Giggle. "Okay! How many Rebeccas are there?"

"There are now five living Rebeccas and a couple more still dead while their castles and so on get designed."

"Do I get to live in a castle?"

"Now, would I mention that all the other Rebeccas get castles and then make you live in a mere house?"

"Eeee!"

"It is not a floating castle. One of me is working on a floating castle but I did not want to wait that long. It has all its foundations firmly in the ground."

"A not-floating castle is great. I can't fly."

"I can fix that. But the children might want to wander the castle grounds before it's safe for them to fly."

Everything just keeps being SO GREAT. Rebecca is not sure she can hold all of this great.

"...it's not that it'd be very unsafe for them to fly, we will make them totally invulnerable to any kind of physical harm, but still, they could bump their heads."

She giggles and pets sleeping Catherine's hair.

"I can make you invulnerable to physical harm too but I wanted to check first that that wouldn't be, ah, disappointing."

"...like, how invulnerable to physical harm?" If he's suggesting it he probably doesn't want to reserve the option to physically harm her. Even if she is bad. She is ambivalent about him having the option to physically harm her for being bad. But losing the nice prickles when he grabs her hair or not being able to get the wind knocked out of her if he suddenly wants her on her back on the floor or whatever would be sad.

"It keeps that - just, things heal quickly, and nothing serious can happen at all. I don't want to reserve the option to harm you for being bad."

Well that's that settled then, he's the boss. "Yes sir."

"I think that's less common now than when you died. Except for people who enjoy it."

"Huh. Why?"

"Well it seems to me that if you can't get your wife to do things that are important to you without beating her then you're pretty bad at your job."

...she giggles. That's so sideways and cute.

Kiss.

Kiss!

"I will find it reassuring that you're safe."

"Yes sir thank you sir."

"If we turn out to find it really inconvenient I am sure we can come up with something non-injurious and satisfactory."

Giggle. "I'll be good sir. Once I know all the rules." ...she's not actually sure if she will be a lot better at being good for him than she is at being, say, a good Catholic, but she will try.

"I have fewer rules than the Catholic Church."

"Most people do!"

"Otherwise they would probably stay single."

"What rules do you have?"

"I wanted to meet you first and figure out - how you felt about following rules and what sort of things you might need rules about. There's nothing at the moment. I don't need to order you to take care of Catherine."

"Catherine can do that herself. It involves yelling."

"Awwww." Kiss. 

Kiss!!!!

"And I have a feeling you won't need a rule that you have to practice magic music."

"I am so excited about magic music sir."

"It's amazing." He sings them both invisible.

That is amazing! But does interfere with adoring gazing. (He's so pretty.)

So is she! When they get visible again he'll do reduced gravity and toss her in the air.

!!!!!!!!

"You're adorable."

"Thank you sir!"

Toss. "You are so adorable."

Wheeeee! "I'm so glad sir."

"And you are mine forever."

"Yes sir, all yours."

He has enough time before the wedding to teach her lots of magic songs!

Eeeee!!!!

Oh, and picking her dress, she should do that.

She likes this gold and blue one!

Oooooohh!

It is important that he think she is pretty in it.

Well luckily he thinks she looks stunning.

Good.

Their alts are all invited.

(The dead ones can watch a video later in their flying castles.) Rebecca horrifies a frill-necked alien who is also a Catholic priest with her bizarre submissive vows.

Poor frill-necked alien. He is so so pleased to have a Rebecca of his very own who isn't into medieval torture devices.

And now they are married!!!!!! And Hazel Rebecca is watching her Catherine so that the elder Catherine can be enthralled with her!

This is a real advantage to having lots of Catherines of varying ages! He sweeps his bride off to her castle. 

It's much bigger than Peka's. 

Castle castle castle married castle married married married castle married!!!

Castle balconies! Castle sitting rooms! Castle guest rooms! Castle ladies-in-waiting rooms - didn't move anybody in yet, though, in case we got distracted from the tour before we got around to our rooms.

"Who will be moving in, sir?"

Our staff.

She is going to be a PRINCESS (one of the other Rebeccas mentioned the part where he is a PRINCE, this just keeps getting better) and have SERVANTS in their CASTLE. !!!!!!!!.

"Adorable."

"I love you."

He grabs her by the hair and tugs her closer. I love you too.

Ee!

They are MARRIED and he can do WHATEVER HE WANTS WITH HER and that is GREAT.

There are a lot of people in Eclipse who would have been a stretch but 'melts with delight when you toss her around' is not even a little bit much.

He picks her up. "I think we should finish the tour later."

"Yes sir!"

Then they can get married the way Elves do that.

She did not enter this marriage anatomically bewildered but she is still really impressed after multiple minutes have elapsed. And she is letting herself be simply full of experiences, she doesn't have to decide anything because that is all her husband's job, she is free free free to just feel and melt and obey and fly -

He will be slightly heartbroken that 'multiple minutes' is really impressive but he is too distracted to make even vague plans to harass one of the living Catherine-dads over it.

And now he has a spacey enraptured wife clinging to him.

That's also an Eclipse thing. Not, like, the best Eclipse thing, spacey is not 'giggling joyously' and giggling joyously is the best look on Rebecca, but he does not panic about it. He pets her.

She tears up a bit and comes out of it gradually and buries her face against his chest and sighs deeply, all wrung out and relaxed.

...okay that's pretty cute. 

And then there is adoring gazing!

...that's also really cute. 

He sings snowflakes.

Rebecca's life is so awesome.

"...so, again?"

"Yes please sir!"

"Apparently the woman who founded the GCP is a demon. Lilie Ho. I want Sybil on call but I expect she'd take checking for worldleapers appropriately seriously."

"Makes sense. Did she show up for a summons? Should I go bug her?"

"Thought we'd start with a letter, though it'll be worth dropping by if we can't seem to get in touch otherwise."

"Do you have her mail label or should I figure it out?"

"Not public, sorry, go ahead and dig around."

Dig dig dig. It's a string of hanzi that do not form a sentence, possibly chosen randomly.

"None of the other candidates were nearly as appealing, I hope that doesn't mean she just hates talking."

And they draft a message.

Her reply comes a day later. I am elsewhere employed at this time but appreciate your inquiry.

Do you think you could make the time to talk anyway? It's important and there are very few suitable candidates.

I cannot accept summonses at this time but may be reached in person at the GCP office in Singapore if you should care to visit in person and await a lull in my work.

He sends somebody. 

An employee shows the somebody to Lillie's forensics office.

Is she in the middle of something?

Not right now!

"Hi! I'm representing Vanda Nossëo, we wrote you a few days ago..."

"Hello."

She closes the door, checks if there's a message from Sybil. "There is a conjurable means of travelling between worlds."

Frown.

"There are, as far as we can tell, infinitely many worlds. I know there's been discussion in Hell of the bizarre phenomenon where conjuring for all worlds doesn't get anything new but then a few years later someone new will show up, with a long established history; this is because of a phenomenon called adjacency, where some worlds neighbor each other and some do not. Travel of any kind is only possible between adjacent worlds. Summoning works in the worlds adjacent to the daeva realms. The three new worlds that started summoning recently are ones whose stars were destroyed and who we brought over so they're now in range. There's a transit network, extranet, and political associations among many worlds in the multiverse. Endorë and this Earth have been left ignorant of it because it would be extraordinarily dangerous for the means of conjurable dimensional travel to become widely known in Hell."

"Why are you telling me this?"

"It has been obvious for a while that keeping the existence of other worlds secret forever isn't sustainable, and we think we have a better way, but it would require someone routinely checking for worldleapers."

"I do not have any demon colleagues I can recommend to you."

"I'm not surprised, we did a pretty thorough personnel search and were unable to find anyone else definitely trustworthy with a concern of this magnitude."

"What is the plan apart from enlisting someone to check for 'worldleapers'?"

"Pair them with someone with precognition so we know about any potential disasters before they endanger anyone. We have a very restricted in scope means of making text unconjurable, so if we catch someone quickly enough we might have a chance at getting rid of the source they ran across. Work with the GCP to come up with a plan for management of a wider range of potential wrongdoing, including crimes against people who accidentally end up in Hell somehow and crimes against people of species that hatch from eggs. Make public the existence of the multiverse in a manner that emphasizes the current - non-conjurable - means of interdimensional transit and ensures no records are available that should spur interest in the original one. Talk with the GCP about their willingness to serve as the daeva law enforcement agency of choice for a much larger number of alien partners or if they prefer we assemble our own organization."

"How frequently do you require the check performed?"

"To catch things before they happen with the precog we'd need every two hours. There's someone else who could cover for you for time off or in the case of other urgent GCP work, but he's a child and not reliable as our primary source here. To catch things before a worldleaping daeva could cause harm, we'd have five days. We're hoping for frequent checks in the immediate aftermath of the news coming out and then a slower rate not sufficient for information security but adequate for safety once there's less scrutiny."

"So this is not necessarily incompatible with my current work."

"That would be our hope."

"There are some demons I might be able to recommend as supplementary GCP forensics providers but I believe Rochelle would be reluctant to replace me entirely."

"Particularly if an increase in the scope of the GCP's jurisdiction is anticipated it makes sense to have you leading their forensics team."

Lillie nods.

"Would you be willing to work with us at the higher frequency during the transition and emergencies, and to do routine checks every five days -"

"When is the transition planned?"

"It could, of course, happen outside our control, but if our secrecy holds we'd plan to make arrangements with the GCP over the course of the next few months and proceed once that's established."

Lillie nods. "What are your applicable terms of employment for me?"

She has a contract! Supervisor in this department, confidentiality is a necessity. Vanda Nossëo has a procedure for pursuit of complaints in cases of people who didn't do anything yet because a precog caught it but who were going to do something serious; informing Hell about worldleapers would qualify. There's a catalogue, 'payment options for demons interested in working with Vanda Nossëo'. "This is a priority of ours, you can more or less pick out anything there of interest."

Lillie diligently reads the provided materials with a break when the GCP needs something forensicsed and she goes behind a paper screen to do that.

The catalogue contains lots and lots of magic items.

Goodness.

"I am willing to assist."

"Oh good! We're looking forward to working with you. Can I answer any questions for you?"

"How do I get in touch with relevant persons from your organization as necessary?"

"We conjure on the half-hour, unlock something for my computer and send me a note at Ilmarë c/o Ambaróna open channel. Once more information is public Revelation will be on the multiversal extranet, at which point you'll be able to just email us."

She nods.

"Thanks so much."

"You are welcome. I would be as appalled as anyone to see lawless demons roaming other universes."

"It's our sincere hope that almost all of them will be delighted to tour it under a safe binding."

"Those of them with any business doing so should find no cause to complain about that."

"You'd think that a demon would like demons better. Or at least have more of a sense that they vary."

"Revelation's thing about demons is very ingrained. Maybe the Amentan summoners will enjoy the chance to feel morally superior, if we frame things right."

"I really thought that learning their dead relatives were daeva would soften it. Do we want the GCP doing all daeva criminal procedures, we can do it ourselves -"

"Not strongly opposed but we'd need something worked out for jurisdiction, and I don't think we want to establish that anyone can set up their own systems, lest someone have an inhumane one -"

      "The GCP -"

"They do their best."

      "Your grace."

"They're fine with us being the summoners modulo logistical considerations which are about to be obviated, and they don't object if we don't gag the demons, are there really other complaints that won't be fixed with some money for good lawyers?"

     "They just very conspicuously think all demons are terrible."