"We will gladly help."

He thinks, briefly, that Fernanda has been gone a while. He squashes the thought. He can't just hover over her shoulder constantly, no matter how right that feels. 'What do you think they're talking about' is the wrong question to ask their boyfriend Katur. He can't think of anything else to ask, though.

"Am I keeping you from anything?"

"Not right this moment. I do have work later, but I have been trying to keep my hours flexible." Pause. "I will understand if you don't want my company, but it feels... like terrible hosting just leaving you alone."

"I can stay. Even if I can't be helpful, we should all get used to each other."

So he'll spend some of the day with Katur. It's fine. If he hadn't imprinted, Scott probably even would have liked him- he's just generally a nice guy, and that's more than you can see for most of the guys on the rez. It's all just a little more complicated now, though, like he's thinking through a layer of cotton. It's fuzzing every thought with his new priority- Fernanda, Fernanda, Fernanda.

They can spend a while hunting for mutual interests- there's usually something to bond over.

Of course, Katur has watched some Earth media cultural cornerstones, like Robocop and Star Wars. Katur likes Star Trek and space-based science fiction in general.

If nothing else they can talk about, Elan's recent trend to create Elanized versions of stories from Earth. Anything from The Tempest to Matilda, got an Elan adaptation in the past few years.

Scott has seen Star Wars! The pack made him watch it. He liked them! He'd kind of managed to avoid all the big spoilers, though, so there were some awkward moments. He thought Luke and Leia would have been cute together, which gave his friends a lot to make fun of him for as soon as he got to that part of the movie marathon.

He's kind of curious about Elanization. What usually changes in those adaptions?

Some things related to cultural gaps and some things are just common tropes. Elan's stories often have on-screen narrators that are not characters, just "the storyteller voice". With some actors being typecast as narrators. They also don't have the same ethnic groups as Earth's, and those change - often being subject to criticism that is too intellectual for Katur to follow. Oh, and on-screen kisses. At least in the hemisphere Katur is from it's considered... something private, people are mindful of contacting each other's saliva because it's considered gross. Mind, couples do kiss, and Earth sounds... prudish about matters beyond that. But usually you imply that the couple is kissing, through shadows or distant camera angles. Or it cuts to the narrator making a tongue in check remark. They sometimes do that with Earth media too, Luke and Leia didn't kiss in the Elan-edited version.

And even if the adaptation is set on Earth, they might add this or that cultural element. In the Tempest, the Prospero was a sorcerer, and the story is presented as something plausible for their kind of magic. Ariel was another sorcerer, instead of what he was in the original (Katur doesn't recall, but apparently not-human). Caliban was a part-animal augmented based on folklore. And so on.

So they talk about that. Scott starts to relax. Being around Katur is easier than being around Fernanda, in a lot of ways. As long as he knows she's safe, he can just enjoy this. They talk about their taste in fiction- not quite overlapping, but Scott is willing to be introduced to new things. He quotes some poetry: Neruda, because he wants to see Katur blush. He could try in Spanish- he wouldn't be surprised if Katur is multilingual, now that he thinks of it- the twins might even have mentioned something like that, for a while there the subject of Katur went in one ear and out the other- but he thinks it's safest to start with English.

"...and this one is my favorite. It wasn't always, but...after meeting Fernanda, it has a whole new meaning.

I have named you queen.
There are taller than you, taller.
There are purer than you, purer.
There are lovelier than you, lovelier.
But you are the queen.

When you go through the streets
No one recognizes you.
No one sees your crystal crown, no one looks
At the carpet of red gold
That you tread as you pass,
The nonexistent carpet.

And when you appear
All the rivers sound
In my body, bells
Shake the sky,
And a hymn fills the world."

Katur listens very impressed. "Yes, that is... Fernanda." He smiles at Scott very fondly, like he understands where he is coming from.

They probably shouldn't just talk about how great Fernanda is all day!

Okay, he spends a little while longer talking about his impressions of her- she's so matter-of-fact about everything, it's refreshing to have in an imprint. Trying to look for hidden meaning constantly is a problem the other guys have had with theirs, but with Fernanda he doesn't have to worry about that. Her priorities are great, and she's trying, which- he knows this could have turned out a lot worse if she didn't care about him.

"Has she ever- no, scratch that, I don't need to hear about her love life. I guess I could use- tips, though, on how to talk to her? She's different than most people I've ever met. It's like she has one speed, and I can barely keep up with it."

"Man, I know the feeling, her and Felicia have a decade head start on what they do, so don't worry too much." He thinks about this seriously. "Uh, the first thing is being honest. In part because of the imprint thing, but also common. She kind of... feels very strongly about knowing the correct information, to figure out what to do? People think she is uncaring and judgmental, but she cares a lot about the large scope, and her judgment is always 'this person deserves better'." More thinking, about more practical advice. "She is very disappointed at people that deceive themselves or just not follow their stated morals? But you can... just ask, for help? From any one of us, she cares if you are honestly trying for the better."

"I feel like I should be taking notes."

Now he feels ready to move on to other topics. He asks Katur to explain a little bit more about what his work is like.

They can talk about that, yeah. Katur considers it rather boring, but important. Mostly figuring out how much of stuff to get, from and to whom.

Eventually, the twins swing by.

With a visitor in tow. "Hey, there."

"Henry wanted to check on you. Because of your similar faces."

"That's a good reason," he says lamely.

He's a bit more filled out than Henry, but otherwise they look identical.

"Have you ever seen anything like this before?"

"Well... I tried to make a few calls, but it turns out to be hard to make people believe this sort of thing. I got like, one anecdote about someone who met a doppelgänger who claimed to have a similar name and similar life, except the doppelgänger was from Earth and the teller was from Elan. But it could be a case of a shape-changer messing with someone."

"Have you tried to look into the obvious options? Twins happening in different worlds seems kind of- scientifically impossible, but it could be something like that. Do we have the same parents?"

"Mine are called Jim and Liliana, but I was raised by my aunt Rose, who is my mom's half-sister. They died barely after I turned one."

"Huh. Different names. Rafael and Melissa. I do have an aunt Rosa, but that's not a super rare name, and my mom has three sisters. Could it be some kind of- magic thing?"

He says this with all the certainty of someone entirely new to magic things.

The people who are supposedly more versed on magic things don't look like they have a better explanation either.

"Rosa Valentine with a son named Gabriel? Or similar. ...I don't want to sound accusatory, but any chance at all that you could have been kidnapped and there is just one Earth where we were both raised?"

"He is definitely something else than a regular sorcerer. It could be the case that you were the one kidnapped, but I am unsure if twins would show near each other."

"Uh, his Earth and yours... have different dates," this came up while they were talking about fiction.