Like this guy!

He seems quite confused by what can be found the other side of the door he's just gone through.

Doesn't seem to have a shirt on, does he.

Well, it looks like someone improvised a dormitory inside a bar and there are three boys, identical ones at that, hang around.

One is just wearing... hard to tell if those are shorts or boxers.

Another is wearing something that provides much more covering.

And the third is wearing pajama pants.

The newcomer is wearing… pretty much the same as that last one.

"Umwhat."

"Hey! Fresh meat, finally!"

"Don't be mean, Trevor. Hello, newcomer. This is a interdimensional hub that randomly possesses doors, bringing patrons from all over the multiverse, usually it presents itself like a bar. Today it decided to throw a pajama party and has been catching people in their sleepwear. I am Felix, these are my brothers Trevor and Fenris. We are from United States, Earth, 2015."

"Earth, United States, um, 2016," he says. "Interdimensional hub bar that uses doors, right."

"Oh, another Earth. There are lot of those, it turns out, often with different types of magic, like ours."

He waves at Fenris.

Fenris levitates several inches from the ground.

"Nope," he says, a bit higher pitched than before. "Nope, pretty sure my world– nope."

"Sorry? Is this too much at once?"

"I am fffine," he says. "Just adjusting – keep going though."

"Well, there are various kinds of magic, in our world it manifests as various powers and people use them to become super-heroes or super-villains. We are super-heroes."

"I would hope so," he says, then looks at the doorway that he's still standing in. "Uh, how many people get these powers?"

He'll come in from the doorway a little. Since it hijacks doors, wouldn't want to be split in half or something horrible.

"The number is just shy of two million today."

"You know, we don't bite," Trevor observes, "unless you ask nicely."

He raises an eyebrow. "How many people do you have on your planet in total, then?"

"Seven billion. 21th century Earths tend to be pretty standard on that regard, apparently. There is some higher concentration of people with powers on the United States. Powers are caused by something called the Ternion Agent, that is contagious - you are safe in Milliways - and it spread from there."

"Are they a bad thing, do they have detrimental side effects?"

"The powers are not, but about a third of whoever catches the Ternion Agent dies and a third develops powers. As I said you are safe, Milliways filters this kind of stuff and people with powers are not contagious."

He nods. "Mutually exclusive thirds or can they sometimes overlap, like, someone gets powers and dies a day later?"

"Technically, impossible to actually tell, the Ternion Argent induces a comatose state and if you don't wake up there is no way of knowing."

"Uh, on the plus side, the spread is thoroughly contained and nowadays."

"So is it a half of all that wake up or is it a third of all that wake up that get powers? And uh yeah. Ew."

"Half of all who wake up get powers, the other half is immunized."

"Oh good immunization, that's– nice. Do they have vaccinations, are people with powers still contagious…?"

"Anyone that survives the agent is safe, it isn't a virus, people still don't know what it is exactly, but they figured out a suppressant that works to make the agent inactive and non-contagious."

"Does that also stop the powers, if they did it on someone with powers?"

… He looks mildly confused.

"No? It just makes the Ternion Agent dormant."

"Right," he says. "Yeah, okay, so I feel like I might have fallen asleep unexpectedly and am now having a weird dream? I don't tend to lucid dream, my dreams don't tend to be as detailed as this, but… yeah." He shrugs. "Basically seems like I'm dreaming."

"That sounds really unimaginative, maybe you are in a coma or in some drug induced hallucination."

"Not helping, Trevor."

"If you are seriously considering this to be a dream, I ask you to still treat it as if real, so you don't do anything stupid that gets anyone hurt."

"I mean, I'm not planning on doing something ridiculously reckless even if I were absolutely assured that this were a dream. I would, probably, at most just really really hope I could fly and see if that works." Pause. "Which it doesn't seem to be. And anyway, there could be some powerful being deciding to mess with me, or I could have had a psychotic break – I don't feel like I've had a psychotic break but never having had one before to the extent of my knowledge it's not like that's any sort of guarantee."

"Well, while you decide if you are locked in a madhouse somewhere, maybe you could come in and have a drink? The first is free."

"And I assume that if this is real then there have been plenty of chances to kill me anyway and unless this is some weird magical thing that can only kill you if you accept a drink or something I will probably be fine."

He considers for a moment, then says, "Okay," and walks further into the bar, looking around slightly curiously.

There is no bartender, instead the bar itself offers him a drink. If he accepts, it will be delicious.

"So, what can you tell us about yourself?"

He does in fact accept, and he gets– an orange drink. Which he eyes slightly warily, but does in fact try, and it actually tastes really good, as is expected.

"I'm Martin! Living in California, USA, high-school senior, college plans underway, it's some date in March, like the fifth or something, I don't usually keep track of the date, um. Aaaanything in particular you want to know?"

"Nothing really? We are just passing the time, Milliways is good for that."

"I… guess it would be with so many possible people to meet."

"We got quite an education on how people across multiple worlds sleep. The three of us are quite a diversified sample on what people use as sleepwear, or in Fenris' case what they don't."

"Trevor, behave."

Martin raises an eyebrow. "Well," he says, looking down and gesturing at his bare torso, "you can see what I wear."

Trevor snorts, he looks down at his own similar get up. "Nice choice, better than 50's dad over here." He gestures at Felix.

He shrugs. "I mean, I wouldn't personally choose to wear that."

"It's comfortable and warm. Not everyone can be immune to cold or damage like these two."

"… And what are your powers? All of you, actually, since you haven't described them?"

"Pyrokinesis and super-speed. Oh, some enhanced durability and regeneration as result of the latter."

"Super-strength, durability and terrakinesis."

"A combo of cryo and aerokinesis, plus flight as I demonstrated earlier."

He demonstrates again.

"… Neat, I guess?" he says. "Any idea how it interacts with the previously-established laws of physics?"

"By kicking the previous laws in the balls and taking their lunch money."

"Huh," says Martin. "Right. How nice of them."

"Well, he means that powers apparently defy previous tenets. In practice everyone is so clueless about how they work that it is hard to say what they disproof or not. They are consistent per individual but no one knows their inner workings."

"When you say it's an agent and not, like, a virus, what actual distinction are you drawing, and what actually is it? Like, 'agent' doesn't give me anything except, like, 'it is a thing that does a thing'."

"Which describes everyone's understanding of it quite well. It is a microscope structure with some crystalline properties and it can alter DNA."

"No idea how it came about?"

"Oh, that is the best part. Alien artifact thingie that some private company found and started experimented with, until the thing popped out a vial of the Ternion Agent and then they experimented on it with humans, because they clearly have not seen that movie and then boom! it is spreading around the world."

"Alien artifact thingie. That had a thing that caused people to spontaneously get powers, or die, or neither, in approximately equal quantities. And these powers seem to break the laws of physics." Pause. "I feel like if this were real I'd want to glare at your world real hard."

The triplets look at each other and laugh.

"That is entirely fair, there are quite a few scientists that sort of... lost it, not in a dramatic way, or not all of them, but quite a few really got disillusioned with magic."

"I mean, it's not just the fact they break what used to be established as the laws of physics, but– it's from a weird alien artifact thingy that goes and infects people and kills a third of them. That sounds like a movie or something."

"Oh, well. Do you want us to open the door to our bedroom and glare at it?"

"I mean, I can try but I doubt it'd do much."

"Maybe it would carthatic," Felix shrugs.

"At least you don't have to live in it? But apparently the multiverse full of even worse cliches - earlier we saw a fairy godmother."

"An actual fairy godmother, as in someone who has someone they look after, grants magical wishes to, possibly Cinderella, that sort of thing?"

"The precise experience was that we saw a lady with dragonfly wings and in her nightgown sleeping over there. And there was this sign saying: This Fairy Godmother is Out of Wishes. Someone took her wand and started playing with it until security took the perp and the wand away."

"Personally, I think she was more like the one from Pinocchio than the one from Cinderella."

"Right," he says, raising an eyebrow.

Felix shrugs. "I mean, insofar it is accurate to ascribe these things, but the multiverse is so big that I wouldn't be all that surprised."

And then the door opens again! And in walks a male wearing just boxers.

He has blue hair. It's a dark blue, but it's definitely noticeably blue.

Martin turns around to look.

So do the triplets. "Welcome to Milliways! If you haven't been here before, this is an inter-dimensional hub that occasionally takes over random doors and receives patrons from all over the multiverse."

"Huh," he says. "And what language are we all speaking, might I ask?"

"English, myself."

"The three of us are speaking English, I suppose he is too," Trevor waves at Martin, "but there is a translation effect going on so he might be speaking German for all we know."

Trevor is not leering, but since the newcomer is from god-knows-where he does glance to see if all that dark-blue hair looks natural.

"Well, I'm pretty sure I'm not speaking the same language as you guys, or at least it's nowhere near guaranteed, because I just tried two different ones, Seren and Keiruna, but cool."

He walks in from the door. It does appear that the hair is natural, or perhaps he just dyes all of it really thoroughly.

Heh, hardly the weirdest thing they've seen today.

"So we are from the United States of America, on Earth, 2015. I'm Trevor, these are Felix and Fenris."

"Martin."

"No idea where that is!" says the newcomer. "I'm Itaruko. Currently living in the country of Kerune. Originally from a really small town called Eiro. I assume you also have no idea where these places are."

"Absolutely not. Likely a completely different universe. Earth is our planet."

"We are human, in case you don't recognize the species as well."

"At least in Seren, our planet is just referred to as 'our planet'. I mean, there's probably a word if you're being technical, like how our star has a star classification, but not in everyday speech? I'm not sure about Keiruna – I'm not actually properly fluent, and having to refer to 'our planet' isn't that common? I'm a Luna, though. Hence the hair." He gestures to his head. Then looks down and also gestures to his torso and legs, since they're visible.

"Also a human, for the record."

"We are technically empowered humans, which is not a distinct species, but plenty find the empowered part more relevant."

"People's priorities are funny like that."

"So, Luna, haven't heard of that one before, only kind of people on your planet?"

"… Nope. There are also Thamari and Rhunes. If you all have eyes like that, you would probably notice a Rhune? The sclera bit is colored. Thamari have, uh, marks across their shoulders. And Luna have colored hair. Other things – Thamari are typically, uh, bulkier? – but otherwise those are probably the easiest to identify."

"At least in my experience, yeah, human eyes are all white sclera."

"Yeah, sometimes empowered get mutations that cause non-standard colors, but not consistently."

"Do you have magic in your own world?"

"No," he says. "Empowered? What, you do have magic?"

Fenris repeats the levitation trick.

While Felix dashes across the run at super-speed, stands long enough for him to be registered by Itaruko and then returns to his seat.

Doesn't take long for Itaruko to register that. "… Right," he says. "Neat, I guess, is there a way for me to get ahold of some?"

"Apparently it comes with a chance of death. It's also not a thing we have on my planet."

He tilts his head.

Felix provides the explanation.

"It might not even work on you, even if you look remarkably human."

"Not sure I want to chance that third-chance of death, either." He walks further into the bar and takes a seat. "So. Are we discussing anything interesting? Each other's worlds, or languages, or why we're all wearing rather little? I mean, this is little by my culture's standards, at least."

"Milliways is having a theme day, can't say I am complaining, it is funny and insightful."

"I honestly don't know if that insightful was an euphemism or not."

"Shush your prude. Well, since he proposed. What exactly do you mean with little to your culture? Would you normally walk into a bar wearing that little?"

"No, I mean this is sleepwear. Or underwear."

"Some people jog in sort-of what I'm wearing?" says Martin. "But yeah, basically sleepwear."

"Same deal. Fifties dad over there," he waves at Felix, "wouldn't want to be seen in public like that, but it isn't indecency. Fenris sleeps naked and Milliways is allowing that right now, but is not like he would explore a new place like that."

"… I mean, I wouldn't term that naked," says Itaruko. "Some people actually do sleep, like, without any clothing at all, but yeah."

"He means I wasn't wearing these when I opened the door and found Milliways on the other side. Good, thing I am the shameless brother."

Nod. "Fortunately I was wearing these when I opened my door."

"So, between us, we have two worlds without magic and two worlds with humans. That seems… interesting?"

"I wonder if we can find something to compare between our Earth and Itaruko's planet. Does your world have super-heroes?"

"Nope. We don't have magic at all, that I know of? We've got technology, though, which might seem like it depending on how advanced your civilizations are – don't know if you have it but I'm assuming you do from what you're wearing?"

"We in fact do have technology? Do you have computers and a network of them that connects the world?"

"Yep," he says. "Also mobile devices that connect to it, too?" He holds out his phone, which looks extremely thin and lightweight.

None of the triplets have their phones, but they have Bar, so here is one of the latest smartphone models to compare. Maybe Martin would want to compare the technology of his world too?

"That's… quite similar to what we have, I think? We might be a few models ahead on some of them, though."

"I don't recognize any of the brands," says Itaruko, "but it looks like you might be a few years behind us?"

"Enough years that it might be decades?"

"I don't think so? It depends, we might have taken different routes to prioritize technology or something."

"You still have, like, lightbulbs and– cars? That sort of thing?"

"Yeees," he says. "Also trains? I know Rhunya has a nice metro." Pause. "Oh, I should probably show you what my planet looks like," he says, and conjures a small ball of light, mostly blue except for a single continent and a few surrounding islands. "I'd expect Earth to be something like this–?"

"We are very likely to prioritize other things, like we have more continents, also we don't have whatever kind of hologram is this?"

Headtilt. "Hologram?"

"This thing?" Fenris points. "How are you doing it?"

"… I'm not sure how to articulate an answer to that question because I feel like there is a pretty big gap if you don't know what this is." He frowns. "It's… lumen? Does that help?"

"Well, yes. The fact that you have a name for it does establish some likely hypothesis."

"Well, he means that he's slightly less clueless. Uh, what is lumen then? We don't have it."

"It looks fairly magical, hey, Martin, doesn't it look fairly magical?"

"Yyyeah. Pretty sure I can't do that."

Itaruko: looks confused. "… Are you sure?"

"Well, if it isn't magic what is it?"

"I haven't actually studied it? There are scientists who've looked into it, though, and it's obviously, you know, a thing that actually functions and responds if you poke it in certain ways? Scientific method, form hypotheses and predictions and stuff, that works with it, it's not mysteriously separate like the term 'magic' suggests?"

"That doesn't sound that different from our kind of magic, actually, its rules are hard to understand from physics stand point, but there are rules and consistency."

"Well, first thing first, how does lumen work? It's something everyone can do? Does it spend energy? Does it apparently create energy?"

"It's a thing that everyone I know of can do, at least, and it's generally known as a thing people can do, uh, it probably uses energy to emit the light, conservation of energy and all, but it's not like it uses much – people don't die from using lumen too long or anything weird like that? People have varying abilities to use it, though – kids are generally worse than adults, Luna are generally better than Rhunes or Thamari, people who put effort in to try to get better are overall better, that sort of thing…?"

"But it is a known fact that it follows conservation of energy or just speculated to do so?"

"It's a known fact that conservation of energy is, to our knowledge, inviolable? It's not like people go around pointing at every particular instance of something that could violate it and broadcasting to the world, 'no, this doesn't violate it', so I'd assume it doesn't violate it, there probably would have been some headline or something, but nobody's actually specifically told me as such?"

"It could just be the case that no one figured out a way to measure it and assumed it worked like everything else."

"How do you use it? It's some kind of mental action?"

"… Yes, but then so is moving my arm? It's– uh," he frowns. "It's kinda hard to explain. Like, um, grabbing the air and twisting it?"

"Well, there could be some internal organ involved, your clothes aren't that much anatomy revealing."

"Ha," he says. "No, my lack of clothes doesn't reveal any of my internal organs, and I doubt the external stuff it does cover is involved."

"Ok, now I am curious. Is there a part of the brain specifically responsible for lumen? What are lumen's limits? Can animals do it?"

"I have not heard of there being a part dedicated to lumen, no, again, like I don't think there's a part dedicated to each arm or to moving facial muscles, or if there is it's not something I've learned about in enough detail to tell you? Animals can't, as far as I know, do it – that would be slightly horrifying – and um, limits are kind of hard to describe? It's… basically a light blob, it's usually the color of your eyes, you can change it and get a bigger size and different shape with practice but it's kinda difficult?"

"I wonder if it's an ambient effect, Milliways supports those," Fenris turns to Martin, "do you mind if we test it with your world?"

"Uh, sure?" he says. "How does that work, will the door go to my world if we want it to, or…?"

"The door will lead to your world if you are the one holding it. I just want to see if Itaruko can lumen while inside your world. It should be safe to do that test in our world, specially to a non-human, but no reason to risk it."

He nods and goes over the door to hold it!

"Do I actually have to stand in his world, or should I just try making it there from in here?"

"I think you should stand in his world, probably, Milliways' ambient effect won't affect you then. I am assuming it will work like the translation effect, which also ceases while the person is standing on the other side of the door. We tested that earlier."

He nods and goes through the door, then creates the same globe as before, this time in Martin's world.

"Apparently not just ambient, then," says Martin.

Itaruko looks slightly confused and tilts his head, keeping the globe up.

"It might be a species feature," Fenris ponders.

"Still looks fairly magical to me."

He frowns, snuffs the illusion, and walks back in. "Huh?"

"Might be a species thing, not a world thing, looks magical," says Martin.

"I mean, I continue to be pretty sure it's not magical, and if you guys don't have it that would suggest a species thing, yeah?"

"Likely, but it could be something else, maybe it works because you are exposed to something in your world since birth. Did your species' ancestors have it as well?"

"As in, evolutionary ancestors? I… think so? There was some sort of study that looked at that sort of thing, I think. It doesn't leave traces, though – once you snuff it, it's gone, so we don't exactly have it in the fossil record?"

"And nothing similar on other animals? Like the ability to generate heat or something?"

"Lumen doesn't do heat anyway, not much unless you poke at it a lot, and even then it's hardly got any range, but no, not that I know of."

"Anyway, what else can you say about your world?"

"I'm not really sure what to compare it to!" he says. "It has cities, we have the three species, we have lumen which is apparently a thing you don't have… You still have, uh, sense of smell and taste and stuff, right, we're not just missing something else relatively fundamental?"

Martin comes in from the door and nods. "Eyesight and hearing, too, presumably? You have proprioception and pain and, I dunno, emotions, consciousness, psychology, biology, science in general, medicine?"

"Yeah. But lumen is more a skill or ability, not a field of study, so I wouldn't expect those to necessarily be different?"

"Still, how about other things? Animals like bears? Lions? Tigers? Fish?"

"Or food, like ice cream or chocolate?"

"No to the bears, lions and tigers, yes to the fish, ice cream and chocolate."

"Weird that you have a specific plant species like cocoa trees. Are you a mammal? You look like one."

"Yeees? Probably. I mean, I'm not sure we have the same classifications as you do on that sort of stuff. Do you have vanilla? Strawberries? And, uh– animals, do you have, uh, kutsiar? Namanth?"

"Yes to the plants. No to the animals. Mammals are warm-blooded animals most notable for having hair and glands that produce milk, most gestate their young inside, but some lay eggs. There are other differences, but those are the most likely to stand out for the layman."

"That would make me a mammal, yeah, because– wait, do you have females?"

"Yep. At least, females exist in my species, and I'm assuming they do in theirs too."

"We do have females, and just to be sure, you require both the male and female sexes to produce babies, after about nine months of gestation inside the female."

"… How long are your months? It's like six months for us, but I think Thamari take a bit longer – not by much?"

"Which are the Thamari again?"

"Due to complicated historical reasons, months tend to alternate between 30 and 31 days long except for one month that is 28 days long except every four years when it is 29. A year is 12 months and 365 days long."

"That sounds like a disgusting system, gotta say," says Itaruko. "Eight months of forty days, plus a new year's day, plus a leap day every five-ish years. Thamari are the– uh, more heavyweight ones with the shoulder stripes."

"The extra day every four years is a leap day and I can't say is properly designed, no."

"Okay, I will try remember the name Thamari while we talk, but I am going to pretty much label them tiger-people in my head."

"I don't even know what a tiger is so I don't know if that's an accurate comparison?"

They get Bar to produce a book with pictures of various megafauna from Earth.

Itaruko is invited to do the same.

Itaruko does so! There are definitely some similarities between species and they have a few that look practically identical but which are given different names, but most of the species are different while seeming like vaguely plausible Earth-like animals.

"I would probably not call them tiger-people, just because they're not– quite like that? But yes, they do have stripe things, look kind of like large, particularly-shaped birthmarks?"

Martin looks through the book.

"Heh, it is the most obvious thing to think when you described them. I supposed there are zebras too, but I don't really associate them with heavyweight."

The triplets looks over Martin's shoulder, what kind of interesting things they have in the land of Luna, tiger-people, and the-third-kind?

Well, the-third-kind are called Rhunes, and they're the ones with the colored sclera, are slightly taller than regular humans, and have slightly pointy ears as well as apparently better hearing.

Other animals (all non-sapient as far as they know) include: kutsiar, which are a sort of small fox-like creature, slightly smaller than foxes are and typically found in the regions that Luna historically come from; farsurils, which are small jungle cats! They're fast at running, can be dangerous if provoked, but will typically leave you alone if you're not actively trying to goad them into harming you, have quite long and sharp claws so beware; namanth, which seem to be… basically like manta rays; keiros, which is a herd animal that has been historically farmed by the Thamari for food. Looks larger than a cow, doesn't seem to produce edible dairy products like a cow does, and is apparently no longer found in the wild.

There are lots more along similar veins, and while most of them bear resemblance to regular Earth animals, only a few seem to be identical, though they seem to fit in similar evolutionary niches.

Felix will shamelessly point out which animals he finds cute.

While Trevor is quite vocal about what animals he thinks are awesome.

And Fenris is curious about the evolution of sapient life in this world.

There isn't much in that book about it! Itaruko can get another one, though, which explains that the three sapient species had a common ancestor not too far back and then took different evolutionary histories after they split up in location. The terrain between the different areas was apparently quite difficult to traverse, and might have got that way quite quickly, resulting in the different routes.

The ancestor species probably also had lumen – there are some copies of various archeological findings that would suggest they had knowledge of it, at least – but this knowledge doesn't seem to stretch back much before them.

"Having fun there?"

"It is very interesting! Most other patrons are from worlds without knowledge about evolution or they're from worlds with humans, so the evolution is likely the same."

Nod. "We probably had similar evolution at least to a point – seems quite coincidental that we'd have such similar-looking species – but I'm not sure what would cause us to diverge?"

"It is more likely that Milliways has a bias for humanoids, it also has a bias towards worlds with Earth. You could pass for a human with unique aesthetic choices."

"So, Martin, how are you handling all these impossible things?"

"I am… kind of continuing to be surprised, but it doesn't really matter if I'm hallucinating or dreaming or it's real since I plan to act the same way, for now, anyway?"

"That sounds like a very stressful mindset."

He shrugs. "I'm just basically acting as if it's real but being prepared to wake up and find it's imaginary, so, sort of stressful I guess? But not too bad."

"Do people usually have dreams this vivid?"

"Nope, but usually while I'm dreaming at least things seem vivid even if they're not, until I wake up. And I can seem totally lucid, act like I think I'm lucid, except when I wake up I go 'wait, no, I wouldn't have done that if I were awake, how weird', so, yeah. Provisionally accepting this is real, background awareness that it might not be."

"Still you haven't woken up yet, despite questioning the dream and doing things like reading, which is supposedly impossible in a dream."

"I've thought I was reading in a dream before, words didn't actually make look like words but I didn't realize that until after, still got the meaning out of it like I was reading. Honestly, this definitely could all be a dream, I don't currently have anything that's making me think that's totally unlikely, but I'm gonna act mostly like it's real because I also don't have too strong evidence against that and I'd probably act mostly this way in a dream anyway."

"Oh, okay. That is probably the only thing preventing Trevor from flirting with you, so it might be for the best."

He shrugs. "I've done stuff in my dreams before, but yeah."

"I mean it would make the consent dubious if it went anywhere."

"… I mean, sort of, yes, but if I were going to consent to 'going anywhere', I'd do it with the consent of 'yes I'm consenting in the case that this is real and also in the case that this is a dream', but I get why you'd be wary." He shrugs again. "It's not like I'd force him to accept my consent or anything."

"I think forcing him to that might even alert security, not that you would be able to do much forcing with him being super-strong and all."

"Security?"

"Yeah, in case some starts a fight or tries to something that bothers the other patrons, they have someone on duty, and apparently it is inevitably someone that can keep the peace. Not sure if it is the same guy now, but before it was some sort of not-exactly-a-god called Dream of the endless."

"I bet that explanation didn't help making you believe this is real, right?"

"I mean, it didn't help but it also didn't make it worse, especially since I don't think I would name a god 'Dream of the Endless', but yeah."

"Anyway, how'd you guys get drinks? I don't see a bartender."

The Bar is sentient, female and also can materialize drinks, the first one is free.

He accepts a drink, in that case!

It's blue. Bright blue, though, instead of the dark blue that his hair is, and he seems to like it.

"Heh, how would you name a god?"

"So, what kind of things do people do to get to know each other in your world?"

"I'm not sure! Probably something neat-sounding, like Kalira or something."

"Uh, mainly talk to each other, sometimes over drinks or ice cream or something?"

"That does sound neat. Kalira, Goddess of the Light! I could see some adventure-based game with her or something."

"Well..." Trevor smiles, "would you mind if I paid for your next drink then?"

Fenris meanwhile is still trying to figure out the evolutionary origins of lumen.

Itaruko smiles. "Sure, in a bit?" He indicates his current drink, which is not yet finished.

There is in fact not much information on the origins of lumen. If he looks in some other books, or asks Itaruko to fetch some, overall there have been some recent studies into it that haven't found anything major and prior to that… not much research into it at all.

Wait, people are not actually curious?

"Sure, that is what I meant."

Apparently people are not that curious! Or perhaps it just hasn't occurred to them to look into it. Or perhaps there's some ominous effect in the world that makes people very uncurious about such things.

Weird.

"So, tell me more about yourself?" Trevor inquires.

Anti-curiosity effect isn't the first thing in Fenris' mind. He reads some more, especially on how you go about using lumen.

"Did I tell you where I was from? Eiro, small town in Serenta, about twenty kilometers from the nearest civilized area, a city called Ouran, has a nice market every midweek. I'm currently living in Rhunya, the– uh, I think it's the biggest city in Kerune? It's the capital city, at least, has quite a large population, and am at university for psychology and math."

It doesn't have a very clear description about how to use lumen, but apparently they do have some therapy courses where they try to rehabilitate people with its use and go through the steps quite slowly and thoroughly as a sort of meditation exercise. It seems to be approximately grabbing hold of a space, trying to conjure lumen there, and then twisting.

They don't seem to have very precise instructions on how to do it, only the previous vague overview.

"Oh, cool. Do you already have a specific career in mind or do you just like the subjects?"

"Itaruko? I would like to test something."

"No specific career yet, just like the subjects," responds Itaruko. "Maybe experimental psychology or something." He turns to Fenris. "Anything in particular?"

"See if I can use lumen."

"I'd expect you to be able to, but if you've never heard of it or seen it before, that's– kind of weird? It'd suggest you can't do it."

"I was thinking it could be some kind of ambient effect from your world if it isn't just a species feature," Fenris shrugs, "it is an easy enough test."

"Okay, um. What do you need to know, because this sounds– difficult to describe, if you want to ask me how I do it and just copy that."

"I'm already used to unusual mental actions, but do you have a better metaphor?"

He demonstrates the "unusual mental actions" by making a gust of cold wind. He then tries lumen and fails.

So he goes through the process of making lumen himself, quite slowly, working out the individual steps in his head…

"It's difficult to describe and it'd be convenient if I could transmit it with some form of telepathy, but unfortunately I'm lacking such a thing. Uh. Try to 'grab' a bit of air – keep it quite small, maybe like ten centimeters in diameter – and then try to push something into it and also try to make it bright, and sort of– you know the difference between thinking of moving your arm and actually moving it? Try to do that with the pushing and brightening action." Pause. "I think if I didn't know what I was talking about, in my head, I would even have difficulty following that set of instructions, so I doubt you'll get anywhere with it."

Fenris tries that. Fails again.

"Would you mind opening the door to your world just so I can try in there?"

"Sure?" he says. "I'd rather you not, like, go around and terrorize all the non-magical inhabitants with your air thing, though, just in case you had plans to do that."

And assuming he doesn't get a worrying response to that, he'll open the door! (On the other side is a small hallway.)

"I promise not to." Fenris steps in and tries again and fails.

"Still no luck?" asks Itaruko.

"Apparently not." Fenris shrugs stepping in. "Too bad you weren't around when there were patrons that could analyze magic."

"I continue to not think it's magic, so it might actually not work too well with the whole analyzing magic thing, but yeah, would've been neat if they could determine that for sure."

"Still looks pretty magical," says Martin.

"Yeah, but still could be biological. I think there have been studies, even if maybe not very many."

"There had been a disappointing small number of studies, even if one didn't consider the possible uses that the underlining principles would have if harnessed."

"I am pretty sure I can't do anything obviously 'magical' in the same way, at least not unless there are some obvious things that I'm overlooking that you can't do? It can do small changes in temperature, it can do lighting which is useful if you're in a dark place – actually, yeah, that might mean we have fewer lightbulbs than you do or something? Or lower tech, I'm not sure? It can also do diagrams, it's useful in teaching, it's useful in showing things – like that globe I did earlier – and I feel like not having it would just be really frustrating in lots of small ways but you've probably got around it a lot?"

"I was thinking how it can transmit or manifest energy apparently without crossing the intervening space. If there was a technological way to do that better, you might be able to transmit information secretly, or maybe through physical barriers depending on how it works."

"… We could already do it by just forming lumen through a wall or something, if we want to do it nearby? But it's difficult to get much range on lumen, and I haven't heard of it being done technologically though it should presumably be possible, so I wouldn't expect developments to be made very quickly."

"I meant something that worked through large distances, presuming that machines have more power for that kind of thing."

"Well. There might be some inherent limit to distance, though if there is I don't actually know of one, since people's ranges vary, but yes, that would probably be possible and could be useful? Huh. I don't think anyone's done anything with that, at least, though maybe they looked into it and found it was a dead end?"

"Maybe they didn't, it was very under researched."

"I haven't really thought about it before. It's just– present and used for specific things and it's limited? I don't know. People have researched things like prosthetic legs, but you can't just lose your ability to do lumen in an accident – unless you get brain damage or something, I suppose – so it's not the same sort of thing and I guess it's possible nobody's actually looked into replicating the ability with technology?"

"The lumen is limited, but how it works, the underlying principles, whetter they are magic or not, have potential to be useful. If all you could do was create a machine that increase its range you could have communication with little infra-structure necessary that works through barriers - it would be very useful during a disaster that damaged landlines, or in case you need emergency signals or..." he shrugs.

"Fenris really hates wasted potential."

"Most people have cell phones, so the landline thing isn't really that much of a problem? And we have a pretty good network as it is, but yeah, it would be useful if we could do something with it technologically."

"Now you are only get him started again."

"If there was a way to transmit heat in the same way, I am certain there would medical benefits, cauterization without the need of invasive surgery, maybe operating tumors that would be too dangerous to remove otherwise. It is possible, maybe likely, that nothing useful would come out of it, but as far I can tell the topic isn't researched enough."

"It doesn't get anywhere near that high in temperature, it's difficult to put lumen near someone else and it's easy for them to remove it, and it's probably difficult to be that precise with it, but I guess if you're using technology then that last thing isn't a problem and if they're unconscious then it shouldn't matter that they could remove it. The temperature thing, though, it'd just cut out if you tried to get it too high."

"The high heat version would involve technology, I understand the standard limits - what I am getting at, is that even those limits hint at several possibilities."

"Yes, but I mean– it is actually impossible for most people to get more than a couple of degrees difference, and I'm pretty sure that if you tried to go higher than approximately twenty, it would stop. I mean, admittedly I haven't actually got some technology to go replicate it so this is all 'well I don't think it would' and whatever, but– like, if you try to get something too bright with people around, it won't go high enough to do permanent damage, people contest it and stop it from going that high, and if you tried to get something really hot for cauterization, that would harm people – even though in the long run it would help – so they'd contest it and it wouldn't work? I'm pretty sure, at least."

"… Do they not need to be conscious to contest it?"

"… I don't actually know if anyone's tested it, but I am reasonably confident that if you tried blinding someone with it while they were unconscious it wouldn't work?"

"Are you sure? That sounds like the obvious kind of thing to try if you want to hurt someone."

"Wow, Fenris, maybe you should try cockblock even more than you already did and talk the many ways your abilities could be turned for evil."

"Well for starters people don't often try to blind people, but it doesn't work if you do it with lumen and they're awake – like I said, they contest it. And then if you've put someone unconscious already, you could blind them by, I don't know, using some sharp implement – there's no need to try to pull their eyelids up and use lumen to blind them with no guarantee it'll even work?"

"I was thinking in the past, at some point in your history when the world was more brutal. It would be likely that at some point someone would be cruel enough and curious enough to try that."

"… Wars were very brutal and result in severe losses and there's basically unanimous agreement that they're terrible and even if we hated each other we should try diplomacy and then spiteful political comments instead of resorting to them." Pause. "Do you still have war?"

"He didn't mean that was a thing people should try, just something people are likely to try. And yeah, we do still have war... You don't?"

"Not on any large scale, no! Are they small-scale wars? Because ours used to be small and ended up resulting in mass casualties to all participants, because it is horrific."

"It definitely is horrific, yeah, and there are lots of casualties, but people still don't seem to stop?"

"Why the hell not?" Pause. "Okay, that's a stupid question because I know people can be really frustratingly obtuse, yeah, but– diplomacy is not that hard, and my world seems to have moved to that fine about as soon as we started doing proper civilization instead of, like, wood huts on the plains or whatever?"

The triplets are astonished and silent.

"Wood huts?"

"I was being facetious – I don't know if we actually lived in wood huts before major civilization or what, I wasn't around then and I haven't studied history much."

"Okay... have you ever heard of a thing called atomic bomb?"

"… I think I have? – Wait, did you guys actually use one of those on each other?"

"Yes. Humans are a brutally war-faring species, and have used them twice."

"Twice in the same war, seventy years ago. Don't scare the poor guy."

"And it didn't, I dunno, irradiate your whole continent?"

"Ah, we have multiple continents, and even then it only was dangerous to a couple of towns and their surroundings."

"We have, like, three landmasses or something – the main one, and then you have temporary and less-temporary ice bits around the poles." He sighs. "Well, it's good that it didn't cause huge damage, in that case. I don't think I got to see Earth – you got distracted by the lumen and then I didn't get to asking about it."

Bar provides maps. "Here is where they detonated the bombs. We're from here, which is also the country that built and deployed them."

"Are you going to freak out that it was during World War Two?"

"… No, I kinda expected that if you were still doing wars there would have been more than two? Unless it's just that it was the second world war."

"The second and last world war. We still have them, and had many before."

"Okay, so what, do you just have a bunch of small conflicts at your borders now?"

"It is not that simple? Often the issue is securing resources and strategic influence. There is next to zero conflict in the borders of the united states, but we deploy our troops to other parts of the globe," Fenris head tilts, "do your world doesn't have resource scarcity? It sounds like a pretty multiversal cause of conflict."

"… There exists trade, though – if we want something, we have something that they want, whether resources or labor, so we can usually get it. Or we can get it through some other group who got it from the first one, and usually not everyone is enough of a dick to each other that you can't just get it by proxy?"

"Sounds nice," says Martin. "Doesn't seem to work that way where we're from."

"There is trade, but various groups might not be satisfied with the terms of trading, others will want to monopolize the resources for power. What happens if someone can't get a resource in your world?"

"… It depends on what sorts of resources you mean, but usually if people 'monopolize resources for power' then they end up being traded with less. Which is usually not in their interests so they stop relatively quickly? And yeah, they might not be happy with the terms, in which case they need to find something else to offer if they are that desperate about having it, not resort to conflict really?"

"...And your world never had imperialism? Inequity of military capability such that one group could just invade and take people's stuff?"

"Not to the extent you seem to be suggesting, but when one group was more technologically advanced they didn't invade and take, or I dunno, maybe they did and the natives got wiped out or something and I haven't heard about it, that'd be pretty horrible, but now at least we're all about equal and we have agreements set up and stuff?"

"Well, there is lot of that, in our world, empires where a land subjugated another land, draining its resources and ending its culture or keeping it stunted. With after effects until this day even after the fall of the relevant empire."

"Huh, okay. … How big are these empires, number of people? Order of magnitude?"

Fenris retrieves some history books for help.

"What a cheerful conversation topic," Trevor comments to Martin and Felix.

"Yeah," shrugs Martin. "Oh well."

After a few moments, Itaruko declares, "Your world has quite a few more people than ours. Like, almost two orders of magnitude more."

"That does make the fight for resources to be less intense. I wonder if your species is less fertile than ours?"

"Wait your world haven't broke the one hundred million mark?"

"Okay, so one and a half orders of magnitude – we're at like a hundred and fifty million. And I have no idea about the fertility but we have three species and don't typically produce offspring with each other, though it's possible."

"And you are concentrated in the same landmass, so I guess it would be harder to have large technologic differences. So, I guess it makes sense, but is still impressive."

"I mean, it'd still be possible. What with the mountains and volcanoes and large plains. But yeah."

"Oceans are huge obstacles, you can't settle on oceans, and for most of history people have been dependent on the weather or supplies or simply knowing how to navigate the huge blue expanse."

He shrugs. "We haven't had anything major like that, no."

"Well, congratulations on your utopia. Fenris will be quietly seethe with jealousy about it."

"I mean, there are problems, but they're nowhere near war, so yeah."

"Sounds nice."

"Extremely nice, I don't even know how to begin quantifying all the problems that you would avoid by having a peaceful non-imperialistic history."

"And I, fortunately enough, and from such a place and so don't know them. We still had plagues and things, it hasn't been a perfect utopia or anything, but yeah, probably a lot better."

"Well, I shall seethe with less jealousy then."

"Anyway – since I haven't met any humans before, because I'm pretty sure you don't exist on my planet, what are you like? So far it looks sort of like you're the average of the three species. Ish. No vibrant hair, no colorful eyes, no stripes, no pointy ears…?"

"No, dude. Clearly the three species are derived from humans. Just add vibrant hair, colorful eyes, stripes, etc."

Fenris checks with Bar if there are humans in Itaruko's universe.

Nope. Perhaps one of the ancestors was, but if they were it's not published in any clear way.

"… I mean, that's possible, but you could have just evolved from one of us, too? Or, I dunno, got a really boring hybrid somehow?"

"No, we have evolutionary ancestors and everything. The similarity is just Milliways being human-centric."

"Well, we have them too, and I'm pretty sure none of them are exactly yours, but yeah."

"No. I meant that we evolved completely separately and the fact that we look this similar is just Milliways catching species that look similar to human."

Nod. "Any more questions about lumen then? Or, I guess, any of the species on my planet or whatever?"

"Not in the moment. I guess you could give book recommendations so we can bring some home. We know someone that does magical translation. Felix likes terrible trashy romance novels."

He laughs a bit, but does make some suggestions. Including for terrible trashy romance novels, with a variety of 'protagonists' as it were.

Other than the terrible trashy romance novels, he has quite a good selection of different genres, both fiction and nonfiction.

Felix can't wait to dig in this new world of terrible, terrible clichés. They buy the various books and leave them back in their own world (there is an assortment of various things parked on the other side of the door in the triplets' world.

Martin also buys some of the suggestions! And if the superhero world has any interesting books that he probably doesn't have, he would also like suggestions from them.

Itaruko is also interested in suggestions, and gets some from Martin too.

It turns out there are a lot of divergences in the media between the triplets' and Martin's universes. They both have Harry Potter, and the first three books look identical, but it was never as successful despite having a total of ten books instead of seven. Unsurprisingly there is more super-hero based literature, since it reflects real life. Felix makes a lot of suggestions – he also likes good books.

Well that's cool. Fortunately he has some money right now – yay summer jobs – so he can buy quite a few of the suggestions!

Itaruko is sure his father wouldn't mind if he bought lots of things for potential future profit.

The fact that he can read a bunch of extra-universal books back in his own universe is just a nice perk.

Most of the books are not in any language that Itaruko can speak, but they can run a fairly advanced translator for his benefit. Would Martin like some donations? Felix reads fast and his brothers don't share his tastes, so there are a lot of books they are willing to donate.

Ooh, yes, he would like some donations.

Itaruko was planning on translating the first few pages of a few books as they appear to him, if that's a thing he can do with the translation effect, and maybe a bit more, and then they can probably work out a lot of the grammar and quite a lot of the vocabulary as necessary.

Probably better to run the advanced translator, though. There are almost certainly words that aren't obvious from context, or that don't translate as a one-to-one.

Donations issue!

They leave the translator running. As long it is returned the translator (but not the translations, they have to pay for the original books) are free.

And Itaruko: continues to be half naked! Well, in just boxers. So. Yeah, half-naked.

It's not like Martin has changed clothing in this time, either.

Fenris is honestly considering skinny-dipping in the lake outside, that should illustrates his thoughts on nudity.

The door opens again, and in walks: a naked male.

Wholly naked.

His eyes have an amber sclera, and his pupil seems to be small and slightly slitted. There is no visible iris.

"Hi, newcomer!" Fenris says with unusual brightness. "Welcome to Milliways. This is an interdimensional bar that takes patrons from around the multiverse and is currently having a sleepwear themed day."

Trevor snickers.

"Hi..."

"Um," he says, quite eloquently. Then he looks down. Then back up. Then down again.

And only now does he cover himself. Somewhat ineffectually. With his hands.

Itaruko seems to have noticed the newcomer's eyes! He raises an eyebrow in response.

"Here," Felix retrieves a pair of shorts from Bar and throws then at the new arrival.

He catches them and stands there for a moment. Then puts them on.

"Um."

"Perhaps a weird question, but are you a Rhune?"

He looks at Itaruko with his amber eyes, blinks, and then says, "… Yes?" Then looks at him a bit more. "You're a Luna, right?"

"Yup."

"And the four of us are the mythical race know as humans."

"… You look more like a Rhune with contact lenses, gotta say. Really good whole-eye contact lenses. Or something. Maybe a Luna-Rhune hybrid who got Luna eyes and who dyed their hair."

"Thanks...?"

… That was more an observation, not a compliment, but sure.

"Interdimensional bar?"

"Apparently," says Martin. "Still pretty sure it's real, but like, no absolutely incontrovertible evidence."

"It is totally a bar, first drink is free. I would recommend you wash your hands first, we know where they have been."

"Is there a bathroom around here somewhere then…?"

Martin points, helpfully!

And off he goes to wash his hands.

"I wonder if he is from another version of your world or the same one."

Then he is back! "Someone said something about a drink?"

"Sure, just ask Bar, she will make it appear out of nothing, because why the hell not?"

"Sounds like a useful skill to have," he says.

"She has good suggestions, too," says Itaruko. "I'm Itaruko, by the way."

"Matil," he responds, and then asks for a suggestion.

He gets a red and white swirled– something.

"I am Trevor, these are Fenris and Felix, we are triplets from the same world."

"Martin," says Martin. "From a boring Earth, which is kinda like your place and has humanoid creatures on it but we only have the one species, humans, who look like an average of your species, sort of."

"Huh."

Matt sips at his drink. It is, in fact, delicious.

"Boring Earth is sort of an standard for Milliways visitors, many worlds are less boring version of boring Earth, ours has magic and super-heroes, like us."

"Magic and superheroes? Or are the superpowers the magic you're talking about?"

"Superheroes are the magic. Fenris you are our go to guy for non-scary demonstration."

Fenris flies. He also makes some cold wind to further demonstrate.

Matt looks suitably impressed, then asks, "Non-scary demonstration? Are the others inherently scary?"

"Well, Felix's powers are fire and super-speed. The latter isn't that scary but tends to surprise people too much. I am super-strong, durable and can control earth and those are kind of hard to demonstrate here without causing damage we'd need to fix or throwing something heavy..."

Fenris makes an ice-club and offers it to Matt.

Matt eyes it but accepts it and looks at Fenris confusedly.

"He wants to show off his durability. This won't hurt him. Swing it as strongly as you can. Felix will pick up any stray ice bits."

"… Um. I'm not sure I'm really okay with this buuuut if he's sure?" he asks, looking at Trevor for confirmation.

"Go ahead!" Trevor says brightly.

He even puffs his chest and makes a pose with his hand on his hips.

… Oookay.

Well, Matt will just go ahead and do that, not that hard but still probably hard enough to leave a bruise on a normal person.

Trevor doesn't even flinches the ice club breaks in a dozen pieces and Trevor's chest is just slightly damp with a few ice bits.

"Aww, there was no need to be cautious. I took gunshots and didn't feel anything."

Felix already collected the bits of ice (no one saw when) and is now evaporating them inside a metallic bowl.

"I mean, I can do it again if you're sure you're okay, but, y'know, don't tend to hit people that hard."

"Oh, well, I did wanted to show off. I couldn't while these two did it all night. Hey, Fenris! Why didn't you come up with the club idea before?"

"It was more crowded and for all I know someone was allergic to water or something."

"Like, because that's a common precaution you have to take, or were there other species in here?"

"There were other species. Humans were the majority but definitely weren't the only ones."

"Any other notable ones? And–" he looks around, "did they all look kinda humanoid?"

"Most look humanoid, or have humanoid features? Would you know what a fairy, gnome, centaur or mermaid are?"