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Bella finds it.
"Alli!" she twines. "C'mere."
"You c'mere. Easier for you."
"No, you need to come look at this, seriously."
"Okay, fine, where are you?"
"Garage."
So Alli comes out to the garage. Their parents aren't home; Charlie's working, Renée is volunteering with some of the refugee kids at a shelter, trying to find which have parents who just wound up somewhere else, which need adopting, which are going to wind up coming of age adrift in the bursting-at-the-seams system. It's just them, not attending school, recovering.
"Whoa," says Alli. "So when you said you were at the garage, you meant that you were at the freakish restaurant that someone put in our garage."
"This isn't somebody's idea of remodeling," Bella says. "It's too big to be the garage."
"Do you think it's safe?"
"I think one of you should go in first, for sure."
"We don't actually know if I work that way," say two Alli voices, but Bella pushes one of them towards the door anyway.
Nothing happens.
The Allis converge, inside the bar. Bella follows.
point_b
thinkering
"Quite. I'm gonna see if I can get a door yet."
She tries. No door.
"Okay, I'm between projects and my internal clock thinks it's ten p.m.. If I'm camping out here I should probably get a room."
She tries. No door.
"Okay, I'm between projects and my internal clock thinks it's ten p.m.. If I'm camping out here I should probably get a room."
thinkering
"Thank you. And can I get some pajamas and a toothbrush and stuff like that...?"
Bar provides a neat little stack of items.
"Thanks."
Bar provides a neat little stack of items.
"Thanks."
"We should probably be getting home, too, before our sleep cycles are messed up too much," Helen admits.
"Thanks for giving me the opportunity to use an amplifier again," Marie adds.
"Thanks for giving me the opportunity to use an amplifier again," Marie adds.
"Well, hey, if we're ever in Milliways at the same time again and you need some kind of atmospheric alteration you know who to ask."
thinkering
Lorica, with the arm not occupied by her overnight objects, gives Flicker a hug. "Enjoy your ashbot. If you decide to hang around despite not being so obliged, see you in the morning. Nice to meet you, Verge."
point_b
"It's like noon, maybe one, now? It was pretty early when I found the place, even holding the door as long as we did didn't get us within spitting distance of our parents coming home."
whatamithinking
"Yeah, the only way we're all going to be awake at the same time 'tomorrow' is if Milliways time-warpery shoehorns it."
whatamithinking
"It might well! Particularly given that as far as anyone can tell the time bullshit and the door bullshit are operated by the same entity."
whatamithinking
"No kidding. The only option I can think of that doesn't have really unfortunate implications about their ethics is if the interface got mistaken for a video game or something and whoever's doing it doesn't realize they're messing with real people."
point_b
"I can't even think of a good video game goal that involves trapping Lorica in here without her computer."
whatamithinking
"Neither can I, but that doesn't mean no one could," she shrugs. "And some people are just trolls. Which doesn't actually say terrible things about their ethics if they don't know people they're trolling are real."
point_b
"Yeah, I guess. I tend to be nice to my game people if I'm playing Civilization or whatever, but Alli drowns Sims and laughs."
whatamithinking
"I don't tend to play video games since the lack of minds behind the characters puts me off, so I can't comment on my own habits."