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give me the wretched refuse of your teeming shore
huddled masses is working for wolfram & hart now and celegorm is very disappointed
Permalink Mark Unread

She's looking for paper. 

She's not, like, the sort of person who usually goes wandering around places she hasn't been before, OK, she knows that's a really good way to get yourself killed, but she really needs paper if she wants to be able to print out some paperwork that she has to get in by noon, and not getting your paperwork in on time is also a great way to get yourself killed, so her options at this point are not great. This is getting to be kind of a theme in her life right now. She kind of wants to just give up. But if she gives up she'll, well, get herself killed, and then her kids will either be handed over to her parents or become wards of the state or something even worse, and she can't let the thing that she gets killed over be her failure to keep her printer stocked with paper, can she?

She finds the office supply closet fine. She finds some paper. And then she tries to open the door to return to her desk, and -

There is an inexplicable bar with galaxies out the window.

She closes the door. Opens it again. Still has a weird galaxy bar. She shuts it and opens it again, just to be sure that her options really are going places she's not supposed to go or starving to death inside the supply closet.

Eventually she wanders into the bar, stares out the window clutching her stack of printer paper, and tries not to give into complete despair about how she is definitely not getting her paperwork in on time.

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There's someone sitting at the bar. Drinking. Not a familiar species. It takes him a few seconds but then he turns his head and -

"Karen?"

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Oh no.

"...Hello? I'm - sorry - I didn't mean to bother you I'm just - kind of lost right now - "

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"You're here! How are you here - are you okay -"

He stands up and takes several steps towards her, not entirely steadily.

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She steps back a few steps.

"I'm - fine really," she says, despite looking nothing at all like a person who is fine.

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He stops walking when she starts backing up. "Okay. Uh, the place is called Milliways. It's an interdimensional bar. It pauses your dimension of origin when you come in, so you should probably stay in, I've been telling people from hells to stay here until we can do something about them - unless - were you someplace nice -"

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- well, no. 

But - it could be a test of some kind - why are people bothering to test her - is this a security issue - is she going to get into trouble for not reporting a security issue - can she even report this from here - it's not like that's going to matter if she ends up in the wrong place -

 

"I - is this still Wolfram & Hart - "

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"Wolfram and Hart? You were at Wolfram and Hart? I have no reason to think they have any power here. Milliways doesn't claim affiliation with -" vague handwave - "anybody."

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" - ok. I need to - do the stairs go anywhere?"

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"Rooms. We can reserve one at the bar."

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" - ok. I need to - is there - I'm sorry, I'm just really - who are you?"

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"Right. Okay. We - knew each other. About two years ago, by how I've been counting time, but - it looks like it's been longer for you, and maybe it's been a lot longer. Do you remember anything about - about Sunnydale, or about Arda -"

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"...no?"

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" - okay. That's fine. The thing that's important is that you're okay. Or at least - 

- I was worried you wouldn't want to exist anymore -

- why don't I call someone down here to watch the door and then we can get you some food and some movies and I can explain everything when you're ready -"

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"I just - that sounds great, thank you, but I, uh, I really really need to get back to my desk before someone notices I'm missing - "

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"Milliways pauses time in the dimension you left from. It won't start again until we open the door. 

-- back to your desk?"

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"Yes, I have - there's paperwork and it's due and I really don't want to be a problem because - I don't know what the new management wants yet and I wanna make sure I don't do anything really stupid, like running into an inter-dimensional bar that opened out of the supply closet and assuming that this is enough of an excuse to just ignore everything."

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"Wolfram and Hart is the interdimensional evil law firm. They - sell people to hell dimensions and do ritual human sacrifices and keep serial killers out of trouble and egg on planetary wars and so on."

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" - yes. This is why I don't expect being in another dimension to be enough to protect me."

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"Why do you work there?"

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" - well what do you expect me to do, quit?"

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"- I am mostly just confused about how this happened in the first place.

I think I may actually be confused about several other things. Do you remember anything that happened in 1996?"

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"...We re-elected Clinton? The first pokemon games came out?"

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"How long has it been since then for you?"

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"Sevenish years...?"

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"And what happened during those seven years?"

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"...we elected Bush...?"

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"To you."

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"Um - " 

- it's not really like she can get anywhere without cooperating with - whoever this person is. Probably.

"Uh - I moved in with my sister, sister had a baby, we started a... business thing, sister died, I took out a loan to keep the business going, business went under anyway, I failed to evade vampire debt collectors, was offered legal counsel and protection and a job by - this place. Which, you know, will also kill me, but pays enough to feed the kids in the mean time, so - really gotta get back to my desk."

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"Okay. I don't think you've forgotten me, actually, I think you're from a parallel universe. 

 

In my universe Karen was the vampire slayer and a hero and saved lots of people and at least one world before she died."

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" - oh."

As if she didn't hate herself enough already.

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"But like, you know, I'm sure the bad guys -" sigh. 

"Can you come upstairs with me, please?"

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She looks around for other exits. 

" - you're sure this place isn't spatially connected to the Wolfram & Hart offices?"

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There's a back door that leads outside. 

 

"I've been here for a year and haven't seen anything consistent with that. And this place isn't evil, so."

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"Oh. Well. It's just - upstairs is where the CEO lives. Exists. I guess he's not alive." At this point she'd probably only be able to get back to her desk in a timely manner if she found an axe or something and tunneled through the supply closet walls, and they just repainted everything from the zombie attack, and anyway destroying the property would probably get her in lots more trouble than not having the paperwork in time, so -

" - but yeah. If - yeah. Sure."

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"We're just going to where my family's staying. They're all alive. We're not going to kill you. I'm not going to pretend meeting Karen's mildly evil alternate universe version is the best thing that happened all week but - I'm sure it's complicated, right? And even if it's actually not complicated and you just really like trafficking baby demons and bribing juries to let off child molesters I don't believe in letting people go to Hell."

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- she does not really like doing those things but she's not feeling like getting into her personal moral convictions or lack thereof is going to go super well for her here. It doesn't usually.

"OK. If you think it'll - sure."

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It's three flights of stairs. He knocks on a door. Another person - same species, this one dressed as a Catholic priest - opens it.

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"Karen -"

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"Nope! Well, yep, that's still her name but this is an alternate universe Karen. Works for Wolfram and Hart. Someone needs to go downstairs and cover for me -"

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"On it."

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"Wolfram and Hart?"

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"What do you suppose is the evillest thing you've done in any universe?"

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"She's pretty skittish, nobody act menacing. I don't actually - know what we're supposed to do here but I couldn't let her walk back into Wolfram and Hart."

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He nods and steps back from the door.

 

The suite of rooms contains five people of this species, some books, some computers, two beds that are not being used, eight desks that are all being used well past their capacity, with papers spilling off the sides, and some magical experiments.

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"You should get her another room, those could be dangerous," someone says without looking up.

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"I can't have her alone with me! She's terrified of me!"

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"Is that better with six of us -"

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"Lúthien thought -"

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"Go downstairs and get her pizza and ice cream and some DVDs and then step through to our side and call Azalea and tell her to bring Wishbone."

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- nod.

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"Karen, I'm really glad you're here. Don't touch the magic experiments, please. There's a chair over there. Michael can sit with you while you wait. If we need you to do anything else, we'll tell you. There are magical protections on Milliways, powerful ones, and I don't think Wolfram and Hart can possibly find you here, but we're going to take some measures to be more sure of that, all right?"

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(She has at this point been mentally trying to disappear for at least a minute.)

- it's not really herself she's worried about, is it, it's what happens to her kids if she doesn't figure out how to keep things smoothed out, but if she tells these ones anything else about her kids then they'll know and she isn't really super confident that they're - friendly.

Her money should all eventually be accessible to her kids. Hopefully. There's some percent chance that Wolfram and Hart somehow has power over it and uses it as leverage to get her kids to do awful things, but she doesn't know how to guard against that, so -

- she can't do anything about any of this anyway.

She nods and sits down in the chair and doesn't say anything.

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He sits with her and doesn't say anything. He might be praying. It's not entirely clear.

 

Everyone else has returned to work. 

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She'll just... sit. And try not to melt into a puddle.

This isn't great but she's not sure how to improve on it.

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He comes back up a couple minutes later. "Called Azalea. Got the room across the hall -- can you do whatever to it so we can be sure that --"

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"Yep. What's the room number?"

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"407."

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"This numbering system -"

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"Thought you'd say that."

 

He walks over to Karen. "Okay, which is worse: pizza, or no pizza?"

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She is kind of hungry and will eventually starve if she doesn't eat anything.

She is also kind of unsure what the full range of potential consequences of eating food given to her by Wolfram & Hart enemies is.

She's not sure she can make herself do generalized poison testing with people watching her but it's hypothetically plausible that they might eventually stop watching her.

"I'm - not really hungry but maybe I'll wanna have it here for later?"

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He sets it down. "Ice cream or no ice cream?"

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Can't do generalized poison testing for ice cream before it melts.

"I don't think I need ice cream. Thank you."

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"Star Trek or no Star Trek."

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"Star Trek is... fine."

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"Princess Bride or no Princess Bride."

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- how do these people even - maybe she and the other Karen really are the same person and the other one just made all of the right decisions and she's made all the wrong ones -

"...Princess Bride sounds ok."

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" - hug or no hug."

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"....m'good."

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“You wanna be alone? Once the room’s secure and everything?”

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She is not going to succeed at poison-testing this pizza until people stop looking at her. If nobody is looking at her then it's possible that Wolfram & Hart will find her and retrieve her without anyone else knowing about it, and this could be slightly good or really really bad depending on a bunch of stuff.

"Whatever's convenient for you."

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Sigh. "Okay, once they're sure it's safe I'll set up the movies and leave you alone."

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"Sounds good."

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And about ten minutes later - "all right, all set."

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"Thank you." 

 

He leads her across the hallway. This room is identical, except that it doesn't have a ton of people in it and it has a TV. He gets the movie running. 

"When you're hungry, you need to come get me. This is important because sometimes rooms in Milliways get disconnected and run at different speeds from each other, so it could easily be ten hours in here before it's been five minutes for me. Are you going to be able to do that?"

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- she will probably not literally starve in this room rather than get someone. At least they won't be able to tell which part of the movie she should be on.

"Yeah. I can do that."

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"I don't mean 'will you manage before you actually die', I'd like you to come get me when you're hungry.  Or want another movie. Or want a puppy to kick, or - whatever, just, I'll be really unhappy if you're sitting in there suffering for hours while I don't have any idea, okay?"

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Very unclear on how saying no could possibly help her here.

"I'll be fine."

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He looks very frustrated and unhappy, but he leaves.

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Oh good. Probably. 

She waits five minutes, counting in her head. It occurs to her that she can't keep good time without the movie going, so she mutes it rather than pausing. Edibility testing is really for wild plants, not for if someone gives you an inedible pizza, but it's not like she has any better way of making sure the food they're giving her is safe to eat, so she's kind of short on options. At least if the pizza is normal pizza it'll probably mean all the other food is however safe the pizza is.

She touches the center with one hand and the crust with the other. Gonna have to wait eight hours to see if it's contact poisonous. That's, like, five Princess Bride runthroughs.

She hates her life. She hates her life so much.

She paces and she prays. She doesn't pray as often as she used to, because she's kind of unsure who's running this show, at this point, but it's not against the rules and she wants the kids to be OK and it seems like it might plausibly help.

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I just would not have expected 'joined the side of evil' to be a mistake Karen would make!

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There's a lot of mistakes out there to make.

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I know that. But this is a weird one. Wolfram and Hart! They're not secretly evil but get you once you're already stuck, they practically advertise that they're evil. 

 

She's convinced I poisoned the pizza. Why would I do that? Even if I wanted her dead, why would I do that?

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Are you still drunk?

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Little bit. Not that much. I'm working on it.

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Why don't you get some sleep, I can be here when she comes out.

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What if she means to come out before she starves to death but overestimates herself and faints before she gets to the door and doesn't wake up and by the time we go in there there's just a - fossilized skeleton -

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Then we'll have to get two of them back.

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He doesn't sleep but he showers and puts on normal human clothes and drinks some water and wanders downstairs to check on whether Azalea's come (it has been five minutes downstairs, so she hasn't) and goes back up.

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She's not gonna eat this pizza until she's run a full edibility test, and a full edibility test takes two days.

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If he were aware of this he'd be very upset about it but you can't read minds through closed Milliways doors.

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Eventually she eats the pizza. It's kind of stale from being out for two days, but it doesn't make her sick or mindwipe her or strip her of her will or make her incapable of thinking straight or make her incapable of asserting falsehoods. As far as she can tell.

If no one's come to get her by that point, she will cautiously open the door and knock on the other one.

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He's actually pacing in the hallway. He looks immensely relieved to see her. "Karen!"

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" - hi. Um. You said to ask for more food at some point."

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"Yep, what do you want?"

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"I don't know? What is there?"

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"The bar's magic, it can make anything you want. If you wanna let it make recommendations they're pretty good ones, too."

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Shrug. "Spaghetti then."

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"Okay. Do you want to come down and get it with me, or stay up here?"

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"I can come down. I guess."

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They go downstairs. There's someone of his species holding the door open; the space is otherwise empty.

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She's... just gonna stand here until someone provides her with food.

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Hello! Can I interest you in a drink? The first one is free, says a napkin that appears out of nowhere.

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"Um. Water. I guess."

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Water's free by default, so you are still entitled to a free drink, says the napkin accompanying this tall glass of ice water.

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"Thanks."

She drinks her water.

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You're welcome.

It's really good water, insofar as water varies.

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She is not really a water connoisseur, but that's nice.

 

 

"Uh... I think I'm supposed to ask for spaghetti?"

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That will be $3.78.

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"Our tab."

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She'll just.... eat her pasta, then.

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It's really good pasta. Very oregano-y.

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She's not really in the mood to politely comment on the pasta quality. Just gonna silently eat until she's done.

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"If you'd like we can get something you can keep in the room, too."

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"Uh, cinnamon roll and a box of granola bars and a pack of bottled water."

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The cinnamon roll comes in one of those fold-up cardboard takeout boxes. The box of granola bars has 200 in assorted flavors and the bottled water is a brandless shrinkwrapped flat of them.

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Probably didn't actually need the water but she's thinking a lot about it because she was avoiding her sink until two hours ago.

"Thank you."

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Any time.

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"Okay. Thanks, Bar. Let's head back up."

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She lugs her food and water upstairs.

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"- I can carry those -"

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"OK."

She hands him her water and granola bars and keeps her cinnamon roll.

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He carries them like his species is much stronger. "Do you want to be alone again or do you want to talk?"

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Shrug. "Good either way."

Actually she will be pretty miserable no matter what, but those both work out to not really having any strong preferences about it.

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"- okay, well, then we're going to talk."

 

He sets her stuff down in her room.

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She sets down her cinnamon roll.

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He sits down and seems to take a bit to come up with anything to say. "So, uh, do you have any ....hobbies?"

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She takes a really abnormally long time to respond to that, because she was not expecting this question. She likes - what does she like. Writing. Reading is not a real hobby. Playing video games with her niece and nephew is also not really a hobby. She feels like she hasn't done anything actually interesting since Azalea died. Maybe writing is enough of an answer and she doesn't have to think of anything else.

"I write fiction sometimes."

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"Do you want paper or pens or anything?"

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"Sure."

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Long pause. "How's Los Angeles?"

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"...It's, you know, a terrible city full of vampires and movie stars."

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"In our timeline you moved to Sunnydale when your parents died."

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"My parents are alive."

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"Well maybe that's what changed. They died in a boating accident when you were fifteen."

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"Weird."

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"Karen activated as the Slayer and moved to Sunnydale and found out about vampires and started fighting them."

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"Huh." At some point he's probably gonna get super annoyed at all of these vague barely-interested sounds, but she doesn't really have a lot of comment on that.

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He's mostly talking to her because solitary confinement is bad for people and who knows how long it'll be until she has someone she trusts. "Uh, and then she did that for a couple years and got sucked into an alternate dimension and saved it from an evil god and came back and - died - and we're working on resurrecting her but haven't gotten it sorted yet. Azalea's really mad at us but she'll come see you."

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Sure she will. "Well. Hope you guys get that sorted, then."

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"Mmhmm.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Do you have any questions?"

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"Um... how does Karen know you?"

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"Uh, she went to confession at Michael's church and he was worried about her so he asked me to look after her and we - got along. Though she might've lived longer without me."

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- super weird because she's not Catholic and has never considered being Catholic. 

"Huh. Well. I'm sorry."

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"Losing people sucks."

She does not really know what else to say about that but it seems like plausibly it deserves some kind of acknowledgement.

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"Okay, I can't think of anything else that isn't about Wolfram and Hart, should I ask about that or should I leave?"

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"I'm good either way." Or at least she does not have a strong preference.

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"Okay. Uh, what do you do at Wolfram and Hart?"

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"Secretarial stuff. I do paperwork and schedule meetings and take phone calls and... stuff."

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"Stuff?"

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"Just, you know, evil law firm assistant stuff. Keeping coffee machines stocked. Getting weird demon snacks for weird demon clients. Emails. Faxes. Calling people to get blood out of the carpets. - like twice, they mostly kill people in meeting rooms."

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"Did the recruiters, uh, claim they were good guys, or..."

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"No? Or, I mean, what, do you start safety negotiations with 'Hi, I'm a good guy, are you also a good guy? Because I am only OK with asking good guys for help defending me from immortal super strong serial killers.'"

- gaaah that was a stupid thing to say why is she stupid.

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"So you ...didn't know their reputation and they offered to protect you?"

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"No, I knew. I just - " - didn't care? But she did, of course she did. Had to protect her kids? But she is not discussing the kids. Was scared? Yeah, that's a great excuse, Karen, great job. "I just, you know, they knew what they were doing, they came the same world the vampires did, and I just - it seemed like I would live longer if I took it. Maybe."

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"Why were there vampires after you in the first place?"

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" - it's dumb. Asked the wrong person for money."

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"I'm sure this has occurred to you, but is it possible the vampires work with Wolfram and Hart to shove recruits their way? And eat the ones who decline, of course."

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"You know, gosh, maybe. That changes the situation so much."

She's stupid, she's stupid, why is she even engaging -

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" - look, I've made a lot of dumb decisions, OK."

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"That doesn't sound like a dumb decision but sure, I believe you."

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"Well, sorry. I don't know what you're looking for here."

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"Picture of the situation? Also sometimes we have to deal with Wolfram and Hart employees and it's useful to know how evil they are versus how stuck. And, like, whether -

 

- I'm really not very good at talking, maybe you should just have these conversations with someone who is -

- hurting people is bad for you, that's not very controversial, right, I'm not going out on much of a limb there?"

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"Hurting people is not my favorite part of my job, no."

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"So, we could imagine that - hurting people is mostly bad for people because it means they get sent to a hell dimension and if you fixed that you'd have fixed everything, problem done, go home. Or we could imagine that hurting people is bad because people have a good angel on one shoulder and a bad angel on the other shoulder and once you're in the habit of listening to the bad angel you'll keep doing it and then you'll be bad in the future even if the circumstances change - I'm oversimplifying, but, some people think about the world as if it works like that, right?"

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"I... guess?"

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"Or you can think about having done something evil as exactly the same as having done some other stuff, no effects at all. Or you could think about having done something evil as needing Macalaurë to go figure out a penance and get it all cleared up with God. Or you could think about having done evil as - having had something bad happen to you, which hurt a lot, and which will probably keep hurting until you fix it - and like, what fits best depends on the person? And depends on the evil? But I mostly find that for most people you have the easiest time predicting them if you just imagine they got hurt a lot. Which is interesting."

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"I should definitely have left this to someone who's good at words. But if you corner someone into shooting a lot of people you traumatize them, right, that's why soldiers come back fucked up, from wars. And they do that exactly the same if they were fighting for the bad side, and I think they do it more if they knew it was the bad side. And - 

- uh, anyway, vampires are not like that, and some humans are probably more like vampires, but it's useful to know whether most people at Wolfram and Hart are like vampires or if they're - cornered and would mostly probably benefit from trauma therapy not that they've noticed."

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"I don't know. Depends on the person, I guess."

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"Who'd have thought. If I were running an evil organization I'd think I'd want to hire evil people for it but I guess maybe the part they like is making normal people do evil things."

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"Really haven't sorted our employees by evil quotient. Though Anna from accounts says she thinks they're gonna try."

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"Really? Why?"

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"I don't know. People don't tell me things. Just, the new CEO is doing a lot of reshuffling people and someone said something about mass aura reading on the top floors, and maybe it filters down."

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"Who's the new CEO?"

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"Vampire named Angel."

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"Angel?"

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"Yeah? I think?"

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"Well that's super weird."

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"...is there context, or...?"

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"Uh I know Angel in our world and he's a good person? Or pretending real effectively. He adopted a lost Slayer and fought the forces of evil and was sad when people died and careful not to injure human enemies and - you know, that kind of stuff. He used to be an evil vampire named Angelus though. Maybe he turned evil again, or never stopped, in your world."

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"He's... a vampire." Also Mr. Kent says he doesn't even have a law degree but this is the sort of complaint that is probably a lot more salient when you're actually, like, a lawyer.

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"He said he had a soul. Was cursed with a soul by the grieving relatives of a girl he murdered. I'm guessing yours didn't so much go that route."

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"I really wouldn't know."

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"Anyway I'd have to look up the details but Angelus was seriously bad news so it's good we're getting you out now."

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"OK. I guess."

Really unclear on what's going to happen to the kids then, or if she can do anything about it from over here. Doesn't super look like it, but maybe she should like, rethink her policy on talking about this problem, given any evidence that they might be sort of possibly actually trying to help her. Maybe. She is undecided.

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"We can figure out a way to get you back to your world, for - anything you might need - but I do not think you should ever show up at Wolfram and Hart again. Angelus's favorite pastime in our timeline was torturing pretty girls to death in elaborate ways and that seems unpromising for your safely getting out of there."

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"Yeah. Probably not."

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"I don't know if we will assassinate him, though, it sounds really dangerous and I'm not actually sure he's worse as a head of Wolfram and Hart than whoever'd replace him. I'm sorry."

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"No, it's - I mean, I don't, uh, know about stuff like that. It's been bad around here for way longer than he's been here anyway."

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"There's a lot of bad stuff in the universe. And it's kind of unclear what most of the good guys are up to."

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"Yeah. I hear that there are good guys. Probably. Somewhere."

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"Karen likes God but I'm pretty pissed at him because he sent her to a hell dimension."

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"I dunno, I feel like I'd forgive him for that. I guess she's better and stuff."

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"I mean, I'll forgive him once he repents."

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Shrug.

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"I could possibly use more DVDs. Or books or something. I guess."

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"Sure thing. What do you want?"

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"I dunno. Haven't seen all the Indiana Jones movies."

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"Okay. I'll nip downstairs for them. If four hours go by before I come back please please come out and knock on the door across the hall or something."

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"OK. I will."

And she is actually intending to do that rather than waiting two days this time.

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Yay.

 

He goes downstairs and gets the movies.

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Then Karen can watch movies. Like, actually watch them this time, even though she is still kind of sort of terrified of Wolfram & Hart recovering and killing her at some point.

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Wishbone runs in the Milliways door before Azalea manages.

WHERE'S THE KAREN TELL ME TELL ME.

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Uh, 407.

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Thank you!

He runs up the stairs.

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Azalea sighs at him. She does not run up the stairs.

 "What do you know about her?"

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"This Karen? Uh, this universe seems similar in many respects to ours, but we haven't asked her too many questions. She's scared of everything, she works for the forces of evil -- well, their law firm in LA -- her parents aren't dead, she's older than ours was --"

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"Great."

She follows the possibly manic dog upstairs.

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Possibly manic dog is continuing to run in what he supposes is the direction of room 407.

KAREN KAREN KAREN WHERE'S THE KAREN.

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Pacing Elf in the hallway points at the door.

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He can't actually open doors, or knock, so he just kind of, like, scratches at it.

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Karen opens the door.

"Hello - ?"

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Karen!!!

Wishbone is gonna jump up several times in his enthusiasm. 

 

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"...does the dog belong to someone...?"

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" - to Karen -"

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"- oh."

She scoops the dog up and hugs him.

"Well. I'm not not Karen, exactly, but I guess I'm probably good enough for you."

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Snuggles!!

Karen's a tough act to follow, really, but I'm sure I'll like you too. Unless your favorite hobby is vivisecting puppies or something.

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"He says 'Karen's a tough act to follow, really, but I'm sure I'll like you too. Unless your favorite hobby is vivisecting puppies or something.' Milliways has a translation effect, Wishbone, I think if you use a sign language she'll just be able to understand it -"

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Do I look like I know how to talk in any human sign languages.

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"He says? The other Karen has a talking dog?"

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"He says 'Do I look like I know how to talk in any human sign languages.' You know a lot of things!!

And yeah, he's actually a squire of a knight of King Arthur's court who got turned into a dog and has been a dog for a long time. Sorry, I should've mentioned."

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" - OK. Well. Sorry for - making totally reasonable assumptions about your linguistic capacities. And the extent to which you're, like, a pet and stuff."

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Oh I'm totally a pet, don't sweat it. I'm just also fifteen hundred years old and an expert on all things magical or literary.

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He conveys this, too.

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"Oh. - how do you know what he's saying?"

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"Telepathy."

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"Oh. OK. Of course."

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"I can keep translating if you want or we can get him a trackpad."

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"That sounds - good. If it's more convenient for you."

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" - which sounds good? Trackpad?"

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"Yeah, sorry, trackpad."

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"Okay." He heads downstairs. "Wishbone, please make her eat if the time dilation means I take forever getting back."

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Duly noted!

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He heads off downstairs to buy a dog communication device.

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- and Azalea finally makes it up the stairs.

She frowns at him when she sees him.

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Yeah he'll just keep going down the stairs.

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Probably for the best. 

"Hey."

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- she has really prepared for this shockingly little given that she's known it was going to happen for almost three days.

She looks exactly like her. She doesn't know if she's really her but she looks exactly like her.

 

"I - "

- she should be saying something but she has no idea what she's supposed to say.

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It takes her a second, but then her expression softens and she sighs. "Yeah, OK, close enough."

She hugs her sister. Not-sister. Whatever.

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She stays frozen for a bit, and then she sobs.

" - you died."

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"Yeah, well, so did you. I guess that makes us even. They working on getting your me back?"

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" - I dunno, I didn't ask, I don't - I don't even know if you're real. They could've - the people I work for, I mean, they can do basically anything, I just don't know why they'd bother with - this - "

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"Meh, I'm not good at the reality check stuff. You seem real enough. Not - mine, quite, but real enough. Maybe I can, like, twenty percent forgive Alex for getting you killed. Your Connor OK?"

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Nodnodnod. At least if they know Connor exists she doesn't have to bother keeping this a secret. "Connor and Zana are fine. Or - they were fine when I left them."

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"I have no idea who that second person is."

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" - oh. She's, uh, your daughter."

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"Huh.

" - with who?"

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"Demon."

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"Huh.

"Well, they want a mom replacement for a bit, or anything?"

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"They probably wanna meet you. I haven't been talking about them to the - people - I didn't know what they knew - "

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"Right, sure. They're, uh, mindreaders, by the way. Like, they don't read everything constantly, but they are mindreaders."

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" - oh. Well. OK. I guess I - failed to get that from 'telepathy'."

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"Yeah. Anyway. They're not gonna eat you or anything. I don't think they wanna get you killed, they just suck real hard at keeping you alive."

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"OK. Well. Maybe, uh, you should talk to them about - stuff. When they get back here with Wishbone's - talking thingy."

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This is kind of a terrible idea.

 

"Yeah, OK."

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He comes back with a keyboard Wishbone can use. 

 

He sets it on the ground and heads for the other room.

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She follows him. 

"Hey. She told me to tell you she has people, back wherever she's from. Connor and another kid."

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He stops. 

Nods. 

"The door to her world is in Wolfram and Hart's office. The evil multidimensional organization whose Earth manifestations are law firms. Our best shot is probably to see if she can also open the door to somewhere else on her world, and if she can't, to drag a couple more people through and see if they can.

 

I - it'll be a disaster if she goes back to Wolfram and Hart. As far as we know, they don't have access to Milliways. We can't let that change."

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"You guys have, like, a plan right now?"

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"Figure out whether new Karen is able to do this. If not, arrange some other form of transit to her dimension."

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This is at least not obviously stupid.

"When're you planning on asking her?"

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"Once she's decompressed a little. Time's frozen in her dimension, Connor and the other aren't missing her or anything."

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Nod.

"You should probably get some board games. And Pixar movies. And clothes, if you expect her to be up here for a bit."

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"Thank you."

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" - yeah. Don't get her killed again, though. Seriously."

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The reason Telvo's at the door and not me is because no one trusts me to shoot her if she tries to go to Wolfram and Hart, he doesn't say.

 

"Yeah."

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"OK."

She heads back to keep her not-sister company.

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Board games! Pixar movies! Some changes of clothes! He knows her size for everything. That's not weird, right?

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Nobody comments on it. They spend a while playing board games and watching Pixar movies and talking through some of the differences of their respective universes. Eventually Karen goes off to find Alex again.

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"Hey."

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"Hi. Uh - Azalea said at some point you wanted me to try opening the door."

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"Sometimes people can open Milliways doors to a location other than the one they entered from. If you could get the door to your home, we could get Connor and - what's her name?"

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"Zana. Uh, Suzanna Tiu."

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Nod. "So we're hoping you can do that. If you can only get the door to Wolfram and Hart, we have other options. But Karen - it's really really important that you don't go through to Wolfram and Hart and let them in here. They'd be able to expand their operations immensely, and everyone everywhere would be in danger. It wouldn't help Connor or Zana, whatever they may have promised -"

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"Yeah. I know."

Maybe it wouldn't be true for everyone, that it couldn't help. But she's not smart enough or special for it to not be true of her. 

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"Okay. Then we can go try it, whenever you're ready."

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"I'm ready. I think. It's just opening a door."

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"Okay."

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So she opens the door.

It still opens to the supply closet.

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"Can you try, like, thinking about the door to your home - concentrating on it maybe -"

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"I can try?"

Still a supply closet.

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"S'okay. We'll figure something else out. Thank you."

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"Yeah. Sorry."

She doesn't know why she's the one apologizing, it's just kind of a reflex.

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He reaches out as if to hug her and then stops himself. "We'll look into this more and let you know if we need anything else from you. I think we might need, I dunno, your original clothes or something for targeting for a dimensional transit spell. Do you want more games in the meantime -"

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"I'm good. Thanks, though."

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He looks at his awkwardly extended arm and pulls it back. "Well. Knock if you need anything."

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Nodnod.

She'll just... wait. With her probably not a trick replacement sister and the other Karen's immortal dog.

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It's not a very long wait. "So the best option for transit actually needs about fifteen pounds of stuff from the target dimension, thirty if we want to send two people. I don't suppose your paperwork was very very heavy?"

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"No. There's - probably that much stuff in the supply closet, though?"

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"- yeah, probably. Are you okay opening the door again so we can haul it out? I could sense if anyone was approaching."

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"Yeah. I can do that. Doesn't sound very hard."

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"Okay."

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So she opens the door again.

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He decides to leave some probably-just-cleaning-chemicals alone and haul a mop and a fire extinguisher and a bucket out instead.

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And someone else walks through one of the walls and into Milliways.

 

"Well. This's weird."

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- well, mops can be stakes pretty fast. 

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The mop goes through him, but with a lot less resistance than if it were piercing flesh. None at all, in fact. 

"Yeah, that's not gonna work for you."

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"That's odd, it worked fine last time. Karen, close the door -"

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She closes the door.

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"Last time? Never seen any of you before in my life. Or unlife. Whichever."

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"Alternate dimension. You and your girl came after my slayer, you lost, you died. So did she. She was very upset about it, saw it coming." He's backing away from the magic door.

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He looks like he is trying to put some things together.

" - OK. Which slayer was this?"

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"Karen. Sunnydale. I know in your universe Karen never activated, but I don't know who they got instead. Obviously she was less thorough about disposing of you." Is he moving away from the door at all.

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Spike is hanging out where he is, completely unworried. "I dunno, I'm a lot of the way gone. Ghost and all. How long has this place been down here?"

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"You'd have to ask her." He points at the bar.

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"Huh. Pity I can't drink."

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(Karen is not really super sure what's going on, but she's going to walk away from... this. She heads vaguely towards the stairs.)

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"She's pretty inventive, maybe there's something for ghosts."

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"Wouldn't bet on it. So what're you lot doing down here? Picked the wrong door for a theft."

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"Oh, but see, there are antique stores that pay top dollar for Wolfram and Hart buckets. And mops, but I doubt I can sell them on this one now."

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"Very believable story you have there."

He wanders away from the door and into the rest of the room, looking to see what's around.

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Away from the door is good, looking at everything else is bad.

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There's a bar and some sitting areas and a door on the other side which opens to outside.

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Boring. He can just pretend to sit on a table until Angel and the others get down here to deal with whatever this all is.

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Once Spike's far enough from the door he opens it himself so Spike can't use it to get back.

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Spike frowns at the door.

"Hey, where all does that thing go?"

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"Not back to Wolfram and Hart. I'd say sorry, but I'm really not."

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"Why would I wanna go back there? Got someone in Europe, is all." He frowns. "Suppose that's not much in the way of an address."

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" - so you don't work at Wolfram and Hart, you just sniff around their basement sometimes?"

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"Haunting it. Involuntarily."

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"I thought you and Angelus were ...acquainted."

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"Oh, Angel's as eager to have me gone as I am. Much rather focus on saving pretty werewolves and complaining about how very hard it is living on top of the world."

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" ...saving...pretty...werewolves?"

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"Really throws himself into it. Only if they're pretty, otherwise he kills them with pens. Apparently."

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"Doesn't really seem like you'd need Wolfram and Hart's resources for that."

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"You would think! No idea why he took the job, really, he spends half his time fighting his own people. Maybe it was the cars."

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"Was the thing where debt-collecting vampires menace pretty young women into Wolfram and Hart's arms his idea, or is that the previous administration?"

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"Man, I dunno, I'm just here to annoy people. Doesn't sound like Captain Forehead's idea, though."

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This is going nowhere. He leans unhappily against the door - on their end it opens to a secure Bureau facility that can probably handle Spike if he decides to waft through - and twirls the stakes in his hands.

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He looks around again and spots Karen hovering by the stairs. 

"So who're you?"

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"Wolfram & Hart employee."

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"Huh. Evil?"

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"Not enthusiastically. ...you?"

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"Formerly. Recently in possession of a soul."

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"Oh. OK. I guess."

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"What? You have a soul in this universe? ....gypsy curse?"

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"Nah, got mine myself. Saw a man about a girl, did some warrior's trials mumbo jumbo, got it restored. Bit worse for lack of use. And then, y'know, burned myself up saving the world, and this is what it got me. Cursed to watch goody do-gooders bumble around this place until it eats them."

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"Now admittedly I've never been in Wolfram and Hart except to steal some ballast for our dimensional transit spell from its supply closet, but there's no one there I'd call a goody do-gooder."

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"Well, Angel claims he's a hero. Mind you, he never blew himself up to save the world. But Fred seems like she's doing her best."

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"My friend here runs around terrified that if she's late with her paperwork she gets murdered."

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"He mostly kills people for murder. Or being ugly werewolves. But, you know, that is a shameful failure of communication, and personally I think you should really go up and give him a piece of your mind right now."

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"I would, but I'm an ugly werewolf, see."

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"Tragic. Would've been funny."

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"So he...has a soul? Thinks he's a good guy? Ended up running Wolfram and Hart...how exactly?"

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"Some kind of devil's bargain, I'd wager. Didn't take it, don't know the details. Just came to in his office after the world-saving and learned I was stuck in LA."

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"Well, we're not in LA right now."

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"Yeah, apparently portals to inter-dimensional demon bars still work. Not exactly Europe, but I guess it could be worse."

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"Karen, are there any rumors about him among the Wolfram and Hart staff?"

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"Not that I've heard? I am not, like, the most up on Wolfram & Hart gossip, though."

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Nod.

 

He turns to glare at Spike again. "And how'd you wander through the supply closet? Hell of a coincidence."

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"Oh, Angel's got a security system that alerts him to all portals opened into the building from outside. Came down to watch the show and happened to get here before he did."

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"Telvo, can you run upstairs and get -"

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"Yep!"

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"I'm finding you very annoying so I'm gonna get someone else and then maybe we can work out what to do about you."

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"You do that, then."

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He comes down a bit later. Looks around at everyone. 

"The bar can't do anything for ghosts? That's actually very surprising."

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"I don't think he tried."

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"Oh, okay, the ghost not expecting very accommodating bars is much less surprising. It's a very good bar," he adds to Spike. 

"Karen, you're welcome to stick around here if you want to but I should warn you that this looks complicated and as a rule Elves don't do anything complicated in less than a week."

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"I mean, it's this or TV."

Permalink Mark Unread

"So long as you're warned. Spike, is there any way to test vampire assertions that they have a soul? Any spells that behave differently?"

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"Couldn't tell you. Willow knows Angel's ensouling curse now, I dunno what that does if you've already got a soul. Not actually eager to test that one, though. Don't want anything knocking loose the next time I have a good shag."

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"From what we know of Angel's behavior and what we know of how his curse works, is it plausible he turned evil again and is just being a bit more subtle this time?"

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"Angel doesn't do subtle. And the evil version mopes a lot less."

Permalink Mark Unread

"And the guy on top at Wolfram and Hart is mopey?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh yeah. Won't shut up about his hard, hard, extremely wealthy corporeal life."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Has he noticed that his underlings are terrified of him and expect to be tortured to death if they catch his attention in the wrong way?"

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Shrug. "He's very dense sometimes."

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"And is he actually in charge or is he sitting in the CEO's office while someone else entirely runs the company?"

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"Y'know, I hadn't thought of that. He did disband the tac team, though."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I guess that's a reasonable first move if you have a large enough stable of personally loyal replacements."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh he knows, like, five people."

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"...and wants them dead?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Really likes doing all of the punching himself, our man Angel. Maybe they didn't let him stab enough monsters with pens."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Werewolves are human, in my world we tranq them. - I guess from the pen it was an urgent sort of situation?"

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"Wasn't there, sorry. Know it'd bit someone."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Is it fair to characterize Angel as ...not very bright?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I think he's being bloody stupid, yeah."

Permalink Mark Unread

"And, hmm, someone who does best in situations where the good guys and bad guys are wearing their respective uniforms so you don't have to do anything more complicated than kill things until nothing on the other side is moving?"

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"Yeah, that sounds about right."

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"And Wolfram and Hart offered to put him in charge."

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"Yep!"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Alex says that Angel can both walk and talk so he cannot possibly be stupid enough he didn't notice it was a trap."

Permalink Mark Unread

"He has been noting that constantly, yeah."

Permalink Mark Unread

"What... does he think the trap is?"

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"Doesn't know."

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"Someone at Wolfram and Hart must be having so much fun."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well, it sure isn't me."

Permalink Mark Unread

"And not any of the employees, either."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Fred seems OK. And that demon they have running entertainment."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I don't know a Fred."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Head of practical sciences. Nice girl. Tried to recorporealize me, but ended up using her solution on bringing back a ghost who's been feeding souls to hell to stave off his own damnation. Can't cause nearly as much trouble now."

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"Got a last name? We can look her up in our world, maybe give her the lab without the evil."

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He has to think about it a second. "Burkle. Winifred Burkle."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Cool. Now, the Angel situation - I'm awfully tempted to do something about it, either by talking to him or by tying him to a post somewhere and then impersonating him for a couple of months, but I assume that if he'd gracefully risen to the occasion Wolfram and Hart would've just had him killed, and that they'll do the same if we somehow manage to raise him to the occasion ourselves. Does that sound about right?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Really couldn't tell you what their game plan is."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Do you want to go back to your dimension particularly, or do you think you'd be just as happy in ours?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Doubt yours has a Buffy Summers. Not the right one, anyway."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Not if you have recent personal history, yeah. In our world you died in 1997."

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"1997 was - oh, right. Yeah, I could see that happening. Rather not pop off to another dimension for good without her, though, at least until... well I should figure out where she is."

Permalink Mark Unread

"If we can get an entrance to your dimension that's not right in Wolfram and Hart's belly, it should be pretty easy to figure that out. - you didn't want to use Wolfram and Hart's resources to look it up?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well I don't exactly have any friends there. Or the ability to consistently touch things."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Not really the type to sneak up on a terrified secretary and tell them they're your personal assistant now?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Meh. Soulful now. Only fun being mean to people who deserve it."

Permalink Mark Unread

"All right. If you need hands while you're here flag us down, won't you?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Sure."

Permalink Mark Unread

"If you step close to the door, time starts in your dimension again and Angel bursts in. I don't particularly want to deal with that at the moment, can you give us a couple of days?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Fine, couple days. But, being totally honest here, I do actually really wanna see that."

Permalink Mark Unread

"If you're not around when we decide we're ready I will put at least, like, twenty minutes of effort into finding you so you can watch."

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"You know what, I like you. You're decent."

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For some reason he thinks this is very funny.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Karen, Alex, come up so we can talk this through some more?"

 

As an aside to the bar, have you got anything for ghosts? And can I get the three of us dinner?

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Some ghosts find that they can enjoy some edibles if they float through them.

A dinner spread featuring lamb chops and mashed potatoes and roasted asparagus appears. There is cherry pie too.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Does interacting with food do anything for you, Spike?"

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"Not that I know of. Mostly the texture that matters for vampires anyway. Unless it's blood."

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"Well, if you want blood you can put it on our tab." He picks up the tray and heads upstairs.

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Karen silently follows people up.

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"How long've there been rumors about the new CEO?"

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"Uh, I think he started... a couple months ago, maybe?"

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"Unexpectedly? Like, you hadn't heard anything in advance about it?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Nope. But I dunno if we would've, normally, it's a big company."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Ever caught sight of him?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"No. But that doesn't seem weird, like, I don't even know who the CEO of Wendy's is."

Permalink Mark Unread

Nod. "It's looking like we can't really avoid letting him in here, do you see why -"

Permalink Mark Unread

Nodnod.

Permalink Mark Unread

"But we can have you very very far away, if you'd like that."

Permalink Mark Unread

" - I dunno. I do kind of want to know what's happening. But he does keep, uh, killing people. And I guess there's no actual reason why me knowing what's going on would matter."

Permalink Mark Unread

"We could do a hidden camera, or the thing Elves do with our telepathy which is approximately equivalent. I don't think you'd be in danger in Milliways, going off Spike's assessment of him, but that's only one take and doesn't fully explain all the killing people. Has he killed people in your department?"

Permalink Mark Unread

" - I mean I don't really know that many people? Or have a team? I just do, like, office receptionist stuff for a couple of the lawyers. Just, people say that he kills people. Of course they've said that about lots of other people, so I wasn't, like, keeping track of him as specifically scary, or anything - "

Permalink Mark Unread

"Have you heard anything about this Fred?"

Permalink Mark Unread

Headshake.

Permalink Mark Unread

"What if we just, like, set up a distracting amount of stuff going on downstairs and when Angel walks in tell him this is the astrology department and we're hosting a retirement party for one of our employees and then probably he'll wander out without looking around much - maybe not this specific idea but you get the general shape of -"

Permalink Mark Unread

"It does seem like it might be a good idea for Angel's interaction with Milliways to leave him unaware of the existence of Milliways. I don't know how far the bar will cooperate with us on that."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Did you mean it about not helping him get better because then Wolfram and Hart will probably remove him?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I don't know. I do think that making the CEO of a Wolfram and Hart branch into a better person is an unusually low-returns activity but maybe it will be really easy, or maybe they want him there for some reason other than terrorizing the employees in a new and different way. - I take it, Karen, that people haven't tried to quit since he started?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"You don't quit. Nobody quits. Ever."

Permalink Mark Unread

He makes a face.

Permalink Mark Unread

"He wants the job," he whispers conspiratorially to Karen.

Permalink Mark Unread

Oh.

She is... very unclear on how this is supposed to make her feel about this person.

Permalink Mark Unread

"I have a better job," he says, "and one of the things that makes it better is that no one is scared and everyone wants to be there, but this does sound like a really interesting challenge. The tricky thing for someone who is trying to be a good person is that if you want to stop being a slaveowner you gotta tell everyone they can quit with no consequences, but if you do that, then everyone who is a good person or has good risk assessment will immediately quit, and it's not clear that the resources you'd have left at that point are actually enough to protect the ones who left. Of course, I have no idea whether Angel has stayed up many nights in anguish thinking this over or whether he hasn't thought about it at all."

Permalink Mark Unread

 

Nod.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Like, from what we know, maybe he's been quietly persuading particularly desperate people they can safely quit and then pretending to murder them if they accept, or maybe he's just planning to dismiss everyone once he can train and bring on competent replacements who don't need enslaving or maybe he can't think how to wrangle it so he's not letting anyone quit until he thinks of something or maybe he's just actually so thoughtless he has not noticed he has slaves.

But - if you were running Wolfram and Hart would you tell Spike which of those was your plan?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I guess not."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I guess maybe we could talk to the Angel from our world and try to guess from that."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I don't think he's doing an extremely elaborate scheme to gradually extract everyone but I have no guesses on whether he's unhappily keeping the rules up because he hasn't thought of anything -- and presumably pretending to kill the deserters when there are some -- or whether he's just fine with slavery if the victims have ever done a bad thing.

I guess when you say it like that -"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Kinda depends on whether anyone has said it like that, right?"

Permalink Mark Unread

 

 

"What would you do?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Depends almost entirely on what other resources Wolfram and Hart has, which is the other thing that makes this tricky."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'd let everyone go. Take all the company's money and give them all their share and a fake ID and tell them to go start over."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I know you would."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Karen would - 

She'd be really unhappy and probably a bunch of things would go badly but everyone who was trying to look after their dead sister's kids would get a transfer to some very safe city whose local demons are friendly. And vegetarians."

Permalink Mark Unread

The other Karen will just be over here looking at the ground and feeling like a very poor example of herself. Who did not actually precisely notice that she was enslaved until about two minutes ago.

Permalink Mark Unread

He clears a table in the room full of magic experiments for dinner.

Permalink Mark Unread

"So what's the story?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"There are so many I have no idea. It's very frustrating. I want to talk to our Angel."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Is compensation at Wolfram and Hart below-market?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"He means do they pay as well as secretary jobs that aren't evil."

Permalink Mark Unread

"...I don't really know. I think other ones don't come with the not being specifically killed by vampires who don't want to upset anyone at the company."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Why do we care -"

Permalink Mark Unread

"It's pretty relevant to how bad your staffing problems are once you cut it out with the slavery."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Ah. Yeah.

 

 

- are we actually going to try to solve this? Resurrecting Karen's more important - I mean, I guess it's not, but it had better be higher priority - and Maitimo just listed off a long bunch of reasons why it's hard and no reasons to do it. There are problems where we don't have adversaries."

Permalink Mark Unread

"We're not taking on Wolfram and Hart. We might give Angel a book of detailed suggestions if suggestions are in fact the thing he's short on."

Permalink Mark Unread

"He might just be a bad person. Having a soul makes you not vampire-evil, not not evil-evil."

Permalink Mark Unread

"But if all you want to do is rescue and or murder pretty girls and drive fast cars why take the job? If you don't care very much about being ethical and have access to magic there are lower-risk ways to make a lot of money and abuse a lot of people. - there's no point in speculating about this until we meet our Angel."

Permalink Mark Unread

"What city do you wanna live in when we're done rescuing your family, Karen?"

Permalink Mark Unread

" - uh. I dunno. Haven't thought about it."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Do you want opinions on cities? I've been to lots of cities, I have lots of opinions."

Permalink Mark Unread

"...Sure? I guess?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Sunnydale, California. Wretched wasteland on a Hellmouth, no. Las Vegas, ugly, best place to steal fifty thousand dollars real fast but literally nothing else going for it. Salt Lake City, clearly trying! I appreciate that they're trying! Still kinda ugly though. Cordova, Alaska. Barely any people, good wilderness. Great place. Soldotna, Alaska, barely any people and good wilderness, pretty perfect. Kotzebue, Alaska, has a cop who can't mind his own business. Pass. Unalaska, Alaska. For the name you'd think it'd be more distinctive than it is but that doesn't mean it's bad. Barely any wilderness and no people so it's great. Kachemak, Alaska. Very few people, when I visited it was storming so I dunno about the views. Smells too fishy. Seldovia, Alaska. Barely any people, too many boats. Nenana, Alaska, barely any people, good wilderness, no roads, love it."

Permalink Mark Unread

"When have you needed to steal fifty thousand dollars? I'd have given you fifty thousand dollars. - and the girl might want to live somewhere that isn't Alaska."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well I've pretty much just been to Alaska."

Permalink Mark Unread

"New York City's nice. It's got stock exchanges."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I think I just want a place with, like, good public schools? And jobs? And not very many vampires."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Public schools kind of always suck."

Permalink Mark Unread

"About half of all U.S. counties had no murders last year! There are big parts of the country that are entirely vampire-free. Maybe she could teach at a school, Tyelco, then it wouldn't have to suck."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, that might work. Or - what's the thing where there's a special teacher for one specific disabled kid, she'd be good at that, or the librarian. She should be a school librarian."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I don't have, like, a degree or anything."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Do you want one?"

Permalink Mark Unread

 

"Uh. I - kinda barely made it through high school and probably need to be working?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"No I mean, like, whatever identity we set you up with can have a degree if you'd like them to."

Permalink Mark Unread

 

"That seems like - I don't know how to do anything. Besides, uh, I guess nobody's killed me for being a terrible secretary yet."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm pretty sure school librarian is like a secretary except you have to think that children should appreciate books, and help them find them, and use the atrocious inhumane disgusting book organization system that humans have."

Permalink Mark Unread

"You sound racist when you say things like that."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I like humans better than you do! It's just that their book organization system is horrible."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I like humans a lot!"

Permalink Mark Unread

He waves his hands frustratedly. "I just mean that it's not racist to say that they messed up at one particular thing. We have, also, messed up at some things."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Just not book organization systems," he calls from his table in the corner.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, see, that's what I mean."

Permalink Mark Unread

She is not actually very confident that she can hold down any sort of decent job when her life is not being implicitly threatened on a daily basis. She decides to eat her food instead of saying this.

Permalink Mark Unread

"It's - also fine if you want to stay home and raise the kids."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Nah, she should be a school librarian. - like, it is in fact fine to stay home and raise one's kids but this is a Karen."

Permalink Mark Unread

 

"I don't know what that means."

Permalink Mark Unread

 

I'm stuck, can you -

Permalink Mark Unread

"Some people flourish more when nothing depends on them but some people actually flourish more when things do depend on them, and when people depend on them, and Alex thinks you are the second sort, and your problem is that you have been enslaved for a while which is not at all the relevant kind of things depending on you, so now you need very small things that you can do, and by doing them you will learn that you are capable of doing things, and then be capable of doing more things. Relevant concepts he's reaching for include that elderly dementia patients live longer with a houseplant to look after, and that Karen was happier as the Slayer than she ever was before she was the Slayer, and that she was very unhappy in summer camp."

Permalink Mark Unread

 

"Oh. I - guess that's possible."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Also the kids deserve a good school librarian who doesn't hate them. Some of them have never met anyone who likes books before."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I suppose I would probably not hate them. Or books."

Permalink Mark Unread

"There you are. School in - some quiet place where I can raise chickens and where Maitimo says there are no vampires and where the schools are very good or very bad and need replacing with a new experimental school that experiments with not abusing the students."

Permalink Mark Unread

- momentarily very confused about why he would want to be in the same city as her but not gonna comment on it.

"I guess that sounds OK.

"I should, um - I'm actually technically living with, like, four people right now, and I should maybe be considering whether it would be unfair to the other two if me and Connor and Zana just left? - and, like, they would worry, if we were just suddenly gone."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Do you want them to come too?"

Permalink Mark Unread

 

 

"Yeah. Probably."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Okay. Can we have names, occupations -- so we can have something set up for them --"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Uh. Kate Marks, she works in a warehouse. And Andrea Chen, but she's, like, ninety and retired. Cousin and great-grandmother. Who - I guess might alarm the rest of the family by disappearing, but honestly less than you'd think."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Okay. I would recommend that you all assume names, just in case Wolfram and Hart looks for you. We can protect against most avenues of magical tracing, but not against just looking you up in the phone book."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Or on the internet."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah. Sure. Makes sense."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Is something wrong? Wronger than it was five minutes ago, I mean?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"No! Just, um - considering that I will be much more permanently cutting off contact with my parents. And entire family. I guess."

Permalink Mark Unread

"We can pass on letters but they'd have to be carefully devoid of identifying details."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It's - not really worth it."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Her parents suck."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Mmm."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Don't."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I wouldn't!"

Permalink Mark Unread

"They're not that bad."

Permalink Mark Unread

"They deserve a joyful and interesting and fulfilling eternity and everything but they're bad for you."

Permalink Mark Unread

 

"Plausibly."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Man should I just....list off all the things that are bad for you - school, your parents, having to take orders from people who aren't actually competent to give them, not sleeping enough, feeling like I'll hurt people if you don't handle things well enough, not getting enough hugs, and actual cuddles, I think, distinct from hugs, being in places where you think you're supposed to be happy, people paying you too close attention, and - uh some stuff that seems very unlikely to come up."

Permalink Mark Unread

 

"I sound like a very fragile person."

Permalink Mark Unread

"You wanna hear the list of all the things that are bad for me?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Um. I guess if you think it'll illustrate a point or something."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Trash cans! Walls with peeling paint. Litter. Neighbors who leave their dogs inside. Dogs in general, actually, 'cept Wishbone I guess. Authority figures, books, forms that you have to do more than just sign, the Dewey Decimal System, passing pregnant humans on the street, car alarms, the smell of fast food places, cops, teachers, urban environments, sleeping indoors, Karen being dead, the existence of hell dimensions, the way food rots when it gets old, peacetime, having prisoners, having to do politics, recycled-smelling air."

Permalink Mark Unread

"People interfering with any of your decisions."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Asking for money instead of stealing it in Vegas."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Religion!"

Permalink Mark Unread

"People trying to explain things to you that take more than ten seconds to get."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Needing anyone for anything."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well, okay, okay, should we do this to you?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"That sounds very easy but if you'd like."

Permalink Mark Unread

 

"I - anyway Karen people need stuff. Some people need lots of very specific stuff."

Permalink Mark Unread

" - I guess."

Permalink Mark Unread

"And anyone who'll do fine as a school librarian with some roommates is, like, not far up there on the picky scale."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well I could still fail horribly. But - I can try."

Permalink Mark Unread

Permalink Mark Unread

 

She'll just... eat things.

Permalink Mark Unread

"So, Kansas?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Not Kansas."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Huh, why?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"It's need-to-know."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Kansas is? - okay, Wyoming?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I haven't actually been there but have no reason to think it's dangerous. It gets cold enough in the winter to make chickens a challenge, I think."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Colorado?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Pretty! Safe enough outside of Denver and Centennial, I think. - how're you picking states here?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"The square ones? They seemed the most wholesome and boring."

Permalink Mark Unread

She does not have any opinions on states that are strong enough to be worth mentioning.

Permalink Mark Unread

They seem to mostly be making conversation but they'll keep it up for the rest of dinner.

Permalink Mark Unread

When she's done she'll thank them for dinner.

 

" - should I just go back to my room then?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Would you like us to get you when our Angel arrives?"

Permalink Mark Unread

- she will probably not be useful for this at all but whatever.

"Sure."

Permalink Mark Unread

So he comes to get her a couple hours later (well, that's how long it's been for him). "Angel's here."

Permalink Mark Unread

Nod. "He's not, like - really likely to attack anyone?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"So far he seems courteously bemused by the whole thing. Uh, once Karen and I attacked him and I shot him many times and the thing that tipped us off that he wasn't a typical vampire was how hard he was working to make sure everyone came out alive -"

Permalink Mark Unread

 

Nod.

She'll head downstairs, then.

Permalink Mark Unread

Angel is there. He's pretty unclear on what's happening, but he's there.

Permalink Mark Unread

He's not alone.

"Hey! Karen's back in the land of the living again?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Faith! This is her alternate universe version. We asked you all to come in because Angel's alternate universe version is running Wolfram and Hart's LA branch."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Is Wolfram and Hart, like, a thing that I should know what it is, or - "

Permalink Mark Unread

"On Earth the forces of evil have this evil law firm called Wolfram and Hart. It does bad stuff and helps other people get away with bad stuff. They apparently offered Angel the chance to be in charge, and he took it, but everything still sounds pretty evil. We can't tell if he's a figurehead or has some kinda long game or - well, I have no idea. We thought you'd be the person to ask."

Permalink Mark Unread

 

"I'm running a law firm?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"It's super weird!"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Is there more information about this that makes it less - completely inexplicable - "

Permalink Mark Unread

"So our only source of information here is Spike, and also this Karen who we rescued from slavery in Wolfram and Hart's secretarial division but who has only heard vague rumors about you."

Permalink Mark Unread

"What did Spike say? - Spike's alive?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"In the other universe he managed not to get himself killed. Or - no, that's not right - he got himself less killed. And now he's a ghost. He haunts Wolfram and Hart for some reason. He says that you kill werewolves with pens and mope about the difficulty of your job and kill people for murder. Or for being ugly werewolves. - to be clear we're not assuming his take here is reliable."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Right, yeah, because - obviously, Spike. That's still pretty weird."

Permalink Mark Unread

"The moping sounds like you."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Some of it's pretty weird."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Theories we were considering include 'you're being mind-controlled', 'you're trying some complicated undercover scheme', 'you're doing your best and there are a bunch of complications not visible from here', or 'you were planning to do your best but got in over your head'. Pretty much."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Mind control is always a possibility but I don't know why anyone would bother to mind control me for this specifically. I - guess I could be trying some complicated undercover thing, although I am still really confused about why I would go into law? And - there are definitely circumstances where killing people is the best you can do. 

"Law, though."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It's pretty confusing!"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I wish I could narrow it down."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Us too. If there are any published books that'd be helpful, this bar's got them all. Otherwise -" 

Shrug. "I guess we wait to meet him and ask him what happened."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I guess so."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Inviting him here isn't ideal, in case it's one of the 'mind-controlled' or 'evil' answers, but we need to get some people from his dimension and that means we can't leave it paused forever and apparently he's right about to find the door so we are planning to let him, as soon as we're ready. We'll be sending some people to pick up the people we need from his dimension at the same time."

Permalink Mark Unread

Nod.

Permalink Mark Unread

"I mean, we have decent Angel and me and you in here, any reason we can't beat him up if he causes problems? I guess if he has a gun on him that could be bad."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Milliways has security that will purportedly intervene if violence starts. I don't know much about it, not having started any violence yet myself. The kind of problem I'm worried about is more 'he turns Milliways into a strategic base for Wolfram and Hart', which would be very very bad, but we talked it over for a long time and we don't actually have a good way to prevent it from becoming a problem eventually so we think it's best for it to come up under circumstances we planned for."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Ugh. Fine."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It's not great."

Permalink Mark Unread

"We did wanna ask that you not explain too much about Milliways to the new Angel until we've determined if he's, well, evil."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Down with not helping evil vampires. Even if they look like ones who're OK."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I don't even really know anything about this place."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Honestly we have been here for years and I'm still very confused."

 

 

And he goes looking for Spike.

Permalink Mark Unread

He's both findable and very interested in watching the proceedings.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh good. In that case you can be the one to restart time into your world. We could ask Karen to do it but she'll be worrying the whole time that Angel will murder her."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Luckily yours truly is murder-proof. Mostly."

He heads downstairs.

Permalink Mark Unread

"So... why are we inviting evil dead again? The one we know is evil?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Thought you were going to - wait, Faith, you know where Buffy is, have you seen her recently -  "

Permalink Mark Unread

"Who the hell is Buffy?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Slayer before Karen. Died in Los Angeles about four months into her tenure. I take it in the other world, she didn't, and that's why Karen was never called."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I take it these two are from your world, then."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yep! We were hoping they could help us figure out why Angel is running a law firm but Angel has no idea why he'd ever run a law firm for any reason."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Uh-huh. That makes all of us, really."

Permalink Mark Unread

"We will just have to ask the man himself."

Permalink Mark Unread

Spike goes to stand by the door.

Permalink Mark Unread

It takes a minute, and then someone appears in the closet, looks around, and stares into Milliways.

 

"Spike?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah. Hi."

Permalink Mark Unread

" - Angel, you'd better see this."

    "See what?"

 

Wesley steps into Milliways.

Permalink Mark Unread

There's a bar. There's Faith and Spike and Angel and some demons of a species he doesn't recognize.

Permalink Mark Unread

He stares down the Angel and Faith.

"What are they?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Said they're from some kind of other universe."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I see."

Permalink Mark Unread

The other Angel appears in the closet and stares in at them.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Wyndam-Pryce?"

Permalink Mark Unread

You know him?

Permalink Mark Unread

That's the watcher who got himself killed in like a month. The one I was sending invoices.

Permalink Mark Unread

"I don't believe we've met."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Pleased to meet you, then, I'm Matt. This is Milliways, it's a bridge between dimensions. We're from another Earth."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I knew you. Or, uh, met you. When you were a Watcher in Sunnydale, assigned to the Slayer Karen Teller."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm afraid I'm not familiar. I was assigned to Buffy Summers and Faith Lehane."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Never seen you before in my life."

Permalink Mark Unread

"In our timeline Summers died in Los Angeles in the summer of 1996 and never lived in Sunnydale."

Permalink Mark Unread

"How did it go in yours?"

Permalink Mark Unread

 

"I understand that Summers destroyed Sunnydale around two months ago."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Ours isn't in great shape by now either. It got overrun by Darth Vader and some pirates."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh, everyone got out of Dodge first. More or less a ghost town by the time we closed the hellmouth. You were there, by the way," he says, pointing at Faith.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Wicked."

Permalink Mark Unread

"How do you safely close a hellmouth?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I don't know that anyone said anything about it being safe."

Permalink Mark Unread

"All right, how do you dangerously close a Hellmouth?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well, Angel? You're the one who brought the trinket. Your lawyer friends tell you where it came from, or did you just take their word for it that everything was on the up and up?"

Permalink Mark Unread

 

"I'm still not clear on why we're talking to these people."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh, we don't want you here at all. We just need access to your dimension so we can fetch the family of your slave who we're adopting."

Permalink Mark Unread

"My what?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Hey, I don't judge. That much. At least not when outnumbered. But we're taking her and we're getting her family too, and that means the door to your dimension needs to be open for a bit."

Permalink Mark Unread

"One of us is very confused."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Wolfram and Hart employees are routinely murdered if they attempt to quit."

Permalink Mark Unread

"But maybe you disbanded the institutions that enforce that internally, sought out and brought under control the gangs and vaguely allied baddies who enforce it externally, and took care to credibly signal that to everyone in the company by helping some people who wanted to quit quit with a good reference, or whatever, and Karen was just out sick that day, and missed it?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Anyone who wants to quit is allowed to. It's not my fault if they've made enemies who are only afraid to mess with them if they think it'll piss  off someone around here."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I mean, I dunno if it's your fault, but it's sure your problem. If the last several people who quit ended up dead within days, everyone's going to assume that you're okay with that, and it sounds like you are. And everyone's going to assume it'd happen to them, and it sounds like it might. 

Also sometimes it is your fault, if you ever give people instructions that'll make them enemies."

Permalink Mark Unread

"We haven't been here that long. They had enemies long before we showed up. It's the kind of thing that happens when you pick the team that goes around dismembering virgins and ritually sacrificing infants."

Permalink Mark Unread

"So were you planning to figure out the thing where they get protection and help leaving town if they quit, but just dawdling since most of them are trapped in your workplace by work they did before you took over?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"We have been extremely busy ever since we took control of this organization. Not everything can be a first priority."

Permalink Mark Unread

Angel finally strolls out of the closet and into the bar.

"Right. And personally, I'm a lot more interested in helping the people who weren't responsible for Wolfram & Hart's mess in the first place."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I mean, sometimes I have a lot on my plate, but if someone hands me a couple thousand slaves that ends up near the top of the agenda, yeah?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"It sounds like a very complicated situation. It also sounds like you don't object if we help people leave, so we're doing that. You're welcome to get back to your other, higher priorities."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I dunno, I find myself suddenly interested in the space bar that has apparently opened for business out of one of our fourth floor supply closets. That's honestly kind of concerning. That and the - whatever that is," he says, gesturing vaguely in the other Angel's direction.

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He rolls his eyes.

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"Milliways is an interdimensional bar! The drinks are pretty great and you can use it to rescue slaves."

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Tyelcormo.

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He's not gonna hand it over to Wolfram and Hart's evil maximizers, is he? So what does it matter if he likes us?

Permalink Mark Unread

What do we get out of having him dislike us?

Permalink Mark Unread

Well, it's fun.

Permalink Mark Unread

"They're not slaves."

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"Sorry. Your prisoners who work."

Permalink Mark Unread

"We've dissolved all of the company's lifetime and eternal-term staff contracts. The staff might benefit from more communication, but as I've said, we've been very busy. Most recently we dealt with a ghost who was feeding the souls of deceased employees to hell in an attempt to stave off his own damnation."

Permalink Mark Unread

"That's horrific."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It wasn't a great situation."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Alex is upset because in our world Karen Teller was activated as a Slayer and was a great one. Died in the line of duty. In your world she became responsible for several young children and was menaced by vampire debt collectors, and Wolfram and Hart arrived in time to save her life, so to speak. She's been running around doing your paperwork and certain she'll die if she quits or comes to your attention. I know there's a lot on your plate but - the idea that this is typical for your employees is of course upsetting to anyone, and Karen's situation in particular is upsetting to us because we knew her."

Permalink Mark Unread

"How certain are you that this is the same person?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'd bring them both here so you could judge but, see, one has spent the last several months expecting you to murder her and the other one is dead. They're the same person. You of all people can hardly believe that no good person would ever end up working at Wolfram and Hart."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Still. Not a lot of saints around here."

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"I want to get them all out," he says to Maedhros.

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I can't. I'm sorry.

 

"It sounds like a situation that would quickly make it very difficult to tell which choices are the saintly ones."

Permalink Mark Unread

The fuck you can't. We can just yell at everyone in range right now.

Permalink Mark Unread

That'll just scare them. 

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I know. 

 

We could stake the guy.

Permalink Mark Unread

Permalink Mark Unread

"I've been finding that true, in any case."

He turns to Angel. "If you want this place investigated, it might make sense to call Fred down. It's not immediately clear to me whether this is more my jurisdiction or hers. She is still working on recorporealizing Spike - "

Permalink Mark Unread

"Spike's not important."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Hey! Standing right here."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'll get her. If it looks like you're about to be sucked into a parallel universe forever, uh - 

 

- don't."

He heads back into the closet and pulls out a phone.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Is Fred definitely trustworthy? We object pretty strongly to Milliways being in Wolfram and Hart's hands."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Fred is trustworthy. She joined when we did and has not submitted to any of Wolfram & Hart's - tampering. The other members of our previous organization are Krevlornswath of the Deathwok clan and Charles Gunn; I don't suppose either name means anything to you?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Nope. Wolfram and Hart have been - tampering?"

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Sigh. "Gunn permitted Wolfram & Hart to upload complete knowledge of the law into his brain. We don't know what else they installed, apart from demon law, several demon languages, and a small collection of classical music."

Permalink Mark Unread

" - huh. 

 

I'm not saying I'd do better in your shoes but it sounds like you're in a pretty vulnerable position, here."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yes, so it seems. I do believe that we've been making progress."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Has the staff been particularly difficult or frustrating to work with?"

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"Not intentionally. There are the obvious moral differences."

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(He covers the mouthpiece of his phone.) "The tac team tried to shoot up an elementary school."

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"We have had some problems."

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"What an odd mistake for them to make."

Permalink Mark Unread

"They were attempting to prevent a plague from spreading. We had a difference of opinion about what methods to try first."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Ah.

If we exist in your world we could probably help with tactical support. I don't know if we do, but we'll be able to check shortly."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Might be worthwhile."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm tentatively guessing not because I think we would've interacted but maybe our path there is different just like yours is."

Permalink Mark Unread

"And what was your path, exactly?"

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"We learned in 1970 of the existence of supernatural entities disguised from the rest of the world by some magic that makes it hard to notice or correctly attribute their behavior. We did some research and began working with the U.S. government to establish diplomatic relations with those demon societies organized enough to largely abide by the terms of treaties negotiated with them, and to protect our population from those demons not inclined to obey such treaties. We started an interdimensional refugee resettlement program and opened bases of operations in cities with particularly high supernatural populations, including Los Angeles. We got involved in operational support of the Slayer, the existing forms of that being inadequate. We're currently working primarily on the retrieval of our dead citizens from hells. We're formally affiliated with the U.S. Bureau of Environmental Enforcement."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Never heard of it. I'll be moderately surprised if it exists."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It isn't supposed to be widely known but I'd be surprised if it never offered you any help at all with this situation, yeah."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I would expect to have learned about it before I left the Watcher's Council. Unless this is a very recent arrangement, I suppose, given that they were blown up around six months ago. But it sounds like our timelines have drifted further than that, if they were ever identical at all."

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"In our world the Watcher's Council has definitely heard of us, yeah."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Where were you before 1970?"

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"Ouch, do I look that old?"

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"Everyone's from somewhere."

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"Our species is native to Azerbaijan. I was born in Kansas."

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"I find it interesting that a race of demons would be surprised to learn of the supernatural. But perhaps you thought you were the only ones."

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"We thought there were four sub-species of humanity, and one universe, and no magic."

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Nod. "Well, I don't have much experience with other universes - besides Pylea, Lorne's home dimension - but perhaps our science team can tell us more about this place."

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"Just Fred, I hope? I really am worried about Wolfram and Hart using this to expand to corners of the multiverse that have avoided them so far, or to make their operations across dimensions simpler."

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"Angel?"

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"She wants to bring Knox."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Tell her it's a delicate situation and we'd like to keep the circle as small as possible." - he is not supposed to be the one giving orders. "At least if you think that's an accurate summary of our  priorities."

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Nod.

 

"She'll be right down."

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"Thank you."

Permalink Mark Unread

She arrives shortly thereafter.

"You guys! Do you have any idea how rare stable transdimensional portals like this are? If that's what this is, it could be some lesser variety of spacetime-warping phenomenon, but - do you have any idea how cool this is?"

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"Very rare?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well actually they're more like relatively uncommon, it's just that the vast majority of them are being held open by powerful demons who want you to prove your worth or bring a gift and who won't hold still enough for any kind of proper scientific study. Or dissolve on entry and then send you to a demon dimension for five years. I really hope that doesn't happen again.

- I'm Fred, who are you guys?"

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"Matt. This is Alex. Our science team is upstairs, they're probably the people you actually want to talk to."

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"Oh great! - I would stay for more pleasantries but I'm sure you have other people for that and if it's going to be just me and Wesley catching up on whatever's here then I think we'd really better get started." She glances at Wesley. "You are going to help, right?"

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He glows a little at the prospect. "Naturally. If there's nothing more pressing down here, that is."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Kinda seems like you're also the person to talk to about employee rescues, since Angel can't even pretend to give a shit."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I think you two should go meet with our scientists; what kind of help it makes sense for us to be offering each other might depend on what you learn."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm really not in charge of staffing, but I'd be happy to attend any meetings on the subject later on. I suppose I'll see you all shortly."

Permalink Mark Unread

Eeeee science!

They'll just head upstairs then.

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Well.

 

"Have I always been this obnoxious?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Meh. Just don't go into law."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Really doesn't seem like it should be hard."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'm not a lawyer. I just - happen to run a law firm."

Permalink Mark Unread

"That seems... worse."

Permalink Mark Unread

"You're not half as obnoxious, dude. I have seen you care about the lives of people who had caused you mild annoyance, so that puts you way ahead of this guy."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I do not kill people for annoying me."

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(Faith heads over to the bar to buy popcorn.)

Permalink Mark Unread

"I didn't say you killed them. I said you didn't care about their lives. Though also Spike says you kill werewolves. With pens. Those're people, dude."

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He glares at Spike. "I know what werewolves are. It was an emergency situation and he'd been habitually killing people every full moon."

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"Yeah, that's what werewolves do if they haven't got a good lockup. I guess maybe you are also shit in a fight compared to our Angel and can't take one werewolf alive."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It was in the middle of attacking someone. Didn't have backup or a weapon and didn't want to take chances with his victim's life."

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"Hey Faith, you've seen your guy fight, right?"

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She takes a second to stop munching popcorn.

"Sure, lotsa times."

Permalink Mark Unread

"If he got into a fight with one werewolf, how worried would you be?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Wouldn't worry about his life. I guess it is harder to take stuff alive than it is to kill it, if you haven't got a weapon. Especially if it's not a vampire, those guys you just beat them until they stop twitching and they wake up good as new. Maybe the werewolf dies if there're some humans around and he's real unlucky and can't wrestle it somewhere safer?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Okay," he says to CEO Angel. "I guess I can believe you got really unlucky there."

Permalink Mark Unread

"It happens."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yep. It's just that when it happens to people who go around saying 'well, they're not saints' about his slaves, you kinda wonder how hard they're trying."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Do you have any idea how many of our people used to habitually torture innocent people to death before we made them cut it out? Or just indefinitely torture them, I'm not actually clear on whether eating werewolves alive causes them to die."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Do you have any idea how many of them would love to quit if it wouldn't get them killed? I work with vampires. They're all sadistic murderers, no exceptions whatsofucking ever. Sometimes we have to kill them. But for the most part, we hand them over and chip them so it's enough hassle for them to hurt people that they mostly can't be bothered. You work with humans. Humans are not soulless irredeemable monsters. And they have rights, and they have families, and they belong to you, at least until you figure out a way that they can quit."

Permalink Mark Unread

Permalink Mark Unread

 

"Oh! Hey, do the people you have chipping vampires have a secret plan to build some kind of demon-human-robot frankenstein superperson that wants to replace humanity with more demon-human-robot superpeople?"

Permalink Mark Unread

" - no? That sounds really stupid."

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"Just checking."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I guess we can - double-check and make sure no one's got a secret side project."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I'll look into it."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah. It was a thing."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Do you know anyone who was involved in it?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh, man, he didn't even come to me until he'd murdered whoever it was. West? Welsh? Buffy would remember."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Buffy didn't leave a number."

Permalink Mark Unread

"We can keep an eye out. When would this have happened?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Late 1999, early 2000?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Then this may be an exceptionally timely warning, thank you."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah. Don't mention it."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Does that mean we have a presence in their world after all, because if we do, we can get his slaves out."

Permalink Mark Unread

"They're not - "

Permalink Mark Unread

"Where do you think you'd be, if you were?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I dunno about me but Matt'd be running the - organization that may or may not have a problem with member scientists in Sunnydale playing Frankenstein."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh, the Initiative? They disbanded after the Frankensteins. Though they did have the place up and running for a bit again before the town was destroyed, so I dunno. Maybe you should call up the president about it."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Gore or Bush?"

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"Bush. Close, though."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, there was that whole thing about the Supreme Court deciding."

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"Do we wanna swing that?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Hmm, maybe? Bush is more religious, I don't know if that makes him more likely to object to rescuing all Americans in hell."

Permalink Mark Unread

"He's gotta have family -"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Probably, yes, but would he trust us on that?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"You're getting everyone out of hell? - or, wait, you're getting everyone who's an American out of hell?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"We're getting everyone out of Hell. It's important to have somewhere to repatriate them so we're getting all the Americans out first."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh. That's. Great, I guess. Hell is pretty bad."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yep, we think so."

Permalink Mark Unread

Permalink Mark Unread

He opens his mouth to say something and then does not. 

Permalink Mark Unread

 

 

 

And the science team comes back!

"You guys! This place has access to published materials across the entire multiverse. I could spend a lifetime in here. I mean, I can't, because then I'd die, but apart from that."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh. That's great. But we do have a lot of work to do."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah, I know. But that's the great thing about it, if you have the door closed then supposedly time doesn't even pass on the other side. Actually, I was thinking, if we can adequately demonstrate this enough to be really sure it's working, then since everything we're doing right now is so time-sensitive, we might want to move some of it in here? It's complicated, because of course we don't want the Senior Partners to catch wind of it, so if we want to be really cautious about things we probably shouldn't tell Gunn, let alone any of our new team members, but we could speed up drafting memos, sifting through anything that needs sifting through, taking a vacation from constant fourteen-hour days - or sleeping! We can sleep in here. It'll be a real timesaver. The only side effect is that it'll reduce our apparent lifespans outside by around thirty percent."

Permalink Mark Unread

"She'll fit right in."

Permalink Mark Unread

"OK! Well. That's what I've got. I'll just be over here asking the bar about everything it remembers ever happening for the next, I dunno, a while."

She goes ahead and does that.

Permalink Mark Unread

He goes upstairs.

Permalink Mark Unread

Karen is hanging out scribbling something in a notebook. Azalea's not in the room and Wishbone is asleep.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Hey. We met Angel and his buddies."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh. How did that go?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"He's stupid. That's it, that's the whole thing, he's stupid and in over his head and hasn't got enough sympathy to go around."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Oh. Well.

"I guess I've been stupid and in over my head before."

Permalink Mark Unread

"This is the problem with power, everyone's in over their head sometimes but if you're not in power there's a limit to how bad it can be, and if you have power there really isn't."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I guess. Everyone pretty much has some power, though."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I admit it sounds hard to fix. But like - we can't afford it now but someday we could offer a Milliways room and money for the tab to everyone in the universe. And then if Milliways security is as good as claimed, everyone'd have a place to go where no one could hurt them, and where they could sleep and eat and nothing bad would happen. And then - then everyone would have a lot less power, in the bad sense of it."

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Nodnod.

"Sounds good. For someday. - kind of unclear on what that would do to currency."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Moryo says there's a way to do that. Uh, my friend who liked the stock exchanges."

Permalink Mark Unread

Nod.

Permalink Mark Unread

"Anyway. Everything's okay now. We can go pick up your family and you can pick out a city and - no one'll come after you."

Permalink Mark Unread

Nod. She should probably ever do anything besides nod.

 

"Thanks."

There. Half a point.

Permalink Mark Unread

Shrug. "And Matt says no vampires but if there are any you can just, like, shout at me, okay? With the telepathy. And I will stab them. Nonlethally cause they're people too."

Permalink Mark Unread

"How far away does the telepathy work?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"Couple miles, for strangers. More when you know people."

Permalink Mark Unread

 

"Which way do I count?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"You know, I'm not really sure. I guess we can test and see."

Permalink Mark Unread

Nod.

"Um, can I ask, like, why? As far as the wanting to live within a couple miles of me goes?"

Permalink Mark Unread

" - so you don't get yourself killed again? Or Azalea or Connor or the baby - or your other friends - that's just a lot of people for you to be keeping safe without any powers."

Permalink Mark Unread

 "Yeah, but they're not, like, objectively any more important or any more likely to get themselves killed than any other people? And you don't, like - I understand the helping me, you guys are like, good guys, or something, but there's only one of you and you don't - like me? So it seems like kind of a weird thing to focus on."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Before you showed up I was hanging out in Milliways drinking. Not - helping people."

Permalink Mark Unread

 

"I feel like 'I don't care about helping people' is not an answer that gives a better understanding of this."

Permalink Mark Unread

"'s also not what I said, right -" sigh - "sometimes people can't, actually, do the most useful of all the things you could write down on a list of useful things to do, or many of them, or maybe any of them. I can't go - god, I don't even know - fight the good fight, right now. But I can keep you out of trouble."

Permalink Mark Unread

 

"OK. Sorry. If you really want to."

Permalink Mark Unread

"You said I didn't like you."

Permalink Mark Unread

 

"I feel like people mostly don't say 'I'm not going to pretend that meeting my friend's mildly evil alternate universe version is the best thing that's happened to me all week' about people who they are, like, super happy to meet."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I mean I was worried you were, like, mildly evil for reasons other than 'if I stop I will get murdered and it won't even improve anything'. That's just a pretty good reason. And being mad at people for not wanting to get murdered and sent off to who-knows-where is - I mean then you're pretty much just Angel. He told us he wasn't bothered about the slavery because not too many of you were saints."

Permalink Mark Unread

 

"I mean, we're not."

Permalink Mark Unread



"There's already someone looking out for the saints, isn't there?"

Permalink Mark Unread

"I wouldn't really know."

Permalink Mark Unread

Sigh.

Permalink Mark Unread

 

"M'sorry. Not Catholic. And just, um, have not had a long history of strangers taking a personal interest in helping me without it causing - problems. I guess."

Permalink Mark Unread

"I don't want anything from you," he says immediately.

Permalink Mark Unread

 

"OK.

"Thanks. I guess."

Permalink Mark Unread

"If you don't want me there that's fine, we can station ...some of Matt's people."

Permalink Mark Unread

"No, it's fine. Like - I don't know you, but I don't know them either. And would kind of be relying on your group either way. I just - would like to stop making mistakes at some point. Ever. That would be neat."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Karen you got kidnapped by a bunch of demon strangers."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Well. Yes. But, like, hypothetically they might have been mostly OK kidnapper demon strangers unless - I don't know exactly."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Right I just mean - I feel like you are holding yourself to a very high standard here."

Permalink Mark Unread

 

"The, uh, lower standards haven't been working out so well so far."

Permalink Mark Unread

Nod.

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"But... thanks."

Permalink Mark Unread

"Yeah."