we are invariably pleased to welcome tourism

[cross_and_bow]

Sherlock is usually very puncutal. He's only one minute late, but that's still not quite as punctual as usual. Bella peers out the window, not yet allowing herself outright concern.

Comments

[cross_and_bow]

"But you managed your empire without anything but your opacity," says Juliet, "didn't you."

[luminous_regnant]

"My opacity and family and friends with their own talents. Mine was important - I was the only person immune to several of the Volturi's most dangerous weapons - but not sufficient."

[toblameforit]

While this back-and-forth is going on, Tony is making hard drives.

He keeps grinning.

"Be right back, guys," he announces, and leaves the room.

[cross_and_bow]

"That sounds like it might be an interesting story," says Juliet to Golden.

[luminous_regnant]

"It might, but Elspeth is better at telling it than I am," says Golden. "She has also written pamphlets on the subject, although they're abridged sketches so as not to turn into novel-sized illustrated histories."

[she_sells_seashells]

"Do you like having a kid?" Shell Bell asks.

[luminous_regnant]

Golden opens her mouth as though to deliver a stock answer of some kind, then closes it and glances between Bell and Juliet thoughtfully.

"I'd say it's like having my soul walk around outside my body," she says instead after a moment, "but given that Amariah exists, perhaps that's not the right comparison; Edward is like having my soul walk around outside my body in the sense that we can operate like extensions of each other and neither of us can function without the other's safety. Elspeth is more like..." She's stumped. "I stopped notebooking before she was conceived, let alone born; I know what it's like but I haven't put it into words."

[cross_and_bow]

"But she's desperately important and beloved and you can only direct her to act like it a limited amount?" tries Juliet.

[luminous_regnant]

"She's not reckless or helpless. She keeps Jacob with her, she can incapacitate or obliterate anyone outside of a couple dozen inoculated people by thinking about it, I believe she's safe at home and when she's in Milliways she doesn't walk through the door with anyone who she can't sincerely tell Jacob they're harmless. But she's been through more than she should've been, and she grew up so terribly fast, and I love the person that she is but she's not who I would've designed if that were how children worked. I'd never have wanted my baby to go on to casually discuss murder and mental rearrangement and torture as things that she's seen and experienced and gotten accustomed to thinking about."

[she_sells_seashells]

"I'm not planning to have kids any time soon even now," says Shell Bell, "but I definitely was planning to never do it before I took over the world. Panem was no place for them."

[luminous_regnant]

"I wasn't originally going to have her that early," says Golden. "At the time I didn't expect her to be in danger, and it would have been problematic to wait. And we were ready as parents. But society, at least supernatural society, was as you say - not fit to have a child in then. I miscalculated, badly, and paid for it, and five years later she did too."

[cross_and_bow]

"I must not have reached some relevant stage in my life-cycle," says Juliet, glancing between the other Bells.

[she_sells_seashells]

"I think you're a little younger than I am," Shell Bell says. "And I think Golden is the oldest, even though she looks about your age plus Diamond vampire stuff."

[luminous_regnant]

"I'm forty-three," agrees Golden. "Chronologically. It's a matter of some debate, to what extent development is relevant or even frozen at all in someone who turns in their teens. Turning small children, though, is forbidden for a reason. But I was just barely eighteen when Elspeth was born."

[cross_and_bow]

"Eighteen, but also married and turned and plotting world takeover already. Amariah says I'm still in the," Juliet makes air-quotes, "resource gathering phase."

[she_sells_seashells]

"I think Angela and Micaiah are going to wind up having a bunch of kids," says Shell Bell. "I get the impression that it's an angel thing. I don't know about anyone else."

[cross_and_bow]

"Isn't your Sherlock a girl, anyway?" says Juliet to Shell Bell.

[she_sells_seashells]

"Yes," says Shell Bell. "But, magic, and even if there weren't magic, she and Tony are identical twins, so." She shrugs, blushing.

[luminous_regnant]

"What is up with my alts and non-monogamy?" asks Golden rhetorically.

[cross_and_bow]

"Don't look at me, I haven't even had that conversation," says Juliet.

[she_sells_seashells]

"I don't think it's us. Well, I don't think it's most of us. I had a crush on my Tony before I even worked out how to make things happen with my Sherlock and my Sherlock is, you know, special circumstances. I think we just attract non-monogamous people who are interesting enough to make the hack worthwhile. Except you, Golden."

[luminous_regnant]

"When I met Stella it was one thing - there weren't any duplicates but us, I could explain to myself that in a world without vampires Edward would've died of the Spanish flu and of course I would have found someone else, but now there are so many duplicates I'm beginning to wonder what's going on," says Golden frankly. "If Whistles can show up in multiple versions of Earth - with different birth years; Amariah's parents apparently met later than typical or something and the picture of Kas still looks about her age - and also on Samaria, and if Sherlocks can appear with not only different genders but also in two neighboring Earths and the obviously far-future Panem... why is there only one Edward, why aren't there two or three of him too? I'm not saying I want there to be. I'd find that nearly as confusing as he finds my alts. But I wonder why there aren't."

[she_sells_seashells]

"We talk about the template," murmurs Shell Bell. "But who's the template?"

[cross_and_bow]

"Well - what are the features that crop up a lot? We all look the same, except Angela's wings and Golden's recoloring - but not everything's universal. The template would have to start out with mental opacity. That random little town in Washington comes up a lot too - Sunnydale has its reasons for attracting interesting goings-on, but Forks doesn't, there's no reason for it to be repeated unless it's in the template. So it's not Shell Bell or Angela and it's not me."

[luminous_regnant]

"Stella and I share a birthdate with each other but not Amariah," says Golden.