The guest list winds up being pretty huge.

To start with, there are now eight Bells. Pattern isn't bringing anyone besides herself, and Aegis no one besides herself and her Whistle, but everyone else -

Between Alice, the Joker, the rescued Queenie, Kas, Micaiah, and Sue, plus Ghosty who Amariah picked up on her way home, that's seven Whistles. (Stella thinks ahead: there is a soundproofed orgy chamber away from the main party awning. With a few nodes off of it in case more than one orgy forms; she can think of at least two other likely ones.)

There's an equally absurd number of Sherlocks and Tonies if you count them together. They have Juliet's matched set, Shell Bell's matched set, two other matched sets from Bell-less worlds (one with souled vampire, one both human), a stray Tony, and a stray Sherlock from Downside.

Amariah grabbed a random Libby on top of the random extra Whistle, but at least she's not incorporating anyone from home.

Golden's bringing much of her family and many of her friends - although Edward is staying home, that still leaves Elspeth and Jacob, Alice and Jasper with little Brandon, Rosalie and Emmett and little Henry, Nathan accompanying his mate and their child Kerron, Esme and Carlisle and their Lily, Addy, and Elena who'll get to see her brother. Golden claims that this is a conservative list and she could easily have produced another twenty enthusiastic guests. Stella doesn't doubt it. She puts up a few signs reading Please Conduct Adult Conversation Only Via Brainphone. Little Half-Vampires Have Good Ears And Perfect Memories. As a last-minute surprise, Golden has taken Elspeth's suggestion to bring Edward's deceased mother Elizabeth, too.

Juliet has, on top of her boyfriend and his - progenitor? - her tiny Libby, James, a tagalong thereto called Virginia, and a ghost called Minnie, plus Giles.

Angela's list is more modest: her, her husband, and their friends Alleluia and Caleb.

Shell Bell is responsible for half the Sherlocks-and-Tonies all by herself, a tagalong called Pepper, and also someone called Darcy and also Matilda. (Shell Bell is also the reason Angela is not inviting her brother-in-law.)

Stella herself is responsible for inviting Libby, Orfeo, Chris, Mary, Anna, Sandy, Eights, Chainsaw, Lazarus, Kolya (who is informed that it would be awfully inconvenient for a majority of Bells to all have to coordinate on pretending he doesn't exist when only one of them has even met him to be able to identify him in the first place, so he can simply stay home if he's planning to be hidey), and Bridget.

Stella sets up a name tag system. Everyone will have a tag stuck to them. Solo persons - a minority - will just have their names. People with template names and nicknames will have both stamped on automatically. ("Hi! I'm a Bell, and you can call me Stella!"; "Hi! I'm a Whistle, and you can call me Alice!" "Hi! I'm a Sherlock, and I don't have a distinguishing nickname yet but as soon as I pick one it will appear here!")

She conjures up a nice buffet of food and beverages which will stay its correct temperature until consumed, and assorted synthetics for the vampires (labeled not for human consumption), and dishes and flatware (all glass; even some of the food-eating guests might dissolve anything else) and fusses with the awning opacity until it lets in just the right amount of sun, and, what the hell, she throws in a stage in case Angela wants to sing or she decides to play the flute or someone decides to pentagon some other performative skill to entertain the crowd. She makes sure there are enough bathrooms for all the people who still need bathrooms.

She puts out a few tables here and there with little bowls of squares and triangles - a mix of her glowing red and Alice's shifty black - in them for everyone's convenience. She accumulates coins in those sizes faster than she generally uses them and has a great many, so there are plenty for anyone to dip and wish if something comes up. She double-checks to make sure the Martian ground rules prohibit any misuses available for those size coins.

Jane gets one of those high-tech holographic projectors, on wheels, which she promptly manifests in, drives around the floor, and makes faces through.

Author: self_composed	The guest list winds up being pretty huge. To start with, there are now eight Bells. Pattern isn't bringing anyone besides herself, and Aegis no one besides herself and her Whistle, but everyone else - Between Alice, the Joker, the rescued Queenie, Kas, Micaiah, and Sue, plus Ghosty who Amariah picked up on her way home, that's seven Whistles. (Stella thinks ahead: there is a soundproofed orgy chamber away from the main party awning. With a few nodes off of it in case more than one orgy forms; she can think of at least two other likely ones.) There's an equally absurd number of Sherlocks and Tonies if you count them together. They have Juliet's matched set, Shell Bell's matched set, two other matched sets from Bell-less worlds (one with souled vampire, one both human), a stray Tony, and a stray Sherlock from Downside. Amariah grabbed a random Libby on top of the random extra Whistle, but at least she's not incorporating anyone from home. Golden's bringing much of her family and many of her friends - although Edward is staying home, that still leaves Elspeth and Jacob, Alice and Jasper with little Brandon, Rosalie and Emmett and little Henry, Nathan accompanying his mate and their child Kerron, Esme and Carlisle and their Lily, Addy, and Elena who'll get to see her brother. Golden claims that this is a conservative list and she could easily have produced another twenty enthusiastic guests. Stella doesn't doubt it. She puts up a few signs reading Please Conduct Adult Conversation Only Via Brainphone. Little Half-Vampires Have Good Ears And Perfect Memories. As a last-minute surprise, Golden has taken Elspeth's suggestion to bring Edward's deceased mother Elizabeth, too. Juliet has, on top of her boyfriend and his - progenitor? - her tiny Libby, James, a tagalong thereto called Virginia, and a ghost called Minnie, plus Giles. Angela's list is more modest: her, her husband, and their friends Alleluia and Caleb. Shell Bell is responsible for half the Sherlocks-and-Tonies all by herself, a tagalong called Pepper, and also someone called Darcy and also Matilda. (Shell Bell is also the reason Angela is not inviting her brother-in-law.) Stella herself is responsible for inviting Libby, Orfeo, Chris, Mary, Anna, Sandy, Eights, Chainsaw, Lazarus, Kolya (who is informed that it would be awfully inconvenient for a majority of Bells to all have to coordinate on pretending he doesn't exist when only one of them has even met him to be able to identify him in the first place, so he can simply stay home if he's planning to be hidey), and Bridget. Stella sets up a name tag system. Everyone will have a tag stuck to them. Solo persons - a minority - will just have their names. People with template names and nicknames will have both stamped on automatically. ("Hi! I'm a Bell, and you can call me Stella!"; "Hi! I'm a Whistle, and you can call me Alice!" "Hi! I'm a Sherlock, and I don't have a distinguishing nickname yet but as soon as I pick one it will appear here!") She conjures up a nice buffet of food and beverages which will stay its correct temperature until consumed, and assorted synthetics for the vampires (labeled not for human consumption), and dishes and flatware (all glass; even some of the food-eating guests might dissolve anything else) and fusses with the awning opacity until it lets in just the right amount of sun, and, what the hell, she throws in a stage in case Angela wants to sing or she decides to play the flute or someone decides to pentagon some other performative skill to entertain the crowd. She makes sure there are enough bathrooms for all the people who still need bathrooms. She puts out a few tables here and there with little bowls of squares and triangles - a mix of her glowing red and Alice's shifty black - in them for everyone's convenience. She accumulates coins in those sizes faster than she generally uses them and has a great many, so there are plenty for anyone to dip and wish if something comes up. She double-checks to make sure the Martian ground rules prohibit any misuses available for those size coins. Jane gets one of those high-tech holographic projectors, on wheels, which she promptly manifests in, drives around the floor, and makes faces through.
Author: autokinetic	Aegis sort of wishes she were as far along in empire-building as some of the others. At least she's not completely on her own like poor Pattern, but her only guest is off in a pile of himselves. Oh well. Everybody here is filtered for being potentially interesting to people like her! There's a guy standing alone with a plate of food looking around with bemusement. She dances over in his direction. Her exo's been rendered quite redundant but she hasn't taken it off yet, so she's still all-over copper. "Hi -" She read his name tag. "Is that pronounced with a hard G or a soft G? Or like a J?"
Author: pythbox	"Giles," says Giles. (It's the J.) "And you are... Aegis?"
Author: autokinetic	"Yes. Also with a G pronounced like a J," she says. "I'm the space soldier one who brought in Jane, if you're having trouble keeping us straight."
Author: pythbox	"Just a little, yes," he admits. "And I am... er... from Juliet's world."
Author: autokinetic	"I can tell," says Aegis. "We can all see now by looking which world a person's from. She named your world Sunshine, by the way. You seem kind of overwhelmed by all this stuff," she says, gesturing around.
Author: pythbox	"That is... definitely accurate."
Author: autokinetic	"You need stuff summarized or explained or would that just make it worse?"
Author: pythbox	"It all seems fairly straightforward," he says. "It's just, well, incredible."
Author: autokinetic	Aegis grins. "I'm lucky, I had warning. Whistles like my Sue sometimes dream their way into Milliways, so I've been hearing about alts and mints and stuff since I was ten, even if I didn't buy it all as a real thing since it was just Sue telling me about a dream he had where there were more of me and one of 'em had wings."
Author: pythbox	"...Yes, I can imagine that would sound dubious."
Author: autokinetic	"Quite." Aegis sways, and pivots around 360º. "How do you know Juliet well enough to get an invite?"
Author: pythbox	"I'm her Watcher," he says, and sighs. "Was. I was her Watcher. Now I'm probably redundant."
Author: autokinetic	"What's a Watcher?"
Author: pythbox	"...Well, do you know what a Slayer is?"
Author: autokinetic	"Yeah, that was in the executive summary I got when I met up with the peal, Slayer's like a supernatural draftee versus monsters. Gets superpowers, but mostly combat ones, not magic. Sue visited Sunshine once, but Juliet made him spar with her first to make sure he'd be able to handle himself if they met anything and he gave her a bloody nose and she was really impressed, so they must be pretty good combat powers. He said she was easier to hit than me, though, just tougher."
Author: pythbox	"Yes, well, the Watchers are meant to lend her a hand. Or so I've always thought. Research obscure varieties of demon, oversee her training, that sort of thing."
Author: autokinetic	"...So you've always thought?" inquires Aegis, tilting her head. She stretches her arms out and then drops them.
Author: pythbox	He sighs again. "We recently had a disagreement with the Council. Juliet died. The Council representative is in jail for kidnapping."
Author: autokinetic	"Yeesh. Did she piss them off or something? She kind of glossed over how she got to be one of the technically dead trio in all the excitement. I don't have as complete a picture of her as some of the others - Sue can't link her. Golden either. Their versions of our power won't let him in even if they try."
Author: pythbox	"No, apparently the Council just thinks that drugging a Slayer to take away her powers and locking her in an empty building with a starving vampire is a perfectly natural form of standardized testing. When I objected, the fellow hit me over the head and then did it anyway."
Author: autokinetic	"Wow. The I.F. had some kind of screwed up ideas about that sort of thing too, I should probably commiserate with her at some point," says Aegis, wincing.
Author: pythbox	Giles nods.
Author: autokinetic	"I was keeping it secret that I could link with Sue, because my telepath-blocking mutation is the only reason I was allowed to have this," says Aegis, flicking the copper webbing on the back of one hand, "but then they really wanted me to be able to do it for the war we were supposed to wage, so in the middle of the night they gave me an illegal mutation suppression drug and took my exoskeleton - and I was almost paralyzed without it before magic happened. But I fessed up about having been able to let Sue in all along and they gave me an antidote and my exo back."
Author: pythbox	"I'm sorry," he says, "that's awful. I apologize on behalf of self-important bureaucrats everywhere."
Author: autokinetic	Aegis laughs. "They weren't a monolith. I hacked into the fleet psych files and there were some people who were shouting at some other people about fucking with us like that. But yeah, now the war's over and I'm an admiral and a mint and I've got Jane and I don't even need my exo anymore, I just haven't bothered to take it off - and some things are gonna change about my world."
Author: pythbox	"That," says Giles, smiling slightly, "seems to be a theme."
Author: autokinetic	"It's a good theme! We're way better than any alternatives anyone's come up with so far."
Author: pythbox	"I wonder," he says, "if we will ever find a Bell who was content to let someone else rule her world."
Author: autokinetic	"Sure," says Aegis. "As soon as we find a Bell whose world is being run acceptably. Otherwise I think the closest we'll get is one who's discontent about it but doesn't have the resources to do much."
Author: pythbox	"And what constitutes acceptable?"
Author: autokinetic	"There's not a master list. Worlds vary, their needs vary. My situation's not as urgent as, say, Shell Bell's was. I might actually decide to be patient enough to get democratically elected instead of just taking stuff over."
Author: pythbox	"And if you are not elected...?"
Author: autokinetic	"I'm still an admiral and a war hero and the best friend of the only person who can translate for the aliens. Whoever's elected will have to listen to me, or at least Sue. If I can't be Hegemon, I can probably at least get awarded governorship of a colony, and make covert little improvements to the rest of the world the way Angela's doing while she waits to order her god to name her Archangel."
Author: pythbox	"...I'd think someone who can order a god to do things is already doing pretty well in the power department."
Author: autokinetic	"Oh, it's not actually a god, just everyone on her world thinks it is and has for a few hundred years. It's actually a spaceship. She made herself captain of it and then Jane ate it and either way it does what she says."
Author: pythbox	"I see."
Author: autokinetic	"You'll get used to this sort of thing soon, I'm sure. I mean, Juliet must like you or she wouldn't have invited you, and that implies a certain minimum level of mental alertness and adjustability."
Author: pythbox	...He shakes his head and laughs. "How reassuring."
Author: autokinetic	"You could always ask her for some brain upgrades if that'd help. I'm having tremendous fun with mine. I was used to processing power boosts from linkups with Sue, but perfect recall is good stuff."
Author: pythbox	"Ah... no, I don't think I will."
Author: autokinetic	"Why not?"
Author: pythbox	He hesitates, then shakes his head.
Author: autokinetic	"Are you this unforthcoming with Juliet, too? Geez, you must have other really sterling qualities."
Author: pythbox	...He frowns. "I am suddenly even less inclined to detail my personal traumas to you in public," he says dryly.
Author: autokinetic	"Aww, but I told you mine," says Aegis. "I could also tell you about how I got beat up in the shower one time or how I got kidnapped or how I learned that I was fighting an actual war and not a sim, would that help?" (She is, Giles may notice, the youngest Bell in attendance.)
Author: pythbox	He takes off his glasses and cleans them. "No," he says. "Thank you. But no."
Author: autokinetic	"I wonder if Juliet knows," says Aegis.
Author: pythbox	"Juliet does know," he says, "and I don't expect that I can stop her from telling you, but right at this moment I am not very happy about the prospect."
Author: autokinetic	"Well, she won't tell me if it's legit personal and there's no conceivable use for the information on my end," says Aegis, "there's that."
Author: pythbox	"How reassuring," he mutters, rubbing the bridge of his nose before he replaces his glasses.
Author: autokinetic	"On the other hand, if the information has ever touched a computer, Jane'll tell me regardless 'cause I'm her mom."
Author: pythbox	"Never have I been gladder to be a relic of the stone age," he says. "What is your fascination with invading my privacy for your, your personal entertainment?"
Author: autokinetic	"I didn't say I was going to ask her! But the vast majority of people who've made it their business to keep shit secret from me were hiding facts like 'we have been reading your diary since you were four' and 'that computer game you've been playing is a psychological evaluation tool' and 'the asshole who knocked your head into the corner of your bunk and could've given you brain damage was actually a plant and we could've stopped him anytime but we didn't' and 'we're graduating you early to use you as leverage against your best friend' and 'that game you just played involved real soldiers, four of whom died after giving up their lives on Earth to relativistic space travel and didn't know they were putting their lives in the hands of fifteen- and sixteen-year olds, and we were never going to tell you but our psychologists convinced us it was strategically necessary'. And I don't like it."
Author: pythbox	He sighs and takes off his glasses for a moment to rub his eyes. "I'm sorry, then," he says. "But out of all the responses you could have chosen to this set of circumstances, taunting me with your ability to spy on me is not my favourite."
Author: autokinetic	"What would've been better, then?"
Author: pythbox	"I don't really know," he sighs.
Author: autokinetic	"Compared to anybody who isn't minted and flush with coins, all of us might as well be omnipotent. If we want to bad enough, we can do anything. You'll have better luck trying to manage what we want. We've got good ethics but not perfect ones."
Author: pythbox	"Manage what you want?" he repeats. "How am I meant to do that? And why should I need to? If you are nearly omnipotent and your ethics cannot prevent you from needless violations of other people's privacy and autonomy, that is a problem that you, urgently, need to solve."
Author: autokinetic	"There's this thing we do," says Aegis. "We ask ourselves: What do I want? What do I have? How can I use the latter to get the former? And having more power lets us be more precise and nicer and more ethical at getting only what we want and not any extras that we don't need that we might not really, truly want. And we don't want to hurt people, or go around needlessly violating other people's privacy and autonomy, and with wishcoins we can avoid it even if something very, very important that might ordinarily conflict with those things is on the line. But at the end of the day it always comes down to what we want. Angela's god is false and Amariah's don't care and mine's probably going to send me a Mother's Day card - we answer to ourselves. I don't think wanting to know things that have no obvious application would ever tend to trump others' personal privacy. But if something were going to... curiosity is high up on things that motivate Bells. I'm not trying to scare you. I do think Juliet must like you, I'm not planning to pry into your head, and you aren't from my jurisdiction anyway. But for keeping conversations a little friendlier than this one turned out, you could consider not being conspicuously, temptingly opaque."
Author: pythbox	"I fail to see at what point in this conversation I could have usefully been more inconspicuous, since you leapt down my throat the moment I failed to volunteer information about my personal history."
Author: cross_and_bow	Juliet chooses this moment to wander by. "This looks distressingly hostile," she says. "What's happened?"
Author: autokinetic	"Your Watcher got me curious and wasn't thrilled with the results," says Aegis.
Author: cross_and_bow	"...Oof. Uh, I wasn't linked up and don't know you as well as the others do, are there special circumstances or are you garden-variety thereabouts?"
Author: autokinetic	"Far as I know, no one has ever kept a significant secret from me specifically, that wasn't both relevant and being kept for reasons contrary to my interests, there's that," says Aegis.
Author: cross_and_bow	"Okay. Maybe when your Whistle comes out you wanna ask him about getting a mindreading install like how Stella and Angela and Shell Bell have. And don't mind Giles. I think he gets it about relevant information. Giles, what's your half?"
Author: pythbox	"I am still unclear on why she felt that the best response to my refusal to tell her why I am wary of mind upgrades was to start listing the ways she might obtain the answer without my consent," he says grumpily. And to Aegis, he adds: "This information has nothing to do with you. Its only conceivable use to anyone, besides making me uncomfortable every time it comes up, is to corroborate a warning that a kind of magic you are never going to study has nasty pitfalls that almost certainly wouldn't affect you anyway."
Author: cross_and_bow	"Also, reminding me of it could prompt me to ask if there's anyone you want pulled from the afterlife," Juliet says archly.
Author: pythbox	"...I don't know," he says helplessly. "I will have that conversation with you later when I've thought about some things."
Author: cross_and_bow	"Okay. Aegis, am I right in thinking that if you were trying to keep a secret from somebody you'd think it was very nice of them to tell you where they could get it besides from you?"
Author: autokinetic	"Yeah," says Aegis. "And what'd happen if I didn't cough up, too. Otherwise maybe I piss them off not telling and they just find it out some other way and later I need them to like me and they don't - or maybe I don't tell and they're not mad but I never even know that they could've just looked it up someplace else and are capable of yea much restraint and I need an evaluation of their character later - or maybe I do tell because it turns out the alternative is getting drugged and half-paralyzed and gosh sure would've been nice to know that they wanted to know I could do this thing back when telling them would've been relatively painless, huh? - or maybe she's the admin Downside and she knows literally everything already and now I know how restrained she's not and also know not to waste time predicating any behavior on her being ignorant of anything - or something. Why wouldn't I want to know exactly how much my secrets were under my control?"
Author: cross_and_bow	"Okay, but," says Juliet, "if one hasn't already thought through all that sort of thing, then learning something about how much one's secrets are under one's control can just sound like bad news or like escalating, they don't necessarily like learning it even if it was already true. If you - geez, you haven't interacted with civilians since you were six apart from the last twelve hours, have you? All kinds of shit probably goes without saying when everybody in the conversation's ranked and uniformed."
Author: autokinetic	"Well - Renée and Charlie wrote, but, yeah," says Aegis. "Lot of explicit power structures. I have bad instincts?"
Author: cross_and_bow	"I'm not gonna say they're complete shit, I'd have to talk to you a bit more to know that, but they're probably not well-calibrated. Giles isn't your C.O. just because he's old enough to vote. If he doesn't tell you something you're not going to wind up killing people on his say-so in the absence of critical information or running into some organizational incompatibility and ending your career."
Author: autokinetic	Aegis considers this. "I probably need, like, a month planetside before I'm decent company for anybody but Sue and the other child soldiers and copies of me," she remarks. "There were totally shades of mouthing off to a colonel back there. Different content same attitude. Sorry, Giles. I know you're not a colonel."
Author: cross_and_bow	Juliet snickers. "Just don't do it to Renée. I can just imagine the look on her face."
Author: autokinetic	"...I can't," murmurs Aegis.
Author: cross_and_bow	"...Didn't you hex up perfect recall, doesn't she send pictures?"
Author: autokinetic	"I did. She does. It's not the same, though, memories a decade out of date and still photos, is it? I can't picture what'd happen if I acted like she was Colonel Beckstead telling me I couldn't have access to ansible communications with the fleet."
Author: cross_and_bow	Juliet hugs her. "She'd get huffy and tell you that she didn't mean anything by whatever prompted the attitude and that you were a very touchy young lady and maybe she won't bake those cinnamon buns after all," she says. "And she'd get over it in about fifteen minutes and hug you. And bake you cinnamon buns."
Author: autokinetic	"Heh," says Aegis, and she hugs back tight.
Author: mind_game	[Hey, Aegis,] says Jane, broadcasting to all three members of the conversation (as the newly installed brainphone upgrade informs them), [I think you have one of these at home. He's got a different name and doesn't wear glasses and I wasn't paying a lot of attention so I didn't notice right away but the face matches one in the I.F. personnel database.]
Author: cross_and_bow	"Ooh, multiple Gileses belonging to sketchy bureucracies," says Juliet.
Author: autokinetic	"I don't recognize him," Aegis points out.
Author: pythbox	[...What,] says Giles, [is this person's name?]
Author: mind_game	[Rupert Merryweather,] reports Jane. [He's out of work now, since the Battle School system is shutting down, but he worked on getting kids into it through unconventional avenues. Including Aegis, who didn't take standard psych tests and couldn't be read by monitor. And he was also one of the principal people yelling at everyone about not giving her any bullshit.]
Author: autokinetic	"Heh," says Aegis, shaking her head. "My champion. I wonder if Sue's champion is an alt of somebody too."
Author: pythbox	"You have champions?"
Author: autokinetic	"That's just what we called certain people commenting in our psych files, when I pulled them. There was one guy - Merryweather - commenting on me, and one different guy commenting on Sue, who were loudly angry at everybody else for mishandling us."
Author: pythbox	"Well, what's the other one's name?"
Author: mind_game	[Jasper Whitlock,] reports Jane.
Author: cross_and_bow	"...You know, I saw a nametag that said Jasper, but then it was followed by Cullen," says Juliet. "Of course, you've got Giles on the one hand and Merryweather on the other."
Author: luminous_regnant	"Someone say my name?" inquires a vampire, appearing rather suddenly. His nametag does indeed say Jasper Cullen on it and doesn't identify him as belonging to a template.
Author: pythbox	"Merryweather was my mother's maiden name," Giles contributes.
Author: autokinetic	"That explains it," says Aegis. "Hey, Jasper, do you recognize the name 'Whitlock'?"
Author: luminous_regnant	"My last name, before I started using Cullen," says Jasper. "Why, what's going on?"
Author: cross_and_bow	"Alts," says Juliet.
Author: pythbox	Giles starts laughing.
Author: mind_game	[I could email them and invite them to the party!] offers Jane cheerfully.
Author: autokinetic	"I'd wanna consult Sue first. I wonder if he's done yet," Aegis says, peering around in search of Sue. The door for him she added to her wall still has a bird-activated doorbell of sorts so she can brighten to solicit attention, which is probably less intrusive and more comfortable than brainphoning. Bird?
Author: pythbox	Yeah? he answers. There are definite overtones of snuggliness, but he is not obviously having sex right this second.
Author: autokinetic	Our champions turn out to be alts of people here. You want Jane to invite 'em?
Author: pythbox	He laughs. Sure, go for it.
Author: autokinetic	"Sue says go for it," says Aegis.
$mind_game: (fractal)$ Author: mind_game	[Okay. So Giles, if you were a military recruitment officer who worked mostly with super-genius six-year-olds and your livelihood had just been rendered moot, what would be the best way for me to invite you to a party on Mars in Eos on behalf of one of your erstwhile charges? Jasper, if you were a military psychologist who liked yelling at bureaucrats - same question!]
Author: luminous_regnant	"Military psychologist? Wonders never cease," mutters Jasper. "Skip straight to the brainphone, I suppose. Tell him - he's the one who worked on Sue? - tell him it's do to with Sue, I suppose, I can be a surprise."
Author: pythbox	"...I have no idea," says Giles. "I suppose... just use the brainphone, yes, but do tell him about me if he lets you get that far. He may not believe you, but I can't imagine that he'd rather be surprised."
Author: mind_game	[Hello, Jasper Whitlock,] says Jane. [Sue, your erstwhile subject, would like to invite you to a party in another world!] [Hello, Rupert Merryweather,] also says Jane. [Swan, your erstwhile recruit, would like to invite you to a party in another world!]
Author: pythbox	There are varying lengths of silence from each recipient. Whitlock speaks first: [Who are you? What's going on?] Then Merryweather, a few seconds later: [Who are you and how do you know anything about my connection to Swan?]
Author: mind_game	[I'm a friend of Sue's!] Whitlock gets. [I'm your ride to and from the party, if you want to go. I can do this nifty teleporting trick.] [I'm a friend of hers!] Merryweather gets. [And she's been hacking into the psych records since she was twelve. She likes you, though.]
Author: pythbox	[...Okay,] says Whitlock, [you know what, sure.] Merryweather hesitates a little longer.
Author: mind_game	[I can pick you up and put you down if you'll stand in front of a camera,] Jane tells Whitlock. [You heard about the kidnapped kids whose building got dropped in the Hegemony complex? Like that, but I don't want your whole building so I can't just use the sattelite photo.] [Lots of universes,] Jane says chattily, [have copies of people from others. There's a you here. He's friends with another of Swan.]
Author: pythbox	[And you're what,] says Whitlock, [the same thing to computers that Sue is to people?] After a moment, Merryweather produces a hesitant, [Er, really?]
Author: mind_game	[That's actually a very good way of describing me!] exclaims Jane. [Yes,] says Jane. [He says you'd probably rather he not be a surprise and so I should tell you if you let me get that far. There are eight of Swan here, total, and they have brought all their friends.]
Author: pythbox	Whitlock laughs. [Good Lord,] mutters Merryweather.
Author: mind_game	[Ah, there you are. Ready?] Jane asks when Whitlock steps in front of a networked camera. [Any other questions?] Jane asks Merryweather innocently.
Author: pythbox	[Yes,] Whitlock says resignedly. Merryweather pauses, then says, [How am I meant to get to this party...?]
Author: mind_game	Jane yoinks Whitlock and drops him next to Jasper (Cullen). [I'm your ride,] she explains to Merryweather. [Did you hear about that building that mysteriously appeared in the Hegemony complex? I put it there. You just have to go somewhere I can see you and say when.]
Author: pythbox	Whitlock... stares. [And where,] asks Merryweather, [can you see me?]
Author: mind_game	[In view of any camera hooked up to the nets,] says Jane.
Author: luminous_regnant	"Hi," says Jasper. "I'm an alternate universe version of you who lived during the Civil War and was turned into a vampire at age twenty."
Author: pythbox	Whitlock shakes his head slowly. Merryweather doesn't say anything, but he does appear in front of such a camera, looking disgruntled.
Author: mind_game	[Ready?] Jane asks Merryweather brightly.
Author: luminous_regnant	"The little admiral's alternate universe version," Jasper adds, gesturing at Aegis, "married my brother, is why I'm here. Adoptive," he adds. "I fell in with a vampire family, you're unlikely to know any of them."
Author: pythbox	[You seem inappropriately cheerful about your surveillance abilities,] says Merryweather. [Yes, fine, let's see this party.]
Author: mind_game	Yoink!
Author: pythbox	Merryweather takes one look at the Jaspers and bursts out laughing. "I ought to have known," he giggles. Whitlock grins at him.
Author: autokinetic	"You two know each other?" inquires Aegis. "I guess that makes sense."
Author: cross_and_bow	"I'm getting Golden over here, this is hilarious," snorts Juliet.
Author: luminous_regnant	Golden appears presently. "Hmm," she says. "Bella," says Jasper, "meet my alt from - what've you named it?" he asks Aegis.
Author: autokinetic	"Peace," says Aegis cheekily.
Author: pythbox	Whitlock and Merryweather exchange a look. Then they both start laughing.
Author: autokinetic	"So what'd you do, coordinate on how to get the I.F. to stop being such idiots about me'n Sue?" Aegis asks. (Both Jaspers are now nametagged as Jaspers who have not chosen distinguishing nicknames. Jasper Cullen peers at his, and shrugs, and it turns into "Jazz". The Ruperts are labeled as Ruperts who may be addressed by their respective last names.)
Author: pythbox	"Nothing so grandiose," says Merryweather. "We get drunk together once a month and complain about being surrounded by fuckwits," says Whitlock.
Author: cross_and_bow	Juliet snickers.
Author: autokinetic	"That's adorable. Lemme see if Sue's extricable from what he's up to," snorts Aegis. Hey bird, they're here!
Author: pythbox	Busy, giggles Sue.
Author: autokinetic	"He's busy," Aegis reports. "Oh well."
Author: luminous_regnant	"I do not particularly understand that template. I know how to get along with my import, but I cannot claim to understand them."
Author: cross_and_bow	"I'm in the same boat, I'm all Team Sherlock over here, I like the Whistles I've met but understanding would be overstating it."
Author: autokinetic	"You're also the two Sue can't link, so that can't be helping. And I understand him pretty good, but then I've known him since we were six," laughs Aegis.
Author: pythbox	"...What... exactly is he busy with?" says Merryweather.
Author: autokinetic	"Lots of him," Aegis summarizes, rolling her eyes. "Lots and lots of him."
Author: pythbox	Whitlock snorts.
Author: cross_and_bow	"It's a popular template. And two of 'em aren't even ours, they're just visiting, although if Pattern's on the ball she'll snag one after they're done in there, if that doesn't take, you know, a week."
Author: luminous_regnant	"They are certainly convenient to have on the payroll. Or working for free, as the case may be."
Author: autokinetic	"Man, I haven't even discussed all that with Sue, everything's happened pretty fast, it was less than twelve hours ago I woke up in Milliways not remembering a thing besides having been kidnapped," laughs Aegis. "I'll get around to it."
Author: pythbox	"Kidnapped?" says Merryweather.
Author: autokinetic	"There was a ton of fighting on Eros, me and Sue were locked up in our room to wait it out, some people got in, we fought but got tranqued and Sue woke up first and Jane learned her teleporting trick and put us in touch with Shell Bell and then all the others and put the other kidnap victims in the Hegemony complex. Was this not on the nets, any of it?"
Author: luminous_regnant	"Being kidnapped's no fun," sighs Golden.
Author: cross_and_bow	"Yeah, it sucks," Juliet agrees, patting Aegis on the shoulder comfortingly.
Author: pythbox	"The part where someone managed to kidnap War and Peace definitely didn't get out," says Merryweather, shaking his head.
Author: cross_and_bow	"It is adorable how you and Sue are War and Peace, Aegis. Or vice versa."
Author: autokinetic	"They couldn't make up their minds for a while but I think I've been given Peace once and for all at this point. That's why I named the world that. I don't really want to go by it in casual conversation. I still like Aegis better for that."
Author: luminous_regnant	"If Sue had been Peace and you War, would you have named your world War?"
Author: autokinetic	"Nah," scoffs Aegis, "that would be terrible, I'd have to think of something else then. Or name it Peace anyway."
Author: pythbox	"Yes," says Merryweather, "it's practically inconceivable that you would name your world after anyone other than yourself." Giles snorts.
Author: autokinetic	"Hey, we don't all name our worlds after ourselves," laughs Aegis. "I think I'm the only one who did, unless you count Golden translating her theme into Latin!"
Author: cross_and_bow	"Angela didn't even rename hers. She just took what her planet was already called and extended it to the world in general."
Author: luminous_regnant	"I," says Golden with dignity, "am fond of my theme. And it is a more aesthetically pleasing distinguishing characteristic than 'Here There Be Vampires, Except Not Juliet's Kind'."
Author: pythbox	Merryweather just laughs.
Author: autokinetic	"Having fun?" Aegis asks him, amused. "Apparently parties are a thing Bells can do. Or at least Stella. I've never tried it, I've been in a kinda party-unfriendly environment."
Author: luminous_regnant	"I generally leave my parties to Alice - mine, not Stella's - who has much more fun with them than I do," Golden says. "Speaking of which," Jasper "Jazz" Cullen says to Whitlock, "do you want to meet my wife and our son, or would that be weird for you?"
Author: pythbox	"Sure," Whitlock decides. "Can't be any weirder than coming here in the first place."
Author: luminous_regnant	Alice does not have to be called over. She's Alice! She dances into Jasper's waiting arms from her conversation all the way across the room (its ending, of course, timed perfectly), holding onto a squirming toddler. "Hello!" she says, beaming brightly. "I'm Alice, and this is Brandon. I would offer to let you hold him, but he occasionally bites." "Only sometimes," says Brandon. "You're another Papa," he observes of Whitlock.
Author: pythbox	"Apparently so," Whitlock agrees, blinking. "Hello, Alice and Brandon." Merryweather is amused. Giles picks up on the mood without sharing its causes.
Author: autokinetic	"Little half-vampires are super-cute," says Aegis. "So, there's you with your kid, Golden, and there's Angela expecting with her Whistle, I guess all that's left is for somebody with a Sherlock to get knocked up and we'll have collectively tried all the known combinations? Juliet, who do you think'll be first, you or Shell Bell?"
Author: cross_and_bow	"I don't know, we haven't exactly sat down and discussed it, but she's the one with the stable empire, I have like five thousand species of demons to individually evaluate and handle before I can claim anything like that," shrugs Juliet. "I'm also not sure kids are a want for me? For us in general?"
Author: luminous_regnant	"I would have wanted one eventually. There were other decisive factors in the earliness of Elspeth's birth."
Author: autokinetic	"And Angela belongs to a species with fewer than a hundred fifty members and grew up on repopulation rhetoric, right," says Aegis. "Duly noted."
Author: pythbox	This is not a conversation that either of the Ruperts particularly wants to be a part of! They exchange a Look.
Author: autokinetic	That's okay, the Bells are done talking about it now! "Thank you for shouting at bureaucrats for me," Aegis tells Merryweather. "Even if it didn't always work."
Author: pythbox	"You're welcome," says Merryweather, a little wryly.