the place to be

[point_b]

Bella finds it.

"Alli!" she twines. "C'mere."

"You c'mere. Easier for you."

"No, you need to come look at this, seriously."

"Okay, fine, where are you?"

"Garage."

So Alli comes out to the garage. Their parents aren't home; Charlie's working, Renée is volunteering with some of the refugee kids at a shelter, trying to find which have parents who just wound up somewhere else, which need adopting, which are going to wind up coming of age adrift in the bursting-at-the-seams system. It's just them, not attending school, recovering.

"Whoa," says Alli. "So when you said you were at the garage, you meant that you were at the freakish restaurant that someone put in our garage."

"This isn't somebody's idea of remodeling," Bella says. "It's too big to be the garage."

"Do you think it's safe?"

"I think one of you should go in first, for sure."

"We don't actually know if I work that way," say two Alli voices, but Bella pushes one of them towards the door anyway.

Nothing happens.

The Allis converge, inside the bar. Bella follows.

Comments

[point_b]

"Mostly I wanted to know if there was someplace we ought to be looking."

[whatamithinking]

"Aha, no. I mean, statistically the universe is big enough that I suspect Earths aren't actually usually the only planet with life, but there's a difference between 'has life' and 'interesting sci-fi aliens.'"

[point_b]

"A bit, yes."

[whatamithinking]

"Given how Earthlike Milliways' outdoors is, I suspect its human-centricism has more to do with Milliways than with the nature of the multiverse."

[point_b]

"I haven't seen the outdoors yet. Is it interestingly Earthlike or meh Earthlike?"

[whatamithinking]

"It has a lake and a forest and a mountain in the distance. The lake's a bit cold, but otherwise good for swimming."

[point_b]

"Does it come to an abrupt stop with exploding stars in the distance after that?"

[whatamithinking]

"I would not consider that good for swimming!"

[point_b]

"Why not? They're certainly striking through the window and I assume if it was a functional vacuum it would slurp up the lake, so it would just be a view."

[whatamithinking]

"Okay, true, but the mental image you initially generated was one where you might go over the edge by accident."

[point_b]

"Wasn't what I had in mind. So what is past the lake and the mountain and the forest?"

[whatamithinking]

"If you go far enough you just sort of loop back around and end up in the general area again."

[point_b]

"...Okay, now I want to figure out how my sense-of-place reacts to it."

[whatamithinking]

"Knock yourself out. That door leads outside," she says, pointing.

[point_b]

Bella goes out. Alli orders lunch.

Bella comes back. "My sense of place is very confused by the edges of that landscape."

[whatamithinking]

"What kind of confused?"

[point_b]

"If I look out too far, it thinks that the places are duplicates of nearer places."

[whatamithinking]

"That does sound confusing."

[point_b]

"Yeah. So I could go to any of the locations, but I'd wind up at the nearby 'instance'."

[whatamithinking]

"Huh. Well, as long as it works. Of course, Milliways does go out of its way to be habitable and such."

[point_b]

"I did notice that. It's friendly."

[whatamithinking]

"It really is."

[point_b]

Flicker and Verge stick around for a while longer, the former talking mostly to Bar and the latter playing cards with herself. Flicker collects a few more souvenirs to bring home, and eventually gemini, ashbot, and shopping bag all go home.

[thinkering]

About half an hour later, Lorica descends the stairs, yawning.

[whatamithinking]

"Oh, hello. Your alt and her twin left, but it hasn't been long enough for my sister or I to have slept."