Delightfully Strange

[magictechsupport]

At the end of the universe,

A man steps into a bar and looks around. "Huh, nobody told me they installed a break room here."

With Slayer Juliet.

With Kappa's Dagna.

With Eclipse!Bell.

Comments

[cross_and_bow]

"They didn't. Well, maybe they did, but it isn't this place," says a girl sitting at the bar.

[magictechsupport]

"True enough. No brand logo plastered everywhere. So what is it, is the question."

[cross_and_bow]

"Interdimensional bar!"

[magictechsupport]

"Fascinating. Hopefully not the kind of interdimensionality I'm used to." He walks up to the bar. "I'm Terence."

[cross_and_bow]

"Bella. What's wrong with your usual kind of interdimensionality?"

Welcome. Can I interest you in a drink? First one is free, says a napkin.

[magictechsupport]

The bar being a person gets an expression of mild surprise.

To Bella, "It'd be boring if it was the same thing, mostly, I just spent about six hours untangling dimensional identifier runes because someone decided that just copying the old version was enough when they moved offices."

To the bar, "Drinks... Close enough to quitting time, why not. Since you're offering, I'll have a 'setting star' or whatever other cocktail you recommend if you don't know that one."

[cross_and_bow]

I know all the drinks, says the bar in affronted handwriting. The napkin is accompanied by a setting star.

"Ah, no, I think this is a different kind. It's not the kind I've got at home either."

[magictechsupport]

"Thank you." He takes a sip and nods approvingly. "It certainly seems like it. I'm just glad that this one, if I have to fix it, the problem will most likely not be the results of someone's lack of common sense."

[cross_and_bow]

"I don't think you have to fix this place. It seems to be working as planned, although who plans a thing to work this way I couldn't tell you."

[all_the_thoughts]

The room is currently mostly deserted, except for a woman sitting at a table off to the left, wearing complicated goggles and peering at some squares of old weathered metal. Occasionally she fiddles with the goggles to swing an old lens out of the way and a new one into place.

[magictechsupport]

On second thought, this bar probably does not belong to MTU. It would be expensive, and he knows this branch's typical response to proposed expenses.

Those items she's using are plainly magic of some kind, but she is not currently in the tech support queue, so instead he asks, "Do you know what this place is?"

[all_the_thoughts]

She looks up, glancing around a bit before she finally locates the source of the unexpected speech sounds.

"Sorry, did you say something just now? I was working."

[magictechsupport]

"I'm wondering if you know why a tenderless bar has replaced my office's teleport room door."

[all_the_thoughts]

"Oh. I have no idea," she says. "It's very confusing and also really interesting but I was in the middle of something when I found it and there are tables here so I just sat down and kept working."

[magictechsupport]

"I... see."

He decides to investigate, producing a shiny, glowing tool from his briefcase and waving it around, frowning at the results. "Well, it is strange."

[all_the_thoughts]

"What's that?" she asks, pushing the goggles up onto her forehead so she can peer at him without her specialized lenses in the way.

[magictechsupport]

"K-1200 series thaumoscope." He twists two knobs on it and waves it around again. "This place's mana field is odd."

[magictechsupport]

Terence investigates the place and quickly grasps the various mysteries of Milliways. He orders a large, fancy coffee for his free drink and does a little magic and confirms that time is, in fact, paused in his universe.

Then he takes advantage of the bar's extremely large repertoire of food and drinks for a while, making small talk with other people who come in. He congratulates someone on getting married, has an interesting discussion about a local brand of witchcraft that seems inferior to the ones he knows (he keeps this sentiment to himself), listens with half a brain to a young man complain about his cousins and then explain the tactics of a video game he likes. Despite the occasional lull or boring patron, it's an interesting bar, on average. He could do this all night.

At the moment the place is empty except for a pair of lizard-people sparring in the backyard. Then the door opens, so he turns to have a look.

[eclipsi]

It's a teenage girl with a cane and short hair. She is confused.

[magictechsupport]

"Welcome to Milliways, the interdimensional bar. First time here, from your confusion."

His mind is well-shielded, if she senses that.

[eclipsi]

She doesn't react to his shielding. She taps in. "Interdimensional bar. Uh, give me the standard explanation if there is one."

[magictechsupport]

"Standard as it is: The door to Milliways replaces doors at whim from your world and everyone else's worlds. Humans are most common, 'Earth' seems fairly common too. Time there is paused while you're here, usually, there's a translation aura, the bar is sentient and female and serves anything you care to name so long as it's not dangerous or magic, and the first drink's free."

[eclipsi]

The girl takes a nickel out of her pocket, leans out the door, throws it, shuts the door before it hits the ground, waits a moment, and opens it to watch it clatter.

"Okay... So are you speaking English or is that the translation aura?"

[magictechsupport]

"I'm speaking English. It's common in the set of connected worlds I know. Lots of worlds speak it already, even before we first contact them. A sort of multiversal standard, and one of the great mysteries of world theory."

[eclipsi]

"You know a set of connected worlds?"