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"So did you?" Lexi of course asks again as soon as they are in their room alone.
"One time, okay, it was just - I wasn't planning on two of my alts having married two of his and four more dating them, okay?"
"You didn't tell me!"
"No, I didn't, it was just going to be a one-off, and for the love of sunshine and rainbows don't spread it around any farther, okay?"
"I won't, but the Joker totally knows."
"Ugh."
"Well, not for sure, but he suspects, and not just because most of you are doing most of him."
"I think your grammar implies a little too much."
"Whatever, you know what I mean," laughs Lexi. "So what're you going to do?"
"I," says Bella with dignity, "am going to think."
And she teleports to a spot in midair, high up to the point of being a speck in the sky above Forks to any grounded observers, and she murmurs "flight" as she begins to fall, and she stands in place in the air.
And she thinks.
+Brilliance?+ she asks after about half an hour.
incanted
incanted
+Well, there you go, I don't have to dissuade you from a life of petty culinary theft. Did the Joker happen to tell you anything about the conversation we had?+
incanted
+You. Well, the template, more, and stuff about how you fit into it. Apparently you guys have been known to do some screwed-up stuff about falling in love, except not with Bells, with this other template.+
incanted
+But apparently I shouldn't actually worry about it because if I ever trigger this template behavior pattern you will be spirited away for snuggles and debauchery, instead.+
incanted
+So I finally got half an hour in which no new magic or key information was being introduced,+ she continues, +and I did some thinking, and mostly I spent the entire time in an unproductive circle of thoughts like "what if I were triplets, WHAT THEN" and "how did all the other Bells deal or do they just come with polyamory installed for some reason" and "well there's Golden but she's a vampire but Alice is a vampire and apparently that didn't do a thing to him but there's Golden and she's a vampire" etcetera and basically it's not going anywhere and. I think the bit I'm missing is that I don't have a picture of what it looks like to be not-monogamous. I haven't met any of these couples in person. I don't know how they work, I mean, the Joker's special effects are cool but they're not the same as actually seeing stuff. And if any of those Bells were here, they could just tell me, but they're not, so basically the person I have to ask is you. What would it be like?+
cardistry
+...I don't really know,+ he says. +Like, from where I'm standing, the big difference between monogamous and not-monogamous is that monogamous means breaking my heart a lot. I know that much. But I still haven't ever done either.+
incanted
+Well, neither've I.+ She sighs. +I could see getting really, really attached to you - and apparently that's not me being seventeen and making things up to be dramatic, because two pairs of us are married - and - I don't know how to reconcile that with sharing, the best I can do is "what if I were triplets WHAT THEN" apparently.+
cardistry
+...Okay but like,+ says Brilliance, +sharing what, what is it about sex that makes it special, would you still feel weird if - the Joker, let's go with him, I've fucked him - if he fed me cake or beat me up?+
incanted
+If he fed you cake? No, not a flicker. If he beat you up - well, now that I know what I know, yeah, if, as is not presently the case, it were any of my business.+
cardistry
+Oh,+ says Brilliance. +I dunno - I guess I didn't really answer your question, did I? I'm still not sure how.+
incanted
+Like, sex is probably special for all kinds of weird historical and evolutionary reasons, it could probably just as easily be waltzing or something if things had shaken out differently, but I did grow up in a culture where The Special Thing is sex, where that is a thing that people in committed relationships do only with each other because it's a Special Thing with Capital Letters.+
cardistry
+It's not a Special Thing to me at all,+ says Brilliance. +Because I, you know, didn't grow up in a culture.+
incanted
+Right. And maybe I could adapt better if, I dunno, if there were some device cultural script for indicating - specialness, uniqueness, particular devotion...+
cardistry
+So,+ he says, sounding somewhere between very nervous and very turned on, +um, you remember when I said the incantation for my built-in torture function wasn't 'pants'...?+
cardistry
+It's 'Devotion',+ he confirms. +And... well, I don't have any cultural scripts... but right now you're the only person who can use it, and I'm—okay with that.+
cardistry
+I'm saying I don't want anyone else to,+ he says, +except maybe the Jokers, and I can live without them doing it, there's plenty of other ways for them to hurt me if they feel like it - and - I have complicated feelings about you doing it, but they're not all 'no'.+