"I will remember this when you meet some boy," grumbles Bella, "you can bet I will, I have a perfect memory now, you know."

"I," says Lexi loftily, "will take my chances. So is he good? He must be if you're gonna keep him for the foreseeable future, right -"

"Shut up shut up shut up."

"Not a chance!"

"I hear the cruiser."

"Shutting up. You play it how you want."

Shell Bell waves.

And Sarion peers around curiously.

"Is Brilliance around?" Shell Bell asks. "Sarion met him earlier."

"...Hi, it's nice to meet you. He's on another planet."

"Okay, we'll go wait for you there!"

"...I'll be along in a minute."

Shell Bell and Sarion disappear. The door into Milliways swings shut behind them.

"So," says Aurora to Charlie, "there are a bunch of me in a bunch of different universes, apparently those ones worked out how to get to this one, I want to go talk to them - Lexi, do you want to come or get caught up later? - and Dad, Brilliance had a really, really lousy - I'm not sure if childhood's the right word, but a lousy first while, and he'll be really upset if you threaten him vaguely about keeping me happy or anything, so, like, you can say what you have to say but please let me pass it on instead of saying it to his face?"

"Cross my heart, Dad, he will never be in our room with any combination of me or Lexi with the door closed," says Bella, deeply unimpressed.

"Should we, like, take lunch?"

"Yes. And let's bring some for Brilliance too, just because he can conjure food doesn't mean he won't appreciate it." Bella fills two bowls with macaroni and cheese - Lexi already has hers - and teleports them both to Planet Rainbowsand.

"I See you," Sarion says.

"You must be Brilliance," says Shell Bell.

"Yeah," says Brilliance. "—Wait, are you the elf one? But you're—better," he says.

Isibel tucks her hair behind her ears.

"Are you better, though? You look better," he says. "That's awesome!"