"Uh, I should maybe reply to Rete real fast but also uh, I am not sure how to distinguish when I am failing a system from when a system is failing me though now that I say that aloud the entire framing seems wrong?"

Oh, I am not sure what that means? She really seems like a Lorica.

I agree. But she doesn't look alike the way I would normally expect someone's counterpart in a nearby world to look.

"You seem unusually high on system-cooperativeness so a system that is not working well with you is probably also not working well with lots of other people."

Yeah - her world also seems to have very different powers from either us or Aleph so it's possible there's something else going on but I'm not sure how that explains this.

"Yeah I think that's true."

"Whatcha texting about?"

"Um. Rete says you don't look like Lorica which is confusing and doesn't match how people being alternates is normally known to work."

"It's... known to normally work? Do a bunch of people have pen pals who are them?"

"I don't know of any pen pals but anyone who was born before 1982 has a duplicate in Earth Aleph since our histories were identical up until then."

"Well, that's not definitely how I work since I was born in 2011."

"Yeah that bit was already confusing but it's even more confusing that you'd end up with the same personality and voice without having the same appearance."

"I guess that means her dad won't recognize me? ...and also that it's probably not a problem if I slip and tell you his name, I refer to my parents by their names when they aren't around."

"We technically don't know that the names don't match though it seems like a reasonable possibility - I can check with Rete to see if yours does?"

"Sure."

Lucien messages Rete.

Inexact but not unrelated.

Lucien can relay this!

"I think you are probably just an alternate version in a slightly weirder way than I expected."

"I guess! I wish I'd had the chance to meet her, I think that would have been cool..."

"Yeah she was really cool. I think she would have liked to meet herself too."

"Do you think I'll likely be able to go home? If people aren't even pen-paling themselves."

"My guess is no but - there's at least one really powerful cape who might have a power that lets him jump between worlds and if so he could send you home if he can be persuaded to take the time to. Also there are rather a lot of other capes and maybe someone else there is a way to do interdimensional travel - it's shown up as a power at least once, not counting the really powerful cape who might be able to do it as a side effect of being able to do a very wide variety of impressive things."

"But it might be hard to convince anyone?"

"If Rete and you can convince Lorica's dad - than I think he might be able to get the Protectorate to consider having Eidolon - the very powerful hero - stop by. Or, if things work out much more nicely, I can pay someone who has a convenient power a bunch of money to send you somewhere and they won't need to be convinced of anything."

"Why would the Protectorate be interested in me? - also you shouldn't have to spend money on me, you're already letting me snuggle you a truly inordinate amount."

"Lorica's dad works for the Protectorate and he has non-trivial ability to get them to do things he want them to, though the politics on an Eidolon intervention in particular are complicated. I am going to have a lot more money than I am used to having soon and probably it will not take such a big chunk out of it? I'm not sure."

"Is there a specific person you're thinking of getting a price estimate from?"