She silently resolves to NEVER let Lacie eat flesh.

🙂 What the actual fuck.

Yeah, let's not let people eat flesh!

Suddenly the claims of violent fantasies seem so much more plausible.

To be fair if Oscar were in an asylum he'd also lean into the madman thing.

no she wants to know what other things other versions of her apparently have instead of speaking cat--

"One of them pilots a giant robot made of love!" Nessa says to the air.

"It was nice meeting you, Miss Clapper. Have a good afternoon."

"I'm not sure if we'll be seeing you again, but it was definitely a pleasant chat."

"...What do I do?" she asks quietly, as some of them start making to leave. "In those other worlds."

To Violet: "Well, in one of them you save everyone."

To Jing Yi: "your father misses you very much."

To Oscar: "be nicer to your wife."

To Terrence: "change nothing. You're doing amazing, sweetie."

To everyone: "And has everyone got that? Follow your dreams, follow Aldabaran, sell your stock on September 19, 1929."

Terrence's heart is warmed just a little, although it'd be unreasonable to be TOO heartened by it, because she's a madwoman.

He is... aware. Unfortunately it takes letters some time to cross oceans, and telegraphs and telephones are Expensive.

Good general advice he guesses. "Great to meet you, Miss Clapper, and thanks again for the recommendation!" He pauses a second... "Take care in here, okay?"

"No one can hurt me, Oscar, I'm omniscient."

"Delighted to hear it."

September 19th, 1929. Right. Why did she give up her pencil.

"It was nice to meet you," she says. "Thank you for talking to us." The endless font of questions can wait until she's not around people who will have no idea why she's taking anything Miss Clapper says seriously at all and who she doesn't super want to explain all of her everything to.

She doesn't put her faith into the ravings of a madwoman. The name was a very lucky guess, maybe not even a guess, but knowing present facts doesn't make you precognitive, it doesn't give you insight into other worlds.

Any comfort she takes in those words is entirely secret.

This was just a deeply weird interaction. He has no reason to believe she Knows Things, but also she is at best frighteningly good at cold reading, and that still does not explain everything. The pronunciation could be practice. His father could just be a good guess. But things like Violet's name are... weirder, and harder to explain.

He doesn't remember Miss Clapper from his shop or IWW meetings or around London, but then it's not unusual to get recognized by a certain brand of very weird person. Of the madpeople he's talked to, she's on the charming and lucid side. Let Lacie eat flesh.

"Oh Nine - One Nine - Two Nine," Terrence murmurs. "There's a nice ring to it."

Then, once they're out: "Okay, show of hands. Did any of that mean anything to anyone?"

"'Let Lacie eat flesh' is pretty good. I could use that in one of my collages."

"That people can make lucky guesses and ramble in a way that sounds just about plausible?"

Unfortunately, if Inaaya tries to explain that Miss Clapper was correct about her speaking Cat and there is literally no natural way she could have known that but Inaaya knows magic and psychic powers exist, she will sound extremely insane and exactly zero people will take her seriously.

There are times and places where she'd try anyway but "literally standing in an insane asylum" is not one of them.

"Not really."

"Understandable. Just checking."

"Has anyone heard of this Institute for Sexual Hygiene, if it in fact exists? Sounds a bit ominous."