"Do you like your job?" Lan Xichen inquires politely. 

"I like it better than my last job as a waiter and not as much as I think I would like being a rock star," says the limo driver.

"Being a musician is a very enjoyable job. Some of my relatives play in orchestras."

"Is there anything you think we should know about the Secretary of State?" Meng Yao says, concerned that small talk is going to lead to them not taking full advantage of this situation. 

"Oh, probably, but I don't know what it is. We don't really talk."

Dammit. 

"Do you know any interesting gossip about politicians?"

"The junior West Virginia senator is married to his second cousin and cheats on her with his intern."

He loves this place. It is his favorite place in the world. 

"Do his constituents know?"

"Probably not all of them? I don't think anyone went door to door about it."

Never mind he hates this place actually.

There is traffic. Sometimes people in the traffic lean out their windows to shout at each other, things such as "I am full of brief but intense rage!" and "I suspect you of being intoxicated!" and "I may be ignoring the posted speed limit but you are driving on the shoulder to get past me at an even greater speed!"

He sings to his baby in Chinese until they arrive at the Secretary of State's office.

The Secretary of State has a staffer in the office who apparently understands Chinese and is really alarmed that the baby is apparently a rabbit! "He doesn't look like a rabbit!"

"You misheard. Actually those syllables mean 'cute little baby.'"

The staffer furrows his brow and mutters to himself in Chinese and says something about getting what you pay for from Duolingo and leaves. A different staffer shows them to the Secretary of State's office.

The Secretary of State is pleased to see them - he says so! - and wants to know how they have found this universe so far.

"It's lovely! Remarkably similar to ours in a lot of ways. I didn't expect that Wal-Mart would be present across universes."

"Can we arrange for someone to watch our son for a little bit?"

"Sure, we have onsite daycare." He summons his assistant and the assistant comes to ferry Meng Xuanyu and his accessories to the onsite daycare.

"You're doing a good job of accommodating working parents!"

"Thank you! I'm nostalgic for an era where it was normal for women to be stay at home parents but this polled well. Anyway, welcome to our universe!"

"So far I've noticed one major difference between my universe and yours."

His dreams of wild political success are melting away.

"What is it?"

"We can say things that aren't."

"That aren't what?"