Derby wasn't sure how supper would go with her new friend, a friend that happened to be a dark lord from another dimension, but she felt a lot less terrified about the prospect after the chat in Derby's room.

Aunt Emme was putting the bunk beds together and Colby was running late, so it was just Derby, Brie, and Derby's mom Dani to start. Derby tried to think of anything to say as silverware clanked on plates. Brie devoured the casserole quickly, her battle earlier probably working up an appetite.

"Matriarch of Hope, this meal is delicious!" Brie said.

"Oh, gosh, you can just call me Dani," Derby's mom said. "Where exactly are you from, Brie?"

"I am the dark lord of the Umpteenth Realm! It is quite the distance from here," Brie said.

"The Umpteenth Realm, huh? Is that an anime?" Dani said. "Derby loves her animes."

Derby smiled nervously, unsure if she should interject. If Brie went too far and said something that would get her mom to kick her out of the house, Derby figured she should probably say something then.

Derby's sister Colby made a loud entrance as she returned home from a hangout with friends, sighing as she chucked her shoes down.

"I just wanted to get ice cream, and of course Jess brings her idiot boyfriend," Colby said, saying it like she was giving an important news update to the family. "That jerk tried to make me pay for everyone's ice cream, and that's just the start—"

Colby stopped mid-sentence as she got to the dining room table, staring at Brie.

"Mom...? Who's this chick?" Colby asked.

"That's Derby's new friend Brie," Dani said.

"Good one," Colby said. "Who is it, seriously?"

"She speaks the truth," Brie said. "And I would advise you against speaking ill of Derby of Hope."

Brie squinted, and Derby debated taking Brie's knife for just a second. Not that Brie needed a weapon to be dangerous. Thinking about a brawl over her dining room table made her decide on a less dramatic solution.

"Easy, it's OK," Derby said. "It's just my sister Colby, she's just...a bit brash, let's say!"

"A bit brash, huh?" Colby said. "Where'd you meet this new friend, Derbus? This isn't a scam or anything like that friendship pyramid scheme, is it?"

"No, at least I don't think so..." Derby said. Brie hadn't offered her a jet ski in exchange for selling candy bars and knives to a hundred new "friends," so they were off to a better start than that unfortunate situation at least.

"I would not partake in any scheme, my actions are direct," Brie said. "For example, earlier today, Derby and I were confronted by our enemies, and I didn't scheme, I merely defeated them in battle."

"She's really good at staying in character," Dani said. "Makes me wanna watch whatever show the character she's playing is from!"

Colby looked back and forth between Brie and Derby.

"So she's totally from the void, right?" Colby asked.

Derby gasped.

"Knew it," Colby said.

"I didn't say anything, I just gasped!" Derby said.

"Mom, Derby brought someone home from the void," Colby said. "You better call someone to like, make sure she's not in trouble."

"No, wait, hold on!" Derby said.

"What is the void?" Brie asked.

"Another world that's like a bajillion worlds," Colby said.

"Oh, then yes, that is most certainly the case," Brie said.

"See?" Colby asked.

"Frick!" Derby said. 

Derby didn't spend much time thinking about the differences between Cani and Echela in her world. In her corner of the world, or at least her corner of her world, the two broad classes for beings. Echela were most of the population, and generally had pointed ears and at least a low energy affinity to specific powers. Derby and her family never really had any reason to use the Echela's main power, nor were any very good at it, so they didn't think much of it. Cani were a smaller part of the population and notably had fangs and other animal-like traits, as well as unique powers, all with the ability to go to another dimension—or rather, a jumbled collection of infinite other worlds—called the void. Derby didn't know many Cani and most of the games and shows she watched didn't capture them well, so she hardly considered herself an expert.

She patted her forehead, already sweating, barely able to look up and see her mother's reaction. Would she be mad Derby accidentally brought someone from the void here? "Wait, but I went there!"

"You went there?" Dani asked.

"Echela can go into the void for a bit, we just don't usually stay long," Colby said. "Do you pay attention at all in class, or...?"

"I do!" Derby said. "I just care more about fantasy worlds than our boring real world..."

Dani and Colby both sighed.

"C'mon, don't you both do that! I...I mean!" Derby said.

Dani got up from the table. "I have to make a few calls."

"Mom, don't kick her out! Please!" Derby said.

"We won't kick her out, we just want to make sure her family isn't missing her," Dani said.

"I'm twenty years old, my family would not be concerned by my absence," Brie said.

"Oh, hey, just a year older than me!" Derby said.

"Well, still," Dani said. "It's nothing scary, I wouldn't ever call anyone that'd put Brie in danger, but I do wanna check with her family. My friend's good people, and quick at checking this kind of thing out and the whole registration thing. I'd do the same if you came from the void, Derby."

"You should probably call someone to check on Derby regularly anyways," Colby said.

"Hey!" Derby said. "Are you alright with this, Brie?"

"Oh, certainly," Brie said. "I'm a guest in this realm, I can abide by your customs."

"Alright..." Derby said.

Derby fidgeted in her seat as her mom made the call. Colby just tapped away on her phone, muttering every few minutes about her friend Jess until she got a call and excused herself from dinner entirely. Brie ate the rest of her meal, as well as Derby's leftovers before Dani came back, the doorbell ringing almost the second Dani began to pull her chair out.

"Oh, wow, that was fast," Dani said.

Dani's mom talked to whoever was at the door and let them in. A woman with dark skin arrived, wearing a suit with a black jacket and a yellow shirt arrived, her demeanor incredibly confident. Her frizzy hair was dyed on one side in a dark blue shade. She had two swords sheathed on her hip, looking like someone directly out of an anime about a bunch of cool people in suits who work in an office that all fight monsters together.

"Wow, is it dinnertime in here or what?" The woman said, pressing something on her phone. A sitcom laugh track played. "Ha, I just like to be a bit silly, makes this job fun, you know? I don't wanna freak people out with my presence, lady in a suit with dual katana is maybe potentially a bit anxiety inducing, but it's part of the gig!" The three second laugh track kept looping in spite of her attempts to stop it. "Oop. Hold on. New phone. Ha, ha." A different audience laughter sound started looping over the first, making an unpleasant combo of noises. "Oh, there's another one." That was joined by a cartoon burp sound effect. "Ooh, burps on this too, this is a good sound board!"

When the phone was finally silenced, the woman found Brie, handing her a folder. Derby clammed up, not ready to talk to a second new person in one day.

"The woman of the hour, Brie de Meaux!" She said. "Got some papers here for you to look over, to peruse with your eyes, as they say, ha! Now...if I could just stop in the bathroom quick, I should've on the way, but alas!"

Dani showed the guest the way to the nearest bathroom as Brie looked through the papers.

Derby shuffled behind Brie to look over her shoulder at the pages. It was a bunch of shapes broken up in weird, pixelated patterns, and text with strange characters.

"Can you read that?" Derby asked.

"No, I wondered if it was a strange dialect from this realm," Brie said.

"It's nothing I've ever seen before," Derby said.

"I figured as much," Brie sighed. "Derby of Hope, would you mind sitting across from me once more?"

"Oh, sure," Derby said, wondering if she smelled bad and Brie wanted her to be farther away. But the moment she stepped back, something moved so quickly that Derby barely processed it. A clang forced her to realize that the woman had returned and swung one of her swords directly at Brie, who blocked the blade with two fingers.

"Tch," Brie said. "I should have known. Your foolish disguise didn't fool me for long. CC."

"CC?" Derby asked.

"Dang," CC said. She drew her blade back, her friendly smile now looking fairly menacing. "But it did fool you, which is a win for me!"

"What disguise? Did she even have a disguise?" Derby asked, not seeing a mask or anything on the woman.

"Mhm! CC is quite devious," Brie said. "She is a fellow dark lord, though one of a much less important realm in Skarlax."

"Excuse me, I am from a very important realm," CC said. "If not the most important, honestly."

"Everyone calls it the penultimate to the umpteenth realm because it's so unimportant that they have to bring up my glorious home to make people even remember it," Brie said.

"Quiet, you!" CC said.

"OK, this is really tense," Derby said. "Why are you here, CC?"

"I heard Brie fled her wedding ceremony, so I thought I'd track her down, defeat her in combat, then bring her back and collect a huge reward." CC said. "But Derby saw through my schemes."

"You just swung your sword once, are you really giving up already?" Derby asked. "I mean! Please don't fight in my house anymore! But like...giving up that easily is..."

"No, Derby of Hope speaks the truth. Not only is it pathetic how easily you submitted, it is also very uncouth to interrupt a meal in a peaceful setting, you dunce." Brie said.

"I wouldn't say I submitted, but a lot of my plan really hinged on getting a sneak attack on you, so I'm recalculating," CC said.

"Recalculate over the meal, the food in this realm is incredible," Brie patted a seat next to her.

CC put her sword away. "Is there enough for me?"

"Of course!" Dani said from the kitchen, bringing another helping of food for everyone. "Where'd Colby run off to?"

"Mom, just so you know, this isn't a void agent or whatever," Derby said.

"Hm? What do you mean?" Dani asked.

"This is one of my friends of the 'cosplay' cloth," Brie said.

"She was just pretending to be a void agent for...a joke?" Derby wasn't sure why she was covering for CC, but Brie did refer to her as a friend.

"Dani, Matriarch of Hope," Brie said, pointing at Derby's mother. "Fear not, she is harmless."

"So...who are you then?" Dani asked.

"CC, my dear! Brie and I are old friends from back home, yep!" CC said.

"Alright then! Just check in with the worker when they arrive too, OK?" Dani said.

Derby was a bit stunned at how easily her mother accepted all of this. CC tore through her own serving of casserole, as Brie did the same to her second helping.

"Delicious!" CC said as her phone played the laugh track and a burp again. "Not me, the phone, but I am in agreement with both sounds! Jovial laughter and a belch for a wonderful meal. Now, where would be a good spot for Brie and I to engage in combat?"

"Er...do you have to?" Derby asked.

"I would like to settle things," Brie said.

"Aren't you going to get a stomach cramp doing anything right after eating?" Derby asked.

"Nonsense, everyone in the Skarlax realm can do battle from the millisecond a feast is completed with nary an ounce of tummy ache," Brie said.

"Alright, well if you have to fight we can go outside," Derby said. "My backyard's pretty open, I guess?"