“In fairness, I always ask for the long story,” Stephen points out, amiably. “My own life has been so batshit weird that I welcome anecdotes that are anywhere near the same. Solidarity, etc.”

He’s ruminative after a moment — everything sliding into that comfortable loose where he’s not quite so anal about his privacy, less neurotic about cracking open the box and swapping these stories, dipping into each others’ personal lives. Cosima’s one of the few he doesn’t mind doing this with, it turns out. Not something he would’ve predicted when he first arrived here, but so it goes.

“It’s not exactly weird clone shit,” he offers, “but if it makes you feel any better, I have a story about meeting an alternate universe version of my ex?”