Dave nods sagely through a mouthful and – very gentlemanly – swallows before opening his mouth. "Yeah, that sounds about right. I mean, I'd call something like that an alternate timeline where I'm from, and those are just kind of doomed by nature. Like some kind of monkey's paw be careful what you wish for crap, sure, maybe everything would seem better in some idealized scenario but you're just gonna die horribly anyway so you're ultimately better off here in corporate hell."

There are a lot more words he could just vomit up on the subject – the inherent paradox of those doomed timelines still mattering even if they aren't the "right" ones, a version of him out there somewhere that is part bird and all depressed and possibly dead? – but fortunately for everyone involved, actual good food is distracting enough to cut himself off with another forkful of chicken. Thank god.

"But for real," he says after a moment, "How the fuck did you manage to pass yourself off as Planker?"