“Well, you’d have to tell me more about your species,” Daniel says thoughtfully to Macavity. “I mean, Sekhmet was mostly shown in the form of a woman with the head of a lioness, and more rarely in a fully leonine form, but Bast herself was originally depicted with a lioness’s head, and even in later depictions was sometimes shown with the head of a cat and holding the mask of a lioness, representing a hidden ferocity. And what about her son, Máahes? He was also depicted with the head of a lion…”

Somehow, the idea of Jellicles actually existing in the Ancient Egypt of his Earth makes more sense to Daniel than the cross-pollination of a book of poetry across three separate realities. But perhaps Sam would disagree.

He gives John a quick, mischievous smile. He has a private feeling that John might actually be Hamlet… but he settles for responding to the other man’s second comment. “A sitcom in space? Nah, sounds like your life is more like one of those shows on the science fiction channel in which the morally sensitive hero with a troubled past uses human ingenuity and pop culture references to defeat beyond-impossible odds and advanced evil villains with superior technology. And makes it with a different alien woman each week while blowing a lot of stuff up.”

He blinks. “Actually, with a few changes that could mine too…”

It had to be done.