“How about Midnight?” Ben asked it, the outsider shaking its new head at the name as they made their way back home, everything Ben needed to finish first completed.

They had ended up needing to go back to Steph’s home, letting him see Will for a bit until she’d perfected the homunculus he requested and from there, he took the empty body to the untamed lands, attaching a tool with aspects of connect and hive mind on it to let the soul possess it, rather than a beastform skill that would taint the body with the soul’s nature, and slid the crystal in, letting the outsider wear its new flesh while he confirmed that none of its unknown skills would do any harm, with that seeming to be so. While they had confirmed that it could still use its third tier skill, leave cracks along the fabric of reality when it had swatted the air with the right intent, none of its other skills appeared to be doing any harm, leaving him hopeful that either they weren’t possible to use within the confines of a universe, or else that what use they did was either unobservable or harmless, leaving only the issue of settling on a name.

“Chuck? Debora? Soda-pop?” He kept at it, giving up on being creative after all the rejections he’d already suffered on the topic when the creature had resided primarily in his head, but continued to get no’s, leaving him to sigh. “You know, for someone who didn’t even understand names as a concept before yesterday, you’re rather picky about yours. In that case, is there anything in all of our talks that’s stood out to you?”

Giving its best approximation of a shrug, still getting used to its new form, it didn’t have an answer either, knowing only that it wasn’t satisfied with what it had heard until then.

“Okay, fine, it’s not like there’s a rush, anyway. You can take your time thinking about it and I can keep giving options. Cello, Dub-step, Rex, Ray, Raymon, Chthulu, Princess, Snookums, Innsmouth, Josephine, Crayon…”

The list went on, but still nothing satisfied, leaving the outsider with no name by the time they finally arrived, standing in front of Sonya’s door.

“Okay, you remember the plan?” Ben asked it, getting a nod but going over it again anyway. “Unless you feel like finally trying out those new vocal cords, I’ll do the talking while you focus on acting cute. Mora shouldn’t be an issue; it’s Thera and Sonya we need to convince, okay?”

Another nod from it, with everything he could do done, all that was left was to see how they’d react, and with that, he opened the door and let himself in, calling out as he did.

“I’m home!”

“Welcome back!,” he heard yelled from the living room, the sounds of the movement of some paper telling him that four were there instead of the expected three and that they were all playing cards, with his entrance revealing that Delair had decided to take advantage of her new living conditions by coming over to play with Mora despite Ben having told her they needed to take that day off, with it looking like the two children were on the winning team of whatever it was they were playing.

Greetings ended there though, as eyes turned to him, half in the room having the sight to see beyond just the cute appearance of the thing he carried in his arms, looking at its soul instead.

In Mora’s eyes, interest, but in Thera’s, there was intense confusion. What she was seeing with her soul sight had left an impact she hadn’t been prepared for, even if it was Sonya among them who spoke first.

“What do you have there, Ben?” She asked, having her own curiosity in the matter, even if she was viewing it favourably from the start as he awkwardly chuckled.

“Well, after a lot of talks, it would prefer if we saw it as a pet.”

“Did you let a wild animal talk you into looking after it?” She asked, the idea not outrageous when she considered that she housed a mind reader, and one that routinely held conversations with his houseplant at that. If he could do that already, why wouldn't he have been able to speak to whatever animal that came into his range if he so desired, with only one problem with that, leaving her eyes to scrunch in their own feeling of incongruity. “Except… that’s… that’s not just an animal, is it?”

“You’ve told me about these things before, right?” Thera asked him, knowing that such a thing didn’t exist on their world. “It’s a… cack?”

“Cat,” Ben corrected, setting the little black ball of fur down to walk around on its new legs, sniffing at the air as it carefully explored. “And it could use a home.”

“That’s not what the system information calls it,” Mora said, still staring while Ben cleared his throat, having his expectations that were betrayed as the boy went on. “Its race text is garbled.”

Huh, I guess not all outsiders are going to be the same species, so it didn’t make sense to list it as one there, but garbled? Could that be a result of the system connecting to its mind and trying to interpret what it viewed itself as? Considering that it didn’t possess language in a traditional sense, maybe it’s a failed interpretation, or maybe it’s a placeholder? Of course, if it’s struggling enough to accept a name for itself, then a name for its species might be a high hurdle too, although, what species would it be? Species is about the flesh it wears, right, not its soul? I know it isn’t actually one, but couldn’t its species be comfortably listed as cat then? After all, it’s not like I’m actually residing in human flesh right now, in a body made of both biology and chemistry that could never exist in the universe where humans actually evolved. Of course, I sure wasn’t considering that when I woke up on this world; doubt anyone else did either. We thought we were still human and we looked like we were still human so we were named human. Which would imply that it might change to proper text if it starts thinking about its species in a more distinct way. Eh, whatever, that’s a future concern.

The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

“It might just need to decide what it is,” Ben added unhelpfully. “Since it doesn’t have a name yet either, maybe you guys could suggest some and see if anything sticks.”

He could see his student’s eyes light up at what sounded like a fun game, holding none of the seriousness that naming should, while Thera’s never changed, focusing on him instead. 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝓮𝒘𝙚𝙗𝒏𝙤𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝓬𝒐𝙢

“Nope, that’s not the problem here. Ben, ignoring the fact that I haven’t heard of any of its skills before, why is this thing a third tier?”

“What?” Sonya asked, wearing her disbelief on her sleeves.

“Ahem, so it’s a bit of a funny story. Before we start, I do just want to say that everything that happened in the past was a misunderstanding, and they’re actually a very sweet little guy if you get to know them. The strong silent type too, not really a fan of using language, and-”

“Gods above, this thing’s the outsider, isn’t it?” Thera asked, rubbing her temples and hoping she was wrong.

“... Yeah, it’s the outsider.”

“Ben, genuinely, why are you like this?”

“In this current case? Mostly guilt over helping to kill it before. When I connected to its soul to try and awaken connect, I got to understand it, Thera, and through that, got to know it was innocent. It was born alone in its original reality and spent billions of years there before it got out, it didn’t even have a conceptual framework to even guess that there were other things with minds. Now that it knows about the havoc it caused when it got out of hell, it feels bad, right?”

They both looked at the outsider, being carried between Delair and Mora without care while they discussed names, its cat head nodding in agreement before focusing on the more important talk happening between the two children.

“See?”

“You’re lucky you’re a mind reader because otherwise, I would not be entertaining this,” she sighed. “Okay, so what is it you want to do?

“Well, like I said, I’m hoping you all would be okay with bringing it into the family.”

“As a pet?” Sonya asked for clarification, getting a shrug from Ben.

“While I was teaching it about the world, it said it didn’t feel ready to be a person. Of course, when I was going over pets, I think it picked up on how comfortable their lives are and, well, what it wants is safety and security. If being a house-cat satisfies those urges, then I’m fine with it.”

“And I’m supposed to somehow think of it as something other than an ancient old man you carried in here?” Thera asked him. “You did say billions with a ‘B’ before, right?”

“Okay, on the one hand, yes, it is probably the oldest thing currently in the universe, possibly older than the universe itself, but on the other, its experience is literally so alien compared to anything you or I have gone through that, well, obviously you should think of it as a person and treat it with that level of care and respect, its lived experience don’t make it the same sort of person, you know? God, how do I explain this in a way that will make sense? It’s a person because in those billions of years, it developed a mind capable of a level of thought worthy of personhood and so of course it deserves it, but before it escaped its universe, by virtue of the fact that it was the only thing in its home reality and that it filled all available space in it, originally, it was probably more accurate to call it a collection of sentient laws of physics, and after, even if it didn’t realize it, it spent a lot of time being prey. One part wild animal that you can reason with like a person and one part child that you can reason with like an adult. I can’t just toss it in the world and tell it to figure out how to live here, so it decided that this should work for it, if you guys are comfortable, and on that note, just look at it.”

Giving the outsider the signal, when Thera and Sonya turned to it, it gave them the widest, sweetest eyes it could, having practiced on the way and gotten a response. The system may have been telling them that it was a being worthy of personhood, just as they’d see with anyone else, but their eyes were telling them it was adorable, even if they weren’t going to be so easily swayed as their attention moved back to him.

“Very cute. Doesn’t change the issue.”

“Okay, how about this then? Neither of you knew anything about outsiders before I started talking to the grey, and why would you? They’re something that some void gods have dealt with at most, not even any of the gods in this world. Sure, the gods are cautious of them, and maybe caution is correct, but I’m saying that as far as this one goes, it’s misplaced. Everything that happened between us came from a misunderstanding and a lack of knowledge, and I contributed to that. Now I just want to make it right. Sonya, I know this is your home so you have final say, and Thera, I know you’re worried about having someone like this around Mora, but I promise, it won’t do anything bad.”

Seeing the earnestness in him, along with the lingering guilt over its death, before either could say more, Delair yelled out, glee in her voice as she and Mora both held the outsider up as high as they could by its front legs.

“We gave it a name!”

“And a better species!” Mora added.

“It’s officially Dewdrop!”

“Dewdrop the scrungle!”

“Seriously?” Ben asked the outsider. “Dewdrop and scrungle, just like that? After all the great names I’ve been suggesting this whole time?”

The newly named scrungle once more did its best attempt at a shrug, Dewdrop’s thoughts conveying the idea that both names had simply clicked, but with it done, both kids were immediately trying to play with it while Thera and Sonya watched, accepting that there wasn’t much room for argument left, even if their concerns hadn’t been completely dropped.

“Alright, if it’s already been named and you’re sure that it will behave, it can stay here,” Sonya gave in, knowing that she’d be away for plenty more days doing hospital work in the future anyway, more than enough time for them to work out whatever problems might pop up with it in the future.

“But, if we see it causing problems or being evil or a bad influence on Mora, you’re going to have to deal with it,” Thera finished, willing to try to treat it with an opened mind as well, even if there were still concerns that some light reassurance couldn’t so easily resolve when it came to sharing a home with an interdimensional monster from beyond the stars, with none of that a concern to Ben as he grinned.

“Don’t worry. It may take some time to get used to, but trust me, you’re going to love them. Dewdrop, huh? Welcome home.”