Mario can calculate the weekday of any date in his head and employ nineteen theoretical tenses, but in some situations he feels like a four-year-old trying to remember which hand is the minutes.

One such situation is Minneapolis.

“Forgive me for this intrusion, your highness,” he manages, concentrating, trying to arrange his words in some sort of sequential order. Untime buffets him, and the sensors on his chronosuit creak into the red. “I boon to a request come–”

A sudden cessation; The Artist Formerly Known inclines his head. “Greetings,” he says, and will say, and has always been saying.