Well, it was a different universe, she thought. Just because it felt familiar didn’t mean it was the same. Maybe apples in this world were like bananas in her own, identical genetic clones.

“Are you ready, shopper?” the cashier said. Ava looked up and froze.

The woman from the training video was standing behind the register. Dana? Had that been her name? It couldn’t have really been her, just someone who bore a creepy resemblance to her. Even though her hair was different—limp blond waves instead of a teased-up helmet—the likeness was uncanny enough to freak her the hell out.

“Shopper?” the woman said. “Are you ready?”

The voice, at least, was different. Ava shook herself and moved her tray up to the register. “Yeah,” she said. “Thanks.”

“Will this be all?”

Ava nodded. The woman watched her expectantly, the blank smile fading into something suspicious.

“Place your hand on the mortänder, shopper,” she said. She gestured to a pad in front of the register. The shape of a hand had been indented into it, and there were small slits interspersed evenly throughout.

Okay, different universe, different rules. Yes, it was creepy, but drawing attention to themselves would be worse, right? Ava hesitantly moved her hand toward the pad, and nearly screamed with fright when someone seized her wrist.

Jules. She snatched her wrist back and hissed, “Don’t scare me like that, jerk.”

Jules’s eyes were on the cashier. “What did you call that thing?”

The woman shifted her unnerving gaze to them.

“It’s the mortänder, shopper,” she said evenly.

“What’s it for?” Jules demanded.

“It’s for taking payment, shopper.”

“Payment of what?”

Ava was about to elbow Jules and tell them to stop being rude when the woman’s reply froze her.

“Why, blood, shopper,” she said in an aren’t you silly voice. Dana nodded to one of the other registers, and holy shit, another Dana was standing behind that register, and helping someone who bore a terrifying resemblance to Mark. Mark placed his hand in the mortänder, half-obscured by the tray of food he’d bought. Ava registered, with growing, distant horror, that they’d bought the same food; the smörgås on his tray looked like exact replicas, the chocolate cake and the apple were identical. The sameness was dizzying.

There was a clear snikk, a metallic whisper like a blade being drawn. Ava realized that she’d been hearing it this whole time, over and over, but that it had somehow settled into the orderly bustle of the food court. She’d dismissed it as the sound of cutlery. The man’s smile twitched, and he drew up his hand.

Blood flowed in bright rivulets down his palm and fingers, spattering across the hand-shaped depression.

“First the mother teeth take the payment. Then Mother’s love soothes the hurt,” Dana explained.