Futures were fickle, Derek knew that, but it wasn't exactly the route of conversation to take on a first meeting. Everything was decidedly different and new, to the point where Derek was surprised his own instincts weren't utterly rebelling like crazy. Since he'd reclaimed an anchor and achieved the full-shift, he was far more settled.
He just returned a small smile at the greeting of acquaintance, still firmly glad that he wasn't thrown into another chaos mess.
"Lai Shi?" He hadn't ever heard of it, but the sight was enough to halt many questions about it. Considering they'd gone from on the ship to enter here, where his senses were being told one thing but finding another. "Okay... Not weird at all."