The knock on my door came at five forty-five. Exactly fifteen minutes before Diane’s promised arrival time.

Sloane stood in the doorway, wearing the same oversized sleep shirt from earlier and looking significantly less murderous than she had at breakfast. Her pink hair was still damp from the shower, hanging loose around her shoulders instead of pulled back in her usual aggressive ponytail.

"Mom just texted me," she said without preamble. "She wants to talk. All three of us."

"I know. She told me six o’clock."

Sloane’s jaw tightened. "Did she tell you what this talk is going to be about?"

"Boundaries and expectations, apparently."

"That sounds ominous."

"It’s your mother. Everything she says sounds ominous."

A ghost of a smile crossed her face before disappearing. "Are you nervous?"

"Terrified."

"Good. At least I’m not the only one." She stepped into my room and closed the door behind her with more force than necessary. The sound echoed in the quiet hallway. "So what’s the plan here? Are we supposed to just sit down at the dinner table and casually discuss how we’re all going to share you like some kind of fucked up timeshare agreement?"

I couldn’t help it. I laughed. 𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝔀𝓮𝒃𝙣𝓸𝒗𝒆𝒍.𝙘𝒐𝒎

"That’s not funny, Lukas."

"It’s kind of funny."

"It’s not." But her lips twitched despite herself, betraying the smile she was trying to suppress. "This is my actual mother we’re talking about. My mother who I just found out has been sleeping with you for two weeks while I was stupidly pining after you like some desperate—"

"You weren’t desperate."

"I was pathetic."

"You were honest." I stood and crossed to where she stood, still hovering near the door like she might bolt at any second. "There’s a difference."

She looked up at me, her blue eyes searching my face for something I probably didn’t have the right to give her. Reassurance, maybe. Or absolution.

"I don’t know how to do this," she admitted quietly. The vulnerability in her voice hit me square in the chest. "I don’t know how to sit across from my mother and talk about sharing my boyfriend with her. That’s not normal. That’s not how anything is supposed to work."

"Nothing about this has been normal since I manifested."

"That’s not exactly comforting."

I took her hand, threading our fingers together the same way she’d done earlier in her room. "We figure it out as we go. Same as everything else."

"And if I can’t handle it?"

"Then we stop. Right there. No questions asked."

She searched my face again, looking for the lie. I let her look.

"Promise?"

"Promise."

Some of the tension drained from her shoulders. Not all of it. There was still a tightness around her eyes that suggested she was holding herself together through sheer force of will. But enough that she leaned into me slightly, accepting the contact.

"Mom’s going to be in CEO mode," she warned. "She always is when she’s about to negotiate something she thinks is non-negotiable."

"I’ve noticed."

"Just so you know, when she gets like that, she’s basically unstoppable. She could convince a drowning man to buy oceanfront property."

"Also noticed."

"So whatever she suggests—" Sloane pulled back slightly to look at me properly. "Whatever she proposes as the ’reasonable solution’ to this mess, you need to actually think about it before agreeing. Because she’s really, really good at making terrible ideas sound perfectly logical."

The warning landed heavier than she probably intended. Because Diane had already made one terrible idea sound logical. She’d convinced me that sleeping with her while hiding it from Sloane was somehow manageable. She’d framed it as helping me understand my new abilities, as scientific curiosity rather than betrayal.

And I’d believed her because it was easier than examining the truth.

"I’ll be careful," I said.

"You better be." She poked me in the chest. Hard. "Because if you hurt me again, I’m going to detonate your entire body from the inside out. Understood?"

"Crystal clear."

"Good." She stood on her toes and kissed me quickly, almost nervously. Like she was afraid I might disappear if she didn’t maintain physical contact. "Okay. I’m going to go put on actual clothes so I don’t have to have this conversation in my pajamas like a child."

"You look fine."

"I look like I just got thoroughly fucked in my childhood bedroom." Her face went red. "Which is accurate but not exactly the image I want to project when discussing relationship logistics with my mother."

Fair point.

She left without another word, pulling the door closed behind her with a soft click.

I sat back down on my bed and checked my phone. Five fifty-three.

Seven minutes until Diane arrived. Seven minutes until the most awkward family meeting in the history of family meetings.

The quest timer ticked down in the corner of my vision. Sixty-one hours and forty-seven minutes remaining.

〘 Observation: Host demonstrates appropriate anxiety response. Recommend maintaining calm demeanor during discussion. Subject Diane Fitzgerald responds positively to confidence and negatively to uncertainty. 〙

"Any other brilliant insights?" I muttered.

〘 Recommendation: Allow Subject Diane to present framework before offering input. She has already formulated optimal approach based on available variables. Host agreement will streamline integration process significantly. 〙

Of course Diane already had a plan. She’d probably worked out every detail during her flight back from Chicago. Knew exactly what she wanted to propose and how she was going to sell it to both of us.

The question was whether her plan and the System’s quest objectives were aligned.

And whether I had any real choice but to go along with both.

My phone buzzed.

I’m pulling into the driveway. Meet me in the living room. Both of you.

I stood, checked my reflection in the mirror long enough to confirm I looked appropriately nervous, and headed downstairs.

Sloane was already there, having changed into fitted jeans and a tank top that somehow made her look both more put together and more defensive. She’d pulled her hair back into a ponytail, which meant she was in fighting mode whether she realized it or not.

She glanced at me when I entered. "Ready?"

"Not even a little bit."

"Good. Me neither."

We stood there in awkward silence, both facing the front door like it was about to deliver a firing squad instead of just Diane coming home from work.

The lock clicked.

The door swung open.

Diane stepped inside looking every inch the CEO who’d just spent three days closing deals in Chicago. Charcoal pencil skirt, cream silk blouse, heels that added three inches to her already impressive height. Her pink hair was perfectly styled, her makeup flawless despite the travel.

She looked at me first. Then at Sloane. Her blue eyes, identical to her daughter’s but carrying decades more experience, assessed the situation in seconds.

"Sugar," she said to Sloane, her Southern drawl slightly thicker than usual.

"Why don’t you help me with my bags?"