Author's Note: This chapter will feature information from the most recent arc in the main series, if you don't want to be spoiled please check the link in the description for the chapter! Otherwise, I hope you enjoy!

I had been foggy this whole trip, so finally letting loose was a relief. Pippi was doing one of her cute "let me do an office icebreaker because socializing is hard" things, and it was my turn. I was pretty trashed at this point but I needed it after the news I'd gotten.

"When, uh, that time where we went to the art show a, ago a bit," I said, laughing at how poorly it came out.

"You wanna try that again?" Mahina said. "Or have another drink or two and just go full incomprehensible?"

"Ohhhh shush, I am soooo compr..." I hiccupped. "Compre...hensi...you know. You can understand me! I went to the art show with Evy. An art show. Zeta almost broke something, Evy accidentally drank a bunch, but we did our parenting thing and Zeta learned something even if she was being a brat. It was nice. I love my family." My eyes welled up. "Well, the family that's Zeta, and Evy's part of the family now too."

Evy hugged me as I cried a bit.

"You good? It's alright." Evy said, her voice so comforting.

"Yes, I'm alright, just...blech!" I said. "Yeah, one more drink."

I ordered another round of shots for everyone.

"Toast first!" I said, making us all clink our drinks together. "I'm saying it again, fuck my stupid-ass parents and their bullshit! Keeping a fucking entire sister from me this whole time? That's fucking shit!"

I hadn't said it out loud the whole trip, but it had been looming over me this whole time. At some point between having me and having Zeta, my parents had another kid. Anastasia Kathron, the girl who had that big box helmet on. She'd just been going to the same school for a while now. I had another sister. It was something completely life altering, but with my parents' other bullshit it also felt strangely mundane. Just another fucking thing they put us through in a long list of them.

I wasn't sure I should even go on this trip, what if Zeta needed me with all this familial upheaval? But she'd been so strong, stronger than I expected, and pushed me to take the trip.

Evy, too, was so supportive. She had familial issues too and had seen plenty from Cani families in her work, so she was oddly perfectly ready to help her partner weave through the complicated feelings of a new sibling.

That new sister was the root of my fogginess. What did she go through growing up with our parents the whole time? I knew when it happened, because Mom and Dad left for a long while the year Anastasia would have been born, but why? Did they go off into the void to have another kid just to not let us know about her?

Yes, they would. They absolutely would. They would probably keep things from that poor girl too. She probably knew even less about things. Broke my heart to think about.

But now what? With Mom somewhat back in the picture, what could I even do here?

Carry on was all I could come up with. And party my ass off on this trip.