Chapter Text
The Forger family’s living room, at 7:00 p.m. sharp, had the airless glow of a stage set—only instead of floodlights, it was a wedge of lamp light softened through Yor’s favorite pink glass shade, and the blue flicker of the television, which threw a pixelated afterimage onto every reflective surface. Loid sat with his back almost upright, as if his vertebrae had no memory of the couch’s intention to lull, and he kept the remote balanced in his palm, thumb hovering in mid‐click.
“Breaking news,” the anchor’s voice echoed through the stillness of the room, slicing through the ambient hum of the television. A vibrant graphic burst onto the screen, capturing attention with bold letters: “Historic Agreement Secures Lasting Peace Between Ostania and Westalis.”
Loid exhaled. It was only a half-breath, but it managed to loosen his shoulders and coax his head into the nape of the couch, just enough that he might seem, to a careless observer, at ease.
Yor had curled herself onto the other end of the sofa, one knee tucked beneath her like a schoolgirl’s. She reached her arm back behind Loid’s head and let it drape there, the hem of her cardigan brushing his ear with every expansion of her lungs. Her eyes followed the crawl of ticker tape across the bottom of the screen, and the habitual line of worry between her brows dissolved.
“They really did it,” Yor said, voice barely louder than the ambient static.
On the armrest, Anya perched cross-legged, knees pointed up like antennae, face haloed by the silent flutter of a potted plant she’d insisted on naming “Bond’s Jungle.” Her cheeks were pink, the kind of oversaturated flush that looked almost painted on. She was not watching the TV, but the both of them—her head canted at an angle, mouth faintly ajar, and eyes gone foggy in that peculiar way that meant she was tuned to something other than broadcast frequencies.
Loid caught the look and raised an eyebrow. “What is it, Anya?” He kept his tone light, with only the faintest arched note of suspicion.
“Papa thinks of going to work,” Anya said, using the Voice she reserved for direct quotations of other people’s thoughts. She did not turn her head, only blinked slowly, as if focusing a telescope.
Yor's eyes widened for a brief moment, a flicker of concern crossing her features before she smoothed it over with a gentle smile. “No matter what happens, we’ll always have each other, right?” She tilted her head slightly, her voice warm and reassuring, as if to anchor them all in the moment.
“Mmm,” Anya said, rolling forward so her legs dangled over the edge, “and Bond.” She squinted into the kitchen, where the family’s oversized dog lay in perfect parallel with the fridge, then looked back. “Is it okay for us to be happy now?” The question hung in the room, neither rhetorical nor innocent.
Loid looked from Yor to Anya and back, then set the remote down on the coffee table, aligning it perfectly with the edge. He leaned in, clasped his hands, and said, “We did what we were supposed to do.” He looked at Anya, his eyes unblinking and very blue. “You did exactly what was needed, too.”
Yor shifted closer, her knee pressing into Loid’s thigh, and with an absent tenderness, she brushed a hair from his forehead. He did not flinch, but instead let the gesture hang in the air between them. “What happens next?” she asked.
He reached for her hand, half-conscious, and squeezed it. “We wait,” he said, “and hope that peace means exactly what it’s supposed to.”
A silence pressed down, intimate and electric. The television’s hum receded, replaced by the measured ticking of the wall clock, its hands clicking toward 7:02.
Loid drew a breath, and with it the room seemed to refill with possibilities. “Let’s go see the stars,” he said.
Yor blinked, then smiled. She stood first, gathering Anya into her arms, who squeaked in delighted surprise but wrapped her arms around Yor’s neck all the same. Loid followed, brushing the remote once more into perfect alignment, then straightening the throw pillow with an unnecessary flick of his wrist.
The three made for the sliding balcony doors, Loid opening them with a turn so gentle it could have been ceremonial. The night air was brisk, but not biting, and the city below was alive with sodium streetlamps and moving headlights—a million moving stories, not one of them aware that they owed their continued existence to the trio now standing above.
They stepped outside. Yor set Anya down, who immediately pressed herself against the balcony’s rail, palms flat and nose above the metal bar. Loid and Yor stood side by side, close enough for their arms to touch, and watched as Anya tilted her head back and traced imaginary constellations in the sky.
From behind, their three silhouettes were framed against the city’s glowing horizon—a family, not by birth or even by country, but by a delicate, deliberate construction. The news broadcast played on inside, muffled, but here it was just the wind and the measured, certain ticking of time.
Loid let his hand slip into Yor’s. She squeezed back, her fingers cool from the night.
“I think,” Loid said, after a while, “it’s going to be okay.”
Anya, still gazing at the sky, said, “I know it will.”
The clock ticked on, and the city below blinked and pulsed. For now, peace was an open balcony, a horizon to stand before, and the certainty that as long as they held tight to each other, they could face whatever morning might come.
The Forger dining room was at its most honest when lit by morning: no decorative lamps to muddy the palette, only the slow, honeyed intrusion of sunlight through curtains that Yor refused to replace, no matter how ragged they became at the hem. The table—still round, still wobbly from that one time Anya tried to climb onto it—was set for three, with a fourth coaster perched on the off chance that Bond would try to join them. (He never did, but Anya liked to keep the option open.)
Scrambled eggs steamed on each plate, their edges browned to a point of crispness that bordered on reckless. Loid had learned, eventually, to cook them this way, to suit Yor’s taste for what she called “texture,” though he always overcompensated with a separate pan for Anya’s, which she would only eat if “barely yellow.” Toast, sliced thick, shingled itself in a basket at the center; the pat of butter, already breached, glistened in its dish. Three mugs—one emblazoned with a chipped cartoon dog, one heavy and institutional, one an inexplicable shade of pastel pink—sat in a loose triangle.
Loid poured coffee in a practiced arc, letting the smell do most of the waking for him. He had grown fond of the sound: the clink of mugs, the faint, erratic rhythm of Yor’s spoon as she stirred honey into her own cup. Anya was already at the table, eyes wide and unblinking, hair still charged with bed-static.
Yor entered last, padding in sock-feet from the hallway, one hand looping back to adjust her bun as she walked. She moved with a subdued, unfamiliar buoyancy, as if the day before had adjusted some invisible weights. Instead of scanning for threats—fire, spills, anything sharp—she drifted straight to Anya and bent to kiss the top of her head.
“Morning,” she said, soft but carrying.
Anya looked up. “Good morning, Mama. You smell like flowers.”
Loid set the coffee pot down, a little too heavily, and grinned. “That’s because your mother is allergic to anything else.”
Yor pretended to be affronted, but her lips twitched at the edges. She sat, tucking her knees together, and folded her napkin in her lap with a ceremony that bordered on reverence. “Eggs look perfect,” she said.
Loid shrugged. “Practice.”
Anya, already deep into her pancakes, mumbled, “Papa reads cookbooks in his sleep.” Then, with more clarity: “Did you make the syrup extra-thick?”
“Only for you.”
The three fell into their breakfast with the concentration of people who’d only recently discovered that they liked each other’s company. The room filled with small noises: the drag of toast through yolk, the bump of knees beneath the table, the fizz of orange juice in Anya’s glass. At intervals, Anya would glance at Loid, then away, then back, her face gone suspiciously blank. He recognized the look. It was the same one she wore right before revealing she’d eaten all the chocolate, or when she was about to recite something from memory that no child had any business knowing.
“You’re doing it again,” he said.
Anya blinked. “Doing what?”
“Reading my mind.” He tapped his temple. “It’s very impolite, you know.”
Yor blushed, or tried to, but the color refused to rise. Instead, she lifted an orange wedge, pinched it between her teeth, and grinned, juice pooling in the fine line at the corner of her mouth.
“Don’t blame Anya,” she said, once she’d finished the slice. “She’s just curious.”
Anya, emboldened, tossed her hair. “What’s for lunch?” she said, even though she was only halfway through her pancakes.
Loid wiped his lips with a napkin and sipped at his coffee, considering. “If you finish every bite of breakfast, we’ll have whatever you want for lunch.”
“Even cake?”
He grinned. “Within reason.”
Yor took pity, reaching over to tousle Anya’s hair. “Maybe try using your mouth, too. These oranges won’t eat themselves.”
Anya groaned, but obliged, stacking three wedges and stuffing them in at once. For a moment her cheeks ballooned so comically that even Loid laughed, which in turn made Anya snort juice down her nose and set off a second, louder round of laughter.
It was only after she’d recovered, after Loid had swabbed her chin with a napkin and Yor had discreetly replaced the juice glass, that the mood settled back into something gentle.
Loid watched Yor across the table, the way she palmed the handle of her mug, the delicate, mechanical precision with which she lifted it to her lips. She never sipped from the same side twice, as if trying to distribute the wear evenly. Today, she caught his gaze and smiled, not with the bashful, sideways look she used to have, but directly. There was a challenge in it, or maybe a question.
He leaned over, feigning the need to reach for the salt, and as he passed behind her chair, pressed a quick kiss to her cheek. Yor didn’t startle. She only caught his wrist, steady and unhurried, and held it for a beat before letting go.
“Embarrassing,” Anya muttered, but the corners of her mouth quirked up. She had inherited, through no genes, the reflex to narrate everything as if it were a spy novel. In her head, Loid could almost hear the breathless play-by-play: The agent plants a kiss, mother’s cheeks remain unblushed, danger imminent.
Loid righted himself, ran a thumb along the inside of his wrist, and sat back down.
They ate. The light in the room shifted, the sun making its slow progress across the floor. Anya, never content to let peace go untested, began to drum her fork against her plate, eyes darting between her parents.
“Do I have to go to school today?” she said, though she already knew the answer.
“Is there a reason you shouldn’t?” Loid replied.
She gave him a look, the one that said, “I have reasons but none I can legally share with you.” She turned to Yor for backup.
“Your teachers will miss you,” Yor said, “and besides, today is your turn to feed the class hamster.”
Anya’s shoulders sagged. “I guess.”
Loid finished his coffee and, after a moment’s consideration, poured himself another half-cup. He wondered if the day would keep feeling like this—loose, untethered, almost normal. The tension he had grown so used to carrying was still there, but it had become background hum, less a matter of survival and more a habit of posture.
When breakfast was finished, Loid cleared the plates with a briskness that surprised him. Yor rinsed the pans, humming tunelessly. Anya vanished to her room, presumably to locate at least one matching sock. The kitchen filled with the good, neutral sounds of running water and clattering dishes.
Loid caught Yor’s eye over the sink.
“Are you alright?” he asked, keeping his voice low.
She nodded, but didn’t stop washing. “Yes. It’s just… quiet now, isn’t it?”
He thought about the word, turned it over. “We can make some noise, if you’d prefer.”
She smiled. “Let’s try quiet, for a change.”
The silence that followed was companionable, not awkward. Loid found he liked it.
When Anya returned, she was dressed and ready, if not perfectly so. Her shirt was on backwards, and she had mismatched shoes, but her hair was combed and her backpack zipped. She looked more herself than she had in days.
Loid knelt to tie her shoes—double knots, per her request—and as he did, Anya leaned in, arms draped around his shoulders.
“Papa,” she whispered, “I think you’re a good spy.”
He blinked, once, then twice, and managed to keep his face composed. “Thank you,” he said. “I think you’re a good daughter.”
She beamed, then skipped to the door.
Yor followed, fixing her own hair in the hall mirror. She glanced at Loid as he joined them, and he recognized the small, private smile that meant she was cataloging this moment for later.
They stepped out together, down the narrow walk and onto the street. The air was brisk but bright. Loid held the door for them both, watched as Yor took Anya’s hand without thinking, and trailed just behind as they set off toward the school bus stop.
Anya chattered about the hamster and the lunch menu and a rumored field trip, never pausing for a reply. Yor listened, every now and then nodding or injecting a gentle “Oh?” at exactly the right moments. Loid walked beside them, content to be quiet.
At the bus stop, a neighbor’s child was already waiting. She gave Loid a wary, appraising look, then turned to Anya and began the ritual trading of stickers. Yor stood off to the side, humming again, and Loid drifted next to her.
“Do you think,” Yor said, very softly, “that we’ll keep having mornings like this?”
He considered. “If we’re lucky.”
She took his hand, squeezed. “Then let’s be lucky, Loid.”
He looked at her, at Anya, at the gold-lit street and the city waking up around them. For the first time in a long time, he let himself believe it.
The bus arrived. Anya clambered on, waving through the window until it turned the corner. Yor and Loid lingered a moment, neither eager to let go of the calm.
“We should go,” Yor said, but didn’t move.
Loid nodded, but stayed where he was, watching the sky shift from gold to white. He reached for her hand again, not out of habit or pretense, but because it felt right. Yor let him, smiling into the morning.
They stood there together, the two of them, no longer waiting for disaster, but for something gentler and slower: the promise of another day just like this one.
The route to WISE headquarters had, once upon a time, been a labyrinth of suspicion, code words, and the frisson of constant risk. These days, with Operation Strix closed and the world balanced precariously on the tip of an uneasy peace, Loid Forger found the commute almost offensively straightforward. He took the tram three stops, walked two blocks, and ducked into a nondescript office building with a lobby so bland that even the janitorial staff seemed to forget it existed. The elevator up to the fourteenth floor required a key card; Loid scanned his without looking, muscle memory and habit doing the work for him.
Inside, the WISE offices were changed only in the sense that no one changed them: the same green tile, the same typewriters clacking behind frosted glass, the same rattling air vent in the corner of the main bullpen. Yet the atmosphere felt altered, lighter and heavier at once, as if someone had turned up the oxygen but left behind a trace of ozone—something sharp and metallic, lurking beneath the surface.
Loid’s desk stood at the end of a row, strategically positioned to maximize sight lines. He didn’t bother to sit. Instead, he hung his coat over the backrest, thumbed open the top drawer, and produced a manila envelope that hadn’t been there yesterday. No note, no signature, just the pale WISE logo stamped in blue ink. The contents: a briefing, thinner than usual. A trend, lately.
He closed the drawer, straightened the envelope to a precise angle on the desktop, and made his way to Handler Silvia Sherwood’s office.
Her door was open, the hinges fixed after years of petitioning. She sat behind her desk, reading glasses perched low on her nose, the lines around her eyes deepened but not unkind. Her hair was pulled back so tight it could have kept a hangar door closed, and she wore the same green suit jacket she’d always worn. The only difference now was the absence of chaos at her elbow—no urgent red folders, no buzzing phone, no parade of junior agents in various states of panic.
“Agent Twilight,” she said, looking up as he hovered at the threshold. “You’re early. Again.”
“Hard to break the habit,” Loid said, stepping inside. He closed the door with a deliberate quietness. “Is now a bad time?”
“It’s never a good time, but I suppose this will do.” She gestured to the seat across from her. Loid sat, hands folded, posture engineered to appear both at-ease and ready for detonation. Silvia plucked off her glasses and studied him with the intensity of a biologist examining a particularly stubborn cell culture.
“I won’t bore you with the preamble,” she said. “You’ve seen the news. The treaty’s been ratified, both sides are posturing for a Nobel, and the Director wants to rebrand the agency as a sort of international outreach consortium. We’re supposed to ‘build relationships’ now.” The phrase clung to her tongue like a splinter.
Loid nodded. “I assume that means fewer assignments.”
She let out a laugh—not unkind, but hollow. “For now, yes. But if you think peace is a retirement plan, you’re in the wrong profession.”
He let the line settle, watching the tension in her jaw.
“I didn’t come here expecting a gold watch,” he said. “But I’m not sure anyone told the world’s malcontents to take up knitting, either.”
She allowed herself a genuine smile. “That’s why I keep you around. You’re not as stupidly optimistic as the rest of the staff.”
He inclined his head. “So what’s the agenda, if not ‘outreach’?”
Silvia leaned forward, elbows on the desk. “We’re retraining. Reallocating. Surveillance is up—on both sides of the border. There are still fringe elements who’d like to see this whole thing burn. And”—her tone darkened—“we’re doing it with half the resources. Budget cuts. The politicians want a peace dividend.”
Loid resisted the urge to roll his eyes. “I see.”
She slid a folder across the table. “You’ll be reporting to the east-side annex next week. The new joint task force. I trust you’ve heard of it?”
He had, but he played along. “Vaguely.”
Silvia’s lip curled. “You’ll love it. Cross-agency, cross-border, everyone pretending to get along. Our new partners from Garden will be there, too. The higher-ups think mutual distrust breeds innovation.”
He tapped the folder. “Anything specific, or is this just a meet-and-greet?”
“For now, it’s team-building.” Her voice dripped contempt at the word. “But I’d keep your skills sharp, Agent. The quiet never lasts.”
He allowed himself a fractional smile. “I’ll try not to embarrass the agency.”
She snorted. “You never do. That’s the problem.”
Before Loid could reply, the door swung open with a violence that suggested someone had never learned to knock. In stepped a man whose appearance was so instantly at odds with the WISE aesthetic that Loid felt a brief, surreal sense of déjà vu: a well-fitted black suit, shoes buffed to a mirror gleam, tie knotted with the kind of precision reserved for hangmen. He was quiet old, probably late sixties, with the sort of sharp, hungry features that made Loid think of birds of prey.
“Handler Sherwood?” the man said, voice a quarter-octave too loud for the room.
She glanced at her watch. “You’re early, McMahon.”
He smiled, but his eyes never left Loid. “Didn’t want to keep anyone waiting. Matthew McMahon, an assassin of Garden.”
He offered a hand across the desk, as if Loid were a visiting dignitary and not a professional adversary. Loid took it, noting the faint trace of scar tissue at the base of McMahon’s thumb, the slight chemical burn of garden-variety sanitizer.
“Loid Forger,” he said, keeping the handshake to exactly two seconds. “WISE.”
Matthew gave a little bow, the gesture half ironic, half cultural lag. “Big fan of your work,” he said. “Word is, you’re the guy who broke Operation Strix.”
Loid made his face a blank. “I was one of many. And it’s ‘Agent Twilight,’ if we’re being formal.”
Matthew’s grin widened. “Right, of course. Forgive me. Just trying to get off on the right foot.”
Silvia’s eyes flicked between them, gauging the tension the way a geologist studies fault lines. “McMahon, since you’re here, why don’t you brief Forger on the new arrangement?”
Matthew perched himself on the edge of the conference table, disregarding every tenet of ergonomic propriety. “Absolutely.” He crossed his arms, then uncrossed them, as if unused to stillness.
“So, big picture: our countries are getting along, but that doesn’t mean our enemies are extinct. Garden and WISE are partnering up to keep the peace, sometimes literally. We’ve got informants embedded on both sides, and the expectation is that we work together, not at cross purposes.”
Loid listened, face impassive. He knew this already—he’d been in the room for the handshake photo, though his own hand had stayed well out of frame. What he didn’t know was how Garden intended to leverage its new reach, or what kind of operators they’d send to play with the grown-ups at WISE.
Matthew continued: “We’ll be running joint missions, training, all that jazz. But what you really need to know is that for the next six weeks, you and I are paired up as task leaders. Real assignments, if and when they come through, but mostly observation. Prove the concept, show the politicians we can play nice.”
“Understood,” Loid said. “Are there ground rules?”
Matthew shrugged. “Don’t kill each other?” He flashed the smile again. “I’m kidding. The rules are simple: no surprises, no leaks, and if you see something, say something. Trust is in short supply, but transparency is the next best thing.”
Silvia smirked. “Let’s see how long that lasts.”
Matthew glanced at her, then back to Loid. “They told me you had a sense of humor. Glad to see it’s not an urban legend.”
Loid permitted himself a millimeter of amusement. “I hear you’re the best Garden has to offer.”
Matthew’s eyes glittered. “That’s the rumor. I hope I live up to it.”
The three sat in silence for a moment, the air charged not with hostility, but with the unspoken mutual assessment of predators sharing a watering hole.
Finally, Matthew slapped his knees and stood. “Well, I should get to the annex, make sure the coffee machine hasn’t been sabotaged. Agent Forger, I look forward to working with you.”
Loid stood as well. “Likewise.”
Matthew made for the door, pausing just long enough to offer Silvia a two-fingered salute. “Handler.”
She nodded in return, and he was gone, the click of the latch punctuating his exit.
Loid turned back to Silvia, who was already rearranging the folders on her desk.
“Thoughts?” she asked, not bothering to look up.
“He’s competent. Too eager, maybe. But not an idiot.”
Silvia smiled at the paper in front of her. “He’s the real deal, I’m told. Keep an eye on him, but don’t try to out-maneuver him unless you have to. We’re in the same boat now.”
Loid absorbed that, feeling the unfamiliar twinge of camaraderie, or maybe just the absence of a target.
“Anything else?” he asked.
She looked up, her expression shifting to something closer to maternal. “You seem… lighter, these days. Is that just the lack of pressure, or is the family working out?”
He hesitated a moment, parsing the possible motives behind the question, but found none worth worrying over.
“They’re well,” he said. “Better than I expected.”
She nodded, satisfied. “Good. You’ll need that.”
He thanked her, then turned and left, the corridor empty and echoing behind him. As he passed through the bullpen, he noticed for the first time how many desks were unoccupied—agents on leave, or reassigned, or quietly shelved. The world had changed, and so had the mission. He wondered if, when the next disaster came, any of them would even recognize it.
In the elevator down, he stared at his reflection in the brushed steel panel. The face was the same, but the eyes seemed less hungry. More dangerous, maybe, for being content.
At the street, he paused before stepping out into the new sunlight. He reached into his pocket and found a single, sugar-dusted hard candy—the kind Anya favored, hoarded from a party and surreptitiously slipped into his coat. He unwrapped it and placed it on his tongue, letting the tartness spread.
No one would ever call him an optimist, but even Loid Forger could admit: the future had never tasted so unpredictable.
The streetlights outside the apartment flickered on at exactly the wrong time, just as Loid Forger fumbled his keys and managed to jam them, upside-down, into the deadbolt. He extracted them with the delicacy of a bomb technician and, for the briefest moment, weighed the possibility of just sleeping in the corridor. But from within came the ambient shuffle of dinnerware, the honeyed drag of Yor’s voice, and—threaded beneath—a bassline of dog snoring that rattled the floorboards. This, too, was home.
He entered on a sigh, closing the door on a day he could not yet decide was successful. The air inside was soft and thick with the scent of garlic and caramelized onion, a sharp contrast to the sterile city corridor. Shoes off, coat on the hook, briefcase into the canted closet: each motion a small ritual, a recalibration. Through the frosted glass that separated the foyer from the kitchen, he could see Anya, standing on a stool and wielding a spoon with the reckless authority of a pirate captain. Yor, apron cinched over her hips, bent beside her, miming the motions of stirring. They were talking about something—Loid couldn’t quite catch it, but Anya’s eyebrows did their best to telegraph that it was both urgent and secret.
Loid lingered in the threshold, watching the two of them. Yor caught him out of the corner of her eye and broke into a smile, the kind that made her forget to hide the small gap in her left canine. It was a smile that made Loid think, for just a second, that he could stand here forever.
“There you are!” Yor said, a little louder than necessary. “Dinner is almost ready. Anya helped.”
“I’m very helpful,” Anya confirmed, and then, sotto voce, “Mama only dropped one egg.”
Yor flicked a dish towel at Anya’s shoulder. “Loid, would you like to sit? Or—could you set the table?”
He glanced at the clock. Ten minutes until seven. “Setting the table sounds perfect.”
By the time the three of them converged around the battered old dinner table, Bond had already installed himself at Loid’s feet, his tail a lazy metronome. The meal was hearty and irregular—omelet triangles, roasted potatoes, a small mound of shredded lettuce that Anya regarded as if it were an alien artifact. The only centerpiece was a jam jar with two stems of feverfew, neither of which would ever admit to being a flower.
Yor poured water for everyone, setting each glass down with a precision that belied the way her hands sometimes shook when she thought no one was watching. She cleared her throat, once, then again, and finally said: “It’s good to have us all together tonight.”
Anya, already three bites in, said, “I like family dinner.” She stabbed at a potato with such enthusiasm that it skittered off her plate. “Can we do it every day?”
Yor looked at Loid, as if seeking permission for a privilege that should have been theirs by default.
He held her gaze, steady and soft. “I’d like that, too.”
They ate. Conversation drifted from the day’s events (Anya’s class hamster had, apparently, learned to fake its own death) to the mystery of a neighbor’s missing bicycle, to a heated debate over the proper sequence of brushing teeth and flossing. At one point, Anya asked, “Papa, do spies eat vegetables?” and when Loid replied, “Only under extreme duress,” she leaned back, triumphant.
Midway through dinner, Loid caught Yor watching him with an intensity that bordered on scientific. She flinched when he met her eyes, then pretended to focus on slicing her lettuce.
After the meal, they cleared the table with practiced efficiency. Yor stacked the plates, Anya toted the silverware, Loid corralled the leftovers into mismatched containers. The kitchen was filled with the pleasant white noise of running water and the odd dish clatter, interrupted only by Anya’s occasional humming—a theme from a cartoon, possibly, or the prelude to whatever mischief she was planning next.
It was while drying the last dish that Yor set her hand on Loid’s wrist. Not a squeeze, not a tug—just the warmth of her palm, anchoring him to the moment.
“Can we talk?” she said, voice so low that it was almost lost in the rush of the faucet.
He nodded, not trusting himself to say anything yet, and finished lining up the plates in the rack. Anya, evidently sensing the adultness of the conversation, retreated to the living room and the safety of a comic book fortress. Only Bond lingered, stretching out on the kitchen tiles with a groan that sounded almost human.
Yor led the way, but instead of the living room, she stopped in the narrow hallway outside the bedrooms. She twisted the dish towel in her hands, knotting and unknotting it. For a moment, Loid wondered if this was a prelude to a confession—something broken, something unfixable. But she looked up at him with a clarity that stilled the air between them.
“I’ve been thinking a lot,” Yor said. “Since the news. Since the peace.” She hesitated, as if assembling the next sentence from a kit she wasn’t sure was complete. “About what we do now. Not just as a family, but… you and me.”
He waited, not wanting to crowd her words.
Yor exhaled. “I know our… arrangement started for reasons outside our control. But it’s been real, hasn’t it?” She sounded surprised at her own courage. “For me, it is.”
Loid felt the weight of every false identity he’d ever worn, and all at once none of them seemed to matter. “For me, too,” he said.
A silence stretched, taut and strange, and for the first time he realized how little they’d actually talked about the shape of their future. The missions, the cover, the improv—all those moments had blurred into a kind of emotional shorthand, enough to survive but not to thrive.
Yor’s fingers fidgeted at the edge of her apron. “There’s something I wanted to ask you. It’s not urgent, but… maybe it is.”
He tried to smile. “I’ll try not to panic.”
She laughed, the sound almost a relief. “I just—well. Would you mind if we talked after Anya is in bed?”
“Of course,” he said. “If you’d like, I can handle bedtime.”
“That would be wonderful,” Yor said, and the words shimmered with a gratitude she rarely allowed herself.
Loid found Anya in the living room, seated cross-legged on the floor and surrounded by a drift of books and toys. Bond, acting as her sentry, rested his chin on her knee.
“Anya,” Loid said, soft but not too soft. “Bedtime.”
She rolled her eyes, but did not protest. “Can Bond sleep in my room?”
“If he fits on the rug,” Loid allowed.
She packed up her comics, her motions less begrudging than performative, and marched down the hall. Loid followed, shepherding Bond with a click of his tongue. The bedtime ritual was a choreography: change into pajamas, brush teeth (with the mandatory minute of “spy interrogation” to make sure she didn’t cut corners), pick a book, read exactly one chapter, then lights out.
Tonight, Anya chose a picture book about a wolf who wanted to be a doctor. She listened with eyes half-lidded, head pillowed against Bond’s flank. When Loid closed the book, she didn’t open her eyes, but said, “Papa, will there be peace tomorrow, too?”
He smoothed her hair. “That’s the plan.”
She was asleep before he finished the sentence. He lingered a moment, watching the smallness of her, the way she curled in on herself. Then he clicked off the lamp and backed out, closing the door just enough to leave a triangle of light.
The apartment was quiet. Yor stood by the window, hands folded in front of her, looking not at the city, but at her own reflection. Loid approached, slow and careful, as if she might vanish if startled.
She turned, and there was something almost regal in her posture—a bearing he’d seen in glimpses, but never this bare.
“Thank you,” she said.
He shrugged, but it didn’t land. “You said you had something to talk about.”
Yor nodded, and took a step toward him. She reached up, almost out of habit, to fix a stray hair behind her ear.
“I was thinking,” she said, “that now the world isn’t ending, maybe we could—if you want—think about our own future. About what we might become.” Her hands fluttered, searching for an anchor. “Not just as a cover family, but as a real one.”
Loid let the words sit, heavy and bright. He felt the impulse to offer comfort, to say “We already are,” but something in her face told him she needed to ask the question first, without rescue.
“I would like that,” he said.
Yor exhaled. “I know this is sudden, but… are you comfortable with the idea of a second child?”
He blinked. Once, then twice, as if he’d misheard her.
“A second…?”
Her lips curved, uncertain but hopeful. “If we’re building a life, maybe we could… build it a little more. For Anya. For us. I know it’s not practical, but—”
Loid made a sound that was half laugh, half choke. For a moment, his mind conjured every possible disaster, every mission gone sideways, every enemy in the shadows—and then, just as quickly, erased them.
He looked at Yor, really looked at her, and said: “Huh.”
She blushed, and the silence that followed was not awkward, but expansive—a space for possibilities, ridiculous and real.
From down the hallway, Anya’s voice drifted, drowsy and slurred: “I want a sister. Or a dragon.”
Loid snorted, and Yor did, too, and in the mingled echo of their laughter, the world outside the window felt very far away.
They stood there, suspended in the calm after crisis, in the hush that only families knew. For once, Loid Forger had no plan, and found that he didn’t need one.
He just needed this: the uncertain, luminous promise of whatever happened next.