Trisc was the only one in the lunch room. This wasn't an unusual state. They often hung around the lunch room, by themselves, reading, or doing jigsaw puzzles. Anything to keep things quiet.

That day, Trisc was watching out the window, as the waves rolled by on the river. They'd been standing there for a while, watching the water. They often watched the water when they were trying not to think about why they were there in the first place.

It was a challenge, not thinking about it, given what they were waiting for in the lunch room, so long after lunch.

A noise behind them didn't make them turn. They knew what it was. Even after so long, they recognized familiar cadence of the footsteps.

"You'd think that fifteen years of pretending to be a girl would've taught you that pretending to be a boy wasn't a good idea."

Still without turning around, Trisc smiled. "Fuck off, Richardson."

"Three months, and that's what you got to open with?" They could hear the smile in Idle's voice, as well.

"Has it really been three months?"

"Well, yeah, I've been working on my anger issues. Turns out my therapist doesn't think it's a great idea for me to visit someone whose teeth I want to kick in."

"Heh. Good thing I worked for a dentist."

"Yeah. Worked. Past tense. And not in the right department. Christ, you look stupid with your hair growing in."

Trisc finally turned, slowly. They fought to keep the tears back. Idle looked just as they remembered, red hair, pale complexion, chubby form. She was wearing torn and faded blue jeans and a black t-shirt with a heavy metal band logo plastered across the front, a band the two of them had gone to see together however long ago. "You're a sight."

"Yeah. You too."

"Wanna talk?"

"That's why I came out here." Idle sighed and pulled a chair out at one of the tables. "This place is kinda creepy."

"It's all the white walls and shit."

"And floors, and ceilings, and tables, and chairs. And of course, there are the residents. Not that they're white, that they're creepy. Some of them."

Trisc shrugged, sitting opposite her former roommate. "The other residents are actually pretty nice."

"Wasn't thinking about the other residents."

"I guess I deserve that."

"Yeah, and a lot more."

Trisc nodded. "Honestly, I'm just happy to see you. And I probably won't again, huh."

"Like fuck you won't." Idle scoffed. "You're gonna be seeing a lot of me. You get out in like six weeks, if your docs clear you."

"Uh huh. And treatment's going good."

"Didn't ask."

"You're still gonna hear it. The shit Caden put me through, and the shit I put you through as a result, and the collective shit we've all had to deal with, at least we can all know that one thing is getting fixed."

"Oh, it's not just you. I've been in therapy, like I said. Midnight's been in therapy. The corpie you got her to poison had a course, too, though she's at least doing alright now. It was mostly preventative, she says."

Trisc nodded. "Good. Everyone doing fine. I can at least live for a bit without the—"

"Guilt? Oh fuck, Spin, you're gonna deal with guilt for the rest of your goddamn life about this."

"Yeah, probably. That's why I'm surprised you're not just ditching me."

Idle laughed, unkindly. "No fuckin' way, Spin, you're sticking with me. You got a year of supervised released after your treatment's done, and you'll be living with me for that year."

Trisc met her former, and now future, roommate's eyes for the first time since she came in, curious.

"If that's what you want," Idle continued.

Trisc's eyebrows rose. "Is that what you want, Idle?"

"I want to hold this shit over your head for the rest of your goddamn life, Spin. There's no way you get to run away from this."

They took a slow breath. "Yeah. I get it." They understood the affection behind that anger, and both were an honest relief, along with the knowledge that they weren't going to be turned out to the street or having to find their way back to their family.

"Gonna be a new address, though."

"You're going to have to slow down and explain some of this for me. I've been out of the loop for..." Trisc tossed their hands in the air.

"Three months," Idle said smugly.

"Fuck. Yeah. Three months. So what do you mean, new address?"

Idle shrugged. "I let the lease lapse. Undid all my electrical work. Moved in with Midnight."

"Okay, but our place is more than big enough to—"

"And Tailor."

Trisc paused. "The corpie?"

"The one you tried to turn into a sex slave for me with oneirathol and Midnight's shitty Alter rig, yes."

"I didn't know you two were—"

"We weren't, until you came along. Or not you." Idle raised her hands and made quotation marks with her fingers. "'Benedict King.'"

Trisc winced, hearing the name. "Jesus."

"Oh, you don't like that one? Should I call you—or him—'nVizzible,' instead?"

"Like I don't feel bad enough about that."

"Yeah, well, you put me through the goddamn wringer, so you get to deal with your shitty alter ego names until I'm sick of teasing you about them."

"Are you sure you want me living with you? I could refuse."

"Oh no, chum." Idle slid her chair back and stood up, planting her hands on the table. "I need you living with me. We all do."

"Even—"

"Even the corpie. Even if she doesn't know it yet. And yes, I've checked, she's cool with it."

"But what about—"

"Midnight? She's the one who got the worst of it." Idle straightened up and started pacing. "She nearly refused treatment because she didn't want to be separated from me. She wanted to keep all your fucking around in her head, all the programming, all the control you had over her, because it let her stay with me. It took a couple techs, me, and Tailor, finally, to convince her that she would still be in love—and so would I—without you playing cupid. She's the most reluctant to let you in, and not because she doesn't like you, you understand. God. The girl still thinks you're just brilliant, even after all the mess in her head was cleared up."

Trisc put their head down on the table. "I... she... she was a good friend, Idle. And I fucking betrayed that."

"You did. That's why she's reluctant."

"Do you mind—"

"Would I stop agreeing with you and feeding into your pity party? Fuck, no. I told you already. The guilt I heap on you is the payment for us not challenging the court recommendations and for taking you into our home." Idle turned to face Spin, and sighed. "Let me know if I carry it too far, will you?"

Trisc lifted their head and looked up at their friend, who had softened considerably in her stance, tone, and posture. "You'll know."

Idle smiled, and Trisc could see the edge of genuineness in that expression. "You'd better tell me."

"I will. I promise."

"Good, because you have a history of not fucking telling me when things go wrong."

"Yeah." Trisc looked around. The game was on again. "I see where that gets me. Not making that mistake twice."

"Twice?" Idle's righteous anger was back. "How long did you put up with that shit from Caden's boys, Spin? How long did you shoulder that, and deal with the garbage in your head, and build up your plan to, what, get revenge on Caden by taking over his clan and shoving it in his stupid fat face?"

"Yeah, that was more or less my stupid, stupid plan." It was Trisc's turn to sigh. "Didn't matter if I was SpinDoctor or nVizzible, I was never going to—"

"Fuck that."

"What?"

"Fuck that. If Tailor hadn't stumbled into the picture, you would have been well on your way. You're a fucking genius, twerp. You put way too much planning into it, you chose the exact right moment to execute, and it took Midnight's care and my stubbornness along with Tailor's investigative curiosity to crack it, and if it wasn't for Tailor, Midnight and me would still be completely lost in each other and you'd be running a fucking incel cult. King Benedict. Don't sell yourself short, because that means you're selling us short, and I am way too proud of my accomplishments here to let you claim that your plan was anything less than a work of fucking art."

A moment of tense silence passed between the two friends.

Trisc spoke up first, tentatively. "Do... do you really think so?"

Idle laughed, loud and cheerful. "Honestly? Fuck, Spin, I don't know. But it sure fucking worked, and those assholes would have to be complete morons not to have accepted nVizzible into their disgusting ranks."

"Thanks."

"I'm not sure that's a compliment."

"Me neither." Trisc shook their head. "That's not a crowd I want to run with."

"Well it sure looked like you wanted to."

They brushed off the comment with a wave of their hand. "I didn't want to run with them, I wanted to run them. Dominate them. It's not the same thing."

"Yeah well. I don't care. Looks the same from the outside." Idle sat back down.

"It's out of my system now. I promise."

Idle grunted. "Sure fuckin' hope so." She leaned back in the chair and laced her fingers behind her head. "So. Treatment."

Trisc sighed. "Started with like one session almost every day. Well, one Alter session to try to break Caden's hold on me, and a lot of talk therapy, and a lot of just keeping me busy and not thinking about it. We're down to three a week, should be one a week soon enough, and then... well yeah. Supervised, provisional release."

"To my custody."

"To your custody, I guess."

"Where you're not allowed to touch Alteration equipment."

"For a whole goddamn year." It was Trisc's turn to get to their feet. "Might as well just leave me in here to rot. Can't work, can't play, can't... whatever. Doesn't matter. There was a tribunal in my absence, too, and they suspended my accreditation until at least the probation is done, probably longer. The therapist told me about it as a professional courtesy, though I think he wasn't supposed to. I'll just be dead weight for your little triad."

"Yeah. Well, I've been pulling some good numbers with build streams lately, and this whole... thing has become a big story. I'm doing some consulting on scripts for some people that Midnight knows, too, and of course I've sold my rights to a publisher... Point is, I'm making good bank, even if it's freelance and temporary and weird. And we're in Tailor's house, and her mortgage payments are less than our rent was, but of course, there's three mouths to feed, four soon when you get out, and I'm sure there's other house-related expenses, I dunno. Anyway. Midnight's been getting a bunch of work, we're out in Copper Hills and she's got a teaching job in a dance studio out there, not to mention she had a big role in a summer production. And Tailor's left AlterLogic—"

"The corpie was an A-L gal?"

"Yup. Worked on contract for the cops, decided she didn't want to do that anymore, went indie."

Trisc nodded. "Pretty standard sort of—"

"She's doing your job now."

"What?"

"She did an eight week intensive to get basic accreditation as a medic-anaesthetist and is in training right now to replace you at the dentist." Idle smirked. "Seems that for some reason, they're short an on-staff Alterist. They filled your spot with a temp and then Tailor's in there when she's done her interning hours."

Trisc let out a breath at the news. "It's a good job, I'm glad they found someone. And I'm glad they found someone good for it."

"You barely know her."

"She meets with your approval, she must be good."

Idle scoffed. "You've been my best friend since grade school and look how that turned out."

Trisc rolled her eyes. "Yeah, that's different."

"So anyway, we're all agreed, after a lot of long talks, about you staying with us, even if that means that we're carrying the load for you."

"You could just let me disappear."

Idle laughed, getting to her feet. "And miss the chance to taunt you about this until we're both locked up in an old folks' home? Spin, I am going to tell the world about this shit in my eulogy for you."

A wry smile twisted onto Trisc's face. "Think you're gonna outlive me, Richardson?"

"You're gonna drive me to strangle you one of these days, I know I'm gonna outlive you."

The two of them laughed together. It felt good. It felt like progress.

It felt like coming home.

They shared a hug together, then.

"I'll see you next week, yeah?" Idle asked, holding her friend close.

"I'm not going anywhere."

"You'd better not."

Trisc watched Idle leave the lunch room before going back to their place in the window to watch the waves. The outside world seemed brighter, clearer, more attainable. And happier.

And that was good enough, at least for that day.