"You wouldn't have to tell me anything you didn't want to tell me, pet, it's voluntary telepathy, I'm not a psychic combatant."

"I know, but I'm not sure I'd be able to not tell you, and right now I don't want to—I mean, I don't want you to know the details." He buries her face in her neck. "Dn't wnt you t' see m' like ths," he mumbles. "But I'd want you to be there anyway. Gee, very consistent and thoughtful of you, brain, here's a cookie," he says a bit more clearly, and sighs.

She pets him. "Oh my lovely," she sighs. "...Renée's a mandated reporter, not about you but about her students so she might know a few things about how this tends to go, if she or her social worker friend or whoever thinks you have a shot at winning can you tolerate an investigation and maybe a court case?"

He groans. "I had been hoping he'd forget about me, no court cases. Yes, if that's what it takes to get him not to touch me, but... What about Jonathan and Sarah?"

"Is your stepmom not able to look after them on her own if she has to?"

"I really don't think so. Did you see how she and Sarah were acting? That was not just in public."

"Is she incompetent or just - quiet? Like, can she drive and fill out paperwork and do shopping? You said she cooks..."

"She can do—house stuff. Cleaning and cooking and shopping. She doesn't work, Tobias' family is rich and they mooch off it, also he's an engineer. I think she might be able to find a job without Tobias around, but she can't really be a mom. And Jonathan might want to take over and take care of the other two and he's eleven."

"...Okay, but you don't actually have to be a sacrifice on the altar of this particular family's well-being. There are families that need at least that much help and can be helped at much less cost."

He continues clinging and doesn't say anything.

Squeeze. "And maybe Tobias's parents will help look after their grandkids or something. It sounds like your half-siblings have a lot more support available than you do and it is okay for you to grab more until you have this extremely basic thing you need of not being terrorized."

"I know you're right, I just don't... believe it, if that makes sense? Inside."

Sigh. "Might as well tell him." He looks at Alex. "And you might've guessed now the reason why I had never seen people in terrible distress before."

"Hadn't put it together. What's the big secret?"

"Sadde's never been to virtuality. If he ran away and didn't dare approach civilization - they're not likely to spend psion resources on tracking you down, or at least it'd take a truly astronomical amount of money from your dad to hire a private one. And you've done it before."

"My father, not my dad," he says. "The first time, I hadn't seen him since I was four, my mom was taking care of me, he had probably forgotten about me, she had custody and he had no interest in keeping a child that was so obviously not going to behave. Then he had custody again and I was his job. And then he gave up on his job. And then there was you, who not only managed to collar me but did so while being female, you're not a sub, and you're letting me stay a boy at least sometimes so you're doing it all wrong. Way he works, you challenged him. He might not hire someone to track me down, but only because then he'd know I wasn't with you either." Pause. "And then I wouldn't be with you, or at school, and that'd be terrible."

"Sorry. Father. It'd only be until you turned eighteen, he can't touch you after that, pet."

"That's still a year and ten months away."

"I know. I know. But is it better than being in his house?"

"...if it's being in his house and not with you versus running away and not being with you, yeah. If he still allows me to go to school... I'm not sure."

"Is there any way to find that out - reliably?"

"Find what out, whether he'd allow me or whether I prefer that?"

"Whether he's going to pull you out of school."

"Oh. I don't know. I—his thing now is that you exist, I think he'd decided that he'd allow me to be a freak if I was gonna be a freak away from him, but now his pride was injured and, um. I have no idea how he'll react."