“Vane, what was that for?” Marcus began, but I interrupted before he could scold me for being impolite.

“Mark, I didn’t tell him my name.” I told him, and for a moment, he looked as concerned as I felt, but then he spoke again.

“Maybe he just overheard it earlier, I still think-” I waved my hand, cutting him off.

“Not now, Mark, we’ve got errands to run.” I turned towards the teller, who’d long since schooled his features back into a polite neutrality. “I need to check the status of my account, change my primary residence, and might be looking for some information, if you have it.”

The man seemed almost bored at first, his deliberately sculpted features portraying the picture of polite apathy, but he perked up the slightest bit at the mention of information. I didn’t know how much I’d need from him, but it was best to get his attention early.

“Happily, sir. And you are…” He raised an eyebrow, and I felt like kicking myself.

“Sorry about that, my name is Sylvain Henry Camille Johansson, I recently moved my home branch from Mars to Sedna, and as you can see, I’m pretty far from both, now.” The man tensed up for the slightest moment when I told him my name, just enough to catch. It made sense, I suppose, the Family wasn’t a power anywhere near as influential as the Bank, but it was large enough that their, or I guess our, presence was noticed wherever we tended to live. That really only constituted a couple of bodies and a small slice of Jupiter’s Wildwinds, but that was probably more than enough to help a lower level teller get a promotion if he handles things well.

“Of course, Mister Johansson. If you wouldn’t mind taking a seat while I take a look at your account?” Mark and I nodded, sitting at the desk across from him as he worked away. Of course, it hardly took a second for him to dig up a nearly disturbing amount of information on my life since opening an account, and most of that was just him thinning it out to anything relevant.

“Sylvain Johansson, born to Gloria Johansson and Nikola Vaughn in the Alba Province of Mars, opened an account with the Bank at age six, the Bank’s affinity test determined no energetic aptitude,” I sunk into my seat, remembering that test. “Retesting at age seven determined a minor full aptitude, neither pursued nor recorded by Bank administration.” It took everything I had not to flinch in the face of my life’s history being rewritten.

“Continuing. You joined the Standard Magitech Coalition at age eighteen, promoted rapidly and in possession of a moderate number of patents within and without the Coalition. Led an expedition to… do something unspecified in the Oort a little over a month ago, but never stopped by to notify the Sedna branch of your arrival.” His voice took on a suspicious undertone at that.

“We do, however, have your trip through a Portal Port on record, verifying you made it well into the outer Sol System, far outside the reach of either Authority. After that, you appear to have vanished, no withdrawals, no deposits, no purchases, and no trade-ins. And now, here you are, deeper into the System than you started, with no recorded purchase of transfer, nor an organization claiming to have transferred you either. In fact, if you were genuinely at the Oort and not Sedna, you’d need a superluminal transport. You wouldn’t happen to have taken an unsanctioned transport, would you?” He narrowed his eyes and continued. “Of course, this is all on the presumption you’re even Sylvain to begin with.”

I sighed, half expecting the interrogation to begin with, but still a bit upset it was coming to pass anyways. “That’s why I brought him,” I motioned to Mark, who just seemed a bit bored, “my cousin, Marcus Johansson, to verify. I also consent to whatever tests you feel need to happen to verify who I am."

“On the matter of transport, I myself am unaware of exactly how I got here. I don’t know how much the Coalition has told you, or anyone really, but that expedition ended poorly, to say the least.” I could tell he was eager to question me, to wring out every bit of information he could before I priced it. I didn’t let him.

“Poorly, to the point of leaving only a single survivor who spent the last month in a hospital recovering. Now, can we begin?” One begrudging nod later, and he turned his attention to Marcus, questioning him about seemingly inane things while trying to sneak in the occasional grab for my own situation, but any ‘good’ information broker would do the same.

I couldn’t really do much to verify my own identity, they didn’t have an imprint of my energetic signature, for obvious reasons, and DNA tests were notoriously easy to fake with just a bit of preparation, as were any determining physical features. Memories could be forcefully claimed, and the mind itself was too nebulous for anyone to measure. It came down to Mark’s own imprint, the one part of a person that couldn’t be reproduced or stolen, but could be measured, to verify that he was who he claimed. From there, he could confirm that I was who I claimed too, that neither of us were trying to cheat the Bank, and that my presence was due to my employers not documenting anything rather than making unlawful Leaps.

Once he had, however, he was quick to let his suspicious attitude simply fade away, like it was never there to begin with, which was honestly a bit insulting, but nothing new. He turned back to me and spoke.

“Now that we’ve taken care of that, Mister Johansson, what can we at the Bank assist you with today?”

“I’d like to change my account status from fixed to nomadic, a wallet chip to go with it, and I’d like any information your Archives have on corrupt cores and non-standard energy types.” There was silence for a moment, and even Mark looked like he was thinking about the request. Then, the man nodded, and went to work.

“Of course, I’m sure you already know this, but nomadic accounts are far less secure than regional accounts, though they remove the chance that you ever need to go through this whole process again. Are you sure?”

“I’ve got a hunch I may not be as stationary, anymore, so yes.”

“And is there any particular reason you’re in the market for information on esoteric energies?” He pried, handing me the tiny chip, which I pocketed. I could’ve had it implanted, but I had no idea how that would react with anything, really. I’d just have to find a more secure way of keeping that on my person, in the future.

“Call it curiosity, unless I don’t have the funds to access that?” He seemed a bit disappointed, but passed me another chip, this one loaded with information.

“Five thousand marks for corrupt cores, eight thousand for information on any non-standard energies we have recorded.” That was… steeper than I thought for raw information. “Of course, this doesn’t include any gathering methods or restricted knowledge, just a history and overview of most known energies outside the Core Four that at least one human has been able to wield, and survive doing so.” That was definitely a surprise, something like that was well over ten times the cost of similar information on the Core Four, and probably only a fraction of the amount I’d get for it, too.

It was more in line with a pretty average gathering method, or even a higher tier technique. “Your balance is now one hundred and fifteen thousand, six hundred marks. Can the Bank help you with anything else today, mister Johansson?”

“No, thank you. That should be everything I need, but if there’s something else I’ll be sure to stop by and ask for…” His smile widened as he offered me a hand, which I took. “Charles, it’s been a pleasure sir.”

I nodded my assent, then followed Marcus out to the car. Donny was nowhere to be seen, thankfully, and our Valet was right by the door, waiting for us. As we both got back into the car, I turned to Marcus.

“Hey, Mark, I need to thank you for that, it would have been an enormous pain otherwise. I guess now is as good a time as any to take care of the rest of my errands, though.” I fought back a sigh as I phrased my question. “Do you know where my parents are staying? I should probably see them before something comes up. I’m still waiting on any word from the Coalition, so now’s probably the best time for it.”

Marcus wasted no time in giving the appropriate address to the driver, and a few minutes later we were pulling into the lot of a truly grand building much closer to the center of the estate, a mansion in any sense of the word, and it was easy to see the status the two of them had within the Family, although it was still a bit more than what I was expecting for them.

It wasn’t the time to be wondering, though, as I walked up to the doors of the building. Marcus was intent on following along and getting answers, and I couldn’t well tell him no after the favor he’d done for me. Steeling my nerves, I used the archaic doorknocker. Three thumps resounded, and then not much more for a moment, before I saw the knob turn.

As the door swung open, I was left face-to-face with my father, a man who looked strikingly similar to me, or the other way around, I suppose, and he seemed just as much at a loss as me. Nothing was said between us for a moment, before he turned around and shouted.

“Ollie! Come to the door!” Then he turned back around and yanked me into the house, crushing me in a hug, almost literally. I spent a long moment struggling in his grip, before finally giving up and embracing the man back. I'd been dreading this moment for a long time, but now I didn't know how to feel.

It was about then that my mother arrived, I wasn’t sure what she had expected to find at the door, but the look she wore clued me in that it probably wasn’t, well, me.

She didn’t say a word, either, before prying me out of my father's hands and pulling me into her own arms, and I went along with it this time, hugging her back, thankful that at least she wasn’t trying to crush my spine like my father.

Eventually, she let go, looking up into my eyes for a moment before sighing herself. She turned, walking into the barebones living room, and my father and I followed. Marcus seemed unsure of what to do with himself and stood at the edge of the room while the three of us sat down.

“Welcome back, Vane.” My dad said when he realized I didn’t know how to start, and my mom followed up. “We’ve missed you.”

“I did too, I just… didn’t know how to come back. I’m sorry mother, fath-” the man waved his hand before I could finish my statement, growing upset. I flinched, not sure what he was about to rebuke me for.

“No more of that, Vane. We held you to the Family’s standards, made you follow the Family’s codes for eighteen years, and I don’t think anyone in this room is happy with how that turned out. No more forced formality, no more unachievable goals, no more pointless politics. I don’t want to lose you again.” My mother seemed mostly in agreement, and I felt a bit of the tension leave me.

“Thank you, dad.” I began, then choked out the words “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be, you silly boy.” Mom said, “the Family put too much pressure on you, and too little faith. We shouldn’t have let them, and we won’t let them try again.”

“I don’t think they will, either, we didn’t follow your every move, you deserved that much respect at least, but most of the Family knows about what you’ve done in the Coalition. It may not be the Family business, but you’re still accomplishing something, and that’s more than most of the kids your age can say.” Dad looked at Mark when he said that and coughed. “Most of them. The rest are too busy at an Academy or just leeching to actually work, and we’re proud of you.”

I wasn’t too surprised that they were watching me, honestly, but I did have a question. “You aren’t upset about the expedition?” Watching them both tilt their head in unison was a little surreal and very much nostalgic, and it told me quite a bit.

“What do you mean?” They asked, and I could see them coming up with their own conclusions already. Apparently, some news travelled slowly outside the Coalition.

“Did you turn something down? Or are you going soon? Is that why you came to Luna instead of stopping by on Mars?” I could see Marcus grimacing in the background.

“I guess you haven’t heard, then. I was… promoted, about a month and a half ago. Put on a sort of rush expedition out to the Oort.” Watching them light up with that news almost hurt, when I had to follow it up. “We were sent out a few weeks ago, and it went- it went wrong.” I didn’t realize how hard it would be to actually talk about it, instead of just using everything as a shield and ignoring it all. They could tell, too, and it made this next bit worse.

“I- I was the only survivor, I don’t even know how.” Another breath, as I watched how the two of them would react. “And it was my fault. I came up with the idea, I got that idea approved, I said that nothing should go wrong, that I could guarantee that we just needed to stick to the numbers and it’d be like summoning, but without a target, and we’d just get to peer into a new plane. Like portals, I promised, and now my ‘portal’ killed three dozen people because they trusted me.” It was hard to stop, once it all started coming out, and it was almost scary realizing how much I’d managed to bury.

“I spent almost a month feeling like I was dying, probably actually dying, and- and I wasn’t even given that, and just…” I trailed off, I didn’t know what more I could say and if I tried, I’d probably just break down. At some point, both my parents had moved over to sit by me, too many emotions on their own faces to make out. Mark had left the room at some point, not that I blamed him, I didn’t expect to almost fall apart like that.

I needed to take a minute, just breathing and focusing on calming down, on forcing myself to find any good news in it all that I could. My mind wandered, and it seemed my parents could understand, since they let it all happen. Eventually, I just decided to change the subject, forcefully. I could confront it all again later, at my own pace.

The problem was that I didn’t know what to change it to, so we ended up sitting in silence. My parents looked on in concern while I tried, and failed, to gather my thoughts, but after a little bit of time I had a loose idea of what to say next.

“I kept my promise to you guys.” I could tell they weren’t sure what I meant, so I held out my hand, palm facing upwards. “Before I left, when I said that Vane the empty would never see you again.” A small intention was all it took to guide some Ether out through the palm of my hand, a little more attention in trying to create something that wouldn’t explode, or light anything on fire, or cause any screaming, or do anything bad. “And he won’t.”

The air rippled, and with a blur of motion, something small and yellow flopped onto my hand. All three of us were staring, now, at the sponge I’d managed to conjure from nothingness, and I felt my shoulders slump at my ‘grand’ reveal, but I wasn’t allowed to sulk for too long before I heard my parents gasp in surprise, and then launch into a tirade of exclamations and even more questions.

“Vane, what have you done! This is- how have you- I’m so happy.” My mother said as she pulled me into a hug. Meanwhile, my father gingerly picked the sponge out of my hand, leaving a puddle of sudsy water in my palm. He examined it, confused and curious as he poked and prodded it not only with his hands but also tendrils of mana and sounding bursts of qi, trying to find whatever secrets it may hold. He quickly deduced that no matter how much he squeezed it or wringed it out, more water just kept dripping out, onto the table he’d held it over, running off onto the floor.

As it went from merely surprising to outright concerning, he set the thing down and turned back to me, still confused but also much happier, now that he was reasonably certain that I hadn’t been joking. “I have so many questions for you, but, why the sponge?” I pulled myself off of my mother, looking at my dad.

“I couldn’t tell you. This happened after my accident, and I don’t really have much control. Honestly, I don’t have any clue what I’m doing, and I don’t think anyone else does either. This stuff is different, and I think it can be dangerous, so I don’t want any of you getting hurt. But there’s one more thing I do need help with.

“Someone broke into the place I’m living, earlier today, and I think I have an idea of who now but I’m not sure at all, and I just don’t know who to turn to.” It’d been some time since I’d last seen either of them look quite so outright furious, and I felt touched. I felt a lot of things, actually, and I was still trying to figure it all out. At first, I’d only come to get it out of the way, but now I didn’t know quite what I wanted. No matter what, though, I couldn’t just leave like last time anymore, I just couldn't anymore.

I had time to think, though, because after telling them about my adventures, they seemed less than content to just let me get accosted by anyone else, and so it was that they practically marched me out of the house, summoning Marcus to come with as we went back to my home of one day.