Right away, Moonsong, Tribute, and the member of Foresight stepped into an office, closing the doors. The blinds were at an angle where I could see where they stood, but not their expressions or what they might be saying.

Anelace stepped into the back, then came back to the sitting area. He looked at us, then at the other members of Moonsong’s group. “Come on. Let’s keep everyone separate until things are settled.”

Our group walked into a back room, a single table and some nice chairs in a room with a coffee maker and microwave.

“I was looking forward to seeing you again, Victoria,” Anelace said. “Sorry it’s not under better circumstances.”

“Yeah,” I said.

“I’m going to go talk to the others. There won’t be a problem if I leave you guys here?”

“Not at all,” I said.

Anelace left us in the room. Kenzie flopped forward, forehead hitting the table, arms extended all the way in front of her.

Byron changed back to Tristan.

“No,” Tristan said, quiet. “So long as I’m here, Moonsong is going to be frothing at the mouth. I’m trading out until she’s good and gone.”

They swapped back. Byron slouched into his seat.

“I didn’t know that about the therapy, Byron,” Sveta said.

Byron shrugged.

“It’s why you don’t want to sit in for Mrs. Yamada’s?”

“It’s part of it,” he said. “Look, I don’t want to demonize Tristan or anything, like Moon is so good at doing. He has his good side, but a lot of the time, I’ve got to conserve my strength for dealing with the rougher patches. Minor, basic stuff.”

“Do you think he’s a sociopath?” I asked.

“No,” Byron said. “But I think… he’s got to be the worst possible person to end up sharing a body with.”

“Is there anything I or we can do to make it easier?” I asked.

“I’m working on a camera that looks inside Tristan to find Byron, or vice-versa,” Kenzie said, without raising her head. “It’s not going so well but I’m going to figure it out.”

“Thanks Kenz. No, nothing makes it easier. You can… tackle the broad strokes, you can be careful not to talk past my face to say something to Tristan and never do the opposite when Tristan’s the one in front. It doesn’t make a difference with the stuff that really matters. That’s my stuff to deal with.”

“What stuff?” I asked.

“He’s… stubborn, destructively stubborn, he holds this idea of what should happen in his head, and if that doesn’t work for you then you’re probably going to be pretty unhappy, because you aren’t going to change anything about it.”

“Reminds me a bit of my mom when you describe it that way,” I said.