Chapter 66: Aspects, Aliens, and Awkward Family Secrets
I recounted the details—the special room, the extensive scanning, Washington’s strange behavior when I ntioned not knowing anything about my father. Every piece of the puzzle seed to have jagged edges that didn’t quite fit together, like soone had taken fragnts from different jigsaws and forced them into place.
"And they gave you that," Kimiko pointed at the monitoring bracelet on my wrist.
"They said it’s standard for late manifestations," I explained, running my thumb over the sleek tal band.
"There’s nothing standard about this, Satori. Nothing at all."
"You think they’re tracking
because of my father?"
"I think," Kimiko said carefully, "that it’s quite a coincidence that you suddenly manifested an Aspect after eighteen years as a Zero, right as you’re about to take the entrance exam for New Vein Academy. The sa academy where your father’s research partner’s granddaughter is the current star."
Seraphina Vance—the VHC President—was the granddaughter of Kenji’s research partner. The woman who controlled the entire Hunter industry, who decided which threats were real and which were silenced, had a direct connection to my supposed father.
Did she have a younger sister?
"Do you think Seraphina knows sothing?"
"I don’t know," Kimiko admitted, wrapping her cardigan tighter around herself as a cool breeze swept through the park, rustling the nearby trees like invisible fingers through hair. "But I do know this—whatever your father discovered, whatever got him taken, it must have been significant. Earth-shattering, even. And now you’re suddenly on their radar."
She reached out and took my hand, her slender fingers wrapping around mine with surprising strength. Her touch was warm, maternal in a way I’d never experienced in either of my lives. Sothing about that simple gesture made my throat tighten unexpectedly.
"Satori," she said, her voice low and intense, her hazel eyes boring into mine as if trying to see past them to what lay beneath, to the stranger wearing her son’s skin. "I’ve watched you change these past weeks. At first, I thought it was just growing up, finding your way. But it’s more than that, isn’t it?"
My heart rate kicked up, hamring against my ribs with such force I was certain she must hear it. What did she suspect? How much could she see? Had I underestimated this seemingly ordinary housewife? Had the Red-hot Habanero spotted the predator hiding behind her son’s glasses?
"I’m just trying to be better," I said, aiming for sincerity. "For you and Luka. For myself."
Kimiko squeezed my hand. "You know you can tell
anything, right? Anything at all. No matter how strange or difficult."
For a mont, I almost believed I could tell her everything. About Kaelen Leone, about dying in another world with a knife in my back, about waking up in her son’s body with a System that fed on my ability to entertain them. About how I wasn’t really her son at all, but sothing else entirely, wearing Satori like a borrowed suit.
The sa instinct that kept
alive in my last life slamd the door shut. So truths are too dangerous, even for mothers who seem like they might understand. So secrets, once spoken, can never be taken back.
"I know, Mom," I said, squeezing her hand back, the lie bitter on my tongue but necessary, another brick in the wall of my deception. "Thank you."
She nodded, seemingly satisfied for now, though sothing in her eyes told
she hadn’t fully abandoned her suspicions. "We should head back before Luka organizes a search party."
As we stood, Kimiko looked out at the city one last ti, the countless lights of New Vein reflecting in her eyes like stars captured in amber. "I want you to be careful, Satori. Especially at the academy. Especially around anyone connected to the Vance family."
"I will be." This, at least, wasn’t a lie. Self-preservation was my specialty.
"And if you start rembering things... strange things, things that don’t seem like your own mories..." She hesitated, her voice dropping to barely above a whisper, each word laden with significance. "Co to
first. Before anyone else."
"What do you an?" I asked, tension coiling in my gut like a serpent.
Kimiko’s smile was sad, tinged with a knowledge that seed far beyond what a simple housewife should possess. "Your father had theories about Aspects, about what they really are. He thought they might be more than just powers—that they might carry sothing else with them. Knowledge. mories."
"From where?" I asked, though part of
already knew the answer, could feel it resonating with a terrible truth in my bones, in the very core of my stolen existence.
"From sowhere beyond the Gates," she said simply, her eyes reflecting the distant city lights like miniature portals, windows into another reality. "Sowhere else. Beyond our world, beyond our understanding... places we were never ant to reach."
"Co on," Kimiko said, turning back toward ho with a gentle tug on my sleeve, pulling
from my spiraling thoughts. "It’s getting late, and the night air gets chilly this high up."
If Kenji Nakano had been researching cross-dinsional phenona and had disappeared because of it, what did that an for ? Was there a connection between his research and my presence in Satori’s body? This was no coincidence. The universe wasn’t that lazy or that cruel.
And most troubling of all—if Kimiko suspected sothing wasn’t quite right with her son, how long before she pieced together the fragnts of truth? How long before the maternal warmth in her eyes hardened into sothing more dangerous?
I glanced at her profile as we walked side by side down the path. She looked peaceful now, as if sharing her story had lifted a weight from her shoulders. But I’d seen the steel beneath her gentle exterior. The "Red-hot Habanero" was still in there, dormant but ready to ignite and burn anyone who threatened what she held dear.
I just hope that potential threat doesn’t include .
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