I'd been thinking about this since our encounter on the pier. The alternate timeline version of my mother who'd accepted transformation and become something beyond human. She'd given me information. Pointed me toward Helena Vasquez. Warned me about threats.
But she hadn't asked for anything in return.
Which meant either she was playing a longer game than I could see, or her goals genuinely aligned with mine.
Neither option was comforting.
"She wants me to succeed where she failed," I said. "To find a middle path between transformation and rejection."
"Which you've already done."
"Partially. The integration gave me a fragment of connection to trans-dimensional energy. But it's incomplete. Like having a key to a door but not knowing which lock it fits."
Natalia processed this.
"So she's investing in your potential."
"Seems that way."
"And if your potential doesn't develop the way she hopes?"
"Then I become another failed experiment in a very long line of failed experiments."
