The crash of the mug made Tessa wince. It was too early in the morning, and she’d messed up while trying to make coffee. The fright of the noise had woken her up nicely, at least.

However, she didn’t want to be woken up at this cost.Crouching down, she realised it was her favourite mug. The one her mother had gotten her from Freetown in Sierra Leone. All she could do right now was stare at the broken remains, however.

“What was that?” the Entity asked, floating over.

“I… that… I knocked a mug over.”

The Entity extended a hand, Tessa thinking it was about to offer her reassurances. Only, instead, its hand glowed. Followed by the shattered fragments of the mug glowing as well. The broken shards then floated into the air, coalescing together in the Entity’s hand. Tessa let out a soft gasp as each fragment fused together, not even the slightest cracks remaining.

“There you go,” the Entity said.

Tessa nodded slowly. “Right. Right… you can do that… I mean… you did… um, un-disintegrate people, so I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.”

She shivered a little, though, thinking back to that first day. When the Entity had seemed so cold and terrifying. When she hadn’t seen any humanity in those glowing red eyes. Only manic obsession, if there was anything she could name with a human emotion.

“Ah. Well. Cela is different,” the Entity replied, putting the mug down on the counter. “It is much easier to undo my own actions. I must merely pull the energy back into myself and it will bring that which it destroyed back with it. Whereas this… it is… direct assembly, I would say? I must know where every piece goes. But it is child’s play to do so with something in so few pieces.”

“So few… with all the little bits that flew off there must have been at least a hundred pieces,” Tessa muttered, half to herself.

“Yes. Simple. If it were shattered to the atomic level it would be a bit trickier, but still manageable. Things still somewhat remember how they were connected, they just need help. I could likely do a bit shy of two kilograms from the atomic level. A little more if I were given time to truly memorise the item,” the Entity said, staring at the mug. “Beyond that and things may get… more pêle-mêle.”

Tessa nodded, deciding to keep that in mind. Not that she expected to be disintegrating anything accidentally. And certainly not two kilograms of… something. She supposed it could be useful to remember for certain destructive analyses that the archaeology department sometimes had to do. They could test a much larger sample if they could call the Entity in to undo the damages.

Having assessed the closest thing she got to disintegrations (not involving the Entity), she realised it was staring at the mug.

“Your mother. She is there, isn’t she,” it said in a soft voice.

“Mhm. Her and dad. Decided to retire somewhere warm.”

The Entity was quiet for a few more moments. As if it were trying to pull at a thread, though she wasn’t quite sure what. It happened sometimes, that memories from Garcelle were stuck just out of reach for it. Especially at times where it was seeming more alien. Tessa was sure it would figure it out eventually, though. Or that it wasn’t overly important. Either or.

---

The Benefactor had given them an energy read out to track, and a basic starting point. His sensors had determined the artifact he was after was located somewhere in the boreal forests of the Canadian shield. Probably Ontario, but possibly Quebec.

Quite close and convenient for aircraft to commit to aerial surveys, but remote enough they’d only be able to deploy forces by aerial insertion. Not that Dr. Montgomery cared for how the grunts were sent in on their retrieval mission. Just as she hadn’t really cared about how the android General Adams had managed to convince the rest of the council to commit the extra resources to the sweep. Most of them were probably wanting something out of the previously sunk costs of the effort, and the promise of new toys from their alien friends was a good lure for anyone at the Pentagon.

Plus, burning money was a good way to try to convince Congress they needed that black book funding. 

Convincing Ottawa to let them run the surveys wasn’t hard either. The Canadians were on edge over their only Atlantic naval base, so were quick to comply when they were told it was to help deal with the Asset. Not that they were prone to resisting much whenever Washington actually put pressure on them. Though Selma still felt it would be best to just hurry up and annex the country already. It was a security threat, what with its slack approach to national defense.

That was a matter for another day, however. They’d managed to pin the artifact down to a few square miles of Northern Ontario. Somewhere properly isolated, a hundred miles from the nearest paved road or rail line. 

Which had meant calling up the Benefactor. Only to discover he wanted to come up to Nova Scotia. Apparently he wanted to move against the entity immediately once the artifact was dealt with.

Dr. Montgomery couldn’t complain about the enthusiasm, but did wonder about the security implications. At least he’d agreed to have them come pick him up, instead of flying over in an alien vessel and likely prompting dozens of UFO reports. 

It was annoying how little many aliens cared about making Earth governments deal with sightings and the cover up process.

Selma left the soldiers outside, guarding the various armoured cars, as she headed into the Benefactor’s compound. It would give her a moment to speak freely with him. She didn’t have anything specific in mind, but wanted to cover in case he did.

An alien servant led her towards the living room, where she found the Benefactor discussing some matter of business with a rather human male, of all things. He was dressed in a suit, tall enough to be a basketball player (though rather solid for his height) and looked to be South Asian. Well, apart from the red hair, that seemed rather at odds with his skin tone. The Benefactor noticed her, however, and wrapped up whatever they were discussing.

“I hope I can trust you on that matter, then, Cakravata?” he said.

The man nodded. “It seems reasonable.”

“Good, good. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a flight to catch.”

---

The Entity happily kicked its feet as it floated in the air above the coffee table. The moan of pure pleasure it made after taking another bite of pizza left Tessa slightly self conscious about the neighbours hearing.

“Why did you not tell me there was a food so magnifique, chérie?” it asked, wearing a happy little smile.

“You seemed very happy with sugary treats,” Tessa replied, watching her girlfriend float along, still wiggling with happiness.

“Ice cream and cookies and doughnuts are delightful, but this… this has a—a… a je ne sais quoi!”

“Umami is the term. I think.”

The Entity nodded. “Umami. And the gooey-ness!”

It floated around in another circling, gobbling up the rest of the slice.

“If you’re this excited about the cheese on a pizza here in Halifax… I wonder what you’ll be like when you get to go back to France and have some high quality cheese.”

“France… France. Ah… ah oui. La France,” the Entity mumbled, eyes growing a bit distant. “C’est ou… mes parents. Ma mère! Ma père!”

The Entity shifted to a standing pose, head snapping towards the direction of the coast. “Je dois les parler.”

With that, it started drifting towards the window, prompting Tessa to hop to her feet. She slid between it and the (mildly unconventional) exit, to block its route.

“You are not flying straight to France.”

“Pourquoi pas?”

“Pour—because international politics! Firstly, you’d probably decide to head over there at, like, mach seven, which French radar stations would probably assume is a missile or—I don’t. But scaring a nuclear armed state like that is a bad idea,” Tessa explained, shifting to stay between the Entity and the window as it made a vague attempt to get past. “Plus, who knows how the Americans will respond to you disappearing off across the Atlantic. They might decide to try to nuke you because they think you’ve gone on the warpath.”

“Mais mes parents,” it mumbled.

“We can do a Flight call with them.” Tessa said.

The Entity looked confused. Until Tessa reminded it that was a video chatting program. It gave a nod, and then floated over to sit at the computer. Which was better than trying to zip across an ocean, but she still needed to call up the CSIS agents, just to make sure they weren’t breaking any rules by making an international call.

And then she had to explain to the Entity that timezones were a thing, and Garcelle’s parents probably weren’t awake right now. They would call first thing in the morning.

“Why did we not call them before now?” the Entity asked in a quiet voice that sounded about as human as it ever did.

Tessa hung her head a little, not sure how to say what needed to be said. After a moment she felt she’d steadied her nerves enough to try.

“When you first… happened, I wasn’t sure how much Garcelle was left in you. And I worried there wouldn’t be enough for them to still see their daughter,” Tessa said, trying to keep her voice soft. “Even once I knew you still had pretty well all of… well, you in there, I… I wasn’t sure if you could act enough like the old you for their comfort. And then I worried how you’d respond if they rejected you.”

The Entity let out a small noise, acknowledging that it had heard. Then it reopened the pizza box and grabbed another slice. Tessa tried to apologise, but it kept rather quiet the rest of the evening. 

At least she managed to get confirmation from it, eventually, that it wasn’t angry. Merely trying to work out how to go about the conversation the next day.

---

Tessa rolled over and stared at the alarm clock. “First thing in the morning does not mean 12:01 am, Entity.”

“Technically it does.”

“I am going back to sleep,” she muttered under her breath, rolling on one side and covering her exposed ear with a stolen pillow to muffle further arguments from the Entity.

---

The Entity and its parents mostly talked in French. Tessa could follow some of it. Not enough to get all the details, but enough to know that the Entity seemed to be acting quite possibly the most human she’d ever seen it.

She was wondering if this had been some breakthrough in helping to ground it until they hung up. Instantly, the Entity seemed to deflate, slumping against Tessa and leaning its head against her chest.

“Was I human enough?” it asked, barely more than a whisper.

”Very? I was surprised,” Tessa offered, now rather confused. “Is everything ok?”

“Didn’t want hurt them. Hurt you. Before…” it said, voice even quieter. “Alors, j’ai Garcellé.”

“Oh… you didn’t have to—to… well, to fully closet yourself,” Tessa said, rubbing its hair. “Trust me, there’s enough of the old you in there naturally that your parents will see it. You don’t have to fake it.”

The Entity looked up at her with sad eyes, before leaning forward and giving her a kiss. And then another kiss. And… well, soon she found them both sprawled on the floor, the Entity getting slightly exploratory with the concept of kisses as French as the conversation it had just had. With Tessa not quite able to resist the electric feeling of that energized tongue against her own.

She’d already learned that lip to lip contact with the Entity was exciting, but this… this was yet a new layer. 

---

The Americans were up to something. For once, Ottawa agreed, and had sent Agent Lee to observe the American operations in Truro, having put pressure on to make them allow an observer. So he sat in the car, three agents with him. Two he knew well, but with one of the new Francophone agents driving. (New arrivals always got the worst arrangement in the car. No control over the radio and having to drive.)

“Not even a veto for songs,” the driver muttered. “Et travailler le week-end…”

“Agents must be ready every day of the week,” Lee replied firmly.

The new agent was quiet most of the rest of the drive, which let Lee focus on his plans. He and the other agents on this mission had agreed to have dormant tracking devices implanted in each of them. Below the skin, and nowhere obvious, but close enough to the surface they could activate them if captured. He hoped it would work, if any of them were captured. They wouldn’t be detected, due to their silence, and could be activated later… assuming the agents survived long enough.

Once they made it to the Truro suburb where the Americans were based it took a few minutes for the driver to find, in his words ‘un parking’, but then he and Agent Park filed out, the other two staying back to guard the car. 

Hopefully all the paranoia would prove unfounded.