"Presumably to forget what I did! Also, I don't remember eating brain spiders!" Shady protested. "I literally don't remember making that decision!"

  “Ashy?” The serval looked at me. “Any bright ideas?”

  I frowned, thinking back to the day Shady invaded my house. "Nope. Shady was incredibly vague about everything. Kept giving me non-answers about what she was. Basically, being cryptic and annoying."

  "I'm often cryptic and annoying," Shady pointed out.

  "True, but this was extra cryptic and annoying. You kept saying things like 'I'm whatever you want me to be' and 'chairs are real but if I close my eyes, no chairs.'

  “‘Das funny,” Nexxali chortled. “But also very annoying.”

  Shady shrugged.

  "Right. So we have no idea where these incredibly important magical keys are, you're meeting your murderous aunt tomorrow, and our best plan is 'fuck everyone's shit sideways and try not to die.'" Nexxali poked Shady.

  "Hey, it's worked so far," Shady pointed out.

  "It does seem like a clever move to sabotage the Citadel," Nexxali added. "But also incredibly stupid and self-destructive."

  Shady made a mildly distressed noise. "Past me thought that was a good idea, I guess.”

  "Maybe..." I hesitated, "Maybe we could try to reconstruct what happened? Like, I remember our first day together pretty clearly. What if I let you look at my memories? See if anything triggers a connection? See if there’s a clue there or something?"

  Shady's ears perked up. "You'd let me into your head? Like, full memory access?"

  "Will it hurt?" I asked cautiously.

  "Only if I root around too aggressively," Shady said. “I’ll be nice, promise! Want to try?"

  I looked at Nexxali, who shrugged. “She's already in my head all the time with her brain hooks. Now she'll be in yours too!"

  "That's... not as reassuring as you think it is."

  "Come on, Ashy," Shady wheedled, moving closer. "Pretty please? I promise I'll be gentle! I want to remember what I did with you before my mind got reset. No aggressive rooting! Only purposeful rooting. Very consensual memory invasion. Just a nice, soft memory browse!"

  "You make it sound like shopping."

  "Memory shopping! I like that! Can I buy some memories? Do you accept O-bux?"

  "You're deflecting again. You don't have any O-bux on you."

  "I'm always deflecting! It's my natural state of being!" She joked.

  I sighed. "Fine. Yes. Let's do the creepy memory-sharing thing. But if you damage anything in there, I'm charging you rent for all the space you're taking up in my brain."

  "Deal!" Shady bobbed.

  I sighed. "Also, if you find any embarrassing memories in there, we don't talk about them."

  "Define embarrassing," Nexxali said with a grin.

  "Literally anything from my teenage years."

  "Oh, this is going to be good," the serval purred.

  “Nexy, pipe down. Ashy, relax and come lie down on the bed,” Shady voiced, “I'm not digging that deep. We'll do it in a dream-state connection.”

  I sighed and went into the bathroom and emerged a few minutes later in a clean t-shirt and boxers. Nexxali's and Shady’s hexasuits were already off, the living material compressed into storage mode hexagons.

  We arranged ourselves in the nest-bed. Me in the middle, Shady pressed against my left side, Nexxali curled against my right. Shady's tail wrapped around both of us.

  "How does this work?" I asked.

  "Just relax and remember," Shady said, pressing her forehead against mine. "Think about the first moment you saw me this week. I'll follow the thread from there, link our minds."

  I closed my eyes and let my mind drift back to that night. The scratching sound.

  Witching hour.

  “Intimate brain invasion time!" Shady whispered conspiratorially, large, silver eyes igniting from within. My mind lurched sideways, drowning in their light.

  . . .

  Suddenly, I wasn't in my bed anymore.

  I was standing in my bedroom, but from a different angle. Third-person perspective, like watching a movie of my own life. There was past-me, lying on the bed with my laptop, looking sleep-deprived and vaguely hopeless, staring at my job application vibe-code app.

  The grandfather clock ticked ominously in the hall.

  “Neat-o," Dream-Shady said, appearing beside me, making me twitch. "I'm watching myself watch you."

  Past-me looked completely unaware that my entire life was about to become infinitely more complicated. Poor bastard.

  "Oh my god, look at you," Nexxali giggled, suddenly manifesting beside me and Shady. "You look so tired and grumpy!" She smooshed me from behind. "Yay, mutual memory experience movie-dream!"

  "I was trying to find a job," I sighed. "And living in a creepy mansion alone. Cut me some slack."

  "No slack! This mansion's not creepy," Shady observed, watching her past self scratching under the bed. "I thought it was cozy."

  "You weren’t helping make it cozy," I pointed out. “Look at you wiggling under there like a creepy critter.”

  "Strategic frightery!"

  “That joke is getting old. Get new material.”

  “Nu-huh!”

  We watched as past-me aimed the tablet's flashlight under the bed.

  "FUCK, what the fuck that's so bright!" Memory-Shady yelped.

  Nexxali burst out laughing beside me, elbowing Shady. "Slayer Ashy, you just tactical-nuked her retinas!”

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

  Past-me yelped and dropped the tablet on past-Shady’s head.

  "ACKK!" Memory-Shady cried out.

  Nexxali howled with laughter. "You... Aha ha ha, Slayer, you just BONKED her!"

  "It was an accident!" I said. “She spooked me.”

  Past-me picked up the tablet and started taking photos. The flash went off repeatedly, blinding past-Shady all over again, making her cry out.

  "You're really committing to the retina damage strategy," Nexxali wheezed.

  Past-Shady swatted at the phone—

  THWACK.

  The tablet landed on her face again.

  "Again?!" Nexxali was dying from laughter at past-Shady's flailing. "Twice! Same spot!"

  "In my defense," I said. "I was sleep deprived as fuck and really, REALLY didn’t expect to find a giant cryptid invader under my bed."

  "Nuu. We are besties forever,” Shady commented. “I had a lifetime pass of under-bed access privileges! One should always expect the spooki Shady inquisition!”

  "I'm pretty sure a thirteen-year gap in contact voids those privileges and inquisition expectations," I huffed.

  Memory-Shady emerged from the bed, cursing and hopping around, rubbing her face.

  Nexxali was laughing so hard she broke into tears. “Poor Wendigo-bae.”

  Shady crossed her arms. "That damn thing weighs like three pounds and has sharp corners."

  "You're an apex divine-tier predator," Nexxali pointed out, wiping tears from her eyes.

  "It was a very thick tablet, okay? Yes, ha ha, very funny," Shady grumbled. "Can we move past the Shady-face-bonking part?"

  "Never," Nexxali declared. "This is going in the permanent memory bank. I'm going to bring this up at every family gathering forever."

  Shady rolled her eyes as we continued watching the memory unfold. Past-me taking photos that showed a Black Shuck instead of Shady.

  “You’re part Shuck?” Nexxali asked.

  “Mhmmm,” Shady nodded.

  The memory inevitably marched onward.

  Past-Shady explained she'd been waiting for past-me to return. The social media stalking confession. Dax's text messages confirming that yes, he only saw a dog in the photos.

  "You know," Nexxali said, "’Dis is like serious full-on stalking."

  "Not stalking!" Shady protested. "Strategic friendship maintenance!"

  "You broke into a library at midnight to lurk on his Instagram," Nexxali said.

  "Again, strategic!"

  "That's literally the definition of stalking, dawg," Nexxali said. "Couldn't you have texted or something?"

  "Uhhh... I was feeling shy," Shady let out. "And his profile had pms disabled from non-friends."

  The memory went on.

  "Abyss. So much deflecting," Nexxali observed. "You're like deflection-central station."

  "I was being mysterious!" Shady protested. "Enigmatic! It's romantic!"

  "It's evasive," Nexxali corrected. "And frustrating. Look at his face. He's trying so hard to understand what's happening and you're just... playing dumb mind games."

  We watched Past-Ash struggle with the existential crisis of whether Shady was real, running through hypotheses: psychotic break, carbon monoxide poisoning, stress dream, supernatural entity.

  "Poor Ashy's literally having a mental breakdown trying to rationalize your existence," Nexxali said, sensing all of my thoughts through Shady’s brain-hookery. "And you're just... making jokes about his brain being too loud?"

  “I was exhausted and wanted to sleep,” Shady protested. “Besides, it helped him remember how to split his mind. See? I’m a helpful critter!”

  "Uh-huh. Helpful. After you refused to answer any of his questions and made everything infinitely more confusing and invaded his bed," Nexxali pointed out critically.

  Shady frowned.

  The memory shifted to the next day. Past-me getting awakened by an unnervingly deep Wendigo stare, the 'eating me' joke, me making coffee.

  "Make me breakfast before I decide to eat you," Past-Shady said, aggressively chewing on the unicorn mug.

  "Eating threat number two," Nexxali observed. "You were really committed to the 'aggressive house guest' energy, huh?”

  "It's friendly banter!" Shady protested. "I was excited to see him!"

  "You told him you were trying to figure out where to bite first!"

  “Playful teasing!" The Wendigo let out.

  “Sure, but as we can clearly see, he didn’t take it one hundred percent as such,” the serval pointed out. “You are funny, yes, but also… I kinda feel bad for Ash here.”

  “Why?” Shady blinked.

  “Are you serious right now?” The cat went on the offensive, waving a clawed hand at the kitchen. “This is the definition of 'mooching' right here!”

  “He’s my kobold Administrator and I didn’t have Earth money,” Shady let out. "I'm allowed to mooch off my bestie."

  “He forgot that you were his bestie and administrator,” Nexxali pointed out. “What did you bring to the table?"

  "My lovely company." Shady said.

  "Uh-huh. That's not enough. What you brought was trouble. An ever-escalating avalanche of trouble. You also didn't ask if you could stay. You just... moved in. Claimed his bed. Made him cook for you." Nexxali's ears flattened slightly. "Shady, you basically invaded his house."

  "I was invited!"

  "Nah," I said, watching the memory. "You invited yourself. I was too shocked and sleep-deprived to argue."

  “No… I…” Shady backpedaled. “I mean... this is my house too! It’s part of my hoard! I claimed it when I was seven!”

  “My Scrut didn’t notice such a claim when we got inside this mansion,” Nexxali pointed out. “Nor are there ward artifacts here.”

  “This Earth’s Aether ground the magic away after a decade!” Shady insisted. “Me and Ashy had a blood pact.”

  “Which he clearly didn’t remember.” Nexali repeated bluntly.

  The memory fast-forwarded through the day. Shady following past-me around the house.

  The shower invasion scene.

  "OH NO," Nexxali said. "Oh no no no. Shady. SHADY, what the fuck?!"

  "What?" Shady blinked.

  "You invaded his SHOWER?!"

  "I needed to be washed! Look at all those cobwebs!”

  "THERE ARE LIKE SEVEN BATHROOMS IN THIS HOUSE!" Nexxali declared. "You specifically chose to invade the one he was actively using!"

  "Lifetime attendant duties were clearly stipulated in subsection C," past-Shady fired back.

  "Shady!” Nexxali growled. “That's not how ANY of this works!"

  "I was being playful!" Shady whined.

  "You were being a boundary-violating menace," Nexxali corrected. "Ash, how did you not kick her out right there?"

  Past-me in the memory looked exhausted and defeated, accepting the shower invasion with the energy of someone whose grip on reality was already tenuous.

  "I thought I was hallucinating," I said. "I figured if I was having a psychotic break, might as well lean into it."

  "That's… sad," Nexxali said, her voice softening as she hugged me. "Shady, do you understand what you did? He thought he was going insane. And instead of helping him process that, you just... kept pushing."

  "I didn't mean—" Shady started.

  “Slayer, dude, you can't just…” Nexxali interrupted.

  “I was... trying to seduce him, okay?!” Shady growled.

  "That wasn’t very seductive, dawg. You were imposing,” Nexxali pointed out. "He explicitly expressed discomfort and you just... ignored it."

  "I thought he was being shy!" Shady protested.

  "Nope. He was being 'I don't want to shower with a cryptid I met yesterday,'" Nexxali said. "Did you consider that?"

  “But—”

  “Damn it, look at his face, Shady. Taste his thoughts of that moment. Does he look happy? Comfortable? Like he's enjoying this?"

  Present-Shady looked hard at Past-Ash's expression. The rigid posture. The forced smile.

  "He looks..." she started, then stopped. "He looks like he wants to disappear."

  "Yes," Nexxali said. "He does. And you didn't notice or care."

  "I cared!" Shady protested. "I just thought... I thought he was being nerdy and awkward because we hadn't seen each other in so long. I thought if I acted normal, joked some more… he'd eventually relax and we'd... have a nice relationship... Look I'm really bad at this stuff and my hooks were already misfiring, stop judging me, damn it!"

  The memory moved onto Shady menacing me and holding me by my wrists because I recorded her.

  “This just keeps getting worse,” Nexxali commented, eyeing the wrist bruises created on the memory-Ash. “You hurt him.”

  “I didn’t mean to—I just snapped a little and—”

  “He’s a little, harmless, human male,” Nexxali growled, claws out. “What the shit, Shades?”

  Shady buried her face in her large hands, looking thoroughly embarrassed. None of us spoke, the memory moving around us like a river, accelerating at times and slowing down in others, likely controlled by Nexxali through Shady’s hooks.

  "Nexxxyyy," Shady's voice cracked slightly, "I was trying to be fun, I swear. I thought—"

  "You thought wrong." Nexxali’s tail lashed. "Shady, I love you, but watching this? Watching you push and push and push past every boundary he tried to set?" She gestured at Past-Ash's defeated expression. "This isn't playful. This is… bullying!"