"I got the explanation from the people who I asked for an explanation. I. Uh. They fired the people who did it and sent them back to their home planet and they're probably never going to be allowed to practice medicine again, so that's the good news."

"What's the bad news?"

He hands her the whole exchange. He translated it. 

Isaiah hugs his sister hard. She still can't talk but rests her head on his shoulder and shuts her eyes and sighs.

"I asked about compensation and they're happy to throw a lot of money at you, but, uh."

"She didn't want kids, but..."

"But they had absolutely no right and are probably also doing it to people who do want kids and also apparently see us in a way that's really really scary all things considered, yeah."

He hugs his sister. She pats his arm.

"This should probably wait until Kitty's mouth is all healed but I was mostly here to ask what you'd like to do."

"If they're letting themselves be sued instead of shooting people for trying I'll take them for whatever they've got," says Isaiah.

Little bit of a smile. "Okay.

I think probably we should talk to Aitim Neli. He runs the alien invasion but he's less horrible than any of the people who would replace him if he had to suddenly stop running the alien invasion. He's the one who said that they'd be happy to throw a lot of money at you and I think he could explain how best to, uh, get things from their system."

"How do you know this guy?"

"Uh. We tracked down the alien in charge when they first invaded, and - fuck - 

- it is illegal for me to explain certain things or even wave suggestively at those things, and that was enough of an impediment already but at this point it's getting ridiculous and both of you deserve better and I feel like at some point not explaining things makes me complicit in all this - shoving people around just because they are powerful enough no one can do anything about it - that's going on right now. There are a couple solutions to the problem where it is illegal for me to tell you things. They all kind of suck. I am going to list them so that you can decide if you prefer any of them to getting vague uninformative answers from me, but I don't want to suggest by listing them any of the things that would normally be suggested by listing them. 

I can tell my children. This includes adoptive children. I think it's legal to adopt anyone under age seventeen. I wouldn't be able to lie in court about whether I thought someone was under seventeen, but you sound really young, Isaiah, I could truthfully testify that you said you were under age seventeen and seemed it. 

I can tell my spouse. My platonic spouse, obviously, I would never actually-marry someone who had less than full information about me. That could be either of you because Britain's got alien marriage now but I'm not actually into men to be clear.

I can tell someone who has a kid who is - unavoidably involved. We could try to find some unavoidably-involved kids and you could adopt one of those. 

I can tell you and then cause it to be the case that you don't remember it.

We could break the law but that makes it harder to sue the aliens for everything they've got."

"Oh, I'm secretly a woman," says Isaiah.

Blink. Blink blink blink. 

"- ah. Okay. Uh. That's - that's incredibly clever really, wow."

"Thank you. I figure the stakes of the information are lower these days."

" - yeah, I suppose, little bit. Because the aliens don't suck in every conceivable way - just most of them - gosh -"

"Exactly. In what way does breaking the law make it harder to sue the aliens?"

"If anyone finds out they will arrest me and erase both of your memories of interactions with me and they don't catch, like, a majority of cases or anything but suing involves evidence-gathering and publicity and stuff and anyone who hears that she vanished from a locked room will know..."

"Is she cleared to know if we did get married?"

"I would get in trouble for telling her if she went and published a newsletter about it but no one's gotten in trouble for telling close family unless a major security breach resulted."

"Well, I certainly wasn't planning to marry some girl and have to explain the explanandum, so."

"Uh. Okay. Gosh. I guess we should go down to the courthouse and get married and then I will explain everything."

"If we get divorced later do I have to be amnesiac?"

"- not in Britain, possibly I should run and check American law real quick and we should pick a different courthouse if so."