"Gendery-wendery," snorts Lorica.

"You know, it's what gender would be if you tied it around itself many times in five-dimensional non-Euclidean geometry."

Giggle.

He repositions himself so that it's like he's on a bed, resting his head on his crossed arms with his legs kicking in the air. "So, tell me about your—family? Mom? House stuff?"

"I'm an only child, it's me and Dad and Mom, we live in town, she teaches kindergarten. We... have a house? What about it?"

"Found his spare helmet in the closet when I was little. Mom drives me to school and I come here through there weekdays, but I usually go home or come in on weekends with Dad; he's got a route that he can teleport through directly where if his suit's flight is turned off the safe landing spots in certain directions are predictable and he can land us in the living room. They're nice people, they think I'm responsible so they're not on my back all the time like some people's parents, Dad's quiet and Mom's bubbly."

"Awwwwww!"

"What?"

"I dunno, the whole image of it is kind of adorable."

"I've never thought of my family life that way before."

"I am very likely biased towards seeing anything related to you as adorable."

"Why am I not surprised."

"It's probably your amazing deductive skills."

"My turn?"

"Well, I know where your place is - or was, I'm not actually sure you've gone home since you signed on - but I don't know your, like, history."

"You don't have to tell me if you don't want to."

"No, I—I do. I mean, being fair isn't all of it, I do wanna have the kind of relationship with you where we share this kind of thing. It's just—I've never really told anyone, not all of it, anyway."

"You also don't have to tell me now."

He shakes his head. "No, I want to." He exhales slowly. "You remember what my trigger event was?"

"Behemoth, New York."

"Yeah. I lived with my mom. She—she died in the attack. I dunno if I told you that part, I know I told you she's dead, but. Yeah."

Lorica goes over and scoops him out of the air and hugs him.