And then he scoops his mate up, twirls him in the air, and kisses him.

Kissing is more than acceptable! And then he turns on the wing pack and flies into the air.

Eeeee best mate. He follows.

They can kiss in midair! The wing pack can't hover, but it has something close enough to an autopilot.

Vacation continues apace.

It does. They visit the rest of the Pillars, and Avernus (that historical city), and several other places, finally ending at Shelling Point again, after the negative associations are mostly gone.

Terel is probably less eager to spend much time here even before the whole debacle. But it makes a nice stopover... Before going back to those Pale Shadows people and finishing their requests because Terel has decided that in fact, yes, he wants to turn now after all.

She has produced a vial with a needle and filled it with venom. "Are you totally, completely certain?"

"I have to tell my family first... And we have to find a nice piece of wilderness. I think you've already taken care of that. But I'm very certain other than those two caveats."

"Yeah, nice piece of wilderness is easy with the shadow people helping. Telling your family... I'm not sure I can help with."

"They'll want to meet you. They'll want to talk me out of it, maybe. Then again maybe not. But it'd feel wrong to turn without giving them any idea."

"Yeah, fair enough, especially because after that you'll probably be a year without seeing them."

"I'll give them a phone call, and then we go physically visit? My brother's probably home, too."

"Yeah, sounds good."

So they do that.

He tells his family, first off, that he has a - girlfriend. She's fun and smart and has brilliant ideas and they're going to start a whole new industry together, on Sadde's money.

His mom wants to meet this 'girlfriend' and see if they're a good sort. His dad wants to give him two hours' lecture on financial responsibility (and calms down when Sandy's name is dropped as a probable CFO). His brother just wishes him luck in a tone that says 'like that will ever work, hah'.

Terel addresses everyone and then calls Sadde on the link crystal. "I think you can come over now, Sadde."

So she does, wings and all.

"Hello, Sadde." Terel's mom smiles kindly. "I'm Samara. Do you want to join us for dinner? Maybe tell us how you met my son?"

"Sure! He hasn't told you the story?"

"I, uh. Don't usually ramble on about stuff like that."

"Which is a no," his mom smirks, "But I'm quite curious."

"It's... unusual. Has he mentioned I'm from a different world?"

His father gives her a pointed look. "That's the part of this I credit the least, but if the both of you say so I'm not going to waste my breath arguing that it's impossible."

"I could show you but I've been told it looks distressingly like a rift."

Samara loudly inserts herself, "Yes, let's just skip that. Sadde, tea or coffee?"

"I'm not picky, whichever's easiest for you."

"I'll have coffee." 

"Of course you will, dearie. Coffee for everyone then."

Terel's dad asks, "What's this revolutionary idea of yours, anyway, Terel?"

"Computing devices!" Cue a layman's introduction into the idea.

With which Sadde can help, of course.