"She boomed me," Mikael stated bluntly over his cup of mediocre chai, the three of them taking up an outdoor table at Chad's Chivin' Chais as the early evening nightlife bustled by. Brock took another sip from his mug of hot chocolate. Compared to Lady Razoralia's tea, it was like drinking dirty dishwater. Next to him, Aphrodite still looked pale, hands clenched tightly around a steaming coffee, and Mikael continued his bemused recollection. "Got me real good. Slipped past my defenses like they weren't even there, and I only caught the dissonance when it clashed with my core mission parameters."

"Aphr-" Brock caught himself, "-Rin was trying to control your mind? Harem you?"

"Not deliberately," Aphrodite said quietly, and Mikael nodded.

"Which is why we're sitting here having sub-par beverages and she's not a pile of quarks."

Aphrodite shivered, her mug rattling slightly in its saucer.

"Fuck. Fuck. What if that had been fucking Hardick? Fuck!"

"Try and relax," Mikael replied neutrally. "I told you, I felt you pull back as soon as you realized you were manipulating the situation. Sympathetic distrust feedback loop?"

"Yeah," she sighed. "Probably took a heavy dose when I empathized you out of hiding because I was expecting something nasty. Skills did their thing after that. I pretty much leave my creep-be-gone on automatic these days."

"Understandable."

Brock followed their exchange like a gopher trying to comprehend a ping-pong match.

"Uhhh, was any of that supposed to make sense? Also, have you been following me?"

Mikael rolled his eyes.

"Of course I've been following you. The Director assigned me close detail - I'm supposed to be your shadow, kid."

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

Brock gave him a long look.

"Pretty sure that's not meant to be literal."

"Overlords aren't the only ones with tricks. Consider it part of your training. Good job finding the 'help' portion of your magiphone, by the way, Verdant was quite impressed."

Brock glowered at him, but Mikael continued on, unperturbed.

"Anyways, Councilor Softheart here is allowed access to certain parts of her skill suite, both as part of her daily duties, as a reward for consistent good behavior, and as protection."

"Protection?"

"Being the face of the integration movement isn't exactly popular," Aphrodite said tiredly. "A lot of people from Earth have done a lot of very bad things to the people here for a very long time."

"Sekkies also aren't the only ones with skills," Mikael added. "It's more efficient to let Councilor Softheart handle situations involving irate residents using her own resources. Non-lethally and non-permanently, of course."

"Means you don't have to waste people watching my ass," Aphrodite grumbled, "and I can't ever slip up."

"That's right," Mikael agreed pleasantly, "you can't." He focused on Brock. "However, Councilor Softheart is not allowed to use her skills on Cat Squad personnel, hence her distress. She isn't wrong about how Captain Darwhick would have perceived the situation. I'm sure you understand why."

Brock thought back to their dinner conversation slash food fight the previous night.

Yeah, Darwhick would go totally apeshit if he thought someone was hareming him. Ugh, that guy is the worst. No wonder Aphrodite got so scared.

"As far as what happened, Councilor Softheart noticed me-" Mikael paused, inviting an explanation, and Aphrodite jumped in, "-while doing a routine scan of short-term memories with an accompanying emotional weighting analysis focusing on suspiciously high empathic resonances. Easiest way to sneak into someone's mind if you're trying to stay unnoticed," she lectured, then finally took a sip of her coffee. She made a face. "Damn, Chad's coffee is awful today."

"Along with his chai," Mikael replied smoothly, toasting his own mug at her. "Needless to say, once she found me, she aligned herself to my emotional state in order to pierce the obfuscation skill I was using."

"Since he's a naturally suspicious bastard, it fed into my own tension, and boom-"

"Positive sympathetic distrust feedback loop," they finished together. Aphrodite took another swig of coffee. "Because I registered him as a threat, my de-escalation skill triggered automatically."

Brock stared at them.

"...you're a bunch of nerds," he eventually replied. "But more importantly, Mikael, you were literally inside my mind?"

Mikael shrugged.

"Lots of space to hide in."

"Ooh, sick burn," Aphrodite snickered as Brock fumed. He took another drink of his hot chocolate in an attempt to ignore the both of them. It still tasted like sewer water.

"...Chad can't make hot chocolate either, can he?"