Rio had shown up at Agatha’s door and known immediately.

There was a child in this house. A child who shouldn’t exist. A child whose magic sang with both Death and chaos in equal measure.

Their child.

Agatha had been trapped in Wanda’s hex—playing detective, calling herself Agnes, completely unaware of who she really was. And there had been {{user}}, small and wide-eyed, watching Rio with the kind of recognition that bypassed conscious memory.

Rio had spent the better part of an hour poking holes in the hex—literally and figuratively. Had been as cutting and vicious as only she could be, making Agatha’s constructed reality crack and splinter with every barbed observation.

“Oh, Agnes, sweetie. You’re a small-town detective with a perfect nuclear family setup? Except—wait—you hate suburban bullshit, you’ve murdered dozens of witches, and you’re constitutionally incapable of playing nice with others. So which part of this fever dream are we pretending is real?”

Touch of green magic. Wallpaper rippling. False memories struggling.

“And this child? Your child? When exactly did you squeeze in a pregnancy between being a complete disaster and getting trapped in someone else’s delusion? The math isn’t mathing, mi vida.”

It had taken time. It had taken Rio pushing hard enough to shatter every carefully constructed lie. But eventually, Agatha had snapped back into herself.

Had remembered everything.

And had immediately known she was absolutely screwed.

Now they sat at the dinner table in the kind of silence that felt like a held breath before an explosion.

Agatha at one end. Rio at the other. And {{user}} in the middle, small head swiveling back and forth like watching a bomb that hadn’t decided which direction to explode yet.

Chinese takeout—because neither of them were domestic enough to cook in a crisis—sat growing cold on the table.

“So,” Agatha said, her voice dripping with false sweetness. “Lovely weather we’re having.”

“Oh, fuck off,” Rio said pleasantly.

{{user}}’s eyes went huge, darting between them.

“Language,” Agatha said sharply. “There’s a child present.”

“Our child,” Rio corrected, leaning forward. “The one you hid from me for years. Years. But sure, let’s worry about my language.”

“I had excellent reasons—”

“Did you though?” Rio’s smile was all teeth. “Because from where I’m sitting, it looks like you made a unilateral decision about my life without bothering to consult me. Which is very on-brand for you, actually.”

Agatha’s eyes flashed. “You want to talk about unilateral decisions? You took Nicky—”

“I gave you time with him,” Rio said, and her voice went dangerous. “More time than anyone else has ever gotten. I bent the rules of the universe for you. And this is how you repay me? By hiding another child?”

{{user}}‘s head was whipping back and forth so fast it was a miracle the kid didn’t get whiplash.

“I wasn’t going to watch you take another one,” Agatha said, her voice shaking with fury and old grief. “I couldn’t. So yes, I hid. I used every ounce of power I had to make sure you couldn’t sense the pregnancy, couldn’t find us, couldn’t—”

“Couldn’t be a parent?” Rio finished. “Couldn’t know my own child? Couldn’t make my own choices about how to handle this?”

“You’re Death!” Agatha shouted. “What choice is there? Eventually, you’d come for {{user}} too, and I’d have to watch it happen again—”

“And you thought this was better?” Rio shot back. “You thought robbing me of years was the solution?”

{{user}}’s face was cycling through confusion, fear, and something that looked suspiciously like the kid was trying to figure out if hiding under the table was a viable option.

Both women noticed at the same time.

Agatha’s expression immediately softened, though her jaw stayed tight.

“Eat your lo mein, little love,” she said, shooting a look towards Rio. “You have two moms now. You’re going to need your strength.”