It was Sunday morning and my family was in church. As an atheist, I'd had the house to myself while they were out, but what was supposed to be a relaxing morning alone had turned into my curled around the toilet silently plotting to murder my mother in retaliation for giving me food poisoning.

"I will be avenged," I vowed weakly as I sat back against the tub and wiped my mouth.

"Whatever you say, dear," Mom agreed distractedly as she came in, dressed in her Sunday best and a bundle of folded towels under her arm.

"You!" I pointed at her tiredly and put as much menacing fury into my glare as I could muster, but I doubted it was very intimidating given my present condition.

She arched an eyebrow when she finally started paying attention to me. "You sure you want to sit on the floor? I haven't mopped in here in a month o' Sundays."

My stomach rolled at the thought and I lurched to the toilet as my body rejected anything I'd eaten in the last year. "I'm onto your plot, vile woman," I groaned into the toilet bowl between dry heaves. "You gave me food poisoning as punishment for leaving."

I didn't have to see her to know she was rolling her eyes. "Don't be dramatic. We all ate the same thing and no one else is sick. It's probably just one of your brothers playing a practical joke again. You know how they are." She started to leave, but paused at the door to give me a warning look. "I know how this usually goes, and if you kids break another set of china, none of you are too old to be taken over my knee."

I laid my head back against the tub's rim and stared at the fairies and butterflies that still covered the ceiling. "I remember her being more sympathetic when I was a kid," I muttered.

0o0o0o0o0o0

Three days later, I was reclining on a towel beside the creek, dozing off and on under the late afternoon sun as my sisters-in-law chatted a few feet away. My stomach was full of my mother's cooking and was pleasantly calm for the first time in days.

A shadow fell across my, and I cracked my eyes to see Ariadne standing above me with a hand on her hip. "Are you sleeping again," she asked incredulously. "That's all you seem to do now."

I shrugged and closed my eyes again. "I'm guessing it's from the food poisoning. I swear I've never been this exhausted in my life."

Ariadne snorted as she spread out her towel and laid down beside me. "No one poisoned you. I fed that same food to my kids, and while I love you, I love them more."

"Good to know," I said dryly. "Maybe it was a bug, then."

"Maybe," she agreed thoughtfully, slipping her sunglasses into her hair to enjoy the sunlight. "I made key lime pie for dessert tonight."

My mouth watered at the thought. "Oh, man, that sounds delicious."

Surprised, she looked at me. "You hate key lime pie."

"I know, but now I'm craving it."

She was silent for a moment, and then her eyes narrowed. "Are you pregnant," she asked accusingly.

I snorted at the ridiculous thought. "I'm on birth control."

Ariadne arched one red eyebrow. "So was I, right before I had your niece."

My laughter ended abruptly, realizing she was right; I'd been there when my sister had taken the pregnancy test. And come to think of it, I'd been on antibiotics a few weeks ago for an infection. "There's no way," I said, but it came out more questioning than I'd intended.

Ariadne nodded, standing. "Come on. Let's go pick up a test."

Ten minutes later, Ariadne and I were still wearing our bathing suits and cover ups as we stood in the pharmacy section of our corner store. The shelves were stocked with more pregnancy tests than I knew existed, and I suddenly felt very out out of my depth. "How do you know which one to get? Do you just pick any one of them? And why are they packaged together like that? This doesn't seem like something you would stock up on."

My big sister snorted. "They sometimes get false readings."

Alarmed, I began scooping up as many different types as I could carry, prompting Ariadne to laugh at me. "Cool your jets, Panicky. These suckers are $15 each."

I did my best to stay calm as we purchased the tests and drove back to the house, but as we waited in my childhood bedroom for the 12 sticks I'd peed on to finish, it became harder and harder to keep my composure. Ariadne watched with amusement as I paced the floor. "Hero, would it really be so bad if you're pregnant? You have a great career, your boyfriend is gainfully employed, and from what you've said, you two are perfectly matched."

I crossed my arms and kept pacing. "Yeah, well, there are some things I haven't told you."

She frowned. "Even if you guys are having problems, being a single mother isn't the end of the world. You have your whole family to help."

I waved my hand dismissively. "No, it's not that. It's..." I sighed and flopped face first next to her on the bed. "People want me dead," I said at last, my words muffled by the bed.

"I'm sorry, what," Ariadne asked in alarm. "People are trying to kill you? What people? Why?"

I turned my head to look at her. "We don't know who, but it has to be because of my project...a hit man broke into our apartment. He was no match for Gabriel, and there hasn't been another attempt since, but...still. Not exactly the environment I'd bring a baby into."

"Yeah, I wouldn't think so," Ariadne agreed, her eyes wide as saucers. "What are you going to do if you are pregnant?"

"Have a massive panic attack, probably." I tugged a pillow over and buried my face in it.

"Can you just...stop," she asked awkwardly. "Can you just quit the project?"

I raised my head just long enough to look at her. "It's too important. Too many people need my help, need the device. I can't quit now when the finish line is in sight." I buried my face back in the pillow and sighed.

Ariadne rubbed my back soothingly. "Maybe it's all blown over. You never know."

We both jumped when the timer on my phone buzzed, and I laid there for a moment, thinking very hard about Shrodinger's cat: according to the theory, I was both pregnant and not pregnant until I looked at the tests. Finally, Ariadne nudged me, and I grudgingly climbed off the bed. She came with me as I walked over to the spread of sticks on the desks. "Negative," I breathed in relief.

She clicked her tongue and held up another one, "Positive."

My stomach sunk. "Oh, I don't like this game at all." The others were positive as well, and I slowly sank to the floor, still holding the lone negative test. "What are the odds that all the others are wrong and this one is right?"

She frowned sympathetically. "You want me to lie?"

I beat the non-peed-on end of the stick against my head. "Oh, this company is getting a strongly worded letter," I said shakily.

"Oh, Hero." Ariadne sat on the floor next to me and took my hand, clasping it tightly, and for a long time we were silent. She was my sister; we shared an innate understanding of each other that no one could match, and she knew that I needed to process this quietly, to take a step back and let myself be absolutely consumed by fear of the unknown for a moment. When it was time to talk, I would let her know, just like always. She pulled my head to rest on her shoulder, and stroked my hair soothingly for a long time, until finally I sighed and straightened.

Recognizing her cue, she met my gaze seriously. "You have options, Hero. If you choose to end the pregnancy, I'll drive you to the clinic myself. If you choose to keep it, I'll help you find adoptive parents, or help you decorate a nursery."

I scrubbed my face with my hands. "I don't know yet. I… I need to talk to Gabriel." She nodded in sympathetic understanding, brushing a lock of hair away from my face. I bit my lip, then blurted, "I need you to keep this a secret. Until I know what I'm going to do, I don't want anyone to know."

She smiled and put out her foot so that her ankle tattoo was showing, and tugged my leg until I did the same. On my ankle was a matching tattoo: What is her, is me. We are one person, broken in two. "I'm your sister. I've got your back, Hero."