Title: Don't Go Breaking My Sister's Heart

Rating: K

Characters: Simon and Aura Blackquill

Time: Sometime in 2013. Simon is 14, Aura is 23.

The graduate students milling about were too wrapped up in their own problems to notice Simon, let alone ask why a teenager in a burgundy school uniform is prowling their halls. Even if that teenager had a katana in a scabbard at his waist, and a determined scowl on his face.

Simon checked the directory. Nova, C, office 503. He counted down the plain doors. His leather oxfords tapped the ugly and faded linoleum floor of Ivy University's linguistic department building. He banged on the door of Office 503. "Cassie Nova! I know you're in here!"

The door opened. A tall, slim woman in a magenta suit and angular black glasses opened the door. She met Simon's glare. "Aura's little brother? Stefan?" Cassie gave that infuriating supercilious smirk. "Or was it Stu?"

"My name is Simon," Simon replied icily.

"Why are you here?"

"Here is what's going to happen. You're going to tell Aura it's over, and tell her the real reason you're dating her."

"I don't take orders from brats who don't know their place!"

Simon smirked. "I thought you might say that."

"I know that tone of voice," Cassie said calmly. "You're going to say 'or else.' Go ahead. Or else what? Do you have pictures of me kissing another woman?" She laughed. "Of course not! They don't exist!"

"When you came over yesterday, you left your briefcase in the foyer. I borrowed a few pages from your thesis draft, made a copy, and slipped it back in."

"All my research materials are over your head," Cassie said impatiently.

"Yes, but not over my mother's head," Simon said. "And she noticed something rather odd about the numbers."

"What about them?"

"My mother is a polyglot," Simon began. "Which means she knows multiple languages, but not many people know she's also well-versed in the language of mathematics. The language Galileo said God used to write the world. She did some crunching of the numbers, and she found something that didn't quite fit. Your numbers are too perfect. Your work is either an astronomically unlikely statistical anomaly, or your numbers have been doctored to support your thesis statement."

"You showed Dr. Stone my work?!" She finally started to look panicked.

Just a little more. She'll hang herself if given enough rope.

"I didn't give your name. My mother has no idea you exist. And there is no way she'd ever sign on you as a protégé. She doesn't like cowards. You have a choice here. Find another new advisor besides my mother, redo your thesis project honestly, and leave Aura. Or I present my findings to your academic dean."

"You would dare ruin my career?"

"You have no career to ruin. Someone who has gotten this far without perseverance and academic integrity has cheated, likely more than once. Are your two degrees as much of a sham as your love for my sister? Your high school diploma, even? I bet if someone scrutinized…"

"Stop it." Just like that, she sank to her knees. Her skin paled a few shades. "You win, Simon Blackquill. Yes, I only dated Aura so she'd introduce me to her – your – mother. Every linguistics student in the country wants to work with the Dr. Rosetta Stone! I'll do it. I'll break up with Aura. Just don't tell the dean…"

"Very well," Simon said. "But you better do it. I'll be watching."

XXX

That night, Simon knocked on his sister's door.

"Go away!" Aura snapped from within.

"Can I borrow fifty bucks?"

Aura opened the door. "Why don't you ask Daddy?"

Simon shoved his way past her. "I only said that so you'd open the door."

Aura was wearing an elegant party dress, her favorite gold necklace and matching gold earrings. Her hair was styled into her two signature conical twists, but wispy strands were coming out of them, as if she had been laying on her back on them. She had been crying, as her makeup was streaked. "I must warn you, I'm not in the mood."

"You got dumped." It was more a statement than a question.

"How'd you…" Aura frowned. "What did you do?!"

"Oh, I found out she's fudging her numbers in her thesis so far. I promised her I wouldn't tell her dean, but I didn't promise not to tell you. I can't forgive a person who takes advantage of someone else's feelings like that." Simon placed one hand on the hilt of his katana. "And if that person manipulates my sister, they're lucky to be alive."

"Your flair for the dramatic never ceases to astound me," Aura sighed and sat down at her vanity. "I got to the restaurant early, but she was there. And she told me that I was just a convenient way to get acquainted with Mother. That I was unworthy of her attention. I can still hear her: 'You're nothing like your genius mother, and if you were stupid enough to fall for me, that's your problem.'"

"She isn't worthy of you," Simon said simply. "A vicious creature that is beneath you and me."

"I'm not sure whether to thank you or slap you," Aura folded her arms. "Maybe I'll do both."

"You're a ray of sunshine, Aura," Simon replied. "And you really need to stop taking your anger out on other people."

"Oh, I don't intend to get mad," Aura said. She gave that mischievous little smile Simon had seen countless times in their childhood together. The one that usually prefaced things like her plucking his pet merlin, or hiding his favorite katana, or rearranging all the books in his bookshelf. "Not especially when I can get even. Hand me my laptop."

Simon picked up Aura's hot pink-cased laptop. It was decorated with shiny stickers of cartoonish robots that seemed to dance. "What do you intend to do?"

"Get ahold of Cassandra's academic advisor," Aura said. "Suggest he take her grants away, if not fire her."

"But I promised not to tell…"

Aura laughed. "You promised you wouldn't tell. You said nothing about me telling."

"…Point. Ever consider being a lawyer?"

"Nah, I rather like having a soul," Aura answered.