Pay the Piper

It was a common enough sentiment, but he'd never quite seen it phrased in just that way. That it was a matter of survival, not doing the right thing. He wondered if his father had thought of things the same way, and decided after a moment that he probably did.

"I'm just the kind of person who tends to match secret with secret," Jude admitted, "because otherwise it feels like one person's extended the olive branch more than the other. Like... I don't know. Like I owe you for the trust you put on me. But..."

He gave a very vague wave of the hand.

"You take your time with it, alright? You don't have to rush it out or anything."

Context was a very odd way of putting it, after all.

"Listen," Jude said, his tone very serious. "If I ever turn down food you're offering to make me, just assume I've been replaced by an evil doppleganger, and go ahead and interrogate them for the real me's location."

He cracked a smile almost immediately. "Food's good. Or whatever. I don't really care. Did you see Overlord yet?"