Lune broke the rule on purpose.
It was a small one—small enough that it would not cause alarm, but clear enough that the response would be predictable. He chose it carefully, the way one selected a controlled variable.
He took a coin from his father's desk drawer.
The drawer was not locked. It never had been. The coin sat loose among paper clips and old receipts, a commemorative piece his father occasionally turned over in his fingers when thinking. Lune had watched him do it dozens of times.
Lune slipped the coin into his pocket and closed the drawer with the same careful pressure he always used.
Nothing happened.
The rest of the afternoon passed normally. Homework. Dinner. Quiet conversation. His parents did not notice anything missing, and Lune did not offer information. He waited.
That evening, his father opened the desk drawer and frowned.
"Did you move this?" he asked his wife.
She shook her head, distracted. "Move what?"
"The coin," he said. "It's gone."
Lune looked up from his book.
"I took it," he said calmly.
The room stilled.
His mother turned toward him, surprise flashing across her face before tightening into concern. His father stared, eyes searching Lune's expression for something—fear, guilt, defiance.
Lune gave him none.
"Why?" his father asked.
Lune considered the question. Truth would complicate things. Utility was simpler.
"I wanted to know what would happen," he said.
Silence.
His mother inhaled sharply. "Lune, that's stealing."
"Yes," Lune agreed.
"You know that's wrong," his father said.
Lune tilted his head slightly. "It's against the rules."
That was not the same thing, and all three of them knew it.
His parents exchanged a glance—quick, loaded. His mother reached for the chart on the refrigerator instinctively, as if the answer might be written there.
"This means a consequence," she said, carefully controlled.
"Yes," Lune said.
They decided on the punishment quickly, grateful for the structure. No screen time for three days. An apology. The coin returned.
Lune retrieved the coin and placed it back in the drawer without ceremony. He apologized using the correct tone, the correct timing. His parents accepted it with visible relief.
"What matters," his father said, voice firm but measured, "is that you understand why it's wrong."
Lune nodded.
He understood why it was forbidden. He did not understand why it should matter.
That night, he lay in bed and reviewed the event.
He had broken a rule.
He had been caught.
He had been punished.
At no point had he felt distress.
The punishment had not hurt. It had not discouraged him. It had simply occurred, like weather. Three days without screens was inconvenient, nothing more. The apology had cost nothing. The system had functioned exactly as designed.
Guilt, he realized, was supposed to prevent repetition.
But nothing inside him resisted the idea of doing it again.
What stopped him was not conscience. It was efficiency.
If breaking rules did not produce better outcomes, there was no reason to do it. If it did, then punishment was simply a cost to be factored in.
The absence of guilt was not freeing.
It was clarifying.
Lune closed his eyes, calm and steady, understanding something his parents could not see.
Consequences did not shape him.
They informed him.