Chương 1021: Day One Thousand And Nineteen

Dear Diary, So weird what people consider neuron activation. I mean, I'm not sure Tallulah even has those triggers; she's not, y'know, flamboyantly Ace like Conrad, but she definitely feels like she's somewhere on the Ace spectrum. So weird here and now not being able to ask people about things like that.

Yeah, they get 'Patroc', 'Sapphic', and 'Pan', but I'm pretty sure they just call straight 'normal', which is kinda fucked, because even if between Patroclus, Achilles, and the entire fuckin' Sacred Brotherhood, nobody takes homophobes seriously, there's still that undercurrent that there's something abnormal about folks who prefer or can even get busy with their own gender.

Thing is, while I am so far from Ace it makes it difficult for me to viscerally understand their motivations, that doesn't mean I in any way disbelieve their existence or their struggles. Seriously, most Queer folks get a sort of 'oh, your targeting system is buggered, just like you might be', but Ace people get the whole 'a fundamental part of you is broken'. Which, just to be clear, there is nothing wrong with my long tall Sidhe Lady's parts.

No, I'm not talking about her reproductive systems, although those are also clearly fully functional, with her having popped out four mostly functional kids. Okay, all of them were fully functional, Lindsey was just an asshole. Y'know, I think that might be why folks get so weirded out by Ace people though. So much of what everybody else does is driven by that need to mate, to procreate, to create more like ourselves, that somebody without that drive just seems alien.

A kind of mental Uncanny Valley, which makes folks go looking for whatever's 'wrong', even if nothing really is. Okay, yeah, I've heard that Ace folks can get really twisted up in the head if they're, y'know, sex-averse and somebody tries to 'fix' them, or worse if society convinces them they need to 'fix' themselves. Shit, maybe that's why I'm so fucked in the head. I'm not talking about the Soul damage I did to myself, either. I'm talking about the shit I arrived with, the shit I carried with me to the Aquarium.

Or fuck, maybe it carried me to the Aquarium. Like my mental baggage is one of those funky high tech suitcases with powered wheels that you can ride and shit, only it scooped me up and carried me to my predestined fate like one of the Final Destination movies. Not that I'm Ace, but I was kinda 'not normal', and so much stuff that wasn't normalized was pathologized back in the day. That shit leaves you perpetually wondering if maybe you ought to try to fix yourself somehow.

Nothing is quite so caustic as thinking you need to fix yourself when you're not broken. Really gotta make sure I don't do that or anything like it to any of my ladies. Or my girls. Or my Worshippers. Fuck, I wonder if there's some way just to get people to embrace diversity rather than fearing it. No idea, honestly, but it's definitely something I need to do. So yesterday I wound up teaching the Camden Yards Cadets how to play basketball.

Okay, unsurprisingly, the Cadets from the Yards had already learned the basics of the game. I'm not sure how, but I gotta assume one of the Cadets I taught before spread the word, because it's not really a game you need to have all kinds of crazy equipment just to play. A ball, two hoops, or even one if you're really short of material, and a reasonably flat playing field, and you've got yourself basketball. So what I wound up doing was teaching them the rules of basketball.

Y'know, the rules against traveling, physically attacking your opponents, or, and I dunno if this is a rule in the NBA or not, but I had to implement it, slamming your opponent in the face with the ball like an oversized, bouncy squadball.

The bit where they're not allowed to take a step unless they're bouncing the ball on the ground weirded them out a little, apparently because they'd thought that was fake, since the street version of the game here and now wound up played on uneven ground where the ball might go any fuckin' direction. They adapted to that pretty quickly though, and passing got much more popular.

The rules about no physical attacks they'd known, they just figured they could get away with it because, y'know, we're training them to be weapons. I pointed out that I'm their Physical Training instructor, not their Combat Training instructor, and maybe growled a little when I offered to do some Combat Training with them. They backed down, but it was a near thing. Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site.

I mean, I'm not proud of that one, because I thought I was just gonna soft intimidate them into growing some brains, but it nearly wound up escalating to some fisticuffs. Gotta get better at the teaching thing. Gotta get better at not being an engine of destruction waiting to happen too, maybe. The rule about hitting the other players in the face with the ball boggled them, because as noted, the ball is soft, and they'd worked up that rule with much harder balls.

Which they threw in each other's faces, and just took it as part of the game. Yeah, even here and now, Camden Yards street kids go hard. Had one of me at home working on dinner with Marie. We tried a couple different takes on lasagna. None of them came out typical Marie-quality great, but I think that's the sauce. Not the red sauce, the cheese sauce. The marinara came out good, but the cheese wound up just being a kind of spiced ricotta. Not awful, but not great.

I know there's a fancy sauce that's supposed to kick lasagna up a notch, but I can't remember what it's called to steal a recipe. Bechdel sauce, maybe? I dunno. I liked eating, and I knew a bunch of shit from menus, but I wasn't exactly anything like a chef back then. Which still boggles me that I sorta am here and now. Yeah, Marie's better than me, but I'm pretty sure somebody's got to be some kinda gourmet to tell the difference. Which, just to be clear, our kids are not.

Eight big assed casserole dishes of lasagna: destroyed. All of them; the four different variations on red sauce, both of the ones with garlic sauce, the pesto one, and the one that didn't have any non-cheese sauce at all, because we were tryna test out different cheese sauces. We hadn't even intended to serve that one, but the kids just nommed everything so fast we pulled it out and kinda threw it at them before they ate each other or us. Okay, they wouldn't do that, I don't think.

Worst case Anise and Felicia might bite each other before one of the saner sisters pulled them apart. The whole fam slept in the Bath again tonight, which did wonderful things for my scars. Yeah, they still hurt, even if it's not so much that it stops me from doing what I need to get done. Honestly, a whiff of dopamine or adrenaline and they quiet to the point where I have to think about it to realize that they still do. But they still do. Dreamt of most of my ladies doing a literal song and dance routine.

I think they were tryna distract me, because that 'most' did not include Saffron, Marie, or Orla, all of whom were floating off to the side around a smaller version of the Maw Planning Table. Not sure what that's all about, but I don't think they were trying to distract me so much as anyone who might be Scrying on me. I'm good with that, by the way, because I will never forget Dad saying, 'why am I the one holding the child'. Yeah, I can be stupid stealthy. Yeah, Saffron can kick over walls.

But somehow this felt right, me being the big loud distraction and her doing the subtle thing. Honestly, it wasn't even the 'wrecking shit' or even 'attack dog' thing. It's because while she's not exactly a glass cannon like some of the Mages I've dealt with, I am literally a continent spanning mass, and can soak damage like a fuckin' continent. I'm pretty sure I could survive a literal nuke, even if it might not be pleasant.

So yeah, I'm not gonna be the tank because I'm less valuable or stupid or anything like that, but because I am literally nigh indestructible. Of course, I really hope nobody flings anything at me while I'm teaching. Teaching Math, like today, just to be clear. Because while I am preternaturally gifted at wrecking shit, and I can and will perform atrocities on those who threaten those under my care, I really... I really don't want to. I remember wanting to.

I remember before the big fight in Norfolk, looking forward to killing fasc. Which, y'know, I will still do whenever the opportunity presents itself. But honestly, somewhere deep inside, I think I'd rather be teaching kids how to do Math.