Chương 702: Day Seven Hundred

Dear Diary, I don't know how long I can fool people. Okay, it's not a generic 'people' I'm tryna fool. It's specifically the kind of assholes who might take advantage of the fact that no matter how many places I can be at one time, I can really only pay attention to one of them at a time. So yesterday after spending the night trying to find Jack, I took my fish to the Academy for processing into sandwiches, then Co-Located to all the different places I've got to be on a Saturday. Saffron supporting. Marie helping.

Siobhan caring. I don't have to watch the kids, because they're at school, but I've got to teach the Cadets on Saturday, so it's not like I've got spare clock cycles. I also stopped in to feed them all at lunch. By evening, I definitely felt some kind of way, what with not getting any sleep. I mean, I wasn't dead on my feet or anything, thanks to the Worship at the Revel on Friday, but I'd kinda run through all of the energy from that by the time sunset rolled around.

I brought home mock beef stew made from bear, then flopped into my seat at the table. Saffron stood, handed Siobhan to Marie, and slipped into my lap.

"You seem tired, love." I nodded. I wanted to explain why, but I didn't have the energy after riding the Cadets and doing flexibility training with Lachlan all day long.

"Would some alone time help?" I smiled at her.

"I appreciate the offer, and will absolutely take you up on it if you insist, but I don't think I'm depressed at the moment. Not crashing anyhow, or even spiraling. I'm just tired."

"After only a single night without sleep?" I thought about it for a second.

"I think it's something to do with Jackville. Oh, and not sleeping at all for a week while I watched it for him. Shit, I'm an idiot, I haven't slept in over a week." She chuckled.

"Well then, I'd best make sure you sleep tonight then?" I sighed and shook my head.

"Can't, Kitten. Gotta go see Jack." She pouted a little.

"Yeah, I'm not thrilled about it either. But I gotta get that shit sorted out so our daughter can go see her sister on the regular without worrying about weird Florida Man shit going down."

"Florida Man?" I shook my head.

"Back in the day thing. Florida is the big peninsula south of Jackville, and 'Florida Man' is the stereotypical inhabitant." I thought for a second.

"You know all that wacky shit Jack did?"

"Yes?"

"Yeah, that shit would fit right in with 'Florida Man'. I keep thinking of him as 'Ye Olde Florida Mann' in my head even." She sighed, asked, "do you need to leave right away?" and then, when I shook my head, snuggled in and fed me dinner one spoon of soup at a time. When we'd both had our fill, she stepped us up to the showers, washed me down, and carried me to the Bath.

"I really can't go to sleep, Kitten." I yawned.

"No matter how much you pamper me."

"Not my intent, love. Just... making you comfortable." She Grinned at me.

"Pliant, even." I shot her a look, but she shut up as the kids piled into the Bath for their nightly play time. I realized right then that them playing in the warmth of the Bath after dinner is what wound up getting them to sleep so fast whether they'd been playing all day or sitting in a classroom. Seriously, if you've never had the sleepies after playing in a pool, I don't know what to tell you, you're either not really playing very hard or you're in way better shape than my kids.

Who are kids, so that's not super hard, but still. We put them to bed, Marie curled around Siobhan centered on the bed, but before I could put Saffron to bed, she snaked her arms around my neck.

"Before you go?" I slipped my arms around her waist.

"Yeah?" The next thing I knew, she shoved me backward onto the Bed. He stood there in all his delectable Glory. I must have made some kind of interrogative noise, because he Grinned and growled out, "I looked for Panther, but he's out with Silk and Closer."

"Uh..." He manhandled me into position, not difficult between my fascination with boy-mode Saffron and my week without sleep lethargy, then looked down at me.

"Get Worshipped, Goddess." Hoo. My Kitten packed a full night of Worship into maybe an hour. Possibly less. I knew I didn't have, like, days of juice, but I definitely had enough to get through to Monday, at least. As Saffron shifted back and lifted me upright, I kissed her.

"Thanks, Kitten." Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon. She just Grinned impishly up at me.

"Any time, love." I tucked her in with the kids, then hopped down to Jackville. Adrienne sat there looking kinda forlorn.

"Has he come back yet?" She nodded.

"He said he needed to go get ingredients for the gumbo."

"When?"

"Right around sunset." I sighed.

"Is he avoiding me?" She shrugged.

"Shit. I mean, I want to help you guys out. I really do. But I can't exactly do that with him not being here." She shook her head.

"I know. I know that, and I appreciate the help, but... I think he's scared."

"Scared of me?" One quick head jerk.

"No." I sat there waiting for a while, until I got impatient.

"Then what?"

"Us," she whispered.

"What's up with the 'Jill' thing, anyhow? That's his wife's name, right?"

"I... I shouldn't." I shrugged.

"I'm not gonna pry if you think he'd rather tell me himself, but maybe I could help him not be so scared if I understood." We sat there for a while. Eventually the words seeped out of her in fits and starts.

"She... waits for him. Was cursed alongside him, to die when he did. The curse lingers with her. So whenever he finds someone..." I waited.

"She... inhabits them."

"Like, possession?" She shrugged.

"She doesn't control them. She... lives within them. Experiencing their love again. Just to see him again."

"That doesn't sound too bad."

"She's still cursed. So when he dies..." It took me a bit.

"Oh. Oh, shit. They die?" She nodded.

"Oh, that fuckin' sucks. Isn't there some... Shit. Um... I'm gonna need to talk to Saffron about this." Her eyes went wide.

"Not the Imperator. Not my Wife either, really. Archmage Aetos-Diaz. She knows more about Souls and shit like that than anyone else I know. Okay, maybe Siobhan. But... if there's a way to figure it out, they'll know how."

"Please. Please, Goddess, I told you that in confidence." I stopped.

"Shit. Okay. Yeah. I get that. I won't... Dammit. Do you mind if I tell him you told me?"

"Told you what?" Jack came in through the back curtain door carrying a big assed basket. A moment later, the bead curtain across the front door exploded inward.

"TABITHA!" Adrienne, Jack and I stared at Lily, shocked both by her entrance and the wisps of smoke coming from her still smoldering hair.

"The fuck, Lily?"

"Please, come quickly!" She grabbed at my hand and tugged, I just stared at her while Jack... Shadows bathed the whole area in front of the fire, Jack a menacing silhouette in front of it.

"Friend of yours, Diaz?"

"Shit. Sorry. Yes. I didn't invite her though." I turned back to her.

"LILY! What's wrong?"

"Children are in danger, Tabitha! Please!" I tasted the truth in her words. I... I couldn't not go.

"Shit. Jack, I'll..."

"It took a lot to come back in here, Diaz." I wanted to stay. To help. But I couldn't not go. I Co-Located one of me to flop into one of the chairs as I grabbed Lily's hand and stepped into an inferno. The houses. The trees. Everything in sight burned. Tallulah! Karen! Kitten! Grandmother's Village is on fire! Send Heroes! Back in Jackville, I looked up at him, begging him with my eyes to understand.

"I'm sorry. I've got to go." Back at the village I pulled my biggest tentacles into the Mortal Realm and Shaped. I Shaped the biggest Create Water I'd ever done a mile up into the air. Then again, and again, and again. Meanwhile I had other tentacles doing smaller ones, dropping boulder sized balls of water on houses, running in to steal burning, baking, blackened bodies from the houses. The rain fell, but the houses had caught. The woods had caught. I leapt the bodies across the River. Revived them as I did.

Then I found the first tiny blackened bundle.

"No."

"Daughter?"

"Can you take the fire out of the village?" She shrugged.

"It will start again." I looked at her.

"The heat."

"And if you take the heat?"

"Ice." In the darkened world of wireframe, I uttered that terrible word, "Live." Then stepped the squalling infant to the shell shocked survivors on the far side of the river, then stepped back across and back into Time.

"Did you want me to remove the people?" Fuckin' Domnu just... stood there. Ignoring the fire. Ignoring the people screaming, the screams of children.

"To the other side of the river?" She shrugged.

"Carry any uninjured people to the far side of the river without allowing them to come to further harm, please, mother." She blinked. I don't think I'd ever said please to her before.

"As you wish." I lost track of time, shaping Create Water after Create Water up in the sky, down on the ground. Domnu stalked through the inferno, ignoring the blaze. At one point I saw her carrying a steaming teenager across the river like walking across the street. It couldn't have been too long, but I'd come into this tired, despite Saffron's Worship. Body after body after body, and even with Mimic's Mana, Reviving people took it out of me. Tentacles were too clumsy, I had to do it.

Then the red uniforms started dropping in. First Lachlan and Velazquez and Castro. Then others I didn't recognize. Then Cadets. My Cadets, diving into the River to douse themselves, then charging into burning houses, carrying blanket covered bodies out, getting them to the river, which flowed wide enough here that the inferno couldn't cross it. Then, just when I thought the Heroes had shit in hand, one of the people on the far side of the river screamed. Lily, standing with the refugees from the village.

"Water Panther!" I spotted it, cruising downstream, looking at our Heroes and the survivors like a buffet. Something in me snapped.

"ENOUGH!" The fuckin' Water Panther looked at me in shock, as did all the refugees. The Heroes kept moving, but I... I couldn't. I leapt at the fuckin' River Dragon, up in its grille before I realized it had to be the size of a semi. I just did not fuckin' care. Natural disasters don't have fuckin' moral components, nor do mindless predators, but even fuckin' Baby had learned not to bite at us when we handed over food. Yeah, I wasn't making a whole lot of sense.

What I was making was a lot of five pound pieces of Water Panther, ripped from the fucker one fuckin' fistful at a time. I completely lost my shit, dozens of me ripping the thing apart like a fuckin' school of piranhas. I'm not sure how long it took. I'm not sure when it turned and tried to flee in terror. I'm sure the tentacle that intertwined with its tail would need some Healing. Fuck it. Worth. Fucker isn't tryna eat people I just saved and getting away with it.