Chương 840: Day Eight Hundred And Thirty-Eight

Dear Diary, Kinda interesting thing I discovered today. While my High Clergy and even one or two of my Clergy conflate Worship and physical intimacy on a regular basis, that's not true for all my Worshippers.

Okay, I can hear you all saying, 'but Tabitha, what about all that Worship you get when you're getting busy on the Altar', and it's true, I get plenty of Worship up there, but I get pretty much the same amount whether I'm rocking somebody's world, getting my own ashes hauled, or just sitting there letting Wendell go on about Squadball.

There's some variation from week to week, from Temple to Temple, but honestly I think that has less to do with the nature of what's going on up on the altar and more to do with the folks in the crowd. I'm not even really talking about 'which people are there', either. More about how if the crowd is loaded with folks who are grateful to me or something they associate with me the Worship is gonna be...

I was gonna say 'more powerful', or 'purer', or 'more refined', but all of those have some connotations that don't quite work. The best way I can describe it is flavor. When the whole Temple is rocking the same kind of emotional resonance in their Worship, they're all putting out the same flavor, and it makes it that much more intense.

Whether that's the kind of horny desire from the Spring Solstice celebration of life, or the innocent appreciation of warmth and attention I got while I sat with Wendell, when everybody's on the same page, it's that much more intense. I'm not entirely sure it's more potent though. It's like the nutrition thing, I think. If all I get is one kind of Worship, I think it might skew me more toward that kind of activity.

I'm not sure, but honestly it sorta feels like Aphrodite might have wound up trapped by her own success in that regard. Then again, she's married to Ares in the here and now, and I can't see him as being an attentive, compassionate lover. Fuck, I can't even see him doing BDSM right, because for the person doing the work it's all about being hyper empathic, using things that most people find scary or painful to elicit positive end states.

Like, yeah, I left Kitten bruised from nape to ankle, but I also left her literally unconscious from intensity of orgasm. Twice. My first time with Marie she played my Soul Burned arm like a fuckin' maestro, but she also filled me with every endorphin available, not to mention all the dopamine possible. Took me from 'embarrassingly messy suicide waiting to happen' to 'fuck it, we ball' over the course of a few excruciating minutes.

Meanwhile Ares seems like the type of motherfucker to confuse 'backhand, hump her before she can get up, get some in her eye when you pull out late seven seconds later' and 'BDSM'. Or, y'know, confuse it with 'being good at sex'. Fuck, that shit is barely sex. Those fish, I think it's salmon, what just blast their spooge all over the riverbed while the lady fish do the same are better at sex than that.

I am absolutely certain that there are in fact people who derive sexual arousal or even satisfaction from the sensation or even thought of being covered in baby batter. No I will not elaborate on how I can be one hundred percent certain such people exist. Nor can I confirm or deny that it improved my complexion. No further questions on this topic at this time.

So after we all ate our paninis and bundled back in to sleep, because the temperature outside the Homestead had plummeted over the past week, Saffron poked me in the tit.

"Revel time." I blinked, looking around muzzily. The sun lay on the western horizon, and Madeline stood by the bed already dressed in her Holy Garb.

"It's fine, Goddess. I'll let the faithful know you will return next week."

"Nah." I shook my head as I worked my unpleasantly dry and gummy mouth. I reached out one hand toward her.

"Hand." As she clasped my hand, I rolled out of bed and stepped us both to the bar at the Temple of Love.

"Hey Jack, can you get me water with some kinda citrus?"

"Lemon?" I nodded, and he handed over a stein a few moments later. I chugged it, thanking my lack of gag reflex for not making me choke on the ice. Then I stepped Mads and I to the Calverton Altar, dropping my Blend as I did. I hugged her, whispering, "kinda hope folks are in the mood for less athletic stuff tonight." She turned, and I saw the idea forming in her head as she did. I touched her hand, shaking my head as I did.

She nodded, and changed the tone of what she'd been about to say by announcing, "praise to Tabitha Diaz, who has stood against the Titans attempting to ravage our Alliance, turning them back and showing our brave Soldiers and sailors the way." That got me a mix of heartfelt but calm 'praise be' from some of the crowd, and more raucous cheers and even subdued war cries from a few folks who struck me somehow as ex-Thralls.

I think it might have been that kind of leanness of feature that comes from long term malnutrition, but whatever it was, whoever they were, they really got into it. Mix of grateful and proud in that burst of Worship, but it still made me sit up and smile a little more. Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings. Oliver came up first tonight.

He seemed a little more shy than normal, so I waved him forward and pulled him up to sit on my lap, growing a little so I could still get a good angle to rub his shoulders.

"Everything okay?" I looked into that dark place, and the foggy images hinting he wasn't even sure what he wanted clarified themselves as he quietly asked, "do you, can you, can we just talk?" I half turned him, pulled him to me to put my arms around him and lay my cheek on his forehead.

"This time is for you, Oliver. Time for me to focus on you. What you need. What you want. Who you are. What you want to be." I waited for a few moments to let that sink in, then before he could really realize and break down, said, "so what did you want to talk about?" For a little bit we didn't even talk. He cried. Quietly. I'm not sure anybody else in the Temple realized he was crying, because he didn't sob, or wail, or anything else like that.

Just sat there, half slumped, leaning into me, tears streaming down my cleavage. Eventually, when he found his voice again, he told me about his life before the Plague. He'd been an apprentice tanner. Which, given the state of here and now tanning, told me a lot about where he'd started. Then he talked about his family from before, and how he'd been eager to get out and prove himself, so much so that while they were his support system, he hadn't really spent as much time as he should have with them.

'Should have' by his own estimation. I didn't judge on that, given the kind of life I lived back in the day. Now they were all gone. He had the Temple, and that's about it. I pulled him to me and held him for a bit, then said, "I don't remember my father. My mom worked herself to death when I was... Probably not much younger than you were when the Plague hit. I had a sister, but I don't know if she's alive or dead at this point."

When he looked at me in confusion, I just shrugged and said, "the Aquarium attack, the war, lots of folks lost lots of folks over the last few years." He nodded.

"I know I shouldn't..." I shook my head, putting my fingers over his lips.

"No. No, you should. I regret not connecting as well as I could with them back then, but I got stupidly lucky and found a family. My wives, my partners, my kids. Fuck, five of them we adopted, little ones from Calverton who had nobody left."

"So, I should...?" He trailed off, not even sure what to ask. I shrugged.

"You're gonna have to decide that for yourself, but to start, mourn those you've lost. Maybe they're in the Afterlife; lots of folks who died, even some of the former Undead, made it there. Maybe they're just literally lost, like somewhere in Lancaster or even somewhere further. All either of us know is that you've lost them. And that means it's okay to mourn. But don't make that everything. Don't follow them into the grave. Here and now, you're alive."

"But what do I do?" I shrugged.

"That's up to you. Live for today, live for tomorrow, maybe even live to honor yesterday, but don't try to get back to it. Forward, always forward. If you enjoy working here in the Temple, I'm happy and honored to have you, you're a great guy. If you want to do something else, take the time to learn about whatever it is, so if you make a go at it, you have your best shot at it. But whatever you do? Just live.

Do the things that make you feel alive, make you feel like you matter, make you want to wake up and do them. And if you're not feeling anything like that? Just try to help other people, and let yourself heal and rest."

"Will you be here for me? Even if I stop volunteering?" I hugged him.

"Hey, c'mon, I'm gonna be here for everybody, even the ones who don't volunteer, as much as I can. But," I sighed, genuinely regretful, "I can't be everywhere with everyone all the time. I wish I could. So, y'know, if you want private time on the Altar with me every couple months, you gotta volunteer at least a little, right? Or maybe become Clergy? That's a thing that could happen."

"Really? I thought..."

"What, that only women can be my clergy?" He nodded.

"Oh, hell no. I mean, the Holy Garb is pretty effeminate, but..." I thought for a second, then shot Madeline a mental image. A moment later, she Shapeshifted into boy mode, still in her Yandere Shobitch Wedding Gown. When he caught a glimpse of that, Oliver blushed and looked away.

"Uh, I don't know if I could do that." I shrugged.

"I don't know if you could either. There are Trials and everything. It's a lot of work. But if you want, I'm not gonna tell you no just because you've got a penis instead of a vag."

"I, uh..." He blushed. I looked into that place of secrets inside him, and smiled.

"Is that what had you worried?"

"A little." He shrugged. I pushed my Blend around us for a tiny bit of obfuscation and privacy, then Shapeshifted into the girl I'd seen in his head.

"You wanna practice a little?"

"I... I couldn't! It wouldn't be right!" I smiled at him.

"Oh, you are absolutely a gem, and if you ever want to bring her up here as a plus one, I think I might just indulge you maybe. Have to check with everybody else to see if they're cool with it. But what I meant was 'did you want to practice talking to her, so you don't feel so awkward when you try to, uh, woo her." He smiled in sudden understanding, and we spent a solid couple hours just talking about his almost literal girl-next-door. Then he got kinda tired, and I cradled him and let him drift off.

Noelle was easier. She just wanted lullabies while I did gentle, quiet, pillow princess things to her. Weirdest thing, somebody absolutely having one hell of an orgasm while almost completely relaxed. Came and went, although only in the temporary, completely blissful sleep sense. I don't know who had told Lacey about what I'd done with my littler ladies on Penance night, or even if they had, but that's what she wanted.

That long, drawn out, almost painful edging until I called Mads over at dawn and let Lacey greet the rising sun with one long, screaming release. Yeah, weird, getting an appetizer of Hero Worship, half a night of warm fuzzy appreciation of me playing big sister or aunt or whatever for Oliver, followed by that more habitual lewdness appreciation. Also, with my newfound appreciation of the different flavors of Worship, I realized something that took me just the tiniest bit by surprise.

The kids in my Math classes apparently Worship me for my brain. So fuckin' weird.