Chương 953: Day Nine Hundred And Fifty-One

Dear Diary, I... I don't want to focus on death all the time. I mean, nobody does, I guess, but somehow I think that I don't deal with it well. Then again, I guess it's also possible that I'm dealing with it better than most people would, but I can't tell because I'm inside my head with me, and I just see them rolling with it. Okay, that's not true. Back in the day I had way more opportunity to get used to death than anybody my age ought to have to.

Not just my mom, either, although her dying hard as I tried to navigate my tweenage years probably exacerbated things. Even the kids who'd lost family to shootings, cops, 'industrial accidents', or 'accidental shootings' by cops usually had it hit out of the blue and be done with. Mom dying hard let me watch it happen over the course of months. Years, really, since I'm pretty sure I realized something was wrong long before she wound up permanently hospitalized and unable to work.

I watched as friends mourned their loved ones. I don't know what was wrong with me, but I wound up torn up on the inside but utterly unable to express it on the outside. Dunno if it was shock, or neruodivergence, or some other random bullshit, but instead of getting sad, I got angry. Angry at my mom for not being there until she got sick, angry at my sister for acting like it wasn't important, angry at myself for not being good enough to keep either of them happy.

Angry at the world for taking away any chance at happiness. Any hope for a future. Because when you're good at pattern recognition and the pattern you grow up with is 'women work two or three menial jobs until they die, while men are shunted into warehouses or prisons', with the 'alternate' options being dealing, turning tricks, or trying out the other gender's path, you get real depressed real fast. Yeah, maybe I'm not real surprised with how fucked up my relationship with death was back in the day.

Here and now, though, I've been given a way to correct that. Okay, to correct untimely deaths of those who want to give it another try, since I'm not gonna pull somebody from their eternal reward without their Consent, and some folks like Anise and Archie seem like they've played this particular game enough, and they're ready to check out, see whatever else is available. If anything else is available.

Shit, wouldn't that be some kind of irony, if they got born back on my old world, or someplace completely different. But I need to not focus on death, because for all those reasons it makes me a little crazy.

Like, I don't respond the way a rational person ought to, which means either I'm gonna wind up doing something stupid like saying nobody dies any more, or getting mad about folks who are ready to check out and doing something dumb, either to them or to someone else, or worst of all saying something stupider than 'nobody dies' and say 'only Bad Guys die'.

Because if I define 'Bad Guy' based on what makes me mad, I'm just adding another layer to Shit Pyramid, and if I go based on my Moral Compass, I'm just being unfair to Ace folks and people who are Bad At Sex. Seriously, if they're Bad At Sex they ought to be getting help, just like anybody else with a disability. Not getting permadeath because I got the weirdest Kinder Surprise Egg Toy of all time.

At any rate, finished up last night with Mercy across my lap and my arms around Orla, which kinda woke Mercy up, but she didn't seem like she minded awfully much. I have a sneaking suspicion that since the stripperiffic wedding dresses are pulling the power they use direct from yours truly, I don't get nearly the pick me up effect from them that my High Clergy and anybody they share the effect with experience.

Which, considering it's an entirely fluid free A plus climax experience at a minimum for me, not to mention a bit of the rest and amphetamine that is Worship, which my High Clergy seem to get the Mortal version of, they might wind up not sleeping until the following night. Or maybe... Shit, I guess they do sleep, since I see them in my Maw in my dreams, but I'm pretty sure any of them I don't see on any particular night wound up getting boosted.

Took the kids to school and engaged in some of that serious last minute prep work, which included a visit to Conrad and another to Jack, all while doing my back to normal bodyguarding, caretaking, cooking, and cleaning. Less momming on school days, because the school days were both oddly long and broken up. Got there not long after breakfast, which in the middle of winter wound up being well before dawn.

Started the day with some snacks, which I realized was a way to make sure that the kids who weren't living at the Temple or at homes that fed them right were getting at least some decent nutrition. Did some basic running around stuff with the littler kids, which meant most of mine, while the older kids socialized. Then lessons until lunch, which lasted way longer than I was used to from Eastside or the Academy.

I mean, the Academy lunches seemed short, but part of that was power loading calories on training days and cooling my brain down on academics days. But the kids at the Temple school got time to socialize while lunch was delivered, time to eat, time to socialize more while digesting, then a bit more active stuff, then back to class. Total lunch took somewhere between two and three hours. Then school went until it was time to go home for dinner, although I think some of the kids got dinner at the Temple as well.

Like, easily a twelve hour school day, overall, but at least half of that, maybe more, was just... Socializing and eating. Playing, although that might have been a kind of free form Phys Ed. Probably was down in Calverton, now that Orla was back in charge. But overall, it was just them being kids in a safe environment.

At any rate, got the kids home, realized that my 'almost forgot about it, did everything at the last minute while Co-Located doing normal daily stuff in plain sight' wound up being a totally effective surprise tactic, because Menace was veering wildly between forlorn and bitchy. I mean, she tried to hide both. Tried to be the Big Sister to all her siblings, especially the kits, who were the only ones she was actually older than in terms of calendar time.

Tried to keep herself in check, which was really pretty fuckin' impressive for a two-year-old. Especially since the reason she was so cranky was that she thought everybody forgot that she turned three today. Of course, I had been dealing with death in various ways, so I wasn't really at my best, but I tried.

When she looked around the Dining Room and got a little cranky as I brought out a mix of Academy breakfast and some salad, eggs, and fish for the less carnivorous girls, I stepped one of me over to her while her sisters got to eating.

"Hey, Menace." She smothered her pout really fast, but I still saw it.

"Mama?" I smiled at her.

"Yeah?"

"D'joo..." She sighed.

"Neh Mine." Her face got a little grumpy as she turned to see Isadora scooping sausages with her fingers.

"Use da fowk, Itha!" This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience. I touched Isnomi's shoulder.

"Y'know, you've been being such a good Big Sister, but I think you might want to let go of that for the evening."

"Why?" I leaned in to whisper in her ear.

"Because you've gotten perilously close to stepping across the line into bullying a couple times today, and..." She blinked at my long pause, half turning before I said, "bullies don't get cake." I'd worried I was being a little mean with the surprise, but the dawning look of glee on her face made it all worth while.

"You 'membered!" she whisper-shouted.

"Of course I remembered. There's nobody tryna kill us all right now."

"Da Spawtanth." I shrugged.

"Yeah, they're hiding right now. Marie and I might have to go dig them out soon, but right now we're letting them hide, because it's still cold as ice outside."

"Gone wait 'til spring?"

"Nah. Just until I'm ready. Now. You ready for cake?"

"Yeth!" So I walked into the room, Marie following, each of us carrying a pair of cakes. Well, okay, two actual cakes, one pie, and one concoction that I thought the kits would like, but I kinda wanted to try as well. A chocolate lava cake, a lemon cake with chocolate icing, a pie that was kinda like a pecan pie without the pecans. Just sugar, sugar, sugar, and more sugar.

Then the last one, which was a little more sweet bread than cake, but which had strips of very, very candied bacon on the outside along with chunks of ham dripping with honey baked into it. Marie and I had to intervene with that one.

Okay, we had to intervene, then I had to step to M-Space and duplicate it a couple times, because not only did every kit seem to want one to themselves, Isnomi definitely wanted one of those all for her own, and of the rest of the girls, the only ones who didn't take a second slice were Maze and Ria. Which isn't to say they didn't enjoy it, just that they didn't lose their itty bitty tiny girl minds over it.

Okay, Lindsey, Alex, Davey, and Daya were also pretty chill about it, although they did each take a second slice. Of course, while we ensured domestic tranquility, I observed a certain level of longing on the face of my Murder Mittens, so I definitely made one more extra cake for nefarious spontaneous Mitten stuffing plans. Luckily, after a full day of school, stuffing themselves on both dinner and dessert, and a long soak in the Bath, the girls all zonked out pretty quick.

Even Menace seemed half asleep when she asked, "party?"

"Tonight wasn't a party?" She shrugged.

"Kinda?" I laughed.

"You guys can do birthday stuff tomorrow, yeah, and there's a present waiting for you, but only after breakfast, once everybody's cleaned up and ready to go outside." She nodded, then dropped off to sleep. At which point three sets of eyes swiveled to grin at Murder Mittens, because I had not been mentally quiet about my plans. Scooped her up, held her down, took turns feeding her sweet pork.

Yes, that is both metaphor and not, because there were three people who could safely shapeshift, and while some people enjoy mixing food and drink in their bed play, and others find it too messy or some shit like that, Maenads were custom crafted to crave carnal excess. Some time after midnight, a while after Siobhan had to tap out and return to the embrace of sleep and Hailee, I leaned down and whispered into Marie's ear, "I think this was a mistake."

Yeah, she got a horrified look that absolutely said, 'no, no, no you didn't', although between a mouth literally stuffed with bacon cake and a brain stuffed with pre-, mid-, and post-coital bliss, coherent words were beyond her.

"After this, what are we gonna do on your birthday?" Saffron, who'd been stuffing cake in Murder Mitten's maw every time it had the ability to handle any more, chuckled, that velvety dark sound that reached out and made every girl kisser in the room pay close attention.

"Perhaps more of this?"

"I dunno. Seems kinda derivative." Marie whimpered a little. Saffron rocked her head side to side.

"We could continue all night into the following day." With her head held still for mouth stuffing purposes, Marie couldn't nod, but I still felt her trying to.

"I mean, yeah, of course we're gonna all be Co-Located and keep four of us here like this all day," her eyes shot open, and she managed a tiny nod despite me holding her still.

"But, still kinda weak?" More whining, which is when Saffron sighed and added, "well, you do have three High Priestesses. We could see if they'd spend the day here as well."

"Yeah, if they're down I guess, but despite our Murder Mittens bein' a tall drink of water, there's only so much three more can add to the experience, right?" Saffron leaned down to Marie's ear, said half an incomplete something, licked our tigress' ear, nipped it, then grabbed all four of us by the Co-Location and duplicated us right next to us on the bed, only with the three of us in alternate positions, Shapeshifted to match my High Clergy who hadn't been involved yet.

"It could, in fact, add quite a lot, I think." Yeah, surprises are fun, but so is anticipation. Marie has made her private birthday party preferences known. Absolute worst case, we fill in as needed for whoever isn't able to make the party. In the morning, we all were kind of in the mood to sleep in, which none of us were allowed to do, because Menace practically dragged us all down to the Dining Room through sheer focused force of will.

I kinda dragged my feet, slow rolling everything, and it wasn't just because I wanted to build up the birthday present anticipation in our tiniest Primordial Terror. I was, in fact, still transporting the part of said present which couldn't travel through M-Space, because Conrad had delivered his part overnight. Once we had all the girls outside in the Courtyard, after three different renditions of the Happy Birthday song, including an actually nice one by Garde and the band, I looked up past the East House.

The others followed my gaze, and with the snow starting to sublime away, not to mention all the work Menace and her Clergy had done clearing things, her Temple showed up clearly, where my little office shack had always been a little harder to see.

"So, Menace. Dragons."

"Yeth?"

"They're Predators, right?" She nodded.

"Yeth."

"Y'know they're dangerous?" She nodded.

"Have you gotten Baby to behave yet?" She frowned, swallowed, and said, "he's still spicy. We pet him, clean him, he behaves for me, but I think he's..." She fumbled, and I could tell she needed words.

"You need to play with him more?" She shrugged.

"I play with him, but he needs to play with more than me." I smiled.

"And he can't play with anyone else because...?"

"He's not careful enough yet. He plays too rough. Maybe when the kits are older..." She frowned at her eight fuzzy sisters as they expressed various levels of protest.

"You're all too young yet. Not strong enough." I overrode their protests.

"Isnomi isn't being mean, girls. If she says she thinks you'll be able to later, but not yet, she's just being careful. Don't go getting up in your feels about that. I told her the same thing when she was your age; some things you need to wait for, or you'll wind up hurting yourself and, maybe more importantly, hurting other people and your own ability to learn and grow and be all you can be."

At that point I had to do some serious Co-Located Blending, and I still almost slipped up, because some things Do Not Blend. I think Maze and Ria might have realized, and I'm pretty sure Lindsey did, but thankfully all three of them have some ability to be subtle about shit. I turned back to Menace.

"Okay then. So Baby needs a playmate?" She got a weird look, like she almost got it.

"Yeth?" I walked toward the entrance to the underground stables, waving the girls to follow. Menace stuck to my side like glue, I walked into the room, where it took her a second to realize that Baby's terrarium had been moved. Basically slid sideways along the wall, because that was the only way to fit the identical terrarium beside it, with the very carefully added airlock between the two.

"You gotted us another Dragon!"

"I got you a Swamp Dragon." Hey, of all the weird hobbies Deities here and now and rich people back in the day have in common, 'keeping exotic apex predators as pets' seemed like the healthiest one to encourage in my daughters. Gotta channel that energy somewhere. I'm sure as shit not ready to be a grandmother yet.