Chương 984: Day Nine Hundred And Eighty-Two

Dear Diary, My tension has been ratcheting up for the past couple days, and it shows no signs of abating until the remaining Spartans are in the ground. Okay, that's a sign of my tension. If I found some kind of non-lethal way to neutralize every fuckin' one of them, like the way Jack froze the two dozen that showed up down in Jackville, that's what I'd want to do. That's the right thing to do. You don't torture rabid dogs to death, you euthanize them cleanly and quickly. Painlessly if you can swing it.

Not because they deserve a painless death, but nobody deserves the trauma they'd do to themselves dishing out the kind of suffering those fuckers deserve. Fuck, until today I couldn't even say I was sure they deserved it, which is kind of stupid of me. I mean, I couldn't say they deserved it before today, because for all I knew the fuckers up north had gone rogue.

Well, I didn't think I could, because I'd forgotten what Marie and even Dionysus told me about the fuckin' Spartans and their 'initiation' and 'training' rituals. The former being hunting down Maenads and Worshippers of Dionysus living out in little enclaves in the wilderness, capturing them, raping them, then either murdering or enslaving them. The latter being torturing and raping their captive Maenads. When are we rescuing them, Kitten? She knew who I meant without asking.

I've been working on the plan, my Goddess. When all the Spartans in Atlantis are neutralized, our Watchtowers fully staffed and integrated into our Scrying network, and the Tentacles fully retrofitted and ready to patrol, it will become my top priority. That's when we save them? I felt Saffron's guilt and resolve, strong enough to rein in my own nascent rage. No, love.

That's when I put the full force of the Alliance military and economy into gathering information without letting the Spartans know what we're looking for or why, then into preparing what needs to be prepared in Europa. I want them free. As do I, my Goddess. If you command me to attack without hesitation or plan, I will. She paused, then very crisply thought, I will even bear the blame for the needless casualties and collateral that would cause. I took a deep breath. Tell me this shit won't drag on forever.

I will keep you appraised of my plans and your part in them, which will be critical, my Goddess. You will know what we are waiting for, and when we receive it, you will be the edge of the scalpel we excise them with. This will not be a battle, but a surgical strike the likes of which will leave the Spartans wondering what happened to their prize prisoners well after we're gone. I guess that's a completely legit reason to let my Kitten cook.

No, seriously, innocent people shouldn't be dying because I can't sit my ass down and wait for the green light to wreck shit. Fuck, once the Spartans are dealt with it won't be me waiting for some unspecified enemy shit-dickery, it'll be me crouched at the starting line, engine pumping and thumping in time... Yeah, I'm definitely at the point of unable to make good choices if I'm having random Cake lyrics interrupting my thoughts. That shit was a banger though. But yeah.

Went home last night to get dinner Marie brought home from the Academy. Apparently they've got some stuff there that they're just, I dunno, it's like really well seasoned cast iron can make the difference on some recipes, like the flavors have inundated the seasoning, and gradually come out when you cook stuff on it, especially the recipes you've done so many times you could taste them when you lick the pan. Yeah, spicy eggs, jalapeno scrapple, sausage, and hearty black bread. So good.

The kids varied in their appreciation for fine cuisine, with the two new ones nibbling at everything. I eventually had to drift around and get Menace to settle Anise and Felicia, who'd begun fighting over sausages and scrapple, which had the new kids ready to give up their share to stop the fighting. Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.

Yeah, I could have stopped it, but somehow I got it in my head that working within the social structures my girls had put together themselves would be less disruptive. Also, while the kids had broken down and cried on me the other day, I needed them to see that their sisters would stand up for them. Shit, if it turns out we find their parents alive and well, or I Revive them somehow, I think I'm gonna have to move them to the Homestead, because I've imprinted on these two. No, I do not mean they've imprinted on me.

I won't be taking questions. Everybody went up to the Bath after dinner. Just like last night, I'd scooped the Cold Iron dust out of the Bath while everybody ate. Less than yesterday, I think. But once we all got in the bath, everybody gradually settled down. We'd all almost fallen asleep when the new kids came over and tugged at me. I felt like shit, because I'd forgotten. Worse, I wasn't sure I could grant them that 'no breathing' Boon without hurting them.

I vaguely worried that if I tried I'd roast their lungs or some shit like that. So I gently lifted everybody but them up in my tentacles, hefted myself out of the Bath and held my hands out. We walked down to the bedroom hand in hand, and if I slipped a thick comforter over them, I didn't flinch away when they rooched right over to lean against me. Dreamt of my ladies in the War Room floating in my Maw again. Quiet conversations. Maps appearing and dissolving when they finished with them. Very mystic-tech.

Saffron is definitely in her element as a leader of women. Women and men. Human-Adjacent. People. Woke up and went right back to it. Okay, I'm definitely getting closer to that raggedy edge, and the events I scried today did not make things better.

Before the Trolls, the Jotnar, the Crusade, and the scouts really got moving, I settled one of me in with my head practically in Tallulah's lap, another dangling from Saffron's shoulders like a cape, and a dozen of me doing laundry duty at the Academy on top of a couple of me playing with the kids. Well, not really 'playing', because they weren't really doing the 'run around games' or stuff where an adult doesn't have an unfair advantage. I did play chess with Maze a little.

Gave up and let her play against Ria after she kicked my ass twice. As I settled in to Scry, I pinged Saffron. Can Karen check in with Compton and Muscogee, make sure they're okay? I'll do so personally, love. Karen is currently otherwise engaged. Huh? I felt my Kitten's smile in my head. This Friday's Revel. Which is also the New Year's Revel. The Spring Solstice Revel. Also, our Darling's birthday. Oh. Shit. Fuck, am I a bad Goddess for saying that's totally important? Perhaps. I am genuinely unsure.

But it does make you a good partner, and that is equally important to me. It's not like Karen's attention would meaningfully change the hunt for the Spartans at this point. Thanks, Kitten. I'll get to it. So I did. The Trolls finished their sweep of Delmarva, and jumped right into the Bay, swam across, and started sweeping up the increasingly broad wedge of land between the James and the Bay. I kind of lost track of them, though, because the Scouts had started finding traces of the Spartans passage.

A few southwest of Calverton, a few in the dead zone that remained between Lancaster and Calverton. Not, like, Undead or anything, just areas where the population had dropped to near zero and not yet recovered. It was closer to zero now. The scouts found half a dozen small, isolated homes today. All burned, with the former inhabitants dead and desecrated. Some of them detecting as corrupted with Cold Iron dust, others not, but we couldn't really take the chance on any of them.

The scouts marked them for later retrieval, then moved on. With each body, each home, each family we found destroyed, my anger grew deeper, my tension stronger. The best part of me wants to capture the Spartans. Put them on trial for what they've done, then hold public executions. Possibly with my two new kids pulling the rope on the guillotine, just to rub it in that they're not 'dying in Glorious combat' or any bullshit like that. My kids don't deserve that kind of trauma.

The Spartans don't deserve to inflict any more trauma than they have. But every body we find pushes me that much closer to doing unto them as I did unto Lyssa.