Dear Diary,

"If you need to kill someone,

Be prepared to Revive them,

'Cause all of us make mistakes."

Doctrine of Tabitha, Book of Justified Homicide

Yeah, maybe that will slow down the murder happy hoboes among my following. Sure as shit there will be people who are all 'you are a Bad Man and should die' only to have someone realize later that the Bad Man was, in fact, just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Seriously, back in the world of Eastside the entire US Department of Justice wound up fucking up one time in twenty five, so sure as shit some rando with a grudge is gonna wind up screwing up way more than that.

That means I've got to be even more specific and restrictive about Vengeance, I guess. People tend to hesitate on killing folks when it comes to abstract stuff like being an exploitative asshole, or even hurting other people, but anyone whose kid has gotten hurt has had the impulse to put a shiv through the fucker who hurt them. Multiple times. Through their skull. Why do I get the impression that this is not a abstract hypothetical situation I'm talking about any more?

So yeah, I need to make sure that anybody following me is both willing to put in the work to make sure they've got the gun pointed at the right forehead, willing to pull the trigger if in fact the fucker in question is involved in the ongoing arrogation of agency, and willing to pay the price for pulling that trigger. Not to mention figuring out a way to un-pull the trigger if it turns out their due diligence was in fact not diligent enough.

So yesterday after Karen dropped that accidental bombshell on my face, I looked at her and said, "uh, yeah, we can do that. Might... uh, might take a little bit? But send her a note to pencil us in."

"As you wish, Goddess."

I smiled up at her from where I propped my chin on my hands, my elbows sinking into the mattress. "Love you too, Karen!" Then I Translocated over to the endless field of tentacles. The sun heading toward the Rockies showed me which way west was, and I just let the tentacles kinda shift me south. I'm pretty sure I should have looked like a dog with my head out the car window, but all I got was a pleasant breeze that blew my big old mane of hair behind me. As the sun set I stared down a long slope of writhing tentacles toward a distant, faintly glowing field. With long tentacles stretching out to snatch up armloads of whatever grain it was and pull them back toward the waiting mass.

You guys gotta see this.

As I started trying to sort out which parts of me were bogarting all the Fae Field crops, which definitely wound up with me being glad I was lying on my belly, because if I hadn't been I would definitely have wound up tumbling down the long tentacle hillside, my High Clergy showed up arrayed around my ever higher ass.

"Pardon, Goddess, but are those the fields of which she spoke?"

"Kekekeke... that's what she said."

"Love, are you well?"

I wasn't stupid enough to try to stand up. Instead I had some tentacles lift me and spin me around to face her. But she kept orbiting me like my own little sun. "Just peachy. Gotta figure out which tentacles are bein' bad and stealing the corpse. The copse. The cops. The prose?"

"Crops." Murder Mittens for the win! I flopped myself across her and hung on tight. Okay, I flopped my arms over her shoulders and had my tentacles kinda press me against her front. So fuzzy!

"Yeah. Crops."

"Perhaps we should help her... her... hur hur hur..." Siobhan stumbled towards us, only to have my Murder Mittens snag her up, then stand there purring with us rubbing our face in her fur."

"Perhaps not then. Tabitha?"

"Yarp?"

Saffron sighed. "I didn't want to test this, but... Dog!" I whined. No idea why, but I whined. "SIT!" I tried to drop to my ass, but I was already kinda sitting on Marie's arm. To the west, all the way to the edge of the fields, tentacles slammed into the ground. "HEEL!" I wrenched myself out of Marie's arms and stagger flopped my way to collapse clutching at Saffron's calves. "Good Girl." Saffron's calves were not nearly as fuzzy as Marie's everything, but they were very squish. Well, there was a lot of muscle under the squish, but there was very squish over the muscle. Tentacles writhed around her calves and knees and thighs. So did my face, but my face had way less writhe capacity.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

Karen half whispered, "Imperator?"

"Yes, Karen. And only that."

"Then... how?"

Saffron sighed, settling down on a throne of tentacles, pulling my head up into her lap, stroking at my hair. "Because while Tabitha is, in fact, Mimic Reborn? She is also my wife, and more importantly in this instance, the Imperator's Attack Dog."

"But... you... she..."

I felt the laughter Saffron carefully kept from her voice. "She submits herself willingly to me. As I do to her. She is my Goddess. I am her Priestess. I am her Imperator, she is my Attack Dog. We are partners. Equals, in every way that matters."

"But... but that's not..." Karen turned to Marie and Siobhan. "So the two of you...?"

Siobhan giggled, blushing hard and flopping over to dangle upside down from Marie's arms. "We are but our Mistresses' beloved Concubines."

Wasn't having that. Scooped them all up, pulled them to us. Piled them on top of us. "Equals. Friends. Lovers. Partners. Allies. Loves. Equals."

Karen just knelt there, mouth working until Saffron's arm slipped around her shoulders. "Did you forget your Goddess' second Value, Karen?"

"Egalitarianism? Of course not, but... But... Not..." She stuttered to a stop. "Even her." She whispered.

I stuck my tongue just a little bit out of my mouth, trying to think of the word I wanted, only to have Siobhan see that and pounce on it. While she occupied my lips I thought, Duh. Of course me.

"But... why?"

Braining wasn't really my strong suit at the moment. Too much wacky weed. Wasn't exactly marijuana. Tasted wrong. Not not marijuana either. Definitely some THC variants in me right now, in concentrations high enough to intoxicate the Great Dark Tentacle Beast her own self. 'Cause I said so?

"So... what happens when you no longer say so?"

That shocked me sober for a split second. I pulled away from Siobhan, letting her gum suggestively at my fingers while I said, "then I'm counting on you guys to find a way to inject some sense back into my ass. Or my head. Wherever my brain seems to be located at the time."

Saffron nudged me, and when I looked up at her, said, "she wasn't there, love."

"Uh, when?"

My adorable squishy wife chuckled, and without thinking about it I kinda started guiding Siobhan's mouth around so no part of me got too much or too little gnawing. "When you gave us, your High Clergy, your prime Commandment, love."

"Whassat? I forget."

"I'm well aware. But what you told us, commanded us even? 'Do as you will'."

I blinked. "Oh. Yeah." I turned to Karen, made sure I was looking at her eyes and not anywhere else, despite the dress, and said, "Thas a commandment. From me, Goddess, to you, Priestest High."

"Uh... what is?"

"Duh. Do as you will. Now, forever. Hope you still do what I tell you, but yeah. Do as you will."

At that point Marie and Siobhan got into the spirit of doing as they will, and that got me way too distracted to be an active participant in the discussion. Siobhan's ticklish, Marie's awesome, and I'm five nines of tentacles.

Karen looked at Saffron and said, "and if what I will is not in agreement with your decisions?"

"Then we might have some heated discussions. But so long as I remained convinced that your goals are, in fact, not inimical to ours? They will remain discussions. Do as you will. But know that I have been planning and preparing for nigh on a year, and you have not."

"So you are better than me because of that?"

Saffron chuckled, and took control of half a dozen thigh thick tentacles. Didn't need them right at the moment, and wouldn't stop her anyway. "Oh, no, Karen." She lifted my Priestess who needed to get as High as Siobhan and I or she might suffer terminal constipation up so that their faces hovered inches from one another. "Not better. Just more experienced, as odd as that may sound to someone a few years my senior. And I think we both know that we can get more done working in coordinated concert than we could working separately, occasionally at cross purposes, no?"

Karen folded her arms across her chest, pouting. "You're right. But you didn't have to manhandle me." Saffron set her back on her feet, and she flopped backwards onto a little tentacle camp stool, because I'm just cool like that. Nothing to do with being able to feel her sitting on it, I promise. I lie a lot, too. "Why is it that I can't find one guy who can manhandle half as well as you three. No offense, Siobhan."

None taken.

"Perhaps when we're done in Rich Man's Port I'll introduce you to my former Volunteer Unit's front rank. Well, three of the four, anyhow."

"Why not the fourth?"

"I didn't think you'd be interested in her?"

"Fair point."

Saffron sighed. "For the moment, though, I think at least Tabitha and I will be out of action until the intoxicant from the Fae Fields passes through her system. Could you please return to your duties as Ambassador, Senior Cadet Smith?"

Karen nodded, and her dress went away, replaced by her Academy Uniform. "As you will, Imperator." Before I could correct her wardrobe malfunction, she was gone.

So I put the other three in the stripperific wedding dress.

No idea why that made my Murder Mittens mewl and blush so much.