Dear Diary,

"A family is a risky venture, because the greater the love, the greater the loss... That's the trade-off. But I'll take it all."

- Brad Pitt

Here I am, minding my own business, living my own mostly Sapphic life, when along comes certified elder sex symbol and Angelina Jolie chew toy dropping wisdom bombs. What the fuck, maybe I pulled my Black Dragon from yet another parallel universe where people aren't their lowest common denominator selves. Then again, maybe I didn't have the money to spend on stupid self help books that are ninety percent quotes, because between Patterson, Pratchett, and Gaiman, my book money was spent before I got it. Shit, that would both completely make sense and yet be completely awful, that there were parts of the world that weren't shit coated urinal cakes, but I couldn't afford to even see them, let alone experience them.

Fuck, even the way I got fuckin' Isekai'd lines up with that, what with most folks I knew not being able to afford the full ticket price at the aquarium, only getting in because a relative worked there so they got a discount, or because they worked there themselves and could sneak in via the employee entrance on off day sometimes, or, y'know, sneaking in like yours truly. Been a long time since I did anything like that. I mean, the same basic mental principle applies, just mentally pretend I'm supposed to be there, like air or light or whatever, and people act like I am. Or I'm not. Whatever the fuck they do when they look right through me and don't see me.

Shit, now that I really think about it, I see the Dan and the Aesir do that all the fuckin' time with Bag and anybody who's not Aesir. Just treat them like furniture, because to them? They are. Nobody's done that to me in a long fuckin' while, yeah, but that's because I very publicly killed the fuck out of anybody who disrespected me and mine. Okay, early on I kicked the shit out of them, but then I got down to Norfolk and my tiny tyrant and towering tiger encouraged me to pull out all the stops and puree some motherfuckers. Then I felt guilty about it because who the fuck gets off on Onotopping some poor dude, no matter how much of an asshole he is, and now I'm pretty sure I need some more therapy for that, and there ain't a fuckin board certified therapist this side of reality.

The Pitt quote is totally spot on, though. That's some long term panty wrecking shit right there. And now I've got yet another thing to add to my 'what the fuck is wrong with me' list.

So, I lost yesterday. Okay, I know where yesterday is, but if I knew how to get there, there'd be a new guy doin' it. Well, getting done. Poor D was surprisingly passive, although the whole event started with Saffron in charge, and after being with her for almost a year, I gotta say she's really fucking good at being in charge. Me being in the bitch role when we first got together was no accident, and if we have all kinds of fun switching that shit up, her being the head bitch in charge and me being her over eager golden retriever is clearly our comfort zone.

Which makes Marie our cat who we both adore, who joins us for affection when it suits her, and just watches us when it doesn't. Which boggles my brain that she's okay with that, but maybe a little less today than it did yesterday, because I discovered that our Marie is the literal fuckin' definition of 'horny drunk', and four is more than three, and Saffron is probably gonna be gleeful about her newfound knowledge regarding the carrying capacity of my hoo hah.

So I assume the sun set, because I remember my drunken orders to the love of my life when I left her to finish Operation Sparta's Comin', GTFO, because while she'd been in my driver's seat pretty much since I gave her those, uh, 'marching' orders, her actual caboose had got more than a little exhausted some time around when a Marie arrived with lunch. Strawberries. Fuckin' bananas, although she wouldn't tell me where she got them, just peeled one, swallowed it whole, smiled smugly, then fed me one the same way, grinning the whole while. Doesn't really matter if the food is an actual aphrodisiac or not, if you eat anything that suggestively it's gonna grease the gears. Of course right after that she whipped out some papayas, split them with her claws, and licked the seeds out of one half. Then she held one out to me. I couldn't leave my best tigress hangin, and it's been a while since I got that nice texture, not to mention, y'know, papaya.

But once the sun set, Saffron let me flop over backwards, exhausted, my head thumping on the floor before I crawled over to her and snuggled up in her lap. She got a little squirmy, so I lifted her up, flipped her around, and lay her on the divan with her head down near the low end so I could use her breasts as a pillow.

"This is incredibly undignified."

I snuggled into her. "You said anything."

"And yet, somehow, despite the indignity I feel I could endure it for a while."

Maybe ten minutes later room shaking snores drew me out of a light snooze. "The fuck?"

"Marie, could you be a dear?" The snoring cut off. "Love, I hate to ask, but could we move this to a somewhat more level surface?"

I lifted her up, carried her over to the bed, and flopped her down with her feet in one corner by the headboard, which put her head not even halfway to the middle of our awesomely huge bed. Then I leaned over her, lay my head on her breast, and closed my eyes.

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Are you trying to suffocate me?

"Can you breathe?"

Yes.

"Then 'm not tryna suffocate you. Try that later if you wanna, right now 'm tired. Need sleep."

Most undignified.

"Nah. That'll be when I poof your dress off in the middle of your next birthday party."

Tabitha! You'd parade me around skyclad?

"D'n say that. Poof dress off. Spin roun'. Dat ass."

Then Marie dropped in on both sides of us, snuggling up with delicious snoozy warmth. "Safe."

That's all I needed to hear to drop me off to sleep.

Mimic sucked her Bad Tentacle like a thumb all night long, still grumbly about how many she'd burned, how many she'd lost. The Kraken in the river pulled debris from where we'd smashed a line across the city right at the waterfront, yeeting any big pieces straight across the gap to smash down in the Undead controlled section of town. I didn't have the heart to tell them to stop.

Woke up to Marie's warm fuzzy contained by something not nearly so fuzzy. My eyes fluttered open to see a slightly ripped vee neck in front of me. The low rumble in my chest started Saffron's boot up sequence. Meanwhile I lifted myself off of her, rolled the Marie who'd been leaning on me onto her back. Her eyes stayed closed, but her lips curved into a smile. "You know what's gonna happen now, right?" Little tiny dagger fangs showed through her smile. "Aww... were you jealous?" She pouted a little, eyes still shut. "Envious?" She mlemmed. I ripped that fuckin' tee shirt from the neck down below her belly, then yanked again to tear it all the way apart. Learned an interesting thing about Maenads just then; just like any other mammal, certain bits got a little, ah, more pronounced when they nursed.

"Wow." Her brow furrowed, and I said, "that's not a head pillow. That's a whole ass body pillow."

From behind me Saffron sing songed, "you haven't found the best part."

Of course I couldn't let that lie, so after I caught my breath I had to mess around a little, and discovered that along with a larger than normal number of fully functional nursing organs, my favorite tiger lady's extensive nip collection were all fully functional in the 'response to stimulation' sense. They were also hot as hell. Not just in the make Tabby happy sense, but in the super warm heating pad sense. Of course I was still kinda tired, so I wriggled my way up until my head rested against the pillowy ones up top, enjoying how she squirmed as I did. I murmured, "gonna play your tits like a fuckin' guitar later," then fell the fuck back to sleep.

Woke to Murder Mittens tickling gently at my earlobe. Not the same response as somebody canoodling with my ear canal, and a way more pleasant way to wake up. I blinked my way awake to hear Marie think, Bath Time. at us.

We rolled out of bed, landing in the tiny clear space in the bedroom. As our feet settled to the floor, heads across the room turned incrementally to look at us. I recognized that quiet, watchful movement from so, so many women I'd known back in the world of Eastside. That constant vigilance, because if you saw it coming you thought maybe you could roll with it and you could make it just a little less bad. The room wasn't quite dark, either, the lights just barely above shut, just barely where the women in the room could see me.

A moment later I think they must have recognized me, because first a trickle, then a wave of Worship rolled over me. One of the women, moving oh, so cautiously and quietly, crawled around and over the still sleeping children, ours and all of theirs, until she knelt at my feet. "Champion."

It took me a second, then I saw a scar, a ring around her bicep just under her shoulder. I reached down and lifted her to her feet, her eyes going wide as I did. "How's the arm feeling?" I asked.

She smiled, a fragile thing. "It... it does not hurt, but it feels as if it should. Like the ghost of pain."

I nodded, but frowned. "Shit. I'm sorry. I was kinda a little bit drunk when I did that. Fuck. Kitten? D'you think Sister Siobhan could do something?"

My Kitten looked up at me, smiled a silly little smile, and said, "I'm certain she'll come for you and try to help you with that."

Was that double entendre? My poor Goof brain is gonna overload you know. Out loud I said, "Would you mind if we called in a Healer, a real pro rather than an overpowered amateur like me, to take a look at it?"

The woman bowed her head. "As you like, Champion."

I shook my head and lifted her chin with a finger. "What's your name?"

"Anna, Champion."

"Okay, Anna. First thing, call me Tabitha." She gasped and tried to shake her head, but I interrupted with that finger under her chin. "You're a High Priestess of Dionysus. You took care of some of these women, some of these girls. You stood up for them, even when you knew all you could do was maybe buy them another few moments of freedom, of peace. You deserve at least as much respect as I do, Anna. Probably more." Her eyes just kept getting wider. "You're safe now, Anna." I took a deep breath, then announced to the room, "you're all safe here, as safe as the Heroes of Phileo can make you. As safe as Lancaster House can make you." I looked back down at her. "As safe as I can make you."

As I finished her whole body just kinda collapsed into me. I'd seen that before, too, when somebody finally let go. She leaned against me, trying not to cry, crying anyway. Of course, along with refugee snot dribbling down my tits I'd also gotten a strong whiff of 'living in a shack with no toilet', so I looked down at the pile of kids, pride warming me when I realized that no matter their relative sizes, Menace, her posse, and the horde hoard had surrounded the kids I'd brought back. Guarding them. My lips curved in something vaguely similar to a smile as I realized that no matter what I'd done to them, my little Menace would have done worse to any Spartan who threatened the kids she'd taken under her wing.

"Hey, Menace." She popped one eye open. "Bath time." As she stretched like a cat, nudging Liam and Maze awake, starting a chain reaction around the circle, I raised my voice again. "Anybody who still needs rest," it had been a day, but some of the ladies in here weren't physically tired, and exhaustion of the soul took as long as it took to heal. "You're welcome to stay here as long as you like. I'm pretty sure Marie and Bonnie can arrange for food for anybody who can't make it down to the dining room, but if you can, my buddy Larry puts out a real good spread. Before that, though, we've got a hot bath in the next room here," I knocked on the door, then spun the wheel to unlock it. "So if you wanna clean up, c'mon in as you're ready."

With that I swung the door open, and Menace led her little troop into the room, each of them guiding one or two of the other kids by the hand.

So fuckin' proud of that kid.