Dear Diary,

Sometimes the hardest part about being an adult is recognizing the flaws in the morals you were taught as a kid while simultaneously acknowledging that morals can be important, and being careful to distinguish between fucked up morals that only support entrenched exploiters and morals that had a real reason, but got fucked up over time.

Yeah, I'm in a pondery mood. Gotta say, that whole 'armored antics' thing? Hits different when somebody with skill and intent made the armor in question. I mean, shit, not like any of us are used to wearing any armor except the shit the Academy apparently sneaks into our jackets. Which explains exactly why they're so fuckin' refractory in terms of ways they're not intended to move. Makes sense they weigh more than you'd expect too. Really kind of surprised they don't go 'clink' or shit when you drop them on the ground, but I'm guessing the whole 'multiple layers of super refractory fabric' sandwiching the non-fabric parts stops that too.

Just gonna put it out there, for an apparently AroAce dude, Conrad has an incredible eye for clothing and accoutrements to light groins on fire on sight. Between that, three odd days of Saffron and Marie deliberately winding me up, and our mutual reaction to me wrecking shit on the 'field of Honor', it wasn't even armored antics. That shit straight got elevated straight past antics, shenanigans, even tomfoolery, and wound up leaping straight up to escapades. I'm pretty sure either the Library walls are soundproofed, which would make sense, or everyone in bordering rooms just likes that soundtrack as background noise for studying.

Wait, wait, wait. I absolutely wasn't into Saffron accidentally nailing my lady bits with a Stabilize in the ring, but adored Marie going full on super sadist in the Infirmary. Armored solo Antics were boring, but I am both narcissistic enough to have gotten my romp on with Saffron Mimicking me and armored Saffron for brunch turned into Epic Mealtime. Holy shit, I'm apparently some kind of shenanigan elitist. A nookie connoisseur. A bang gourmet.

I think I need to go sit down a bit or some shit, because the idea that I have Standards is absolutely shaking the foundations of my world more than me being, y'know, the moral compass of my fucked up little family.

For what it's worth, the armor didn't come off until some time before dinner. The most disturbing thing to me about our extended shenanigans though, wasn't anything about the armor or clothing or any shit like that. Frankly all of that is under the sheets vanilla missionary kinda tame compared to the shit Marie and apparently I are into. Pride of place for that went to Marie licking me clean some time after round two. I really don't quite remember details other than, well...

"Uh... Saffron?"

"Mmm hmm?"

"What're you doing?"

"Hmm..." followed by a snicker from both of them.

"Guys... guys? Guys!"

I don't remember anything in any kind of detail after that, but somehow Saffron assisting with ingestion of miscellaneous body bits weirded me out way more than Marie doing so. Maybe it's the whole 'upright tiger' part of things? Maybe some part of me remembered that the first blood I got on me yesterday was, in fact, my beloved Kitten using her own precious bodily fluid as body paint? I know I felt some kinda way, but I also know that afterward, when my brain got as coherent as it ever is, her only response was, "you kept calling for guys, and there were no guys in the room."

Of course, if yesterday did anything really well, it was getting us back on a daytime schedule, because we all stumbled down to the Academy Dining Hall in uniform, smiling and goofy. The other Cadets didn't seem to mind, exactly, although a couple of them pointed and laughed when we started feeding Marie when she came by with more food. I had a serious moment of dissonance there, too. Not because I like being the target of somebody else's humor or anything. Weird, being so totally down with subbing down to complete Agency surrender, yet not having anything really resembling a humiliation kink, but whatever. No, I got weirded because I realized I was having too much fun and enjoying myself too much to care all that much about what some Freshman Cadet thought about it.

I mean, not so much that I didn't Co-Locate in between them an dropped an arm over each of their shoulders. "Hey, guys. Having a good time?"

One of them froze. The other, who I realized had a weird orange and blue nametag, tried to shrug me off. Then tried again. By the third time when I let him go he stumbled, slipped, and sat his ass down right on his own tray of food. "The fuck are you?"

He had a bit of a weird accent, but his buddy sounded pure Philly. "Shut up, Shut Up, SHUT UP!" he hissed out.

I squeezed him just a little, a friendly bro hug, and said, "no, no, I want to see where this goes. Where are you from?"

"New Amsterdam. Where, apparently, we know the difference between servants and peers."

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His friend choked on air, wheezing out something that sounded a lot like, "you dumb shit."

I turned to the smart one of the pair. "Didn't I see you laughing right along with him?"

"Peer pressure?" He looked up at me hopefully.

"Oh! I know this one! Do you know what the technical definition of peer pressure is?" His eyes got wide as he shook his head, once. "That's where I see how much pressure you can survive when I drop you under a pier."

His eyes slid closed. "Sorry."

I gave him another side bro hug. "Hey, no worries. It starts with sorry, right? Everybody fucks up. I sure fuckin' do. All the goddamned time, it seems. But you recognize your mistakes, you apologize to anybody you hurt, you learn better, and you move on. Right?"

"Absolutely, ma'am."

"Now, I'm gonna save you from another big, big mistake before you make it. Okay?"

"Yes, ma'am."

I looked him straight in the eye to make sure he was listening rather than just cowering in fear. "Okay, then. Here goes. If you see somebody in the same uniform as you here? Even if they've got a weird nametag?"

"Yes?"

"They got in, same as you. So if you're smarter than them? They're probably stronger than you. If you're stronger than them? They're probably smarter than you. If you're smarter and stronger and faster and just all around better than them?"

He looked a little confused, but said, "Yes, ma'am?"

"They still made it in, which means they've got something. Maybe some talent that will help raise your life from a scrabble for survival into a life of joy, surrounded by beauty. Maybe the courage to step in front of you and take the hit that would end you. Maybe the sheer crazy optimism that will change your entire way of looking at the world. And even if they've got none of that, if after every generous assessment you can make of them, you still objectively see that in each and every way they're a lesser version of you?"

"Yeah?" I knew I had him now. WTF Tabitha in full effect on his face.

"At that point? It's your job as the stronger of the two of you to protect them. Like fuckin' Heroes do. Got it?"

At this point blue and orange dipshit managed to stand back up, although my forearm still lay over his shoulder. "I ask again, who the fuck are you to try and tell me that I shouldn't treat servants as servants?"

With a gentle downward pressure I sat the smarter of the pair back in his seat, then took the other Cadet, 'Prellwitz' by his nametag, under my arm and guided him back over to the ROTC table. "Oh, no, you shouldn't respect her because I told you to. Marie!"

Marie set a tray down in front of the me at the table, then stepped directly over to stand in front of us. Prellwitz' brow furrowed when he saw me obviously sitting over there, but I nudged him. "Cadet Prellwitz, may I introduce Maenad Marie, Phileo City Heroic Academy Head Maid, and holy shit does she deserve that title, as well as Champion of Dionysus. Could you give Cadet Prellwitz a smile, sweetie?"

A broad smile stretched across her face, showing off a mouth full of fangs designed to rip and tear. Then she up and curtsied to the Cadet. Real low, like, bowed head, knees to the floor kind of thing. Which let me look right down her cleavage, so I decided to be merciful. "Thanks, hot stuff." A tiny blush showed up through her fur right under her eyes. I turned to Prellwitz and said, "During the recent fracas with Calverton, Ares sent eight High Priests in Cold Iron plate to stop me. Something about him being pissed off about me not murdering the fuck out of another of his High Priests."

"Wait... are you?"

"So instead of being stupid and going after the hit squad sent to hit me, I asked Murder Mittens here for help." Omigod watching her blush! So cute! "I think it took you what, sixty seconds to turn all eight of them into a pile of assorted body parts?" She shrugged. I swear I heard a subsonic giggle. "Now Marie here is special, no doubt. My absolute favorite. But I'm betting any other four maids could have done the same thing, right Marie?"

She shrugged. "Six."

I nodded. "Okay, honey. You're the expert." I turned to Prellwitz. "Now, you know the important takeaway from that?" His head jerked. "She is, in fact, the expert. I've got a lot of talent for, as Marshall duBois says, 'wrecking shit'. But her? She's got over four hundred years of experience dedicated to taking shit apart and putting it back together again, usually in tasty or comfy ways. Understand?"

"Who the fuck are you?"

I stepped back, threw one arm around Marie's waist to lean into her, popped The Dress on, and held out a hand. "Tabitha Diaz. Good to meet you!"

He squeaked, froze, and toppled over onto the floor. A moment later duBois stood there, hands on his hips, shaking his head. "Are you breaking my transfer Cadets now, Diaz?"

"Oh, no, sir! Just introducing him to Maid Marie, maybe explaining some of our Phileo social norms, sir!"

He chuckled, reached down, and lifted Prellwitz to dangle. "Damn. Kinda hoped I wouldn't have to deal with him tomorrow. You mind coming down and helping out with PT?"

I sighed. "I'm really trying to cool down from dealing with Norfolk, sir. But since I've still got political crap to do down there, I'm guessing I need to start the whole 'physical cooldown' now, so sure."

"I'll see you there." He walked off, towing Prellwitz. "C'mon, Cadet, let's get you to the infirmary."

So after a nice dinner I slept through the night, enjoying late night chibi Chef snacks. No shrimp, I'm guessing due to it being night, but my chibi Chefs started doing fancy flips and shit during their auto-yeeting. Dinner and a show!

Spent Saturday in the Practice Yard. Brought Saffron and Menace along, because I hadn't spent much Menace time lately, and watching Saffron exercise? Always high on my list. He had us help teach the new crop of Cadets how to lead somebody taller than you, or follow somebody shorter. Kinda weird, especially with having to watch my strength so much. I mean, I didn't accidentally hurt anybody. If anything, crushing Ericson's overengineered skull between my thighs was an excellent object lesson on how physically strong I'd gotten with my Mimicking shenanigans. But at one point Prellwitz hurt himself on me when I moved just the way a lead is supposed to and he... didn't follow.

I was nice enough to personally Heal him before he even finished wetting his damn pants.

Y'know, I'm gonna get really pissed if I finally decide to get me some cock and find out that along with making babies shit themselves I've now got the mystical power to make boys piss themselves.

Might help sort the men from the boys, though.