Dear Diary,

I know that my beloved wife Saffron means well and is probably correct when she tells me I shouldn't call myself a dumbass, but it's also important to be truthful when self-reflecting, or so I've been told.

And sometimes my ass? Despite no longer being flabby, yet still being a hell of an ass due to my surprisingly impressive glutes? Is capable of impressive, even incredible dumbness.

This one in particular required like two minor leaps of logic to get from 'what I knew' to 'what I should have known', but the word 'leap' in that phrase? Really ought to be 'step'. Possibly even 'stumble'. Maybe 'my logic foot accidentally stepped there when I shifted my logic feet'.

So after helping Saffron Rae out by dangling ourselves in front of her husband like super sus Saffron Rae shaped hunks of meat, which wound up feeling like the world's weirdest combination of 'super niche-specific kinky hot as fuck' and 'surprisingly thoughtful and sweet', Saffron and I headed back to our new spots at the Academy to sleep for the night. We both knew this was likely to be our last night sleeping in the same bed without messing about with Translocation, we definitely messed around with a lot of Co-Location coupling and maybe a little bit of Shapeshifting shenanigans. Saffron Rae and her hubby Raymond are kinda hot in a well kept middle aged kind of way. Weird that I'm finally seeing the appeal of adult fun time cosplay than I ever did back in the world where, y'know, cosplay existed. I think my friend Illy's head might explode if I told her my wife and I could now perform a full yaoi scene with just the two of us. She'd sure as shit rupture something if we showed her. Marie joined in at the beginning and end of our debauchery; the former because she's literally built to enjoy doing that kind of shit, the latter because somebody had to get Saffron and I to settle down and get our asses some sleep. Even if we technically might not need it for physiological reasons, Saffron and Marie definitely needed it for psychological ones.

Okay, yeah, I probably did too. Even if my consciousness or mind or whatever spends every moment from falling asleep to waking up wandering Mimic's psyche, it still feels like a dream, so I guess it still does the same 'down time' shit for my psychology that it does for normal people. Or maybe it doesn't, and I'm slowly sliding into madness, which would really suck, mostly because I might hurt someone I cared about without knowing. Fuck on a stick, duBois is right. I have a knack for wrecking people's shit, and it extends to my own goddamned peace of mind. Anyway, last night's Mimic Dream was all over the fuckin' place. A bit more looking at the whatever-the-game-is not-tic-tac-toe board, some of what seemed almost literal navel gazing in the dark, and a bit of six distinct flavors of psychedelic tadpole right in said navel, which was new and not bad, but weirder than normal.

Got up, got dressed in my uniform, and since the menace was still in her room with the adjoining door closed had some unidirectional adult fun putting Glowing Midnight on Saffron. Okay, that's not quite true, because once Marie saw what I was doing she joined in, but I'm not sure what you'd call two people starting with a naked person and ending up with a fully dressed post-orgasmic person. Other than, y'know, 'hot as fuck' and 'little bit weird', which really fits as a description for most kinks, doesn't it?

We headed out before breakfast, each to our duties, which after the past couple days was more 'have a good day at work honey' the slightest bit bitter while mostly sweet than anything else. I couldn't even feel some kind of way about the food; I knew Saffron would get Drivers', Isnomi would get whatever she convinced Marie to cook for her, and for all I knew Marie got the same kind of Divinely-Inspired-satisfaction from cooking for loved ones that she got from hardcore sex. I got Lancaster House waffles, which really tells you something about the quality of Lancaster House waffles, that I couldn't really count myself as the 'loser' when placed against Drivers' cream filled crepes and Marie popping off while making, y'know, anything, what with her ability to turn random bullshit into haute cuisine.

Breakfast in the dining room at Lancaster House, with me seated just to Bonnie's left, was a little weird, but entirely funny endearing weird.

"I do actually have two functional hands now, love, and I'm a big girl. I can cut my food and feed myself, both." She cut up her waffles with comically exaggerated gestures to demonstrate.

I'm not sure when it happened, but at some point in the past couple weeks? Maybe even the past couple days? My man Larry had straight up left fear and anything related to it, like 'embarrassment', in the ditch on the side of the road like an old tattered set of briefs. "I'm well aware of both of your hands and how skilled you are with them, sweet Bonnie. I just enjoy feeding you."

Bonnie might or might not be the Girl Without Fear, but she sure as shit gave no fucks when it came to other people's opinions about her feelings about Larry. She smirked, said, "you just enjoy putting things in my mouth," then opened wide and said, "aaaaah."

He speared a three tall stack of waffle squares on a fork, slid it between her lips, and said, "that as well, yes."

A waffle or so later, Larry quietly said, "fuck."

"Right here? Okay." She reached to push her chair back, but stopped with a smile when Larry shook his head laughing.

"No, love. I'm mildly surprised that I could seemingly lose the knack for eating syrup covered food without getting my hands or anything else sticky in under two days." He'd set his fork down and held up his right hand, which had a thin rope of shining syrup stuck to the side.

Bonnie, for her part, slid her chair forward again, grabbed his hand, and said, "not surprised at all. I didn't mean for it to happen, but I think I rewarded you being sloppy a bit more than either of us realized." She then demonstrated exactly how few shits she gave about that by licking the side of his hand where the syrup had been.

He laughed, a thing made out of equal parts amused frustration and open affection. "I appreciate your efforts, love, but I'm afraid your tongue is no less sticky than my hand at the moment." He leaned back and looked to the side. "Oscar?"

A moment or two later one of the butler guys stepped to Larry's side holding out a gently steaming washcloth. Larry took it in his free hand, grabbed the sides of Bonnie's chin with his sticky-sided hand, then gently but firmly wiped her face clean while her eyes sparkled with mischief. While he shook his head affectionately and wiped his sticky hand clean, he said, "it seems we've both picked up some sloppy habits recently."

"Or what you were just doing brings back pleasant memories of the past few days. Any complaints?"

"None at all, love. But we really do have work to do today, and that means we ought finish breakfast."

Overall breakfast was fun. I think most of us lost at least one bite to Bonnie and Larry's ongoing back and forth. I sure as shit wasn't intending to interrupt the show with boring shop talk. I saved all that shit for the end.

Midway through breakfast, Lachlan tried to feed Raven, who sat across from me, a sausage on a fork. She shut him down with the coldest look I'd ever seen someone give a person they didn't intend to kill in the next scene, so since neither of them pushed it past that, I back burnered it until after breakfast. When everybody'd hit the filling in the corners stage, I set my fork down and cleared my throat. "Okay, guys. The last couple of days have been fun, but just like Larry said, we've all got work to do. Before I take Angel, Bill, Fred, and Linus back to their units to keep up the sweep and clean and picket, I'd like all ten of us here, plus Lachlan, to inventory what we've got in terms of supplies, both here and in all the farmsteads we've touched base with so far. We need a list of manpower, skills, equipment, and supplies, so we can make sure nobody starves over the winter, that any perishable food gets eaten before it perishes, that we aren't shitting in our own cereal when we send something to one of the farmsteads that needs it, and that all our troops have everything they need to stop Calverton when it comes."

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

Bill perked up a little at that. "Don't you mean if?"

I shook my head, realizing not everyone here knew the full tally of the dickwads formerly known as Lancaster's crimes. "Larry's former cousins, instead of scouting, decided to see how many war crimes and assorted unforgivable atrocities they could perform before they headed back here to do the same."

Carruthers looked confused. "Former cousins?"

Larry fielded that question by answering, "they committed unforgivable acts. I executed them."

Carruthers, lovable idiot he is, asked, "doesn't that leave us kinda short of Heroes?"

Larry's brows started to draw down, then he shook his head, realizing that Carruthers wasn't being deliberately dense. Dense as fuck yeah, but that's just Carruthers. He slowly repeated, stressing the first word, "I executed them. Mostly all at the same time. Alistair was earlier, and Charles ran away until the Commander caught him."

That got a few wide eyes from those that hadn't been privy to those details previously. Then Carruthers cut in again. "But, there's only one of you. Yeah, I get it, you can kill Heroes, but what if they come at us from more than one direction at a time?" Still kind of reeling from the shock of listening to Carruthers making a valid logical point, I cleared my throat, only to have him say, "okay, but two is still way less than eight. What about three ways?" While that phrasing had some of us at the table having to choke back laughter, it was nice to have Carruthers reassure us that he was still, along with 'broad of shoulder' and 'pure of heart', 'dumb of ass'.

Not unlike myself, but I'm getting there. Because right at that moment I think the brain cell that had been orbiting in Carruthers' skull did some kind of orbital slingshot maneuver and hammered into my own brain. "Senior Cadet Laurence Lachlan!"

"Yes, Commander?"

"You are hereby requested and required to accept promotion to the status of Hero, effective immediately, any previously accepted orders still in force."

"Yes, Commander!" His voice echoed through the dining room in a way it hadn't a moment before, and I knew that the little gamble I'd just taken had paid off. Lachlan radiated a sense of presence that I hadn't felt from him since before he died, and even there whatever mojo being a 'Hero' gave him was clearly more than whatever 'Heir' had.

I blinked at the sudden reminder that, here and now? Titles Meant Something.

"Unfortunately for us, I don't think any of the rest of us have completed training, so we're not Senior Cadets."

While everybody else was still frantically pondering what I'd just done, Carruthers, for whom 'ponder' was a strange, arcane activity taken by the not-dumb-of-ass, shrugged and said, "three is a lot closer to half of eight than two is, I think."

Without anybody asking him, Oscar broke out a bottle of fizzy wine, and had it open before Larry could put his foot down, not to kill the celebration or even the alcohol, but to all of us sharing the one bottle, since none of us could really afford to get drunk at breakfast today. Still tacked about half hour onto breakfast between the congratulations and Lachlan showing off just a little by doing shit like lifting Bill and Linus at the same time in their chairs, one in each hand. As we broke up to go about our day I said, "Larry, coordinate everything if you would? Hero Lancaster, Cadet Aetos, please stay, I need to speak with you."

When everybody else cleared off, I looked at the two and sighed. "Okay, Lachlan, I get that you meant the whole sausage thing as a well-intentioned joke, but you need to realize, especially with your new Hero status, that you could totally push somebody into doing shit they didn't want to."

He sighed, closed his eyes, and nodded. "I apologize, Commander." He half turned to Raven. "I apologize Raven. Cadet Aetos."

Before I could say anything, Raven shook her head a little and said, "Raven's fine, Lachlan."

When he opened his eyes he had nearly as much confusion in them as he or Carruthers ever had. "Then what... I don't... But we..."

I cut him off, not ungently, saying, "Raven? Since I'm not sure I have all the details, could you do me a favor and explain it to him?"

She shrugged. "Sure, Commander." She turned to face him, clearly buoyed past any intimidation factor he might have by being twice her size and a Hero to boot by the fact that I was pretty clearly supporting her in this. "I was horny as fuck last night, you're not ugly, and you seemed pretty ready to go yourself. But you're really not my type, so barring some kind of similar situation, which I don't foresee, it was a one time thing, okay?"

"I'm not your..." he trailed off, and Raven looked at me. We shared a moment of wordless communion regarding the nature of attractive men before both of us snorted out a laugh. Lachlan pulled himself back, but he did so with a slow headshake and self-effacing grin. "I hope you'll let me know if you change your mind, for another one time or otherwise. Last night was fun."

She smirked up at him and replied, "I didn't say it wasn't, but like I said, you're really not the kind of guy I could see looking down at every night for the rest of my life, okay?"

He nodded, shrugged, and held out a hand. "I apologize for any offense given. Friends?"

She reached up, her hand absolutely engulfed in his. "Apology accepted, you're forgiven, and yeah, Friends. No benefits though, got it?"

He chuckled, shrugged, and after letting go of her hand and taking a step back so he was clearly outside of her personal space, said, "hey, a guy can dream, can't he?"

"Okay, you two. Off to work. Both of you let me know if you think you need me to intervene again, or if you see anything similar going on that you can't clear up yourself, right?"

"Yes, Ma'am!" They both saluted and walked off, following the rest of the Cadets.

Right as I started to push myself back from the table, Saffron's thought reached me. Love, do you have time to speak with General Lancaster for a moment?

I pushed myself to my feet in the command building, standing behind Saffron's chair. "Sure." I looked at the General, who nodded. "What did you need to speak with me about, General?"

He waved me over to a corner of the room away from the main table. "Nothing that ought impede the Council's progress on their current tasks." When we both stood at a distance where a reasonable speaking voice wouldn't interrupt conversation at the table. "First, I wanted to thank you, both for your efforts on behalf of Lancaster House in general, and for whatever you have done to bring my son to his current state. I'd previously feared for the future of House Lancaster, and I no longer do. I may not agree with you, your methods, his changes, or his choices, but I no longer fear for the future of my House in the slightest."

I blinked a little. "Wow. Thanks, General. I mean, you're welcome, I was just doin' the right thing as I saw it at the time. Just doin' my job, y'know?"

His mouth quirked for a moment as he said, "one of the few points you and I will likely ever agree completely on; doing one's duties as we see them to the best of our ability." The smile vanished, he sighed and said, "although I believe in this case I may have made assumptions regarding yourself and your relationship with your Deity that both made your task harder and your successes all the more impressive."

He didn't sound like he meant to insult me. Like, not even 'backhanded compliment' insult. He sounded like he really meant that he'd fucked up with his assessment of me. "What assumption?"

"I expected that given your apparent closeness with Loki, he would have given you the Boon of Farsight."

My face scrunched up as I thought about what he'd said. "You mean Scrying?"

Without a pause, he replied, "scrying is a Mortal Magical art, but from what I'm given to understand it mirrors the Boon of Farsight closely enough that the two are easily mistaken for one another. The only real difference would be the source of skill and power; Scrying is, as noted, a specialized form of Mana Shaping, whereas Farsight is granted by a Deity."

I shrugged and said, "cool. Good to know. Loki hasn't Booned me Farsight, but he's been teaching me some Scrying. Kind of how I knew almost-but-actually-a-second-too-late-but-not-really that that thing," I nodded toward the big old hunk of rock in the room, "was about to squish Saffron and the rest of the diplomatic party."

He looked a little confused, a weird look on him to be sure, and said, "I thought I'd heard you mention something of the sort. Are you not far enough along in your studies to use the Scrying Room in Lancaster House?"

That caught me off guard, as you might imagine. "Scrying room?"

"Ground floor, underneath the dining room, pictures of Lancaster House and all the farmsteads and villages under our protection on the floor?"

My face kinda slid into 'fuck' with a side of 'really?'. "The Map room?"

He laughed, "I would hardly call that a 'map'. It's barely a suggestion of a 'map'. But the pictures?"

"Yeah?"

"Not only as accurate as can be done with the world's finest artisan artists and no lack of funding, but also created with, I am told, materials taken from the farmsteads and villages themselves."

As my palm unerringly sought my face, I muttered, "shit. Thanks for the info, General, but I've got some scrying to do."

I'd seen the pictures, seen how closely the farmsteads I'd seen were represented, but never even thought about, y'know, attempting to use them as Scrying connections.

Compleat Dumbass, thy name is Tabitha.