Dear Diary,

Sometimes I do something, because right there in that instant it seems like the Right Thing, but afterward I wind up beating myself up about it.

I'm not sure which is worse; when I find out that it wasn't the Right Thing, when the Right Thing has bad consequences, or when I haven't done that Right Thing for everybody, just for people in my close circle or my line of sight. I've mentioned before I've been told I self-sabotage. Yeah, I think this is definitely one of those things, but... what if it's not?

So yesterday evening, right when everything was looking rosy for your girl Tabitha? The Cousins Lancaster finally turned up like, as my mom would say, a Bad Penny, did unspeakable things to poor Bonnie, after which Larry and I showed them the error of their ways. Permanently, as in 'go directly to non-existence, do not go to Valhalla, do not collect two hundred virgins'. Then we wound up having to do the same to an octet of Valkyries who came for their souls. Which we had, as noted, turned into so much cosmic dust.

I may have also threatened to end existence. Just a little bit, until my wife talked me out of it, because she's cool like that.

So after all that, I decided that Bonnie deserved a lot fuckin' better than what she got, so after a deep heart to heart where I made Larry say out loud what had been going on in his head for the past month or so, I put her back together and stood her up on her feet. Then made sure she was willing to give life another chance, because it would be super shitty to bring someone back to life only to have them commit suicide.

Yeah, that was an absolutely PG-13 heartwarming moment. Bonnie and I popped back to the Mortal World right in front of Larry, whose mouth hung open where he'd been saying something to Lachlan and Raven. Whatever it was, our appearance cut him off immediately. He stood there, mouth hanging open, staring at Bonnie. She stood, hands clasped in front of her, her gaze flickering between his eyes and the ground at his feet. Finally, she managed to squeak out, "Larry...?"

I jumped a little bit when he moved, because our boy Larry has got some quickness in him. One second he was leaning against the railing, arm slowly slipping as he stared at her, the next he stood in front of her, pressed against her, one hand on each of her cheeks, kissing her with the kind of passion I'd only ever seen in movies and shit.

Okay, I'd experienced that kind of kiss. On the regular. With Saffron. Now and again with Marie, now that I thought about it.

Right then, right there, in that moment? I knew I'd done the Right Thing. Felt good.

Of course, a moment after that she got a little bit braver or a lot less scared, because she straight up pounced on him. Which, given that she was, like, normal woman sized to his slightly below average but duBois trained man sized, did little more than stagger him back into the railing as she locked her ankles behind him and her arms around his neck. Also, neither of them seemed to have a shortage of lung capacity, because by the time they came up for air Raven, Lachlan and I were looking at each other making 'how long are they gonna do that?' kinda gestures. By the time they finally broke that lip lock and pulled their faces back to maybe six inches apart, he'd got his hands clasped under her. Fingers laced together for her to sit on. Such a gentleman. My hands would totally have been exploring the topography of Saffron's ass by that point.

At any rate, without ever breaking eye contact with Bonnie, he said, "ah, Commander?"

"What you need, Larry?"

"I'd like to request some leave time, if you can spare me for a bit?"

I rolled my eyes. Trying to do better or not, our boy Larry still had that Lancaster rod and love of doing things By The Book. "How much time do you think you're gonna need?"

Bonnie leaned forward, whispered something to him, and laid her head on his shoulder. God, these two really were like the PG-13 version of me and Saffron. "I'll let you know as soon as I know?"

I laughed at that, and first Raven, then Lachlan joined in. Before Larry could get bent out of shape about it, I said, "you both take as long as you need, on one condition."

He looked at me finally, although his eyes had that tendency to glaze that told me Bonnie had stopped just 'laying her head on his shoulder'. "Of course, Commander. What condition?"

I smiled at him to let him know that while I was dead serious, I wasn't going to be a bitch about things. "If anything requiring, y'know, ceremonies, or witnesses pops up? You let me know, get it?"

He smiled at me, one of the first smiles I'd ever seen on his face that didn't have anything nasty attached, not even self-recrimination or snark. "Yes, ma'am. By your leave, then?"

"Go. Go, go, before she gets impatient and starts taking clothing off of the both of you right here!" Her head popped up at that, although whether to spout a denial or what I'll never know, because midway through turning to face me Larry intercepted her, mouth first, and she forgot all about me. Larry then proved that despite his time away, he remembered his own house just fine, as he navigated his way to the stairs and up them without ever opening his eyes or taking his lips off hers.

Once they'd gotten out of sight, I turned to the other two. "Lachlan?"

"Yeah?"

"I know you don't report to me, but I'd appreciate it if you could help Raven out for the time being?"

He shrugged, smiled down at Raven, and said, "sure!"

She rolled her eyes and looked at me. I said, "Raven?"

"Yeah, Commander?"

I chuckled a little. "Not sure I like that or not, but cool. I'm gonna go get some rest, because the past hour or so has been just a little bit exhausting. Are you okay enough to take over here until then?"

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She blinked a little at that. "Take over like...?"

"Get this place back in some kind of order, get the plans for taking in refugees in place, get the troops here at Lancaster House manning the defenses in shifts, and dole out supplies or troops to the other six as needed. Can you handle that? Remember, you'll have Lachlan to help if somebody needs to be sat on."

With each thing I'd added to the list, her face got a little paler, her eyes a little wider. "Me? Why me?"

"You remember what the chain of command is, right?"

She shrugged. "Not really. We never had any classes on that yet."

"It's the chain you or Lachlan beats somebody with if they give you any shit, because until Larry or I are ready to think coherently? The buck stops with you. So, can I count on you?"

Somewhere around me telling her to beat people with chains, one corner of her lips quirked up, and something other than deer in a headlights came into her eyes. She gave Lachlan the tiniest bit of side eye, then asked, "can I beat him if he gets out of line?"

I shrugged. "Whatever you got to do to get the job done. Just no permanent damage, or it comes out of your pay." With that, I turned and stumbled back to my room, closed the door, and stepped back to Phileo.

It took me a couple seconds to recognize the bare walls and plain furniture around me, at which point it took another panicked second to realize the reason. Then I remembered; we'd moved the day before. I stepped up to our new digs to find Saffron and Isnomi sitting on Isnomi's toddler bed, with the menace stroking her mom's hair as Saffron sat there with her elbows on her knees, her hands covering her face.

"Hi, honey. I'm home from work." She looked up at me, emotions racing through her eyes faster than I could track. Before she could say anything, I said, "I'm sorry. I lost my temper and said something I shouldn't have. Something that I didn't mean." Before she could interrupt, I spoke over her and said, "I'm sorry, and I'll try to do better in the future. But I understand if you..."

She stood, Isnomi dangling from her shoulders, with the little one's toes just touching the edge of her bed. "If I what?"

I couldn't look at her and say it. I had to look at her and say it. I closed my eyes for a second, took a deep breath, then opened them and looked right at her. "I understand if you don't want to be around me. For now. For a while. Forever."

She did much the same, closing her eyes, inhaling, then letting the air pour out in one long stream. She stepped toward me, opening her eyes and looking toward me. Isnomi balanced on tiptoes as she let go, then toppled forward to faceplant into the padded floor. I'd have been a lot more worried if I hadn't seen her peek up to see if I'd noticed. Then Saffron eclipsed everything in my world. "I want to slap you. To punch you. To hurt you, both like you hurt me when you lashed out, and more for good measure." She stopped, sighed again, and said. "Did you mean to hurt me?"

I closed my eyes. "In that moment? Yeah. I think so. I'm sorry."

I stood there in silence and darkness, listening to her breathing. "Were you in pain?"

I nodded. "Yeah."

"Had someone hurt you?"

I thought about that for a moment, my head tilting to the side and my eyes slipping open. "Yeah? Kinda? Indirectly?"

"So you were hurt. Confused?"

I shrugged. "Yes and no? I mean, at the time, everything seemed so crystal clear. So simple. But looking back? I was thinking about as straight as a fuckin' corkscrew".

"We'll call that a yes, then. People who are confused don't always know it. So you were hurt and confused. That's when I spoke to you?"

"Yeah."

"And you lashed out at me, because you couldn't lash out at the ones who hurt you?"

I stopped, a crooked grin crawling across my face, my head shaking just a little. "I could have. I could have hurt them. But there would have been some collateral damage."

She rolled her eyes, a different, but equally crooked grin twisting her lips. "Collateral? Like the entire world?"

"Maybe a little more than that? But yeah."

She walked up to me, straightened what remained of my uniform, then shook her head. "This is a complete loss, unless Marie has more stitch-witchery than we've seen just yet." She put her hands on my cheeks and tilted my gaze down until we stood there, eye to eye. "From now on, what do we do when we're considering apocalypse as a solution to problems?"

"Just say no?" Her hands tightened a little, and a twinkle lit in her eyes despite her frown. "Uh, talk to you first?"

She smiled up at me. "Good girl."

"Wait, wait, wait. Are you Momming me right now?"

She glanced down for a moment. "Maybe a little."

I snorted. "Guess I kinda needed it, but holy shit that makes some of the shit going through the back of my head even kinkier than it was previously. Possibly even pushing it into perverted."

She shook her head, then turned back to pick Isnomi up. For her part the menace just yawned hugely. "My girl, you are supposed to be in bed right now. You've had a full day, and you need your sleep to grow."

The little one's eyes got really big, and she said, "sweep to gwow?"

We both looked at her seriously, and Saffron nodded as she tucked her in. "Yes, Menace. You grow when you're asleep." Isnomi took one look at me when she said it, then plopped her head on her pillow, closed her eyes, and started fake snoring immediately. Saffron chuckled, then stood and walked over to me quietly, pretending like the little one had actually gone to sleep. After she'd pulled me into the outer room and closed the door, she looked up at me and said, "so. I forgive you completely on one condition."

I looked down at her, wanting to be all smooth and snarky, but my heart wasn't in it. I wanted her forgiveness more than air. "Name it."

"Before someone so rudely interrupted us," her brows drew down and she muttered, "for which I intend to express to them my displeasure..."

"Uh, about that?"

She looked up, a smile lurking behind her eyes. "Whatever did you do now?" she singsonged.

I put on my best naughty little girl voice and said, "I might have killed them and destroyed their souls." Her mouth dropped open. "Slowly." It snapped shut again, her smile growing. "And kinda did the same to their psychopomps."

I could feel her shivering in my arms, and it didn't really seem like the 'I'm scared' kind of shaking. Then she looked up at me and said, "I was going to say that I wanted you to show me what you intended when we were interrupted, but..."

I gave her my best puppy dog eyes and half whimpered, "but?"

The next moment my arms were empty; as I half-panicked looking around the room, I saw one of her slouching in the chair, facing the bed, where another of her lay, half covered by sheets and abso-fucking-lutely nothing else. As the sight of that latter completely drew in every bit of my attention, the her on the chair sing-songed, "that makes it even wetter."

Yeah, I got some really useful Co-Location practice overnight. Sleep? You can't Co-Locate while you're sleeping.

We spent most of the following day getting more Co-Location practice. One pair of us sat on the roof, cheering Isnomi on as she flew around on her hang glider. Another sat around in the living room in our suite at Lancaster House canoodling and answering questions when Raven needed a judgement call on something. The third pair? Yeah, we were back at the Academy in bed, very much not sleeping. I've said it before, I'll say it again, duBois training? Made shenanigans so. Much. Better.

Slept through the night last night, the sleep of the just, the blissful, and the exhausted.

Through the day today, tried to spend time putting myself back together. Like, both in a 'spending time talking about nothing with Saffron all day' and 'meditating under Loki's direction, feeling out the traceries of my scars where they ran all over my body'.

As we got ready to head to bed, someone came to knock on our door at Lancaster House. I looked at Saffron, and she nodded toward the door, so I got up and walked over. When I got there, Lancaster stood outside, Bonnie standing behind him holding his hand. With a hand made completely of matte black, reflectionless... something. She never even looked at me, her eyes fixed on him the entire time, grinning like an idiot. With teeth made of the same stuff.

Larry coughed, and when I focused back on him, said, "Commander, I had a request."

"Hit me."

"Could you pay a visit to my father with me tomorrow?"