While I'm very glad to see Gable again I wasn't exactly expecting this.

Don't get me wrong, I love Gable's place. His secret hobbit home deep in the woods is a magical sanctuary, both literally and figuratively. It's a place I would have grown to love if I didn't already, charming in its simplicity and secrets.

It's a wonderful place.

But I just don't....like...the chickens.

They're not really chickens. They lay eggs and all but they're essentially little raptors.

No one likes the damn 'chickens' okay!

So here I am, running around gathering the second round of eggs aka running for my life. Those chicken are vicious! They definitely need to be whacked more than a couple of times if I have any chance of escaping with all my ligaments and veins intact. At least they seem tired out already, not as vicious in chasing me down. Someone else obviously got the first round of eggs.

"Why don't you have normal chickens?!"

I pant as I enter through the not so secret to me porthole window to the kitchen. It's not visible from the outside but those inside have a perfect view.

No way am I risking going through the door properly when I can fit through this just fine. Not wasting those precious minutes running and hitting some tiny dinosaurs. What if they get me? Again?!

Gable shrugs from whatever he was working on, looking more like an Elfen witch than a man in his own kitchen. Like I really wasn't just forced to run and fight for my little delicate life to get him some eggs.

"Those are normal chickens. It's the newer domesticated breeds that are strange."

"You mean ones that don't have as many teeth? Or attack instincts?"

"They're good at egg-laying. Not for eating. " he answers as if that was all that anyone needed to defend raising tiny dinosaurs.

Not like I was ever going to argue against Gable in the first place.

I'm from a different world with less ....lethal....farm animals. Obviously I have some skewed standards.

Somehow, sometime in between arriving and setting me to work with chores, a baby high chair had magically appeared. Lilyanne sat snug as a bug in it, gleefully clapping at anything that floated by.

Wow what a difference in treatment!

"Would you prefer to be in a high chair yourself Rosalia?" questioned Gable without even looking over his shoulder. Yet he still sees me staring.

"No thank you, I'm ok with the chickens. Well not those chickens, you know what I mean."

Please don't imprison me like a baby. I was just looking.

"Funny how all you young ones seem to hate egg duty the most. "

That's because the eggs are laid and guarded by literal dinosaurs. Little fat raptors with feathers. I recall quite a few calls from Gable that featured Lukas either screaming feathery murder or recovering from said egg duty. Once I received another side- Gable care package with nothing but a feather inside, I assumed Lukas was dead and eaten.

See he may be bigger, older and faster but I have a magic bag to my advantage. I'm pretty sure his only allocated weapon is the egg gathering basket.

It's good....agility training I suppose?

That's what grampa would say.

Speaking of which, where is that kid?

I haven't heard even an echo of his megaphone decibel voice since I got here. Now that's saying something.

It's interesting though, how this place has obviously changed in so many little ways. On the first impression, it's exactly the same, still the Hobbit home I love. But now there are all these signs that a child obviously lives here full time. A real one.

For one there's a lot more scuffs and damage to the otherwise pristine wooden floors. And the chairs are more mismatched as if they've been replaced slowly here and there.

In the other rooms on the way here, there are certain spots that give it away. A small desk crammed with water-damaged books in the library, more stools and messy scrawling scrolls in the main workroom, tiny little cool knick-knacks and crude animal figures everywhere. It just feels more, not really messy so much as lived in.

Gable has the magical ability to clean but there are still all these little messes and signs that scream 'Lukas was here!'. Small socks in the corners, tiny fingerprints smeared, all that and more.

Okay to be fair, some of the bigger messes scream more 'Grampa was here!'. Those are definitely his fat boots in the outer closet. And his stinky stuff in the inner closets. Definitely Grampa's messes.

Speaking of which....

"Gable, is Lukas off with Grampa? I don't see either of them. The other day gramps kidnapped Amar too, are they together?" I ask, climbing over to his counter area to hand over the eggs. It just makes sense.

Gable nods, accepting my hard-earned offerings, aka chores. Aka surviving the chickens, again.

"Yes, they should be back soon. They're just off getting fresh milk and some things."

"Milk?"

Like the grocery store? We don't exactly have a local mini mart or supermarket here. Besides, doesn't Gable keep the old goat for that? If it's with grampa it can't be good news.

"It's....a more specialized kind. Besides, it's good to let those boys ...and Ronald, tire out. By the way, bring this to your sister and let her charge off some steam will you Rosalia?"

"Well ok."

I expected more seemingly plain magical rocks but Gable slides something even more surprisingly mundane. Lilyanne and I have zapped up some weapons and amulets before but I can't say we ever charged a spoon. Or a ladle. Or a bowl?

Hey, there's a first time for everything. If anyone had a secretly magical spoon I would think it would be Gable afterall. Shrugging off the request I gather up the utensils and patter my way over to Lilyanne. She's a bit difficult to reach while in her new high chair but nothing I can't stack and climb over.

Take my hand and this spoon Lilyanne, it's magical zap zap time! Don't want you getting sick again.

As I sit there feeling for the gauge on when to take the spoon away from her sticky hands, I can't help to marvel how easy it really was in the end. My Lilyanne's health problems, a defining characteristic of her person, her fate, was that simple to solve.

No prolonged doctors visits. No far away treatment plans in other lands. Not even some physical therapy? There's no need for it, not when the problem has finally been identified and the treatment so readily available.

She can grow up like a normal, though pampered, little girl. She doesn't need to hurt through any more spells or fevers. Of course it would be good if she could be healthier, that was part of my initial goals while I'm still in this household. A healthier Lilyanne is less of a burden to not only me but everyone. It's why my parents even have the luxury of bothering with me.

In no way was that nerd of a father ever so annoying to Rosalia before. In no way did my mother hover so much over me, let alone pay so much attention to me.

That I can reason out. Healthier Lilyanne means more time and mental resources to deal with your other kid. So yay, good for Lilyanne. May she grow up to be a better, less vulnerable person.

Amazing, Gable really is amazing. Of course, he is, of course, he would figure it out.

But my brain doesn't shut off just because I actually trust someone. I wish I was more intelligent, wiser and all that crap. But I'm rather normal, I see a pattern and I see holes, but I can't see the answer to them.

Where was Gable in the last life?

Where was he? I...never formally met him, I think. I'm not sure why.

He seems close with mother, he's terribly close with grampa...why wasn't he in the picture in the last lifetime? Why didn't he come save Lilyanne? It would have saved us a lot of headache and heartache.

Of course he's not obligated to do so, not then and not now.

It's just odd.

Where was he then? What was he doing? What changed now?

The only factor I can isolate is me. But I can't figure anything further.

The only difference is that I found Gable first, through the mess of unfortunate events sans Grampa. If Gramps decided to catapult a real toddler as he did me, the kid may have died out of shock before they even landed by bird. Unless Rosalia passed out with a great episode of amnesia I'm sure I would have some recollection of that trauma, no matter how young I was.

Let's just blame Grampa again. Yes, this is all grampa's fault. Was he a reincarnator in the last timeline too, he must have been, it's still him. What does that mean in the grand scheme of it all? See this is too much deep thinking, let's set it aside to never think about again.

"You know what's the weirdest part Gable?"

Of course I'm sure I wasn't speaking out loud without realizing it again, that's a terribly stupid habit. Where the hell does it come from? No, I mean to speak directly to Gable this time.

"Hmm?" he hums, completely oblivious to the dissemination going on in my tiny little head.

As if this was normal, but it is to him. This, this entire world is normal to everyone but me, the one with all these lifetimes of memories. Geez how does grampa deal with reality? Maybe he doesn't, that would explain a lot.

Lilyanne burps and gnaws on the spoon, unintentionally charging it though her wet gums and baby teeth. The kitchen tinkers and boils away. It's peaceful here. It makes me ill-advised to break it, no matter how many questions I have. More than will ever be answered.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

"Gable, the strangest part is why you have a baby chair. No really, the design of it, this is 'modern'. No one has baby high chairs, how did you come up with this? How many weird things does grampa tell you about?"

Questions I'm not brave nor proactive enough to ask about.

I'm still recovering from the last 'talk' I had with grampa ok. Club reincarnation sucks, really don't wanna have the next meeting anytime soon, as important as they are. How are these things scheduled anyways? Is it like, bi-annual or whatever?

That sounds painful but reasonable. Even more so than my arranged meetings with my baby fiance.

But I suppose it's gotten easier after that. An interdimensional ice breaker, sorta, it's complicated.

I can let more things slip. Less worrying about what I have to keep secret to hide, especially from the fearful old man himself.

If anyone finds me odd, as they rightfully should, they just blame grampa or my father for teaching me weird things. Our staff is already used to much odder things, they don't even blink at me or anything I demand to do.

What a terrible reputation this family has. From the way people either pray to or cower at 'Lady Maria', mother's not exactly spotless either. What a dysfunctional family this is.

Gable needs to take me away more often.

"Not exactly, this 'baby' chair as you call it is based on an executioner's seat So it would be incorrect to say no one has it, though certainly not for infants. Yes it was modified by Ronald though, morbid really. "

Explained Gable, floating away a few items that he had finished and pulling out a few more, including some books. Is he cooking or experimenting on some research? It's hard to tell.

Apparently Grampa used a similar chair on mother when she was young, much to Gable's then horror. Since, you know, an innocent baby sat where a then to be sentenced criminal would be bound., Ready for public execution. Lovely comparison, but it's just a high chair people. No need to be so terrified.

"That's....exactly what Ronald would say." sighs Gable, "Unfortunately for me, Ronald likes to tell me about every other random thing that flies through his head. There is no true distinction or meter to judge on. Things he should tell me about, say important future events or any practical information, he finds irrelevant and keeps mum. Random....things... he finds very...fascinating."

"That sounds like gramps alright, you sure have it hard."

"Yes quite....last night I got an earful on.... subjects such as the obscure mating process of migrating seasonal fish. The such."

"Like salmon- err the pink ones."

"....Yes... like the pin crested Nerka...I don't want to ask how you know that?"

"They're in season right?! See at this time of year they swim up from the ocean to our freshwater rivers to lay their eggs and we have a similar fish called salmon where I'm from. The eggs have to be sprayed out into the water before males can fertilize them in a similar manner but if you catch a female with full egg sacs, they're really tasty with soy sauce over rice-"

Oh would you look at that. The spoon in my shared grasp with Lilyanne tingled in my hand. Charging time is up. Onto the next thing, a spatula? Sure, chew on this Lily.

Gable's current experiment must not be going too well because he looks to be resigned, face in his palms to hide his tired frustration. He's muttering how the results are the same, how sad.

Fighting Gable!

This random talk has me hungry though. I really miss salmon, like sushi style and stuff. I wasn't just going off randomly when I started talking about ikura, I really miss soy sauce and sweet short grain rice. Miss a lot of things really. Shush now tummy, we can't have what's not possible. At least not until I make it possible.

Don't know how but I'll figure it out. I'm super rich now after all.

Gable seems to distract himself when he hears my tummy go off since my stomach doesn't listen to my brain obviously.

"Rosa hungwi! Rum rum!"

".....eat your spatula Lily."

"Rumm gwaaa noms."

My little twin is perfectly content to suckle on the corner of the kitchen utensil. Thanks for outing me sis.

"Hmmm, Rosalia, would you say you consume more than your sister?"

Ack! How could you ask that Gable?! I'm a delicate little lady and....oh screw it. I pucker my lips in thought on how to word this.

"Mmmmm...yes. Father says I eat a lot more, like lots more. But it's just snacks! I sneak out a lot more and stuff. Okay and at meal times, but Lily is getting better since we figured out her fever source! She eats a lot at meal times."

"Are your portions about the same then, at meal times?

I see the feather pen scribbling the observations into a notebook in the air and deduce this is Doctor Gable time. No need to be shy, it's all for a medical reason yes. But a girl still feels shy when confronted about her weight, no matter how old she is.

"....no. I eat ...like....1/3 more? Sometimes double."

"And how much more snack times?"

"I don't know, no really I can't say. There's a lot of kitchen experiments that I need to taste, and snacks for before and after my training or lessons. Lilyanne gets snack time too! Just...maybe twice a day."

"Hmmmm, I see."

And I take...an uncountable number. I wouldn't say a dozen or anything, though some days may be like that.

If food shows up then it's snack time. If a kitchen staff has tasters for me or if a troop member wants to tip me a new goodie from their travels, then it's definitely snack time.

It's fine, right? I'm a toddler, we're supposed to be focused on gaining fat and nutrients. I should not have to be feeling weight conscious for a good number of years!

My twin and I are about the same size though.

True, I'm much sturdier. The kind of toddler that looks like you could toss into a ball pit without any fear. But for the most part, we're not that different. I'm not anywhere near overweight and she looks perfectly healthy, not underweight at all. We're both chubby baby mochis. We burn calories in different numbers, so it would make sense we need different intake amounts. I highly doubt staying with my mother and the maids are very strenuous activities. Though I do hear Lilyanne likes rolling around on the floor when she gets bored. I claim no responsibility for that ok, no matter what Mother says.

Gable sets down the pen and book to soothingly smooth down my hair and forehead.

"No need to worry yourself Rosalia, it's nothing to be concerned about. You're both perfectly healthy despite your different habits."

I can't help but to puff my cheeks, it's hard controlling emotions in this sensitive young body.

"You're not going to say I eat too much?" I ask.

"No, absolutely not." the perfect man answers.

"And you're not just saying that to make me feel better?" I still poke and prod.

"If you think you eat too much Rosalia, then you should see Lukas." Gable says.

"He's like 5 though? Of course, he needs more nutrients." I bring up as if I wasn't a toddler myself.

Gable pats my head and checks a meter sort of thing floating around Lilyanne. In front of me a plate floats down, the parts and pieces of snacks piling up together. Fruits, olives, nuts and bits of cheese pile up with a bread roll.

"Six actually, he just turned 6. And he certainly eats more than the average 6 year old, he needs to. You all do. Fun times stocking the kitchen."

"What! Really?! He would have said something!" I exclaim in surprise. Kid like him is the type that lets everyone know for a month beforehand. You know, the kind of kid that reminds you daily.

"Oh trust me, he did, repeatedly. But it's not something he can really go telling anyone. Not while he's living here with me, so isolated."

"Sometimes you call."

"Sometimes I suppose so, yes...but we have our rules. "

Gable lifts me away from the Lilyanne perch and sets me down on a proper seat by the table, along with what I suppose is my snack plate. Wait are those pistachio nuts in there? Score!

"Dinner won't begin to be set for over an hour so tide yourself with this for now- and no don't concern yourself over trivial matters of 'too much'. No such thing. The difference in your diets is interesting but expectedly normal, you're more than fine. Children need to eat, more so if you wish to grow stronger."

See I knew Gable was the best.

"Okay then, do you need help with dinner?"

"Thank you, Rosalia, perhaps another time. That will be unnecessary for now."

While I'm munching down, two more nutritiously balanced snack plates are floating up and being filled at double the amount I received. I don't think those are for Lilyanne or Gable himself, hey wait where did that ham come from?

The kitchen rumbles like a small earthquake chose this spot as the epicenter. Gable curses under his breath, snapping things back into place.

"I remember saying to use the doors, why the hell do we have doors?"

Out of the fireplace, a bright greenish flame erupts, prompting Lilyanne to clap giddily at the magic show,

"We're back!" bellows Grampa, half covered in soot and grass stains as he steps through the flames and into the actual kitchen.

"We're back! And we got the milk!" a little black haired black faced boy strapped to his front echos, and he sounds exactly like Lukas.

Correction, it is Lukas. Just an extremely filthy Lukas. Dipped in tar, oil and soot levels of dirty. Given grampa's history, I don't doubt for a moment that's what happened.

Gable just shakes his head, waving his finger to clear the soot and ash from dirtying anything further.

"Welcome back, did you have fun?"

"Yeah we climbed the Nightding gorge and crossed all the little chasms and-and-oh hi Rosalia! Huh why'd you bring the other baby? And then we swung from the living trees but I didn't dodge that last one real well carrying all our stuff but it's cool so-"

"Slow down Lukas, yes we did all of that and more. And yes Gable we found the beast and got the milk." Grampa remarked.

Grampa tries to approach in a hug but is firmly stopped by an invisible wall called Gable's glare. He compromises by waving his arms and dropping a small sack with a heavy thud. Oh that must be bigger on the inside. Especially if it was to be worth whatever mess of a grocery run they were just on.

"Uh huh, at a great cost to the boy's clothing I see....Ronald....where is....the other child?"

Lukas sits partly slug to grampas chest, a looser dangling version of Lilyanne's baby sling, to which a small child has no problem fitting. Like a bad fashion model, grampa turns around to show what was strapped to his back. An even smaller and much more bewildered looking child, who also covered in soot.

"Right here! Nice and safe!"

"Pray exactly...what did you do to them to get them this dirty?"

"Nothing! We went and gathered the ingredients just like you listed out Gable. Right Lukas?"

"Right we didn't do anything- except for when commander said it would be a good training for us to jump into a-mmmpf"

With a little help from grampa, Lukas shuts up.

"Absolutely nothing! Boys are just so messy! Not like my darling granddaughters! Hello dearies!"

"Gwampy!"

While Lilyanne may be happily waving back over her drooly spatula, I choose to munch on my snack plate like it were popcorn.

This is a very familiar scene. Messy but familiar. I didn't see the comparison earlier but now that it's noisy this reminds me a lot like going to my grandparent's house. You know, away from the parents, cousins screaming everywhere. How oddly nostalgic. Of course, Gable's place smells much better than my granny's old countryside farmhouse, though still somewhat medicinal.

"Hi Lukas, Hi Amar. Did grampa throw you guys like cannon balls somewhere too?"

"Yeah it was awesome! Right Amar?!" exclaims Lukas as grampa unstraps them down. He looks like he's been through a cartoon level bad explosion, or worse.

Amar gets down unharmed but looks far too still, especially compared to a still bouncing Lukas. His mind still somewhere else. He looks a little traumatized, to be honest.

Geez how bad was this place?

"But how does it poop? Or eat?"

"...I'm sorry, what now?"

Well, that wasn't anywhere what I was expecting out of Amar's mouth. What? Talk about awkward, I was enjoying my snack!

"How does the cow- beast do anything? It has no head, no bottom, but so many legs. How can it poop? How!" he exclaims, rightfully bewildered.

"Duh, it's maaagic, an above-ground dungeon beast. Come on Amar, you're usually better at listening than I am." answers Lukas easily, which really isn't an answer at all.

"But how? How does it poop?! If we can get their milk then it has to eat something, so then it has to poop. If there are no exits but the udder....does it poop where it milks?" shouts back Amar.

The sooty boys look down to their black hands as if those were the very hands that did some mystery milking. Then awkwardly to the sack, where the collected mystery milk must be stored.

"Gable and commander said so- it's maaagic." Lukas sounds a little less enthusiastic.

"Magic things still need to poop though. Everything that eats does. It has to poop. "

"I don't know! We got the milk and we lived! I mean yeah I did, I practice a lot with our goat."

"It doesn't make sense- what if....what if the milk is its poop?"

"But it was milk-colored!"

"Milk poop?"

"Whoa- bleck oh gross."

Ah yes lovely, the conversational topics of little children. I am so glad I have willingly chosen to associate myself with these two. I am completely tuning this out, do not want to know at all about a milkable cow with no head and no butts. What is that even supposed to look like?

How does something like that poop?

Of course, I don't dare ask. What if grampa takes that as permission to take ME on a grocery run next time?

"Well technically-" starts grampa, before a bread roll flies into his mouth. He settles on munching and playing with Lilyanne from afar, leaving Gable to handle this crisis.

"Alright, that's enough of that. I promise there is a very good explanation and there is no milk ...poop. It's just milk. *sigh* We'll go over it later. I had prepared some snacks for when you all got back but you all clearly need a bath before that. Off you go then." finalizes Gable.

Lukas both perks up at the word snack and instantly deflates on the word bath.

That leaves Amar to drag him along out of the kitchen by the hand. The boy looking much more relieved and back to normal to finally be answered of his very concerning questions. He never got the full answer but this much was good enough.

"Come on, the faster we clean the faster we eat. Lukas."

I see the boy, the one who is actually a natural brunette and not just filthy to that point, eyeing the snack plates, making no attempts at being subtle. I understand perfectly, adventure time with Grampa is hungry work.

"Okay! Thanks for taking us, commander!" shouts out Lukas, before turning to me. He drools a bit at my snack plate but shakes himself out of it.

"Sorry you missed out Rosalia, it was awesome! But you weren't here yet and Gable said it was ok, he would bring you later! Which is now. It's okay because there's tomorrow and the day after that and after that and lots of things planned!" goes the chatter mouth, exiting only by the aid of Gable's snapping fingers.

I sit there at the kitchen table, ignoring grampa's Lilyanne directed babytalk and trying not to choke on a grape myself.

There's a lot of what now?