“All right!”  Charlotte announced, interrupting my thoughts yet again.  I knew I tended to get bogged down in my own thoughts easily – at least when it came to thoughts about the surface – and I made an effort to try to pay better attention.

“On to the pandemonium, then?”  She asked.  “Or should we summon them here?”  She glanced at me, as if suddenly concerned.  “Demons aren’t hugely fond of meeting in someone else’s territory, but if they’re sparring or something, that might not be great for Sage here.”

Silas shifted to rest a hand on my shoulder and briefly squeeze it.  “We can go, Sage will be okay – if we see anything potentially triggering for her, we just don’t let her see it.”

Anthony seemed to pick up on what my issue was and nodded immediately.  “Sure, we’ll be careful.  Did you bring a car or should we walk?  Mine won’t hold six people.”

We ended up having to walk to the pandemonium, but I felt like all the others were making an effort to distract me along the way.  Maybe it was just my imagination, but it seemed like Silas and Charlotte were kind of leading the group and keeping an eye out for any potential problems while Theo started telling me stories about sea otters and cute things they did, like holding hands – paws? – while they slept so they wouldn’t float away.

I was more than happy to listen to his distractions, though – if they were that – because he was right, sea otters were cute.  I actually wasn’t as familiar with sea otters as most of the underwater sealife because I spent a lot less time dealing with anything that was on the surface, so I was kind of intrigued to learn more about sea otters.

“You really float with your babies on top of you?”

“Mm-hmm.”  Theo smiled a smile with a hint of pain, but he seemed to be okay.  “Arlo was too sick so we never got the chance, but normally we spend a lot of time with our babies very close to us.”

“Dolphins are family oriented, too,” I offered in return.  “We like to be near family.  We usually stay with our parents longer than most people and our parents take great care to make sure we can handle ourselves before we leave.  If we leave the pod, anyway.  Mom was great about homeschooling me when I stopped going to regular school.”

“Yeah, up until they decide to go take a trip around the world and see all the sights.”  Silas sighed dramatically.  “I guess they figured we’re all grown up now and can take care of ourselves, and I don’t entirely blame them for wanting to see all the different kinds of water out there in the world, but still, they left us behind.”

Our parents hadn’t invited any of us to come along, but I was actually aware that none of us really wanted to go along with them, either.  Silas might joke about it, but he loved living here and while he might be up for a trip, he wasn’t interested in leaving for potentially decades any more than I was.

“We’ve arrived,” Charlotte interrupted.  She had stopped in front of a gate and she rang the bell and had to talk on the intercom before we were allowed to proceed past the gate through a large courtyard area into the building beyond.

Thankfully, no signs of violence, just a couple of curious demon children watching us – imagining themselves very hidden behind the bushes, no doubt – and one demon jogging around in circles.

“Charlotte!”  A demon came down the steps from the house to greet the centaur.  “I wasn’t expecting you, what’s going on?”

“Britt,” Charlotte greeted her, then briefly introduced the rest of us.  “We need to talk to you.  And to…?”  She looked over at Anthony, questioningly.

“Selene,” Anthony answered.

Britt seemed surprised, but agreed easily enough.  “Sure, we can do that.  Come with me.”  She led us down a hallway to a small room that looked like it served as a breakfast room or something.  “Stay here for a bit while I go find Selene, okay?  We’re not always keen on visitors,” she explained.  “No one will hurt you, but they might be a little unfriendly.”

It didn’t take her long to find the demon in question.  Selene turned out to be more buff than even Theo and she didn’t look particularly pleased to see any of us, though she did give Anthony a bit of a nod.

“What’s up?”  She demanded.

Her tone made me flinch internally.  Somehow, she reminded me of the bullies back in elementary school.  I knew she was Anthony’s friend and a police officer, but she still didn’t strike me as someone I would normally want to be in a room alone with.

At least I wasn’t alone here.

Charlotte explained about the centaur herd – which Britt seemed to be somewhat familiar with already – and then about the plan to basically intimidate them into submission.

“We figure just Jett and Anthony should be enough, but we’d rather have some extra assurance just in case – better too much than too little, you know?”  Charlotte was addressing most of her explanation to Britt, who was nodding along.

Selene, on the other hand, seemed less convinced.  “We’re not a private army,” she said stiffly.  “We don’t just show up to help – friends or no,” she glared at Britt when the younger demon looked like she intended to protest.

“But a centaur herd will be a problem for all of us,” Anthony pointed out, resting his forearms against the top of one of the chairs.  “Humans and supernaturals alike will have problems with a centaur herd running wild.  We’ll be flooded with cases related to it and you know we don’t have enough supernaturals on the force to deal with it if we’re called out to face them – I can’t shift in town, I’m too large for that, so we’ll be at a disadvantage.  It’s better to deal with the problem now, on our terms.”

Selene grumbled a bit, but she didn’t seem to disagree with him, either.

“If we’re not helping our friends,” Britt finally got a chance to put in her argument, “what’s the point of being powerful?  Sure, to protect ourselves, but after that, I mean.  We’re not in danger at the moment, helping them isn’t going to put us at risk or really cost us much.  It sounds pretty easy, really – we just go, show up, get to see a kraken and a dragon in full form, which, by the way, sounds pretty cool.  Then we stand there and make a point of showing the centaurs how scary we are.  If we see them again later in town, just let our darker sides out just a bit.”  She smiled suddenly, a smile that seemed almost creepy.  “Remind them that we’re not to be trifled with.  In the long run, it brings the pandemonium more respect, helps our friends, and helps protect the town.  All of which seem pretty good to me, plus it sounds like we’re not even going to be in danger.”

“Not unless the herd decides to try to retaliate in town afterwards,” Selene pointed out, crossing her arms.

Britt shrugged.  “So?  We can handle them.  We can even get Charlotte here to help show us some pointers for dealing with centaurs if you want – give us an advantage against them.  Even if we end up having to kill a few, there’s not much of a chance they’re really going to harm us.”

I flinched at the reference to killing, which I didn’t think either demon missed, but at least they didn’t comment on it, either.

“We’d prefer violence be the last option,” Jett put in calmly, “but of course if they attack you in town and it’s self-defense, that’s not exactly something any of us would have a problem with.”  He glanced sideways at me as he made that last comment, and after a brief pause, I gave a slight nod.  He was right, it wasn’t like I didn’t want people to defend themselves.  That was no good, either.  I just…wished all this wasn’t necessary.

“But hopefully it won’t come to that,” Jett continued, almost as if reading my mind.  “We think if they realize what and how many they’re facing, they’ll back off.  Move away or just behave better if nothing else.”

Selene sighed.  “Fine.  Britt and I will talk to the rest of the pandemonium, but with two leaders on board, they’ll listen.  Call us with the information on the island when you’ve picked which one and give us a time.”

Charlotte looked at us excitedly as we left.  “This is actually happening!  Now I just have to call them and convince them to come meet me, right?  That should be easy enough.”  Then, under her breath, which I didn’t think I was supposed to hear, “I hope.”

~~~~

“Okay, so here is her food,” Sidney dropped a rather large box on the floor of Theo’s new apartment, “and uh, I gave you the instructions already, right?  I think I wrote everything down.”

“I’ll be fine.”  Theo was cradling Zoey gently, and it was easy to see that despite the reminders this brought to him, he was clearly enjoying snuggling her tiny body.  “It’s just a few hours, she’ll be fine.  I’ll dunk her in the bathtub if I need to.”

Sidney let out a strangled laugh.  “Oh, yeah, she might like that – wait, no, she hasn’t been in freshwater yet, not sure how she’d like that?  Maybe, um, the ocean?  No, no, people might see if he walks down there carrying an octopus.  Well, a kraken, but they’d think it was an octopus.”  Sidney kept rambling on, so I took his arm and started gently propelling him outside – which was why I had come along, to make sure Sidney actually left the baby with Theo.

Along this part of the beach was a set of duplex-type apartments – or was it townhouse-type?  I was really, really vague on surface stuff.  Anyway, point was, this particular set of six apartments were owned by a merfolk, and they’d agreed to let Theo stay in a unit.  It was a nice spot, really – you could see the ocean from the sliding glass doors and get down to the water within a couple minutes, even if you were walking slowly.  The biggest downside was that this time of year there were a lot of human tourists enjoying the beach so merfolk still had to be careful.

Which was why we were dropping Zoey off before dawn, so that Sidney and I didn’t have to worry about potentially being spotted as we shifted from aquatic to land version and back again.

Sidney, however, seemed torn about the idea of leaving Zoey before he absolutely needed to.  “You sure you’ll be okay?”  He looked at Theo anxiously.

“I promise.”  Theo gave Sidney a comforting smile.  “You’ll be back here in no time, and Zoey will probably have slept most of the morning.  Relax, go help deal with the centaurs, we’ll be fine.”

Sidney reluctantly kissed Zoey’s head and then turned to leave.  I paused to give Theo a searching glance.

“You’re really okay with this?”

He knew what I was actually asking.  “It hurts some,” he admitted, “but I wasn’t kidding, I want to be able to hold babies and not have a breakdown.  And it’s hard to feel sad looking at something this cute.  It’s a process, but I’ll be okay.  Honestly.”  The smile he offered told me that despite the pain, he was strong.  He was right – he’d be okay.

“I’m proud of you,” I told him before I slipped out to run after Sidney.  As I caught up with my friend, I hoped that Theo wouldn’t end up crying to himself after we left – but maybe that was still part of the grieving process if he did?  And even if he did, I knew he’d take extra good care of Zoey.  In fact, I was pretty sure he’d take better care of her than almost anyone else, except maybe her parents, just because he had lost his baby and he would never risk anything like that happening again if he could help it.

I glanced around, ensuring there were no stray humans on the beach, before I waded deep into the ocean enough that my body began to change into aquatic form.  Sidney was waiting for me, chewing his nails nervously.

“I don’t know about this,” he started to say.

I grabbed his arm and began pulling him along with me, using my speed to force him to keep up with me.  “She’ll be fine.  You’ll be fine.  You know you can be apart from your baby for more than an hour and not fall apart?”

Sidney made an insulted noise.  “I’m a new parent!  It’s normal to be worried!”

“Sidney, silly, you worry about everything.”  That was actually how we’d become friends in the first place.  I was worried about going to the surface and dealing with, well, everything up there, so I’d understood Sidney’s tendency to obsess.  “But Theo will take very good care of Zoey, and, well, we could use you.”  I paused, remembering Jett’s words.  “To be honest, I need you.  I know they’re counting on me to turn the ground to mud and trap the centaurs, but I’m worried I’ll freeze up.”

Sidney made an effort to keep up with me, although he was a little slower in his male form, so I had to pull back on my speed a bit.  “How come?  You’re good with magic, you use it for all sorts of stuff.  This is pretty easy compared to even building our addition for Zoey.”

“I’m worried about freezing up if they try to attack,” I admitted.  “Centaurs are often violent.  No one’s really saying that specifically, but that’s why they’re all worried about the herd having the run of the town, right?  Charlotte’s different from most, but even she is okay with fighting people.  I just…I can’t guarantee I’ll be able to do what’s necessary if they do get violent.  And I don’t want to put everyone else in danger because I had a panic attack and couldn’t do what was needed.”

Sidney reached for my hand and gave it a quick squeeze.  “You’ll be fine, but you’re right – I’ll be there as backup, so don’t worry.  We can do this.”

I certainly hoped so.

“Besides,” Sidney admitted with a bit of a smile, “I’m kind of looking forward to seeing Jett be scary.  You and I both know he’s a softy, really, but he’s got that other side that I never get to see.  I want to see my husband be a terrifying sea monster!  I think it’d be pretty cool.”

I laughed a little, some of my tension easing.  “He is very cool,” I agreed.  Scary sea monster or not, Jett was cool.  And a great friend.