Dear Diary,

I don't know if I've gone native, I've affected so much of the culture of the Alliance, or wealth and power and living in the bubble of the Homestead has insulated me from the shit I got exposed to so much back when I arrived. But I've definitely wound up with way less of the automatic assumptions about Mortals and Deities and different Human-Adjacent types than I had when I arrived.

That's a good thing, I think, at least overall. Mostly that's because instead of walking around with a bunch of prejudices and lashing out at random targets who fit a certain demographic and happen to piss me off, I've been able to focus more on holding individuals responsible for their decisions and the consequences thereof. Especially people with the power to express their Agency, yeah, but also it means I can be a better mom, since I'm not focused on the fact that nine of my daughters are Deities and one of them is a legitimate princess. Instead I'm watching what they're doing, how they're behaving toward one another, and can gently course correct them into being better people.

I've also realized that doing that with most of the Mortals in the world is completely not my lookout. Which would have seemed kind of dismissive, but I'm not saying that none of them need course correction, or any bullshit about them being 'beneath my notice', but most of the folks out there aren't making a lot of decisions. They're not acting, they're reacting. Yeah, maybe there are better decisions, better motivations or whatever, but I've done my part with that, and continue to do so whenever I can. I've set the most organized people I know to setting up systems to get people all of their basic needs, so they're not forced into doing sketchy shit to support themselves and their loved ones. I've given the most devout folks I know my best effort at guidelines on being better people, and let them spread that out to anybody who thinks I'm worth listening to.

Yeah, I could just scream out, 'do what I say, stop being dicks, or I end the world', but that just seems wrong. Most people's dickishness affects them and the folks they come in contact with. Apocalyptic existential threats do not seem an appropriate motivator for change at that level. On the other hand, when it comes to Deities and Lords and other folks who can be existential threats to others they've never met, or who wind up fucking over not only everyone they interact with, but everyone else who looks at them as a role model, now we're talking about individuals who often need the threat of imminent painful death just to get their attention. Also, unlike Odin, some of them are too dumb, arrogant, or both to back the fuck down and fly right, so I gotta carry through with those existential threats.

So yeah, to my kids I'm Mom. To my Worshippers I'm more of a wine aunt who offers ears, hugs, advice, and resources when needed. For Deities Behaving Badly, I'm the Matriarch who is here to correct their behavior by any means necessary. To folks stronger than me...

I think that's the big difference. There are folks who are, one way or another, out of my reach, or against whom I have poor leverage. But if the Mother of Water Panthers taught me anything, it's that if somebody faces me directly in a contest of power at the place of my greatest strength, they're gonna fuckin' lose. Lose hard and probably die screaming while I flick the bean at the thought of sucking their sweet bits out, whether that's metaphorically, literally, or both. So I don't go walking around with a head full of steam ready to go full berserk rage at anybody and everybody I think of as 'above me'.

I'd kind of forgotten that I've never been the only person who had that flavor of chip on their shoulder, especially what with the person in my life with the most similar chip being one of my favorite flavors.

A moment after Siobhan and the Docs arrived, Doc Glass seemed to stiffen up like somebody had shoved a Lancaster Issue Rod directly up his ass. Then, almost like he'd decided very carefully to check the landing area before jumping to conclusions, he scanned the room. That done, he turned back to Siobhan, his expression a mask of icy disdain.

"You told me Hades had a Soul which had been harmed beyond your ability to repair."

Siobhan, one hand now stroking Hailee's head where it poked out of the papoose, smiled sadly and said, "and he does."

Before Doc Glass could reply to that, Doc Z, who'd stepped over to examine Hades the moment they arrived, frowned and said, "you know you brought us here to heal our greatest enemy."

Persephone stiffened, but I lay a quiet tentacle on her shoulder, and when her eyes snapped to me, I shook my head the tiniest bit. She frowned, but held her peace.

"Nah, Doc, you got that wrong, really."

"Oh?" I could tell he wasn't happy, but that was mostly because his husband was upset. His hands wove through the motions of Assess Health, but he obviously had one ear open for me while he swiped through the granular data.

"Yeah. Hades doesn't kill people, dude."

"He's a God of Death."

I shrugged. "Only because he's the one who provides housing for the Souls when you guys fail."

Neither of them liked that. They both turned to me, Doc G hissing out, "excuse me?"

I shook my head. "Nah, man, you got every right to be pissed, no need for excuses. You two also are super dedicated to the art and science of keeping people not just not dead, but as healthy as possible for as long as possible." That got them, they were at least sort of listening. "But, y'know, the world's imperfect, and people are Mortal, which means eventually their shit breaks down beyond your ability to fix it."

"You say that like you lack the power to fix it."

I sighed, slumped, because he'd just said something I'd yelled at myself about from both directions so many fuckin' times. "Yeah. Yeah, I could. I could reach out and slip tentacles into everybody in the Alliance. All our neighbors, too. Make them behave themselves, make them Worship me until I had the power to do the same thing in the rest of Atlantis. In Europa. in Asia. In Africa. I could puppet every fuckin' person in the world, and then nobody would ever be an asshole again." I shrugged. "Nobody would really be their own person again, and I'd have to keep threading tentacles into the kids, because I don't actually know how to make somebody immortal, and believe it or not turning people into Demigods isn't something I'm capable of." I'd watch as horror crept over their faces as they realized that I wasn't bragging, wasn't threatening, was just stating facts. "But doing that seems kinda worse than leaving it as it is."

Doc Glass shook off his horror first. "You say that like there's nothing you could do to make things better."

I nodded. "Yeah. Question for you."

"Yes?"

"Have things gotten better?" He worked his mouth. "Fewer people dying in stupid wars? Fewer starving when there's food to be eaten? More with decent clothing and shelter?" I paused. Then my face heated as I forced myself to keep talking. "Your University hospitals getting all the funding they need to find new and better ways to help people be healthy? Honest question, Saffron handles the finances, because I'm an airheaded dumbass, but you guys are doing important work, so if she hasn't made sure you're funded let me know, I'll tell her it's a priority."

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He kept chewing air for a second before he shook his head. "So arrogant."

I shrugged. "Am I, though? No, seriously. Last I checked 'arrogant' was about having an inflated opinion about yourself. Thinking that you're bigger or stronger than you are, or more important, or God forbid 'better' than other people."

I personally prefer you to most other people, Daughter.

Not now, Dad. Now hush before I send Marie to tell Mom to sit on best Dad face to shut him up.

I know?

I desperately tried to keep the smirk about Dad's confused reply off my face as I continued. "Thing is, I know I'm not better than you. Shit, I'm significantly worse, by my own estimation, than any of the Mortals in this room."

"Not by mine," whispered Siobhan.

"Love you too, Darling. But seriously, I'm not better than you. I'm just bigger. Stronger. Also stupider, and clumsier. Which is why when a problem can be solved with muscles, I step up, but when it needs brains and finesse, I call for help from the smartest, most Skilled people I know."

"Flattery will get you nowhere."

At that point Doc Z, who'd gone back to flipping through the granular data, quietly said, "Stephen?"

"Yes, Joseph?"

If Doc Z winced a little, he still quietly continued with, "she Healed the Undead."

Something about that seemed to snap, then shatter that rod up Doc Glass' ass. He sighed, then said, "I know." He shook his head, half turned to Hades. "But..."

"Look, I get it. Deities have been Absolute Bastards™ for thousands of fuckin' years. Plenty of them. But tell me, what's the worst thing he's done? Him in particular?"

"He stole Persephone away from her mother."

The woman herself snorted. "Oh. Yeah. 'Stole'. Such a cruel fate, snatched away to a palace by a handsome man who read me poetry and promised me devotion and earth shattering orgasms." Doc Glass choked a little at that last bit, while Doc Z tried valiantly to hold back his laughter. He failed a moment later when she purred out, "delivered on all counts, too."

"Sounds like any reports of involuntary abduction were greatly exaggerated, Steve."

Doc Glass looked a little petulant. "He turned his former lovers into a tree and a weed."

Persephone shook her head. "That was mother and I. And they got better." I snickered a little at that, and a little more when she muttered, "still don't trust them alone with him, though. But they're good company when I have to go visit mother."

Doc G slumped. Sighed. "Fine." He turned to Siobhan. "I still feel you deceived us."

She shrugged, nodded, and calmly said, "I apologize for the necessity, but your oaths were to to lend all aid to those in need, especially those needing aid none other could offer, were they not?"

"Yes?"

"As were mine. None other could help, at least none that I know of."

He frowned. "Not your precious Canta?"

She shook her head, which mesmerized me a little as her shortened hair flared out around her head. "He cannot aid with this." When both doctors froze and looked at her, she smiled again, this time sadly. "Oh, he might perhaps have filled in for you, Doctor Zeccardi, but no Gods I know of truly see ailments of the Soul as injury or disease. They speak of them as 'curses' or, in some cases, 'weakness'." After the briefest of pauses, she said, "even I might have fallen to that, had I not studied with the two of you, and seen Tabitha Heal the most horrifying of such ailments."

"But she could not Heal this?" To his benefit, Doc Glass sounded less snarky than confused.

"Yeah, Healing the Undead took a bit of knowledge and a shit ton of Mana. I'm a dumbass, not a complete moron, so a little bit of knowledge I could manage. And we all know I've got Mana blowing out my ass."

Doc Glass rolled his eyes. "Goddess."

"Yeah, exactly. But this... This is really, really fiddly stuff. Shit where if I tried to overpower it, I might break shit. I mean, if you guys tell me that there's nothing that can be done? Maybe I'll just pull out all the stops and reboot his shit. I..." I paused, sighed. "I kinda did that with the kids. The Undead ones. There wasn't anything there, really, and the worst had happened. But, y'know, I think she," I nodded at Persephone. "Would like her husband back rather than a drooling idiot who needs to be retaught how not to soil himself."

"I... I don't know whether I would want a child back in my beloved's body."

"I don't know if that's what would happen. Maybe that, maybe he loses some memories, maybe he's an entirely different person. I have no clue, but if the Docs say he can't be Healed the right way, it's your call whether I roll those dice or not."

By this point Doc Glass had stepped over and done his own Assess Health. He and Doc Z muttered a few things to one another, shit that flew straight over my head. Doc Z turned to me and asked, "What'd you do so far?"

I ticked them off on my fingers. "Healing Coma, Stabilize, Heal Injury." I paused, trying to remember. "I don't know Regrow Bone. Figured there might be some other fancy Shapes you guys knew that would help too."

Doc Z smirked. "We do in fact have a few fancy Shapes like that. Although... I'm not sure I have enough Mana to Regrow an Elder Deity's bones."

I shrugged, thought for a second to try to remember the Shape, then thought, Karen? Mana Network? A moment later she wordlessly reached through me and Shaped my Mana. "With your permission, Docs?"

They glanced at one another, then back to me. "Certainly."

I brought them into the Network, then said, "take whatever you need."

"But this might..."

I fed Mana through the Network, and chuckled as Doc Z clenched like somebody'd goosed him. "As much as you need. Seriously. I'll let you know if there's a problem."

With that, the two turned to Hades, Doc Z Shaping and Doc G quietly conferring with him. After a bit, a few weird bits I hadn't consciously noticed with all the blood and scars smoothed themselves out. Head, fingers, chest. When he finished, Doc Z turned to his partner and said, "You're up."

"I think I'll need more information." He turned to Persephone. "May I?"

"Whatever you need do to heal him, you have my permission and blessing."

Doc G nodded, then Shaped something. No idea what, but he moved his hands not unlike Saffron did with her coding windows. "We ask permission from next of kin," Doc Z explained, "because some of our less careful colleagues have had patients react poorly to these Shapes. Nothing that can be predicted with absolute certainty, unfortunately."

"That risk would have been nice to know about."

He shrugged. "Would you have chosen the greater risk?" He nodded to me.

She sighed. "Probably not."

He nodded again. "Forgive us, but we do occasionally need to manipulate those we treat into doing the right thing."

At that point Siobhan got a chuckle out of me as she played with Haliee's fingers and said, "I'm familiar with that part of medical practice, at least."

"What are you guys looking at, anyhow?"

"I'm surprised you can't see it."

I shrugged. "Ongoing problem. I have trouble seeing Mana. I can just about make out Ley Lines and shit of that magnitude. Oh, unless I'm high on Fae Grain."

Doc Glass, now beginning some additional Shaping, muttered, "cursed."

"Excuse me?"

Still focused on his Shaping, he said, "Fae Grain curses the imbiber with true sight."

"Huh. Good to know."

The two of them called Siobhan over, stepped her through their 'advanced diagnostic' shaping, and she and Doc G talked in quiet murmurs for a while. I listened in as best I could, and got that super weird situation I remembered from class where on one hand, I barely comprehended what they were saying as they were saying it, but on the other hand I actually understood whether what they were saying was closer or further from objectively correct. I didn't say anything, because I didn't want to jostle their elbow with my interjections, but I did nudge her with a sort of mental 'yes / no' when I got those feelings.

"Tabitha?"

"Whatcha need, Doc?"

"Keep the Mana flowing steadily, please."

"You got it, Doc."

"Everyone, I believe Joseph and I can Heal him, but it will not be easy. Everyone remain silent." He started Shaping. I pulled Mana through that one tentacle stretched all the way here from the Alliance, feeding it slowly into the Network, as the Docs proceeded to Shape shit I had no ability to see.

They Shaped. And Shaped. And kept on Shaping. I had too much of my concentration on keeping the Mana flowing slow and steady to pay attention to anything but that. At one point, I heard Siobhan mutter something about 'ongoing healing' through my brain.

It's weird, while time moves oddly in M-Space, it absolutely did not flash by this time. It crawled. The pair Shaped for hours, for days, for months, for ages. A couple times Siobhan stepped over and touched them, gently wiping away their sweat and fatigue.

Finally, finally, after an eternity of Shaping, the Docs stepped away. We all stared at them until Persephone asked, "well?"

At the sound of her voice, Hades' eyes fluttered open.

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