“Hey, baby bro! Is it your time on guard duty?”
Elksia peered out of her bedroom, spotting as Psiksi approached.
“I don’t get why you call me baby bro…” Psiksi muttered. He was carrying a ton of stuff. “But like… kinda?”
“Arkay is little bro. You came after Arkay so you’re baby bro!” Elksia smiled. “Oh! Are those crisps?”
“Yeah. I wanted to grab a bunch of stuff and us four Dessaron guys all chill out and have a picnic together or something!” Psiksi returned to his normal, perky self. “Tenuk and Retvik are here, right?”
“Well, I haven’t gone anywhere!” Tenuk tutted as he also peered out of the bedroom. “I’m basically glued to Elksia now. Retvik just went to the bathroom, he’ll be back in a minute or so.”
“Wonderful!” Psiksi beamed. He pushed Elksia and Tenuk back inside, then laid out a blanket on the bed, before covering it with bowls of food, mostly various flavours of crisps. Elksia immediately grabbed a small bowl of prawn cocktail crisps, which she was definitely craving right now.
After a few moments, Retvik appeared in the doorway, grunting as always.
“Apologies. I needed to have a quick chat with Litvir. He is not happy.”
“Yeah, the baby stuff is kinda getting to him…” Tenuk frowned. “We’ve been keeping you and Arkay busy.”
“It’s not for forever though, I promise!” Elksia chirped. “Once the egg hatches, I’ll be good. Can carry the baby with me while I work. And I’ll stop being anxious. And affecting everyone. And Sini can go away too.”
“Oh, so we’re all in agreement that no one likes Sini?” Psiksi tutted. “She is kinda an evil bitch. Arkay said she changed, but still.”
Elksia shrugged. She glanced at Retvik and tweeted at him, telling him to stop standing around and come and sit down. Retvik did as he was told and sat on the very edge of the bed.
“She has changed. Not completely crazy now. She’s just helping by distracting me. So I stop affecting everyone. Waiting for the egg to hatch is the worst bit.”
“How comes?” Psiksi asked. “I thought the whole pushing an egg out of your body bit was the worst.”
“That’s painful but brief. This is all just waiting. The baby can suddenly die inside the egg. Nothing I can do. Luckily I have time strings. I can see that it’s fine. But I still worry. It’ll hatch soon though. About two evs. Just before the void storm hits. Luckily Arkay is super magical though. He’ll protect us through that.”
“Yeah… wait, what?” Psiksi blinked, then exclaimed. “Arkay will protect us from a void storm? Those things are fucking horrible! And huge!”
Elksia shrugged some more. “He’s magic. A proper god. And as Life Goddess-y as Phovos is. He’ll know what to do.”
“But wasn’t Saahro a proper god?” Tenuk frowned. “And Vikalos and Galyn? I know Itaviir was always a Phantai, he’s never really been inside a proper universe, but those guys were actual gods too.”
Retvik grunted. “They had different duties and different rules. Galyn was a god of war and rage, which means he was not actually that powerful. Saahro was a more traditional grim reaper deity rather than being in control of decay overall the way Arkay was.”
“Plus, Arkay was deified by one of the most powerful Life Goddesses around!” Psiksi added. “Dunno about Vikalos though. Great guy, I love the fuzzy bear dude, but I’m sure he’s hiding a fuckton of power somewhere. But it’s angry power, not all-round power like the shit Life Goddesses have.”
Tenuk eyed Psiksi. “How do you know?”
“I mean, everyone knows. He’s Firestorm, the terrifying Hell Lord from the Goldtorn-Justar Border. According to the much older Alsyr, Vikalos was this terrific monster who was so scary he kept the Golden Doom armies out of the Justarian Circle almost on his own, before one day just seemingly disappearing, leaving behind three other, slightly less terrifying Hell Lords to take his place. In all honesty, I have no fucking clue how Itaviir and Galyn, two kinda exiled Beh’ens, managed to cool Vikalos down.”
Retvik rolled his eyes. “Vikalos only appears scary on the outside. He is an incredibly intelligent individual as well as being a powerful one. He knows that image and what people think you are goes a long way. But Vikalos was starting to wind down long before he decided to leave the Justar.”
“And he’s much happier for it!” Elksia beamed. “Same way we’re all happy now! Actually, we all kinda made Vikalos super happy. He was getting sad towards the end of the old Thantir. Because of all the stupid Voidborns and the Kronothrax and all that. Like, at the peak, there were a hundred Thantir? Vikalos had more members in his Justar sub-division. But we fixed it all. Because we’re awesome.”
Psiksi sighed briefly. “Well, you did. I only just joined you guys. Kinda always felt like the new guy.”
“Nah! You’re still cool!” Elksia was unswayed. “You’re new. But you help out. You helped the Decaylings! And you help with purges. And greeting and stuff. You’re cool too. Also you’ve been helping me. Retvik is silly and doesn’t always listen to me. But you tell him and Tenuk to take breaks. Also you being new is good. You’re the fresh perspective. We need that a lot here!”
Psiksi perked up a bit. “I appreciate that, Elksia. Plus, that’s just more proof that you’re super smart. And that you’ll be able to handle this baby no problem.”
Elksia grinned. “Oh, I know. I’ll be fine. I got this. And I got you lot helping me too. Also, the circular conversations will stop. Once it’s hatched. My mind will be better then. Like, literally, my brain is making sad hormones. But when I see the egg hatch, my brain will make happy hormones. And my tits will make milk. Pink milk. Pilk!”
Psiksi, Retvik and Tenuk all stared at Elksia. Psiksi started snickering, Tenuk snorted, but Retvik continued to look a bit blank before slowly smiling as well.
“Yeah, we’ll be absolutely fine!” Tenuk laughed. “Don’t need to be a Time Drake to know that.”