Welcome to Gaia! ::

— SEI —

A lot of unexpected things had happened over the past few days.

He didn’t expect Teegan giving up and just coming to his office to lead to, ultimately, Diryas relenting in his position. Diryas hadn’t been able to make himself get Teegan and Tobias to leave. Zebulon hadn’t quite known how to take it from there, but something felt a bit lighter. Seeing all three of his husbands in the morning–or at least two of them, Zebulon had suggested and Teegan had agreed that he would keep splitting where he was living until everything was moved back to Diryas’ house–instead of only Diryas felt a bit more like normal. The house was alive again, at least in an approximation of how it should have been.

Things were still tense. Diryas still wasn’t necessarily letting Teegan back in the main bedroom. Zebulon could tell Teegan felt he was still on thin ice. Zebulon still felt like he was dancing near fire.

But Zebulon wanted to make sure the home stayed alive.

To that end, he had resisted Teegan’s words of “I’ll handle this myself.” When Zebulon grimly reminded him that there was a reason why all of the other three had recruited him for major home projects–which he counted moving things around as–Teegan had relented. And so, on a day when he didn’t have to worry about classes anyway but Tobias was busy and Diryas had his head down in spring gardening prep, Zebulon drove over to the Bell Household.

… s**t, Teegan was living the life, wasn’t he? He knew that Teegan’s room wasn’t exactly fancy, but this place didn’t seem like it would have been a bad place to land. Nice neighbourhood, with a nicer front entrance. Didn’t seem like it was bougie or anything, but these Bells did pretty decently well for themselves.

He had gathered as much from Teegan himself, but it was a bit different to see it in person. For a moment, he wondered if he was underdressed.

Too late now! They'd just get to see him at his most obnoxious leopard print t-shirt life.

As he rolled up to the front door, he wondered if he should just text Teegan instead of ringing the doorbell. Not like he knew who would answer. But he saw a cat in the window, and by ringing the doorbell, he hoped he’d get their attention.

— STARI —

“Anyone interesting?” Livie asked Viatrix as she bounced down the stairs. Since she worked from home, other than a few hours of dance class a week, she was usually the one on door duty. She also was always ordering stuff, so she was pretty much expecting to see the delivery lady’s face before she picked up the specialty ribbon she was waiting for, or maybe the beads.

As she opened the door, though, she realized it wasn’t the mail. “Oh, hi!” she said, to Teegan’s final husband, Zeb. She would have said that he was the most mysterious, since unlike the others, she hadn’t talked to him since the purification.

Unfortunately, he wasn’t mysterious enough. She knew his secret.

That time she’d googled floggers came to mind.

Nope. She couldn’t think about that right now. It’d get so awkward so fast. “I like your shirt!” She said instead.

Most guys wore boring clothes, neutrals and stuff, but he was here in leopard print! Livie liked expressive stuff, so she decided right then that she liked him, too. Just had to ignore all that.

It helped that Teegan was making up with his husbands, so she didn’t have to get all defensive about stuff any more, or, like, get judgy ‘cause they weren’t being nice to him. She could just take them at face value.

Her own clothes weren’t that impressive right now, since she was just working. She had on a pink t-shirt, stripey pajama shorts, and some fuzzy socks.

“If you’re looking for Teegan, he’s working, though.”

— SEI —

“I think so!” chirped the cat in the window, who was staring with a tilted head at the guy who seemed to be making pspsps noises at her. Cute, but it wouldn't work. “He seems to think I'm an actual cat, for one.”

She snickered, hopping off the ledge to follow Livie. “Little does he know that I'm a tech cat. I gotta show you the stuff I got for discorder–”

She hushed, though, when Livie opened the door, to a surprised man dressed in the print that … well, there weren't many Mauvians with that kind of print, but she was sure she had seen some at some point …

Zebulon supposed he should have expected someone not his husband to answer but she had good taste, and also the little cat had followed her. Mission accomplished. “Why thank you.” He grinned, swirling around to show her the back, to show the pattern repeated throughout. “I like leopard print, what can I say.”

His husbands would make the argument that he more than liked leopard print. Perhaps he was even obsessed with it. Zebulon would just say he knew what a good print was when he ******** saw it, but that was neither here nor there.

He waved at the cat behind her. Viatrix purred, circling around Livie’s feet.

“Teeg’s not here?” s**t. The hell was he doing today? “Do you know when he'll be back? I was gonna help him get a bit of his s**t packed while the other two are busy anyway…”

Well. Maybe not a total loss.

“I can hang out til he gets back if you don't mind?” He glanced down at the cat that was now circling his feet. “Maybe pet y'all's cat a bit. She cute.”

— STARI —

He did seem to think that Viatrix was pretty cute, but Livie couldn’t blame him for that. Viatrix was adorable. “He’s a knight,” Livie told her, so she wasn’t gonna feel like she had to do the cat thing, unless she wanted to. “You can talk to him if you want.”

Hopefully she hadn’t been supposed to keep the Mauvian thing, or the knight thing, a secret.

To Zebulon, she said, “Uh, he’s just over there ‘cause someone needed something.” Had she been listening to what he’d said as he walked out the door? Maybe not. “So, like, he should be back eventually! Unless people end up needing more things.”

She’d figured out that it was kinda hard to know an exact schedule for the priest stuff.

“But, yeah, come in! I can get you water! I don’t have any leopard cups, though.”

He would have probably liked leopard cup, since he had that one at his house. “I have sanrio though! Or, uh, this mermaid scale one!”

She’d been thinking of Sadie when she got that one, but this guy could drink from it, too!

— SEI —

“You're a Mauvian!” Zebulon didn't seem to mind being exposed as a knight. It made sense, anyway. After all, this house had accepted Teegan after his purification. Certainly, they were aware...

Viatrix, on the other hand, was slightly disappointed she couldn't try to trick Zebulon, but she didn't show it. Another person to babble about her apps at! Perfect! “I sure am! I'm the reason why your … husband? Is that right?” Zebulon nodded, but Viatrix didn't let him talk. “Good! I'm the reason why he was able to get his priest stuff back.”

So she was how he was back to being Father Isaac. He might have to ask about that– “You Mauvians are damn magic…”

Viatrix bumped Zebulon's leg with her head. Damn right they were.

His attention was quickly pulled by the mention of the leopard print cup, and he grinned. “Yeah, not sure what people need at his parish,” he assumed that was what she was talking about with the vague description, “but they won't keep him all night, right?”

Probably not. He had a loose knowledge of what season it was – Lent, right? – but he didn't quite understand it beyond what he had always heard Elliot Teegan mention.

“I'll take sanrio though! Or mermaid, whatever you want to offer.” He offered a grin as he walked in after the invite. “Guess Dise let you see that cup? My niece gave it to me, actually.” He didn't seem to mind someone else using it, though. “She likes Lisa Frank, I like leopard print, she thought it was the perfect thing to gift Uncle Zeb.”

She had been right.

“Just show me where I'm allowed to hang out.”

— STARI—

“Yeah, the living room’s right there,” said Livie, even as she was already moving towards the kitchen at a pace between a jog and a sprint. She was determined to be a good hostess and impress Teegan’s husband, and that meant she had to have speedy service. Anyway, she was sure Viatrix could point him in the right direction if he managed to get too lost.

He would hear cabinet doors bangling open and shut, and then the water running. Livie had a couple of different Sanrio character cups she could have picked from, but in the end she decided to go with the classic Hello Kitty. She wasn’t really a leopard, but she was a cat, so that was kinda close? Anyway, he clearly liked cats.

She grabbed the My Melody cup for herself, filled that too, and then headed to the living room.

“Yeah, Dise let me drink out of the Lisa Frank cup. Which was good, ‘cause, like, I thought he was kinda scary at first. At the purification, and at first when I went to talk to him, he didn’t smile and he was just kinda staring and I didn’t know what to think?”

Well, other than that he’d hated both her and Teegan, obviously. She’d thought that.

“But I figured, if he had something like that, he must be cool.”

She handed his glass over and held onto her own, sinking into a cross-legged seat on the couch. “He is cool, by the way. We started talking after that. Did you know he knows a lot about science? Like, a lot.”

— SEI —

Letting Livie bound off to go get him water, he followed Viatrix to the living room and the couches. The moment he sat down, the Mauvian hopped onto the couch and sat in his lap. Did Mauvians do that? Was she just doing it because he thought she was an actual cat?

Well, she was purring, so who cared– “So how did you get his priesthood back?”

“Oh, that one was a challenge! But a fun one.” Viatrix grinned up at Zebulon as he pet her behind the ears. He was pretty good at that actually… “Just had to get into the Vatican records and move some things around.”

“Oh, that doesn't sound too bad.” Zebulon took one moment, and then another, and interrupted his own casual observation with a, “Wait–”

No, that was actually pretty extreme. Wasn't the Vatican notorious for how locked up they were about literally everything-

Zebulon's attention was taken by taking the cup from Livie and also Viatrix's giggling. He probably was never going to figure out the how on that one, was he? “Diryas isn't as scary as he seems,” noted Zebulon, with a chuckle. “I mean, I met him first online where he has a lot less of the flat effect going on, so maybe that impacted my initial view, but.”

To be fair, though, he wouldn't deny that all three of them–Teegan, Tobias, and Zebulon–tended to agree that Diryas' fury was the most frightening. That had nothing to do with first impressions, though.

“But he was upset,” still was, honestly, though since the last few days it had a different tenor, “in multiple ways, so I think that impacted how he acted.” He sipped from the Hello Kitty cup after smiling at it. “Glad you think he's cool now, though. Obviously, I agree.” His grin was rakish. “And yeah, his love of chemistry is how we bonded at first.”

Well, beyond things he wasn't going to disclose to her. He was pretty sure Teegan wouldn't have liked that.

“I offhand mentioned when we were just shooting the s**t that I was doing undergrad in chemistry and he shared the same with me. We both have our doctorates now.” He laughed. “He concentrated on biochemistry and moved to industry. I did inorganic and became a professor.”

— STARI —

“Wait, you know about chemistry stuff, too?” said Livie, in the tone of someone who had totally gone down an ADHD fueled rabbit hole on the subject recently. She’d only gotten so far before the wikipedia pages had gotten kinda dense and there had been equations and stuff, though. It was a lot easier to talk about it with a person, and that meant her eyes were sparkling right now.

“Plus you have a doctorate? That means you went to school for, like, a long time, right? That means you’re awesome and super smart!”

There was only the tiniest second of a pause before she added, “And if you’re inorganic, does that mean you get to do the explosions?”

He wouldn’t get to study his beloved leopards, though, which Livie thought was a rip off. Well, she thought that for a second, and then she thought about the biology diagram she’d found on her Wonder, that had managed to make butterflies look gross, and she thought that maybe it was fine not to study leopards after all.

“Do you know anything about carbon, though? ‘Cause he was telling me that for it to be in your skin instead of a rock, it had to be in a matrix net thingy so it’s softer, and I found some pictures,” she pulled her phone out of her pocket and in the saved images there was a picture of carbon atoms all linked together in hexagons. “But if this is pure carbon is it a net thing, or is it still a rock? Is the skin the one with other stuff in it too?”

That probably counted as biochemistry though, didn’t it?

“And why is the shape different when it’s different stuff? Like, even in the little molecules. Carbon dioxide and water look different. Did you know that?”

— SEI —

“I do!”

“Oh, so you're Dr. Castaneda?” Viatrix glanced up to Zebulon from where she sat in his lap. That was one of the names he recognized from Teegan talking about his husbands. “Fancy fancy.”

He snorted quietly. “Thanks.” When he had first earned that degree, he insisted that almost everyone call him Doctor for a bit. The fascination that he had legitimately made it had faded, but it was still fun to have it acknowledged. Students didn't usually focus on how much work it took unless they were graduate students. “Both of you. I was in school for a while! More than half of my life overall.”

And arguably he was still in school, just… different, now. A research professor was different from a Ph.D. student.

He let Livie be enthusiastic for a moment before he followed, with a quirk of his lips, “I can deal with explosions. Have you ever heard of phosphorus? That's a pretty big one. Sugar and sulphur tend to fuel inorganic explosives. Actually, a lot of inorganic explosives deal with sulphur…”

His eyes shined with some interest as he leaned forward, only to quickly lean back when Viatrix complained. “Sorry– but honestly, explosions are actually what got me interested in chemistry in the first place.”

That and an idle fascination with poisons, but that was neither here nor there…

She was right to ask him if he knew much about carbon considering carbon was what made organic chemistry organic, and inorganic, well, not. Fortunately, though, she was asking about things he did know. “I know enough,” he responded, with a laugh. He wasn't Diryas, but he certainly knew these things. “A lot of what changes what an item is has to do with the types of bonds between the molecules. Carbon is particularly good at bonding with other molecules, including each other. Diamonds and graphite are both pure carbon, but one is hard and the other is, well, what's in a pencil. So, yes, pure carbon could end up as a net! Can also end up as a sheet, as a chain, all sorts of things, really.

“And yes, there is something of a net happening with skin itself. My husband would better know the exact formation than I do, but there's an extracellular matrix that makes up a lot of skin. Hyaluronic acid too.”

Hopefully, Diryas would be proud of him for having some organic thoughts–

“And yes, they do look different! A lot of that is about the bonds between the individual atoms. There are molecules with the same atoms in them, but end up acting differently because of different things about them, such as the bonds between the individual atoms.”

… Huh. Okay, maybe he was fancy. Viatrix wondered if her Mauvian tech knowledge could get her a fun title like that…

— STARI —

Okay, so carbon was weird, and multifaceted, and could make different shapes and do all kinds of different chemical-y things, which was probably why it had a whole subset of chemistry focused around it.

It seemed like Zebulon was more into the other subset, though, which apparently had more to do with other stuff, like sulfur. And phosphorus.

Explosions, basically.

That was more Livie’s thing, honestly, even if she was doing her best to wrap her head around the rest.

“Oh, I know what sulfur is! I think!” She leaned slightly forwards on the couch, looking proud. “That’s the yellow one, right? It smells like rotten eggs and you’re not supposed to touch it.” She puffed out her cheeks, thinking. “Or, I guess it smells like hell, depending on who you talk to?”

She also was still trying to wrap her head around the whole religion thing. That was fun, too!

“So does it make up a rotten egg explosion? Also, what’s phosphorus?” She was speaking quickly, the way she tended to when she got invested in something. “And you said you’re a teacher, right? So can you teach me to, y’know,”

She moved her hands apart and wiggled her fingers in a pretend explosion.

— SEI —

“Yeah, sulphur smells ******** awful.” Zebulon snorted. “Suppose like hell would be an accurate descriptor.” To be honest, it sounded like something Teegan would say. Was hell described as smelling sulphuric? He mostly described it by the rotten egg thing himself– “It is yellow, though. Usually pretty easy to spot in a solid form because of that. The form of sulphur that is most associated with being explosive is the gas form, though, and you can’t necessarily see that.”

Viatrix wrinkled her nose. That sounded vile. Why would he want to even mess with that?

He remembered an experiment that he had seen when he was an undergrad where they ended up letting some very minor amount of hydrogen sulfide into the air after a chemical reaction. Smelled like s**t. He was very happy to get out of the room after that. “The gas in the air is usually hydrogen sulfide! Flammable at even low amounts.” Zebulon tapped his chin. “But a rotten egg exploding itself is a bit of a different thing. Mostly has to do with the gases that build up when it rots.”

Could also be steam, depending on if the person had attempted to microwave or otherwise prepare a rotten egg…

He digressed.

“Phosphorus is an element. Fifteenth on the periodic table, nonmetallic. White phosphorus is the most dangerous of the group, outright poisonous, and will spontaneously ignite when exposed to air. Pretty badass, right?” Zebulon definitely had a different definition of badass than most people, but it seemed like Livie was on board. She was even asking if he could show her some things about explosives.

… That he could do.

To some degree, anyway. Obviously, it was one thing to chat about it. It was another thing still to look up videos. If she was looking for him to use his professor knowledge…

“I mean,” he snickered, “I don’t really have access to an explosives testing facility, but there are a few things I could show off at the DCU lab.”

“You can do that?” Viatrix sounded a bit incredulous. Of course, was she really one to talk, considering she literally had a basement lab? By the same token, though, she used it for things like, well, making new apps. Like the GPS or the Discorder. Not really blowing things up.

Zebulon laughed. “I mean, I’m full-time research faculty. So long as no one else has the lab reserved, I can go ahead and reserve it for myself. Usually handy for people who are under me doing independent study. Just gotta not damage the place.”

“Is that a risk?”

“Well,” he snorted, “with chemistry? Could be. But I’d be talking more minor things.”

Teegan would probably like it if he showed Livie a few things, right? … Or maybe he wouldn’t, considering that an interest in explosives wasn’t necessarily the right thing to encourage, but who was he kidding? Explosions were badass.

— STARI —

“Wait,” said Livie, nose wrinkling just at the thought of what he was describing. “Sulphur can be a gas?” Her face twisted, and she stuck out her tongue. “That might be the grossest thing I’ve ever heard of in my entire life.”

She wondered if that was something that they used in war. Like, just for the smell, not the explosion part. Although, she guessed the explosion part made sense, since sulphur could burn, which was where the whole brimstone and hell thing came from.

“Or does making it hydrogen sulfide make it smell less bad? I know adding different stuff changes thing’s properties, I figured that part out!”

Either way, it probably wasn’t the best thing to have around in large amounts.

“Phosphorus sounds cooler, I like the idea of spontaneous combustion!”

She liked fire! It was pretty! It was, like, powerful, too. She liked the idea of powerful things. Maybe it wasn’t that surprising that she’d ended up as a Negaverse General.

Her face lit up when he offered to show her sciency stuff at his lab. Obviously she wanted to do that! She wanted to see all the explosions, them being small scale wasn’t a problem. There had to be other cool chemistry stuff, too.

“It doesn’t have to just be explosions. It’d be cool to learn about, like, bubbly stuff? Colors?”

She was gonna be so good at chemistry by the end of this.

She felt like she should probably offer him something in return, though.

“Oooh, if you show me your science stuff at the school, then I can show you my lab,” she told him. She grinned, bouncing a little on the sofa. “Would you have guessed I have a lab? I do! It’s in space. My magic space lab.” She wiggled her fingers.

“It’s definitely not inorganic, though. There’s butterflies and stuff. Hopefully that’s not a problem?”

It probably technically wouldn’t even be a chemistry lab, although she could probably make explosions there if she tried hard enough.

— SEI —

He snickered under his breath, his eyes dancing. Okay. He could definitely see what Teegan liked in Livie. She was cute! “All elements can be any form of matter. You can find sulphur as a solid or a gas. Can also find it as liquid or plasma.” He wouldn’t mention one of the lesser-known states of matter on top of that, because he didn’t need to make the quick lesson in chemistry into a more in-depth lesson on what the hell a bose-einstein concentrate or a time crystal was…

He didn’t want to delve into quantum mechanics on top of everything else he was explaining.

“And making it hydrogen sulfide definitely doesn’t help.” Honestly, in his opinion, it in some ways made it worse. Hydrogen sulfide was a lot easier to cause by accident. “It does change its properties, but it doesn’t make it smell any better.”

As he shifted again, Viatrix decided she was done being Zebulon’s lap cat and instead settled in between him and Livie as he resumed talking. “Anyway, I agree phosphorous is badass. Just avoid ingesting it. For as badass it looks on fire, it is outright deadly in some forms.”

The poisons aspect almost seemed to fascinate him more than the explosions, but he tamped that part down. It was hard not to when she mentioned first the concept of the chemistry of bubbly things–he could think of a few fun reactions–and colours, and then, more importantly, a lab. A lab in space.

“Wait, you have a lab?” interrupted Viatrix, sitting up a bit straighter. “I didn’t know you had a lab!”

“Look, a lab is a lab. I just like labs.” He grinned. “And even if butterflies would probably be more Diryas’ thing, a place to study alien butterflies is intriguing. I can make that deal.”

He would absolutely show her–and maybe Viatrix the apparent Mauvian, considering she seemed curious–some fun science experiments in trade for showing him around whatever space lab she had. Honestly, his mind was flying around with some thoughts about it. Were butterflies all they studied? Were they the same as ones of Earth or very much different? What did they want to know about the butterflies? Were there other things of interest to these ancient entomologists, or did they stick to butterflies on Nectaris’ wonder specifically?

He took another sip from his Hello Kitty cup as he thought about it, Viatrix butting in with, “how long have you known you have a whole lab?”

— STARI —

That made sense, yeah, Livie thought. That was how the states of matter worked, even if she’d never put together the thoughts of gas and sulfur before. Then she bounced again, putting the thought of plasma in there.

“Oooh, you should tell that to Ignacio,” she said. “My brother. He’s the senshi of plasma, Encke, and, like, he can already burn people, but if he could burn people while also smelling absolutely terrible?” Her grin was wicked. “Yeah, that’d be awesome, and also kinda terrifying.”

Although she didn’t think he could change his magic just ‘cause he knew that sulfur plasma existed. Oh well.

She noticed Viatrix jumped away from Zeb to sit between the two of them when they started to talk about her space lab. Was the Mauvian trying to butter her up?

It wouldn’t take much buttering. She was doing a lot better about taking people to her Wonder lately! She scratched Viatrix behind the ears anyway, since she’d decided to grace her with her presence.

“Yeah, I have a lab,” she said. “I found it, I think, like, the second time I went up to my wonder, when I was looking through all the buildings? Except I, uh,” she puffed out her cheeks, looking embarrassed, “Didn’t really think much about it? I mean, there was all the stained glass and shiny stuff, and, yeah.”

She looked back to the two of them, deflated. “I mean, I didn’t even know that science was cool until, like, a couple of weeks ago! Then I wasn’t even doing space stuff for a while, either, with all of the boy drama.”

She shot Zeb a look. “There’s boy drama.” Since he was dealing with his own boy drama, she thought he would understand.

“I’m trying to get back into it, though. I showed Encke the lab recently, and he was into it. He looked at the books and we cleaned a bunch, so it’s not too dusty in there now.”

If she had people who thought that her space lab was cool, maybe she’d have to put more effort into making it nice.
“But yeah! Both of you guys can come see it whenever.”

— SEI —

Wait, there was a senshi of plasma? Badass. Zebulon definitely wanted to talk to him, honestly. “You said his name was Ignacio?” That name was very familiar for multiple reasons, but he’d presume that Ignacio who was Livie’s brother was not the same Ignacio in the movies. Ignacio was a common enough name.

Viatrix curled a bit closer to Livie. “Yeah! Ig’s my bonded, actually. Sure he’d love to show you around, and also talk about powers.” She giggled. “It would be terrifying if he could make that burn magic a stink bomb, but I don’t think that’s something that would just happen.”

Maybe she could make something that he could launch at the same time as his magic. Make some kind of plasma sulphur. Now that would be fun…

Maybe after she finished Discorder. That was more important.

… And the pets for a bribe to get to this lab she was talking about, of course.

“That sounds lovely, actually, with the stained glass.” Was that at all in the lab? Zebulon was growing more curious about this place, admittedly, but there was a record scratch that disrupted the excitement when she mentioned something achingly familiar.

Boy drama. As much as his particular boy drama was resolved, he absolutely never wanted to feel that kind of ache ever again. Zebulon had missed them terribly, and it impacted every part of his life. His brows knit, and he couldn’t help but offer, “If you ever need some help getting through that, think the four of us,” referring to himself and his husbands, of course, “might have some insight.”

Hopefully, none of them had ever tried to murder each other, but that wasn’t important. Maybe there were no betrayals and ghosting for years while trying to deal with what that meant, and then the other three reeling as they tried to figure out the new reality.

But she seemed interested in talking about the lab more, and so was he for the moment, and so was the very content Mauvian who was openly purring at being scratched. In fact, she interrupted Zebulon’s reply with, “Please! I think space stuff is pretty badass. Maybe you can help me test my GPS app on Wonders, too. It’s a really good app too.”

She knew a lot of knights, but they were all so cagey about their wonders! Basiluzzo had only just started letting people up. Rude. She had so many things to do!

Zebulon snorted when Viatrix’s excited babble finally stopped. “Yeah, I’d like to go.”

— STARI —

“Yeah, Ignacio Araya-Bell,” chirped Livie, always ready to talk about her family as much if not more than she was willing to talk about anything else, like science. “Which, technically makes him my brother in law if you wanna get into that stuff, but,” she gave a smug little smile, “I don’t wanna get technical.”

At first, he’d felt the most like her family out of any of them. After a few months, she’d come to feel right at home with all the Bells, but Ignacio had been the one who had found her wandering on the streets and kinda saved her.

“And I’ll tell you about the boy drama sometime if you want, but that’s gonna have to be, like, a whole thing,” she told him, “With, like, stuffed animals, and emotional support mac and cheese.” She was doing a really good job of not thinking about it right now. She’d been doing a pretty good job of not thinking about it, with the four husbands’ drama to focus on instead.

She didn’t wanna ruin that now.

“If you both actually wanna see this space lab, we can go look at it now,” she said, to pull all three of them away from falling down the boy drama rabbit hole. “Plus there’s, like, butterflies. It’s prettier than the living room, I promise. Unless Teegan’s on his way home or something,” she chewed the insides of her cheeks in thought.

“Probably not, though. When he goes to do church stuff it almost always ends up taking forever.”

— SEI —

Zebulon just about did a spittake.

He had just been thinking that it would be unreasonable to think that this Ignacio would be the locally-born actor Ignacio Araya, and there she was, saying her brother…in-law was legitimately that exact Ignacio. He cleared his throat, figuring out how to best approach this, before asking, stunned, “Wait, Ignacio Araya. That one.”

There were a bunch of pieces of news that this was giving him at once. The reason why Ignacio was a Bell, a tidbit he did know, was the same reason why Livie was a Bell, or at least the same family. Bell was a common enough last name! How the ******** was he supposed to make that connection! The actor Ignacio was also apparently a g-ddamn senshi, and he was a senshi of ******** plasma, at that.

No wonder he was so ******** hot.

“I have to– one second.”

He knew Teegan was doing church things. That didn’t quite stop Zebulon from sending out a text he knew wouldn’t be seen right away.

He tucked the phone away, attempting to gather his desire to drool over him openly. This was his sister. Or sister-in-law. Whatever. This wasn’t one of his online communities where he thirsted over some public figures pretty ******** openly. This was Teegan’s not-interested bestie. Bury it, move on, move on, “I can be good at listening about these things, trust me. Boy drama is a bit of a speciality of mine at this point.”

Macaroni and cheese and stuffed animals? Sure, he could do that. Cheddar wasn’t one of those cheeses that pissed off his lactose intolerance anyway… But she was related to Ignacio Araya! Okay, calm down–

Viatrix didn’t quite understand what the humans saw so much in her bonded. She guessed she understood it from an aesthetic perspective, she guessed. He was handsome from things like generalized aesthetic rules of determining if someone was attractive. Also, he was pretty damn strong. And he glowed.

Okay, most humans didn’t know that one. Unfortunately.

But whatever. If one of the husbands of the priest was going to be a whole disaster about her bonded, as long as she didn’t have to hear about what that meant.

“Look, even if he can’t, I’ll go to the space lab.”

“Hey!” the space lab was a good distraction from the new knowledge that someone had stepped danger close from the realm of safe to thirst for because they will never know you into they know you, only thirst if they are interested in your thirst. “You’re right. Teegan tends,” or, at least, tended, “to hang around after ceremonies or masses to make sure no one needs him.”

So it would probably be another couple of hours.

-STARI-

“Oh, did you see him on TV?” Asked Livie, going into proud sister mode and mostly oblivious to the full depth of the crisis that Zebulon was going through in front of her. “Yeah, I like watching his stuff too! He’s a pretty good actor, right?”

She was vaguely aware that some people got into his looks. Like, really into them. She’d read some thirst tweets. That information generally got shoved to the back of her brain, though, with the fact that her dad had a boytoy and also her new cursed kink knowledge.

“But yeah! It’s him.” Pulling out her own phone, she pulled up a selfie of the two of them with a silly glitter filter put over it, and turned it so that Zeb could see. “He’ll probably give you an autograph or something if you want. Later, though. He’s also working right now.”

That meant none of the three of them had anything better to do then to go look at some butterflies and try to figure out some space science!

She hopped up from the couch, all smiles.

“Okay. Ready?”

— SEI —

Zebulon definitely only watched Ignacio’s stuff for his acting skills.

Definitely only that–

“He is!” and to cover like that wasn’t a lie, just an omission. Viatrix glanced at him for a moment, but she moved on from it, nosing in to see the pictures that Livie was showing Zebulon. She had already seen them, of course, but they were super cute. It didn’t quite miss her notice that Zebulon’s eyes locked onto Ignacio first–

But at least Zebulon managed to yank himself out of that to look at both of them. “Those are cute pictures. I like the filter you chose.” This definitely was not helping take his mind off just how accessible Ignacio apparently now was.

He was committed though, right? Were Ignacio and his husband at least swingers at all–

He pulled himself up from the couch and was very thankful he was good at burying things down. “Ready!”

To space! And space labs! Where he would not find people he actively thirsted over–