Thrudd wasn’t sure when she started noticing that she was different.

It couldn’t have been before she was a few thousand years old.

She had grown curious about how different her life was as prime Thrudd when compared to her counterparts. So, she ventured to the highest floor of their family’s observatory to check.

What she saw shocked her to her core.

A man she didn’t even recognize was her father in most every other life. Only her mother remained a constant.

At first, Thrudd was reasonably shaken by what she had seen. It felt wrong, like she was witnessing a great big cosmic joke.

And then, years later, the family started regaining memories of the different timelines they’d lived through.

She’d confirmed it with them secretly.

Her family had remembered three different timelines. She had only remembered two.

“The timeline I wasn’t a part of… does it have something to do with how I ended up as part of the family…?”

Abaddon was hoping with all of his heart that Thrudd wouldn’t ask that. His heart was pounding so loudly that he was sure the girls could hear it.

He had difficulty even meeting Thrudd’s gaze.

“That… I don’t really know what you’re-”

“Dad, just… tell me. I need to know.” Thrudd said firmly.

“No, you don’t.” Abaddon shook his head and started to stand up. “It’s insignificant, you’re my kid, and that’s all that matters. Everything else is just some other accident that doesn’t matter at all.”

He pulled himself away from Thrudd and Thea before either of them could try to stop him from leaving.

“I’m going back to bed, girls. Goodnight.”

Abaddon vanished from the living room and left the girls with a sour taste in their mouths.

Thrudd was particularly distraught, as she had never seen her father stonewall her on information before. They had just about the most open relationship that a parent and child could have.

Or at least she thought they did.

*Sniff*

Thea heard a small sound that nearly hurt her heart to witness.

She went to her sister’s side and wiped her face with a newly created tissue.

“…Don’t mind Dad. He’s just… ashamed.” Thea surmised.

“A-Ashamed for what? Why won’t he tell me what happened??”

“Because he loves you.” Thea acquiesced. “He doesn’t want you to hate him, or start thinking that he’s evil, o-or..”

Thrudd suddenly grabbed her sister by the shoulders. “You know what happened. You have to tell me!”

If there was one thing that could be said for Thea, it was that she had a weakness for family.

Between two choices, she usually went with whichever one favored a member of her family.

But now, between the father she loved and the little sister she spent her life looking after, she was petrified of betraying the confidence of either one.

–

“Knuck if you buck, boy, nuck if you buck, boy!”

“Whoop that trick! Whoop that trick!”

Mira and Mateo kicked down the door to the family dungeons with an inhuman amount of energy being passed between them.

As a godfather, Mateo was everything a kid could ask for.

He was a fun and slightly mischievous bad influence with a penchant for occasionally throwing caution to the wind and living a bit on the edge.

Similarly, Mira was a bubbly agent of chaos who thrived on doing things that would probably make Lisa faint.

So it was no surprise to anyone that the two got along wonderfully and fed off each other in a manner similar to Helios and Darius, or Abaddon and Bekka.

It was great for them. However, it was usually bad for everyone else.

“Knock knock, fuck faces! Hell has come a-calling!” Mira yelled.

“”AAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!!! IT’S THE SHRIMP DEMON!!!!!!!””

Nug and Yeb’s twin shrieks were significantly less jarring than the twin puddles of urine they expelled at the sight of Mira.

Their fear was hardly unjustified.

“Who the hell are you calling ’shrimp’, you jelly-filled cocksuckers!”

Mira lunged across the room and reintroduced the twins to her fists after several thousand years. Bits of their gelatinous body splashed onto Mateo’s shoes.

“Bleh… Do me a favor and clean this off, would ya?” Mateo raised his foot to a chained Dagon.

The former vampire king was almost completely lifeless. A shell of a man with no will to go on even for a day more.

“Please… either put me back in my own private cell, or kill me slowly and painfully…”

Mateo raised a brow.

Loki scooted into the frame and pointed to the twins who were being massacred under Mira.

“He’s been like that ever since those two came in.” The god sighed. “Can’t figure out why though. We’re charming conversationalists if I do say so myself.”

“Just undo my shackles. I’ll fly into the sun and never trouble any of you again…” Dagon said lifelessly.

Loki waved his hand dismissively.

“Oh, ignore him. He’s just being curmudgeonly because we’re trying to unpack a few millennia of deeply held bigotry. Do you know he’s prejudiced against dragons?

What sense does that even make? Where does he even think vampires come from, a witch? Plus, it’s like he’s never heard of god damn Dracula or-”

Mateo grabbed Loki by the neck and lifted him above his head.

All of his earlier friendliness and levity had completely disappeared.

“Never. Mention. That. Name. Again..!”

Rather than being afraid, Loki was visibly amused.

“Oh, that’s right… I forgot you two had your whole thing. But what’s it matter now? You won in the end, after all.”

Mateo growled distastefully and hurled Loki over his shoulder like he was garbage.

’God, I can’t wait for Odin to come take you away..’

Sighing, Mateo turned to pull Mira off of the twins. “Come on, mija. There has to be something left of them when we call their Mama.”

“Oh shit, right…” Mira finally realized what she was doing and pulled her fists out of the blasphemies’ chests.

“M-Mercy…”

“Please… get her away from us.”

Mira smiled evilly at the two horrors cowering before her.

“It’s way too early for you to start crying already. You’re going to help me get my aunt back by any means necessary…!”

Nug and Yeb peed on themselves again. They whimpered as they held each other tightly.

Mateo sighed fondly while Loki put an arm around his shoulder.

“Such a cute kid. I wonder if mine will be like that.”

Loki gasped.

“You didn’t hear that and if you open your mouth you die.”

–

Mira and Mateo were rather decisive in picking a region of space to travel to.

Their journey didn’t even take them five minutes before they arrived on a stretch of clustered moons in a distant galaxy.

As soon as they arrived, Mateo took a moment to get his bearings.

Space travel wasn’t something the vampire liked to do often. Not because he was afraid, but because he simply knew too much.

“Godfather? You’re looking a little green there.” Mira noticed.

“I’m not going to make it, mija. I keep thinking about it!”

“Keep it together bro!”

“We’re standing inside your father!” Mateo retched.

He pointed to two moons that were particularly close together.

“What if those are his cojones?!”

“You’re being silly, they’re just moons! If anything they’re more like pimples!”

“I don’t know if that’s better!”

Even though they had literally just been tortured, the twin blasphemies were dying of laughter.

Mateo was eventually able to get his bearings and nodded while steeling his posture.

“Okay, okay… I’m fine.”

“Good.”

“I don’t like either one of you.”

The duo suddenly looked up and found the floating face of a dragon above them.

Mateo was taken aback, while Mira was ecstatic.

“Holy hell, dad… You look all young again!” She squealed.

Mateo hadn’t seen Abaddon back when he only had one head, but he knew what a young dragon looked like thanks to all his years living with them.

Abaddon had one massive baby face.

“Is this a midlife crisis thing?”

“No!” Abaddon said firmly. “It’s a can’t control my shape thing!”

“Like puberty?” Mira tilted her head.

“Geez, get it together, man, you’re a grandpa now! This is like the dragon equivalent of falling asleep in the chair at dinner!”

“…” Abaddon seriously considered hurling shooting stars at his family members.

“I’m monitoring the two of you to avoid stress… please don’t give me more of it.”

Mateo raised a brow. “Aren’t you supposed to be with your daughters?”

“Brother, what did I just say?”

Mateo held his hands up in surrender.

He felt a cold breeze rush behind his back.

When he looked for the source, he found Mira standing on the moon behind him as a bright white dragon on two legs.

“No time like the present…”

Mira walked over to the pink cube housing the twin blasphemies.

She reached inside and removed the writhing masses despite their intense protests.

“Alright, you miserable sacks of shit… Do what you do best..!”

Mira applied force into her grip and squeezed the twins until their insides were close to becoming outsides.

It took almost no time for them to throw their heads back and scream.

“”MOMMMMMMMMYYYYYYYYYY!!!!!!!””