CHAPTER FIVE: The Masochism Tango.


Godric's P.O.V

The night was warm and black like blood spilled in dusk. The kind of night that was still bloated with daylight heat, wafting up from cracked pavement, pressing in from all sides, demanding to be heard. Godric, clad only in linen trousers from his recent rising, stood in his personal room, watching out his window.

The gleaming surge of Dallas stared back, a slumping cityscape of radiance and debauchery cresting on the horizon. A city where any man's sins could be fed if one searched hard enough or not at all, and never in-between. Nevertheless, to Godric, none of it brought any sort of joy.

Not like it used to.

He glanced down to the phone in his hand, thumb hovering over the ring button. Even now, he debated. Wavered. He should laugh, he thought. Godric, the vampire once known as death itself… hesitant. He would laugh, if he wasn't so completely drowned with apathy lately.

Food was nothing but ash on his tongue. The pleasure he had once delighted in with hunting became sour and brittle. Games, those mental matches he had always indulged in, became pointless. Even sex became an act, a weary wave to ride out, going through the motions to a sweaty unfulfillment that left him wondering what was the point?

Perhaps he should just end-

However, Godric had one thing, only one, that this crushing indifference had not dulled quite yet. His love for his Childe. His Eric. And boy, over the last few nights, wasn't he putting him through the emotional wringer?

For two nights straight, torturously, Godric had been receiving through his Maker-bond a positively writhing emulsion of strange, so very strange, feelings coming from Eric, and, most surprisingly, to a lesser degree, Pam. More remarkably, considering how he kept his side of the Maker-bond subdued and cut off recently, these emotions had been powerful enough to break through his quite impressive mental blocks.

That evening, upon rising to a myriad of emotions filtering in from Eric once more, Godric felt something other than this dreadful stagnation.

Curiosity.

Just an ember, barely a spark in the void, but Godric grasped onto it and refused to let go.

What had piqued his Childe's interest so suddenly, so impressively?

Godric pressed the button, as he brought the phone up to his ear. There was only one way to find out, wasn't there? Immediately, he was on edge. The phone rang out for a long while. Odd, considering Eric constantly picked up by the third ring, no later, and never let a call drop. Just before the irritating click of voicemail intercepted the ringing, the line snapped through.

"Hello, love."

And that was definitely not Eric.

The voice was startling. Low, with a warm trail of huskiness corded through the heart of it, smoke and smoulder, with a whiff of energy-… Inferno skulking behind. The English accent of the woman, for it certainly was a woman, was dense, a fortress, educated. Not an erudite voice one gained from high class education, but inflicted by a restraint which hadn't quite demolished the country, cockney perhaps, accent of childhood that bled through with the vowels. It was the type of voice that never did well with a whisper, Godric thought. For it always had a million reasons and more to bellow.

"Where is Eric?"

The line crackled with stillness.

"He's indisposed right now. I'll be sure to pass any message you have across."

Indisposed?

To Godric?

Doubtful.

Godric was sure, if the mood struck, he could ring through daybreak, and Eric would find a way to answer through is death slumber. Neither did Godric like the way the woman said indisposed. Drawling. Languid. Pulling the word thin and taut, readying to snap. Almost a tease, really. Beckoning a challenge to her assertion, as if she wanted Godric to argue the point.

He didn't fall for the diversion over a petty tenet.

"What have you done to him?"

She chuckled and it buzzed against his ear like an angry wasp. Godric thought, truly, it was the kind of laughter you could feel. It burst forth and spread wide across space, touching everything it could, conquering, sinking into your body to bury itself in your bones like a fang in the neck.

"I find your insinuation insulting. Positively rude, in fact. I have done nothing. Well… There was a little bit of a nibble, but nothing big and blue can't handle. I assume Eric is somewhere back in Louisiana, spitting like a big cat about his missing car and phone."

Fascinating.

She was good with her words; Godric would give her that much. She laid on the excitements generously, trapping with honey, redirecting from the essence. She wanted him to push about that little nibble she described, tried to hook him with it, all the while distracting from the fact she had let slip Eric's car and phone were missing, and seen as she, as she was talking to Godric right now, had his phone, it was only a given she had Eric's car too.

Did she have an aversion to lying? Or, possibly, could she simply not lie?

"And why is his car and phone missing?"

She was good, but Godric was better at the verbal tango, it seemed. She didn't even bother to try and lie. By how swiftly she answered, she didn't even contemplate doing so.

"Because I took them."

Either she saw no point in lying, which meant she had sussed out, already, how quick Godric was at picking people apart mentally like a crow pecked a field of corn clean, and had, in turn, done so to him, or she found it… Boring. Better a game to be had in telling the truth, as obscured as they could make it, and still get what they wanted than getting it easily through a lie. Made the win more… Succulent. Godric knew that one personally.

Both were troubling for their own reasons.

Both sent a lick of heat to his groin.

"And why did you take them?"

Anew, silence drifted along the phone line. Once More, she shocked him by fully jumping track. Wasn't she just a big ball of surprises? This, her, Godric knew, for he knew his Childe intimately, was what had caught Eric's attention these last few nights.

He never did know when not to play with fire.

"I heard it's very sunny in Texas. An unusual place for a vampire such as yourself. You are a vampire, aren't you? Yeah. I can practically taste it. Your kind has a sleekness in the voice. A certainty of self. But Texas? That's ballsy. One wrong blind or door and you go up in smoke. So… You must be somewhere well guarded. Inner Dallas city, I think. Somewhere the buildings offer a lot of shade against that dreadfully sunny skyline."

It seemed this night was to be filled with oddities, because, strangely, Godric found a smile threatening to pull at his lips. He couldn't remember the last time he had smiled, or felt the urge to, not to ease those around him, but because… Because he wanted to.

Just wanted to.

If Godric was ballsy, as the woman so delicately put, so was she.

"That was a very clumsy attempt at trying to weasel out where I live. If I say yes, you know I am within Dallas. If I say no, too fast and it's a lie, too slow, it's another lie, and if I say it perfectly, you know I'm in the suburbs."

Another chuckle, brighter, biting.

"It was a bit ham-fisted, wasn't it? Can't seem to help myself. Something pops into my head, and out it pops right back out the mouth. Impulse seems to be a problem lately… But, it did work. You didn't say anything. You're trying to distract me by looping me into pedantics, and therefore, I hit the nail on the head, didn't I? You're in mainland Dallas."

Godric ran his tongue over his teeth, a keen ache starting up in his gums.

"And why would you want to know where I am?"

No reticence or reluctance.

"You wouldn't believe me if I said Eric wanted me to check up on you, would you?"

Godric… Godric laughed. It scorched. It hurt. Twisted in his gut. Foreign and throbbing. And it felt good. Really good.

"No, I wouldn't."

A tapping came from the other side of the line, and Godric could picture the woman thrumming her forefinger as she held the phone, banging through her thoughts, drumming through her options. One beat, another idea, a new thump, an alternative notion. She thought like rainfall, Godric suspected, rapidly, in a blitz of creativity and revival.

"It says in the messages on this phone that you have a nest? I'm guessing a nest is like a werewolves pack. How many do you have in your nest? Two? Four? Nineteen?"

Another leap. More telling this time. She had wanted to know where he was. Now she wanted to know how high his nest numbered. She…

She was coming here.

"I have enough."

A click of a tongue smacking lips. Perhaps even swirling over fang. Did her gums ache too?

"Splendid. Middling numbers. Not too large, or you would have bragged. Not to low that you would have lied. Six? Seven? Five?"

She wasn't a vampire if she did not know what a nest was, and compared it to a werewolves pack of all things. Neither was she human. She couldn't be. Too quick on her feet and sharp of tongue. She liked poking sleeping bears too much to have that human survival instinct. And, by all indications, she adored a good game. The sort of games Godric used to love.

It was only fair, he thought, to give her a warning of what prodding this bear entailed. Even if, presently, he wasn't completely who he used to be.

"I know you're trying to come here. I can hear the hum of an engine, Eric's car I assume, through the line. Why else would you need the numbers of my nest? Testing my defence? I can assure you it won't be as easy as you think it is. You do not want to pick this battle, little one."

For she was little. Young. No matter what her species was. The jumping in her thoughts and conversation gave her away. Erratic with energy, impossible to stay on one path. A supernova barely erupted. The force of the youth to want to do, say and be everything at once.

How Godric missed those days.

Still, he was older. Wiser. It wasn't a threat he had given her. He quite… Enjoyed this discussion, and with it, the girl with the silver tongue. It would be a shame to end it so soon, end her so soon, if she recklessly decided to attack him or his nest. A caution, as light as can be, she should heed seemed appropriate.

A part of him, some small piece he had thought was long dead, pun not intended, didn't want to her listen at all.

"Do you want a fight? Because it sounds like it. It sounds like it a whole lot, and I like fighting."

That wasn't a threat either. It could be nothing less than a promise. Try me, and let me try you. Who has the bigger appetite? Let's find out. You know you want to. That fragment of him, primal and ancient, that he thought was long gone reared its head from sleep, gnashing and clawing, trying to reach the surface through the thick blanket of apathy. He didn't notice he was holding onto the window frame with his spare hand until it bent and crunched beneath his pale fingers.

He should hang up.

He should get in touch with Eric and speak to his Childe, tell him what he knew and never look back.

He should end this right now.

This was a dangerous game they were about to play.

A game she likely couldn't fully see.

But he could. Oh, he could. And it was glorious.

He should hang up.

The beast broke to the surface, and it was starving.

"Five in the nest. The address is 411 East Lawther Drive, right by White Rock lake."

She chuckled that whirring laugh that mingled with the whine of the engine echoing in the background. She was picking up speed by the whistle of the wind blowing across the line, pressing her foot to the ground, flooring it.

"Seen as we're both being so very honest, I'm not planning on killing you."

He did smile this time. Sharp.

"I suspect we both know killing is one of the softer things in life."

She answered back both confoundedly appalled and thrilled, as if she couldn't decide whether what she said was a blessing or a curse.

"Oh, I like you."

There was no turning back now.

Godric, uneasily, wasn't sure he wanted to.

The game was on, and neither he, nor she, seemed the type to fold. Yet, there needed to be some ground rules.

"You will not kill any of my nest."

She scoffed at him.

No one had dared scoffed at him in centuries.

He was almost… Proud she had.

Delighted.

"Can't promise that, and we both know it. If they attack me, I will wrench their heads clean off their shoulders. I might even play bongos with their skulls. Depends how much they piss me off."

So, she had the strength to rip a head off, did she? She likely didn't mean to let that slip. That whittled down the table of possibilities quite a lot. Werewolf? No. Too calm for an enraged werewolf. Faeries didn't have the stomach for fighting, forever choosing to retreat and hide. Ghoul? No. You could hear the spittle they dribbled as they spoke. Djinn? She was awfully good at how she worded things, but, again, no. If she was a Djinn, she wouldn't be acting by herself, tethered to the one who caste her into this plane.

"Not Stan or Isabelle."

"How will I know who is who?"

"You'll know."

She gave a drawn-out sigh.

"Fine. Not Stan or Isabelle. But no tricky shit. You can't call in more to your nest and fuck up the numbers you've given me. No moving either. I will find you, and I'll be angry, and that's a terrible way to start our friendship."

Tricky shit.

Tricks.

Got you.

"No magic either, little witch."

Silence, floating, and then scorching laughter.

"You are good. What gave me away?"

"Only a Witch or Wizard would be concerned with tricks, being naturally slippery and misleading, themselves. Your laughter too. It crackles like magic in the air."

She hummed.

"You are good, but not perfect. You're only partly right. I bet you're not used to that, are you? Only being partly something. Does it chaff? Does it sting? But, alright. No offensive magic."

She was trying to get under his skin, throw him off with a peppered insult, and, all over again, she was fishing, attempting to get him to bite so he ignored her phrasing.

Eric might have chomped, hot-headed as he was.

Godric didn't.

"No magic at all. That's the deal, raindrop. If you want to reach me, you do it with your own hands, not with your wand."

It's intimate. Too familiar. Worst of all, the name came too easily to his lips. Raindrop. Back, so long ago, when he was human, in his tribe that was nothing but ash now, forgotten in the history books, names had power. You guarded it, kept it close and warm like a newborn at a mother's breast, and you never chose your own. The elders gave it to you when you reached maturity at eleven and could hunt.

They often took their names from nature. Leaf, if a person was flighty or touched by the gods. River, for those of calm disposition. Mountain, for the warriors. Boulder and pebble and twig and bog. They tattooed it onto their skin, to always remember who they were, no matter how far from home they roamed. Only Eric knew his tribal name, before he was captured and sent to Rome as a slave, given the Latin brand of Godric by the master who bought him.

The master who turned out to be a vampire.

The master who ra-

No.

He'd only given one name out before. Of course, to Eric. Snowdrift. Dangerous. A sculpture of ice. As cold as it was beautiful. He gave that name two centuries after he turned him. Not on a phone call of all things, seconds after first speaking.

Raindrop.

Able to quench a mans thirst as effortlessly as it could flood him out his home and drown him.

It fit, he thought. Fit more than it had the right to.

There was something carnal there that simmered in his chest, a type of heat, like this muggy night, that lingered in the in-between. In the places of silence, amongst one breath and the next, between the cracks and pitch of a gasping voice.

It burned.

"I won't need my wand. I'll show you my teeth if you show me yours? I've got a biting problem I've been told."

Click.

The impulsivity. The thirst for a good fight. Godric bet too, in person, she was flexible and malleable. Hard to get a tight grasp on. Shadowless too. The inability to outwardly lie because, more often than not, she spoke before she fully formed a plan. Evasive, as she would be in a fight, testing boundaries, pushing them, before she went in for a kill.

You're only partly right.

Partly, indeed.

No wonder Eric was in such high unpredictable spirits.

"You're a Dhampir."

A Dhampir. How… Marvellous. Godric had, in his two thousand plus years on this planet, only met three before, one only being a glimpse across a battlefield he and the Dhampir had both wandered across three hundred years ago. So slim in numbers were they. They had to be.

They'd consume the entire earth otherwise.

However, despite his low contact, he had heard of them. Every vampire had, with how equally feared and revered they were. Read extensively on the subject, always a slither entranced with the idea of death birthing some form of life, and what shape that life could take. Brilliant creatures. Tenacious. Ambitious. Bold. When they wanted something, they took it. They lived with everything they had, enjoying each moment, both sour and sweet in equal measure. Finding beauty in the grotesque.

They were also creatures born out of severe trauma and suffering. War bred and hated from birth, their beginnings were always sorrowful and absurdly tragic. Loss and death haunted their every step, and misfortune was never far behind until their unveiling. They didn't turn, turn described becoming something, a Dhampir was always a Dhampir, and if you knew where to look, you could spot them concealed in the flock of sheep. It was nature's way of warning the magpies they had a cuckoo in the nest before it hatched and gobbled the other helpless chicks.

They hid as humans in those first dangerous years of their lives, masquerading with a heartbeat to strengthen themselves before their unveiling, and their unveiling was always… Harrowing. Painful. A complete shed of skin.

Sacrifice.

To be a Dhampir, to have that final unveiling, they had to sacrifice themselves.

Sacrifice themselves the worst possible way.

For love.

Be it for a wife, husband, a child, or even for love itself, a great sacrifice of life to ensure the existence of those that the Dhampir itself loved, it was always betrayed and slain by the one thing all living, and dead creatures, sort.

Love.

They would rise stronger for it. Survivor and Dhampir were interchangeable, the latter the epitome of the former. Yet, those it sacrificed itself for would always, always, turn on it. Hunt it. Sequentially, it was the Dhampir's destiny, or doom, to, miserably, kill those it had originally died for.

Mother nature did so adore irony.

"Does that scare you? Afraid I'll devour you?"

Godric did not imagine the suggestive friction laden in the raspy voice. Still, he was sure, it was another bid by the Dhampir to throw him off his seat. A good attempt, and one Godric batted back with ease.

"You'll find I'm more than a mouthful."

A growl that was, feasibly, not entirely proper. Perhaps it had not only been a move to unseat him, at least, not entirely. Vampires were used to speaking in riddles, their collective loaded with underhanded metaphors and subtleties. Threats hiding as platitudes. It was this kind of speech Godric was used to. Dhampir's, on the other hand, were infamously forthright, often to their own detriment. Vulgar and crude, some would say.

It would do Godric well to remember that.

"Promises, promises."

She whistled through the line.

"Would you look at that. State lines coming up. I'll see you soon, Godric. We'll see if you're a man of your word then."

The throbbing in his gums was appallingly prominent, as if he was a fledgling all over again.

"Don't make me wait too long."

The line cut off on a peel of raucous laughter.

A few taps on his phone, and it was ringing once more. Pam answered on the second bell, a little breathless, if a vampire could be such a thing.

"Godric?"

"Hello, Pamela. Where is Eric?"

"He's here and-"

"Put him on, please."

The Dhampir was telling the truth. Excellent. As much as he had relished their tit-for-tat, if Eric had, in any way, shape or form, been permanently hurt… She would not have survived stepping into Dallas. A rush of wind blew across the line as the phone was passed.

"Godric? It has been too long. Are you alright?"

Eric spoke with a voice hushed like a prayer, full of reverence only the faithful knew, sliding back into his native Scandi tongue. Surprise. He sounded surprised. He had reason to. Godric had not answered his calls, nor rang himself, for… For months.

Godric had done this.

Created this… Chasm.

No more.

"I am fine, Childe. It is you I should be asking about. You've been… Loud these last few nights."

Eric chuckled.

"It has been a busy few nights. I'm sorry if I disturbed you, but you would not guess what I've come across."

A Dhampir. Godric knew this, as he knew, unlike Eric, she was currently stealing away in his car, on her way to him to… Well, to wherever this game led. Godric said nothing, and let Eric persist.

"A Dhampir is in my area. Though, she's gone on a… Walkabout, should we call it."

"You're looking for her?"

Eric sighed.

"Trying to. She's extremely good at hiding her tracks. Sanguini, the vampire who brought her to my area, says she is skilled at gorilla warfare. She was on the run from her government for most of her teenage years and won a civil war by the time she was sixteen, despite the numbers not being in her favour. Do you know what her old kind called her? You'll like this."

Eric let the tension simmer, always one to draw out the fun he found.

"Master of Death."

A flare of fire in the bottom of his gut, a wrench of muscle. Godric only noted he growled when Eric cut him off with a snicker.

"I thought that would pick your interest."

Enough.

"I tried to ring your phone earlier."

Eric hummed.

"Minx nabbed it from my pocket, along with my car keys. She's good, even with how young she is."

Ultimately, Eric sniffed the crumb Godric had dropped.

"Did she answer? Did you speak to her? Pam and Compton have tried ringing on and off for the last few hours, but she's blanking the calls. Even picked up Compton's just to say fuck off, and then hung up."

That was why she was heading his way? It was never really about him. Not in the beginning, though Godric may have plucked at her curiosity through the call. This was about Eric. She must have gone through his phone, spotted Godric's name, tied up all the pretty little clues to understand Godric meant, in any case something, to the Scandinavian vampire.

She said she had no plan on killing him. Godric, from all the truth she had spoken, doubted she would lie about this, and so, this, whatever this was, wasn't to harm Eric by killing his maker. In fact-

Oh… You clever, clever girl.

Godric was a gift. She was young, Eric only confirmed his suspicions, but she had mapped out the hierarchy in Louisiana already. She spotted Eric on top, and in the vampiric world, you either killed or purchased your way to the crown. Too young to win a fight with a thousand-year-old vampire, she had gone with the only other alternative she could see.

Godric went to answer…

"No. The call went straight to voicemail."

And lied.

Eric would understand.

Godric liked playing with fire too.

Why did he lie?

No one was in harms way. The Dhampir wasn't attacking outright, more like a… Cub honing their stalking skills, pouncing through the grass. It would be a shame to cut off her lesson so soon. And because, perhaps, of that hot, wriggling knot in his gut, the promise of a good fight hanging in the air, that flash of the vampire he used to be flickering back, and for once, just once, apathy wasn't choking him.

If he told Eric she was currently driving right towards him headfirst, Eric would demand to be there, no matter if there was no real threat to his Maker. Master of Death… How well had she earned her title? Godric knew how he had gained his…

Furthermore, he had promised not to call in more to his nest, hadn't he?

Who was he to break his word so brazenly?

Eric, once more, sighed.

"Shame. I really do think you would like her if you met her. She has a sharp tongue and a sharper mind."

He was sure he would find out very soon. Perhaps in a night, if the Dhampir was swift. Godric hoped she was. He found himself… Impatient.

"I will leave you to your search."

"Godric…"

There was a pleading note in Eric's tone, a pitch of begging, a solemn sound Godric had not heard for many centuries. The warmth in his gut was gone, replaced with bitter beads of self-deprecation. Eric was his Childe. His Childe. He should never have to beg to speak to him, and yet, here they were.

Never again, he vowed.

Godric smiled softly and thought, sincerely, Eric could feel it from the other side as the blockades in the Maker-bond came tumbling down from his side. A breath of shock. A burst of unadulterated joy from Eric. Hot and sizzling and scorching. It burned away the vestiges of wintry apathy.

"I will call tomorrow night. I have been… Remiss of my duties these last few years. For that I am sor-"

Eric cut him off sharply.

"Don't. You don't have to apologize. Not to me. Not ever. I'll…"

There was so much to say, things that could never be placed in such brief constrictions such as words, and so, they didn't speak. Not for a long while. They only felt, an ebb and flow, a gush and fade.

A knock on his chamber door broke the moment.

"I'll speak to you soon, Eric."

A quick goodbye, and Godric hung up. After a soft enter was given, Isabelle poked her head through the door, not daring to enter Godric's personal space more than she needed to. He had always been a little… Territorial. Possessive, Eric would call it.

"Godric? Is there anything I can get you?"

She must have heard him on the phone, and as usual, came to offer a drink. Typically, if he did not refuse any food, Godric requested a stale True Blood, downed the swill, and moved on. He knew the motions well. However, the thought churned. Whipped in his chest. On Occasion, you only noticed you were trapped in fog after leaving it and gulping in fresh, clear air.

Godric found he had been lost in fog for a long, long, long time.

Now, free and fresh, he was ravenous.

Blood would be a good place to start.

Plus, it was only fair to the Dhampir if he met her at his best.

"AB-. Human. As fresh as you can get it, please."

Isabelle blinked her surprise at his request, but smiled brightly. However, before she could dip back behind the door to find his meal, Godric called her back.

"Isabelle? I want you and Stan to test the nest defenses. Any weak points I want tightened by tomorrow night. Add a new layer too. A witch ward."

She frowned, perplexed, on edge instantly at the mention of a witch. Their kind was, after all, notoriously anti-vampire.

"Are we expecting an attack?"

Godric shook his head.

"No. I have a… Guest coming. I thought she might enjoy a challenge to sharpen her claws with."

No less confused, but placated by Godric's answer, Isabelle nodded and left. In the dark of his room, he turned back to his window.

A whole new world glistened back.


NEXT CHAPTER PREVIEW:

Godric found their bodies in the kitchens. Four of his five nest-mates, motionless on the linoleum, silver knives dug between the third and fourth vertebrae of the neck. Not enough to kill a vampire, but the silver halted their recovery, leaving them paralyzed on the floor. They would heal as soon as the knives were taken out.

Blood was sprayed on the floor in drops like stars on a constellation atlas, speckled with comets. They were huddled and lumped by the kitchen cabinets at the far right, a heap of bodies, and, there, by the third's foot was a different mark, a spread, a drag.

They had been moved there, Godric knew. Hauled and placed meticulously to look as if they had all fallen in the same spot, perhaps fighting the same assailant, but nonetheless had not. The Dhampir must have forgotten to clean that mark up before they splattered the room to look like a battlefield.

Godric strolled into the dimly lit kitchen, stayed close to the left, and crossed his arms over his chest, cocking a brow as he glanced to the highest cupboards lining the wall, right above the pile that was, in truth, a lure.

"I know you are in there, little one. I told you this won't be so easy."

The creak of hinges echoed in the dark, as the cupboard door right above the heap arched open. Astonishingly green eyes glowed from the depths, the Dhampir having bent and screwed themselves tightly into the small space, only capable due to its astounding plasticity.

It was the perfect spot to pounce on him if he had, as she likely planned, gone to release his nest-mates from the silver daggers in their necks.

Honestly, he almost had, if he had not spotted that mark by the boot.

She unfurled from the cupboard, one pale hand, a softer calf, sliding to the floor barefoot, bloodstained, with the grace of a spider descending from their web, listless opulence of a marauding predator. She grinned beneath a tangle of onyx curls.

"Hello, love."


Woo or Boo?

A.N: So the world is kind of scary right now. And, while I know this isn't a lot, I do hope, if you're like me and in self-isolation, something, even one line in this chapter, made you smile and forget the mess we are all currently in. I wasn't going to publish this chapter for another couple of weeks, as there are a few bits I am iffy on and wanted to tweak, but not perfect as it is, I thought publishing something was better than nothing. On that, I hope you are all safe too, and your families, and that, despite the chaos, you are all doing well and having fun.

Thank you for all the lovely reviews, they've really brightened my days these last few weeks, and truly, thank you. Hopefully, I will see you guys soon.