Chapter 219: The party of villains!

SURPRISE!

Well, I kind of saw this coming. 

This was literally a family thing. No one extra was here- just our family. 

But really- why the hell was 'she' here!

And not only was 'she' here but there was also more! Uncle Excrucio, his wife, his kids my other cousins, other uncles, and even the elders. 

Our reception was large, and yet, these morons made it look like this place was small or something. 

I didn't see any lackeys though.

Everything was decorated nicely- Romswell style. Skulls here, bones there. Yeah, very nice. 

Hell no! What the hell! 

"Marg we should run, we should run, right now," I whispered. 

She giggled and just stayed quiet.

The hell?

Oh, now I got it. 

She was in this too, of course, she was. 

"Awe!" Look how flustered he is. "Poor thing." Susan- one of my aunties, came near me, patted my head, and gently took me to the middle of the party, and handed me a large knife- it was more of a sword than a knife. 

And the cake? It was at least ten times bigger than what mom usually baked. I had a feeling mom wasn't the only one who cooked this. And did we even have the oven to make something this big?

Seriously, how many people were in on this?

"Mom?" I didn't see her and I was getting scared. 

Seriously, what the hell was my whole family doing here?

"You know, you suck at acting, right?" Uncle Excrucio laughed loudly. "Come on, boy, let's end that charade and just get on with it."

Well, now that I'd been called about it, I couldn't just act like this either. 

Marg had actually teleported me straight to one of the bathrooms and before anything she made me take a shower: she'd teleported Enira elsewhere. And since I could sense people's presence, yeah, I had a rough idea of what was going on. After showering and wearing nice new clothes, we both teleported outside the house and entered through the main door, pretending like nothing was wrong. 

My family was here and they'd put a lot of effort into this. So the least I could do was make a little effort on my part to at least seem surprised. 

I chuckled. "Well, if you say so." I cut the cake, like cutting a man in two- it was tradition.

"HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU…."

"MOM?" 

"What? I'm right here you know?" She was actually just casually standing behind me. 

I chuckled a little and picked up the cake, held it near her face. "Well, you know the rules."

She smiled, took a bite and next took the cake in her hand and fed me. This was the tradition of the Romswell family- I hated it at times, and at other times, I really loved it. 

"Elsa?"

She was behind mom. 

"What?" She seemed slightly sulky. 

"Here, you go." I gave her a piece. 

But instead of taking it from my hand, she just ate it all. Typical. 

I heard a round of snickers but oh well. I fed Marg a piece and she did the same to me.

I next cut into the cake and took a large portion for myself. "Well, feel free to start cutting in folks."

I took a bite and- "HAPPY BIRTHDAY HELIO!" The usual stuff. I'd last had this kind of birthday, maybe about thirteen- fourteen years ago. We didn't usually have this many people on my birthday. At best some uncles and cousins dropped by but- this many was really rare. "CONGRATS ON GETTING ENGAGED!" well, that was true too. According to the Romswell tradition I was already engaged with Marg. "AND-" they paused. "CONGRATS ON BEING A FATHER!"

Huh?

Excuse me?

I looked at Marg and she blushed. 

Mom laughed and so did the rest of the people.

"To think that pipsqueak…" Uncle shed a tear.

This was really happening. 

"Marg you-"

She put a hand over her stomach. "Well, I was wrong and- we really are having a baby, Helio." She stood in front of me.

Okay, my head started to spin and I felt like I couldn't breathe anymore. 

Seriously?

Should I have been happy or devastated?

I couldn't pick. 

My head had stopped working, 

Helio.EXE had stopped working!

"Don't look that shocked!" Uncle gave me a slap on the back. "Didn't I say, you suck at acting?" They all chuckled. 

But unfortunately, this really wasn't an act. 

Marg's smile kind of started to falter and I had a feeling she'd end up crying if I kept this up. 

So- I discarded all that baby-hating thoughts and for just this one moment- "Thank you, Marg." I gave her a hug. 'I hate kids but I'll suck it up for you.'

Marg smiled- shed a drop of tear and hugged me tighter. I also hugged her pretty tight. 

I still hated kids though. 

***

The party went smoothly and the cake was really good. 

The food was also good. And mom had made chocolate milkshakes with grandma. 

Speaking of grandma, she hadn't actually said a thing to me. 

I didn't know what to say or how to even attempt to start a conversation with her. 

Our relatives were just chatting amongst themselves. Some were hanging around me- mostly my not-so-friendly cousins. 

"I tell ya, humans are evil. They deserve to be enslaved!" 

Yeah, like these morons weren't humans themselves. 

"It's really fun ruling over them, you know."

"Nah, it's more fun just destroying cities and seeing them cry their hearts out. Impregnating them is kind of fun too."

"AHHHHAHAHAHAH!" Yeah, I felt like a sore thumb sticking out in this conversation between villains. 

"What about you Helio? How would you destroy the world?"

Umm, what?

"Steal all the women for myself?" I wasn't being serious and I just said it with a straight face. 

I just wanted to get out of this conversation.

'Now be disgusted and leave alone please.'

My three cousins stared at me with wide eyes. 'Yes, be disgusted.' The plan was almost a success!

And they broke into laughter. "Yeah, you've got the looks."

"Well, you already have like five or six I heard?"

"The world is really big you know? But yeah, if you steal all the women, there goes humanity!" He made a hilarious face and started laughing. 

The rest followed suit. 

They kept on laughing. 

So much for being disgusted. 

Sigh. This family was weird. 

I did see Enira and Elsa look at me with dull glares. They both probably had good hearing so yeah, operation 'feel disgusted' might have been a grand success after all.

"Oh Helio?" and that's when mom called me. 

'Oh, I love you so much!'

I was really, really glad!

I almost danced the way to mom. And when I did reach her, my expression almost turned to stone. 

'Oh.' 

Apparently, she was with grandma and I was going to join this conversation the two were having. Marg was just in the corner, waiting for me too. 

"We'll take a sit," Grandma said. Her voice was slightly prickly. Her skin was wrinkly. She looked pretty good for her age- somewhere around eighty- but she was old, and that was clear. 

'Shit.' I had to talk to her about the world-ending stuff too. Shit indeed.