Chapter 616: Narrowly Avoiding Destruction

Ever since she'd left home, Thea hadn't had a lot of opportunities to spend with her family like she usually did.

It was honestly kind of depressing when she sat and thought about it too long; since family was everything in Tehom society, but among the Tathamet's especially.

Which was why whenever she was home, she made it a real point to spend as much time with them as possible.

Even now, she was sitting on the sofa in the common area with Courtney, Thrudd, and Gabbrielle.

All of the lights were cut off and the curtains were drawn closed because the girls were currently watching a horror movie that Courtney had picked.

No one felt like they were allowed to suggest anything else because she was the youngest.

Which was how the three girls ended up watching an 'It' marathon- consisting of both part one and two.

Now it should be noted that Thea did try to get her sister to watch something different, but Courtney said the only other thing that she hadn't seen was 'The Human Centipede'.

...It was an easy decision to make after reading the synopsis.

Despite all of her power, Thea didn't do well with horror movies.

And she appeared to be the only one.

Thrudd was on the ground sleeping halfway through the second movie.

Gabbrielle was just sitting closely beside Thea- eating out of a popcorn bucket that was as large as her toddler form and staring blankly.

And Courtney, well... even though she was watching the movie, she was also asking a lot of questions at the same time.

It was as if every thirty minutes or so she realized that there was a new hole in her brain and she began desperately trying to fill it with new information.

"Is that what my bones look like inside of my body?"

"What exactly makes my bones grow?"

"Am I ever going to be as tall as the rest of you?"

"How do you spell 'bastard'?"

"Big sister Thea, I asked big brother Bell why you have wives instead of husbands, and he said that you liked to play 'Rock, Paper, Scissors' without the rock and the paper. What does that mean?"

"Ack!"

The lemon water that Thea had been sipping prior to this conversation suddenly came rushing out of her nose.

Gabbrielle snickered lightly, and even Thrudd woke up just to crack a giggle.

"A-Aren't you just asking a lot of questions today?" Thea asked as she lifted up her sister, clearly deflecting.

"I can't help it, I just want to know stuff!" she shrugged.

"W-Well I should probably be heading back now, so let these two explain it, okay?"

"Oh? You're leaving already?"

Abaddon entered the room rubbing his eyes as if he'd just woken up.

"Yea, dad. Maybe if you get out of bed before noon next time you won't miss my entire visit." Thea said cheekily.

"He wasn't asleep." Gabbrielle said without taking her eyes away from the movie screen. "He was upstairs in the Reality Observatory."

""Doing what??"" Thea and Thrudd asked in unison.

"Planning a war." Abaddon answered nonchalantly as he walked into the kitchen.

""Another one!?""

"Won't be for a few years from now, but yes. What I was doing just now was a bit of preemptive study."

After grabbing a small beverage to quench his thirst, Abaddon returned to the seating area with his children.

He rubbed Thea affectionately on the head and noticed a certain new addition that was missing.

"You're still hiding your horns?"

Thea smiled sheepishly. "Yea... They're kind of heavy, and I don't think they make my hair look cute."

Though Nyx looked like she was seconds from breaking Abaddon's jaw just a moment ago, one simple four worded question from him almost caused her entire world to crumble.

It started with a small lip trembling, and then at the next second a small stream of tears as black as night began to drip down her face.

"I-I'm... I'm an awful mother...!!"

Nyx devolved into a full blown bawl right on his doormat.

With a primordial goddess collapsed right in his arms crying her eyes out, Abaddon was starting to feel like maybe he had much bigger problems on his hands than the way that his eldest daughter chose to dress.

-

You will find very few gods, young or old, Shinto or Sumerian, who do not like to drink.

Funnily enough, wine is possibly one of the leading catalysts of strife between the gods.

The others are either lust, incest, or insecurity. (Those first two are basically the same, but I digress.)

Abaddon already knew about the gods' tendency to enjoy drinking because production of alcohol in Tehom had to see a 15% increase in order to meet the demand caused by the few gods who were already here.

But since Izanami wasn't particularly much of a drinker, he had no idea just how much alcohol a primordial deity could truly hold within them.

Until today.

This was the fist time since his home's construction where they had been almost completely out of alcohol.

In an hour's time, Nyx had gone through seventy-two bottles of both dark and clear liquor, and even the little wine coolers that the eldest children typically drank.

The only thing that still remained untouched was the wine cellar, and Abaddon suspected she was going to rip through that too.

As of right now, Nyx was lying on her back in Abaddon and his wives' private wing of the mansion.

The entire seating area was littered with empty bottles and cans as the ancient night goddess drank her sorrows away.

Apparently her alternate was in a bit of a spat with her children because of a decision she'd made long ago.

But Abaddon was having a hard time getting the full gist of the story, because Nyx was occasionally sobbing incoherently and she hadn't removed a bottle from her lips for longer than a couple of seconds.

And every time that he tried to talk to her...

"Nyx, you-"

"I don't want to hear it, you shitty friend!" Nyx hurled an empty bottle at Abaddon's head.

He didn't even budge an inch from his cross-legged position as the wind itself caught the bottle and placed it down neatly beside him.

Along with the other twenty-two she'd thrown...

"You're not being-"

"Shit dragon! Shit friend! Shit god! Shit-"

"Yes, yes, I get it..."

At that moment, Abaddon started to muster up some kind of defense for himself when a new feeling suddenly began tugging the back of his brain.

It was a little uncomfortable if he was honest.

It was old... and very similar to his own power.

But more than that, it was distinctive; and it contained a particular brand of energy that Abaddon had never come across before.

Suddenly, a name and image bubbled into his mind- erasing some of the mystery surrounding this phenomena.

"Ah... Nyx?"

*Burp* "What do you want, fuckboy...?"

"What exactly can you tell me about Shiva?"

Now, Nyx looked to have sobered up a bit and sat up on the couch with her brow raised.

"Why are you asking about such a one-noted sort as him?"

"Well... I think he's trying to invoke me."