A Mother's Worry

“John! Sweetie! There are monsters here! Monsters! They’re real! I’ve seen them! Elves and werewolves and the bird one! I...I don’t remember the name. Been a while since I took ancient history, but she was here! I saw her!” rambled Brenda to her son as he walked into the room. John just stood there and allowed his mother to ramble on. He knew she had to get this out of her system before she would calm down. She rambled on for a good 15 minutes before she finally calmed down enough for John to talk to her.

“Got that out of your system?” asked John, concern in his voice.

“Yes, dear. Thank you. I needed that,” his mother told her son. She had made John sit next to her as she talked to him to which he did. As she talked, she had grabbed John’s hand and slowly it found its way on her lap. John’s hand was in a deathgrip of his mother’s hand as he could tell the fear of what had happened and what she was finding out about the world had shaken her to her core.

“Now I know this is a lot to take in, mom, but its all true, all of it. Monsters are real, magic is real, and I somehow ended up as a mage with a lot of potential. And all this is thanks to Gaia,” John said in his best quick recap for his mom, who had seemed to have become lost in his longer, more detailed explanation.

“And this Gaia is God, right?” she asked, still confused.

“Well, she’s a god, but I dunno if she’s the God. She’s probably more akin to the pagan mother goddess and things of that nature,” John said truthfully.

“So...you’re a pagan now?” she asked. John sighed at his mother’s complete loss at what he was saying about Gaia.

This explains a lot.

John sighed again at Gaia’s snarky answer to his earlier, more confused state at learning about all this.

“It’s ok, mom. We’ll just put a pin in the whole Gaia conversation for now. What’s more important is that I kinda might have started a war with a powerful organization in the Abyss,” John said as his free hand rubbed the back of his neck.

“You WHAT?!” yelled his mother.

“I didn’t mean to! It just kinda happened! Besides, they’re all crazy zealots that want to kill me and my friends just cause they exist and I won’t be their pawn!” argued John, who was in the right as far as he was concerned.

“Well, I do recall that some of the stuff you told me about them did sound kinda bad. But it also sounded like they wanted to just keep order?” asked his mother. John had to admit, she was right. That was their goal, just in a very dystopian way.

“Well, they do want to keep order, just their order. And there's a whole lot of ‘do as we say, and look like us’ kind of way,” John explained to his mother.

“Oh, so like Nazis?” she asked, much to John’s dismay.

“Well no, the Nazis are like the Nazis,” he said. His mother gave him a confused look since he was referring to them as currently existing.

“Now, I know some of those groups here and in Germany are like Nazis, but they are all gone, sweetie,” Brenda said, trying to correct her son.

“Oh no, mom. Nazis still exist in the Abyss. Apparently they are a minor faction in the German Abyssal political group. They used to be in control when they existed in the normal world but now they just mostly hide around and do secret experiments to regain power. At least one of the good things the Order does is keep them in check. But yeah, they’re still around,” he informed his mother.

“This is all so confusing,” admitted Brenda, who was more confused after her son explained the Abyss to her than when she just saw his magical companions.

“Yeah. It’ll take some time for you to adjust. I always wished this was real when I played video games, so I was able to adjust rather quickly compared to probably other people,” said John in an effort to comfort his mother.

“JOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHN!”

“MAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAASTEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEER!”

As John hugged his mother, he heard two very familiar voices call for him.

“What’s that, John?” asked Brenda, a concerned look on her face. John just gave her a warming smile as he kissed her cheek.

“It’s ok, mom. Those two are completely harmless,” he said as he walked to the door and opened it. “Mimi, Yatina, I’m over here!” he yelled down the hall. The pitter-patter of two sets of tiny feet racing through the hallway to his location could easily be heard. John looked down the hall and all he could see was a large dust cloud heading right for him. “Where the hell is the dust coming from? The elves keep this place pretty clean?” John mumbled to himself right before Mimi and Yatina emerged from the cloud and tackled him with hugs. John stumbled a bit before he fell to the ground. The two derps sat on his chest and just patted his head.

“Oh, who are these two, John?” asked Brenda as she stared at Mimi and Yatina. The two stopped their patting of John and looked at Brenda, their eyes all meeting.

“New person!” yelled Mimi.

“Let’s pat her!” suggested Yatina. The two nodded at each other before they launched off of John and flanked Brenda on the bed. Their tiny hands immediately made their way to her head as they gave her pat after pat.

“Awww. These two are adorable!” she said as she scooped one up in each arm and began to hug them.

“YAY! HUGGLES!” the two said in unison as they hugged Brenda back.

“Mom, this is Mimi the Gorgon and Yatina the dragongirl. They are what we like to call our little derps,” explained John.

“Miho says we’re the derpiest of derps!” Mimi proudly exclaims.

“Mamma Gali says nobody can outderp us!” replied Yatina as she puffs out her chest proudly.

“And they are both right,” John said as he gave each girl a pat. “Mimi is from Greece but kept sneaking back to America to visit the family that rescued her. She’s also looking for her ‘Papa’, Dargon. Yatina, meanwhile, I got as an egg from Mrs. Wentworth,”

“Oh, that’s your magical teacher!” interrupted Brenda. John nodded.

“Yep, her,” confirmed John. Brenda smiled happily as she was slowly starting to get the grasp of this Abyss business. “Yeah, she gave me that as a reward for a thing I had to help her with. Eventually the egg hatched into Yatina as a dragon whelp. And then through something that none of us are really sure how, she eventually became a preteen dragongirl and Mimi’s best friend,” John said.

“Yep! We’re the bestest of bestest friends!” confirmed Mimi.

“Nobody can ever out bestest of bestest friends us!” Yatina boldly said.

“Of that, I have no doubts. Now, I was thinking, maybe you can take care of them, mom. They should help you better acclimate to the Abyss if you are taking care of the two of them. Plus, they should probably have a good parental figure, since none of us here are really cut out for parenthood quite yet,” suggested John. Brenda looked at the two girls, who gave her their best puppy dog eyes they could muster. Even Mimi’s sneks gave their own version. It was only a matter of seconds before Brenda broke down and accepted.

“Oh of course! How could I say no to such adorable faces!” she said as she showered the two with kisses. “From now on, you can call me mommy if you want,” she told the two derps in a soft voice. The two cheered and gave her kisses back on the cheek.

“We got a new mommy!” the two happily said.

“So, what can we do first?” asked Mimi.

“Oooh! Can you tell us a story?” suggested Yatina.

“Why yes I can most certainly do that...Ya...Yatina, right?” asked Brenda, still trying to remember the names of everyone she had met so far.

“Yay! Mommy Brenda remembered my name!” Yatina cheered.

“Ooooh! Do you remember my name?” asked Mimi as she tugged on Brenda’s sleeve to get her attention.

“Oh let me think...” she said as she feigned thinking long and hard. Mimi looked as if she was about to start crying before Brenda made this big gesture like she finally remembered. “You, my dear, are Mimi!” she said as she booped Mimi on the nose with her index finger.

“Yay! Mommy Brenda remembered my name too!” said a happy Mimi.

“She’s the best mommy ever!” Yatina decided.

“I agree!” was Mimi’s obvious answer.

“Well, I’ll leave you three to get to know each other better. I have to go take care of a few things before tomorrow. Have fun you three and listen to Mommy Brenda, ok?” John said to the derps, who nodded in agreement before returning their attention back to Brenda.