Dear Diary,

  Amazing sometimes how 'awful' can become 'normal'. Then again, I suppose the current value of 'awful' isn't as bad as I've lived through before.

  So st night it took everything Marie and I could do to get Saffron unwound enough to sleep. Harder than usual what with the whole 'refractory overload' being the reason for the season, as it were. But like good partners we persevered; plenty of massage and cuddling and eventually she started snoring. We spooned around her and dropped off ourselves shortly thereafter.

  More disturbed vibing. I really wish I knew why I itched so much at night. Not like there's anything there during the day. I've checked.

  Okay, no I haven't, but nothing itches during the day, so why would I check then?

  I woke to Saffron groaning something about it not being time to get up yet. Apparently Isnomi had decided that Mom being home meant Mom would provide morning breakfast. I Mimicked her, stole Isnomi away despite her protests, then gently shook her shoulder with my free hand. "Lancaster wants you back before sunrise, Kitten. If we're up and moving early we can get you breakfast in the Dining Hall though."

  "Damn you and your culinary temptations, Diaz. I was all set to cim death, too."

  I stopped shaking, but left my hand on her shoulder. "Damn. Does it still hurt that much?"

  She smiled and said, "not really. I think not having one or both of you work the knots out the night before st was a mistake though. I hope my unit doesn't get annoyed with me not sleeping in the encampment."

  "Bring Vulcan with you. Tell 'em it's a security measure. The enemy can't do a daring midnight raid to destroy our new artillery piece if the artillery piece in question is here, can they?"

  She cracked open one eye. "Have I told you tely that you are deceptively intelligent for a Goof?"

  I shrugged. "Not tely. I doubt you're gonna let me do anything about it, even if we did manage to convince Isnomi to give up breakfast and go carting early."

  She winced a little, but pushed herself upright, then crawled over to the armoire. As she used the ropes to pull herself upright, she said, "sadly, you're right. Damn this war. You're sure you can't just kill them all and be done with it?"

  "What is it with you and wanting me to be a vilin? Like you want me to be lime green or something," I muttered.

  She pulled on a fresh pair of scks and said, "would that be Key lime?"

  "You and your sweet tooth."

  She shrugged on her blouse and bent forward flirtatiously as she tied it in the back. "I'm just a big pie fan, I guess."

  I reached up with my free hand and booped her nose. "Would that be my pie in particur, or just pie in general?"

  She ughed as she pulled a new jacket from the armoire. "Oh, Goof. You know I can't help but favor pumpkin spice. Although..." as she buttoned up her jacket she looked behind me specutively, then sighed. "Not today, though. Not for a while, really."

  "The other night left me with no compints, I'm sure we could fit something in between massage rehab and sleeping."

  She shook her head. "Just Happening aside, if such things aren't spontaneous, they ought be given all due pnning, preparation, and the best performance one can manage." I ughed enough to jostle Isnomi. She giggled a little at my ughter, then smacked me and reattached. I couldn't help but notice that for the moment she was doing the smacking, she had to be at least half again bigger. Weird. When I looked up at Saffron, she had one eyebrow raised. "I thought you appreciated my attention to detail?"

  I shook my head, grinning. "Oh, no, I absolutely do. I was just thinking of an old joke about how people are like floor tiles." At her continued questioning look, I said, "y them right the first time, you can walk on them forever."

  She'd just finished pulling one uniform boot on, and put her heel down right between my thighs, holding her toe less than an inch from pces I'd never really fantasized about being stepped on. "Is that so?"

  My mind kind of froze up. What? She's hot when she's, y'know, breathing. "Uh... can I get a rain check on that? Or maybe you could do some pnning or something?"

  That drew a ugh out of her, and I wound up vacilting wildly between smug and terrified as she banced on her heel while she pulled her other boot on, never breaking eye contact and ughing the whole time. When she finished, she stepped away and stamped her heels into the boots, then sighed. "We're gaining a few miles a day at best. So frustrating."

  I smirked up at her again. "I'd think you of all people would be anything but frustrated at the moment."

  She kicked me in the meatiest part of my thigh. "You should know better, Goof." Then she fired up a one-handed Stabilize and leaned over. "Unless you'd like something before I have to go?"

  I tried for a derisive snort, but I think I failed. I'm bming it on being Mimicked as her at the time. "Let's put a pin in that. Right next to the whole boot stompy thing. Point taken though."

  She shook her head. "Point taken, she says, as she tries to hide her titiltion at the thought." She leaned over and, as I held my breath, reached down, grabbed my knee with her other hand, then grounded the Stabilize out in her own forearm. "If Isnomi weren't here, I'd have been tempted to just go ahead and let you have that." She chuckled. "Who am I kidding. I was obviously tempted to do it anyway. But," she sighed, "not today. At some point I am going to become frustrated enough to just Mimic you and kill them all, you realize."

  "Nah." At her raised eyebrow, I expined, "like you said, I'm the spontaneous, brutal one. You'll probably just figure out a way to use Vulcan to tag them all with a brown note until they surrender."

  "Do I want to know what a 'brown note' is?"

  "Harmonic frequency that makes a person shit themselves."

  That drew another ugh out of her, and she patted me on the thigh, stood up, and said, "On that note, I'm going to get a head start on breakfast, which is starting any minute now. You might want to wake our Maid; I think she's been shorting herself on sleep a bit to keep up with everything."

  I reached up, and she helped me to my feet. "Nah. If she needs the sleep, I'm gonna let her fuckin' sleep. The Academy won't fall apart if she needs a nap, and if it would? Maybe it oughta. Hold her a sec?"

  She took Isnomi, and I turned back into myself, concentrated on Loki's insta-garb trick, only with a different outfit in mind. A moment ter I stood there in my best Uniform. On completely correctly even. Then I snagged a uniform for Isnomi and said, "c'mon, we'll dress her on the way."

  We left Marie snoring on the floor and made our way down to breakfast. When Angel saw us, she said, "Saffron? When the fuck did you get back? How the fuck did you get back?"

  Saffron just lifted a finger to her lips and said, "shh! It's a secret to everyone, but the power of spicy eggs drew me back."

  That got them; for the rest of breakfast she had to fend off spoonsful of catapulted eggs. She managed it, for the most part, although the Menace managed to mush a whole handful in her face at point bnk range. About halfway through breakfast, she stood, brushed herself off, and held her hands out for Isnomi, who sprinted down the table and glomped her. She carried the menace around to me, held out a hand, and helped me up. "Hey guys, I've got to see her off. See you all at dinner."

  We walked into the hall, back to the Infirmary where we dropped Isnomi off with Grandma, and after one more long, spicy kiss, she was gone.

  The rest of the day would have sucked anyway after that, but eight hours of learning vocabury in Basic Mana Shaping was just insult atop injury.

  Even getting to watch through her eyes as she pelted 'Damn soldiers with artillery fire wasn't enough to make that fun.

  Maybe I should just embrace the lime green highlights and kill 'em all.