Eighty-one
— Dad, is there a video game in your house?
— Video game, arcade...everything as we agreed!
—WE LOVE it!
Taking advantage of Mila spending the night out, Piter organized the whole house so that the twins could meet. Although they lived with a dragon and knew about the creatures that surround our world, I asked my nephew to hide the sharp objects, cover the sockets and pass the key in the glass door that led to the basement.
— We are coming!
— WOW! — shouted from the back seat.
— Why so many cars, Dad? — he asked in the front seat, sitting next to me.
"I don’t believe it!"
As soon as we arrived, I saw that the front of my house was taken over by cars, they being the majority of the Thomas collection that the Queen had auctioned. It was even hard to find a spot when my scrotum nephew plugged the front of the garage door with a Ferrari.
— How nice of you!
— CHILDREN! — I leave the door all happy running to open the door.
— BROTHER!
I close my face bothered by the way they had the habit of calling him.
— Look how many cool cars my dad has!
— But these are not your father’s, these are all mine! — he said embracing Apollo.
— Really? — Keep your mouth open. — You’re gonna take me for a ride on them, aren’t you?
— Of course s —
— Not! — I reply by blocking it.
— But why, Dad?
— Because Piter is a very irresponsible adult, and getting in a car with him can be dangerous!
— Irresponsible? — retorted with mockery. — You just brought a seven—year—old girl in the front seat without feeling safe and I’m the irresponsible one?
"Shit!"
— I liked riding in the front seat. Mom never lets us do that!
— It’s...just wait until "Mom" knows about it! — laughed.
If I’ve ever started vacillating with the car, I don’t even want to imagine what will happen when they enter the house.
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— Turn, turn, turn, turn! — sang making the Queen spin the eighth glass of another drink very different from the previous one.
— N—our...is...is...apple. TASTES LIKE APPLE! — cried drunk.
Security guards all outside and only the four inside mixing over twenty different drinks while dancing on stage, with the sound at most.
— The...what are you...is...good...one minute! — said changed. — What do you think of the party?
— I’M LOVING IT!
— Here girls, look what I brought... she comes with a tray in her hand with eleven rows of dust.
They all smell, while the Queen is watching the scene with the confused expression.
— The...what is it?
The three laugh, mocking her face.
— Are you serious?
Queens ignores and dances again.
— Don’t you have those things here in Dallnalia?
— Yes, but Mila is what we call quiet, she is the daughter of barons, a very strict family. You can’t enjoy much, especially after you’ve become Queen!
— Nothing to do, I am an Empress and in my country I have fun whenever I want!
— Once she went to a party at my house!
— Did you say "once"?
— Wow...how sad!
Suddenly the Queen stumbles on her own foot while sitting down. Julie is frightened and runs to help her friend who died laughing at herself.
— How did someone like Benjamin Bennet fall in love with this woman? — whispered to his partner. — She is beautiful, I know, but I can not understand...
— I have no idea, but I doubt she can give him what he really likes!
— She barely knows what her fiancé is capable of doing with ten women at once!
— Waste!
— The most horrific act this woman has ever done is betray the king with his replacement. She knows nothing about life, not even how to have fun.
— I never imagined that man would be able to marry and live with a single woman!
— Do you think it’ll last?
— I doubt it, Benjamin is not a one—woman man, he never was!
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— Wow... —snitch. — Thank God!
— Did you get them to sleep?
I throw myself on the sofa in the living room, dead tired.
— Why do children take so long to sleep? — I question intrigued. — They were rolling their eyes, but they kept jumping and jumping, like they were fighting sleep!
— That’s because you weren’t here when their teeth started coming out!
— It’s...it couldn’t have been easy!
— I think it was the worst phase to be honest. I remember Mila spent nights and nights up. We all helped, but she was still there watching them.
— I...I wish I had the chance to...well...you know, I wish I had helped...to have seen them grow and finally...I lost everything, until the first steps.
— Oh, but rest assured, we also could not see the first steps!
"What is it?"
— What do you mean?
— When they gave signs that they were going to start walking, they lived falling and falling. They held on to something, stood up and as soon as they let go they hit their butts on the floor. It made them very frustrated and whenever they cried, the dragon was agitated. He came and made the whole house tremble, and if we did not take the twins to him, his roar followed as a warning. Then, one day, Falkor decided to do with them what he did with Mila when she was pregnant –
— Did he kidnap the children? — I say perplexed, dressing up on the pillows.
— It wasn’t really a kidnapping... but yes... he took the babies. After that, Hector used my blood to track them down, and when we found Falkor he was sitting in the sand with that pussy pose, watching the twins as they walked with their little feet.
I’m at a loss for words.
— Mila was desperate, but when we saw the two walking, it was automatic, a tasty feeling filled us. It was magical, although we missed the first steps!
"I would have freaked out!"
— There’s something I really wanted to ask you...
— Speak...
— Mila said she has a fear, something she carries alone since the twins were born. Do you know what that fear is?
— Isn’t it obvious? — He said. — They are growing, Benjamin...growing more and more with each passing day.
— And that’s bad?
— When you have to live with the doubt whether or not you will have to bury your children one day, that’s bad!
Fuck, so that’s it, all this time that fear was about their identity, whether or not they were immortal.
— What’s the crudest thing. Where did you get it from?
— They don’t drink blood, eat human food and still age. Look at our faces, we stop aging as soon as we transform!
— And what do you have to say about the wounds that heal in seconds, and about human diseases?
— Yeah, okay on that you’re right. They heal and don’t get sick...
— You forget the origin of them, the DNA. If you analyzed the organism, you would understand why I say thinking about it is bullshit!
— Now you will have to explain! — said curious.
"I can’t believe Mila has been suffering from something so unreasonable!"
— Apollo and Artemis were conceived by me, Mila and Falkor. We are three totally different beings with different powers. I was born a vampire, and I have a heartbeat just like them. Mila is an ordinary vampire, but has always been skilled with her gifts, and her competence may well have passed to them, preventing her eyes from activating too soon. Falkor is a carnivorous creature, he eats other animals and sometimes even people. Cow, pig, chicken, he eats as children eat in everyday life.
If I had known before that this was what was tormenting everyone, I would have done something to avoid this headache.
— Fuck, we have to tell Hector and Mila...it makes a lot of sense seeing that way...
— Yes, but there are still things we don’t know about them, like, Will they ever thirst for blood? And what weapon is capable of injuring them, since they are immune to Kokio’s flower?
Kokio was fatal to vampires, but not to me, and one of the first experiments Hector had done with the children years ago when I was still here was to test their blood with the plant.
— Everyone knows that the only thing that can kill me is Falkor, but Apollo and Artemis have his blood, so I wonder if there is anything that can hurt them...
I didn’t know if I should be happy about it, because being invincible meant being feared.
And in this world all that is unknown becomes a threat!
— Well...can you keep an eye on the kids?
— Are you leaving? — He sees me take the car key.
— Something tells me Mila needs me...
— Is it that breeding instinct thing?
— Yeah, but it’s different, if she was in danger I’d know right away, but when it’s not something serious, you get a weird feeling. You’ll understand when you have your vampires!
— God forbid! — he rebukes in the same second making me laugh at his reaction.
— Why do you say that?
— Apollo and Artemis are not even mine and already give a bitch job, imagine how it should be if I created a vampire. My freedom was down!
"Really!"
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Three o'clock in the morning and it is the volume of the sound that guides me to the east wing of the Palace.
— Good evening, Mr Bennet! — greeted as I arrived.
— Mr Reese! — I’m ironic. — Don’t you ever rest?
George was my fun spot in this place, I liked to piss him off and he knew it.
— My job is to protect the Queen!
— For the laughs that are coming from inside the right would be you to protect the Queen herself!
— They’re not her laughs, sir, they’re from Miss Julie and Sovereigns Lana and Yeva!
"Oops!"
— Are you telling me Mila’s not in there?
— Yes she is, see — he shows me the watch on his wrist, displaying the same tracking map that Piter and I once used to keep an eye on the Queen. — I always track her in high—risk cases!
"He put a GPS on my wife’s phone?"
— Since when do you have this?
— Some years ago, you were not here when it was implemented!
— So you’re spying on her?
— By no means, sir, it was the Queen herself who asked for the integration of the chips into the cell phones of all the members of the Palace!
So at the end of the day, my slide from the past was good for something.
— And that point, that’s the bathroom, isn’t it?
— Correct, at the end of the room in the right hallway, she’s been there for a while!
"To a time?"
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