Royal arrives at Camp Lana to talk to Lana who has been calling him for weeks now. He enters and Lana demands he follows her.
They open a door to where his Ex is fast asleep next to a baby.
"You already know what this is. If you want to know if she's yours, go ask Murasaki, but we know she's your daughter." Lana says.
Royal looks at his sleeping ex Natalia, "Why didn't she tell me?"
"Why would she? The odds of getting pregnant are bad enough, but as if it's a slap on the face to keep a pregnancy is just as much a horror. Nothing is for sure until the baby's first breath. 8 hours old." Lana says.
Natalia's sister looks at her sister with shock on her face and scowls, "How sure are you it's his child?" Talia asks scowling.
Lana glares at her, "Because she's never been with anyone else but Kamikaze. This is his daughter without a doubt. Talia if you're done here, please get out. I don't remember calling you to be here."
Royal looks at the baby with his hair and green eyes, "Why didn't she say anything?"
"We thought she had lost the baby, her birth was a shock to all of us, we realised 3 weeks ago she's still pregnant. We kept calling and of course you come after the babies birth. We'll have her bags packed, unless you want her to stay here?" Lana says.
Royal shakes his head, "No, I don't need you to pack anything. I'll take them home immediately when Natalia wakes up. Can I hold her?"
Lana passes the baby on to Royal and smiles when he cries holding her, "She looks like her father."
Royal chuckles, "I thought I imagined that."
Talia goes to her room packing her things angrily before she breaks the mirror in her room. So many women moved to new camps and now her sister is going, she's getting left behind.
"I am the most beautiful in this camp, more beautiful than Lana herself, I deserve to be leaving this place not her. Me!" Talia packs her bags furious.
She walks to the delivery room and watches Royal holding the little baby with her eyes open.
"You have really cool 3 big sisters who are going to take care of you so well." Royal says.
"You have 3 other children? With who?" Talia asks
Lana glares at her, "They are adopted. Could you leave the baby cries non stop around you. She must have her mother's power, but if you give her the Murasaki vaccine it will increase the odds of her inheriting both your powers." She says standing up straight giving Talia a warning glare.
Royal nods, "I have Murasaki guests at my camp. It's as if they knew about this." He laughs and smiles when he thinks he saw the baby smile first.
Lana excuses her self dragging Talia to the back and slapping the day lights out of her, "You will not mess this up for the rest of us just because you're jealous the girls beneath you have husbands and you don't. You are going to suck it up whatever insecurity you're feeling. Sit in your damn room or go out, I don't care but stay away from that baby."
Talia slaps Lana across the face.
Lana stands up straight brushing that off. She removes the mark on Talia's hand and she's immediately transported outside in the black mist.
Talia realising no one will take her in screams for help.
Invaders come to her rescue and she plays the damsel in distress role pretending to be sick and scared.
~~~
Natalia wakes up and nurses the baby that was in Royal's arms he refused to put her down.
"Why didn't you tell me? Do you know how bad I wanted this?" Royal asks sitting on the side of the bed looking her in the eyes.
"You were devastated when we lost the first baby, I could not go through that again and you shouldn't either." Natalia says looking at the baby.
"So you bared the loss alone? Is that really what you thought I wanted? I would rather go through it again than for you to go through it alone." Royal hovers watching the baby.
"I didn't know how you would react, we didn't handle the first time really well. I said I hate you, you said you hate me. Things were thrown at each other, insults, and it didn't change anything when we tried to work it out. We just drifted apart trying to detach ourselves from the loss. I couldn't think of a scenario where we bond over this." Natalia rocks the baby when she stops suckling, she's not sure if she's full or not.
"That was barely 5 minutes, feed my daughter." Royal says looking at the baby.
"You feed her." Natalia comments angry.
"I would but look, milk doesn't come out. Let me try." He holds out his hand.
Natalia laughs playing along, "No, you're not gripping the breast right. That's why nothing is coming out." She says squeezing the nipple.
Royal winces when she twists it, "Ow, I don't deserve that."
The baby cries and he insists on breast feeding her himself.
Natalia rolls her eyes at his legit disappointment.
"I wanna feed my baby." Royal whines hovering again.
"You will. With a bottle is still okay." Natalia reassures him.
"Okay." He nods his head ready to go. He tells Lana they're leaving going back to his Camp and takes Natalia to the castle calling his 3 adopted daughters for the good news.
Bonny, Barbie, and Bex meet the baby.
"I have told her so much about her 3 big sisters who are going to be so kind and sweet to her because they are the sweetest and kindest in the world." Royal says excited.
The 3 girls smile taking turns holding the baby while Natalia eats something.
A servant tells him Murasaki guests have arrived.
Royal smiles, "Bring them in. Just them." He says smiling at the baby.
"She looks a lot like you dad." Bex says.
"Really Bexy? I keep thinking I imagine that. I am so happy." Royal says crying again.
Luna walks in with her house mates.
Angela looks at the baby and the Natalia in bed with a servant fluffing her pillows, "No way, Is that your ..." She squeals silently hovering over the baby.
"Those are his 3 daughter's." Aya says to Luna and Sarah who smile introducing themselves to the girls.
"Perfect Luna, I was hoping you'd be one of the people here. She needs a vaccine." Royal says.
Luna nods wishing for one on the spot. She injects the baby and Royal holds her keeping the baby quiet.
"Do you girls wanna share a room? That's if you don't mind crying. I don't want to have my attention divided between you and her, so if we work together that would be just as fun as hanging out." Royal asks his daughters who jump up happy nodding, "Netty, that's her name." Royal says.
Angela smiles inviting the 3 girls to Beauty's house to crash her date with Cheshire.
~~~
Cheshire eats the food and it's nice but his mom cooks better.
"So, what is your power?" Beauty's mother asks
"I don't have one. Both my parents are ordinary. In Murasaki we don't work because we have powers, everyone is important." Cheshire says.
"Oh, so, what do you do?"
"Mostly it's the odd jobs like house inspections. Visiting other camps on Colin's behalf or monitoring the supplies packers making sure no one steals anything." Cheshire replies honestly.
"Wow, you're already working leadership duties. What do your parents do?"
"My mom works with the women to take care of the elderly. We lost 2 of them after Winter. It really devastated so many people. My dad works with the maintenance team like cutting grass and trimming trees. The people who usually do that are gone now."
"They moved to the farm lands?"
"Yes, Colin will be going to New Moon to collect some farm animals. They will be cultivating the farms."
Beauty smiles at how well this is going.
Ashely, Beauty's sister, looks at her big sister with her red cheeks and bright smile, "Are you guys having sex?" She asks curious since she was told a girls body changes when she has sex with a boy.
Cheshire chokes on his food, "Oh no, Lily would know before it even happened and Colin would kill me that I brought her to the camp for that. I won't say I haven't thought about it."
Beauty chokes on her food glaring at Cheshire.
"What?" Cheshire asks. Oblivious.
Cheshire's mother laughs, "Well good. That's all I wanted to know, but how did she change so much in such a short time?"
Cheshire smiles, "She lives with the two hottest girls in our camp. It's obviously contagious. They have all these daily self care routine. Workout regularly and just overall take care of themselves more than anyone I know. You should see your daughter deep squat 10 Kilos like it's nothing. Luna and Sarah specialise in all the feminine products everyone is talking about.
"She's in the same house as them, this other time they all tried out some weird facial masks and were running around blind and screaming. I mean all of them were blind and screaming, who's helping who in that situation? It burns like hell but it works, it was for wrinkles for the women and men struggling with deep wrinkles.
"My mom had that problem, she cried and danced around like a crazy person while it was on her face but when she takes it off she's happy. Still does it until they can find a recipe that doesn't burn. Deep wrinkles gone she looks more like my sister than my mom now."
Beauty hides her face embarrassed, "That was so embarrassing. He left out the part where it was applied full body."
Everyone laughs at that.
"Did you have wrinkles?" Ashley asks.
"Nope, just really bad stretch marks. You should have seen Angela hiding from Kyle when he heard what she did to get rid of her stretch marks. It worked but Kyle chewed her out really bad. He was really scared about the baby. Lucky for him the babies enjoyed the burning sensation since it just felt like heat to them." Beauty says.
The door is knocked down and everyone looks at Luna and Sarah circle the table like they own the place.
"We are!"
"The incredible!"
"The insatiable!"
"The adorable!"
"The explicable!"
"The Capable!"
"Party!!! Crashers!!!"
Luna and Sarah introduce themselves.
Angela sits at the table making herself comfortable eating out of Beauty's plate, "You were invited to a feast, and what are we supposed to do at home? Drool over what you could be eating? Hmm?" She pulls Cheshire's plate eating out his plate too.
"Are they always like this?" Bonny asks laughing.
"No, they're usual quiet. It's a surprise to me too." Una says sitting down.
"Oh, your burning mask really works." Ashley says.
Luna's group looks around the table, "We vowed to never speak of that again. Someone must die here today for speaking of it." She scares Ashley with the knife, "Who said that?!" She asks really angry.
"He did." Ashley points at Cheshire getting another plate of food.
"Oh, he was not at the meeting. He shall live. We shall never speak of it again." Luna tightens her legs, she added it to her stick and till to this day she has stopped the stick treatment traumatized.
"Sarah, pass me the sugar." Bonny says.
Sarah stands up dramatically and dramatically introduces everyone before passing the sugar.
Luna and everyone eat and finish and than leave to tour the town.
Beauty covers her face, "They just came here to embarrass me."
Ashley laughs, "They're fun." She says.
"They're not usually like that. They're usually quiet. They're idea of fun is chili cosmetics, sleeping all day. Fake cooking shows and hanging out in their rooms. This is a first I have seen them like that." Cheshire says.
"Ohh, they really like you." Beauty's mother says.
Beauty smiles, "Thank you. They really have made my stay at Murasaki very fun and exciting so far."
"What do you do during the day?" Ashley asks Beauty excited.
"We used to study with Thomas but he's at the farm lands, but Brandon will be taking over. Now that more people are helping out, there's less for us to do so they focus on our education. I made my first nano bracelet. Look." She shows Ashley excited.
"Wow, before people weren't helping?" Her cousin asks.
"No, we didn't think we should. Or that we could, but they appreciate it a lot when we're sitting around less and busy, they focus on things like teaching and training the young." Cheshire responds.
"Ohh, that's really great. We also are under the impression, we shouldn't help, we'll only get in the way. It's good to know what's happening in other camps to help us too, so what's the reward?"
"A reward is not guaranteed but every once in a while they'll spoil the helpers with shopping trips. Surprise gifts and stuff like that. Especially those who are consistent. Some people do it for the reward no reward no work. Murasaki doesn't have time for that, they can still run the place without our help." Cheshire says.
"Woow, I want to move there." Ashley says excited.
"Well, maybe if there's another festival at Murasaki. There's still too many single people. We might be throwing another party start of summer. Camp Lana's event definitely helped a lot of people show off their fun and wild side. I had fun at the treasure hunt." Cheshire says.
Beauty sulks, "Literally found nothing but stones, I expected more." She says.
"We don't need stones here. I understand your frustration. Other camps though we're ecstatic finding stones." Ashley says.
"Cool." Cheshire comments.