Meet the Family

Another cave. Wait, not really a cave. I felt the heat. This was the volcano where I had met with Salamander, and later Eden. I hadn't thought about Eden in awhile. This was one place I had experienced nightmares about. Granberia had cut me up good in this place. I'd never felt so much pain before. In my nightmares, she killed me as Alice laughed. The pain was dulled in the dream, but the memory still had power over me. By now, however, I knew what to expect. I would probably not encounter either Granberia nor Salamander here. Alice was not with me. I was probably going to meet Ancestors here. The only question was who and how many? Why did these dreams keep on taking place in similar environments? Why not a forest? I wondered if I was subconsciously controlling any of this. Perhaps I should try to envision a more pleasant environment, one less foreboding.

"Minagi?! Saja?!" I called. "Are you here?"

"Come in," I heard from behind a wall. The wall seemed to be hiding a hidden passage of sorts, although not well. I could clearly see the creases. I tried pushing at it. Nothing. Oh well, it's my dream, I should be able to make this do what I want.

"Open sesame!" I said, and sure enough, the wall peeled back and a room was revealed. If I'd wished for a more pleasant environment, I had received it. As dreams are wont to do, opening a door can often lead you into a completely different place, and it was true of this dream as well. It was a piano bar similar to one I would find on my own world. The fact that the piano player was slumped over the piano, dead or unconscious, did not seem to be a good sign. Seated all around in couches enjoying drinks of various sorts were all five of the ancestors, although I didn't see a sixth, which I assume would have been the Dark God herself. There was a bartender present, calmly wiping glasses and not concerned at all about the possibly dead piano player.

Saja greeted me first, remaining seated. "The music was irritating, so I killed him. He's not real, of course, so I imagine you won't take it personally. It's not a representation of someone you knew, was it?"

I couldn't really tell, given that he was face down, but I assumed he probably wasn't and that it didn't matter anyway. "No… I guess it's fine. Maybe. Is that normally how you react to annoyances?"

"If he was real," Saja explained. "it would have been unnecessary to kill him, as he would have listened when I told him to quit that insipid noise."

"Humans in our era knew to listen to their betters," said one of the monsters I had not yet met. Judging by the looks of her, this was Kanon, an ancient plant monster. "You should show the proper respect when you enter the room. Bow."

Minagi laughed. "Oh, Kanon, did he not show us sufficient respect by creating this wonderful lounge for us? It's so much better than the last two places I met him. The drinks here are positively delightful."

Saja gestured to the rest of the ladies in the room. "You have met Minagi and I. Let me introduce my sisters. The one who demanded that you bow is Kanon. That little one over there is Hiruko. Don't let her appearance fool you. She has hundreds of tentacles under that skirt of hers. This slime sitting next to me is Kanade."

Hiruko and Kanade acknowledged me with a gesture. "I'm afraid we are one short. Tamamo isn't here. She was left partially unsealed to watch over our people and insure that Ilias did not break her promise to leave monsters alone."

"I know Tamamo well," I said. "She's a good friend."

That didn't go over well with this crowd. The new ones seemed about to leap out of their sitting positions and attack me for speaking such blasphemy. Minagi and Saja seemed to already be used to me.

"Calm yourselves, sisters," Minagi said mildly. "The boy likes to tell tall tales and seems to have increasingly preposterous lies to share every time we speak to him. You cannot harm him in any case. This is only a dream for him. At best you can frighten him, as I did the first time we met. It was fun, but beneath beings such as us. There will be ample time to find him and punish him appropriately when we are fully unsealed."

"I haven't told you a single lie," I said. "As I've tried to explain, much time has passed. The world is different now."

"So you keep saying," Saja replied, sipping her drink. "We will see the truth of it for ourselves soon enough."

"Out of curiosity, I notice you're short one other as well. Where is Alipheese?"

"The Six Ancestors Seal works by using a being's own power to seal them," Kanade explained. "Since the Dark God is the greatest of us, indeed, our very creator, she will be the last to be free. As you have seen, Minagi, the weakest of us, was free first."

I expected Minagi to object, but Saja beat her to it. "Do not speak such foolishness! Our consciousnesses emerged within days of one another! There is no significance to the order in which we emerged. We are equals here, although I, of course, am first among equals, being the monster lord successor to the First."

"As fun as this discussion is," Hiruko said, speaking up for the first time. "I would like to know why we are only partially unsealed. Our seals were designed so that they would only be undone if Ilias broke her promise. Did anyone here anticipate a gradual unsealing?"

The others shook their heads. "Only the Dark God truly understands that seal," Minagi noted. "Perhaps our expectations were simply mistaken."

"I'm getting discouraged about the hostility here," I said. "We live in a peaceful world now, where everyone gets along. I hope when you return that you don't have plans of upsetting that peace."

"That would depend on how truthful you are being, and the true nature of this peace you speak of," Saja countered. "If you worry that we will simply burst out of our seals and rampage around the world committing genocide, you can put your mind at rest. We sealed ourselves to save this world. We would all be absolutely ecstatic if we emerged into a world at peace. It is what we've longed for our entire existences!"

The others nodded their agreement. I relaxed a little. Their suspicion was understandable. Maybe once they were fully unsealed, they would see the world as it is and be glad. They were Tamamo's sisters after all. While even Tamamo hadn't been perfect on the issue of coexistence, she had always been more ally in that cause than adversary, even early on.

"A world where every being knows their place in the order of things," Kanon explained. "Who would not desire such a thing?"

That sounded less hopeful. "And what is my place in your ideal world?" I asked.

"If you are telling us the truth," Minagi answered. "and are as strong as you claim to be, we will create a new, far more powerful race of monsters with your genes. You will be consort to all of us, possibly even the Dark God herself. You will experience heights of pleasure you could never imagine, even if what you say about being the Monster Lord's husband is true. When not mating with us, you will experience more privileges and luxuries than any human has ever known. It will be a life of paradise."

"And if you are lying," Kanade warned. "you will be dissolved by me. Painfully. Our actions after that will be determined by the true nature of the world we reenter."

"Pending the Dark God's orders, of course," Saja interjected. "While we can have as much fun as we desire in the likely event that we emerge first into the world, no moves that will significantly alter the status quo may be undertaken in the absence of orders from Alipheese. I assume your long sleeps have not made any of you forget who your master is?"

"We have not forgotten," Kanade assured her. The others nodded.

"I think you've got a lot to learn about the world," I said, now very concerned about their thought processes. "Your values may have held sway 1000 years ago, but those values are not how people live in the present. You're going to need to adjust to the new reality."

That caused Hiruko to explode out of her couch. That wasn't all that exploded. Tentacles streamed out from under her skirt and wrapped me up. Her face was inches from mine, twisted in fury.

"Calm yourself, Hiruko," Saja said. "You cannot actually hurt him yet. Simply speak your peace to him and release him."

Hiruko loosened her grip, although her face didn't appear to be any calmer. "Whatever the new reality is, it will have to adjust to us, not us to it! You say our values are one thousand years old, but that is not so! Our values are tens of thousands of years old! Do you think that because things have changed in merely a few centuries that this is the way the world was meant to be? Whelp, you cannot be more than 20 years old! What could you possibly know of how the world is supposed to be? What could you possibly know of values?"

"You speak of these changes as far more recent than one thousand years," Saja pointed out. "How long ago do you claim to have slain Ilias and brought about this new world that we should supposedly change for?"

I knew right then that I was about to lose this argument in the most spectacular fashion that an argument had ever been lost. "One year ago," I whispered.

Hiruko's face changed from anger to mirth. She released me, laughing hysterically. The others thought it was pretty hilarious as well.

"One year!" Minagi laughed. "One year, and he thinks paradise has been established!"

Hiruko stumbled back to the couch, having an LOLROFL moment if I've ever seen one. "Sisters, I no longer want to kill him! We can keep him for entertainment! His fairy tales were tiresome at first, but I loved the punchline!"

Minagi put down her drink and walked over to me, smiling. "I am beginning to believe the boy. Perhaps the world has changed as he says. But as one so young you cannot understand that this new world you speak of is unstable. It will never last. Our way kept the world stable for thousands of years. Everyone was happy, at least those who knew their place. It was only broken by the goddess waging war on us."

"But now she's gone!" I argued. "There's nothing standing in the way of peace for all time."

"Nothing except human nature," Minagi scoffed. "When given just a little bit of freedom, the humans hate us because we are better than they. But when cowed into submission they are happy. Humans were meant to be slaves. They are only happy as slaves. In return we provide for all of their needs and give them endless pleasure."

"When they were too old to be useful for work, reproduction, or food, we allowed them lives of relaxation and entertainment in their golden years," Saja added. "After all, human males have something we want, and they love to give it to us. Our system simply insured that it could be done safely and easily."

I'd made a similar argument myself to Alice when arguing for coexistence. It sounded so much more twisted the way they talked about it.

"We are not cruel, we love the humans. We only ever killed the bad ones. Ones who committed crimes, or rebelled," Kanade said.

"No sentient being should ever be a slave!" I shouted. "All of us long for freedom! Even if that means we mess things up sometimes!"

"Oh, I do love naïve young boys," Minagi said, putting her arms around me. Her touch alone had sent shockwaves of pleasure through me last time. Her full embrace was even more intense. "I agree with Hiruko, killing you would be a shame. Or if we do decide to kill you, we should at least do it with pleasure."

She licked my ear lightly. I woke up suddenly, ejaculating. Alice was up like a shot."What happened?!" she shrieked, then noticed something. "That smell. You're coming!"

She pulled the covers off. Indeed, my stomach and legs were covered in my own semen, as well as part of the blanket. She licked it off of me, which sent even more shockwaves of pleasure through me, causing me to ejaculate a second time.

"Wow, you haven't been this quick triggered in a long time!" she asked. "What did you dream about to make you this way?"

"Alice, it was the Ancestors!" I said, my voice shaking. "All of them! And I don't think their intentions are good!"

Granberia was embarrassed again. A different kind of embarrassment this time. In Port Natalia, she had had her nose bloodied by some nobody and further endured Sara ministering to her like a nursemaid in front of an enemy. This was different. She was staring up at a statue. A statue of herself, sword drawn. She had dreaded coming to this city for this very reason. Almost regretted ever coming here. Almost.

This was the former San Ilia. As a city that had been sacked as badly as Luka Village, a lot of resources had been put into rebuilding it. The work had been impressive. The city's population had not fully recovered, but it could already be considered a real city once again. The problem for the city was that It had needed a new name. Granberia had assumed that like everything on the old Ilias Continent, it would simply be called San Eden. But unlike Eden Continent, most people had not merely switched their worship to the new goddess. The arrival of a legion of angels into the city in the opening minutes of the war, followed immediately by a massacre of a third of the city's population, had left the people of the region disenchanted with anything having to do with heaven, to put things mildly. This was the one city where angels who didn't want to follow Eden or who had other reasons for wanting to live among the humans couldn't settle. With the worldwide seal on heavenly protection still in place, angels had to fear mob violence. So none dared set foot in the old San Ilia. Monsters, however, were now quite welcome and the population was as much as one quarter monster.

So what to name the city? There had been a lot of debate and discussion. The form of government had been settled on before the name, which is part of the reason it had taken months to come up with one. The city had formerly been a theocracy run by the high priest of the Ilias faith. With the religion all but abolished in this region, the survivors chose a democratic form of government instead, the first on the continent, although Granberia had heard dim tales of experiments like this in the distant past. She hoped this one would work out. She disliked the idea of one person being in charge, unless it was someone like the Monster Lord, who did not rule with a heavy hand as many human monarchs did.

Eventually, however, they had come up with a new name, and that name was… she grimaced…. Granberry. This statue of herself had replaced the Ilias statue that Luka had destroyed in a fit of righteous anger. She was certain that Alma Elma must have had something to do with the name, as well as the statue. Granberry, after all, was Alma Elma's pet name for her, and no humans should have known that, except perhaps Luka, and his sense of humor wasn't this irritating. The reasoning had been, that since the hero Luka had saved the world, that perhaps the city should be called San Luka. Granberia would have felt that honor to be well deserved. But other voices had argued that Granberia had defeated the hero in this very city, and she herself had performed great acts of heroism during the war. In the spirit of friendship with the monster races, it was agreed by acclamation that the town should be named after the Heavenly Knight.

As if the statue wasn't enough, there were paintings up and down the hall representing their battle. Granberia remembered this battle more fondly than all the others. In this very hall, she had whipped Luka thoroughly. It had still been a fun battle, with Luka doing much better than he had the first time. But possessing an enchanted sword that didn't break was a double edged… er.. sword. It had meant the battle continued until there was a winner and the winner had been Granberia. Of course, she had also won their third battle, but she didn't remember that one as fondly. She had hurt him so badly. What she would never tell Luka was that she too had nightmares about that night, and they were the very same nightmares. In those dreams, she killed him. She reflected that there were apparently many things she didn't tell Luka. Was he the same? Did he have nightmares about that night as well? Perhaps they didn't know each other as well as they assumed.

Sara was enjoying the artwork immensely. One piece showed Granberia and Luka with swords crossed. Granberia's sword was flaming, which she observed was inaccurate. Others showed Granberia towering over Luka, who was drawn as almost a little boy. That too, was inaccurate. Luka and she were about the same height. Accurate or not, it was all quite mortifying. She was uncomfortable being honored so. The throngs of people wanting to meet her were even worse. Some had even wanted her to run for Prime Minister! She couldn't very well show how agitated she was, however. Granberia cared a great deal about her personal honor, and it would have been the height of ingratitude to not give the people what they wanted, within reasonable limits. No, she was not going to run for office. Yes, maybe she would attend a reenactment of the great battle between the two of them. If she was still in town, which she hoped fervently that she wasn't.

"This place is so amazing!" Sara exulted. "I wish I could have seen it back when it was a cathedral for Ilias! I hear it was even more incredlble back then!"

"I almost wish Ilias was still alive, seeing all that has been done here for my benefit," Granberia groused. "But you needn't worry about missing anything. The angels did little damage to the temple itself. As you can see, most of the damage here was done by me. See, right here is a spot where my sword struck. They still haven't repaired it."

"They've also labeled it," Sara chuckled. "It's a monument now. There's a plaque and everything."

"Yes, I noticed that," Granberia grumbled.

"You don't like it? Even in Sabasa I wouldn't be getting this… much."

"I am uncomfortable with this," Granberia admitted. "I do not do what I do for the accolades. I do it for my liege and for myself."

"Were you only acting for your Monster Lord when you hopped out of bed half dead and went to war?" Sara asked slyly. "Against her wishes, had she known?"

"Hmph…" was all she got out of Granberia. The dragonkin wasn't quite sure herself what had motivated her. Was it really the love of battle? No, battle wasn't nearly as fun when one was in debilitating pain and could not give her best. Was it for Alice? No, Alice wouldn't have wanted that. Luka perhaps? That was getting a little warmer. She hadn't done it so much for Luka himself, but for what he represented, what he believed in. He had somehow convinced her that his cause was her cause. The fact that it was also the Monster Lord's cause had made it easier to rationalize. But in the end, she decided that she had probably staggered out of bed because she had come to believe. Luka hadn't been the reason, but he had been the inspiration. She wondered if the other Knights felt the same way. Alma Elma, normally unwilling to commit to anything fully, had thrown herself into the fight with just as much vigor, despite also being injured severely, although not as badly as Granberia had been.

"Come, let us go get some food," Granberia said, knowing that she would not be allowed to pay for anything in this city. Might as well get good and full. The next stop was the desert. She loved deserts, and Sara was used to it, so maybe the desert would be more gratifying.

I didn't go to work that morning. Alice had already spoken to Tamamo of my dreams a week ago, and Tamamo's advice had been to just keep an eye on things but not to worry too much. She had felt nothing, heard nothing. Probably just dreams, she said. As usual, even after our marriage, Alice didn't reveal all the details of their conversation. She still tried to protect me from information she didn't feel that I was ready for. Tamamo was having none of it today, however. I heard them arguing as they walked down the hall. I was still in our room, trying to relax by reading a book. A fantasy book, this time, rather than a history book. The book in question was my first look at what was called LitRPG books. It was an interesting concept, although it took the reader out of the story. It wasn't very immersive, but it was entertaining.

The door swung open and Tamamo burst in, Alice behind her. Tamamo sat on the bed and got right to it. She was not her usual self. She was almost in tears.

"Luka, I felt it! The seal is actually weakening!"

"Tamamo, calm down," Alice said, putting her hand on Tamamo's shoulder. "We've heard the legends, not the humans' warped versions, but the real truth. They aren't evil. It will be fine. It will be fine, won't it?"

"I don't know!" the kitsune sobbed. "I just don't know! I miss my sisters so much! But I remember how it was back then. What I thought was the right thing then isn't what I believe in now, and I'm not sure how well they'll accept that!"

"So they are coming out of their seals?" I asked with trepidation. "How much trouble are we in?"

Tamamo could barely speak. Alice tried to speak for her. "Imagine for a moment that George Washington from your world came back to life and took over as President. How would that go?"

"I'm not sure," I replied. "Our histories have been very kind to him, but he was a product of his time. He had slaves, believed in the superiority of the white man."

"The white what?" Tamamo asked. "Humans on your world discriminate against each other by skin color?"

"Yes, it was a thing over there," Alice confirmed. "Still is, although they have been trying to change and have made a lot of progress."

"Alice, I didn't know you were researching my world so much," I said.

"Of course!" Alice replied. "Your world is dangerous! I need to know as much as I can about it!"

"It probably doesn't hurt that Luka has worked so hard to learn our history," Tamamo said, smiling wanly through her tears. "Don't try to tell me that you aren't learning about his world in part because you want to understand the place where he came from."

"It's true," Alice answered. "Anyway, it's like that only worse because George Washington was just a man. If he came back to life, he'd probably develop a following, but he couldn't just take over and reimpose his 200 year old values on the world. The Six Ancestors are different. They have the power to take us back one thousand years if they so desire."

"That did sound like their intent the last time I spoke to them," I said. "But I'd also like to think that if a great man from a long time ago came back, that he'd adjust to the world he lived in and not go off half cocked trying to make things the way they used to be. George Washington was a flawed man, but he was also an idealist. I have to think he'd be pretty open minded if he stepped into the modern world."

"That's our hope," Alice agreed. "From what you told me, they simply don't believe you. But maybe if they see how things are, they'll embrace it. And we haven't heard from the Dark God herself yet. From what I've been told, she was the wisest of all of them. Even if her subordinates have the attitude that humans should be slaves, her opinion is probably the only one that matters."

"Luka, Alice…." Tamamo said softly. "I have something to tell you both. I haven't been entirely honest with you. Well, I haven't intentionally lied. I've been dishonest with myself as well. I wasn't so nice back then."

"You've mentioned that," I said. "It was a long time ago, what person wasn't different even 20 years ago? You're talking one thousand years!"

"She hasn't told you the whole story," Alice said. "And I suspect I haven't heard it all either. What haven't you told me, Tamamo?"

"I've left little out," Tamamo replied. "I used to get men to sell their souls to me. I ruled entire kingdoms. I used to drive men mad with my sexual skills and made them slaves to me. I destroyed other kingdoms for fun, to keep the humans from getting too strong. That was what I told myself, anyway. In reality, we were trying to just keep them enslaved to us."

"That was just last year!" I said. "There are still slaves in this castle, although they technically aren't slaves anymore. They just won't leave."

"I know!" Tamamo replied, now crying again. "I changed so much in the last few hundred years, and yet when I met you I realized just how much more it was possible, not just possible, but necessary, to change! I'm so scared that things are going to go back to the way they were! I don't want to be that person anymore!"

"Tamamo, you're not that person anymore," I said soothingly. "I believe in you."

"I never really thought about things from Ilias' perspective before, but maybe she was right to wage war on us," Tamamo continued. "We treated all of humanity like livestock. When the war began, it was a period when our domination over the human race was total. Not so much as an independent village existed. All humans lived to serve monsters. Ilias must have found that intolerable. It WAS intolerable! How could I have been a part of that?"

"Don't give Ilias too much credit," Alice said. "She was jealous of the monsters' power, and in the end she was willing to see the world burn and all the humans she supposedly loved with it."

"She tried to do it a second time!" I added, stating the obvious.

"I don't know that I can explain this in a way you can understand, but immortal beings see these things differently," Tamamo said. "We don't see lives that are so short as something to care more about than the bigger picture. Yes, Ilias wanted to wipe out all life, but both times she intended to rebuild and hopefully get it right the second time. She truly did want a world where humans could prosper and live in peace, without fear of monsters. In that, at least, I believe she was sincere."

"I just don't see how you can believe that about her, " Alice responded. "The woman was mad."

"Yes, but her Seraphs were not," Tamamo argued. "I didn't come to this conclusion through any interactions with Ilias. I came to that conclusion while speaking to Micaela. Micaela only abandoned Ilias when it became clear that Ilias placed less value on individual lives than she did. Sometimes one can focus too much on the big picture and not realize that individuals matter too. Lucifina was the first to leave. Micaela the second. They did so because they loved humanity in their own way, and realized that the path to human peace and happiness was coexistence, not the absolute destruction of all monsters. Eden was close to seeing the light as well."

"In the end, she couldn't carry out her master's orders," I observed. "But she couldn't abandon her either. She worried that she was the only thing keeping Ilias from getting completely out of control."

"This is all interesting, but what do we do?" Alice asked. "Do we just wait for them to show up and hope for the best? Try to persuade them? Do we need to prepare for war? If so, we need to start warning all the human kingdoms now. They are very slow to mobilize."

"The first thing we're going to do,' Tamamo said. "Is keep talking to them. I've never met anyone more able to get the best out of people than you, Luka. If you can't convince them to give this new world you've worked so hard to bring about a chance, no one can. That doesn't mean I'm not going to try, but I believe the key to this is you."

"Me?" I asked, disbelieving. "I've been trying to argue with them but you know I never win at debates. If anything, my arguing with them is why that last encounter went sideways so suddenly."

"I'm not talking about arguing," Tamamo said, smiling. "I saw you arguing fruitlessly with Erubetie while you two fought. That's not what I mean. Show them who you are, like you showed all of us. They haven't seen the best of humanity."

"I'm pretty sure I've tried that as well," I said. "At times I thought they were softening but then they'd just come right back to hostility."

"That's why I'm going to be with you next time," Tamamo said, putting her hand on my leg.

"What?! How?!" Alice asked in disbelief. "I know everything there is to know about mind magic! The block on his mind will keep you out, and secondly, it's his dreams! Only a god can get into dreams!"

"Where did you read that?" Tamamo asked. "I never taught you that."

"I…." Alice stammered. "I didn't read it anywhere. I just assumed that since you didn't teach it to me, that it couldn't be done. I thought you taught me everything in that discipline!?"

"Everything important!," Tamamo giggled. "Bothering people in their dreams is a parlor trick, although a very difficult parlor trick. You're making a second wrong assumption, the idea that I can't get into Luka's dreams because of the mind shield. I just never thought there would be a use for dreamwalking. I didn't keep it from you intentionally. I just didn't see it as useful until now."

"I can think of a lot of uses for such a skill," Alice said.

"Maybe," Tamamo agreed. 'You're gifted in that you're so damn creative. You'd figure out how to defeat a dragon with nothing but a deck of cards. But dreamwalking is very limited. You can talk to someone, you can watch what's happening, but you can't control someone that way. Gods like it because it's a cute way to contact their followers that inspires awe and devotion. It also spares them from having to go anywhere. Ilias only put a spell on Luka's mind that prevents mind manipulation. As you saw, your teleportation was indeed safe for him. So I theorize that if the Ancestors can get into his dreams, I can as well."

"Why mine?" I asked. "They said all other minds were closed to them except mine. That's why their consciousnesses seem to only exist in my mind."

"I don't know the answer to that for sure," Tamamo mused. "But I do have a theory. It's possible that Ilias having gone into your dreams so much turned it into a beacon for them. Or it could just be that you yourself are a beacon due to your otherworldly nature. That's not the important thing. What's important now is that I speak to them. They don't believe you. They'll believe me. My only worry is that they won't care. But I have to try."

"Okay, so tonight then?" Alice asked. "How is this done?"

"I'll teach it to you as well, since you want to know so badly," Tamamo said. "But we're not as powerful as a god, and dreamwalking is mostly god magic. For us to do it, we have to be in close proximity to the person whose dreams we're entering. That means Luka sleeps with me tonight!"

"Oh, how convenient!" Alice snarked. "And I suppose that it will just be innocent cuddling with you and your tails?"

"Of course!" Tamamo giggled, now in a much better mood. "I'm in no way responsible if he responds physically to the touch of my tails!"

"Oh, all right," Alice said. "it's important and I promised to not get mad about it if it's for a good reason."

"Unless it's kitsunes!" Tamamo giggled. "But don't worry, it'll be nothing like that night a couple of weeks ago. I got that out of my system for awhile. This is for sleeping only. I'll only do what's necessary to help him sleep. Men have been falling into blissful sleep in my arms and tails for centuries without any need for hanky panky!"